Bitcoin Slumps Towards $63K as Speculation About Biden Dropout Intensifies

Cryptocurrency markets were lower again on Wednesday as the slide in U.S. stock prices continued and speculation about the presidential race increased.

BTC fell from $65,000 to $63,500 in just two hours during mid-morning trading hours in the US, and is down 1.7% over the past 24 hours. Second-largest cryptocurrency ether {{ETH}} and Solana’s native token {{SOL}} have held up slightly better, but are also down more than 1%.

Smaller digital assets fell further, pushing the broader market benchmark Coindesk 20 Index (CD20) down 2.8%. Leading the decline were 5%-6% declines for Ripple’s XRP {{XRP}}, Polkadot’s DOT {{DOT}}, Cardano’s {{ADA}} and Polygon’s token {{MATIC}}.

CoinDesk 20 components (CoinDesk)

The price action came after U.S. stocks failed to recover from big declines earlier this week, with the tech-heavy Nasdaq 100 index falling 1% and the broad-based S&P 500 index falling 0.7%.

Uncertainty surrounding the US presidential election has risen markedly in recent hours following reports that senior party figures were mounting pressure on President Biden not to seek re-election.

Traders on crypto-based prediction market Polymarket are now seeing Biden’s chances of dropping out rise to 80%, up from 40% a day earlier. Meanwhile, Vice President Kamala Harris’ chances of becoming the Democratic nominee for the presidency have risen to 63%, up from 15% a day earlier.

Meanwhile, Republican Party candidate Donald Trump’s chances of winning in Polymarket have dropped to 65 percent from a high of 70 percent after he survived an assassination attempt last weekend.

The recovery in cryptocurrency prices over the past week has been supported by investors’ belief that Trump’s chances of winning the election have increased, along with a much more crypto-friendly administration in the US.