Bitcoin price falls below $50,000

Bitcoin's price has dropped below $50,000 on early Friday UTC time.

The price continued to decline to below $49,000 and is changing hands around $49,500 as of writing, which represents an 8.46% drop over the past 24 hours on Coinbase Pro.

The price drop follows news in the U.S. hours that President Joe Biden was said to propose increasing tax for the wealthy on capital-gains by as much as 100%. 

Data from Bybt.com shows nearly $500 million worth-of bitcoin long positions have been liquidated over the past one hour due to the price slump.

Overall, around $1.6 billion in crypto futures positions have been liquidated during the same time.