Defying the expectations of many investors, the bitcoin price did not reach $5,000 on Tuesday. However, bitcoin remains in position for a breakout, and the general expectation is that the question is not if bitcoin will reach $5,000 — but when. Wednesday brought a minor recovery to the altcoin markets, enabling them to reclaim about $1.5 billion of the combined market cap they had shed earlier this week.
The total cryptocurrency market cap entered the day at $152.6 billion. It rose past $155 billion on Tuesday evening but began to pull back leading into Wednesday morning. At present, the combined value of all cryptocurrencies is $154.9 billion — a 24-hour gain of $2.3 billion.
Bitcoin Price Awaits History
On Tuesday, Blockchain Capital’s Spencer Bogart had tweeted that it “feels like a $5k kinda day.” However, he followed this up by saying that the fact that it “feels” like it “means it probably won’t be,” because “the honey badger prefers sneak attacks.”
Initially, it appeared the bitcoin price had the momentum to burst through the $5,000 barrier. After beginning the day just slightly below $4,800, the bitcoin price leaped above $4,900 on Wednesday evening at about 17:00 UTC, eventually rising as high as $4,922. At this point, the bitcoin price needed just a 1.6% increase to extend past $5,000.
Unfortunately, Bogart’s latter prediction was correct. The rally stalled, and bitcoin fell back toward the $4,800 support level and is now trading at a global average of $4,830. This translates into a market cap of $80.3 billion.
Ethereum Price Holds at $300
The ethereum price continued to tread water at the $300 mark on Wednesday as it awaits the official release of Byzantium, the first phase of the network’s next major protocol upgrade. Ethereum maintains a market cap of $28.5 billion.
Altcoins Eye Minor Increase
The altcoin markets made positive movement on Wednesday, although those advances were slight and could be easily reversed.
The ripple price led the recovery with a 5% increase to $0.264. This raised its market cap to $10.2 billion. Bitcoin cash, meanwhile dipped 4% and is now trading at $317. Bitcoin cash currently has a market cap nearly $5 billion smaller than that of ripple.
The litecoin price increased about 1%, while dash returned a 2% gain to bring its price back to $292. NEM and monero held steady at their previous levels, and eighth-ranked NEO increased 3% to $31.
Aside from bitcoin cash, IOTA was the only top 10 cryptocurrency to experience a 24-hour decline. The IOTA price fell about 1% and maintains a $120 million market cap edge on 11th-ranked bitconnect.