Analyst: Expect Bitcoin Price at $3,000 By Year’s End

Bitcoin price could hit $3,000 by year’s end, having recently traded above gold and hitting a new high, according to Adam Davies, a consultant at Altus Consulting who works with financial institutions on technology. CNBC recently interviewed Davies, noting in the interest of disclosure, that he owns bitcoin.

Adam Davies

That price would mark a near 150% gain over the recent $1,204, and more than 130% over the $1,293.47 high from last week.

Market And Geopolitical Factors

Bitcoin’s price has not trading above an ounce of gold. However, it’s price is up 195% in the past 12 months, due to various market and geopolitical factors. China’s clampdown on money laundering has delivered stricter regulations in that country.

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Demonetization in India has made bitcoin a more likely alternative store of value. Other currencies have experienced volatility while the global economy faces uncertainty. Davies said as bitcoin expands and its acceptance grows, adoption will increase rapidly.

People are unsure about global events, he said. Brexit has impacted currencies such as the U.K. pound, causing people to divest into bitcoin. Such drivers will hedge against insecurity and currency fluctuation in markets.

Unprecedented Bitcoin Volume

Peter Smith, Blockchain’s CEO, told CNBC that Blockchain has experienced unprecedented volume. A £3,000 price by year end is feasible at current price appreciation. Experts cited other factors as well.

The expected approval of the Winklevoss exchange traded fund could deliver a “flood of institutional funds” into the bitcoin market, said Thomas Glucksmann, marketing head at Gatecoin, a cryptocurrency trading platform.

Positive Indicators Rise

Japan recently approved a law deeming digital currencies similar to fiat currency that can be used as methods of payment, bringing credibility to cryptocurrency. Glucksmann agreed a $3,000 bitcoin price by year end is realistic. He said a range of $2,000 to $2,5000 is a safer prediction.

The bitcoin price will rise this year, he said, but the extent of the rise is difficult to say.

Source: Cryptocoinsnews

Bitcoin and Ethereum are Booming

The digital currency space has reached new heights with a total market cap of more than $24 billion, an all-time high. The main driver appears to be the two biggest digital currencies, bitcoin and ethereum, which have attracted adoption based on different use cases.

Digital Currencies Reach an All-Time High Market Cap – image from coinmarketcap

Bitcoin is now seen as a hedge and a useful addition to investment portfolios due to its unique nature which means it is uncorrelated with any other assets, making it highly desirable for diversification as it reduces total risk while potentially increasing gains.

In particular, anticipation over the bitcoin ETF which, if approved, would bring in Wall Street, has propelled the currency to its highest level ever, surpassing gold. A historical event that may have significant psychological effects as the currency now proves its value.

Ethereum, a barely two years old digital currency has in a short time created a highly vibrant, dynamic and very innovative happy ecosystem with discussions ranging from primitive artificial intelligence to preventing cheating in fantasy sports. Its market cap has recently reached an all-time high.

The eth community speaks of a flipping – a point when ethereum’s market cap overtakes bitcoin. They argue the new currency can do everything bitcoin does, but better, and then some more. They say eth’s transaction times are in seconds, fees almost nonexistent, taking bitcoin’s mantra of as good as free and instant global payments.

Bitcoin, but better? Perhaps, but the two are different and as we have seen recently can both grow. Bitcoin is more concerned with gold-like qualities, something you uselessly hold as a hedge against monetary mismanagement. Eth is more concerned with codable cash, money you or machines spend either manually or automatically. It is further concerned with a much wider range than just money. Chronicled, for example, secures the authenticity of sneakers through eth’s blockchain to prevent fake goods.

Bitcoin, through Rootstock, can take some of eth’s niche while ethereum could make obsolete bitcoin’s gold claim by themselves capping coin issuance. They both are trying, but Rootstock has problems from a user perspective while eth, though there are suggestions it will be limited to around 100 million, might still have some inflation.

They, therefore, appear more complementary, at least for now, but many are asking: brothers or foes? The market hasn’t decided, instead appears to be betting on both.

Regardless of how matters may further develop, both communities, which often overlap, have much to celebrate. Bitcoin just surpassed gold parity, eth just surpassed silver parity. Both are at or near all-time high. The boom times have arrived.

Source: cryptocoinsnews

Bitcoin Price Advances, Tiring Legs Overdue

The bitcoin price advance of the past few weeks has been as relentless as it has been vexing. I must confess I have been stymied and surprised by the inexorable strength of this advance off the 750 low.

However, all advances must end sooner or later.  This begs the question:  when?

Here is the daily chart (kraken):Even a novice Elliott Wave reader can see that there were (2) 5 waves completed at the 1080 high.  That was also the place where the 2nd arc of the 4th pair stopped the rally.  Well, it turns out that as of this very moment, pricetime has again met the very same arc that stopped the last rally.  Will it get through the arc this time, or will it be denied once again?

I have been stopped out a couple times on short trades in the past couple days.  I am reaching the point of wanting to throw in the towel and go long.  But alas, it is precisely when we want to throw in the towel, that trends change.

Let’s look at a shorter term chart for more insight:As of this writing, price has not been able to escape the 2nd arc pair on the 4 hour chart.   It broke through briefly, but was pulled back within the arc’s dominion.  So, there is resistance overhead on the daily and the 4 hour charts.

Here is a 2-hour chart:Here, we can see that pricetime has bumped up against the same Gann angle that stopped the last rally.  And it has done so just as pricetime is hitting the 4th square in time, and exiting the 4tharc pair on this bear setup.

I must confess, I am getting gun-shy of the short trade in this surprisingly strong advance.  But I can’t help but feel that this might be another time to consider it.  We will see…

Happy trading!

Remember:  The author is a trader who is subject to all manner of error in judgement.  Do your own research, and be prepared to take full responsibility for your own trades.

Source:cryptocoinnews

Anger Grows at PBOC’s Interference with Bitcoin

Following yet another sharp price drop due to the secretive, closed-door and private actions of China’s Central Bank, the bitcoin community turned today to angry rhetoric directed at PBOC.

“You can’t live in a fascist state and not expect the fascist state to come bursting through your door to slap you around, every now and then.” – says one bitcoiner. “I am about sick of China.” – says another. “It’s safe to say that China is going to keep saying something every time Bitcoin gets close to the value of Gold.” – says a third.

PBOC stands accused of taking measures against bitcoin every time price rises. Just as bitcoin surpassed gold parity, they announced the opening of an “investigation” into China’s big three exchanges: BTCC, OKCoin and Huobi.

Price fell sharply by around $300, but then slowly recovered, increasing by around $170 from the beginning of this month to reach around $1,070. PBOC again interfered. Telling Bloomberg they were to hold a closed door meeting with nine of China’s smaller bitcoin exchanges: CHBTC, BtcTrade, HaoBTC, Yunbi, Yuanbao, BTC100, Jubi, BitBays and Dahonghuo.

PBOC warned them to comply with regulations or risk being shut down. Price initially reacted by $80, but it recovered and even went higher as PBOC’s language was ambiguous. A word for word translation reads: “If there is a Bitcoin trading platform in violation of the above requirements [related to money laundering, foreign exchange rules, taxation and advertising],[and] the circumstances are serious, the inspection team will bring it to the relevant departments [for the exchange] to be closed down according to [the] law.”

It is not fully clear whether PBOC is referring to violations that happen after the above warning, or to violations that may have occurred in the past. The price’s reaction suggested the former which would have earned PBOC some praise for acting reasonably. But then, OKCoin and Huobi announced they are to pause bitcoin and litecoin withdrawals for a time estimate of one month to enact measures that allows them to comply with the requirements of PBOC.

Bitcoin’s Price Drops as OKCoin and Huobi Temporarily Pause Withdrawals – image from cryptowatch

Price reacted quickly, falling by almost $160 in minutes. It has now somewhat recovered, but denying people access to their own funds for a current time estimate of one month is always a worrying event. Some might also wonder, why is it just these two exchanges?

No one talks. We’ve tried to reach out to many, but they all have the same response: silence.

Anger Grows

OKCoin and Huobi were by far the most popular bitcoin exchanges. Most western traders used one of the two, with suggestions that hedge funds and other financial institutions were engaged in high-frequency trading there.

Some hours before their official announcement earlier today, a western based trader stated his hands were shaking as while he was logged in on OKCoin, he was suddenly logged out. When he entered the password, it would not work. “It’s the correct password,” – he insisted. After some more comments full of typos because he was imagining the worst, “going on a bike ride” – he said.

Hopefully he is fine, but the actions of PBOC leave much to be desired as they are not explaining their aims. PBOC is not officially talking to the media, instead sending out rumors about “third party custodians,” with their brief announcements nothing more than bland, bureaucratic, grayness, which says little to explain their intentions.

Instead, all we get is drip drops, with exchanges arbitrarily probably asked to enact trading fees although their absence breaches no laws, as well as to remove margins or futures for no given reason that has any relevance to the country’s laws.

This is no way to behave for the world’s second largest economy which has aspirations to be a global player. One of the world’s most powerful central bank cannot arbitrarily take actions that affect global markets without even explaining their aims or laying down proposals on what it wishes to achieve and how.

It has been over a month since the PBOC began investigating Chinese bitcoin exchanges.

PBOC’s actions do not affect just Chinese citizens. Many westerners used those two exchanges and probably other bitcoin exchanges based in China. Many of them are now suddenly shut out and though we are told temporarily, until it is proven so we do not quite know.

When America wished to make an example to show its intentions of applying the current laws to bitcoin related activity before it was clear it was so applicable, they picked a target which had seemingly intentionally engaged in actual money laundering. A target who happened to be running one of the far smaller bitcoin exchanges.

A bigger exchange would have affected many who would have turned their ire against the state for intentionally causing them the loss of much wealth. In any event, China has made clear its intentions that they require exchanges to comply far more than American authorities did back in 2013. Someone to make an example may not even be necessary.

If violations are found from now on then enforcement would be appropriate, but doing so without prior warning at the expense of so many, both Chinese and non-Chinese citizens, serves only to show that Chinese authorities do not take into account the considerations of others.

Regulations with clear rules, as well as audits, are desirable. Potentially shutting down exchanges before the law is even laid down and clarified it applies to this very new technology is a draconian action by out of touch far older generations who probably can’t even use an e-mail, let alone have any clue about bitcoin, the blockchain or today’s interconnected global markets.

Source: cryptocoinsnews

[Updated] Bitcoin Price Crashes as Chinese Exchanges OkCoin & Huobi Pause Withdrawals Temporarily

Bitcoin crashed today as OKCoin made a surprise announcement stating they are to pause BTC and LTC withdrawals for a time estimate of one month to comply with “relevant national anti-money laundering, payment and settlement of foreign exchange management and other financial laws and regulations.” Huobi made a similar announcement.

The exchanges state that in order to strictly comply with relevant laws and regulations, in a joint effort with industry counterparts, a comprehensive upgrade of the platform to effectively prevent and combat the use of Bitcoin for money laundering, foreign exchange, pyramid schemes and other illegal activities will be undertaken. In order to avoid possible illegal transactions that may continue before the system upgrade is complete, the exchanges decided:

1) Immediately from this moment, to suspend bitcoin and litecoin withdrawals;

2) RMB cash withdrawal and other operations are not affected;

3) The implementation of the system… is estimated to take 1 month, but may also be substantially ahead of that time estimate.

We have reached out to a number of exchanges, but have not yet received any response. According to unconfirmed reports, BTCC is allowing bitcoin withdrawals. They have not issued an announcement and it is currently unclear if they are taking the same measures.

There were previous reports today by western based bitcoiners that they could not withdraw from OKCoin, but those reports are not fully confirmed.

The measures follow a meeting with PBOC by nine smaller Chinese bitcoin exchanges – CHBTC, BtcTrade, HaoBTC, Yunbi, Yuanbao, BTC100, Jubi, BitBays and Dahonghuo – where they were warned to comply with laws related to money laundering, foreign currency payment and management, taxation and advertisement. In its strongest language yet, if there is a violation, PBOC may make a recommendation to the relevant authorities for the exchange to be shut down, the statement said yesterday.

The wording of PBOC is somewhat ambiguous as it is not clear whether they are warning exchanges to strictly comply from now on and if not they may even be shut down or whether it includes past violations.

Price sharply fell as of writing. Readers are however warned this story is developing. Although great care has been taken to ensure the accuracy of the above content, inadvertent mistakes may be made, thus caution is urged until further details emerge.

Bitcoin price crashes as OkCoin and Huobi pause withdrawals of Bitcoin and Litecoin. Chart courtesy: Cryptowatch.

CCN is following this developing story.

Source : cryptocoinsnews

Price Shoots Up as Bitcoin Unlimited Surpasses Segwit

Bitcoin’s price jumped by around $30 yesterday shortly after it became clear that Bitcoin Unlimited had overtaken segwit in hashrate share.

Bitcoin’s Price Rises as Bitcoin Unlimited Surpasses Segwit – image from bitcoinwisdom

Although there may have been other factors, especially an increase in global uncertainty due to some of Trump’s policies, the timing of the sudden increase closely coincided with Bitcoin Unlimited surpassing segwit, standing today at 23% of the hashrate while segwit is at around 21%.

The new grassroots client has been gaining increasing support with ViaBTC, an open Bitcoin Unlimited pool, rising to 12% of the network hashrate in the past 24 hours, up from around 8-9%.

If Antpool or F2Pool start mining with Bitcoin Unlimited, its hashrate nears 40%. A significant psychological event which may raise anticipations for an upgrade of the network capacity that can currently only handle 2.5-3 transactions per second.

However, F2Pool’s co-founder, Wang Chun, told CCN that he has no plans to upgrade. Jihan Wu, Antpool’s founder, used to be very vocal in asking for a higher transaction capacity, but has not recently made any comments on BU. In reply to my question on whether he intends to upgrade to either Bitcoin Unilimited or segwit, Wu told CCN:

“The protocol debate is not my priority. I need to focus on BITMAIN’s own business these days.”

Bitcoin Unlimited Surpasses Segwit – image from nodecounter

Bitcoin Unlimited has attracted a number of developers, including Peter Tschipper, Andrea Suisani, Andrew Stone, Tom Harding, Dagur Johannsson, Amaury Sèchet, Tom Zander, Jerry Chan, ftrader as well as many others. They also port changes from Bitcoin Core developers who can indirectly be considered as contributors.

By activity, it appears to be roughly half of Bitcoin Core’s, after just one year of being established. Both have encountered difficulties. Bitcoin Core has unintentionally chain split twice, in 2013 and in 2015. Bitcoin Unlimited recently had a quickly fixed bug which caused one forked block.

Currently, both clients are compatible, but if Bitcoin Unlimited reaches more than 51%, preferably 75% or as good as 100%, the network will be able to create blocks that provide higher transaction capacity in line with demand as has been the case for much of bitcoin’s existence. Ending the transaction backlogs.

Some are strongly opposed to a capacity increase through raising the maxblocksize, suggesting that segregated witnesses (segwit) is a better solution. It is a proposal that many expected to be adopted, but segwit has stalled for the past two months with its hashrate now seemingly falling. Moreover, the founders of two mining pools – ViaBTC and BTC.TOP – have stated they will not adopt segwit. As such, it’s unlikely it can reach its threshold of 95%.

Bitcoin Core developers have not proposed any further suggestions on how transaction capacity can be increased except for a recommendation by Luke-Jr to reduce maxblocksize by 70%. Some Bitcoin Core developers have further threatened a chain split if maxblocksize is increased. In reply, BTC.TOP’s founder has stated that $100 million is set aside to attack a smaller hashrate chain, ensuring a chain split is unlikely or difficult, if at all possible.

It appears that some Bitcoin Core developers are happy with no increase at all, which many would consider as the worst possible outcome of this almost two years long debate. On the other hand, the founder of BTC.TOP says that other miners are “just waiting for a suitable time.” While ViaBTC’s founder says that “BU has the support of Bitmain and F2pool, they have said privately they will switch to BU.”

Current Bitcoin Unlimited Nodes

They may be waiting for nodes to upgrade, which have been increasing recently, or for Bitcoin Core to propose an acceptable solution, but as some are against a maxblocksize increase, that may be unlikely. They may be further waiting to see more testing in Bitcoin Unlimited which has now been running for more than a year and is used by around five mining pools in production.

Currently, F2Pool’s and Antpool’s hashrate appears to be decreasing with the hashrate of BTC.TOP and ViaBTC on the rise, giving Bitcoin Unlimited a level of momentum that has not been seen since this debate began.

Source: cryptocoinsnews

Bitcoin Price is Within Touching Distance of $1,000 (WHY WAIT?)

Bitcoin price is nearing the $1000 mark for the second time this year, just over a month after the cryptocurrency scaled the milestone at the beginning of 2017.

It’s still early days in the year and bitcoin has already seen a dramatic 2017.

Trading beyond the barrier in early January, the cryptocurrency’s market capital swelled beyond $17.5 billion. In China, bitcoin prices reached all-time highs in the first week of 2017. Price also scaled beyond $1100 on January 4, nearing an all-time high in the Bitstamp Price Index (BPI) as bitcoin reached gold parity. The following day, price crashed steeply following a  crackdown led by China’s central bank. Altogether, bitcoin lost over a third in value after falling further to a low of $751 in January, having scaled a high of $1139 in the month.

Now, despite a significant drop-off in bitcoin trading volumes in major market China – following the introduction of trading fees – bitcoin has hit the bull switch again as it charts its way toward the $1000 figure.

At the time of publishing, bitcoin is trading to the dollar at $995.48, close to the day’s high of $995.62 on the BPI.

Despite feeling its impact initially, Bitcoin shrugged aside the People Bank of China’s involvement into the Chinese trading market, where bitcoin is – once again – trading beyond the $1000 mark. According to Bobby Lee, CEO of major Chinese exchange BTCC, the reason behind bitcoin’s rising prices is due increased interest and media coverage of bitcoin, contributing to a “hype cycle”, rather than any instance of capital flight from China.

In statements to Forbes, he stated:

People are learning about Bitcoin from the media and having confidence in the technology, which then leads to more people buying, the price continuing to rise and more media attention. The hype cycle continues.

Another possible factor behind bitcoin’s latest bullish run are speculated policies and enforced executive orders of new American president Donald Trump. Talk of imposing tax tariffs on Chinese imports, verbal sparring between Trump’s camp and German chancellor Angela Merkel, a controversial ban denying immigrants and refugees into the United States have all lead to storm clouds gathering and adding to global political and financial uncertainties. These developments, observers believe, has led to bitcoin’s price making gains in the initial days of Trump’s presidency.

Today’s gain has added to a notable bullish run since Donald Trump was inaugurated as President on January 20. Bitcoin price has gained over 10% since Trump took office.

For a live Bitcoin Price chart, click here.

For the most recent bitcoin price analysis piece from CCN analyst Jim Fredrickson, click here.

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All time references are in Coordinated Universal Time (UTC).