Bitcoin, Ethereum and Litecoin Nosedive amid Market Fear

Bitcoin, Ethereum and other major cryptocurrencies declined heavily during the past three sessions. The main market moving event was Facebook’s ban on cryptocurrency and ICO Ads.

In a surprise move, Facebook banned ads for cryptocurrencies and initial coin offerings (ICOs). In a statement, the company’s Product Management Director, Rob Leathern said:

“We want people to continue to discover and learn about new products and services through Facebook ads without fear of scams or deception. That said, there are many companies who are advertising binary options, ICOs and cryptocurrencies that are not currently operating in good faith.”

Clearly, the company wants more protection and does not want users to get scammed by frauds. Therefore, they decided to place a ban on deceptive promotional practices.

It had a negative impact on the market as bitcoin price declined by more than 8% and traded close to the USD 10,000 level. Ethereum’s Ether was also down by 6.8% to trade near USD 1,094.

On the positive side, the Free Software Foundation recently stated that they got their biggest donation ever in the form of 91.45 bitcoins. The donation was around USD 1 million at the time of payment and it was done by an anonymous entity called Pineapple Fund. Commenting on the same, FSF executive director, John Sullivan, stated:

“We will use it to further empower free software activists and developers around the world. Now is a critical time for computer user freedom, and this gift will make a tremendous difference in our ability, as a movement, to meet the challenges.”

However, the mentioned donation by an anonymous entity called Pineapple Fund raises eyebrows since it is not clear how funds were transacted before reaching the Free Software Foundation.

Coming back to Bitcoin, a multi-asset strategist at Aberdeen Standard Investments, Gerry Fowler recently stated to Bloomberg that many cryptocurrencies will become irrelevant and ultimately it will be the underlying technology, blockchain and the distributed ledger which could stay.

The market sentiment is clearly bearish today. BTC/USD is trading just above the USD 10,000 level. It must stay above the stated USD 10,000 support. Should there be a break below USD 10,000, the price could decline toward the USD 9,200 level.

ETH/USD is also in a negative zone, but the pair is trading well above the USD 1,000 level. It faces many barriers on the upside such as USD 1,100 and USD 1,120.

Other altcoins such as LTC/USD and NEO/USD too followed the market sentiment and tumbled to USD 160 and USD 140 respectively.