Fearing about the Omicron mutation, investors massively sold bitcoin

In Friday’s trading session, the price of bitcoin fell deeply along with the value of many other risky assets. Bitcoin price is now trading at a 7-week low, the bitcoin market is officially in decline.

The price of the world’s largest cryptocurrency dropped nearly 8% in the last 24 hours to $54,321/bitcoin, according to CoinMetrics statistics. This sharp decline has dragged the bitcoin price to its lowest level since early October 2021.

The bitcoin price is now about 20% below its record high of nearly $69,000 earlier this month. Bearing markets are defined as when an asset’s price is down about 20% from its most recent peak.

The prices of several other cryptocurrencies also fell sharply on Friday. The price of ether, the second largest cryptocurrency, fell more than 10% to $4,059, while the price of XRP fell 9.9% to just 95 cents.

The prices of such cryptocurrencies are falling along with the prices of many other risky assets amid fears related to the Omicron strain first discovered in South Africa.

On Thursday, the World Health Organization (WHO) held a press conference on the new strain known as B.1.1.529 and considered to have up to 30 strains. The UK and many other countries have now temporarily suspended flights from six African countries.

The stock market fell deeply on Friday when the new strain of COVID-19 was discovered in South Africa, investor sentiment became fearful, they withdrew money from risky assets.

Closing the last session of the week, the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 905.04 points, or 2.53% and thus recorded the deepest drop of the year, closing at 34,899.34 points.

The S&P 500 index lost 2.27% to 4,594.6. The Nasdaq index fell 2.23% to 15,491.6 points. At the deepest drop of the session, the Dow Jones lost more than 1,000 points.

Asian stock markets were hit hard on Friday, with the Nikkei 225 and the Hang Seng in Hong Kong both losing more than 2%. Germany’s Dax index fell more than 4%. Bitcoin price fell 8%.

The CBOE index, a measure of fear volatility on Wall Street, rose to 28 points, the highest level in the last 2 trading months. Oil prices fell sharply.

Tomoichiro Kubota, senior strategist at Matsui Securities, commented: “The reaction of the Japanese market seems to be quite limited, because so far there are still many unknowns about this variant. There is currently a concern about the possibility that the new strain is more contagious than the previous delta variant, so investors must consider the worst-case scenario when cities are forced to apply measures. the blockade is back”.

Hong Kong (China) health officials said that the first case of B.1.1.529 mutation on this island was a COVID-19 patient causing cross-infection in the isolation area.

Hong Kong (China) health authorities on November 25 said the patient was found to be infected with B.1.1.52 strain from South Africa on November 11. This person was isolated at the Regal Airport hotel and tested positive for SARS-CoV-2 on November 15. The 62-year-old visitor from Canada in the room opposite the patient also tested positive for the mutation more than 5 days later.