Bitcoin hits lowest since September in drop of 40% from record

Bitcoin continued a weeks-long drop on Friday, falling below $42,000 to levels not seen since September.

The largest cryptocurrency declined as much as 4.9% to $41,008, marking a tumble of about 40% from its record near $69,000 reached Nov. 10. Ether, the second-largest, dropped as much as 9% to its lowest level since Sept. 30. Both of those tokens, as well as others including Binance Coin, Solana, Cardano and XRP are down more than 10% in the past seven days, according to CoinGecko.

The retreat comes after minutes from the Federal Reserve’s December meeting, published Wednesday, flagged the chance of