Bitcoin price drops $200 on UPbit exchange theft

The price of bitcoin has fallen by $200 in one hour following news that South Korea's largest crypto exchange, UPbit, lost 340,000 ether (ETH), worth $51.3 million. One bitcoin is now worth $7,008, down 2.3% in the last 24 hours.

To put it in context, the price of bitcoin had been on a downward trajectory for the last month, until November 25 where it broke down to $6,600. Then it seemed to recover somewhat, breaking back above the $7,000 mark, reaching highs of $7,300.

The theft at UPbit reportedly happened at 4:00 UTC. Bitcoin continued to trade sideways until 8:00 UTC—when reports of the hack began spreading more widely—where it rose to $7,270 before suddenly crashing downwards. It fell to a low of $6,980 before rising back to the $7,000 mark.

At the same time, many other cryptocurrencies are also in the red, with ether down by 1.3% and bitcoin sv down 3.6%. In contrast, the price of tron is up 5.1%.