Major cryptocurrencies showed tepid signs of stability Tuesday following a five-day rout.
Bitcoin, the world’s largest cryptocurrency by market value, edged 0.4% lower from its 5 pm ET level Monday to trade at $30,959.99. The moderation followed the cryptocurrency dropping almost 22% over the previous five trading days—its worst such stretch since May 2021, according to Dow Jones Market Data. Ether gained about 1.6% from its Monday evening level.
Cryptocurrencies have fallen in lockstep with the broader stock market in recent days. The trend for bitcoin other digital assets to fall alongside stocks is one that has become more pronounced in recent years, investors say, as traditional money managers such as hedge funds and family offices have entered the space. Such funds may be more likely to sell crypto holdings during periods of volatility rather than hold them.
“That’s the double-edged sword. You have a larger market but on the other hand it’s treated like a regular financial asset,” said Ilan Solot, a partner at crypto hedge fund Tagus Capital LLP. “Stocks are collapsing and when you get stress, everything starts to get correlated.”
US stocks swung between gains and losses on Tuesday, with the S&P 500 and Nasdaq Composite indexes finishing higher and the Dow Jones Industrial Average falling for a fourth consecutive session. Stability in the broader stock market could help alleviate some selling pressure from cryptocurrency markets, analysts say.
The recent break of the dollar peg in the third-largest stablecoin by market value has also injected volatility into the crypto ecosystem. The cryptocurrency TerraUSD, which is usually tied to a $1 value, moved below that over the weekend following a series of large withdrawals from Anchor Protocol, a sort of decentralized bank for crypto investors.
Sales of ether and bitcoin to defend TerraUSD’s value have also weighed on the prices of the two largest cryptocurrencies. TerraUSD’s decoupling from $1 looks unlikely to resolve soon, investors say, as many sell orders are still awaiting processing.
Binance, the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange by volume, said Tuesday it had temporarily suspended withdrawals for TerraUSD and Luna tokens—another cryptocurrency used to maintain TerraUSD’s peg—due to a high volume of pending withdrawal transactions caused by network congestion. It later resumed those transactions.
TerraUSD’s value fell as low as 61 cents over the past 24 hours, according to CoinDesk, before rebounding to trade around 90 cents as of 5 pm ET Tuesday. Luna, the sister cryptocurrency of TerraUSD, traded around $22.54 at the same period Tuesday, having lost more than half of its value from 24 hours prior, according to CoinDesk.
“The Terra situation added fuel to the fire,” said Yuya Hasegawa, a market analyst at Japanese crypto exchange Bitbank Inc.
Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen on Tuesday reiterated calls for Congress to authorize regulation of stablecoins following the fall in the price of TerraUSD.
Investors and analysts expect that some traders will step in to buy bitcoin and ether at reduced prices, even if they fall further in the coming days.
El Salvador’s president, Nayib Bukele, wrote Monday on
that the country bought 500 bitcoins at an average price of $30,744 each. El Salvador, which became the first country to make bitcoin legal tender last year, has often added to its cryptocurrency holdings during selloffs.
The US quickly became the world leader in bitcoin mining after China cracked down on crypto last year. WSJ’s Shelby Holliday takes a look at what the global shift has meant for the bitcoin network, the energy industry and the environment. Photo: Mark Felix/Agence France-Presse/Getty Images
Write to Elaine Yu at elaine.yu@wsj.com and Caitlin Ostroff at caitlin.ostroff@wsj.com
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