Last week our theme was “Top VCs investing during crypto bear market.”
Our theme for this week is “3 Bullish signals during the Blockchain bear market.”
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On November 12th, the price of Bitcoin was at $7,195 and dropped to $5,975. This was the last drop before we saw its big bull run, a 228.9% increase, reaching an all-time high of $19,655 on December 17th.
The days of Bitcoin’s crazy volatility are over and Bitcoin has been as flat as it can be. Since June, it has had three dips between 9–10%, with its price hovering around the $6,500 mark for almost two months. This has been very unusual for one of the most volatile assets in history.
Bitcoin has matured to the point that it can be compared to traditional stock, fiar currencies, or commodities. Data from the CBOE, indicates that Bitcoin (BTC) is less volatile than the publicly-traded stocks, like Amazon (AMZN) , Netflix (NFLX), and Nvidia (NVDA), while its 20-day volatility is nearing that of Apple (APPL).
There are many signals that indicate a possible bull market:
JPMorgan is exploring a relationship with Bakkt. The article, suggests that while the bank may not be a first mover in Bitcoin, JPMorgan’s clients will eventually gain access to Bitcoin through Bakkt. Fundstrat’s Lee tweeted: “Great article on @jpmorgan potential use of Bakkt infrastructure. Highlights how Bakkt is providing the security/compliance/reputation needed to truly attract large financial institutions to crypto, previously concerned about reputation risk.”
Stellar, the nonprofit organization behind Stellar (XLM), announced on Tuesday that they will be doing the largest airdrop in crypto history. The airdrop will consist of $125 million worth of Stellar Lumens (XLM) to be distributed to users of the popular Blockchain. Blockchain’s blog post says the reason for the XLM giveaway is to thank the company’s “30M Wallet users” and to celebrate the addition of “full support for XLM in the Blockchain Wallet.”
Bitfury raised $80 million in closed funding round. Led by Korelya Capital, the private placement was joined by Macquarie Capital, Asian financial institution Dentsu Inc., European investment company Armat Group, European fund managers Jabre and Lian Group, Argenthal Capital Partners, insurance group MACSF and Mike Novogratz’s digital asset merchant bank Galaxy Digital.
Goldman Sachs, has started to sign up a small number of customers for its upcoming Bitcoin trading product. Citing a source familiar with the matter, The Block reports that the bank is on-boarding a “small number of clients” to actively trade the derivative, a futures contract but does not trade on an exchange. Additionally, the bank continues to consider launching custody services for crypto assets.
Fidelity, the 5th largest asset management company in the world, revealed its plan to offer custody services on cryptocurrency investments.
Again, Mike Novogratz made bullish predictions, that BTC could reach $9,000 by the end of 2018. but for Bitcoin to reach achieve this, it will need to pass $6,800. Indicators, like the relative price index, that measures speed and price changes, have jumped to 59.04, the highest level since September. 4th, showing Bitcoin to be more and more bullish.
The CBOE is planning on launching Ethereum futures later this year. Bitcoin Futures, in late 2017, had a important impact Bitcoin’s price spike. An Ethereum futures product could help solidify the mainstream adoption of crypto as investment vehicles.
Despite an enormous amount of bullish news the price of Bitcoin has remained flat for months now. Many think that Bitcoin’s price is being artificially kept low, so big players can get in the market.
While no one really knows if we are exiting the bear market, over the last year we’ve seen a lot of progress both in terms of regulations and investments from institutional investors. The upcoming launch of Bakkt and the SEC’s decision on the pending Bitcoin ETF could trigger the next bull run.
The impact of these signals is highly speculative, but potentially they could affect Bitcoin and crypto trading, and drive more money to the market. Please keep in mind that this is not financial advice, just my opinion, but I think its safe to say that Bitcoin and the crypto market is looking more bullish and its only a matter of time before the bulls are loose again.
Ilias Louis Hatzis is the Founder & CEO at Mercato Blockchain Corporation AG. He writes the Blockchain Weekly Front Page each Monday.