It seems the are openly manipulating things because they are haemorrhaging literally billions of dollars currently and having to pull money from other investments to fund this, they know even if they get in trouble any penalty or fine will almost certainly be tiny compared to what they are losing right now or stand to lose.
The thing is, people seem to be aware what they are trying and if they simply hold and dont panic the price will rise again. (I dont understand how it works but this is what I read).