“You’re seeing more and more institutional investors moving into the space,” said Brendan O’Connor, CEO of Genesis Global Trading, a bitcoin broker.
Some of the demand has been coming from China. O’Connor said the daily volume of bitcoin trades coming from China has been two- to three-times the ordinary amount over the last two weeks.
It’s not just the value of bitcoin that’s increasing, it’s also the prevalence of use.
The number of daily bitcoin transactions appears to be steadily rising, according to tracking site Coinbase. And that has the potential to have a tremendous impact on the cryptocurrency.
“We are seeing unprecedented volume globally,” said Michael Sonneshein from Grayscale Investments, which manages the Bitcoin Investment Trust, a publicly listed vehicle that tracks bitcoin. Bitcoin Investment Trust hasn’t been public very long — but it enjoyed a run-up ofmore than 7% on the good news Tuesday.
It is difficult to determine the specific reasons as to why the price of bitcoin is currently trending upwards, but industry observers recently told CoinDeskthat it may be related to China's tightening of capital controls and a series of positive news for the industry; including the EU's VAT ruling.
There has been a multitude of positive announcements regarding bitcoin with no price movement all year, however, once it starts moving it can move fast... This is an old fashioned re-rating at basement bargain levels atm IMO
