On Sunday, the price of bitcoin cash reached as high as $2,500 before falling back. On Monday, it dropped nearly 60 percent from that high. Bitcoin itself reversed course from its steep decline to as low as $5,550 and is reported in a Fortune article as being at $6,700.
Differing views as to what caused bitcoin prices to fall
It appears that after the original bitcoin failed to increase its block size many of those who had supported the plan to double the size sold off their bitcoin and bought bitcoin cash as they had already increased their block size by eight times the original.
The huge drive to buy bitcoin cash had cooled by Monday and was as low as $1,250 as of mid-morning.
Those supporting bitcoin cash claim that the surge in support for the coin showed that many supported the newer coin whereas others claimed that the whole rise and fall resulted from Chinese and others carrying out a “pump-and-dump ” maneuver.
Some other analysts claim that part of the price gains of bitcoin cash were fueled by Korean speculators who were buying in the hopes that bitcoin cash did not lose its momentum.
Many speculators may have lost a bundle overnight
Those who bought bitcoin cash (BCH) near its peak of 2,4000 to 2,500 will find themselves with half of their money gone today.
However, the price at $1,250 is still over twice what it was as recently as November 7th when it was around $600 dollars. Not everyone is losing.
Business is booming for cryptocurrency exchanges
Price volatility has been accompanied by a surge in trading as there is a large value of transactions. The CEO of Chainalysis a firm specializing in forensic analysis of digital transactions claims that weekend volumes were high and resulted in fat trading fees.
Bitcoin cash does not appear to be dethroning bitcoin for now.
During bitcoins’ crash and bitcoin cash’s rise some were predicting that bitcoin cash would soon replace bitcoin as the dominant cryptocurrency.
Today’s developments show that such a dramatic shift could be far in the future. The recovery of bitcoin’s price also shows that the bubble may not have burst as many had been predicting– that is assuming there is a bubble. What we can be sure of is that we cannot be sure what will happen next.
Present prices
As I write this on Monday evening bitcoin cash is priced at $1,239. Bitcoin itself is at $6,663.. Check the links for the prices at the time you read this. They could be quite different given the volatility of the coin prices.
The appended video has a lot of conspiracy flavoring.
