ETH, XRP, ADA, LTC Plunge 6% as Crypto Markets Shed $40B Daily (Market Watch)

Soon after the US Fed announced a halt to interest rate hikes, bitcoin took a sharp turn south and hit a multi-month low.

Most altcoins are in even worse shape, with ETH, XRP, ADA, DOT, LTC, AVAX, and many others dumping 5-7%.

BTC drops below $25K

The past week hasn’t been a good one for BTC, despite its recovery on Tuesday following SEC lawsuits against Binance and Coinbase. As the weekend approached, bitcoin fell once again from above $27,000 to below $26,000.

The weekend itself was somewhat more positive as BTC hovered around $26,000. The first few days of the new week were similar, with the cryptocurrency trading at that level.

That was followed by the US FOMC meeting, in which Fed Chairman Jerome Powell was expected to halt monetary policy by raising key interest rates. This is exactly what Powell announced, but surprisingly, it had a negative effect on the price of BTC.

After holding relatively steady for the first few hours, BTC fell below $25,000 for the first time since mid-March. Despite trying to bounce off soon, the asset is still trading below that level.

Its market capitalization has plummeted to $485 billion, while its dominance of alts quietly stands at 47.5%.

alts dump hard

Alternative coins followed BTC on its way south. Ethereum was among the worst performers from the large-cap alts, down more than 6%. As a result, ETH is trading at its own multi-month low below $1,650.

Ripple, Cardano, Litecoin, Polkadot, Polygon, and Avalanche all dumped by similar percentages. Binance Coin, Dogecoin, Tron, Solana, and Shiba Inu are also in the red, though in a less painful way.

Midcap and lower cap alts also suffered losses. Some of the most notable daily drops came from Lido DAO, Arbitrum HBAR, XLM, and TONCOIN.

Overall, the total crypto market cap has declined by $40 billion and is inching closer to breaking below the coveted $1 trillion mark.