The world’s most famous cryptocurrency is enduring it’s worst quarter in 11 years as Bitcoin‘s value and activity plummets.
The second quarter’s end saw Bitcoin’s price fall from around $45,000 at the start of the quarter to trade at $19,884 before midnight EST on Thursday, according to CoinGecko. This represents a 56.2% loss, according to crypto analytics platform Coinglass.
It’s the steepest price fall since the third quarter of 2011 when BTC fell from $15.40 to $5.03, a loss of over 67% and worse than the bear markets of 2014 and 2018 when Bitcoin’s price slumped 39.7% and 49.7% in their worst quarters respectively.
The past quarter saw eight weekly red candles in a row for Bitcoin and the month of June saw a drawdown of over 37%. This was the heaviest monthly losses since September 2011, which saw the price fall more than 38.5% in the month.
There are also signs that investors are keeping their powder dry — or they’ve run out of funds — during the bear market. Activity on the blockchain is taking a dive with Bitcoin’s spot volume — the total amount of coins transacting on the blockchain — dropped over 58.5% in just nine days, according to a Wednesda analysis from Arcane Research.
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But, it’s not just crypto markets in turmoil. Thanks to sky-high inflation and rising interest rates, the traditional stock market has also taken a pounding, with some calling it the “worst quarter ever” for stocks.
Charlie Bilello, CEO of financial advisory firm Compound Capital Advisors, shared a chart on Twitter showing the S&P 500 index was down 20.6% in the first half of 2022, the worst start to the year for the index since 1962 when price return was -26.5%.
The S&P was down 20.6% in the first half of 2022, the worst start to a year for the index since 1962. $SPX pic.twitter.com/OMcX7yfP5o
— Charlie Bilello (@charliebilello) June 30, 2022
The difficult economic conditions have seen a swath of staff layoffs from crypto companies including Gemini, Crypto.com and BlockFi. Most recently, the crypto and stock trading platform Bitpanda cut its employee count by approximately 277 full-time and part-time employees.
