Cryptocurrency News Update: Bitcoin gets ready to retest $12,000 by the weekend

Here’s what you need to know on Thursday

Markets:

BTC/USD hit the intraday high at $11,816 during early Asian hours and retreated to $11,650 by press time. The first digital coin has gained nearly 4% in the recent 24 hours and lost 1% since the beginning of the day, moving within a short-term bullish trend amid shrinking volatility.

At the time of writing, ETH/USD is changing hands at $394.50. The price touched the intraday high above $403.00 during early Asian hours but failed to hold the ground. ETH/USD has been trying to clear $400 since the start of the week. Now it is moving within a short-term bullish trend amid low volatility, down nearly 2% since the start of the day.

XRP/USD is changing hands at $0.2985. The price hit the intraday high of $0.3037 during early Asian hours and lost over 1.5% since the beginning of Thursday. On a day-to-day basis, it is in a green zone. Now it is moving within the short-term bullish trend amid shrinking volatility.

Among the 100 most important cryptocurrencies, Band Protocol (BAND) $7.34 (+40.7%), Bancor (BNT) $2.63 (+28.8%), Travala.com (AVA) $2.12 (+28.3%),  are the most successful.  The day’s losers are Nexo (NEXO) $0.1813 (-23.6%), The Midas Touch Gold (TMTG) $0.0323 (-7.3%),THORChain (RUNE) $0.5191 (-5%).

Chart of the day:
BTC/USD, 30-min chart

Market
 
Bitcoin surpassed $11,000 on Wednesday, and cryptocurrency experts believe that $12,000 is within reach. Chris Thomas from Swissquote noted that bitcoin’s price increase was accompanied by rising spot volumes after a month of relative feebleness.

I think we’ll hit $12,000 by Friday. There’s a lot of momentum in the market just now. Tuesday was a pause for breath, but we didn’t react negatively, the expert said.

 
Industry
 
Bitmain’s subsidiary, Matrixport, launched the exchange for cryptocurrency derivatives Bit.com. The platform is based on the state-of-the-art mechanism of orders matching with the delay of less than 50 seconds. Also, Bit.com has a mechanism of progressive position liquidations to provide additional protection during extreme market conditions, and an insurance fund to guaranty that the investments are safe and secure. According to Matrixport и Bit.com COO, Daniel Jan, the cryptocurrency options market will experience a 30x growth.
 
Young investors have been buying bitcoin during the pandemic, while the older generation prefers gold, according to JPMorgan analysts.

The two cohorts show divergence in their preference for ‘alternative’ currencies. The older cohorts prefer gold while the younger cohorts prefer bitcoin, a team of analysts led by Nikolaos Panigirtzoglou wrote.

The state-backed newspaper cited sources saying employees at state banks in cities including Shenzhen have started internally testing the app to transfer money and make payments.
 
Regulation
 
The Japanese Financial Services Agency (FSA) is concerned about the lack of regulation in the cryptocurrency trading industry. The concerns were voiced by the newly appointed commissioner of the regulator, Ryozo Himino.
 

“Deregulating bitcoins and other cryptocurrencies may not necessarily promote technical innovation, if doing so simply increases speculative trading,” Himino said in the interview with Reuters.
 

Decentralized finance (DeFi) has been creating bottlenecks in the Ethereum network. An architectural peculiarity of the software version of Ethereum Geth, allows for transaction spamming that leads to higher Ethereum transaction fees for ordinary users. Since may the transaction fees on Ethereum blockchain jumped by 800%.