Cryptocurrency update: Is the BTC bull market back on?

After making strong gains across the past couple of weeks, crypto analysts are suggesting the Bitcoin bull market is back.

Cryptocurrency update

Analyst says crypto bull market could make a return

Bloomberg’s Mike McGlone has stated he believes bitcoin will hit $100,000 this year in a “refreshed” crypto bull market.

McGlone, a commodity strategist, predicts the massive price, despite the May broad crypto sell-off tanking BTC prices. In terms of other coins, Ethereum was McGlone’s other top pick, predicting $5,000 being the path of least resistance.

In September’s Bloomberg Crypto Outlook, McGlone said: “Crypto-assets appear in a revived and refreshed bull market with the 2H benefit of a steep discount from previous highs at the start.”

“We see Ethereum on course toward $5,000 and $100,000 for bitcoin. Portfolios of some combination of gold and bonds appear increasingly naked without some Bitcoin and Ethereum joining the mix,” McGlone continued.

Diminishing supply but a higher level of adoption for practical use may be behind the ETH support. Ethereum’s status as the primary denominator for non-fungible tokens (NFTs), which are dramatically rising in popularity, could also help put prices on an upward trajectory.

The London Fork, a change to the Ethereum blockchain protocol, caused significant coin burn and a drop in overall ETH supply when it went live last month.

Looking to Bitcoin, McGlone believes the $100,000 price is “highly probable, especially after last year’s supply cut. Post-halving years have seen the greatest appreciation, and 4x in 2021 would be quite tame for the No. 1 crypto compared with 55x in 2013 and 15x in 2017.”

Anything can happen in the world of cryptocurrencies. Volatility is the watchword. It will be interesting to see if this most bullish of predictions comes true – especially when we’ve seen the brutal market effects a sustained sell-off can bring.

At the time of writing, Bitcoin futures were trading at $51,812.91 and were up 3.15% on the day.

Ethereum was trading for $3905.05.

Bitcoin price pump El Salvador movement gains traction on Social Media

Twitter and Reddit users are organising plans to support El Salvador’s adoption of BTC as legal tender by buying small amounts of Bitcoin.

By buying up to $30 worth at a time, the users hope this will bring attention to El Salvador’s controversial plan.

On September 7^th, El Salvador brings BTC fully into its economy as legal tender. ATM machines have been installed around the country to allow Salvadorans to exchange US dollars for Bitcoin. The government has also a $150m fund to back nationwide conversion efforts.

The $30 amount comes from the fact Salvadorans will be able to download the government’s digital wallet, enter their ID number and receive $30 in Bitcoin going forward.

The whole thing smacks of the recent Gamestop/memestocks market manipulation tactics employed by the more vociferous members of the online trading community. The fact that thousands of online traders could start snapping up more BTC at one time could create ripples that end up with higher BTC/USD conversion rates. That may drain El Salvador’s conversion fund at a rapid rate, and semi-scuppering the launch.

Additionally, the citizens of El Salvador are not particularly keen on the introduction of BTC into their currency system anyway.

A poll by the local Central American University showed that of 1,281 people surveyed, at least 67.9% of 1,281 people disagree or strongly disagree with the use of Bitcoin as a legal tender.

South Korea introduces its first blockchain mutual fund

KB Asset Management, an investment-focussed branch of KB Financial Group, has launched South Korea’s first mutual fund for blockchain technologies.

The KB Global Digital Chain Economy fund will invest in three main areas:

• Hardware – This includes investment in businesses specialising in the physical products needed to run blockchain servers and/or crypto mining, Companies like NVIDIA, AMD, and Intel are just some of those mentioned by KB Asset Management.
• Software – Under this umbrella are software suppliers involved in sustaining and creating blockchains, such as IBM, Amazon Web Services and China’s Baidu.
• Users – The third segment covers companies that have integrated blockchain into their businesses. According to KB, this means it will invest in businesses such as PayPal, Square, NTT Data and Tencent amongst others.

US firms are KB’s primary investment target. A smaller allocation of funds will be put towards companies operating in Japan, Europe, and China.

KB Asset Management had more than $90 billion under management as of February, according to Korea Financial Investment Association data.