China, in particular, has for months been aggressively pushing to curtail use of virtual currencies, and has intensified its crackdown on both mining and trading over the last few days.

On Monday, the People’s Bank of China said it had summoned Alipay, the widely popular online payments platform run by Jack Ma’s Ant Group, along with five big lenders and told them to “comprehensively investigate and identify” cryptocurrency exchanges and dealers so they could cut off any crypto trading.

Over the weekend, Chinese state media reported that Sichuan, a southwestern province of China, had ordered a halt to all crypto mining operations and to cut off the power supply to many mining facilities. Sichuan is a major hub for bitcoin mining.

Edward Moya, a senior market analyst at Oanda, noted the increased pressure in China in a report to clients this week.

“Bitcoin needs to expedite transitioning mining out of China,” he wrote.

“Bitcoin remains trapped in the $30,000 to $41,000 range, but downside risks are catching the eyes of everyone.”

— Laura He contributed to this report.