Bitcoin – The Meltdown Resumes, Can the Bears Deliver sub-$4,000

Bitcoin was back in the red on Thursday, sliding by 6.33% to end the day at $4,369.6, with the day’s reversal wiping out Wednesday’s 2.01% gain with interest.

A positive start to the day, continuing on from a late upward move on Wednesday, saw Bitcoin rise to an early morning intraday high $4,723.7 before hitting reverse, the day’s high coming up short of the first major resistance level at $4,829.23.

The day long reversal saw Bitcoin fall through the first major resistance level at $4,454.23 to an intraday low $4,342.1 before steadying, with Bitcoin managing to hold above Tuesday’s new swing lo $4,303.5 to avoid $4,200 levels.

There was more bad news hitting the crypto wires through the day, with a lawsuit against U.S crypto exchange Coinbase over price manipulation contributing to the downward spiral, which left Bitcoin down 22.79% by the day’s end on Thursday.

With Coinbase being a U.S crypto exchange and price manipulation one of the SEC’s major concerns, there’s yet another reason for the SEC to decline the Bitcoin ETF applications for a 2^nd time, with news of the investigation into last year’s Bitcoin rally by the Department of Justice hitting the wires earlier in the week amongst a laundry list of issues that the SEC will need to consider.

It’s been over 2-weeks since the SEC stopped taking comments and the longer it takes for a decision to be made, the less likely the SEC will be to approve any of ETFs, with the chances of more bad news hitting the wires ever present.

The Thursday sell-off will have the bears eyeing $3,000 levels once more and with the total cryptomarket cap now sitting at $137bn, a pullback to sub-$100bn would really test the market’s resolve in the coming weeks, with only the brave buying in the current environment.

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At the time of writing, Bitcoin was down 1.34% to $4,311.1, a bearish start to the day seeing Bitcoin fall from a morning high $4,463 to a morning low $4,242.1 before steadying.

The early sell-off saw Bitcoin slide through the day’s first major support level at $4,454.23 to call on support at the second major support level at $4,245.77 to strike a new swing lo before moving back through to $4,300 levels.

For the day ahead, the crypto mood will need to materially improve for Bitcoin to recover from the morning reversal, a move back through the morning high $4,463 to $4,475 levels needed to support a break through to $4,500 levels to bring the day’s first major resistance level at $4,614.83 into play before any pullback.

Failure to move back through the morning high could see Bitcoin take a bigger hit later in the day, a pullback through the morning low $4,242.1 bringing sub-$4,000 support levels ever closer, a fall through the first major support level at $4,233.23 likely to bring $4,100 levels before any recovery, sub-$4,100 support levels unlikely to be tested just yet.

Elsewhere, the sell-off was most felt by BCH SV that was down 10.08% at the time of writing, with BCH ABC also down towards the bottom of the table, with a 4.2% loss,  the resumption of the crypto sell-off bringing Bitcoin ever close to $3,000 levels. It wasn’t that long ago that the entire market had lost its vim.