(Bloomberg) -- Bitcoin struggled to hold above the closely-watched $20,000 level, extending a period of marked volatility that saw huge weekend swings.
The largest cryptocurrency fell as much as 4.8% to $19,618 on Monday in Asia and was trading at $20,014 as of 11:09 a.m. in Tokyo. Ether at one point shed 6.6% but held above $1,000. Solana, Cardano and Dogecoin were in the red.
Bitcoin sank almost 15% on Saturday but then vaulted back above $20,000 with a 16% surge on Sunday. The pattern of swings suggest investor sentiment remains highly fragile as the Federal Reserve goes full-throttle to fight inflation with interest-rate hikes that drain liquidity from markets.
“Expect more pockets of forced selling of Bitcoin and Ether as the market figures out who is swimming naked,” Arthur Hayes, co-founder of crypto exchange BitMEX, said on Twitter.
He said he doesn’t know if the selling is over but “for those skilled knife-catchers, there may yet be additional opportunities to buy coin from those who must whack every bid no matter the price.”
Bitcoin is down about 57% since the start of the year, with many other tokens down even more.
Developments like lender Celsius freezing withdrawals and decentralized-finance applications taking unprecedented measures to protect themselves against cascading liquidations have injected further uncertainty into the industry.