By Dhirendra Tripathi
Investing.com – The world of cryptocurrencies and blockchain is staging a recovery after Wednesday left it badly bruised.
Bitcoin (BitfinexUSD), the crypto with the largest market cap, was back above $42,000, bouncing back from the $30,000 depth it sank to a day earlier.
Ethereum ETH/USD and Dogecoin DOGE/USD, both of which lost more than a fourth of their value in the carnage, were also attempting to erase their losses, with the latter managing to recoup all of it.
Coinbase (NASDAQ:COIN) was up 3%, still some way off from a full recovery after a near 6% erosion Wednesday. MicroStrategy (NASDAQ:MSTR), a Bitcoin investor, was up 5%.
Shares of companies linked to blockchain technology, the basis of cryptos, were also up. Riot Blockchain (NASDAQ:RIOT) and Marathon Digital (NASDAQ:MARA) were each up 7% to 8%.
A 30% to 40% erosion in crypto values is not unusual but coming as it did amid a swirling debate around their stability, use as a store of value and use by criminals left many questioning their continued viability.
There had been much unease in the last few days over Tesla (NASDAQ:TSLA) CEO Elon Musk’s sudden shifting of allegiance to Dogecoin from Bitcoin, the latter also being the most popular crypto.
With China announcing a clampdown on crypto transactions Wednesday, all hell broke loose and crypto prices plunged, causing much amusement among their skeptics who question their value as a hedge against inflation and their viability against sovereign currencies.
That a CEO’s tweets can cause wild swings in their value has also not helped the cause of the crypto backers.
But Thursday’s comeback will give a huge sigh of relief to its supporters as they seek greater acceptance for the cryptos.