Bitcoin loses over 25% in 6 days, hovering at lowest in 10 months

By Ovunc Kutlu

ANKARA (AA) - Bitcoin lost over 25% of its value in less than a week, hovering around the lowest level in 10 months as of Tuesday, with a major selloff in global markets pushing cryptocurrencies into the bear market territory.

The price of Bitcoin dipped to $29,730.4 at 0030GMT, according to data on Binance, the world's largest cryptocurrency market by trade volume.

This marked the lowest level for Bitcoin since July 21 last year when it fell to as low as $29,518.4, according to official figures.

Bitcoin, the world's biggest crypto by market cap, has lost 25.1% of its value in just six days as it closed at $39,690 last Wednesday when the US Federal Reserve made a 50 basis point rate hike.

El Salvador President Nayib Bukele said his country bought 500 Bitcoins at an average price of $30,744. "El Salvador just bought the dip!" he wrote on his Twitter account.

This means the small Central American nation, which has become the world's first country last year to formally adopt Bitcoin as legal tender, has spent almost $15.4 million in total on its latest purchase.

The Central African Republic has recently become the second country to make Bitcoin legal tender, where the world's most popular cryptocurrency must be accepted as payment alongside the existing currency CFA franc as of April 20, despite nine out of 10 people in the country do not have access to the internet.

The steep decline in Bitcoin and cryptos came with major indices in the US stock market plummeting for almost a week, as the Fed's hawkish stance has led to pessimism among investors who believe that the central bank's aggressive monetary tightening could cause a recession in the US.

On Monday, the Dow Jones fell almost 2%, while the S&P 500 dove below 4,000 points for a 3.2% loss, and the Nasdaq plunged a whopping 4.3%.