The drop began Saturday evening after Trump signed an order imposing 25% tariffs on imports from Mexico and Canada, as well as a 10% duty on China. The U.S. does about $1.6 trillion in business with the three countries.
"Every coin that recently rallied through January, including memes like [dogecoin], have essentially handed back most of their gains," said James Davies, CEO and co-founder at trading platform Crypto Valley Exchange.
"Crypto is fundamentally about freedom to make and conduct trades, which runs counter to the global political narrative of the last week," he added. "As a community, we are pro free-trade … when that is being restricted many investors are risk-off in terms of their holdings. This massively impacts the alt coin market."