It has been another disappointing 24 hours of trade for the crypto market with declines being seen across the board again this morning.
This has seen the market lose a further 1% of its value over the period to US$208.5 billion according to Coin Market Cap.
Why are cryptocurrencies falling?
A report by Reuters on crypto theft certainly wouldn't have been great for trader sentiment.
According to the report, financial research firm Autonomous NEXT and Crypto Aware, estimates that 15% of cryptocurrencies have been stolen between 2012 and the first half of 2018.
This year has been particularly bad, with the research estimating that over US$800 million was stolen in just the first half of 2018.
However, these estimates are based on reported cases and experts believe that a significant amount of theft goes unreported. Autonomous NEXT's Lex Sokolin suspects that as much as 85% of crypto crimes go unreported.
I believe stories such as these demonstrate how risky the market can be and are very off-putting for would-be traders.
And while Fidelity has attempted to tackle this with the launch of its custody service this week, at this stage it is only for institutional investors. So, I can't say I'm surprised that trading volumes have been on the decline over recent months.
Unfortunately, until security issues are dealt with and price manipulation concerns are eased, I can't see Bitcoin and its peers moving notably higher. But time will tell.
In the meantime, here is the state of play on the market this morning compared to 24 hours ago:
The Bitcoin (BTC) price is down 0.6% to US$6,495.81. This leaves Bitcoin with a market capitalisation of just under US$112.6 billion.
The Ethereum (ETH) price has fallen 1.5% to US$203.60, reducing ETH's market capitalisation to US$20.9 billion.
The Ripple (XRP) price has tumbled 2.7% to 45.44 U.S. cents. This leaves the alt coin with a market capitalisation of just under US$18.2 billion.
The Bitcoin Cash (BCH) price is 2.5% lower to US$436.34, reducing the Bitcoin spin off's market capitalisation to US$7.6 billion.
The EOS (EOS) price is down 0.5% to US$5.37. EOS now has a market capitalisation of just under US$4.9 billion.
Outside the top five things were equally disappointing. Stellar (XLM) is down 1.6%, Litecoin (LTC) has fallen 1.9%, Cardano (ADA) is off 2.9%, and Monero (XMR) is 2.2% lower. The only coin in the top ten in positive territory is the controversial Tether (USDT), which is up 1.2%.
