Coinmarketcap Glitch Shows Prices of Cryptocurrencies in The Order of Several Trillions of Dollars Per Coin
No, you aren't a millionaire. A Coinmarketcap issue caused an astronomically large gain in the most major cryptocurrencies, impacting all crypto services that used its data to display fiat balances and prices.
For many cryptocurrency holders, December 14, 2021, was the happiest day of their lives, even if it was only for a few minutes. Thanks to Coinmarketcap for making this possible.
Due to a malfunction in Coinmarketcap, the most prominent price aggregator in the cryptocurrency business, price surges in the billions of dollars began to appear.
Coinmarketcap and the Trillion-Dollar Bug
Bitcoin was worth $850,867,136,053.72, Ethereum was worth $179,598,602,169.65, and BNB was at $33,520,911,478. Even stablecoins have risen in value, with USDC trading at $42,042,904 and USDT at $69,894,267.23.
Other service providers were impacted by the pricing inconsistencies. Users of certain cryptocurrency wallets (such as Jax) that get data from Coinmarketcap also claimed that their fiat balances had soared to new heights – however, it's worth noting that crypto balances stayed stable.
Similarly, certain bitcoin price tracking websites were impacted. Cryptocurrency prices, for example, have risen by trillions of dollars on CNBC, but Bitcoin has plummeted to the $30K area on Yahoo Finance.
Everything points to an API problem based on its characteristics. There was no unusual behavior or significant price volatility on any of the exchanges. The Coinmarketcap staff was able to correct the problem a few minutes after it was discovered, restoring normalcy.
Following the irregularities we observed on our platform this afternoon, despite the issue having been fixed, we will be rebooting our servers as a final step in accordance with our internal remediation plan. Apologies for the inconvenience.
— CoinMarketCap (@CoinMarketCap) December 15, 2021
The Crypto Community is Having a Good Time
During the events, the price of Bitcoin did not have an alarming reaction. Indeed, the daily candlestick concluded with a 3.5 percent gain, rising from $46,736 to $48,389. It has since corrected a little, and BTC is now selling about $48,000, a far cry from the $850 billion.
Crypto Twitter users, on the other hand, were quick to respond, pulling out the newest arsenal of smart jokes and memes to "enjoy" their newly acquired fortune before returning to normalcy.
In reality, the Coinmarketcap team used an amazing public relations strategy, engaging with their audience and even making the occasional caustic and satirical remark.
If anything good came out of this it's that #cryptotwitter
— CoinMarketCap (@CoinMarketCap) December 14, 2021
Is alive again 😅
WELCOME BACK EVERYONE WE MISSED YOU 💙 🤍 pic.twitter.com/mOEULUTLOi
Although the origin of the problem was not explained, Coinmarketcap was adamant that it was not a hack; yet, this notion was hotly disputed on social media.