Bitcoin Falls To $60,000 As Zcash Bug Rocks Crypto (coindesk.com) 47
Bitcoin briefly fell below $60,000 on Friday, "extending its weekly loss to nearly 20% and threatening to fall below $59,000," reports CoinDesk. Crypto was also hit by a 40%-plus plunge in Zcash after Shielded Labs disclosed a years-old bug that could have allowed undetected counterfeit ZEC creation. From the report: Now, with stocks in plunge mode -- the Nasdaq down nearly 4% on Friday -- bitcoin finds itself perfectly correlated. "Short term, Bitcoin feels like swallowing broken glass," wrote Jeff Swanson Friday. "The chart goes up. It goes down. It makes grown men cry into their Robinhood accounts and CNBC anchors smugly declare the funeral, for the eleventh time." "Here's what uncomfortable people don't understand: the discomfort is the yield. Every paper-handed panic seller is handing their future to someone with a longer time horizon and a colder storage device."
[...] Earlier, Shielded Labs, a nonprofit developer on the privacy token system, disclosed a critical vulnerability in Zcash's (ZEC) Orchard privacy pool that could have threatened the integrity of the token's supply. The vulnerability, if exploited, could have allowed an attacker to create an unlimited number of counterfeit ZEC tokens, completely undetected. "Think of it as someone secretly gaining access to the Federal Reserve's dollar printing press, except in this case, even the Fed wouldn't be able to tell these extra dollars were printed," wrote Omkar Godbole. Importantly, the vulnerability was discovered with help from Anthropic's recently released Opus 4.8 AI model, raising difficult questions for the entire crypto industry. More to come on that. ZEC is now down 42% over the past 24 hours. On Wednesday, the Zcash Foundation said: "The vulnerability was caught before any known exploitation occurred. There is no evidence of unauthorized value creation. Zcash's turnstile mechanism (which tracks the total ZEC balance across all value pools) confirmed that the total supply remained intact throughout. User privacy was not affected. Sapling and transparent transactions continued operating normally throughout the incident."
[...] Earlier, Shielded Labs, a nonprofit developer on the privacy token system, disclosed a critical vulnerability in Zcash's (ZEC) Orchard privacy pool that could have threatened the integrity of the token's supply. The vulnerability, if exploited, could have allowed an attacker to create an unlimited number of counterfeit ZEC tokens, completely undetected. "Think of it as someone secretly gaining access to the Federal Reserve's dollar printing press, except in this case, even the Fed wouldn't be able to tell these extra dollars were printed," wrote Omkar Godbole. Importantly, the vulnerability was discovered with help from Anthropic's recently released Opus 4.8 AI model, raising difficult questions for the entire crypto industry. More to come on that. ZEC is now down 42% over the past 24 hours. On Wednesday, the Zcash Foundation said: "The vulnerability was caught before any known exploitation occurred. There is no evidence of unauthorized value creation. Zcash's turnstile mechanism (which tracks the total ZEC balance across all value pools) confirmed that the total supply remained intact throughout. User privacy was not affected. Sapling and transparent transactions continued operating normally throughout the incident."
A 50% correction is mild for bitcoin ... (Score:3)
Re: (Score:1)
It was at over. 120k at its peak two or two and a half years ago at the start of the current trump term. Back during the last big push to convince people to buy crypto. It has not stoped falling since. The big investors obviously are pulling their money out to maybe buy the IPO's coming up. This after convincing the average investors to buy buy buy...... So all reason says it has a lot more to fall. Can a consistent decline of 60% over two and a half years with no signs of leveling out really be called a c
Re: (Score:3)
It was at over. 120k at its peak two or two and a half years ago at the start of the current trump term. Back during the last big push to convince people to buy crypto. It has not stoped falling since. The big investors obviously are pulling their money out to maybe buy the IPO's coming up. This after convincing the average investors to buy buy buy...... So all reason says it has a lot more to fall. Can a consistent decline of 60% over two and a half years with no signs of leveling out really be called a correction ?
The 75% corrections are not as fast as the hyperbolic rides up. They also tend to be followed by rather long plateaus.
We'll see how well this pattern holds, but it's probably too soon to make a call. One thing is very different from those past corrections. More Wall Streeters are involved and more non-technical people are involved. However the more diverse ownership shares the same motivations, then and now, high risk / high reward speculation. Maybe there will be fewer HODL advocates as a result.
Re:A 50% correction is mild for bitcoin ... (Score:5, Informative)
Then crypto is meant to be a currency.
That is just the aspiration of many tech enthusiasts.
I am sure most people who invested over the last 3 years did not expect their stable currency trade for crypto to be worth 1/2 or less than what they went in for.
No one imagined it is stable. Even those who buy/sell goods/services with bitcoin tend not to hold it. Buy and transfer immediately, receive and sell immediately, it avoids the volatility risk. As mentioned earlier, "investors" tend to know it is high risk/reward, very speculative.
Some people at the top of this pyramid scheme ...
It's not a pyramid scheme. It's a "greater fool" scheme. Pyramid involves some sort of interest or dividends, greater fool involves increasing prices.
But they didn't plan for this severe of a systematic collapse.
75-80% drops are not systematic collapses for bitcoin, its a run of the mill post-run up correction.
Re: (Score:2, Funny)
Even those who buy/sell goods/services with bitcoin tend not to hold it. Buy and transfer immediately, receive and sell immediately, it avoids the volatility risk.
Idiots. Just use money. Oh, you wanted to do illegal shit. Carry on.
Re: (Score:2)
No one imagined it is stable. Even those who buy/sell goods/services with bitcoin tend not to hold it. Buy and transfer immediately, receive and sell immediately, it avoids the volatility risk. As mentioned earlier, "investors" tend to know it is high risk/reward, very speculative.
I suppose some idjits thought it was stable. There are always people seemingly asking to be taken to the cleaners.
Crypto should be treated like gold, investment-wise, only more random.
Gold has salvage value, unlike crypto (Score:2)
Crypto should be treated like gold, investment-wise, only more random.
Gold has an industrial salvage value. Crypto does not, unless you count selling the heat sinks on mining equipment as scrap metal.
Re: (Score:2)
Crypto should be treated like gold, investment-wise, only more random.
Gold has an industrial salvage value. Crypto does not, unless you count selling the heat sinks on mining equipment as scrap metal.
Perhaps I did not elucidate well enough. When gold goes on one of its wild rides, people buy it up at ever increasing prices. Then it craters. When Crypto goes on one of its wild rides, people buy it up at ever increasing prices, then it craters.
What is the similarity? A whole lot of dollars vaporize very quickly. And the present day trick of giving out paper certificates in lieu of the actual element, takes gold into a whole new level of irrational behavior, IMO.
Yes indeed, gold has an intrinsic valu
no miners equals no bitcoin (Score:4, Funny)
50% of miners went bankrupt in 2023 and bitcoin came close to systemic failure. Same thing is happening again, miners have collectively lost around $4 billion since April 2024 and are losing around $500 million per month right now.
https://www.scry.llc/2026/02/0... [scry.llc]
.
Re: (Score:2)
Yep. The whole thing is totally irrational on the side of people "investing" money in this. Stupid money on an impressive level. The ones still mining probably hope to recover their costs somehow, but they will probably not manage that. And, obviously, money laundering for crime is still keeping part of crapto working and will continue to do so for a while.
Re: (Score:1)
50% of miners went bankrupt in 2023 and bitcoin came close to systemic failure. Same thing is happening again, miners have collectively lost around $4 billion since April 2024 and are losing around $500 million per month right now.
Mining and trading are two entirely different things. Mining equipment has a very short period of profitability. Even modestly informed miners are aware of this. Unprofitable is also "complicated". Some miners will run at a modest loss expecting later price increases to make them profitable. So the "greater fool" principle can be applied to both traders and miners here. Yes, yes, I know you are thinking why continue to run, just spend the money you would have spent on electricity and buy BTC on an exchange.
I was told this was a good investment (Score:5, Funny)
better than gold...
Re: I was told this was a good investment (Score:4, Informative)
98% of investors don't realize that the bitcoin miners have been losing money for 20 of the past 25 months since the last coin halving. they're spending around $18 billion in energy to mine 165k coins at $70k. Do the math
the miners have been redirected assets away from Bitcoin to AI, the Bitcoin network has been oversaturated since August and doubled saturation rate in May.
https://www.scry.llc/2026/05/2... [scry.llc]
ie. bitcoin is probably dropping 10% of its transactions now.
Re: (Score:2)
Problem is, "AI" is almost as bad and loses something like 80% of all new investments at the moment. That means they would need to increase profits by 10x or so, taking in the mountain id debt they effectively have to become profitable. Yet, for many uses the per-token prices are already far too high. Some "all in on LLMs" software makers find that hiring developers would be cheaper than letting "AI" do things. And that does not even really take the level of review needed or the far worse maintainability of
Re: (Score:2)
the per-token prices are high because they are profitable. The unprofitable part are the flatrates. Just estimate what the per-token price of your last month of ChatGPT chats was and if it is below $20. Then add the free plan people to the mix and you get where they lose the money currently. But the capital they are building are loyal users, who may be worth it when the plans start becoming profitable. The free users will always cost money, but with inference prices going down, the $20 users will eventually
Re: (Score:2)
the per-token prices are high because they are profitable.
And there you told us you do not have a clue at all.No, the per-token pricing is far too low to make them profitable.
Re: (Score:2)
Given that gold was basically never a good investment...
Re: (Score:2)
Given that gold was basically never a good investment...
Gold is a funny one. I have a bit of Gold, Silver, and Platinum. I prefer to hold the bars in my hands. But it is really just something to play with, I'm not concerned if I lose money, because it isn't all that much.
But Gold "investment" is a fear investment, brought out during unsettling events and times, and almost every normal but foolish person uses the buy high, sell low paradigm, and loses money.
Re: (Score:2)
But Gold "investment" is a fear investment, brought out during unsettling events and times, and almost every normal but foolish person uses the buy high, sell low paradigm, and loses money.
Exactly. The problem is that Gold, while having intrinsic value for industrial application, is typically about 2x overvalued for that. Hence while you will not lose it all, you may lose up to 50% of it.
One day it started to fall, and didn't stop (Score:4, Insightful)
The old market hypothesis used to be called the "efficient market hypothesis", positing that somehow the collective wisdom of the crowds would create the perfect market. The new market hypothesis carried by economists is the "inelastic market hypothesis", that the stock/bond/crypto/etc. market is just a supply and demand of how much money people have that they're willing to currently bet on making even more future money. When people run out of extra money they're willing to put in, the market can start going down without stopping until large portions become worthless and shutter.
Re:One day it started to fall, and didn't stop (Score:4, Informative)
With top tier governments like the state of Texas, El Salvador, and even the US going all in with cryptocurrencies
You mean the top tier governments who bought near the top? The ones who, as the Texas Comptroller said, were buying bitcoin "that strengthens the state’s balance sheet". [texastribune.org]
They're already down over 30%. Not sure that's considered "strengthening" the balance sheet.
Re:One day it started to fall, and didn't stop (Score:4, Insightful)
Which they were all told, very loudly, at the time they were making their purchases.
It's almost like people that don't know what the hell they're doing, might also not listen to people who actually do know what they're doing. Everyone except these idiots knew this was a play to turn government balance sheets into bagholders for well-assetted individuals.
Delusional Statement (Score:4, Funny)
Every paper-handed panic seller is handing their future to someone with a longer time horizon and a colder storage device.
As long as it is permanently unused, it's worth infinite money. That is how currency works, I guess.
Re: (Score:3)
> Every paper-handed panic seller is handing their future to someone with a longer time horizon and a colder storage device
Crypto Religion, just hang on and believe
Re: (Score:2)
That statement was AI Slop, there is no reason to put any weight behind it whatsoever.
Obvious solution ... (Score:2)
The vulnerability, if exploited, could have allowed an attacker to create an unlimited number of counterfeit ZEC tokens, completely undetected.
Each token needs a serial number so fake ones can be detected. ;-)
Re: (Score:1)
The vulnerability, if exploited, could have allowed an attacker to create an unlimited number of counterfeit ZEC tokens, completely undetected.
Each token needs a serial number so fake ones can be detected. ;-)
Why can't they just attach each one to a paper certificate that already has a serial number? ...
New shiny (Score:2)
It's worth 0 (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
One property of crypto is if it goes to 0 it will never come back, think about that for a while.
Re: (Score:2)
Yes. Because the "trading" is so expensive and so slow that once it drops below a certain level, it stops working permanently. Unlike, say, penny-stocks.
Re: (Score:3)
That's the same for paper money. Once it is a 0 I can collect all of it for free. Why should then anyone pay me for it afterward? Once it is 0, there is no reason for someone to bid more than 0.
Re: (Score:2)
Okay, you do it. Go get rid of all the Bitcoin. Also why are people still repeating the lie that crypto is only for money laundering, when that has repeatedly been shown to be false?
Re: It's worth 0 (Score:2)
Re: It's worth 0 (Score:2)
Parent has a good point. Crypto is good for things other than money laundering. It is also good for tax evasion and as a form of gambling.
Folks cashing out (Score:3)
Jeff Swanson doesn't understand math (Score:2)
the only reason bitcoin still works was because Blackrock propped up bankrupt miners in 2023 so they could ETF the hell out of it. Miners losing money since the coin halving in April 20w4 and the next coin halving will accelerate losses exponentially. the math is pretty simple...
annual income = # of coins x price per coin
annual energy cost = terawatts used x cost per terawatt.
Annual Coin Income: $77k x 165k coins = $12.7 billion
Annual Energy Cost: 169 terawatts @ $0.105 per kwatt = $17.7 billion
Annual Net
Re: (Score:2)
Interesting. Lets see how long it will take for all the small-time stupid money to get a clue and cause it to crash.
When it was at 120k... (Score:2)
...a lot of people online were saying there was an upcoming event called The Halvening that would change everything.
I guess this is it?
That crap is still around? (Score:2)
Well, I guess we would need to get rid of the ample idiot population in the human race to eliminate crapto. And so the crime financing and money-laundering continues.
Re: (Score:2)
I have known that Bitcoin was a worthless, bubble-driven fad for 17 years. I look forward to being proven right this time.
Re: (Score:2)
It is not large enough to collapse fast. And criminal use (mostly from ransomware and money hiding) has kept it propped up for a long time now.
pimping (Score:2)
Pimping the ride