By
Steve Muchoki
April 18th, 2024
After surpassing a $4,700 mark on Monday, the digital currency is already approaching a historic record of over $5,000 it reached in September.
Bitcoin is regaining its upward momentum right now. After a highly volatile month, the cryptocurrency is making significant gains owing to the growing investor demand.
The bitcoin price surged above $4,900 yesterday, on October 10, nearing its historic record of $5,000. It managed to gain more than $500 over the last four days, soaring from $4,400 to over $4,900. Although the cryptocurrency slightly decreased through the day, it is still just $200 lower than its all-time high of $5,000. Bitcoin is now hovering at around $4,800 and at the time of report is trading at $4,854, according to CoinMarketCap.
Bitcoin jumped to nearly $5,000 in the beginning of September, but dropped to almost $2,900 in mid-September on the news about the cryptocurrency crackdown and ICO ban in China.
The bitcoin community is now awaiting two hard forks, Bitcoin Gold, which is scheduled for October 25, and SegWit2x, which is expected in November. Normally, such event as a hard fork leads to a decline in the cryptocurrency adoption. However, it doesn’t happen now, what illustrates the lack of support for the new hard fork.
Despite the upcoming SegWit2x, the growth of trading volume is recorded in South Korea, the US, and Japan. Besides, according to analysts, the bitcoin price will continue to rise in the near future.
Thomas Glucksmann from Gatecoin has recently claimed bitcoin could achieve $6,000 by the end of the year and added that investors should brace for more volatility as some in the bitcoin community might move to reject SegWit2X. Charles Hayter, CEO of industry website CryptoCompare, predicted that the cryptocurrency could hit $5,000 by the end of the year due to increased regulation to cryptocurrencies and ICOs.
In a recent interview to Bloomberg News, the CEO of the world’s largest asset manager BlackRock, Larry Fink, said he sees great potential in digital currency and its underlying technology. At the same time, he believes the current market is focused on speculation.
“Most importantly, when I think about most of the cryptocurrencies, it just identifies how much money laundering is being done in the world. How much people are trying to move currencies from one place to another,” he said.
As Forbes reported, there are a number of reasons behind the bitcoin price growth. The world financial crisis, according to the publication, could urge investors to buy the digital currency, which would turn into the “safe heaven” asset. Another possible factor is the prospect of a regional war in North Korea or the Middle East. Besides, the recent ICO ban in China may only be a temporary measure to appease international agencies and hardcore communist members in view of the upcoming Communist Party convention.