For the first time in six days, Bitcoin rose past $52,000 as bulls pushed prices higher in early Asia trading hours Monday.
In a rally that appeared to start around 22:00 UTC (6 p.m. ET) on Sunday, bitcoin (BTC) bounced off a seven-week low around $47,655, subsequently printing some of its largest hourly gains in two days.
The largest cryptocurrency is now exchanging hands at $52 792.14 as of 9.00 AM East African Time.
Traders are speculating whether bitcoin might be correcting. Prices tumbled last week by the most since February, amid concern that U.S. President Joe Biden’s proposal to raise the capital gains tax on cryptocurrencies and other investments might weigh on the market.
On the technical side, bitcoin’s relative strength index – an indicator used to gauge trend momentum – shows the cryptocurrency is attempting a daily timeframe bounce from levels of oversold at 30.00 on April 25.
Valkyrie Digital Assets to launch Bitcoin ETF
This comes as Valkyrie Digital Assets is close to launching its BTC exchange-traded fund (ETF). The New York Stock Exchange has filed a 19B-4 Form on behalf of the investment firm, for its Bitcoin ETF this Friday.
This means a 45 day review period is about to start from the moment the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) acknowledges the filing. The SEC can either approve, disapprove the application or extend the review period.
“This is something that I’ve wanted to do for five years now. It wasn’t until recently that I believed that the SEC would probably approve a bitcoin ETF. So we started working on that in earnest probably in August.” Steven McClurg, Chief Investment Officer of Valkyrie Investments.
The SEC has so far rejected every BTC ETF application. There have been some concerns previously that the BTC market was too small and did not have enough liquidity to safely offer an ETF product.
However, with currently a $1 trillion market cap and new SEC Chair Gary Gensler in the lead, many are expecting an opening.Gary Gensler is considered pro-crypto and used to be chairman at the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) and in recent years has taught crypto and blockchain courses at MIT.
Ether Bounces Back
Ethereum (ETH), the second-largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization, is now trading at $2,469, up almost 13% in 24 hours and almost 9% higher than seven days ago.
Read also; Bitcoin Drops Below $50,000 Amidst Rising U.S Tax Worries, Ether Follows.
