Bitcoin’s market capitalization now stands at around $1.57 trillion, making it the 13th largest asset by this measure, behind the shares of Saudi Aramco and Tesla.
The move came after its price dropped sharply from around $90,000 to $78,500, a loss of over 11% in the last 7 days. The recent price decline comes amid geopolitical tensions, a collapsing precious metals rally, the appointment of an upcoming “hawkish” Federal Reserve chairman and a partial government shutdown.
The fact that Bitcoin is no longer among the top 10 assets by market capitalization is significant because in recent years it has remained on the list while prices have remained high. Only on October 7, when prices reached a new all-time high, it was in 7th place. Earlier last year, it even made the top five, surpassing tech giants such as Google and Amazon.
For comparison, during October’s record price, bitcoin briefly traded above $126,000 and approached a valuation of $2.5 trillion.
The sale
The recent drop in prices is partly explained by the strength of the US dollar.
Trump’s appointment of Warsh, a veteran of the 2008 financial crisis with experience on Wall Street and known for favoring higher real interest rates and a smaller Fed balance sheet, led to the biggest rise in the U.S. dollar since May.
This led to a pullback not only in Bitcoin, but also in the precious metals rally, which saw gold plunge 9% in a single trading session to just under $4,900, while silver fell 26.3% to $85.3.
Gold remains the largest asset by market capitalization despite its recent decline, with a market capitalization of $34.1 trillion. It is followed by the market capitalization of silver, close to $4.8 trillion. The largest company by this criterion remains NVIDIA, with $4.6 trillion, followed by Alphabet with $4.08 trillion.
Ether also took a hit, falling to 56th place and now with a market capitalization just above $300 billion, after the cryptocurrency lost 14.5% of its value in a week. Previously, it was among the top 50 assets by market capitalization, and before the October 10 crash, it was near the top 25.
The second largest cryptocurrency is now worth less than companies such as Caterpillar, Inditex, Coca-Cola and Cisco.
