The emergence of the Omicron covid variant has panicked investors and caused a dramatic plunge to the price of bitcoin, the biggest cryptocurrency.
The cryptocurrency market saw huge value dips amid investor fears about the Covid-19 Omicron variant, with bitcoin, ether, XPR and doegecoin prices dropping.
The price of bitcoin, the biggest cryptocurrency on the market, is now trading at $US54,620 ($A76,690) after hitting a record high of more than $US69,000 ($A97,000) earlier this month, The Sun reported.
XPR saw a 1.40 per cent drop to $US0.0233 ($A0.033).
Dogecoin and etheruem were down seven per cent and 4.44 per cent respectively on Saturday.
The news comes in the midst of a sudden stock market crash that has some investors concerned.
Alongside plummeting crypto prices, the Dow Jones index saw a 2.8 per cent loss, the S&P 500 dropped 2.3 per cent, and the Nasdaq Composite saw a similar drop at 2.2 per cent.
Website Yahoo! Finance reported that a “new and more transmissible variant of Covid-19” identified in South Africa may have something to do with the market drop.
These concerns all come after Tokyo plans to repay creditors of Mt Gox after losing half a billion dollars in bitcoin, in 2014.
“Selling pressure has been quite constant,” said Matthew Dibb, chief operating officer at Singapore-based crypto asset manager Stack Funds.
This article originally appeared on The Sun and was reproduced with permission
Originally published as Bitcoin price plunges amid Omicron Covid variant fears
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