Bitcoin experienced a brief 10% surge on Monday after a false report by crypto news outlet Cointelegraph said that asset manager BlackRock’s Bitcoin exchange-traded fund (ETF) for the US spot market had been approved by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).
The erroneous report resulted in the apex cryptocurrency trading at $30,0002, its highest price since March. However, BlackRock came out and confirmed the same day that its application was still under review and nothing was concrete. Despite the fallback, Bitcoin still remained 4.4% higher than last week.
Bitcoin Rallies To $30,000, Its Highest Price Since March 2023
The world’s largest asset manager is among the dozen crypto and traditional finance investment firms that are looking to trade the first-ever BTC-focused ETF in the US spot market. Despite the SEC’s anti-crypto stance, market optimists believe the agency will eventually have to approve the products due to growing investor demand and that such funds will spur wider adoption of crypto products, resulting in further growth and development of the sector.
Bloomberg’s ETF analyst James Seyffart noted that the short rally was a “dry run” for what would happen if Bitcoin spot ETFs do get approved and were a “playbook” for traders. He expects the first batch of spot Bitcoin ETFs to be approved by the SEC before its deadline in January 2024.
Meanwhile, data provided by crypto analytics firm Coinglass showed that $107 million worth of open positions in Bitcoin, held mostly by traders betting on lower prices, were liquidated in the past 24 hours after they made huge returns on their investment (ROI).
Higher Price Could Make People Hold Bitcoin As A Hedge Against Inflation
Noelle Acheson, author of the crypto newsletter Crypto Is Macro Now, highlighted that the market is starting to see “some progress” on the ETF front, which will result in the prices starting to move in the upward direction. She also anticipates some investors to use BTC as a hedge against macroeconomic uncertainties.
News connected to Bitcoin spot ETFs helped trigger some of the biggest Bitcoin rallies this year. The last time BTC topped $30,000 was in June when Wall Street giants BlackRock and Fidelity first announced they were seeking permission from the SEC to list a Bitcoin spot ETF for US retail and institutional investors.
However, the rally was short-lived after investor interest in the development died down as days passed by, causing BTC to retreat to about $26,000 by the end of July.
The following month also saw Bitcoin and crypto markets rally after a US court ruled that Grayscale was “unlawfully” denied by the SEC in its attempt to release a Bitcoin spot ETF. The ruling has paved the way for the world’s largest crypto asset manager and corporate holder of Bitcoin to convert its $17.7 billion GBTC Bitcoin Trust into a spot market-traded fund.
At the time, BTC rallied close to $28,000 before falling back to the $25,000 – $26,000 range.
SEC Argues Crypto Futures ETFs Are Safer Than Spot ETFs
However, the SEC remains stubborn in its approach toward cryptocurrencies. Since the collapse of FTX in November 2022, the financial regulator has been cracking down on crypto service providers, including crypto exchanges Kraken, Binance, and Coinbase, and crypto project Ripple (XRP), and suing them for violating federal securities laws by facilitating the sale of unregistered securities in the form of cryptocurrencies.
The agency considers crypto assets as securities and wants the instruments to be regulated similarly to stocks and bonds, which come under its legislation.
The SEC has so far delayed making a decision on the Bitcoin spot ETF listings, citing the funds are susceptible to risks such as fraud and market manipulation on the spot market. Interestingly enough, the regulator permitted the listing of ETFs holding Bitcoin and Ether (ETH) futures, which pro-crypto advocates argue possess the same risk or even more as they are not tied to the underlying asset but derivative contracts that track the future price of BTC or ETH.
On Monday, the SEC went on X (formerly Twitter) to warn investors to be careful of what they read on the internet, adding that the best source of information about the SEC, “is the SEC”.
Tony Sycamore, a market analyst at Australian investment firm IG Australia Pty, expects Bitcoin to jump to “about $32,000” if spot Bitcoin ETF applications are approved in the States. However, he does not expect the news to break the all-time high of $69,000 that BTC achieved in September 2021, at least during the first attempt.
At the time of writing, Bitcoin (BTC) is trading at $28,162 – up 1% over its price in the last 24 hours.
Bitcoin experienced a brief 10% surge on Monday after a false report by crypto news outlet Cointelegraph said that asset manager BlackRock’s Bitcoin exchange-traded fund (ETF) for the US spot market had been approved by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).
The erroneous report resulted in the apex cryptocurrency trading at $30,0002, its highest price since March. However, BlackRock came out and confirmed the same day that its application was still under review and nothing was concrete. Despite the fallback, Bitcoin still remained 4.4% higher than last week.
Bitcoin Rallies to $30,000, Its Highest Price Since March 2023
The world’s largest asset manager is among the dozen crypto and traditional finance investment firms that are looking to trade the first-ever BTC-focused ETF in the US spot market. Despite the SEC’s anti-crypto stance, market optimists believe the agency will eventually have to approve the products due to growing investor demand and that such funds will spur wider adoption of crypto products, resulting in further growth and development of the sector.
Bloomberg’s ETF analyst James Seyffart noted that the short rally was a “dry run” for what would happen if Bitcoin spot ETFs do get approved and were a “playbook” for traders. He expects the first batch of spot Bitcoin ETFs to be approved by the SEC before its deadline in January 2024.
Meanwhile, data provided by crypto analytics firm Coinglass showed that $107 million worth of open positions in Bitcoin, held mostly by traders betting on lower prices, were liquidated in the past 24 hours after they made huge returns on their investment (ROI).
Higher Price Could Make People Hold Bitcoin as a Hedge Against Inflation
Noelle Acheson, author of the crypto newsletter Crypto Is Macro Now, highlighted that the market is starting to see “some progress” on the ETF front, which will result in the prices starting to move in the upward direction. She also anticipates some investors to use BTC as a hedge against macroeconomic uncertainties.
News connected to Bitcoin spot ETFs helped trigger some of the biggest Bitcoin rallies this year. The last time BTC topped $30,000 was in June when Wall Street giants BlackRock and Fidelity first announced they were seeking permission from the SEC to list a Bitcoin spot ETF for US retail and institutional investors.
However, the rally was short-lived after investor interest in the development died down as days passed by, causing BTC to retreat to about $26,000 by the end of July.
The following month also saw Bitcoin and crypto markets rally after a US court ruled that Grayscale was “unlawfully” denied by the SEC in its attempt to release a Bitcoin spot ETF. The ruling has paved the way for the world’s largest crypto asset manager and corporate holder of Bitcoin to convert its $17.7 billion GBTC Bitcoin Trust into a spot market-traded fund.
At the time, BTC rallied close to $28,000 before falling back to the $25,000 – $26,000 range.
SEC Argues Crypto Futures ETFs are Safer than Spot ETFs
However, the SEC remains stubborn in its approach toward cryptocurrencies. Since the collapse of FTX in November 2022, the financial regulator has been cracking down on crypto service providers, including crypto exchanges Kraken, Binance, and Coinbase, and crypto project Ripple (XRP), and suing them for violating federal securities laws by facilitating the sale of unregistered securities in the form of cryptocurrencies.
The agency considers crypto assets as securities and wants the instruments to be regulated similarly to stocks and bonds, which come under its legislation.
Further info : Bitcoin Rush Review: Is It A Legit Trading Software?
The SEC has so far delayed making a decision on the Bitcoin spot ETF listings, citing the funds are susceptible to risks such as fraud and market manipulation on the spot market. Interestingly enough, the regulator permitted the listing of ETFs holding Bitcoin and Ether (ETH) futures, which pro-crypto advocates argue possess the same risk or even more as they are not tied to the underlying asset but derivative contracts that track the future price of BTC or ETH.
On Monday, the SEC went on X (formerly Twitter) to warn investors to be careful of what they read on the internet, adding that the best source of information about the SEC, “is the SEC”.
Tony Sycamore, a market analyst at Australian investment firm IG Australia Pty, expects Bitcoin to jump to “about $32,000” if spot Bitcoin ETF applications are approved in the States. However, he does not expect the news to break the all-time high of $69,000 that BTC achieved in September 2021, at least during the first attempt.
At the time of writing, Bitcoin (BTC) is trading at $28,162 – up 1% over its price in the last 24 hours.
Further info : Bitcoin Trader Review: Is It A Scam Or Safe To Use?
