Bitcoin retreats from five-month high in Asia trading
05:10, 12 October 2021
Bitcoin slipped back slightly in Asian trading after hitting a near five-month high of $57,755 in US hours on Monday.
As of midday Hong Kong time, bitcoin had dropped to $56,880 but is still up nearly 16% over the last seven days, according to data from CoinMarketCap.Com, meaning the leading digital token retained a market capitalisation above the $1trn mark.
This is still some way short of bitcoin’s all-time high of $64,863, which it reached on 14 April.
Mixed trading for other coins
The strong performance of bitcoin so far this week was not reflected uniformly across the other top 10 coins by market capitalisation. Ethereum, XRP and Polkadot are up 3.3%, 6.5% and 6.9% over the last 24 hours according to CoinMarketCap, whereas Cardano, Solano and Binance Coin saw their price head south.
News emerged on Sunday that the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) approved an exchange-traded fund (ETF) based on publicly traded companies with exposure to bitcoin.
One analyst told Forbes that the recent boost to bitcoin’s price comes as investors focus on a later October deadline for the SEC to greenlight an ETF linked to bitcoin futures themselves.
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Power crisis boosts cryptocurrency
“There is no doubt that investors’ sentiment is well fueled as October marks the deadline when the SEC will have to make a decision as to either approve, reject or delay” action on a futures-linked bitcoin ETF, said Konstantin Anissimov, executive director at CEX.IO told Forbes.
Ed Moya, senior market analyst at brokers OANDA said in a note that the ongoing global power crisis was another push for investors to switch from fiat to digital currencies.
“The global energy crisis is leading to blackouts, food shortages, and worsening economic conditions that will force many individuals to seek protection from fiat currencies. Lebanon is the latest example of how bad economic conditions can get, which might start to make Bitcoin look attractive for many individuals who are staring at a nightmare situation.
Potential for record BTC high
Bitcoin will likely need a fresh catalyst to make $60,000 happen, but if that happens quickly, record highs might not be hard to reach,” he said.
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