Crypto Today: Bitcoin eases below $18K, IOTA gains more than 30%

Following yet another record-setting rally over the weekend ahead of CME Group's bitcoin futures trading launch, the BTC/USD pair started to correct its gains on Tuesday and dropped below the $18K mark to refresh its lowest level since last Friday before retracing a portion of its daily losses. According to the latest available data on coinmarketcap.com, the pair was trading at $18,220, down 3.2% on the day. Amid rising concerns over a potential price bubble, investors continue to gravitate towards alternative cryptocurrencies.

IOTA, the 6th biggest cryptocurrency in terms of trading volume, on Tuesday broke above the $5 mark after Robert Bosch Venture Capital GmbH (RBVC) announced a substantial investment in the currency, and was last seen trading at $5.67, adding 33.56% on the day

"The IOTA Foundation, an open-source non-profit foundation from Germany, is announcing that Robert Bosch Venture Capital GmbH (RBVC), the corporate venture capital company of the Bosch Group, has purchased a significant amount of IOTA tokens. Dr. Hongquan Jiang, Partner at RBVC, will also join the IOTA Foundation’s advisory board," the IOTA Foundation wrote in the official press release. Commenting on the Bosch Group's decision and his role, “we have been working with the IOTA team for more than one year. I’m very excited about IOTA’s innovative tangle technology, which could potentially become the standard underlying technology for trustless machine to machine communication, security and payment in the IoT space,” Dr. Hongquan Jiang said, as per cointelegraph.com reports.

Meanwhile, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) on Tuesday reported that it suspended trading of The Crypto Company, which describes itself as a company that provides institutions and individuals direct exposure to the growth of global blockchain development, shares until January 3 after their value increased by more than tenfold in the last month alone. In a statement, the SEC explained that it was concerned about "the accuracy and adequacy of information in the marketplace about, among other things, the compensation paid for promotion of the company, and statements in Commission filings about the plans of the company’s insiders to sell their shares of The Crypto Company’s common stock.”