What happened
It's been a day of sell-offs for many leading cryptocurrencies and altcoins, and Cardano (ADA +2.40%) is moving lower in the pullback. The blockchain network's ADA token was down roughly 7% over the previous 24 hours of trading as of 4:15 p.m. ET on Wednesday, and it had been down as much 10.4% earlier in the day.
The pricing decline for Cardano's ADA token appears partly driven by overall market momentum, but it's also likely that token-specific news is factoring into the pullback. eToro recently announced that it plans to remove the ADA token from its trading platform for U.S.-based account holders, and that appears to be pushing investors out of the cryptocurrency.
Image source: Getty Images.
So what
eToro announced on Nov. 23 that it would be limiting trading on Cardano and Tron's (TRX +0.17%) cryptocurrency tokens. The trading platform didn't get deep into the details of why it was making the move, but it cited "business-related considerations in the evolving regulatory environment" as the major motivating factor.
eToro users won't be able to open new positions in either coin beginning on Dec. 26, and the ability to stake either of the tokens will then expire on Dec. 31. Users will still be able to sell coins they are holding until changes are implemented in 2022, but the trading specialist's decision creates extra uncertainty surrounding Cardano, and it's not surprising to see its token losing ground following the news.
Now what
Cardano founder Charles Hoskinson indicated that the lack of an established global regulatory standard for cryptocurrency-exchange listing was at the root of ADA's trading being limited on eToro. Investors will still have plenty of other trading platforms on which to buy and sell Cardano's token, but eToro's decision clouds the cryptocurrency's outlook and could cause it to see more-volatile trading in the near term.
Even with the recent pricing pullback, Cardano's token price has surged roughly 900% across 2021. The cryptocurrency now has a market capitalization of roughly $54.5 billion, and it ranks as the sixth-largest cryptocurrency by market cap.
