Bitcoin traded in negative territory in Monday morning’s early deals as investors failed to keep the momentum from the beginning of the month, amid high inflation and growing Russia-Ukraine tensions.
Much like many of the heavy selling days in January, most of the leading digital currencies were trading in the red, with Bitcoin easing 0.5% to US$42,159.
“Cryptocurrency prices have come under pressure once again following an unfavourable inflation report released last week and growing tensions between Russia and Ukraine,” Naeem Aslam, Avatrade market analyst, said.
He noted that while Bitcoin had fallen below US$42,000 over the weekend, it was still above the “crucial” $40,000 level.
At the start of last week, the world’s leading cryptocurrency notched up its longest rally since September as speculation that Russia’s government and central bank will begin to accept crypto as legal tender consolidated investors’ recent positivity surrounding crypto (read more).
Meanwhile, its closest rival by market value, Ethereum, performed worse, falling 1.7% to US$2,869.
Both remain approximately 40% below all-time highs seen in November, but up from the six-month lows seen in January.
Alt-coins XRP, Avalanche, and Polkadot dropped 4.0%, 5.1%, and 4.0% respectively.
Further down the pecking order, Polygon, Decrentaland, and The Sandbox lost 4.4%, 4.8%, and 6.1% in value respectively.
Overall, 94 of the top 100 cryptos were being offloaded by investors.
Notable in bucking the trend was doggy meme-coin Shiba Inu, which grew 1.2%, while Symbol and Wax advanced 4.9% and 2.5%.