Bitcoin Erases April Gains After Slumping More Than 5% in a Day

Bitcoin on Monday slumped by 5.2%, erasing gains it had made in April when it rocketed above $30,000.

The biggest cryptocurrency by market cap was trading hands for $28,275 as of 1.30 p.m. ET, according to CoinGecko.

That means the asset is also down 8.7% from the April high of $30,979 it hit just two weeks ago. Bitcoin had been on a roll: it surged past $30,000 for the first time in 10 months on April 10. It has now erased those gains.

But, overall, the coin is still doing well this year—it’s up over 70% from the start of January, when it was priced at $16,615.

So if you bought in at the start of 2023, you’re in great shape. If you bought anywhere near November 2021, not so much. Bitcoin, which has a market cap of $549 billion, is still down 58.8% from its all-time high of $69,044.

The rest of the biggest 20 coins and tokens were also in the red at the time of writing. Ethereum, the second biggest digital asset, was down nearly 5%, trading for $1,835.

While Solana, the 11th largest cryptocurrency, took the biggest 24-hour hit and dropped 6.8% to $21.92.

The crypto market, led by Bitcoin, has been doing well this year as investors continue to eye-up “risk-on” assets; Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell was expected to slow the rate of interest rate hikes following a banking crisis in the U.S., which makes volatile investments fair game again in the eyes of traders with at least a moderate appetite for risk.

Experts have also claimed that with a recession apparently around the corner, investors have been flocking to “safe bets” like Bitcoin and gold.

This narrative has been strengthened with the collapse of a number of banks in the United States. In March, regulators shut down Signature Bank, and tech-friendly Silicon Valley Bank went bust the same week.

Just today, regulators seized First Republic Bank; JPMorgan Chase agreed to buy most of its assets.