Bitcoin has risen by 20% in the last three months. Last October 8th, the power devoted to Bitcoin mining exceeded its all-time high.
Once again, the price of Bitcoin (BTC) broke the USD 11,000 barrier. The rebound of more than 4% in 24 hours occurred on October 8th, after the company Square, belonging to Jack Dorsey, founder of Twitter, invested USD 50 million worth of Bitcoin.
Bitcoin has remained below the USD 11,000 level since last September 19th. According to CoinMarketCap, the value of the first cryptocurrency on the market even reached USD 10,248 at its lowest moment on September 23rd.
In recent days, the price of Bitcoin has fluctuated between USD 10,400 and USD 10,700. However, the final momentum to break the 11,000 barrier again occurred between October 8th and 9th, coinciding with Square’s investment. The inclusion of the company seems to have mobilized bullish sentiment and investment enthusiasm, moving the price accordingly.
This recent momentum led Bitcoin’s total market capitalization to exceed USD 200 billion once again.
The price of the first cryptocurrency has recovered by close to 20% in the last three months. Its current value is almost 150% more than the price that it had during the fall that the declaration of a pandemic has caused since its start in March of this year.
Besides, the price increase coincides with a new milestone for Bitcoin mining. For the first time in history, on October 8th, the total processing power on the network was above 170 EH/s, according to data from Glassnode.
The cryptocurrency market has usually followed in Bitcoin’s footsteps by increasing the price of altcoins accordingly. The numbers of the main cryptocurrencies have remained green in recent days. The Chainlink project, whose LINK token has risen by more than 14%, is the most prominent. Others, like Ether (ETH) and Binance Coin (BNB), have increased by more than 4%.
Institutional Investment in Bitcoin
Square’s purchase of USD 50 million worth of Bitcoin is just an example of how the institutional curve of investment in the main cryptocurrency has been accelerating.
This year, business intelligence firm MicroStrategy has invested more than USD 400 million to maintain part of its reserves in Bitcoin. First, they bought around 21,000 BTC in August and, a month later, added another 16,796 BTC to their assets.
In September, investment firm Grayscale reportedly reached USD 4.8 billion worth of BTC in reserve. Not all the bitcoins in those reserves are in the hands of Grayscale, which does not buy them directly either. One of the services that Grayscale provides is that of making purchases on behalf of its customers, in addition to issuing shares denominated in Bitcoin.
Despite that situation, this fund is close to USD 5,000 million, which is a sign of the institutional interest in investing in Bitcoin. Data from CoinMarketCap indicate that the trading volume of the cryptocurrency reached more than USD 60,000 million in just 24 hours.
By Alexander Salazar
