Bitcoin, Ethereum and Other Cryptocurrencies Gain Momentum after Wednesday’s Debacle
Despite all the fear-mongering about its imminent “death” over the past few days due to a sharp decline in value, bitcoin has regained some of its lost momentum Wednesday onward.
Crawling Back to Saftey
However, judging by the movement in the crypto market, it looks like things are slowly improving. And it’s not just bitcoin alone, other top cryptocurrencies including ethereum and ripple are also bouncing back.
Bitcoin’s gradual decline began soon after it surpassed $20,000, falling as low as $9,200 on Wednesday morning. Part of its sloppy performance has been attributed to speculations surrounding the South Korean government’s purported plans to pull the plug on crypto trading.
However, now that the Korean government has come clean on the controversy by assuring investors that a crypto ban is not imminent, the market has sighed with relief and indicated a positive momentum for bitcoin and the vast majority of all the top altcoins.
Crypto Market is Bouncing Back
As of January 19, 2018, bitcoin is trading around $11,600 per token, down marginally compared to yesterday’s value at over $11,900 per token. However, given its recent debacle, the ongoing surge is indeed quite significant and promising.
Ethereum, the second highest-valued coin, has had its fair share of troubles over the past few days. It dove below $800 on Wednesday, reaching a three-week low of $780.92. However, as of this writing, it bounced back all the way up to $1,074.21 per token, down 1.70 percent over the last 24 hours.
Ripple XRP, commonly referred to as the ripple, has shot up to about $1.61 per token as of Friday morning. The coin, which some crypto enthusiasts accuse of being backed by big banks, has seen a surge of over 70 percent since Wednesday.
Regulatory Concerns Are Not Completely Over
Although the South Korean government has denied plotting any punitive action against the country’s thriving cryptocurrency market, no such assurances can be heard coming from Beijing.
China, an early adopter of virtual currencies, has been traditionally a key player in the surge of the global crypto economy. However, over the past few months, the government has been particularly harsh on the domestic digital currency market.
Recent reports by Bloomberg and Reuters allege that the country is devising a strategy to ban the centralized trading of all digital currencies outright.
On a related note, Sonny Singh, the Chief Commercial Officer at bitcoin service provider BitPay, recently stated that government regulations on digital currencies could be blessing in disguise for most investors. Singh told Bloomberg,
“There’s talks about Asian regulators trying to manage and maybe ban some crypto exchanges in Korea. China’s already been stopped from bitcoin trading for a while and now Korea’s in focus. But again I think regulators don’t want to ban it, they just want to regulate it more and make sure it’s all being done in a legal way which is actually good for the industry.”
