Bitcoin price plunges below $60,000 less than 24 hours before halving

Bitcoin halving is less than a day away, but prices of major cryptocurrencies are not showing much strength ahead of the fourth-year event. Bitcoin prices fell below $60,000 late Thursday for the first time since late February, falling as low as $59,573 on cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase.

The latest decline extended Bitcoin’s recent losing streak, pushing its weekly decline to nearly 14%. Bitcoin price is currently down 18% since hitting an all-time high of $73,737 just over a month ago.

After a sharp decline, the price of Bitcoin has rebounded slightly, currently at $60,945. It’s still down more than 1% over the past day, but it plummeted from over $63,000 to under $60,000 in less than two hours.

Thursday’s decline also coincides with another geopolitical conflict. Explosions have been reported near military bases in Iran in the past hour, according to news outlets. A U.S. official said: CNN Israel attacked Iran.

Details were not yet known at press time, but the reported conflict follows missile and drone attacks launched by Iran against Israel last Saturday. Cryptocurrency prices also plummeted due to last weekend’s events.

Other top coins such as Ethereum and Solana have also fallen significantly over the past few hours but are starting to bounce back.

Any further downside could dampen excitement over Friday’s Bitcoin halving (occurs roughly every four years), an event in which BTC rewards to miners are cut in half. These movements are usually associated with an eventual rise in the price of Bitcoin due to supply shortages.