Bitcoin & ether plummet as cryptocurrency market continues to cool
Following June's record rally, the world's most popular digital currencies bitcoin and ethereum continued their slide on Tuesday.
Bitcoin was trading at $2,430, having given up 20 percent since hitting nearly $3,000 two weeks ago.
Rival cryptocurrency ethereum now costs $267, down over 30 percent since the mid-June record of nearly $400.
The total market capitalization of all cryptocurrencies fell to around $91 billion, a more than a 20 percent decline from the all-time high of $117.2bn on June 12.
Charles Hayter, co-founder, and CEO of leveraged cryptocurrency platform CryptoCompare told Coindesk investors overhyped the market.
"A correction of sorts was in the cards," he said.
Despite the recent setback, the two biggest digital currencies are still up in value this year. Ethereum cost around $8 at the beginning of the year, while bitcoin has gained about 150 percent year to date.
"When people fixate on price movements over a single day, my recommendation is zoom out of the price chart and look at the broader trend," said Peter Van Valkenburgh, director of research at Coin Center, a Washington-based nonprofit research firm focusing on cryptocurrencies, in an interview with Bloomberg.
"Blockchain could either catch on as the rails for global finance, or not, so valuations for a digital currency like bitcoin can either go to zero or be worth much more than it is today, so these assets are bound to be very volatile as people’s calculations of what they are worth can be all over the map," he added.
