Bitcoin (BTC) fell $2,000 overnight on March 11 after United States-based multinational Oracle dispelled rumors that it had bought 72,000 BTC.
Data from Cointelegraph Markets and TradingView showed BTC/USD returning to $55,000 on Thursday after hitting local highs of around $57,00.
The previous day had delivered strong performance across cryptocurrency, with bulls eagerly awaiting a retest of Bitcoin's all-time highs at $58,300.
While the momentum did much to overcome a final band of resistance in place just below that level, it did not last, as an alleged adoption announcement from Oracle failed to materialize.
Starting in February, claims began to surface that the firm planned to buy a huge amount of Bitcoin in a move that would rival top institutional investors Grayscale and MicroStrategy. Confirmation should have come on Wednesday, social media users added, but an earnings call failed to confirm their suspicions.
In the event, co-founder Larry Ellison did not disclose any Bitcoin-related activity, while signalling that he was bullish on the trading environment for the coming year
“I’m not really ready to disclose our plans as to why I think it’s going to suddenly spike but we expect very, very rapid database growth next year,” he said, quoted by CNBC.
At the time of writing, BTC/USD was continuing to retrace, losing around 2% in an hour and heading towards $54,000.
Reacting, commentators remained unfazed by the anticlimax.
"For those caught in the day to day pricing of Bitcoin, it is a long journey," entrepreneur Jeff Booth responded:
“The fact that Oracle hasn't bought 'yet' is very bullish and signalling how early it still is.”
Analyst: Amazon market cap could be next for Bitcoin
Taking a longer-term view, one analyst this week described the slowdown in Bitcoin's bull run at around a $1 trillion market cap as a "back-and-fill process."
In a tweet, Mike McGlone, senior commodity strategist at Bloomberg Intelligence, argued that once consolidation is over, Bitcoin would rise again — and its next target would be Amazon's market cap.
"Tesla in Rear View, About $80,000 Bitcoin Eyes Amazon Market Cap — Once Bitcoin's back-and-fill process around the $1 trillion market cap is complete, we see internet pioneer Amazon.com as a potential next threshold...," he wrote on Tuesday.
McGlone uploaded a comparative chart highlighting Bitcoin's low volatility poised to repeat performance from 2017, the year in which BTC/USD grew from $1,000 to just under $20,000.