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posted by janrinok on Sunday May 15 2022, @01:43PM   Printer-friendly
from the every-cloud-has-a-silver-lining dept.

Crypto crash: almost $1 trillion wiped off markets as Bitcoin hits lowest level since 2020:

It's been a nightmare week for cryptocurrency holders as the market crashes and Bitcoin hits its lowest price since December 2020. Ethereum, BNB, XRP, and many other digital coins have also fallen to their lowest levels in a long time. The crisis came after stablecoin Terra, designed to trade 1:1 with the US dollar, collapsed.

TerraUSD (UST), the 11th largest cryptocurrency by market cap, is an algorithmic stablecoin that uses a set of smart contracts to ensure its value stays as close to $1 as possible. But after hovering at around $1 for about a year, it crashed to 29 cents yesterday, plunging its market cap from more than $45 billion to less than $5 billion. It has since rallied to 62 cents, but that's still far from $1.

Terra's support coin, Luna, has also plummeted in dramatic style, going from $86 at the start of the week to its current price of 20 cents. Terra is designed so traders can exchange 1 UST for $1 worth of Luna, no matter the price of UST

[...] Do Kwon, co-founder of Terra developer Terraform Labs, tweeted: "I understand the last 72 hours have been extremely tough on all of you - know that I am resolved to work with every one of you to weather this crisis, and we will build our way out of this."

Terra's collapse has impacted many cryptocurrencies, the most notable being the biggest one of all: Bitcoin. At the time of writing, BTC is at $27,236, its lowest value since before the crypto boom at the end of 2020. Bitcoin has now lost nearly two-thirds of its value since peaking at $69,000 in November 2021.

[...] The good news for non-crypto-owning gamers is that the freefall will doubtlessly make mining less profitable, and should push graphics card prices even closer to MSRP.


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  • (Score: 2) by stretch611 on Sunday May 15 2022, @11:31PM (2 children)

    by stretch611 (6199) on Sunday May 15 2022, @11:31PM (#1245204)

    Actually, the parent is correct...

    https://decrypt.co/100292/bitcoin-ethereum-mount-recovery-crypto-markets-rebound-2 [decrypt.co]

    There was a little recovery on Friday after the original article in the title was written on Thursday.

    That being said, It is still far from its peak 6 months ago and still down for the week (last week)

    Of course as with anything in the stock market, tomorrow is a new day... Which way it will go, I won't know until after it happens.

    --
    Now with 5 covid vaccine shots/boosters altering my DNA :P
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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 16 2022, @08:36AM (1 child)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 16 2022, @08:36AM (#1245267)

    It's not much of a currency if it's that unstable in value. When I want to sell a pizza I want to have a good idea on whether I'm making money or not. If the "currency" I use fluctuates a lot I might have to price it a lot higher to try to ensure I make money.

    Also if the transaction costs are significant when compared to the cost of my pizza then I'd have to add that to the costs as well.

    Bitcoin is not suitable as a modern currency because it's expensive to produce. It's like going back to the primitive and stupid days of using gold. Except Bitcoin is even worse than gold. Gold at least is a very useful material for many purposes.

    Go work out how much energy would be wasted if the world economy uses trillions of dollars worth of Bitcoin.

    • (Score: 2) by stretch611 on Monday May 16 2022, @03:55PM

      by stretch611 (6199) on Monday May 16 2022, @03:55PM (#1245342)

      I agree that crypto-finance is nothing tangible; but imagined.

      It is nothing but a ponzi scheme goin awry, and destroying the power grid and environment as a horrible side effect.

      But, my point is that it is traded on the stock market, so every day its perceived value is determined on Wall St, regardless of any actual assets.

      --
      Now with 5 covid vaccine shots/boosters altering my DNA :P