Bitcoin’s price fell by the most in a week after U.S. Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell acknowledged he “would be concerned” by tightening financial conditions because rising U.S. government bond yields put upward pressure on borrowing costs.
Bitcoin was trading around $48,204 as of 21:15 UTC (4:15 p.m. ET). Declining 4.5% over the previous 24 hours . Bitcoin’s 24-hour range: $47,578-$51,781.
In a question-and-answer session with the Wall Street Journal, Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell said he doesn’t expect higher inflation to persist and that the central bank is still a long way from its economic goals of recovery and lower unemployment.
Markets reacted negatively to Powell’s comments, with stocks sliding and Treasury yields jumping. Some investors and economists had been looking for him to address the recent surge in rates, with a possible nod toward adjusting the Fed’s asset purchase program.
The cryptocurrency market has been facing high volatility, even as more companies continue to invest in digital currencies.
Recently, Microstrategy, the largest independent publicly-traded business intelligence company, said it had managed to buy $1 billion worth of BTC.
The purchase made by the company was made with zero-interest debt making it one of the single largest BTC investments ever by a publicly-traded company. Other than this, the only large investment that we know about is Tesla’s $1.5 billion.
Ether follows bitcoin
The last 24 hours were marked with a lot of drama for Ether, especially as altcoin was beginning to showcase signs of another breakout after scaling up to the $1,625 mark.
However, after hovering around the $1,600 region for around 12 hours running, the currency started to slide rapidly, dropping by a staggering 7% within no time.
Ether (ETH (-7.84%)), the second-largest cryptocurrency by market value, fell by 2.5% to $1,528.
For the past week, prices have remained in a narrow range between roughly $1,420 and $1,570
With the economy increasingly back on its feet, some price pressures are likely to emerge, we likely will be transitory and look higher because of “base effects,” or the difference against last year’s deeply depressed levels just as the Covid-19 crisis began. said Jerome Powell
Read also: Bitcoin Climbs Back to $50K as Ether Gains Momentum.
