Bitcoin tanks below $9,000 under heavy selling pressure

After surging through the $8,000 boundary yesterday, and even breaking the $9,000 resistance this morning, the price of Bitcoin (BTC) has dropped back down. It has fallen $600 in a matter of hours, to reach its current value of $8,700.

The price is fluctuating wildly but the cryptocurrency is still up around eight percent in the last 24 hours.

Since yesterday, Bitcoin has pumped from a low of $7,800 up to a peak of $9,420 earlier this morning—representing a spike of 20.7% from trough to peak. During this time, Bitcoin trading volumes on popular exchanges skyrocketed, more than doubling yesterday's values to reach $72 billion in BTC changing hands each day today—and still growing.

This sudden surge in activity saw at least one popular cryptocurrency exchange crash under the load, while open interest in Bitcoin futures at CME has more than tripled since the start of the month, indicating a renewed interest in the market.

Overall, this growth has seen Bitcoin recover all of the value lost as a result of the crash in the first half of March. The cryptocurrency is now up more than 22% for the year, making it one of the best performing financial instruments so far in 2020. In comparison, popular US stock indices the S&P 500 and Dow Jones are still down 9.8% and 14.7% YTD, while the gold spot price is up 13.2%.

It isn't just Bitcoin that's cooling off today. Practically every major cryptocurrency has retracted after seeing strong bullish momentum yesterday. Now, Ethereum (ETH) has fallen back to $206.90 and is now down 0.8% in the last day, while XRP is down 2.1% in the last 24 hours.

Some were already starting to predict that the stars had aligned for the Bitcoin halving—but there's all to play for.