Bitcoin reached a new all-time high on Friday, crossing the $70,000 mark for the first time in its history, driven by investors’ growing appetite for risk with speculation around rate cuts in the United States.
Around 3:50 p.m. GMT (10:50 a.m. in Quebec), bitcoin climbed 1.4% to $68,319 shortly after peaking at $70,085.85, a new high since its creation.
The queen of cryptocurrencies thus surpassed its previous record recorded earlier in the week. In 2024 alone, the price of bitcoin will soar by around 60%.
The “downward movement of the dollar” after the publication of the February US employment report on Friday has boosted the price of bitcoin, which is benefiting from growing speculation of an imminent rate cut by the US Federal Reserve (Fed), explains James Harte, analyst at TickMill.
The result is “a sharp increase in risk appetite and a marked movement towards high-yielding assets, such as cryptocurrencies,” continues Mr. Harte.
For several months, the price of bitcoin has been supported by the anticipation of the authorization on the American markets of a new investment product, an investment fund (ETF) indexed to bitcoin, allowing a greater part of the public to invest in these cryptoassets without directly holding them.
Enough to put the cryptocurrency sector in turmoil.
Another major event boosting bitcoin on the market radar: the “halving”, or the reduction by half of the reward for bitcoin miners, those who allow the validation of transactions and the creation of cryptocurrency.
It occurs approximately every four years and the next one is expected in April, generating “enthusiasm” among investors, notes Matthew Weller of City Index.
The operation is made necessary by the fact that the creator of bitcoin, a certain Satoshi Nakamoto whose real identity is not known, has limited the maximum number of bitcoins in the world to 21 million.