Bitcoin has gained, and plunged, well over $1,000 in less than 24 hours.

The digital currency dropped more than 18 percent from a record high of $11,388.33 to $9,290.30 on Wednesday, according to CoinDesk. Bitcoin then attempted to recover the $10,000 level in the late afternoon and was last trading around $9,795. Trading was extremely volatile as exchanges struggled to keep up with the surging demand.

Trading volume was a whopping $9.75 billion over the last 24 hours, according to CoinMarketCap, compared with $2.26 billion for digital currency ethereum.

Coinbase, the leading U.S. website for buying and selling bitcoin, reported record-high traffic Wednesday. Services were unavailable for some customers. Coinbase's GDAX exchange also reported "performance issues and downtime" Wednesday afternoon, but as of about 3:20 p.m. ET, it said those issues had been resolved.

Bitcoin 24-hour performance

Source: CoinDesk

"It's definitely been going a bit parabolic over the past few weeks. I think today's action marks somewhat of an inflection point," said Jonathan Krinsky, chief market technician at MKM Partners. "But it's still 200 percent above its 200-day moving average, so it's not surprising to see some consolidation here."

That all-time high itself came as bitcoin's gains accelerated. About a week after crossing above $8,000, bitcoin topped $9,000 Sunday before soaring above $10,000 Tuesday evening.