If you’re putting all your eggs in one basket and counting on that make-believe money you tucked away — you’re fresh out of luck, mostly. Bitcoin prices were sent nosediving after Coinrail was hacked.
That left over 30,000 users with compromised data — giving hackers the ability to transfer coins through account access.
Cryptocurrency has found a key market in South Korea and according to Coinhills, it was the third-biggest market worldwide for Bitcoin trades, trailing Japan and the United States.
The plunge destroyed more than $40 billion in market value and since December Bitcoin has seen 50 percent of its worth plummet.
It couldn’t get much worse, with Bitcoin trying to find its footing among major financial players, formal regulations, diminishing deals and the cost of massive energy.
Some experts think buying cryptocurrencies resemble gambling more than investing.
But don’t lose complete hope. Bitcoin is still doing better than this time last year, when less than $3,000 was a typical trade, if you keep track of those type of things.
It now costs $6,750 and the market has been incredibly erratic. The South Korean hack was certainly not the only one to wreak damage. Coincheck, a Japanese exchange was affected in January, when almost $500 million was stolen.
And many are afraid that cryptocurrency is wide open for intrusion.
According to Coinrail, they make it tough for hackers to break through by keeping a high percent of its cryptocurrency on “cold wallet” devices not linked to the World Wide Web. Despite China’s nonstop threats to crack down on the industry, Bitcoin is all the rage among Chinese businesses, including bitcoin miner and designer, Bitmain, worth an estimated $40 billion.
Last month the Feds launched a criminal investigation into possible price manipulation of Bitcoin and other digital currencies. It remains to be seen whether the agencies will take action.
But Google, Facebook and Twitter did - take action that is, banning cryptocurrency ads on the social media sites.
Will Bitcoin survive this latest round of 2018 hits without finding itself further scathed? Who knows, considering the imitation money is worth less than half of what it once was.
~JR
