Cryptocurrency prices are falling amid a wave of liquidations, with the price of Bitcoin (BTC) briefly dropping below $60,000 U.S.
The price of Bitcoin declined as much as 6% over the past 24 hours to trade as low as $59,421.95 U.S. before recovering somewhat.
At the same time, the price of Ethereum (ETH), the second largest crypto after Bitcoin, decreased 5% to trade at $2,469.50 U.S.
Analysts say the current declines are due to leverage driven liquidations, which is when loans investors took out to buy cryptocurrencies get called in, requiring sales of the digital assets to raise cash.
Data from CoinGlass shows that there have been $94 million U.S. in Ethereum liquidations over the past 24 hours, forcing investors and traders to sell their assets at market price to settle their debts. About $85 million U.S. in Bitcoin liquidations have also occurred.
Bitcoin continues to be rangebound, trading between $55,000 U.S. and $70,000 U.S., which it has been doing since April of this year when it underwent a halving event that reduced the available supply of the cryptocurrency by 50%.
Despite the current pullback, Bitcoin is still up nearly 40% this year. Ethereum has posted a 7% gain year-to-date and smaller cryptocurrencies continue to see wide price fluctuations.
