Bitcoin dips below US$21,000

Bitcoin and chart — Image: Envato Elements

Bitcoin slipped below US$21,000 in Friday afternoon trade in Asia while prices of other top 10 non-stablecoin cryptocurrencies were mixed.

Fast facts

Bitcoin, the largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization, edged just below US$21,000 but remained up more than half a per cent at 4 p.m. in Hong Kong on Friday, according to CoinMarketCap data. It gained 0.64% to US$20,966 in 24 hours of trade, a 11.36% rise for the week.
Ethereum rose 1.33% to US$1,549, up by 10% in the past seven days.
Ripple payment network’s token XRP gained 1.28% to US$0.3887 and increased 3.2% on the week. The gains come after Ripple Labs’ chief executive Brad Garlinghouse told CNBC that its legal tussle with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission will end soon.
Binance’s BNB token slipped 0.83% to US$288 after the U.S. Financial Crimes Enforcement Network named Binance, the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange, as one of the top three receiving counterparties of Bitzlato Ltd. that has been charged for allegedly laundering US$700 million in crypto assets.
Cardano’s ADA token strengthened 1.2% on the day to US$0.3354, up by 2.36% in the past seven days, following Charles Hoskinson, co-founder of the Cardano blockchain network, saying he is looking to acquire Coindesk, the media arm of the struggling Digital Currency Group.
Asian stock markets were up on Friday ahead of Lunar New Year holidays in the region that begin on Jan. 21. The Shenzhen stock exchange rose 0.57%, the Shanghai Stock Exchange gained 0.76%, and South Korea’s Kospi rose 0.63%. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index increased 1.82% and Japan’s Nikkei 225 gained 0.56%.
See related article: FTX chief John Ray mulls resurrection of collapsed crypto exchange

Author profile

Pradipta Mukherjee

Pradipta Mukherjee is a business reporter and has worked for Bloomberg News and Business Standard in India. An MBA and a post-graduate in Economics, Mukherjee focuses on financial markets and corporates. She is a Mary Morgan Hewitt award recipient for Women in Journalism. She has also won the Jefferson Fellowship; the Thomson Reuters Foundation fellowship on ‘Social Media and Digital Journalism’ at The Chinese University of Hong Kong; and most recently, the Kiplinger Fellowship at Ohio University, USA.

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