Bitcoin
rose to above $30,000 Thursday as institutional interest in the crypto sector propelled its price and that of other cryptocurrencies higher. A further breakout could depend on a regulatory decision on approving exchange-traded funds for the world’s largest crypto.
Bitcoin
has risen 2.9% to $30,173 over the past 24 hours. While Bitcoin was down from the peak of its surge late on Wednesday, it was largely holding onto gains sparked by the launch of a Wall Street-backed crypto exchange this week.
That’s likely to boost confidence that Bitcoin can avoid a repeat of its price action in April, when it briefly rose above $30,000 before falling back. While the macroeconomic picture for risk assets remains clouded by the prospect of further interest rate hikes from the Federal Reserve, for now Bitcoin appears to have broken out of lockstep with assets such as technology stocks.
“From a technical standpoint, on Tuesday, the cryptocurrency emerged above the downward sloping trendline drawn from the high of April 14, which probably means that some further advances may be in store,” wrote Charalampos Pissouros, an investment analyst at XM, in a note.
A key factor for whether Bitcoin can head higher from here will be whether the Securities and Exchange Commission drops its opposition to approving an ETF which owns the cryptocurrency.
The SEC’s stance is being tested again by applications for launching Bitcoin ETFs from
BlackRock
(ticker: BLK),
Invesco
(IVZ), and
WisdomTree
(WT). New commitments from the firms to monitoring for market manipulation have raised hopes that the SEC might be willing to approve such a fund for the first time.
“If [BlackRock’s] Bitcoin ETF is approved, that will open the floodgates of institutional adoption of Bitcoin. As a result that will likely drive the price of Bitcoin significantly,” said Kate Laurence, the CEO of crypto-focused venture-capital fund Bloccelerate VC.
Beyond Bitcoin,
Ether
—the second-largest crypto— rose 2.8% to $1,892. Smaller cryptos, or altcoins, also moved higher, with
Cardano
up 5% and
Polygon
up 3.5%. Memecoins were stronger, with
Dogecoin
rising 3.4%.
Write to Adam Clark at adam.clark@barrons.com
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