Category Archives: Bitcoin
Bitcoin Price Hits All-Time High Above $19,000, Topping 2017 Record – The Wall Street Journal
Bitcoin surged on Monday to set its first fresh record in nearly three years, driven by a wave of new investors lured by the potential for big profits.
The digital currency rose as high as $19,834.93, according to CoinDesk, topping the previous intraday record of $19,783.21 set Dec. 18, 2017. Bitcoin has nearly tripled in 2020 and is up more than 90% since early September. It closed Monday at $19376.18, up 6.1%. The surge comes amid a wider rally across markets. The Federal Reserve and other central banks have injected trillions worth of liquidity into the capital markets, and a number of companies working on coronavirus vaccines are providing hope that the global pandemic will soon be brought under control.
With safe assets like government bonds yielding close to zero, investors have been more willing to place bets on risky assets in hopes of reaping big gains, and bitcoin is among the riskiest assets in the capital markets. You have the weakened dollar, enormous growth of central bank balance sheets and questions about whether it will or wont cause inflation, said Socit Gnrale forex strategist Kit Juckes. Its another beneficiary of the collapse in real yields.
Trading volume for bitcoin has surged in the past few months, to $50 billion a day from around $18 billion a day in September, according to data from research site Coingecko. Other cryptocurrencies have benefited from the interest as well. Ether is up 370% this year. XRP is up more than 234%.
Bitcoins gains have been fueled by both retail and professional investors, and a plethora of platforms that make it easy to trade cryptocurrencies.
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Bitcoin Price Hits All-Time High Above $19,000, Topping 2017 Record - The Wall Street Journal
Over 5000 Bitcoin Worth $97 Million from the 2016 Bitfinex Hack Spring Into Action – Bitcoin News
As bitcoin surpassed its 2017 all-time high on Monday morning, a few hours later 5,045 BTC or $97 million worth of bitcoin from the 2016 Bitfinex hack was transferred. The hackers that stole the funds four years ago have moved the bitcoins numerous times this year.
The hackers that stole 119,756 BTC from the cryptocurrency exchange Bitfinex on August 2, 2016, have moved a number of stolen coins in 2020. The coins that were taken over four years ago are now worth around $2.3 billion using todays exchange rates.
Following the Bitfinex hack, the breach crippled trader confidence that day as BTC slid more than 22% across global exchanges on August 2, 2016. The coins did not move for three years until the summer of 2019, the stolen coins started moving again.
On Monday, November 30, 2020, the Bitfinex hackers transferred a large sum of bitcoins as approximately 5,045 BTC were moved. The action was caught by the blockchain parser Btcparser.com, a platform that crawls the BTC blockchain to catch old coinbase reward awakenings and addresses that stem from the Bitfinex hack.
Using todays exchange rates, the 5,045 BTC is worth more than $97 million. Bitcoin (BTC) touched an all-time high on the exchange Bitstamp reaching $19,864 per coin.
Data from Btcparser.com and the blockchain explorer Blockchair shows the 5,045 BTC was separated into separate addresses and some were combined. 14 transactions were sent and confirmed in blocks 659,373 and 659,374.
Blockchairs Privacy-o-meter shows the transactions sent by the Bitfinex hackers were not very private, receiving a low score of 55. The tool shows whether or not a transaction is susceptible to some of the heuristics used by numerous transaction tracing tools. The bitcoins moved on Monday from the Bitfinex hack look as though if they were simply swept into a different address.
What do you think about the Bitfinex hackers moving 5,045 bitcoin stemming from the 2016 breach? Let us know what you think in the comments section below.
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Over 5000 Bitcoin Worth $97 Million from the 2016 Bitfinex Hack Spring Into Action - Bitcoin News
Bitcoin moves $500K around the globe every second, says Samson Mow – Cointelegraph
Blockstreams Samson Mow wants to move the conversation away from Bitcoins (BTC) performance in transactions per second and toward its role in ushering in a new financial paradigm, that is, serving as a permissionless medium for the store and transfer of value.
Mows argument is that VPTS [value transacted per second] not TPS [transaction per second] is what really counts.Calculations for the video were reportedly made using on-chain data by the editor of the Blockstream engineering blog, who goes by Grubles on Twitter. The editor similarly tweeted that Bitcoin scales just fine. 1 BTC can store an infinite amount of value.
The video, according to afollow-up tweetfrom Mow, was inspired by a stupid XRP marketing video comparing their sh*tcoins TPS [transaction per second] to Bitcoins.
Blockchain.com datashows thatas of Dec. 1, the total estimated value of transactions on the Bitcoin blockchain was estimated at $4.627 billion. This figure hit $5.15 billion, close to its all-time-high, on Nov. 5.
TPS has long been presented as a purported Achilles heel for Bitcoin, whose capacity maxes out at a lower threshold than competitor coins like Ether (ETH). This is notably the line taken by Bitcoin Cash (BCH) evangelists like Roger Ver, who tout the asset as a better currency for retail adoption in small-scale transactions.
Mows line on Bitcoin has been consistent, arguing that those who are interested in everyday transactions can use second-layer solutions like the Lightning Network. Bitcoin in itself, he says, has an altogether different purpose:
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Bitcoin moves $500K around the globe every second, says Samson Mow - Cointelegraph
Bitcoin hit the $19,800 mark. What the IRS wants to know about your holdings – CNBC
If you're cashing in some of your Bitcoin this year, the IRS wants to know about it.
On Monday, the cryptocurrency's value hit new heights, surging beyond $19,800 for a unit of Bitcoin. The asset's appreciation has skyrocketed this year, rising by 160% in 2020.
Understand that if you want to take a few of those holdings off the table, you'll need to share that information when you file your individual income tax return next spring.
More from Smart Tax Planning:Got a scary letter from the IRS? How to dealFive steps business owners can take to trim their taxesSpend down these tax-advantaged dollars or lose them
In fact, the IRS gets right to the point, asking on the first page of the income tax return, or Form 1040, "At any time during 2020, did you receive, sell, send, exchange, or otherwise acquire any financial interest in any virtual currency?"
You'll have to check yes or no.
"The first thing with cryptocurrency is that, if you have crypto transactions, you'll need to report them," said Andy Phillips, director of the Tax Institute at H&R Block.
"The question is front and center the first thing that they touch on Form 1040," he said.
People who transacted with virtual currency aren't the only ones who'll be checking the yes box on their 1040 next year.
If you received any crypto for free, you're still expected to check yes on the front of your tax return, according to newly released draft instructions from the IRS.
Exchanged some virtual currency for goods and services or for other property including different cryptocurrency? You still need to answer yes.
You'll also need to keep records of your transactions, which can get tricky if you're using multiple exchanges or different types of cryptocurrency.
"People have multiple exchanges and the more spread out the cryptocurrency is, the more challenging it is to gather it together and do your calculations," said Kirk Phillips, CPA and member of member of the American Institute of CPAs' Virtual Currency Task Force.
The IRS considers virtual currency to be property the same way it treats stocks or other investments.
This way, if you bought some Ethereum and then sell it or if you swap it for something else, you've incurred a capital gain or a capital loss. If you captured a gain, then you're responsible for taxes.
Here's where things can get confusing: Major cryptocurrency exchanges may provide taxpayers with a Form 1099-K with these details if they've had gross payments exceeding $20,000 and they've made more than 200 transactions.
Once you know the IRS has access to the information, it's better to come into compliance before they come calling.
Mark Luscombe, CPA
principal federal tax analyst at Wolters Kluwer Tax & Accounting
"That threshold is so high," said Phillips at H&R Block.
"A lot of taxpayers either don't do a lot of transactions," he said. "Or if they do many of them, they use multiple exchanges and don't hit the threshold on any one exchange."
Even if you're below the threshold, you're still required to report the transaction and pay taxes owed.
Virtual currency from an employer is treated like wages.
That means federal income taxes and FICA taxes apply. It will be reported on your Form W-2, which you shouldreceive from your employerby the end of January.
If you mine cryptocurrency, you're also required to include it in your taxable income. You would include the fair market value as of the date you received it.
The IRS has been cracking down on unreported transactions in recent years. Last year, the agency sent letters to more than 10,000 taxpayers with virtual currency transactions, telling them to pay back taxes and file amended returns.
Failing to report income can carry hefty penalties and interest. In the worst case, you could go to prison and be fined up to $250,000.
krisanapong detraphiphat | Moment | Getty Images
Transacted in virtual currency this year? Know three key points: the fair market value of at the time of the transaction, your basis the amount you originally paid when you acquired the asset and the holding period.
"If the holding period is greater than one year, it's considered long-term capital gains," Mark Luscombe, CPA, principal federal tax analyst at Wolters Kluwer Tax & Accounting. "If it's less than one year, it's ordinary income."
The difference in tax treatment is stark: Long term capital gains are subject to rates of 0%, 15% or 20%, while ordinary income rates can be as high as 37%.
Several software providers have emerged including LukkaTax and Bitcoin.Tax to help individuals keep track of their transactions and basis.
Expect the taxman to take a hard line with compliance around crypto.
"Once you know the IRS has access to the information, it's better to come into compliance before they come calling," said Luscombe.
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Bitcoin hit the $19,800 mark. What the IRS wants to know about your holdings - CNBC
Bitcoin.com Exchange To List HUB Token as the Next Gen Trust-Based Cryptocurrency | Press release – Bitcoin News
PRESS RELEASE. Bitcoin.com Exchange is thrilled to announce the upcoming listing of HUB on the 1st of December 2020 at 14:00 UTC. HUB was created by the Human Trust Protocol Network, under founding member Eric Ly. HUB will be listed with BTC and USDT trading pairs.
Human Trust Protocol solves endemic trust problems, and provides verifiable and portable trust. The vision of the Human Trust Protocol, and that of its HUB token is to encode identity and reputation on the blockchain, to become the next digital identity protocol interoperable across multiple platforms. The platform focuses on 3 factors: Identity, Reputation and Trust. Each account will reference an identity using decentralized digital identities, having the capability to capture rich and raw reputation data by which applications can enable users to make the best interpretation of trustworthiness. After all, the solution the platform is providing is the ability to evaluate a users capability and intent on a new interaction via a Decentralized Trust Network.
HUB has a number of unique properties:
It effectively solves endemic trust problems and usability in any community and marketplace. Its backed by an astounding and experienced team, with the platform being created by LinkedIn Co-Founder Eric Ly at the helm, as a seasoned veteran in the tech space and a successful entrepreneur the company surely has the potential to become the next big thing.
Outside of just the backing of the team, HUBs seen major adoption as a blockchain platform, especially with its user base increasing this year by 603% and MAU increased 688% with tens of thousands of users on the HUB platform at joinhub.com.
Danish Chaudhry, CEO of Bitcoin.com Exchange, shared his views on the HUB platform and the next stage in incentivising trustworthy interactions: The Human Trust Protocol, and the HUB token is a very interesting project, billions of users on the internet interact with each other every day on messengers, online communities, social networks and peer-to-peer marketplaces, making constant contact with people they never met, let alone trust. This token will flourish within our exchange, and I am sure our users will gain a lot of interest in what their team has to offer.
Eric Ly, Founder and CEO of HUB says that, we are incredibly excited to partner with Bitcoin.com to begin trading the HUB token. Given the reputation of the HUB project and our global ambition to deliver economic prosperity through decentralized trust and reputation to every corner of the world, we were looking for a partner who shared our global ambitions for the project. We were impressed by the exchanges unparalleled support of our efforts and its increasingly widespread reach across the globe.
About Bitcoin.com Exchange
The mission of Bitcoin.com Exchange is to empower people from all over the world to trade cryptocurrencies with ease and confidence, from first-time traders to advanced trading professionals. With high liquidity, 24/7 multilingual support and dozens of trading pairs, complemented with a high level of security, we offer an attractive platform for trading any cryptocurrency. Within one year since launch, on average, our exchange has been visited by more than 500K active traders per month, and this number continues to grow as you read this sentence.
About HUB
Started in 2018 by LinkedIn co-founder Eric Ly, HUBs vision is to encode identity and reputation on the blockchain to become the next digital identity protocol interoperable across multiple platforms. By putting identity data, one of the most valuable data types, back into the hands of users, people will gain access to an unprecedented level of economic opportunity and prosperity. HUBs ecosystem includes the HUB platform at joinhub.com, a rapidly growing rewards-based event and community platform, and partner companies in the background verification and DeFi areas.
This is a press release. Readers should do their own due diligence before taking any actions related to the promoted company or any of its affiliates or services. Bitcoin.com is not responsible, directly or indirectly, for any damage or loss caused or alleged to be caused by or in connection with the use of or reliance on any content, goods or services mentioned in the press release.
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Mogo Reports 135% Increase in Bitcoin Transaction Volume in November – Business Wire
VANCOUVER, British Columbia--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Mogo Inc. (TSX:MOGO) (NASDAQ:MOGO) (Mogo or the Company), a financial technology company focused on empowering consumers with innovative digital financial solutions through its mobile app, today reported a 135% month-over-month increase in the dollar value of bitcoin traded on the Mogo platform from October 2020 to November 2020. This follows on the Companys previous announcement that Mogo bitcoin accounts increased 237% year over year in Q3 2020.
The strong performance of bitcoin and its growing credibility as an asset class have fuelled rapid growth in transaction volume and new bitcoin accounts on the Mogo platform, said David Feller, Mogos Founder and CEO. Although bitcoin has now been around for just over 10 years, its still early days for this new asset class as most Canadians have yet to own it. The introduction of bitcoin trading by leading digital players in the U.S., combined with the overall rise of digital currencies, has significantly increased the interest in bitcoin among Canadian consumers.
Greg Feller, President and CFO of Mogo, added: As one of the pioneers in Canada and the only well-established publicly traded Canadian company offering a simple and low-cost way to buy and sell bitcoin, we are in a unique position to meet this rising demand through our award winning app that offers a number of innovative products to help Canadians manage their financial lives.
MogoCrypto1, launched in 2018, is the easiest way to buy and sell bitcoin in Canada. It enables members to buy and sell bitcoin at real-time prices instantly through the Mogo app, 24/7 from their mobile device, bringing a new level of convenience and accessibility to bitcoin ownership for all Canadians. Users can sign up for free and in three minutes open an account, have the account funded in as little as 30 minutes with no funding fee, and begin buying and selling bitcoin. As part of the Companys current promotion, new Mogo members get $5 just for opening their account. MogoCrypto is available through the free Mogo app, on iOS or Android or at mogo.ca. Mogo was recently named Best Cryptocurrency App by savvynewcanadians.com and featured by Apple as one of the apps we love.
Forward-Looking Statements
This news release may contain "forward-looking statements" within the meaning of applicable securities legislation, including statements regarding the growth of Mogos revenue as a result of increased bitcoin transaction volume. Forward-looking statements are necessarily based upon a number of estimates and assumptions that, while considered reasonable by management at the time of preparation, are inherently subject to significant business, economic and competitive uncertainties and contingencies, and may prove to be incorrect. Forward-looking statements involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors that may cause actual financial results, performance or achievements to be materially different from the estimated future results, performance or achievements expressed or implied by those forward-looking statements and the forward-looking statements are not guarantees of future performance. Mogo's growth, its ability to expand into new products and markets and its expectations for its future financial performance are subject to a number of conditions, many of which are outside of Mogo's control. For a description of the risks associated with Mogo's business please refer to the Risk Factors section of Mogos current annual information form, which is available at http://www.sedar.com and http://www.sec.gov. Except as required by law, Mogo disclaims any obligation to update or revise any forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, events or otherwise.
About Mogo
Mogo a financial technology company offers a finance app that empowers consumers with simple solutions to help them get in control of their financial health and be more mindful of the impact they have on society and the planet. Users can sign up for a free account in only three minutes, begin to learn the 4 habits of financial health and get convenient access to products that can help them achieve their financial goals and have a positive impact on the planet including a digital spending account with Mogo Visa* Platinum Prepaid Card featuring automatic carbon offsetting, free monthly credit score monitoring, ID fraud protection and personal loans. Members can also easily buy and sell bitcoin 24/7 through the Mogo app, as well as participate in Mogos new bitcoin rewards program. The Mogo platform has been purpose-built to deliver a best-in-class digital experience, with best-in-class products, all through one account. With more than one million members and a marketing partnership with Canada's largest news media company, Mogo continues to execute on its vision to gamify financial health and become the go-to financial app for the next generation of Canadians. To learn more, please visit mogo.ca or download the mobile app (iOS or Android).
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Mogo Reports 135% Increase in Bitcoin Transaction Volume in November - Business Wire
Bitcoin Climbs to Record High – The New York Times
Bitcoin is back. Again.
Nearly three years after it went on a hair-bending rise and hit a peak of $19,783, the price of a single Bitcoin rose above that for the first time on Monday, according to the data and news provider CoinDesk. The cryptocurrency has soared since March, after sinking below $4,000 at the outset of the coronavirus pandemic.
Bitcoins latest climb is different from its last spike in 2017, which was driven largely by investors in Asia who had just learned about cryptocurrencies. Back then, the digital token soon lost momentum as people questioned what it could do other than allow for easy online speculating and drug and ransom payments.
While those questions remain, Bitcoin is now being fueled by a less speculative fever. Buyers led by American investors, including companies and other traditional investors are treating Bitcoin as an alternative asset, somewhat like gold, according to an analysis from the data firm Chainalysis. Rather than quickly trading in and out of it, more investors are using Bitcoin as a place to park part of their investment portfolios outside the influence of governments and the traditional financial system, Chainalysis and other industry firms said.
Its a very different set of people who are buying Bitcoin recently, said Philip Gradwell, the chief economist at Chainalysis, which analyzes the movement of cryptocurrencies. They are doing it in steadier amounts over sustained periods of time, and they are taking it off exchanges and holding it as an investment.
The excitement has been underpinned by regulators and mainstream financial companies that are trying to make cryptocurrencies safer and more accessible. The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, an American regulator, said this summer that banks would be allowed to hold cryptocurrencies for customers. And PayPal announced in October that it would follow its rival Square and allow people to buy and hold Bitcoin and a few other cryptocurrencies.
Our move came as a result of conversations with government officials, and then seeing the dramatic shift into digital payments as a result of the pandemic, Dan Schulman, the chief executive of PayPal, said in an interview. More than a million people three to four times what the company expected joined a wait list to use cryptocurrencies before the feature was started, he said.
Bitcoins rise is part of a broader exuberance in cryptocurrencies and stock markets, which are defying the gloom of a pandemic-induced recession. The Dow, S&P 500 and Nasdaq have hit record highs this past month, with Wall Street buoyed by the presidential election and the news of potential coronavirus vaccines.
Bitcoin is a digital currency with software and rules that were released in early 2009 by a shadowy creator with the pseudonym Satoshi Nakamoto. The computer code established that the total supply of Bitcoin would be limited. Only 21 million tokens will ever be created, distributed in small blocks each day through a process known as mining to some of the computers that maintain the currencys online infrastructure.
Like gold, Bitcoin can be created, moved and stored outside the purview of any government or financial institution. Bitcoins exist on a financial ledger, known as a blockchain, which is maintained and updated by a volunteer network of people running thousands of computers worldwide a system meant to ensure that no one computer or institution can change the rules or control the network.
The open nature of the system and the fact that anyone can join it and create a wallet without providing so much as a name or a phone number has made it popular for those who want to circumvent the traditional financial system. They have included terrorists, drug dealers and countries, like North Korea, Venezuela and Iran, that want to evade American financial sanctions.
This technology already plays a role in many of the most significant criminal and national security threats our nation faces, the Department of Justice said in a report in October. The report described how deeply Bitcoin had been woven into the infrastructure of the criminal world.
But Bitcoins stateless nature has also won over investors interested in legitimate uses of the technology. Some have been motivated by a libertarian distrust of governments. Others who are less ideological have gravitated to Bitcoin as an alternative to the financial system.
Still, Bitcoin is not backed by anything other than its computer network and the faith of people who buy it and give it value on exchanges. Many of these people are betting that someone else will be willing to pay them more for their Bitcoin in the future.
That has made Bitcoin prices volatile. It fell to its most recent low in March when fear over the pandemic hit global markets. Soon after, though, investors began talking about Bitcoin as a beneficiary of the global downturn.
In May, Paul Tudor Jones, one of Wall Streets best-known hedge fund managers, said he had put almost 2 percent of his portfolio in Bitcoin. He said the cap on Bitcoin production made it an attractive alternative to the declining value of traditional currencies, which he thought was inevitable as central banks printed more money to encourage an economic recovery.
Every day that goes by that Bitcoin survives, the trust in it will go up, Mr. Jones told CNBC at the time. He did not respond to a request for comment for this article.
Some public companies also dived into Bitcoin because of concerns about the value of the dollar. In August, MicroStrategy, a software company in Virginia, said it bought $250 million of Bitcoin to store some of the cash it had in the corporate treasury.
Michael Saylor, MicroStrategys chief executive, said in an interview that after knowing almost nothing about Bitcoin at the beginning of this year, he had become a believer in how the hard-coded limit on the number of tokens would help it hold its value over time. He became so enthusiastic that he put $175 million of his own money into the currency. MicroStrategy later bought another $175 million of Bitcoin.
For anything that anybody invested in as a store of value, it starts to look like it is better to move that into Bitcoin, Mr. Saylor said.
In October, Square said it was putting $50 million of its corporate cash into Bitcoin. In 2018, Square also began offering the digital currency on the Cash App, its phone app that people use to send money between friends and family. The company, which is led by Jack Dorsey, who is also chief executive of Twitter, said in early November that its customers held $1.8 billion of Bitcoin, up 180 percent from a year ago.
In October, analysts at JPMorgan Chase wrote a widely circulated note about how using Bitcoin as an alternative to gold especially by younger investors was creating a significant market for the tokens. Given that the total value of all outstanding Bitcoin, around $350 billion, was a small fraction of all the gold in the world, the analysts said they could see the value of Bitcoin going much higher.
Bitcoins rally has been accompanied by a broader bull market in cryptocurrencies, just as in 2017. While much of the fervor three years ago centered on new coins from scammy so-called initial coin offerings, interest has shifted to coins trying to take part in what is known as decentralized finance, or DeFi. These systems, which remain buggy and unproven, aim to make it possible to take out loans and insurance or collect interest without involving any financial institutions.
Central banks from countries such as Singapore, Sweden and the Bahamas are also looking at creating national digital currencies, inspired partly by Bitcoin. The biggest project, from Chinas central bank, appears to be the furthest along.
The national coins, which would leave behind the volatility of Bitcoin, could make cryptocurrencies obsolete. But they could also make it easier to move in and out of digital currencies of all kinds.
Given the uncertainty around Bitcoins value, any excitement is likely to be followed by a another contraction. But the number of crashes Bitcoin has survived is changing the conversation around the technology.
Now its LeBron James playing at age 21 and starting to dominate the court, Mr. Saylor said. Its not LeBron James, age 13, throwing a temper tantrum. Youve got a hardening and a maturing of the asset.
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Bitcoin Climbs to Record High - The New York Times
Bitcoin Rallies Above $19,000 After Biggest Rout Since Pandemic – Bloomberg
- Bitcoin Rallies Above $19,000 After Biggest Rout Since Pandemic Bloomberg
- Guggenheim says it could invest up to $530 million in a bitcoin trust as the cryptocurrency leaps to reco.. Business Insider
- Surprise! Even Conservative Investors Could Profit on Bitcoin Kiplinger's Personal Finance
- Guggenheim Partners prepares to dip investment funds toes into Bitcoin Cointelegraph
- Wall Streets Leading Investment Firm Enters Bitcoin Finance Magnates
- View Full Coverage on Google News
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Bitcoin Rallies Above $19,000 After Biggest Rout Since Pandemic - Bloomberg
Canadian Public Company Dumps Ethereum and Monero for Bitcoin | News – Bitcoin News
A Canadian publicly held company has liquidated all of its ethereum and monero holdings and put all of the proceeds into bitcoin. The company is led by a well-known poker player and former member of the European Parliament.
Cypherpunk Holdings, a Toronto-headquartered company listed on the Canadian Securities Exchange (CSE), announced Thursday that it has increased its bitcoin holdings to 276.479 bitcoins. At the current price, the company now holds about $5 million USD in bitcoin. Cypherpunk Holdings added that this is a net increase since June 30 of 72.979 bitcoins, elaborating:
The increase in bitcoin holdings is a result of the full liquidation of positions in monero (XMR) and ethereum (ETH), as well as the partial use of proceeds from a private placement of $505,000 CAD that closed on August 27th, 2020.
Founded in 1995, Cypherpunk Holdings was formerly known as Khan Resources Inc. but the company changed its name in November 2018. Cypherpunk invests in cryptocurrencies and privacy technologies and is listed on the CSE under the ticker HODL. CEO Antanas Guoga, or Tony G, is a well known high stakes poker player and former member of the European Parliament. He founded the Blockchain Centre in Vilnius, Lithuania, in 2018.
Cypherpunk Holdings joins a growing list of major companies with a treasury position in bitcoin such as the Nasdaq-listed Microstrategy and Jack Dorseys Square Inc.
What do you think about this Canadian public company dumping ether and monero for bitcoin? Let us know in the comments section below.
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Disclaimer: This article is for informational purposes only. It is not a direct offer or solicitation of an offer to buy or sell, or a recommendation or endorsement of any products, services, or companies. Bitcoin.com does not provide investment, tax, legal, or accounting advice. Neither the company nor the author is responsible, directly or indirectly, for any damage or loss caused or alleged to be caused by or in connection with the use of or reliance on any content, goods or services mentioned in this article.
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Canadian Public Company Dumps Ethereum and Monero for Bitcoin | News - Bitcoin News
Bitcoin may see major price volatility at the start of December Here’s why – Cointelegraph
The price of Bitcoin (BTC) faces two crucial events on Dec. 1 right after the weekly and monthly candles close. The upcoming weekly candle close is particularly noteworthy because it could mark the first red weekly candle since late September.
The monthly candle will be significant since it would mark the highest close in Bitcoins history if the price remains over $13,791.
There are three key factors that could cause the volatility of Bitcoin to spike upon the weekly and monthly candle close. The factors are general uncertainty around the BTC price, record-high futures trading activity and open interest, as well as the overextended weekly chart.
Meanwhile, traders have turned cautiousanticipating a pullback in the near term despite the rebound in price from around $16,500 on Nov. 28.
There are two key trends that could be fueling the recovery of BTC. First, Guggenheim Investments, a global asset management firm with over $233 billion in assets under management, secured the right to invest $500 million in the Grayscale Bitcoin Trust.
In the U.S., where a Bitcoin exchange-traded fund (ETF) does not exist, the Grayscale Bitcoin Trust is the first point of entry for most institutional investors. Deribit reported that the news triggered significant buying activity in the options market. The firm said:
Second, high-net-worth investors and whales might be buying the dip in anticipation of Monday. In recent weeks, as quantitative traders pointed out, most of the buyer demand came from the U.S.
Some speculate that the demand is coming from Time-weighted Average Price (TWAP) algorithms, typically used by institutions and funds. Since TWAP algorithms would get activated again on Monday, this could add to the buyer demand for BTC.
There is a high degree of uncertainty in the cryptocurrency market at the moment as traders are divided on where the price will go next.
Some are confident that BTC likely bottomed during the weekend due to market trends. For instance, Avi Felman, the head of trading at BlockTower, said that on Coinbase the recent pullback caused BTC to transfer to stronger hands.
Sell-offs during a bull market can become overextended, especially because traders often look for reasons to sell. As such, overleveraged buyers get caught at local tops, leading to cascading liquidations. But BTC frequently tends to recover right when traders expect more downside and market sentiment reaches a low point. Felman explained:
Additionally, various technical indicators signal that Bitcoin is neither overbought nor oversold across lower timeframes.
On the daily chart, as an example, the Relative Strength Index (RSI) of BTC is at around 55. An asset is considered oversold on the RSI indicator if it drops below 35. Hence, Bitcoin is in an awkward position because high time frame charts, like the weekly chart, remain overbought.
This has led traders to predict a potential correction to the $13,000 to $14,000 support range could soon occur. This high level of uncertainty in the market could cause volatility to increase as the new weekly and monthly candles open.
The open interest across futures exchanges would likely increase again, raising the probability of big price movements.
Throughout the rally of Bitcoin in recent weeks, the trading activity on major BTC futures exchanges has continuously increased. Despite the recent drop, the open interest on top futures trading platforms remains above $1 billion. When the open interest is high, the likelihood of a short or long squeeze increases, which may result in large spikes in volatility.
The Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME), in particular, has seen a noticeable increase in Bitcoin futures trading activity. Interestingly, Arcane Research reported that large traders who hold a minimum position of over 25 BTC more than doubled on the CME in 2020.
The researchers at Arcane explained that this trend shows increased institutional demand for Bitcoin. The heightened trading activity on CME, which tailors to accredited and institutional investors, can cause short-term volatility to increase due to the large sizes of trades. The researchers said:
Although the institutional demand for Bitcoin has been rising, the futures market remains a major factor driving volatility.
Cointelegraph reported earlier this week that when BTC fell from $19,400 to $16,200 largely due to cascading liquidations, over $400 million worth of futures contracts were wiped out on Binance Futures alone.
Bitcoin will see a new weekly candle emerge in the next 48 hours, but the variable remains the overbought nature on the weekly time frame.
The RSI of the weekly chart is at 88, and when the RSI of an asset surpasses 75, it is considered overbought. The weekly candle is also significantly above short-term moving averages (MAs), namely the 5-day, 10-day and 20-day MAs.
Traders have been anticipating a correction because the weekly chart is overextended. It would make a more sustainable rally if BTC consolidates above short-term MAs, as it would give time for the derivatives market and spot buyer demand to catch up.
Furthermore, the monthly candle chart of Bitcoin is even more overextended than the weekly chart. The 5-day, 10-day and 20-day MAs are at $13,129, $10,778, and $9,685, respectively, and significantly below the current market price.
But whether technicals alone would cause BTC to correct in the foreseeable future remains uncertain. If institutional buyers, like Guggenheim, continue to make headlines by entering the Bitcoin market, it could attract additional buyers and retail interest in the near term.
To boot, December has historically been highly volatile for the price of Bitcoin. Though December 2019 recorded a relatively low level of volatility, the end of 2017 and 2018 saw wild price swings including the all-time high BTC price of nearly $20,000 and the bear market bottom, respectively.
If a similar pattern emerges, BTC price could see a spike in volatility as it heads towards the end of the year.
Original post:
Bitcoin may see major price volatility at the start of December Here's why - Cointelegraph