MORE THAN A BIT
Coin plunge panic
Bitcoin’s “Black Friday” has rattled one of the controversial cryptocurrency’s biggest backers.
Panicked sellers on Friday sent bitcoin tumbling to a low of $10,891.32, down more than a third from just a day earlier, according to Coindesk data.
There was no clear reason for the dramatic drop — capping a 45 percent slide that marked bitcoin’s worst week since 2013 — leaving experts to speculate about year-end profit-taking and skittish momand-pop investors.
Meanwhile, hedgie Mike Novogratz — who earlier this month predicted that bitcoin could hit $50,00 next year — said Friday he’s is putting the brakes on launching his crypto fund.
“We didn’t like market conditions and we wanted to reevaluate what we’re doing,” Novogratz, 53, a former trader at Fortress Investment Group, told Bloomberg.
Novogratz’ fund, Galaxy Digital Assets, was supposed to launch on Dec. 15 with $500 million. But Novogratz apparently had a change of heart last week. He said he told potential investors of his decision to halt the launch on Dec. 13 — when bitcoin was trading around $17,000.
“I look pretty smart pressing the pause button now,” Novogratz said Friday.
It’s a rapid about-face for the hedgie who said on Dec. 7 — when bitcoin cleared $15,000 — that the currency wasn’t yet at its peak.
It wasn’t the only bullish bitcoin prognostication the hedgie made. He began making rounds on financial television in September as news of his planned fund emerged.
In late November — when bitcoin first crossed $8,000 — Novogratz downplayed the cryptocurrency’s volatility, telling Bloomberg, “We’re in the second or third inning” of the cryptocurrency revolution.
He now says that bitcoin could fall as low as $8,000 and that it will be at least three to four months before the cryptocurrency flirts with $20,000 again.
“When you get kicked this hard, it takes a lot of ice to get the swelling down,” Novogratz said.
By 6:15 p.m., bitcoin rebounded from the day’s lows and hit $14,726.39.
But while Novogratz, whose last hedge fund liquidated in 2015 following poor performance, claims he is “pretty smart,” other bitcoin traders found themselves hamstrung Friday amid bitcoin’s stomachchurning plunge.
Digital currency exchange Coinbase faced at least two hours of outages early Friday due to high traffic. The site — whose app has been among the most popular in iPhone’s US app store — has faced a series of disruptions over the last few weeks amid the bitcoin craze.
But while Novogratz and others appeared to panic over bitcoin’s sudden drop, many analysts saw Friday’s action as more of the same for the volatile cryptocurrency.
Indeed, Friday’s sudden drop took bitcoin to a level seen only three weeks ago — when the cryptocurrency was on its way up.
“Anybody who has been involved in the space for more than a couple of weeks has seen this volatility before,” Michael Kazley, co-founder of Crescent Crypto Asset Management, told The Post.
Charles Hayter, founder of cryptocurrency data analysis firm Cryptocompare, said, “the markets have been sentimentdriven and there is an element of panic now after such heavy swings.”