Bitcoin (CRYPTO: BTC) fell below the key $30,000 mark in the early hours of Tuesday as the New Jersey-based privately held lending platform BlockFi became the latest to face regulatory pressures.
What Happened: The apex coin traded 6.48% lower at $29,699.02 over 24 hours at press time. BTC is down 10.38% for the week.
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The fall in BTC came among a wider decline seen in cryptocurrencies whose collective market capitalization fell 7.04% to $1.2 trillion at press time.
On Monday, BlockFi received an order from the New Jersey Bureau of Securities to suspend applications for new interest accounts in the state, as per a tweet from BlockFi CEO Zac Prince, first seen on The Block.
Late Monday evening BlockFi received an order from the New Jersey Bureau of Securities regarding BlockFi Interest Account (BIA) operations in the State of New Jersey.
— Zac Prince (@BlockFiZac) July 20, 2021
See Also: BlockFi Review
(thread)
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BTC has yielded 1.74% since the year began. The cryptocurrency has declined 54.25% since touching an all-time high of $64,863.10 in April.
Why It Matters: Prince said that BlockFi is engaging with the regulators to help them understand the company’s products.
See Also: Is Now A Good Time To Buy Ethereum?
“BIA [BlockFi Interest Account] is not a security, and we therefore disagree with the action by the New Jersey Bureau of Securities,” said the executive on Twitter.
Last month, regulators in Canada’s British Columbia had published a statement of allegations against Binance, one of the largest cryptocurrency exchanges in the world.
The Changpeng Zhao-led exchange was ordered by United Kingdom regulators to stop activities in the country.
Bitcoin is facing increased regulatory scrutiny in China, Europe, and West Africa, as per a CoinDesk report.