What is going on with the bitcoin markets right now?

Elvira Sojli: The past year and month have been among the worst for the bitcoin markets. Most of the decline in their value occurred in the past two months, and their value has fallen.

Not just the cryptocurrency markets have seen this decline (although it is more pronounced here). The equities market as a whole, where the SP500 stock market index has dropped 23% in the year to date, is what they are currently paying attention to. The global rise in interest rates, which raises the cost of money, is having an impact on all markets.

A $1 trillion market no longer exists. The overall market value for cryptocurrencies has fallen to $870 billion in just a few short days, in a dramatic series of events. FTX's liquidity problems are at the root of the sell-off. The Bahamas-based 'too large, too fail' exchange is to blame for the most recent decline in the industry.

Growing worries about FTX alleged insolvency have been expressed over the past few days. The native token of FTX continues to decline in value. Over the last five days, the FTX token has fallen by more than 80%.

A rush of withdrawals threatened to bring FTX down, and in a quick series of events that mostly took place on Twitter, FTX attempted to sell a sizable portion of its running business to rival Binance.

But as soon as Binance announced its rescue plan—an acquisition—the business laid off employees.

Changpeng 'CZ' Zhao, CEO of Binance, tweeted on November 9 a day after announcing a bailout plan, “We have decided that we will not pursue the possible acquisition of FTX.com due to corporate due diligence as well as the latest news reports alleging mishandled client cash and purported U.S. government investigations.”