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Bitcoin Hits New Highs as Bitcoin Cash Recovery Continues

Bitcoin Hits New Highs as Bitcoin Cash Recovery Continues

Nick Cawley, Senior Strategist

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Talking Points

- Cryptocurrency market cap soars to over USD121 billion.

- Bitcoin Cash the standout rising by nearly 35% in the last 24 hours.

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Bitcoin (BTC) Prints Yet Another All-Time High

The unstoppable force that is Bitcoin continues to carve out new highs on the day that SegWit2X is expected to be implemented. If miners continue to signal at their current pace, SegWit2X will become part of the Bitcoin network today. This will be followed by a two-week grace period that will allow miners to upgrade their software to be able to build blocks compatible with the new ecosystem.

And it is this advance and scaling of the blockchain that is currently providing the updraft for the original Bitcoin, BTC. The digital currency printed a new high of $3485 in European trade and in the eyes of a lot of market commentators the price will continue to rise. A Fibonacci extension at $3715 is the likely first target although calls for $5000 are increasing by the day. Indeed one Harvard academic and Bitcoin investor, Dennis Porto, sees the currency potentially hitting $100,000 by the end of 2021 if BTC follows ‘Moore’s Law’ of exponential growth.

The recent rally in BTC has also seen it close in on being three times the price of gold, the traditional safe haven of choice. Bitcoin overtook gold for the first time at the beginning of March this year and became twice as valuable as the precious metal by the end of May.

The worry in all this unbridled enthusiasm however is that the market can also fall at an exponential rate the minute the sellers take control of the market and cannot find any bids. And if Bitcoin usage continues to grow sharply, there may well be further scaling issues ahead.

And I will be talking Bitcoin Trading and Strategy on Wednesday August 9 at 1100 GMT. Join the free webinar here.

Chart: Bitcoin (BTC) Price Daily Timeframe (May – August 8, 2017)

Chart by IG

Bitcoin Cash (BCH) Soars Boosting the Cryptocurrency Market Capitalization to a Fresh High

And the spin-off from last week’s hard-fork, BCH, continues to recover, jumping nearly 35% in the last 24 hours. This surge plus other gains in market heavyweights, including Ethereum (ETH), has boosted the value of the digital currency market place to just over USD121 billion.

Market Moves/Top 5 Capitalizations – August 8, 2017

Australian Senators Call for Bitcoin to be Made an Official Currency

In a further push for to open the Bitcoin market, two Australian senators have asked the country’s central bank, the Reserve Bank of Australia, to recognize the digital token as an official form of currency. According to one Australian newspaper, Labor senator Sam Dastyari (New South Wales) and Liberal senator Jane Hume (Victoria) said that the country’s financial competiveness would be hindered without officially accepting Bitcoin and would put it at a disadvantage to other countries.

If you are interested in trading digital pairs and would like to practice trading either BTC or ETH, you can create a Quick and Free Demo Account Here

--- Written by Nick Cawley, Analyst.

To contact Nick, email him at nicholas.cawley@ig.com

Follow Nick on Twitter @nickcawley1

DailyFX provides forex news and technical analysis on the trends that influence the global currency markets.

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