Cryptocurrencies have quickly gone from buzz to bust.
"The Great Crypto Crash of 2018" is now even more drastic than when the dot-com bubble burst in 2000, Bloomberg reported Wednesday. Virtual currencies have plummeted 80 percent since January, and selloffs are only poised to worsen this month.
Even during the worst of the dot-com bust, the Nasdaq Composite Index showed a decline of 78 percent. Crypto-defenders point out that the industry recovered and went on to make a revolutionary changes to society, but for now, those who bet big on Bitcoin may be swallowing their pride to accept some major losses.
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The new low among top cryptocurrencies may mean that one currency may come out on top as a "winner takes all" result. Experts told Bloomberg that winner would likely be Bitcoin, which fell the least compared to its competitors. Fervor over crypto's potential to reinvent industries all over the world had early adopters racing to buy up blockchain-powered currency, but security flaws and tightened regulations reportedly sent wary buyers running.
"It just shows what a massive, speculative bubble the whole crypto thing was — as many of us at the time warned,” Neil Wilson, a market analyst, told Bloomberg.
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