Bitcoin, Ether Lead Crypto Market Crash as US Federal Reserve Validates Hike in Interest Rates

Two major events in the cryptocurrency space have rocked Bitcoin's value down to a three-month low as the entire market witnessed a cascading crash. At the time of writing, Bitcoin is valued at $43,168 (roughly Rs. 32.1 lakh), down by over 7 percent over the past 24 hours on global exchanges. On Indian exchanges like CoinSwitch Kuber, the price of the most popular cryptocurrency stands at Rs. 34.92 lakh, down by 6.17 percent over the past 24 hours.

The big slump occurred as the US Federal Reserve indicated it could move up its timetable for raising interest rates to mid-March. The US Federal Reserve is essentially going to stop printing money and make it more expensive to borrow in order to steady the economy and keep rising inflation in check. Meanwhile, Kazakhstan, the country which accounts for a large 18 percent of the Bitcoin network's hash activity, witnessed a nationwide Internet shutdown, causing BTC's hashrate to drop by 13.4 percent — reflecting in a sharp fall in value.

Ether, the second-largest cryptocurrency by market capitalisation saw a substantial drop as well. The Ethereum-based cryptocurrency witnessed a plunge of 8.3 percent over the past 24 hours after a healthy start to the year. At the time of publishing, Ether is valued at $3,759 (roughly Rs. 2.79 lakh) on CoinSwitch Kuber while values on global exchanges see the crypto pegged lower at $3,446 (roughly Rs. 2.56 lakh), where the coin saw a steeper drop of 9.73 percent over the past 24 hours. The dip sees Ether's performance improve marginally but still down 6.8 percent in value over the past week.

Gadgets 360's cryptocurrency price tracker reveals a bad day for the entire market as stable coin appears to be the only crypto assets to have gained in value. Ripple, Cardano, Polygon, Litecoin, Chainlink, and Polkadot all witnessed drops in value, while Tether, and USDC rose in value.

Meme coins haven't been spared by the crash either. Dogecoin is down 6.86 percent in 24 hours to be valued at $0.17 (roughly Rs. 12.67). Meanwhile, Shiba Inu is down 7.61 percent to be valued at $0.000032 (roughly Rs. 0.002417). SHIB's value has dropped by 10.2 percent in the past week, while Dogecoin is down by 6.9 percent.

As per CoinGecko, Bitcoin's value has dropped by over 7 percent over the past week, even though the cryptocurrency is up by more than 26 percent year-on-date.

Meanwhile, a member of India's Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) has given Indian crypto investors some respite from rumours suggesting that the crypto sector could be totally prohibited in the country. Ashima Goyal, in a recent interview with the Press Trust of India, reportedly said that imposing a blanket ban on crypto-related activities is difficult to implement. The main reason why India will not legalise any cryptocurrency as legal tender, as per Goyal, is the possibility of it being misused for unlawful activities.

Cryptocurrency is an unregulated digital currency, not a legal tender and subject to market risks. The information provided in the article is not intended to be and does not constitute financial advice, trading advice or any other advice or recommendation of any sort offered or endorsed by NDTV. NDTV shall not be responsible for any loss arising from any investment based on any perceived recommendation, forecast or any other information contained in the article.