A case of crypto traders locking in holiday gains?
Whatever the reason, the price of bitcoin spent much of Saturday in decline, as the world's largest cryptocurrency saw a nine percent drop over the 24-hour span. Sunday's session has so far seen that drop intensify, with the price down nearly 12 percent as of 4:00 UTC.
Just hours away from a launch on a major futures exchange, bitcoin is now down nearly 25 percent from an all-time high of $17,117 set earlier this week, with the price hitting a low of $13,152 today, data from the CoinDesk Bitcoin Price Index reveals.
That said, bitcoin wasn't the only cryptocurrency affected. According to data from CoinMarketCap, all but one of the top 50 assets by market capitalization have seen 24-hour declines.
At time of publication, the total value of all publicly traded cryptocurrencies was down 8 percent from its recent highs, falling from a high near $400 billion to $367 billion.
Still, that's not to say there hasn't been periods of upward movements. A look at the market's most recent session (18:00 to 24:00 UTC) indicates litecoin, bitcoin and IOTA all gained more than 5 percent in the 6-hour span (despite being down on the day).
Data further suggests declines may have been limited to a poor afternoon session on Saturday (12:00 to 18:00 UTC), as data from CoinMarketCap shows that the five best performing cryptocurrencies during the period all saw declines.