Bitcoin (BTC) Runs Above $64K, New Peak Possible
Bitcoin (BTC) entered the region where its price could set another all-time high above $64,000. On October 19, BTC broke out to a peak of $64,634.53, achieving its gains on trading volumes around $37B in 24 hours.
BTC stopped just short of its previous peaks in May at above $64,800, but with strong expectations of booming to a much higher price range. Greed is expanding fast, based on the Fear and Greed Index, and now measures Extreme Greed at 82 points.
The current trading climate ensured BTC had one of its most successful trading days despite prices near an all-time high, suggesting the upside for BTC may be more significant in the coming days and weeks.
The most recent rally still happened on relatively low trading volumes and with leverage still recovering to levels from the previous peak. This sets the expectations for BTC breaking above $100K in another bullish cycle.
BTC remains highly volatile, and the exact time frame of the price moves is unpredictable. Still, some of the most bullish scenarios see a breakout to six-digit prices before a pullback.
BTC continues to show long-term confidence on holding the assets as a future source of non-KYC payment solution in some cases, and as a long-term bet on price appreciation.
Whale Accumulation Drives Scarcity
The past two years showed remarkable large-scale adoption of BTC. Wallets with more significant holdings expanded and continued adding to their holdings. Short-term selling is still observed, but overall growth of large-scale wallets continues.
The Supply per Whale measure shows the readiness to take coins off the market.
BTC offers incentives to hold long term, as well as potentially use the assets in their wrapped form to participate in DeFi operations. Still, BTC is sometimes viewed as too valuable to risk in smart contracts and Ethereum (ETH) is more often used for liquidity.
Is BTC Still Threatened by Sudden Dips
BTC has survived a record liquidation in May, followed by a mining ban from China in September. Since then, both prices and mining activity are on the mend. However, prices remain shaky as futures markets seek direction. BTC leveraged trading remains on the low side.
So far, BTC remains on the upside, and while prices have not recovered their intra-day all-time high, the close on October 19 was the highest in history, at $64,291.99.
Bitcoin ETF Adoption Accelerates
After years of applications to launch various types of Bitcoin-based ETF, several tickers are set to start trading. The Valkyrie Bitcoin Strategy ETF was among the first to be accepted by the US Securities and Exchange Commission and is set to start trading within days with a chosen ticker BTFD.
The ProShares BTC ETF also traded for a day already under the BITO ticker, raising more than $1B in volumes. The ETF market fluctuations are much lower, with 2% gains in its first highly active day, where BTC broke out nearly 5% on the spot market.
In the coming months, several different futures-based Bitcoin funds are set to seek approval and launch for trading. As the ETF vehicle receives the green light, other forms of BTC investment are also transforming.
Grayscale Capital will transform its Bitcoin Trust GBTC into an ETF. Grayscale’s proposal will also be based partially on actual BTC holdings, which are currently 10% of the value of each share. GBTC has coexisted with spot crypto trading as a tool to gain exposure, and has either lagged or traded at a premium compared to spot crypto markets.
Grayscale Capital has already filed to change the status of its investment vehicle, while retaining the status of its other crypto-based shares.
The ETF launch news may be a factor for BTC in the next two months, especially given the success of BITO on its first day. So far, BTC has not gone through a sell-off and kept close to its all-time highs.
Miners Preserving Brand-New Coins
Miners are becoming an even more important factor, as they keep an ever-growing storage of newly mined BTC. At 900 coins per day, even that supply is scarce. The advantage of newly mined BTC is a lack of previous history that may be linked to problematic wallets.
BTC mining has reached 143 EH/s, still lower than its peak values of above 190 EH/s. The latest difficulty adjustment on October 18 means the next two weeks may be less competitive for miners.
For the first time in years, a US-based mining pool has displaced the top 4 Chinese miners. Foundry USA is the fourth largest BTC mining pool, displacing even the Binance.com mining operation. The pool produces around 13% of the BTC blocks in recent days.
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