--- title: "If You Bought Bitcoin in December 2017, You Have Now Lost Money" description: "The value of Bitcoin has slid significantly, and is now hovering at a two-year low, following the news of Binance offering to bail out FTX." date: "2022-11-09" modified: "2022-11-09" authors: - name: "Victor Tangermann" job_title: "Senior Editor" link: "https://futurism.com/authors/victor" url: "https://futurism.com/the-byte/bitcoin-2017-now-lost-money" categories: - "Bitcoin" - "Blockchain" - "Cryptocurrency" - "Future Society" tags: - "bitcoin" - "cryptocurrencies" - "the digest" --- # If You Bought Bitcoin in December 2017, You Have Now Lost Money ![The value of Bitcoin has slid significantly, and is now hovering at a two-year low, following the news of Binance offering to bail out FTX.]() *\Image: Futurism\* ## Nosedive The values of major cryptocurrencies are in a nosedive right now. Bitcoin has slid nearly ten percent over the past 24 hours, now hovering around $17,000 and marking a two-year low that bookends a [rotten year]() for cryptocurrencies as a whole. It's a stunning drop of historic proportions. In fact, if you bought Bitcoin in December 2017 — when the token hit its first major spike, briefly reaching nearly $20,000 in value — you're now *down* on your investment. And that's without getting into folks who bought it when it was worth even more. ## Cryptos Crash Other tokens such as Ether are [also in free fall right now](), signifying a major downturn. Investors are likely responding to the news that Binance, the largest exchange by trading volume, has [offered to bail out]() rival exchange FTX, which had imploded in a matter of days — while [wiping out 94 percent]() of billionaire CEO Sam Bankman-Fried's net worth. The news has clearly rattled the entire cryptocurrency industry. "It's scary to think that FTX, which is one of the largest crypto exchanges in the world, was bitten by liquidity concerns and Binance, their biggest rival, is coming to their rescue," Dan Raju, CEO of financial services provider Tradier, [told *Reuters*](). The sudden news of an impending acquisition drew the attention from antitrust experts as well, spurring fears of impending regulation amongst investors. "This \[deal is\] a textbook horizontal merger of the sort that the antitrust laws in the US and internationally are meant to address," Brandon Kressin, a crypto-focused attorney at Kressin Law Group, [told *CoinDesk*](). "I think that the apparent hope they have that excluding the U.S. exchanges from the deal is going to save their deal from antitrust scrutiny is very short sighted." ## Deep Plunge While cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin or Ether rallied on Tuesday directly following the news, their values then started falling again, wiping out those gains in a matter of hours. FTX's token FTT unsurprisingly has also been dealt a devastating blow, [losing roughly 80 per**ce**nt]() of its value since Monday. And the plunge is still ongoing as of Wednesday morning, with major tokens stumbling even further, suggesting a prolonged period of uncertainty. All the chaos underlines the tech's seemingly inherent volatility — and the fact that even holding on to your investments for years isn't always guaranteed to pay off. **READ MORE:** [Bitcoin, Ether, Solana and FTX Token Prices Fall Further]() \[*The Wall Street Journal*\] **More on FTX:** *[Crypto Billionaire Loses 94 Percent of His Wealth in One Day]()* ## Author I've been at Futurism since 2017, where my role has evolved to encompass design, writing, and increasingly editing. I've always been fascinated by space exploration and advanced transportation, which I've leaned into by interviewing luminaries in those fields while closely following the dimensions of policy and regulation that allow next-generation projects to succeed -- or, sometimes, to fail. I'm also keenly interested in the effects of generative AI on society, policies, and democratic institutions, as well as clean energy, physics and biology, and the vagaries of tech leadership. My work for Futurism has been cited by publications including Ars Technica, Gizmodo, PC Magazine, Jalopnik, Fox News, and the New York Post. I spent my childhood living in locations including Manila, the Philippines, and Geneva, Switzerland, attended McGill University, and now live in Toronto, Canada. Before Futurism I worked at AskMen and a small photography studio. In my free time, I'm an avid gardener, foodie, and craft beer lover, as well as a maker of artisanal hot pepper sauces. I have a magnificent dog named Freida. ### Author social links [Bluesky]()