Trillions lost and lives ruined: crypto in crisis

As the market nosedives into oblivion and investors flee in their droves, insiders are speculating that the bubble might have finally burst. Can it come back from this crash? Giulia Crouch asks the experts - and meets the Londoners who have lost everything

- Giulia Crouch

EVEN if you know nothing about crypto, Bitcoin baffles you, and you thought Ethereum was a Marvel character, what's not hard to understand is that a crypto-crash has caused investors to lose vast sums of money and in some cases, everything they had. The crash was so spectacular that some people are calling it the Lehman Brothers of the crypto world. The market value of cryptocurrencies, almost £2.4 trillion in November, is now just £1 trillion.

The largest crypto-trading platform in the US, Coinbase, lost half its value in a week and has warned users they could lose their money if the company goes bankrupt. Founder Brian Armstrong has seen £8.8 billion vanish from his personal wealth. He's just one of the "crypto bros" who lost vast sums. A trader with 288,000 Bitcoin lost £640 million in a day after the price plunged and Elon Musk saw his £1.2 billion investment in Bitcoin drop in value by £240 million.

For the uninitiated, cryptocurrency is a "virtual currency" that is de-centralised so doesn't require a middleman aka a bank. It's pitched as a fairer way to do finance but is completely unregulated and can be very hard to predict.

This was shown on May 11 when one coin, Terra (Luna), plummeted in value, having a knock-on effect on the other coins. The fall was so catastrophic that questions are being raised about the future of the industry. Some say investors are so spooked that it marks the start of a long "crypto-winter", while others dubbed it an "ice-age". With one in five young Londoners (18-34) investing in crypto, what will this mean for the capital, the hub of the UK's crypto-hype? Has the Bitcoin-bubble burst?

Luna was called a "stablecoin" but proved to be anything but. It lost more than 99 per cent of its value in 24 hours. The industry panicked, investors scrambled to move their money and desperate Luna-losers posted online about how they'd lose their homes.