In the last 24 hour, popular cryptocurrency Bitcoin slumped by over 12 per cent from $59,236.13 to $52,148.98, according to Coindesk. This is the lowest in months. Bitcoin was not the only losers, other cryptocurrencies like Ethereum, XRP and Stellar saw a decline in value too.
This decline in Bitcoin was mainly due to talks that US Treasury was about to crack down on financial institutions for laundering money using cryptocurrencies.
The US Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) took action against 16 entities and 16 individuals who attempted to influence the 2020 US presidential election at the direction of the leadership of the Russian Government.
“As part of today’s listing of Second Eye Solution (SES) on OFAC’s Specially Designated Nationals and Blocked Persons List (SDN List), OFAC is also identifying digital currency addresses used by SES to fulfil customer orders in order to help assist financial institutions, and their third-party identity verification services, in identifying customers on their platforms who have purchased fraudulent identity documents,” stated a treasury note.
This post comes a day after Turkey’s central bank banned the use of cryptocurrencies and crypto-assets for purchases. The Central Bank stated that cryptocurrencies will cause irreparable damage and transaction risks.
Bitcoin witnessed a bull’s run since the last few days before the crash. It traded as high as $64,829.14 last week, after crypto exchange Coinbase’s Nasdaq listing. This had brought a major hope for cryptocurrencies.
While major cryptocurrencies were hit by the US treasury news, the impact of that on popular meme-based cryptocurrency was limited. Its 24 hours low was $0.242358 but it recovered to touch $0.351534 during the day.
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