Cryptocurrency

(Reuters) – Bitcoin is riding high.The world’s largest cryptocurrency has leapt 22% this year to $52,005, pushing it past a market value of $1 trillion mark for the first time since its record heyday of late 2021. Its resurgence has electrified the broader cryptocurrency market, including ether and other digital coins, which has now exceeded $2 trillion, as per data from CoinGecko.The sector has been bolstered by the U.S. regulatory approval of several spot bitcoin exchange-traded funds (ETFs), from BlackRock (NYSE:BLK) and Fidelity among others, which allow access to the crypto coin vis regular stock exchanges.The U.S. spot ETFs added 60,000 bitcoin in the first month of their launch, more than twice the miner production in the same period, brokerage Bernstein said.”The amount of flows far outstrips anyone’s expectation,” said Mark Connors, head of research at Canada’s 3iQ Corp.Crypto trading volumes are also robust.Total spot trading volumes on centralized exchanges rose 4.4% to $1.4 trillion in January, recording the fourth consecutive monthly increase and the highest reading since June 2022, a report by London-based researcher CCData said.The resurgence of interest helped the largest listed crypto exchange Coinbase (NASDAQ:COIN) Global post its first quarterly profit in two years last week .”The bitcoin appreciation is contributing to better spot bitcoin ETF flows, which is in turn driving bitcoin prices higher, and pulling other tokens higher as well,” J.P.Morgan analysts said.$150,000 BITCOIN IN 2025?Many industry watchers say the outlook is looking bright at the moment, with investors buying bitcoin ahead of the blockchain’s “halving” – a preplanned process that reduces mining rewards in half every four years – due in April.Gautam Chhugani, analyst at Bernstein, expects 2024 to be a break-out year for cryptocurrencies where bitcoin hits all-time highs followed by a peak of $150,000 by mid-2025.”This optimistic outlook is bolstered by the expectation of an upcoming halving event and the possibility of interest-rate reductions,” CCData analysts said.While bitcoin remain 32% away from its record high of $69,000, it notched an all-time high against the Japanese yen at 7,919,000 yen last week.BEWARE GREEDY CORRECTIONIt’s not all crypto high-fives: There are some signs the market is being led by investors driven by FOMO.CoinGlass’ Crypto Fear & Greed Index, a scale of 0 to 100 where zero denotes “extreme fear” and 100 signals “extreme greed”, hovered at 72. Usually when investors get too greedy, it signals the market is due for a correction.Riskier assets such as bitcoin could be threatened by persistently high interest rates; traders’ have pushed back bets of a rate cut to June from March following a string of strong U.S. economic data.”While we remain bullish with liquidity rushing back into risk assets, inflation being sticky over 3% remains a downside risk and would also mean increased volatility across markets,” analysts at crypto trading firm QCP Markets said. (This story has been refiled to add a dropped word in paragraph 15) More

They told investors that the Bitcoin rise takes both the crypto market and Coinbase’s earnings power higher. JPMorgan had been quite concerned that the enthusiasm in Bitcoin over the last three months was being driven by unrealistic optimism for new money going into the cryptocurrency market through the newly approved and recently launched U.S. spot Bitcoin ETFs. “However, what was initially a sell-the-news event with the launch of U.S. Bitcoin spot ETFs has now turned into meaningful Bitcoin price appreciation,” acknowledged the analysts at JPMorgan.”In our opinion, we think this Bitcoin appreciation is contributing to better spot Bitcoin ETF flows, which is, in turn, driving Bitcoin prices higher and pulling other tokens higher as well,” they added. After the acceleration in recent days of flows into Bitcoin ETFs and the significant price appreciation of Bitcoin and now Ethereum, the bank sees the higher cryptocurrency prices not only sustaining but improving activity levels and Coinbase’s earnings power. More

Bitcoin is currently trading around $51,770, its highest level since December 2021. The rise has taken its market cap to $1 trillion. Ethereum, the second-largest cryptocurrency, is up close to 4% at the time of writing, trading at around $2,746. The rise in cryptocurrencies has seen exchange Coinbase (NASDAQ:COIN) shares rally more than 10% on Wednesday, trading at $155.61. The stock initially hit a high of over $160 per share. Meanwhile, Bitcoin mining companies Riot Platforms (NASDAQ:RIOT) and Marathon Digital Holdings (NASDAQ:MARA) have jumped, up 9% and 12%, respectively. More

“We’re focused on building our growth and expanding our capacity by moving sites like this from our power pipeline to production,” said Trey Kelly, CEO of GRIID. “We’re especially pleased to be expanding our footprint in the Tennessee Valley, where the Tennessee Valley Authority’s (TVA) mix of affordable, reliable and low-carbon electricity has made this area an excellent long-term location to mine bitcoin.”“GRIID has been a good neighbor, and we’re excited to see them expand their operations in Lenoir City,” said the city’s mayor, Tony Aikens. “Bitcoin has been a net benefit for the city and for our state, generating tax receipts and good jobs. We look forward to GRIID being our neighbors for many years to come.”That sentiment was echoed by Shannon Littleton, CEO of the Lenoir City Utility Board. “Having a reliable customer like GRIID helps keep public power plants in business that might otherwise be struggling,” Littleton said. “They also pay for infrastructure improvements, a burden that will normally fall exclusively on local ratepayers. In a period of high inflation, I would have few options: raise prices, issue debt, reduce services, or find more customers like GRIID to bridge the gap.”GRIID operates two other mining facilities in East Tennessee, one in Maynardville and the other in Limestone, as well as a development, deployment and equipment repair center in Rutledge. GRIID also operates a facility co-located at the Glen Park Dam in Watertown, New York.In the aggregate, GRIID operates 68 MW of mining capacity (55MW in Tennessee). On February 6, the company announced plans to build a new 60 MW mining facility in Jackson, TN. When the new facilities in Jackson and Lenoir City become fully operational, GRIID would have nearly 150 MW of mining capacity, which would more than double its current capacity and represents the ongoing commitment to growth in the Tennessee Valley. More

Amidst a resurgence of interest in the cryptocurrency sector from Silicon Valley, the venture capital firm reportedly allocated $200 million towards purchasing these cryptocurrencies in the period from late summer to early autumn of 2023. The investment was equally divided between the top two cryptocurrencies by market cap. The move, which had not been disclosed before, highlights a renewed engagement from some institutional investors in the cryptocurrency market, which faced challenges in 2022 due to the downfall of major entities like the crypto exchange FTX, leading to a decrease in valuations, damage to the sector’s reputation, and increased regulatory scrutiny.Founders Fund began purchasing BTC when its price was under $30,000 and continued to buy both bitcoin and ether over the following months. The average purchase price of these cryptocurrencies could not be determined, the report adds. More

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WASHINGTON/LONDON (Reuters) -Bitcoin hit the $50,000 level for the first time in more than two years as the world’s largest cryptocurrency was buoyed by expectations of interest rate cuts later this year and last month’s regulatory nod for U.S. exchange-traded funds designed to track its price. The cryptocurrency has risen 16.3% so far this year, on Monday touching its highest since Dec. 27, 2021. At 12:56 p.m. EST (1756 GMT), bitcoin was up 4.96% on the day at $49,899, having oscillated around the $50,000 level. “$50,000 is a significant milestone for bitcoin after the launch of spot ETFs last month not only failed to elicit a move above this key psychological level but led to a 20% sell-off,” said Antoni Trenchev, co-founder of crypto lending platform Nexo. Crypto stocks also enjoyed a boost on Monday, with crypto exchange Coinbase (NASDAQ:COIN) up 4.9% and crypto miners Riot Platforms (NASDAQ:RIOT) and Marathon Digital (NASDAQ:MARA) up 10.8% and 11.9%, respectively. Shares of software firm MicroStrategy — a notable buyer of bitcoin — were up 10.2%. The price of ether, the second-largest cryptocurrency, was up 4.12% at $2,607.57. Global stock indexes also edged higher on Monday, as traders looked for cues on when the U.S. Federal Reserve might begin cutting interest rates. Analysts and financial market expectations both point to May as a potential start for rate cuts this year.ETF EXUBERANCE The primary driver behind bitcoin’s recent price appreciation “can be attributed to the increased inflow into BTC spot ETFs,” said Matteo Greco, a research analyst at fintech investment firm Fineqia International, in a research note. The U.S. securities regulator on Jan. 10 approved the first U.S. spot bitcoin ETFs, a watershed for the world’s largest cryptocurrency and the broader crypto industry, which had been trying to bring such a product to market for more than a decade. Greco in particular noted that outflows from Grayscale Investment’s Grayscale Bitcoin Trust — which received approval from the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC)in January to convert to an ETF — have begun to slow. “While GBTC recorded a cumulative outflow of $415 million last week, representing a significant reduction from previous weeks, BTC Spot ETFs saw a total net inflow of about $1.2 billion during the same period, marking the highest weekly inflow since their launch,” he said. Analysts at Bernstein have estimated that flows into the new ETFs will build up gradually to cross $10 billion in 2024, while Standard Chartered (OTC:SCBFF) analysts have said the products could draw $50 billion to $100 billion this year alone. Other analysts have said inflows could be $55 billion over five years.The market is also eyeing seven pending applications in front of the U.S. SEC for ETFs tied to the spot price of ether. The SEC is due to deliver a final decision on several of those proposals by May. Investors are also looking eagerly to the next bitcoin “halving,” expected in April, analysts say. That process is designed to slow the release of bitcoin, whose supply is capped at 21 million tokens – of which 19 million have already been created. Bitcoin rallied on the previous three halvings, the most recent of which was in 2020.”With (the) fourth bitcoin halving, a first Fed interest rate cut and potential ethereum spot ETF approval, all are significant for what is the smallest, youngest and most retail-dominated asset class,” said Ben Laidler, global markets strategist at eToro. More

Bitcoin rose 3.2% to $50,160.2 by 20:13 ET (05:13 GMT), crossing the $50,000 mark for the first time since December 2021. The token was now about $19,000 away from making new record highs.Gains in bitcoin came amid consistent capital flows into the recently-approved spot ETFs, which saw net inflows of over $1 billion in the past week, digital asset management firm CoinShares said in a report on Monday. BlackRock Inc’s (NYSE:BLK) iShares Bitcoin Trust (NASDAQ:IBIT) saw the biggest inflows for the week, at about $690 million.The token also benefited from slowing outflows from Grayscale Bitcoin Trust (NYSE:GBTC), which gained approval from the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) last month to convert into a spot ETF. This conversion saw the release of about $2 billion worth of bitcoin onto the open market, which caused steep losses in the price of the cryptocurrency.The token had fallen as much as 20% after the approval of the spot ETFs, but has now recouped all of those losses. Analysts at Bernstein noted that an element of “fear of missing out”, or FOMO, was also attracting some retail interest in the cryptocurrency, and that the token was well-placed to hit record highs on FOMO-driven buying. Bernstein expects flows into the new ETFs to cross $10 billion in 2024. Markets were also focused squarely on an upcoming halving event this year, which is expected in April. The event cuts the rate at which new bitcoins are generated by 50%, and has historically spurred a rally in the cryptocurrency. The most recent halving took place in May 2020, with the lead-up to the event seeing a 50% spike in bitcoin prices.Optimism over the potential approval of a spot ethereum ETF drove gains in broader crypto markets, with the world no.2 cryptocurrency rising 6.3% to a one-month high of $2,672.25.U.S.-listed crypto stocks saw strong gains on Monday, with exchange Coinbase Global Inc (NASDAQ:COIN) rising 3.8%, while bitcoin miner Marathon Digital Holdings Inc (NASDAQ:MARA) surged 14.2%. MicroStrategy Inc (NASDAQ:MSTR), which is the largest corporate holder of bitcoin, rose 11%. But the broader crypto market is still struggling with decreased retail interest, especially following a series of high-profile frauds, bankruptcies and regulatory crackdowns over the past two years. This was evident with spot trading volumes in bitcoin remaining well below their 2021 and 2017 peaks. The lower trading volumes also factored into the token’s rapid gains through 2023, as bitcoin benefited from an absence of active sellers. The SEC and Coinbase are currently embroiled in a legal battle that could dictate the nature of crypto tokens and cause a shift in their regulatory standing. More