Investing.com - A six-day rally in bitcoin ran out of steam on Tuesday with the largest alt coin by market cap unable to hold on to the $12,000 handle as stabilization in other financial markets may have dented a further run.
Bitcoin, the largest alt coin by market cap, slipped 0.46% to $11,810.70 by 1:28 PM ET (18:17 GMT). Beginning at the end of July around $9,500, the digital currency reached as high as $12,291.90 in a nonstop rally before changing direction early Tuesday.
Although that upward move began before U.S. President Donald Trump threatened to impose a new round of tariffs on China, the escalation in the Sino-U.S. trade dispute wreaked havoc on global stocks with the latest bout in the bilateral battle sending the Dow to its worst daily performance of the year on Monday.
“The geopolitical situation in the world has now deteriorated so much that fears around stock indices may provoke investors to move funds even into such volatile assets as bitcoin in an attempt to wait out the storm in traditional financial markets,” Alexander Kuptsikevich, analyst at FXPro, said in a note.
With stock markets showing gains Tuesday, investors in bitcoin may also have found an excuse for a pause.
Kuptsikevich did indicate, however, that other altcoins seemed reluctant to join in the bitcoin rally and pointed to what he considered the main event in the sector: the halving of litecoin, that saw the miner reward reduced to 12.5 LTC from the previous 25.
Speculated to be a bullish impetus for digital currencies, the pre-planned halving of rewards is argued to help reduce the supply of the altcoin in question.
Kuptsikevich noted that bullish impulse in litecoin did not last long.
“Halving of the fifth largest cryptocurrency in terms of capitalization has not brought the expected dividends so far,” he said. “Even against the backdrop of bitcoin growth, LTC still does not even reach $100.”
Litecoin last traded down 2.8% to $94.426 by 11:17 AM ET (15:17 GMT).
Total cryptocurrency market capitalization decreased to $309.06 billion, compared to $312.66 billion a day earlier.
In other individual crypto trades, Ethereum dipped 2% to $229.48, XRP fell 3.8% to $0.31516, while Bitcoin Cash dropped 2.8% to $343.60.