Bitcoin Dropped Nearly 30% This Week. But Why? (cnn.com)
- Reference: 0180754130
- News link: https://slashdot.org/story/26/02/07/1914240/bitcoin-dropped-nearly-30-this-week-but-why
- Source link: https://www.cnn.com/2026/02/05/investing/bitcoin-price
By Thursday it had dropped another 21%, to $60,062.
This morning it's at $69,549 — up from Thursday, down from Sunday, but 44% lower than its all-time high in October of $123,742. In short, Bitcoin "is down almost 30% this week alone," [2]reports CNBC :
> "This steady selling in our view signals that traditional investors are losing interest, and overall pessimism about crypto is growing," Deutsche Bank analyst Marion Laboure said Wednesday in a note to clients. Growing investor caution comes as many of the sensationalized claims about bitcoin have failed to materialize. The token has largely traded in the same direction as other risk-on assets, such as stocks... and its adoption as a form of payment for goods and services has been minimal... While many in the crypto market have previously credited large institutional investors with supporting the price of bitcoin, now it is those same participants who appear to be selling. "Institutional demand has reversed materially," CryptoQuant said in a report on Wednesday.
But not everyone accepts that answer, [3]the Wall Street Journal reported Saturday . "The worst part for some of crypto's permabulls is that they aren't sure what exactly caused the crash":
> The selloff left many of the market's luminaries — those so well-known that they go simply as "Pomp" and "Novo" and "Mooch" — searching for answers... Ether dropped 24% to $2,052, off 59% from its own high of last year. Both tokens staged furious rallies Friday, but the week remained a historically bad one for crypto. And few seem to know what went wrong. Market theories for the selloff ranged from investors' pivot toward the prediction markets and other risky bets, to widespread profit-taking after a blistering bull run. "There was no smoking gun," said Michael Novogratz, who runs Galaxy Digital, a crypto merchant-banking and trading firm...
>
> "If you ask five experts, you'll get five explanations," said Anthony Scaramucci, who served for 11 days as communications director during Trump's first term and is among the best-known crypto bulls at his firm, SkyBridge Capital.
" [4]No, but seriously: What's going on with bitcoin ?" reads the headline at CNN, with a story that begins "Bitcoin is acting weird... "
> Crypto is notoriously volatile, and it's gone through numerous crashes that are bigger than this one. What's strange is this: Bitcoin's four-month slump has come at a time when, in theory, it had everything going for it.
Economist Paul Krugman [5]points out the price of Bitcoin is now lower than it was before America's 2024 election, when candidate Trump promised to make cryptocurrency " [6]one of the greatest industries on earth ."
CNN seems to agree with CNBC that what's behind this new crypto winter is "Mostly doubts that bitcoin is 'digital gold,' after all..."
Thanks to Slashdot reader [7]fjo3 for sharing the news.
[1] https://slashdot.org/story/26/02/01/2146224/bitcoin-drops-40-in-four-months-bloomberg-blames-absence-of-buyers-and-belief
[2] https://www.cnbc.com/2026/02/05/bitcoin-price-today-70000-in-focus.html
[3] https://www.msn.com/en-us/technology/cryptocurrencies/a-new-crypto-winter-is-here-and-even-the-biggest-bulls-are-worried/ar-AA1VQPRs
[4] https://www.cnn.com/2026/02/05/investing/bitcoin-price
[5] https://paulkrugman.substack.com/p/crypotocrash
[6] https://politics.slashdot.org/story/24/07/27/2141234/trump-says-hed-oppose-cbdcs-pardon-ulbricht-and-create-a-strategic-national-bitcoin-stockpile
[7] https://www.slashdot.org/~fjo3
history (Score:2)
Last time Dontardo passed a big trickle down scam bit coin crashed down to the price to generate a coin. This time it's a repeat but the cost is higher. What is it now $40k? (depends on cheap power) We probably have a ways longer to drop. Last time it made more sense to invest in higher return "investments" because of the trickle down scam and it is the same now.
I do think it will rise up again later on like last time.
Also try to pay attention when Putin goes in big; likely after the USA goes in and then
Why not? (Score:2)
Fear and greed drive bitcoin. No inherent value.
Re: (Score:1)
You left out ignorance and stupidity. Without that, it would never have gotten to anything.
Re: (Score:1)
Well, yes but the supply of human stupidity is really big and it's also a renewable resource. There is literally a new sucker born every day. Actually the AI says at least 360 thousand new suckers each day.
I have a new formulation of the problem. Previous changes have created many problems. Some of those problems are becoming existential and we need solutions. But the solutions involve more changes, and the people with the power to decide on and implement changes are not thinking about solving old problems.
Re: (Score:2)
Indeed. Although I tend to think the world is not actually so connected that it all has to implode together. Some parts may still be able to survive the crash of the rest. That a really big implosion is coming seems to be rather obvious though.
Just following the cycle, I guess... (Score:2)
Bitcoin seems to have this odd 4 year cycle where it skyrockets to more than double it's prior all time high, only to crash over 50% in value 6 months later.
It went from around 20,000 back to 3,000 around 2018, and from $62,000 back to $16,000 around 2022. This time in 2025-2026 it drops from $120,000 to... $55,000? I'm not sure where the bottom is, but I don't think that we hit it yet.
Each dip seems to be a bit less crazy than the last one, but it's definitely either a "cyclical asset" if you're a Bitcoin
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
And if you are neither "believer" nor a "hater", but see it as what it is with, you know, using rational though instead of emotions, there are no "cycles" here, as it is all even less valuable than hot air.
Re: (Score:1)
If by "hot air" you mean the stuff coming out of your ass across your keyboard producing your comments here, sure Bitcoin cannot beat that gold!
But otherwise one Bitcoin would go a long way to cover my gas bill to run my heater here in the dead of winter.
So I disagree, Bitcoin is more valuable than hot air.
And Bitcoin does not believe in you either...hater.
Re: (Score:2)
You people are even more disconnected from reality than the AI fanbois. And that is saying something.
Re: (Score:2)
"You people" is for sure one of the best ways to start out a line of "rational [thought]".
I confess, I believe in the AI as well, love it, want more of it...but it does not provide any arguments to prove my statements false.
Why not? Because you know I am right, otherwise you would type something proving me wrong.
Whether you like it or not people buy and sell control of Bitcoin, and there is an obvious cycle.
Why deny it because you think it is irrational or emotion to "believe" in or "trade" Bitcoin?
For bett
Yeah, not surprising, but I wish I understood why (Score:2)
I agree, the "halving" charts seemed to correlate with this four year pattern.
But the charts do not show a drop right after the reward to mine a block is cut in half as I would expect.
Those who pushed the "halving" correlation are probably comfortably hibernating for another year of crypto winter before the spring.
If I had any money I would put it where my mouth is an buy me some Bitcoin...but all I can do is put my prediction here in writing: the bottom is no lower than $60k, and 3 years from now $120K min
Election uncertainties? (Score:2)
I wonder if it is related to the uncertainties that come with the mid-term elections. Almost every one so far since 2006 [exception: 2014] has seen the House flip which invites a whole new relationship with the President (usually antagonistic) and with it a huge increase in uncertainties that tend to drop a lot of markets for a time. So maybe they're selling to ride it out in more stable things (like international stocks and, well, you've likely noted the price of gold is exploding...)
Because it's mostly used for money laundering (Score:3)
And there's absolutely no point in caring when there's virtually no enforcement of money laundering laws going on right now.
If you're a white collar criminal you can rip off pretty much anyone you want anyway you want as long as you don't go after the really really rich people like Bernie Madoff and Elizabeth Holmes did.
So there's a lot less demand for crypto because it's a lot easier to commit white collar crime and will be for the next at least 3 years.
Meanwhile the AI data centers are sucking down all the compute power so cryptocurrency is having a rough time competing.
And finally of course we are in a massive massive recession that nobody is talking about because the news media has been ordered to keep quiet about it by their owners. That recession is inevitably affecting scams like Bitcoin because they are Ponzi schemes and when the economy gets bad Ponzi schemes start to collapse because there aren't enough suckers who have money left to keep them going
Bithumb (Score:1)
My guess of how the dominoes fell as worldwide BTC dropped from $80K -> $65K--
1) Bithumb, a South Korean company, screwed up by sending BTC instead of won to its accounts
[1]https://feed.bithumb.com/notic... [bithumb.com]
2) its users quickly sold 1,788 BTCs, which pushed the Korean bitcoin index down below $60K
3) IBIT then plummeted from the national selling
4) Blackrock had hedged IBIT
[2]https://bitrss.com/bitcoin-cra... [bitrss.com]
5) worldwide BTC dropped from Blackrock's loss
[1] https://feed.bithumb.com/notice/1651924
[2] https://bitrss.com/bitcoin-crash-linked-to-blackrock-ibit-hedging-arthur-hayes-claims-181352
Hallucinations are not stable (Score:4, Insightful)
The belief that BTC has value is a pure hallucination. Also, the fewer people that fall for the scam, the more volatile things get. It seems the scam is slowly coming to an end. About time.
"I want to say one two words to you" (Score:1)
"I want to say two words to you. Just two words...
"Monkey JPEGs"
Okay, one word and an acronym.
Shall I come in again ?
Re: (Score:2)
Yeah, but the whole "$200,000 Monkey JPEG" thing was the high point of the last 2021-2022 crypto rally.
This last rally seemed to be more of a "We can put Bitcoin ETF's in our IRA now, and we just got a crypto friendly president in office! Buy Buy Buy!" sort of thing.
and the 4-year halving cycle... (Score:2)
...of course, has NOTHING to do with it. I mean, it's just maths baked into the coin code itself, right? Surely halving the supply every 4 years wouldn't create an ebb and flow cycle?
At this point I would just ban it (Score:2, Offtopic)
It's been what, over 10 years now of Bitcoin and crypto and what has been the net utility to society or even humanity? I would say outside of a few select people getting wealthy it has overall been a net negative for 99% of humans alive.
It eats electricity, it eats labor which could be used on more useful things (how many talented coders are in crypto shit?) it eats money, it eats investments which could otherwise go into new companies or other ventures, it's just a big fat distraction for everyone, the fac
Hmmm (Score:4, Interesting)
The interesting issue here is that Bitcoin is a fiat currency, but it is backed by nothing. It's not that other currencies are not fiat currencies, but they are backed by something.
The US dollar is "backed" in the sense that if it crashes, the USA will do "something" to relieve the crash, and it's currently a currency that is needed to buy oil worldwide, and it's currently accepted as a "reserve currency". Could all of this change and the US dollar become worthless? Yes, of course but that would not happen until the US economy is completely destroyed. Most people would consider that unlikely, so they accept the fiat US dollar as a stable investment.
I suspect Bitcoin survived this long since it developed a little bit of real-world usefulness as a tool for moving and laundering criminal proceeds. As law enforcement gets better at attacking that criminal revenue chain, that usefulness is going to fade.
In a sense, the fact Bitcoin is a fiat currency backed by nothing is part of its allure: That makes it volatile. That makes it really attractive to gamblers or the professional gamblers who take big risks and call themselves "investors"
But eventually there will be a run on Bitcoin, just as there always is with any bubble. Perhaps this is just a big run. And there will continue to be runs as long as Bitcoin exists.
Re: (Score:2)
> The US dollar is "backed" in the sense that if it crashes
No it's backed by something stronger than that. The US dollar is backed by the sheer volume of which it is traded for material goods. It's backed by the sheer volume of its international trade. It's also backed by the treasury bonds and as you eluded to the actions of a governing body that has an interest in keeping it stable.
But ultimately volume provides stability. Bitcoin trades $67bn in daily trade (on a normal day). That's very small meaning it only takes a couple of buyers making big moves to cause an
Re: (Score:2)
>> The US dollar is "backed" in the sense that if it crashes
> No it's backed by something stronger than that. The US dollar is backed by the sheer volume of which it is traded for material goods. It's backed by the sheer volume of its international trade. It's also backed by the treasury bonds and as you eluded to the actions of a governing body that has an interest in keeping it stable.
It's got more than that behind it, too. It's backed by a massive network of debt contracts obligating people to do work in order to generate value in the form of dollars. That's how dollars are created: When banks issue loans they create the money[*] they're lending out at the same instant they create the loan contract that obligates someone to repay it.
Fiat currencies (which BTC is not) are essentially built on the legally-enforceable promise of people to do work in the future. They're backed by human
Why? (Score:2)
...when candidate Trump promised to make cryptocurrency "one of the greatest industries on earth."
That's why.
Re: (Score:2)
You are onto something there. el Bunko usually destroys everything he touches: his "companies", the Kennedy Center, U.S. democracy, law and order, etc. This is just another in his unbroken line of failures.
It's stablecoins, stupid (Score:2)
Bitcoin only got to rise in price because it was the first and for some time the only digital wallet. People, particularly tax evaders and money launderers, liked the idea of moving millions in a USB stick.or a mail. That created demand, demand bid the price up, and prices up brought the momentum-seeker speculators. Virtuous circle for you.
That era is gone. There are many digital options now. Particularly you have stablecoins where you don't need to worry (so much) about them losing value. So only the specu
It's nice to see this... (Score:2)
...because it means that the people quietly working hard to destroy cryptocurrency are finally making some progress. Cryptocurrency has always been, and has always been intended to be, fake money for criminals -- so the sooner it's gone, the better.
Just now? (Score:2)
Why didn't You ask the same question when it went up 30%? It is harvest time, that is it. That is your answer.
The realization it's stupid? (Score:2)
And that it's a scam, and that one insane dude controls way too much of the money supply, and that it's harder to make money at it now, the pushback against bitcoin mining in general, and that itls literally designed to have a finite life because its sole purpose is to troll technolibertarians that have a marvelous misunderstanding of how reality actually works.
Blame Putin (Score:2)
My bet? Putin. Russia has blown through its savings due to this dumb fucking psychopathic war that Putin chosen to wage. And thanks to burning refineries, destroyed pipelines, blown up and seized tankers, China and even India cutting back on orders, they're running out of money and facing collapse. Putin likely had a huge store of bitcoins, having used it to transact outside of the banking systems that he's been banned from. Liquidating it would be one way to help shore up near term finances.
AI (Score:2)
Surely if you want to expend lots of energy exercising processors then the trendy thing this year is in AI rather than crypto? Generating AI slop might not produce measurable impact, like an actual coin would, but company valuations go up directly in proportion to their AI presence
Oh so we have massive dollar deflation now? (Score:2)
Bitcoin advocates used to claim that the reason Bitcoin was shooting up in value wasn't that it was a made up currency subject to massive swings in value, but because the dollar was undergoing massive inflation and Bitcoin was the one actually holding its value.
They claimed this when USD inflation was actually around the usual 2-3% it normally is.
And for the last few years we've seen inflation bordering hyperinflation for the USD. But somehow... Bitcoin has lost value, not gained it.
So, Bitcoin advocates, a
Why not? (Score:2)
It has been pumped and dumped for years now.. the whales are gladly riding the waves and the news media got something to report and discuss. All the fat cats win!
And this is the problem. (Score:4, Insightful)
The doubts will last for as long as the depression, during which the wealthy will be buying up bitcoin like mad. Once Bitcoin heads back into the 100k region, everyone will decide it IS digital gold, and push it up higher, at which point the wealthy will sell off, causing a collapse that the "everyone elsers" essentially pay for, and the cycle will continue.
And that is all bitcoin is. It's all the stock market is, too. A tool for pumping money from 401K plans and the gambling poor into the hands of the wealthy.
Re: And this is the problem. (Score:2)
I can guarantee it'll go to zero. Just after I buy some!
Re: (Score:3)
Yep. And different from penny-stocks or other crappy investments, you will not ever be able to sell them, because the Bitcoin network will simply vanish when mining does not pay anymore.
Re: (Score:2)
> Yep. And different from penny-stocks or other crappy investments, you will not ever be able to sell them, because the Bitcoin network will simply vanish when mining does not pay anymore.
Miners are turning off their rigs because [1]it's not profitable to mine [futurism.com]. The cost to mine is roughly $87,000 whereas BTC is only at 70,000 or so.
[1] https://futurism.com/future-society/bitcoin-crashing-miners-unplugging-equipment
Re: And this is the problem. (Score:2)
It's still marginally profitable if you are stealing electricity.
Re: (Score:2)
Interesting. That effect may be the end of it.
Re: (Score:2)
> Interesting. That effect may be the end of it.
If it comes to that, the difficulty can be turned down to make mining profitable again.
I wish it would just end.
Re: (Score:3)
> And that is all bitcoin is. It's all the stock market is, too. A tool for pumping money from 401K plans and the gambling poor into the hands of the wealthy.
You forgot money laundering, and a large part of that for ransomware ransom money. A tool for crime.
Re: (Score:2)
> And that is all bitcoin is. It's all the stock market is, too.
You're completely wrong to equate bitcoin with the stock market. When you buy shares in a publicly-traded company you're buying something real, a portion of an actual business that owns real stuff, has real employees, makes real stuff and sells it to real people. Exactly how much that company is worth, so exactly how much your share is worth, isn't really clear because calculating that value requires a lot of guesses about what the company, and its market, and the economy as a whole, are going to do in th
Re: (Score:3)
It’’s fundamentally different from the stock market. The stock market is about ownership of a productive asset, a company. Bitcoin produces nothing. It’s a nominal store of value, like gold, but completely intangible. It’s worth exactly the faith that people have in it, no more or less. There is no liquidation value as there is for a stock. You are not left with something in your hand, as you are with gold.
In short, it’s bullshit. It’s always been bullshit. I’ll nev
Re: (Score:2)
The wealthy are buying good, not Bitcoin. The challenge with Bitcoin now is that it has effectively become regulated via tax and anti money laundering agreements across most countries.