Bitcoin (BTC/USD) has slipped again, now trading at $475 on BTC-e, a new 10-day low.
With its earlier low of $464, Bitcoin had been trading at a 15% discount to its 200-day moving average, now down to $546. This gap matches that of 2 weeks ago when the price also hung around its support level of $480 before its flash crash, and is the widest observed in regular trading since the May rally.
The current range of $470-480 is therefore an important support level, both for price and momentum. Should it be broken, the next line of defense is the $450 range, which had offered nearly a month of solid support and has not been breached during normal trade.
During the recent downturn, the price on BTC-e has been trending more closely toward those on other major exchanges like Bitstamp and Bitfinex. Previously, Bitcoin usually traded at a 1.5% discount on BTC-e relative to its peers. Currently, the prices are less than $1 apart.
The convergence is interesting in light of irregular trading behavior that has transpired on the Exchange during the past month. Earlier this week, trading volume exploded to over 10x typical levels, without having a major effect on the traded price. A trading bot gone wild is suspected. Two weeks ago, margin calls are widely believed to have caused the price to crash to $309 within minutes, after which it immediately recovered back to $460.
