Crypto winter sees $700-billion dent in market capital since start of 2022

The year 2022 seems to have had a lukewarm start for for cryptocurrencies, with regular value erosions, and markets plummeting in the red every other day. Data from CoinGecko suggests that nearly $700 billion have been wiped out of the markets since the start of this year.

Adding to the "crypto-winter" jitters is the sharp drop crypto market capitalisation, which currently stands at $1.62 trillion, down significantly from its all-time high of $3.1 trillion in November 2021 and even from $2.3 trillion at the start of 2022. However, it is not uncommon for the crypto market to experience such drastic, major drawdowns and volatilities.

Back in April 2013, for instance, the price of bitcoin touched almost $230 from trading at a measly $13 in January. And just days later, it fell again, to just $68. Even during 2018, the crypto market cap tumbled to just $130 billion in December from almost $850 billion in January.

Ever since the start of the year, the bitcoin has fallen 16.5 percent within seven days, while Ethereum is posting a 23 percent loss and Solana is down 33 percent.

These numbers are, however, insignificant in comparison to the jitters the crypto market experienced during 2017-2018, also called the "crypto winters". On December 15, 2017, bitcoin surged to $19,497, sharply dropping to just $13,831 six days later.

It continued to fall below $7,000 in February 2018, trading at just $6,359 in November 2018 and was ultimately priced at under $3,300 the very next month.

There was a time when bitcoin saw its value fall about 99.9 percent in a single day. This was back in 2014, when the news of bitcoin, then majorly traded on the now-defunct Mt Goxx exchange saw a flash-crash, whereby a hack allowed bitcoin to be sold for just a penny!