Crypto Market tumbles as new variant makes investors dump riskier assets

The cryptocurrencies that had been falling in the last few weeks saw yet another backlash in the form of the new Covid 19 variant. Bitcoin alone stumbled around 8% on Black Friday. On average most of the cryptocurrencies have fallen around 10% in the last 24-hrs. Most of these are included in the top-20 cryptos on Coin MarketCap.  

The new variant B.1.1.529 is a red-flagged mutant by scientists. They assume that the high number of mutations in the virus to become this variant would have made it more resistant to vaccines. This will increase its transmissibility and will lead to more symptoms.  

The crypto market has been seeing a decline in the last few weeks. Now, Bitcoin has entered the Bear Market after it dropped over 20% from its all-time high of $69,000, which it had touched just around a month back.   

The digital currencies and the high-risk assets are plunging sharply. The sharp fall has been observed as investors dump these high-risk assets amid the ongoing pandemic and discovery of a new, heavily-mutated variant B.1.1.529, which was first found in South Africa.  

Earlier, the WHO stated that the new variant could have undergone over 30 mutations.   

The volatility of the crypto market was witnessed as Bitcoin, Ether, Dogecoin, and others continued to rise a little and sink again, around 10% in a day. Bitcoin is currently priced at $54,472.61, down 6.97% in 24hours. Avalanche (AVAX), the token that went against the crypto market’s general trend and surged in the last few days, fell by 15% during the previous 24 hours. Tether has been volatile but is currently the only crypto in the top 20 cryptocurrencies on the Coin Market cap that surged a little.  

The rising fears of the new variant have taken the markets by storm, and the share market also saw the effects as the significant stock prices went downhill. Earlier, the crypto market was downhill because of the regulations different countries were putting. When it seemed like the market would recover back, the fear of the new Covid variant being more dangerous than the delta variant came in, it is expected that the market will go on similar trends for the coming weeks.