Hassan Maishera
TL;DR
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Bitcoin briefly dropped below the $100k mark after Fed Chair Jerome Powell commented against BTC reserve.
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The Fed cut interest rates by 25 basis points, as widely expected.
BTC Slips Below $100k on Powell’s Hawkish Press Conference
Bitcoin, the leading cryptocurrency by market cap, briefly dropped below the $100k psychological level on Wednesday, losing over 3% of its value.
The bearish performance comes despite the Federal Reserve cutting interest rates by 25 basis points, as widely expected. The primary catalyst behind the bearish performance was the Fed Chair Jerome Powell speaking against a BTC reserve.
Powell stated during his press conference that the apex bank is not allowed to hold bitcoin and is "not looking for a law change," in response to his view on the U.S. government's bitcoin reserve.
The Fed's quarterly economic projections also included the ‘dot plot,’ which indicates where policymakers expect the Fed funds rate to be in the near term. The projects revealed that policymakers expect the Fed funds rate to decline to 3.9% by year-end 2025 or another 50 basis points in rate cuts next year. This figure is higher than the 3.4% projected in September, indicating a less dovish monetary policy in 2025.
Altcoins Also in the Red
As usual, altcoins followed Bitcoin’s performance, with most of them currently in the red. Ether is down 4% and trades at $3,647 per coin. XRP, BNB, Dogecoin, Cardano, and Tron are all down by 3% or more in the last 24 hours.
The bearish run saw over $300 million of leveraged positions wiped out from the cryptocurrency market.
JUST IN: $310,000,000 liquidated from the cryptocurrency market in the past 60 minutes.
— Watcher.Guru (@WatcherGuru) December 18, 2024
Chainlink (LINK) and Uniswap (UNI) are the worst performers amongst the top 20 cryptocurrencies by market cap, losing 10% of their values. The total cryptocurrency market cap has now dropped to $3.52 trillion following yesterday’s bearish run.
