Early this morning, cryptocurrencies were all simultaneously hit by selling pressure and as the day has worn off, it has accelerated with one witty trader noting "it's a virtual bloodbath."

Source: CoinMarketCap.com

29 of the Top 30 cryptocurrencies (by market cap) are in the red and while there remains no immediat catalyst, chatter is focused on uncertainty surrounding SegWit (another potential fork in the codebase) and some looming large ICOs...

IMO this is all a shakeout before the "excited-about-SegWit" rally

Or I'm completely misreading the situation!#bitcoin — Alistair Milne (@alistairmilne) June 25, 2017

As a reminder SegWit (or Segragated Witness) is a proposed update to the Bitcoin software, designed to fix a range of serious issues. As CoinTelegraph reports, originally, the update was aimed at solving transaction malleability, a well-known weak spot in Bitcoin software. Although this vector of attack is not the most damaging to the users, it has been exploited in several instances already, highlighting the need to patch it. However, SegWit offers a range of other advantages and by now the focus of attention has shifted from fixing the transaction malleability to solving the problem of Bitcoin scaling. As we have explained in the eponymous article, and in many others, Bitcoin is currently experiencing massive scaling problems, which are only getting worse with time.

However, some are noting today's moves are perhaps reflective of pre-positioning for some big Initial Coin Offerings (ICOs) rumored to be on the horizon.

Still others have speculated that it's a technical move as Bitcoin broke below its 20-day moving average...

Either way, the biggest players are suffering but the drops are not the magnitude that some recent 20%-plus retreats have been...