Bitcoin Falls to $60K amid a Sharp Drop in Hash Rate and Turkey's Crypto Payment Ban

After setting a new all-time high of $64,895 on April 14, Bitcoin fell to $60,811 for the first time today due to the decline in hash power of Chinese mining pools and the ban on cryptocurrency payments proposed by the Turkish government.

Today, the Central Bank of Turkey proposed a new regulation banning the use of cryptocurrency and crypto assets to purchase goods and services - on the grounds of possible damage and major “irreparable” risks in transactions.

Amid Turkey's proposal, China also suffered a hit in a major crypto mining region. China accounts for 65.08% of the global average monthly hash rate for Bitcoin. The Xinjiang region contributes the most to the average monthly hash rate, sometimes making up as much as 35.76% of it.

However, due to the sudden flood in northwestern Xinjiang on April 11, a total of 21 coal miners working in the coal mine was trapped.

The incident caused the Xinjiang region of China to restart all aspects of security inspections. The power outage impacting security checks greatly affected the hash rate of many of China's top Bitcoin mining pools, leading to a decline in processing power.

Source: Cambridge Bitcoin Electricity Consumption Index

Under this circumstance, the hashing power of Chinese mining pools dropped sharply.

According to related reports, Antpool crashed by 24.5%, Binance Pool by 20%, BTC.com by 18.9%, and Poolin plummeted by 33%.

Bitcoin (BTC) subsequently turned from its previous stable state of $63K and reverted to a downward trend. At the time of writing, Bitcoin is trading at $60,833.

Bitcoin Price Analysis

Source: BTC/USD 4-Hour via TradingView

The bearish MACD index indicates that the bears are currently dominating the market. The Relative Strength Index reversed its direction towards overselling zone, which suggests that Bitcoin will experience a pullback.

The previous high of $61,781 is a critical support point. If the bulls can push the BTC's closing price above $61,781, then the bullish momentum may prompt BTC to reach a new all-time high.

Conversely, a surge in the number of sell orders will push BTC below the $60,000 support level and may trigger a more severe correction to $58,000.