Hot on the heels of bitcoin surging to
multi-month highs, other major cryptocurrencies are also posting big
moves upward.
As of 1:36 p.m. HK/SIN, the price of
ethereum had surged 12.46 percent in 24 hours to $166.66, according to data
from Coindesk. Ripple's XRP token also rose 6.55 percent to approximately
$0.346. While bitcoin has by far the largest market cap of any digital token,
ethereum and XRP hold the second and third positions, respectively.
As of the
afternoon of Asian trading hours, data from Coinmarketcap showed that more than
$84 billion had been traded in the cryptocurrency space over the last 24 hours.
For its part, Bitcoin jumped more
than 3 percent higher over 24 hours to $4,924.21, according to Coindesk. It had
earlier breached the $5,000 level.
One expert told CNBC on Tuesday that
one potential
catalyst behind the surge in bitcoin was likely tied to a Reuters report of
a private buyer purchasing more than $100 million worth of bitcoin over a short
period.
Given the small daily trading volume
of bitcoin, "that order would be enough to have an impact," said
Hunter Horsley, CEO of Bitwise, which is in the process of applying for the
first-ever bitcoin exchange-traded fund.
That large purchase of bitcoin could
have been triggered by an individual trader or a small group of traders,
according to Zennon Kapron, director at financial technology consultancy
Kapronasia.
Speaking with CNBC over the phone,
Kapron said there were many traders sitting on "significant amounts of
bitcoin" who could "very well be behind the movement."
Still, Bitwise's Horsely said:
"Crypto is famous for a long history of volatility like this. It's always
hard to pin down the true impetus, and often the real source is not
obvious."
Other possible reasons for the surge
include the crossing of an important technical level at the $4,200 price
triggering a stop-loss trade. (In bitcoin and other assets, traders will often
set a certain level for when they automatically cover their shorts.)
Asked about the rally's
sustainability, Kapron said prices were likely to come back down if there was
nothing to support them. And, he added, there was "nothing in
particular" that drove the recent price spikes aside from general market
demand.
Bitcoin prices have seen a
relatively calm 2019 after last year's volatility. The cryptocurrency fell
roughly 75 percent in 2018 after climbing to a high of almost $20,000 at the
end of 2017.
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