By 
Bitcoin
BTCUSD,
+3.60%
reached a monthly high on Tuesday as better-than-expected inflation data was released.
Bitcoin was trading at just over $17,500 on Tuesday morning, a price the digital asset has not hit since November 10 — other cryptocurrencies like ether
ETHUSD,
+4.02%,
dogecoin
DOGEUSD,
+2.42%,
Cardano
ADAUSD,
+2.12%
and Solana
SOLUSD,
+3.53%
also jumped on Tuesday amid signs that inflation is cooling.
The annual rate of inflation in November fell to 7.1 % from 7.7% in the prior month, the lowest level since the end of 2021 — inflation peaked at 9.1% in June 2022.
Prices for bitcoin peaked at $68,789 in November 2021, according to Coinbase
COIN,
-1.60%.
The total market cap for all crypto was just under $3 trillion in 2021, but is now around $850 billion.
See also: Athletes like Tom Brady and Odell Beckham took crypto as compensation. As of now, that’s backfiring.
This is a tumultuous time for the crypto industry as the SEC has officially charged Sam Bankman-Fried with defrauding investors in the now-bankrupt FTX exchange — Bankman-Fried was arrested in the Bahamas on Monday after the U.S. Justice Department filed criminal charges against him.
John Ray, the new CEO of FTX, is testifying in front of the U.S. House Committee on Financial Services on Tuesday, and called former FTX leaders “greatly inexperienced individuals.”
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