It looks like retail customers are coming back to the world of bitcoin, according to one analyst.
Bitcoin Is Once Again the Object of Affection for Retailers
Caroline Bowler – the CEO of Australian cryptocurrency exchange BTC Markets – explained in a recent interview that bitcoin has been suffering as of late, and that the circumstances surrounding it have ultimately brought retailers back into play. She says that the currency has remained above a key technical point, which suggests bullish behavior recurring over the next couple of months, and she’s excited about the prospects of so many individual traders returning to the industry.
She states:
After a quiet July, we’re seeing a return of retail investors. Market wisdom draws a line between the retreat of Chinese bitcoin miners and the recentering of trading activity in the U.S. and Europe.
For so long now, we have been putting quite a bit of emphasis on institutional investors. We are so eager to see the bitcoin space grow even further, and in wanting to see this, we ultimately convinced ourselves that more participation from institutions was necessary to keep the crypto space high and mighty. While this may have been true, it appears institutions have seemingly stepped away from the digital currency industry given how much bitcoin has fallen in the past three months.
This wasn’t always the case. Earlier in the year, when the world’s number one cryptocurrency was making its way towards a new all-time high, many institutions were cheering it on and trading it like it was the freshest commodity around. Tesla, for example, invested more than $1.5 billion into the asset, while MicroStrategy has invested more than $2 billion and Square has invested several hundred million into the asset.
But now that bitcoin has fallen back a bit, the currency is not looking as hot to these institutions, and several retailers have stepped back into the game. Discussing her own company’s numbers in recent weeks, Bowler said:
Despite July being a quieter month, we experienced a significantly larger number of accounts trading over $1 million per month.
The Asset Is Following Its Counterparts
According to Daniel Kim – head of capital markets at Maple Finance – bitcoin is arguably following Ethereum and several other altcoins, which is potentially why it’s doing so well at press time. Since Ethereum is spiking, bitcoin is following in its footsteps and shooting north as well. He says:
Ether and other assets are representing the majority in trading volume and not bitcoin. This shows that individuals and institutions are feeling a lot more comfortable holding other cryptos and are no longer diversifying their portfolios by just holding bitcoin.
Not long ago, bitcoin was trading in the low $30,000 range, though at the time of writing, it has incurred several spikes and has since shot back up to about $46,800 per unit.
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