- Hackers attacked large companies in Israel, traditionally demanding a ransom in bitcoins to regain access to confidential information. The new ransomware virus was named Pay2Key. It affects corporate programs through which reports on financial transactions and other data are transmitted. According to IT company CheckPoint, if the conditions set by the criminals are not met, they usually simply upload the databases to the darknet or to specialized resources on the Web, where anyone can view the materials or buy them.
- Mike Novogratz's Galaxy Digital cryptocurrency bank, in collaboration with investment company CI Global Asset Management, will launch a new bitcoin fund in Canada. The investment company will act as its manager, and the cryptobank will act as co-manager. The latter will carry out all Bitcoin transactions on behalf of the fund. The asset value will be based on the Bloomberg CFIX Bitcoin Index. The partners have already announced preparations for the IPO, as part of the initiative. The offer consists of $10 Class A and F shares.
- Bloomberg analyst Mike McGlone is confident that the capitalization of the first cryptocurrency will reach $1 trillion in the second half of next year. However, first the price of bitcoin needs to overcome the main obstacle: the all-time high reached in December 2017 at around $20,089. Almost three years have passed since then, during which time the price managed to drop to $3,126, and then grow fivefold, reaching $18,000 at the moment. “$20,000 is the main obstacle for bitcoin to capitalize at $1 trillion,” McGlone wrote. - The digital version of gold, but with a more limited supply and a history of adding zeros, appears to be in the early stages of pricing and may simply continue to grow in 2021. Its mass acceptance is growing."
- Actress Maisie Williams, who portrays Arya Stark in Game of Thrones, asked her Twitter followers if she should invest in Bitcoin. At the time of this writing, 650,369 users expressed their opinion, of which 50.7% answered in the affirmative, 49.3% - in the negative. Comments from representatives of the cryptocurrency community appeared under the post. For example, the founder of the investment company Grayscale, Barry Silbert, recommended Williams to get acquainted with his firm. In the message, he stressed that "Game of Thrones" featured a "greyscale" in keeping with the name of his company, Greyscale.
- Thanks to consolidation in the status of digital gold, the rate of the first cryptocurrency can reach $318,000 by the end of 2021. This forecast was presented by Tom Fitzpatrick, Managing Director of one of the largest banks in the world, Citibank. He believes that the bitcoin market is now reminiscent of the 1970s, when dollar inflation led to increased demand for gold. In 1971, US President Richard Nixon carried out a series of reforms, abandoning the Bretton Woods system and pegging the dollar to gold. As a result, the price of this precious metal showed a steady increase over the next 50 years. In his new report, Bitcoin: Gold for the 21st Century, Fitzpatrick writes: "Bitcoin moved in the aftermath of the Great Financial Crisis of 2008, when new changes in the monetary regime took place and we dropped to zero interest rates." He notes that currently, financial stimulus measures against the backdrop of the coronavirus pandemic are leading to the formation of conditions similar to the 1970s.
- The founder of the Galaxy Digital cryptobank Mike Novogratz admitted that he once bought his first 500,000 ETH at the rate of $0.99 from Vitalik Buterin. According to the billionaire, the Ethereum project team decided that it would be nice for the community to have a buyer from Wall Street. As for bitcoin, Novogratz learned about it in 2012 and purchased the first 30,001 BTC at $95 per coin. When asked why such a strange amount, the billionaire replied that at that moment the head of the hedge fund Pantera Capital Dan Morehead bought 30,000 coins, and "then we decided that we would buy 30,001 because we could not afford to have more." Novogratz also admitted that he planned to sell bitcoin at $1,000 to buy a plane, but he was talked out of it by partner Pete Briger.
- New US Senator Cynthia Lummis plans to bring the discussion of the first cryptocurrency to the national level. The politician said this in an interview with ABC News channel. “21 million bitcoins will be mined and that's it, this is a limited emission. Therefore, I am confident that it will become an important player as a store of value over time,” said Lummis.
- The popular American businessman Robert Kiyosaki agrees with the senator. “Bitcoin's rise has outpaced gold and silver,” he wrote. - What does it mean? This means that you need to buy as much bitcoin and precious metal as you can and don't put it off. The train is already leaving. The dollar is dying. When the dollar falls, the price doesn't matter anymore. What matters is how much gold, silver and bitcoins you have.” It is curious that in addition to his bestseller "Rich Dad Poor Dad," Kiyosaki wrote two more books in collaboration with US President Donald Trump.
- The price of bitcoin broke through the level of $18,000 with a market capitalization of $338 billion. BTC has grown by more than 50% over the past month as its net purchases on crypto exchanges have far exceeded those of miners. Citing data from analyst firm Glassnode, cryptanalyst Will Wu pointed out that hourly purchases of BTC on exchanges are almost 20 times higher than the amounts attributed to miner sales. Another specialist, Lark Davis, also confirmed that 145,000 bitcoins left the exchanges in the last month, and only 27,000 BTC were mined during this time.
