Bitcoin sank below $40,000 in early trading on Tuesday, the first time below this level since early December.
The leading cryptocurrency has fallen 6.8% over the past week and 9.5% over the month as interest fades away over the US Securities and Exchange Commission’s approval of 11 spot bitcoin exchange-traded funds (ETFs).
At publication, BTC/USD was down 3.8% over 24 hours to $39,347.
Investors have sold several billion dollars' worth of the largest of these ETFs, Grayscale Bitcoin Trust (GBTC), since it was converted from a closed-ended fund to an ETF, a large part being dumped by the bankruptcy estate of Sam Bankman-Fried’s FTX, according to media reports.
“With the BTC spot ETF now behind us and the flows into these ETFs perhaps underwhelming some of the more bullish contingents in the markets - we see price breaking the October uptrend, as well as the range lows around 40,200,” said analyst Chris Weston at Pepperstone.
“Near-term, I favour taking a momentum approach and playing this from the short side, with the former consolidation highs at 37,900 as a near-term target.”
Elsewhere, ethereum was also down 5.3% to $2,292.6, down 8.5% since this time last week but essentially flat for the month.
Solana (SOL), down 8%, and Avalanche (AVAX), down almost 10%, were bigger fallers among major altcoins.
All apart from stablecoins were in the red, with only TRON (TRX) and Dai (DAI) in the top 20 largest cryptos falling less than 1% over 24 hours.