It’s another one of those days in cryptos where it seems like everything is down.
And based on the top 10 from coinmarketcap below, most of the top coins are down.
Bitcoin, which reached a high of nearly $5,850 this week, dropped as low as $5,150 today, cutting 12% of its value. Like in most cases it has rebounded fairly quickly and is now back above $5,500.
Let’s take a look at the news today and see what’s causing the crypto sell-off.
What’s apparent now is that investors do not ‘fear the fork’ anymore. Prior to the Bitcoin Cash hard fork we had a nasty sell-off. That hasn’t happened this time around, even with two potential hard forks on the way.
The biggest fear now can be summed up in one word – regulation.
Earlier today the CFTC released a report that got the regulation fears going again. It agreed with the SEC and said that virtual tokens used in initial coin offerings were characterized as securities, and thus could be subject to regulation.
Per the CFTC, "there is no inconsistency between the SEC's analysis and the CFTC's determination that virtual currencies are commodities and that virtual tokens may be commodities or derivatives contracts depending on the particular facts and circumstances."
The uncertainty will remain until these regulatory agencies figure out how they’re going to treat cryptocurrencies.
Not helping matters was the announcement from Bitfinex that it was getting out of the U.S. It just doesn’t want to deal with the regulatory headaches.
All U.S. users will start being blocked on Bitfinex starting November 9.
Then there’s reports of mysterious account closings on Bittrex.
It looks like most of those accounts are from countries like Iran and Syria. Nevertheless, it’s concerning the markets.
One potential area for good news is ironically, China. They’re holding the 19th National Congress today. Many speculate they’ll make blockchain announcements after it’s done. We’ll see.
So what to do in the meantime?
Keep calm and hodl !
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