The cryptocurrency markets shed approximately $20 billion following the US Securities and Exchange Commission’s decision to delay the highly anticipated CBoE BZX Exchange Bitcoin ETF until September 30th, 2018. Immediately following the SEC’s announcement, the cryptocurrency markets went from a daily high of approximately $257 billion to a daily low of $236 billion.
SEC’s Bitcoin ETF Decision Highly Impactful to Markets
The SEC’s decisions regarding the approval or denial of Bitcoin ETF’s is driving the cryptocurrency markets. Following the decision to deny the Winklevoss Bitcoin ETF application on July 26th, Bitcoin’s price immediately went from daily highs of nearly $8,300 to daily lows of $7,880 within only a couple hours of the news breaking.
Today’s SEC announcement to delay their decision on the CBoE Bitcoin ETF immediately sent shockwaves through the markets and has led Bitcoin’s price from daily highs of over $7,100 to daily lows of $6,550 on Coinbase. The SEC’s notice of delay wasn’t a surprise to many familiar of the topic.
CNBC Cryptotrader host, Ran NeuNer, tweeted about the decision, saying:
As expected the SEC has exercised their right to an extension on the Van Eck ETF – new date 30 September.https://t.co/g0VpimsxJf
— Ran NeuNer (@cryptomanran) August 7, 2018
The decision to delay the application is unsurprising, as the SEC frequently delays rulings on ETFs from emerging markets. As for the new decision date, the SEC wrote:
“Accordingly, the Commission … designates September 30, 2018, as the date by which the Commission shall either approve or disapprove, or institute proceedings to determine whether to disapprove, the proposed rule change.”
The SEC also notes in their notice of extension that they have the ability to extend the decision under federal law, saying:
“Section 19(b)(2) of the Act provides that within 45 days of the publication of notice of the filing of a proposed rule change, or within such longer period up to 90 days as the Commission may designate if it finds such longer period to be appropriate…the Commission shall either approve the proposed rule change, disapprove the proposed rule change, or institute proceedings to determine whether the proposed rule change should be disapproved. The Commission is extending this 45-day time period.”
It comes as no surprise that they are exercising their right to extend their ruling due to the relatively new nature of the Bitcoin markets, and the regulatory fog that surrounds the popular cryptocurrency.
Some Cryptos See Yearly Lows Amidst Market Decline
Over the past few weeks, Bitcoin had regained some of its market dominance, climbing from 42% on July 16th to nearly 49% on August 2nd. Although good for Bitcoin, this has proven to be very bad for altcoins. When Bitcoin’s price climbs at a greater rate than altcoins, therefore gaining market dominance, it gains the ability to further push alts down as it falls. Unfortunately, most alts did not rise proportional to Bitcoin over the past few weeks, and as Bitcoin fell today, some alts have been pushed to their lowest prices this year.
One such example is XRP, which is currently down -10.96% over the past 24 hours and is sitting around $0.365 at the time of writing according to CoinMarketCap. This is the lowest price XRP has seen in 2018, and the last time it was this low was prior to its meteoric rise in early December.
Other alt-coins also fell to incredibly low levels as a result of the SEC decision, with Ethereum sitting at $380 and Litecoin at $67. It remains to be seen whether or not the markets are oversold at this time, but regardless, these prices are uncharted waters for many cryptos in 2018.