Cryptocurrency market sees little respite after a bumpy start of the year

• The market slipped to the lowest of two weeks.
• Ethereum lost the second place in crypto rating.
• The industry is haunted by security issues and regulatory concerns.

Cryptocurrency market shed nearly $17B on its value in one week as bears returned to their trading desks after Christmas and New Year holidays. The total capitalization of all assets in circulation dropped from $138B to $118B at the time of writing. 

All major coins, including Bitcoin, Ethereum and XRP, are back at their late-December levels as the new year started with the old concerns about security and regulation. 

Bitcoin lost about 15% on a weekly basis and tested lows under $3,500. Currently, BTC/USD is changing hands at $3,520 with a downward bias. While the price has been rangebound during early Asian hours, after a collapse on Sunday, the sell-off may be resumed once the European and US traders join the game. 

Meanwhile, Bitcoin is not the worst performing coin out of top-20. Both Ethereum and Bitcoin Cash lost over 24% of their respective value, IOTA is down 23%, Litecoin is trading 21% lower than a week before; EOS, Ethereum Classic, and Monero are all down 19%. 

It is worth noting, that Ethereum is Number Three again. It was surpassed by XRP, which is now rated as the second largest coin with a market capitalization of $13.2B against Ethereum's $12.3B. XRP's weekly losses amounted to 12.3% and took the coin to $0.3236 level by the time of writing. 

The key cryptocurrency industry developments

Europe may introduce a unified regulation for digital assets as the European Commision suggested that certain cryptocurrencies may be classified as financial instruments and covered by the existing financial regulation. This is just another attempt to take the industry under control and prevent violation of anti-money laundering laws and other corrupt practices.

A cryptocurrency investment fund Bitwise wants to launch its own Bitcoin ETF backed by Bitcoins physically held with a third-party custodian. The company filed an application with SEC, though it is not clear whether the regulator is going to approve it.

Ethereum Classic is plagued by 51% attack. Moreover, users of a forecasting platform Augur make bets on its delisting from Coinbase. 

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