Crypto, stocks take a beating after oil prices drop below zero

The markets today have taken a turn for the worse.

In crypto, most of the industry’s top 20 coins by market cap have all dipped in price between 5% and 7%. Bitcoin is again below $7,000, falling today to $6,800 per coin. Ethereum dropped all the way down to $168 before recovering to $172, a loss of nearly 7% on the day.

All in all, crypto has lost about $10 billion in market capitalization since Sunday. It now stands at around $198 billion.

In the stock market, the Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA) fell today by nearly 600 points during the final hours of trading.

But the real loser today is the oil market, as an expiring oil futures contract scheduled for delivery in May through West Texas Intermediate fell by more than 100%, marking the first time in history where an oil futures contract has gone negative.

This caused oil prices to drop below zero, threatening to bankrupt hundreds of companies in an already battered US economy.

Hope for oil was riding on a deal solidified between OPEC and its allies last week that will potentially bring production down by about 10 million barrels per day starting May 1, but some argue this won’t be enough to fix the damage done in April.

The International Energy Agency (IEA), for example, warns that oil demand for this month will be close to 30 million barrels per day less than where it stood a year ago, marking a new 25-year low.