Yesterday the Bitcoin market cap managed to reach 16.5 billion dollars, which is the highest the market cap has ever been...
The trading volume over the last month but even just the last week specifically has been consistently in excess of 200,000 bitcoins per day, with nearly all of the volume attributed to the major Chinese exchanges. This type of trading volume has never been seen in Bitcoins past and shows why the recent bitcoin price increases are based off of increases in adoption, stability, and incentives to high volume investors.
The increases in volume and market cap show a relatively recent trend of increased confidence in bitcoin, which has shown through an increase of 4.5 billion dollars in market cap when compared to the market cap 3 months ago. Most of the high volume traders and investors are still typically using the various Chinese exchanges due to the reduced regulation compared to the American and European exchanges. Some believe that the selection of Mick Mulvany to head the Office of Budget and Management in the Trump administration played a factor in breaking the resistance in the 800's after his appointment on December 16th. Of course there are so many factors to be considered when evaluating bitcoin price, it is a logical theory that Mick Mulvany who is a bitcoin and conservative fiscal spending advocate did play a small role in the price after his appointment.
It is my hope along with many others, that having a Bitcoin Advocate in a high position within the government could influence reasonable regulation that Bitcoin so vitally needs.
When I say bitcoin vitally needs reasonable regulation it is because clear and fair regulations would make it a much safer investment for many companies offering bitcoin services, as well as making it a safer investment for high volume investors. Reasonable regulation could be what brings the much needed liquidity to many that have been hindered by the lack of liquidity in the past. In the short term regulation is needed to bring more companies into the market and help bitcoin become more adopted and relevant. After the adoption the regulation will begin to have less control as the amount of people using Bitcoin as currency instead of trading bitcoin to fiat currency will increases.
Another major aspect of the recent Bitcoin gains that should excite Bitcoin holders is the lack of sell motivation we have seen throughout the recent $200 gains. Of course there were points of serious resistance, but the bull market has shown just how much stronger it is compared to the recent bear market we have seen. Bitcoin has yet to retreat back more than 5% on any of its gains over the last month, and continued to exceed what many people expected was likely to happen. This major lack of sell desire by most long term holders shows just how deep the faith and belief in Bitcoin is for many holders. I still consider it an excellent time to invest safely in Bitcoin and I know that I will be gradually increasing my stake on a bi-weekly basis for the near future.
I don't pretend to be nearly as experienced or insightful as many others, just want to share why I am so excited to see what the near future has in store for bitcoin!