The market capitalization of cryptocurrencies has fallen below $200 billion. Currently, the total value of the digital currencies presented at CoinMarketCap is $191.4 billion, which corresponds to the values of the beginning of November last year.

Over the past day, most cryptocurrencies have lost more than 10% in price. At the same time, the “digital gold” is trading at levels close to the lows of this year.

It is noteworthy that against the background of falling market capitalization, the bitcoin dominance index is growing. Currently, this figure is 54%. This may indicate that most investors prefer to keep funds in a time-tested and somewhat less volatile cryptocurrency.

As for the second-largest cryptocurrency (Ethereum), which has lost more than a third of its value in the last seven days, a Twitter user Galaxy wrote that the current situation is “expected”. According to him, now there are more ICO-advisors and project managers than buyers.

However, according to Galaxy, the next bullish rally in tandem with a new ICO fever could easily push the price of Ethereum to the $5000 mark.

The rate of the second largest in terms of market capitalization cryptocurrency (Ethereum) is rapidly falling and has already reached a multi-month low. The last time the digital asset was so cheap at the beginning of November last year.

The price of ether fell to $267. Thus, in just one day, the rate of electronic cash decreased by almost 17%. According to experts, such dynamics is associated with a drop in interest in the initial coins offering, as most ICOs are based on the Ethereum blockchain.

In addition, against the background of the fall in the ether rate, many investors do not want to invest in projects, expecting that the rate will rise again, and they will be able to buy more new tokens. However, the situation continues to deteriorate.

An even more interesting situation in terms of technical analysis is observed in Bitcoin. The main cryptocurrency is losing more than 4% today, and the quotes have come close to the so-called Maginot line. The level around $5800 had repeatedly acted as a springboard, from which the Bitcoin rate bounced and begun its growth. But this time it has failed to develop success: the price has returned back.

The main intrigue is how Bitcoin will behave this time. If this level will be overcome, there is a high probability that we will see a new wave of sales, which will make the price of the cryptocurrency much lower.
The worst situation is with Ripple, which at the end of last year suddenly shot and within a month grew to haven. What was that? An artificial acceleration or fleeting euphoria – we do not know, but now the quotes have returned to where they had begun their journey.

A well-known cryptographer and a pioneer in the field of smart contracts Nick Szabo expressed concerns about the approval of bitcoin-ETF. In his opinion, there may be more problems from cryptocurrency exchange-traded funds than benefits.

Note that the cryptocurrency community has high hopes for bitcoin-ETF. As of today, the US securities and exchange Commission (SEC) considers nine applications for registration of exchange-traded investment funds using bitcoin.
Recall that recently the SEC has extended the deadline for a decision on bitcoin-ETF till September 30 of this year.

The state committee, consisting of Saudi Arabia and other Middle East countries representatives of regulator, issued a statement warning about the illegality of cryptocurrency trading. The reason for the ban, according to the committee members, are negative consequences and high risks for traders.

It is noteworthy that the document does not contain information about any sanctions for traders who violate the ban.

The standing committee for awareness on dealing in unauthorized securities activities in the foreign exchange market comprises representatives of the five regulators of the countries in the Middle East. In particular, the committee includes representatives of the local Monetary Authority and the capital market departments.

It is reported that the new structure will not only monitor the stock market, but also inform the relevant services about the facts of work with virtual currencies in order to prevent public access to these assets.

Note that at the beginning of the year there was information about the plans of the Saudi authorities to allow the turnover of cryptocurrencies.

A group of computer security specialists reported that they had managed to crack the Bitfi crypto-wallet and, most importantly, to conduct transactions from it.

In the statement, hackers claim that the result of their efforts falls under the terms of the campaign announced by John McAfee. The latter promised $100 thousand to anyone who can hack the Bitfi wallet and conduct transactions from it. Then the reward was increased to $250 thousand.

It is reported that experts had got full access (root-rights) to the wallet two weeks ago. Since then they have been watching the entire activity of the device. They noted that Bitfi had maintained communication with the company’s servers and that they had been able to intercept the transmitted data.

The hackers managed to send private keys and passphrase from the device to a remote server.

Note that earlier security experts have found malware in the Bitfi wallet, transmitting data to China. And only a short time ago, a 15-year-old hacker has managed to launch Doom on the device.

According to the report published by Kaspersky Lab, during the second quarter of 2018, crypto scammers earned $2,3 million from cryptocurrency scams, reports CoinDesk.

In the Spam and Phishing in Q2 2018 report, the company announced that over 58 000 attempts were prevented. Every time users were attacked when visiting fraudulent web pages featuring popular cryptocurrency wallets and exchanges from April to June 2018. It was also noted that the intruders induced their victims to send their coins to fake ICOs and token distributions.

The permanence of attacks targeting financial organizations reflects the fact that more and more people are using electronic money,” Nadezhda Demidova, lead web content analyst for Kaspersky, wrote in the company’s news release.

?Kaspersky Lab? studied global reach of phishing scams, with South America and Asia seeing the most activity in this area. Brazil hold the leading position with 15,51% of all phishing attacks during that period. China and Georgia come next (14,44%), followed by Kirghizstan (13.6%) and Russia (13.27%)

The majority of digital money won’t survive the correction, however, ?lower BTC price means incredible opportunity to buy more?, Xapo President believes.
Most of the cryptocurrencies have no future and are ?in the midst of the extinction-level event?, posted Ted Rogers in his Twitter. He also noted that good projects will survive digital money crash just like Amazon survived dot-com bubble.

?We could be in the midst of the extinction-level event for “cryptoassets” that many maximalists have predicted. 90%+ of CoinMarketCap list will disappear eventually – might as well happen now?, — posted Rogers.

He pointed out that in the future ICO would be a standard way to attract investments but right now this industry was filled with poor quality projects.

In 2018, digital money market went down 76% — from $830 billion to $203 billion. At the same time, the industry gained half of its capitalization and the trading price of different cryptocurrencies went up significantly.

Chris Concannon, President and Chief Operating Officer of CBOE Global Markets, believes that the US Securities and exchange Commission (SEC) will approve the application for new financial tool.
The SEC had previously voiced concern about insufficient insurance for cryptocurrency investors. Concannon said the futures provide a more mature and healthier market, but a futures-based ETF raises the question of what is the correct liquidity level since such a product has not yet been tested, Bloomberg reports.

CBOE’s ETF filing emphasized that it will only invest in bitcoin for the benefit of investors, facilitating over-the-counter trades among accredited market investors and insuring the funds that are invested in bitcoin. The SEC requires additional time to discuss the potential approval or rejection.

The SEC last week postponed acting on a proposal to allow such a fund from SolidXPartners Inc. and VanEck Associates Corp. to list on CBOE, underscoring the commission’s wariness of a bitcoin ETF. The commission had previously rejected an ETF proposal from Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss, owners of the Gemini Trust Co. cryptocurrency exchange, as well as an earlier solo proposal from SolidXPartners Inc.

Now the industry is at the same level as a month before bitcoin reached $20,000. We found out how long it takes digital money to reach historical highs.

The cryptocurrency industry has changed in 2018 — the authorities have begun to strictly control it, users have got interested in the blockchain and forgot about it, many startups have begun to cooperate with corporations. Meanwhile, the value of the coins is now the same as last year.

Digital money took about a month to reach historical highs. Then a powerful catalyst for growth was the launch of bitcoin futures on the Chicago exchanges CME and CBOE.

Now digital money is in a situation of regulatory uncertainty, hackers have robbed several large cryptocurrency exchanges, users have practically lost interest in this area — trading volumes have decreased by almost a half, and the number of searches in search engines on this topic has fallen significantly. However, the American Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) solves the problem of starting a new investment instrument — bitcoin-ETF.

Most experts believe that this year we should not wait for a positive decision, but if it does happen, the price of coins can increase dramatically. Just like it was last year after the launch of futures.

In mid-August, the first cryptocurrency occupied 53.9% of the digital money market. The last time this figure was as high in mid-December, when the bitcoin exchange rate reached $20 000.

From April to August 2018, Ethereum fell almost three times – now the price of the coin is below $ 270. At the end of last year, this value did not prevent the cryptocurrency from reaching a historical maximum of $1400 in two months.

Now Ripple is worth $0.26, 14 times cheaper than at its peak in January. The last time the token price was the same low was on December 12, a month before it reached the $3.7 mark.
Bitcoin Cash fork fell to $500, although at the end of last year it was trading at $4500. Then the coin has risen three times in just a few days.

The EOS token differs from other digital money: it reached its maximum not at the end of last year, but in April this year. It took less than a month to do this — users has been buying cryptocurrency on the eve of the launch of the main network.

Stellar’s rate is now four times lower than at its peak, when the token was worth $0.84. Then, the cryptocurrency rose sharply from $ 0.22 within just a week – from December 28 to January 4.
The price of “digital silver” for the first time this year has fallen to $50. It was trading at the same level as it is now just a month before the peak of $ 350.
For three weeks at the end of last year, the price of Cardano increased more than tenfold. Now it has returned to its previous values.

Since July, the price of Monero has dropped almost twice, in mid-August it is at the level of $ 80. Last time it took altcoin two months to rise from this level to a record $480.
At the end of 2017, IOTA has risen in price almost ten times in four weeks. Cryptocurrency returned to the previous levels only after eight months.

Total Capitalization

In November last year, the value of the digital money market was the same as it is now — about $200 billion. However, just a month later, it grew almost four times and exceeded $830 billion.

The monthly minimum for the most popular cryptocurrency has been updated. At the time of writing, bitcoin is worth $6024. Given how market participants sell altcoins, bitcoin should expect a new minimum. By August 17, we expect a test of $5500 mark. The $5400-$5500 zone is a key support. If it does not stand, then wait for a panic sale.

Protective stops placed under the designated zone will cause a new wave of bitcoin sales, where the price drop will accelerate to $3575. This will happen very quickly. In this case, the “buckets” for the purchase should be placed as low as possible. Market participants react positively to the news related to listings of coins on exchanges. Everything else is ignored.

Over the previous six days of trading, from 6 to 12 August, on the Bitfinex exchange, bitcoin fell against the dollar by 9.03%, to $6344. On Monday, August 13, trading on Bitmex closed in a small minus. The rate of the most popular cryptocurrency reached $6251. There was no significant news behind the weakening of the first digital coin. The fall is caused by cyclical factors and because of large speculators, closing open positions on the CME and CBOE exchanges. On Friday, August 10, the CFTC – Commodity Futures Trading Commission – has presented new COT reports (Commitments of Traders) on CME and CBOE exchanges.

On both exchanges the open interest has decreased. In the falling market, large speculators have reduced long and short positions. On the CBOE, five traders have significantly increased covered positions. They got confused in the “bullish” market, that is why they opened positions in different directions.

Ethereum co-founder and CEO of ConsenSys Inc. Joseph Lubin is convinced that the cryptocurrency market has already had six bubbles. However, in his opinion, the growth will continue after stabilization.

The ConsenSys head also notes that volatility is created by speculative investors and the price movement is not always an indicator of infrastructure improvements.

In his opinion, hundreds of protocols will coexist in the blockchain industry in the future, but Ethereum will continue to occupy a significant market share.

Recall that on August 13, the average weighted rate of the second terms of capitalization cryptocurrency updated the nine-month low, falling below the psychological mark of $300.

Cryptocurrencies continue to rapidly decrease amid falling interest from retail investors.

For 7 months, the market capitalization has fallen by 70%. And on Tuesday, for the first time since November last year, it fell below $200 billion.

Compared with the January excitement, when the market volume reached its peak, cryptocurrency holders have become impoverished by a total of 623 billion dollars – an amount comparable to the annual GDP of such countries as Switzerland or Saudi Arabia (18th and 19th economies of the world).

Attempts of cryptocurrencies to recover in July, when bitcoin soared by 17% within a week, ended with new sales: its rate on Tuesday fell by another 5% and dropped below 6 thousand dollars for the first time since June.
Ether has lost 66% of its value since the beginning of the year, Ripple – 88%, Bitcoin Cash – 80%, LTC – 77%.

The first wave of decline at the beginning of the year, analysts attributed to the fact that large potential buyers artificially whipped up tension to buy at the lows, but the negative period ran over, and this scenario can hardly still be considered relevant, says the head of the analytical department of Grand Capital Sergey Kozlovsky.

The owners of cryptocurrencies are playing with fire: bitcoin have not stopped at the level of 6,4 thousand dollars and seems to carry on falling.

On Tuesday morning, the bitcoin exchange rate fell by 6.35% and reached six thousand dollars. This was reported by CoinMarketCap after calculating the average price of e-currency on more than 20 exchanges.

On the largest in terms of trading volume cryptocurrency exchange Binance bitcoin fell below 5,966 thousand dollars. According to CoinMarketCap, the share of bitcoin in the cryptocurrency market is approximately 53.9% with a capitalization of 191.94 billion dollars.

Among the reasons for the fall of bitcoin, Vladislav Antonov, an analyst of Alpari, points out cyclical factors and large speculators, closing open positions on the CME and CBOE exchanges.

On Friday morning, the recession stopped. According to Antonov, if the recession resumes, many players on the stock exchange will have a deplorable future.

The fall of the bitcoin exchange rate started in early August. Then, the cryptocurrency fell below eight thousand dollars. Bitcoin losses for the last week amounted to 14% (about 1 thousand dollars).

Soon the Securities and Exchange Commission of the USA (SEC) will find it profitable to cooperate with the bitcoin-ETF. This point of view was expressed by the President of the Chicago board options exchange (CBOE) Chris Concannon.

The President of the exchange also said that the launch of bitcoin futures, which had taken place on the CBOE in December, indicated the maturity of the crypto-market. Regarding futures-based ETF, Concannon noted that since no one had tested this product, it was necessary to solve one important task — to determine an appropriate level of liquidity.

There is also another dilemma. Bitcoin futures trading volume is relatively low compared to contracts for commodities such as oil and gold. ETFs are designed to solve this problem. However, the SEC is unlikely to approve ETF products without sufficient liquidity of bitcoin futures.

As Concannon pointed out, ETF can offer huge dividends to the pioneers.
Recall, on August 7 the SEC has extended the consideration period of the joint application for the creation of bitcoin-ETF from VanEck and SolidX. However, representatives of the CBOE and the above firms are still convinced of a positive outcome.

The value of the cryptocurrency has risen to $56. However, it still can decrease again.

On Wednesday, August 15, the average market price of Litecoin increased by 6% to $56. Rate was able to hold above the zone of $50, that is why it managed to go up, says Aayush Jindal, an expert of Ethereum World News. He noted that altcoin may rise to $58 but it is unlikely to overcome it.

According to the analyst, $56 – $58 is the level of resistance, and Litecoin will find it difficult to rise above it. If this happens, the cryptocurrency will soar to $60 very quickly. In this case, the coin will return to the positive zone and will gradually grow in price.

It is more likely that the rate will fall again to support levels of $ 52 and $50. The expert is sure, that the price will not fall lower, and then it will begin to rise again.