Bitcoin reached as high as $8,937.25 in the early hours of this morning, according to data from crypto tracker Coindesk. This pushed the price of BTC to levels not seen in more than 12 months, with the digital currency last reaching this price on May 11, 2018. As of 10.10 am BST, bitcoin was at $8,731.16, up 8.89 percent on the day. It is unclear at this stage exactly why BTC has surged, but analysts at CNN have noted a substantial increase on Google Trends for the keyword ‘bitcoin’ which could suggest renewed interest in the crypto giant.
Cryptocurrency watchers have also described bitcoin as now being in “bull market territory” after breaking past the $3,000 barrier.
Crypto Rand, an analysis website dedicated to bitcoin news and trends, said it is possible for the digital currency to soar higher and is expecting BTC to smash through $10,000.
In a tweet to its 213,000 followers, the website said: “$10,000 is the next stop.”
Peter Brandt, a veteran trader and crypto analyst, described the latest advance as a “fear of missing out” phase, suggesting investors are delving into bitcoin on the anticipation of an advance in price.
However, he is predicting a “sizeable correction” – a decline of 10 percent or more – will likely follow.
Mr Brandt tweeted: “This is the FOMO phase of the advance.
“Once the majority of sold-out crypto bulls capitulate and chase this rally a more sizeable correction will likely occur, stopping out the same bulls, who are chasing this advance.”
This sentiment was shared by David Tawil, president of crypto hedge fund ProChain Capital.
He told Bloomberg: “There still may be another pullback before we get to fundamentals truly taking over and speculators and frauds being expunged.”
Ethereum was also trading higher and was at $267.75 at the time of writing, up 7.05 percent.
Litecoin was 11.17 percent higher at $114.10, while XRP had increased by 6.4 percent to $0.4144.
Bitcoin Cash was up by 7.67 percent to $433.09.