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A thousand years ago, when money meant coins, China invented paper currency. Now the Chinese government is minting cash digitally, in a re-imagination of money that could shake a pillar of American power.

It might seem money is already virtual, as credit cards and payment apps such as Apple Pay in the U.S. and WeChat in China eliminate the need for bills or coins. But those are just ways to move money electronically. China is turning legal tender itself into computer code.

Cryptocurrencies such as bitcoin have foreshadowed a potential digital future for money, though they exist outside the traditional global financial system and aren’t legal tender like cash issued by governments.

China’s version of a digital currency is controlled by its central bank, which will issue the new electronic money. It is expected to give China’s government vast new tools to monitor both its economy and its people. By design, the digital yuan will negate one of bitcoin’s major draws: anonymity for the user.

Continue reading at wsj.com

The price of Bitcoin rose 100.8% in the first quarter and has increased 447.2% since October 2020, but reduced volatility may be the key to future price rises, analysts believe.

U.S. stocks gained 6.4% in the first quarter of 2020, while bond yields rose 3.6% and gold fell 10.3%.

"In the context of Bitcoin's historical returns, which have been quite remarkable, this period stands out as notable," Greg Cipolaro, global head of research at New York Digital Investment Group, said in a research report.

However, reduced volatility—not manic price swings ratcheting upward—could boost Bitcoin's long-term valuation as major institutions move into the cryptocurrency to diversify their holdings.

Continue reading at newsweek.com

Bitcoin and cryptocurrency prices are soaring, pushing the value of the entire cryptocurrency market over $2 trillion for the first time (though some think the bull run could be just getting started).

With the bitcoin price hovering around $60,000 per bitcoin, the psychological $2 trillion barrier was broken by sharp increases in the price of smaller cryptocurrencies ethereum, binance coin, Ripple's XRP and litecoin, according to data from crypto price website CoinGecko.

The bitcoin and cryptocurrency market has more than doubled in value so far this year, rising from around $750 billion at the beginning of the year. Bitcoin, by far the biggest cryptocurrency by value, makes up more than half of the cryptocurrency market capitalization and has traditionally led the market.

Continue reading at forbes.com

Billionaire investor and the world’s biggest hedge fund founder Ray Dalio said that the history of money has left hints that bitcoin could face being outlawed by the U.S. government, just as gold was in 1934.

“I think that it would be very likely that you will have it, under a certain set of circumstances outlawed, the way gold was outlawed,” he said on the podcast Influencers with Andy Serwer on Friday (March 26). Serwer is editor in chief for Yahoo! Finance.

The Bridgewater Associates founder and co-chief investment officer pointed to the 1934 Gold Reserve Act, which prohibited people from holding gold and mandated the transfer to the U.S. Treasury.

“Every country treasures its monopoly on controlling the supply and demand. They don’t want other monies to be operating or competing because things can get out of control. So I think it would be very likely that you will have it under a certain set of circumstances outlawed the way gold was outlawed,” Dalio said on the program.

Continue reading at pymnts.com

Bitcoin is getting boring at a time when annualized 30-day volatility as of Thursday’s close has seen a sharp downward dip, in a March with its own type of (weather) volatility.

To emphasize the point, have a look at the chart above, which shows the volatility of bitcoin daily returns for the past month. To be fair, I’m employing a little chart crime here, starting the y axis at 40% in order to accentuate the drop between March 24-25, as all but the last days of February have disappeared from the 30-day look-back on the CoinDesk Bitcoin Price Index.

The boredom engendered by a tame month sparked a mild disagreement with “First Mover” show host Lawrence Lewitinn about penny stocks versus bitcoin. We were discussing the benefits of using indexes weighted either by price or by market cap. Price-weighted indexes can be more volatile because smaller-cap components can have a greater impact. I said a crypto index doesn’t need more volatility because crypto assets already have the volatility of penny stocks.

Continue reading at yahoo.com

Cristiano Ronaldo received 770 Fan Tokens $JUV ahead of Juventus' match against Benevento on Sunday as a way of marking his record-breaking goal milestone.

It's the first time a footballer has been rewarded with cryptocurrency, which is becoming prominent in terms of fan interaction in the game.

Fan Tokens $JUV allows Juventus fans to interact with their club and participate in various decisions through the Socios app.

Continue reading at marca.com

Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies could face a “brutal” price correction when regulators eventually weigh in on the sector, Europe’s largest asset manager Amundi has said.

The firm’s deputy chief investment officer Vincent Mortier said cryptocurrencies cannot be viewed as money or an asset worth investing in, in comments published as part of an upcoming report on the sector, seen by Financial News.

It is the first time Amundi – with €1.7tn of assets under management – has taken a public stance on cryptocurrencies.

“To date, [crypto] is neither a proven store of value, nor a recognised unit of account and even less a universal means of payment,” Mortier said. “Cryptocurrencies have no real economic underlying asset. As a result, there is no valuation model.”

Speaking to FN in a virtual interview, Mortier said the price of bitcoin above $50,000 was difficult to justify.

The cryptocurrency reached an all-time high of above $61,000 earlier this month, and was trading around $56,800 as of 12:20 GMT on 24 March.

Continue reading at fnlondon.com

Deutsche Bank’s investor clients mostly see limited upside in bitcoin (BTC) this year and expect a decline towards $20,000-$40,000 in 12 months. Those are the highlights of a monthly market survey conducted by the German lender March 18-22 of 520 market professionals around the world.

Bitcoin has been trading in a sideways range over the past week after failing to sustain an all-time-high around $61,000 reached earlier in the month.

• The 12-month BTC price forecast is more evenly distributed versus the three-month forecast, though a majority (52%) of respondents see prices under $60,000.
• The most common predicted range for bitcoin prices in three months was between $60,000 and $80,000, expected by some 36% of respondents.
• 69% of respondents think bitcoin is more likely to fall by half in 12 months, compared to 65% in February. BTC rallied by roughly 80% from February to March.
• Only 23% of respondents said they had ever bought bitcoin for their personal investments. Just over 40% of respondents under 35 have bought bitcoin compared to just 13% of those over 55.

Continue reading at finance.yahoo.com

They call it “max pain” in the bitcoin options market: How to make one’s trading counterparty suffer the most. 

Although the largest cryptocurrency was changing hands Wednesday around $56,500, traders were handicapping the odds of a plunge to about $44,000 by Friday, when a record $6 billion of options contracts is set to expire. 

A drop to that price level would inflict “max pain” on buyers of options contracts, and it might be the most profitable price point for options sellers. It’s a remote risk, but not one to be discounted.

The max pain theory states that the market will gravitate toward the pain point while heading into the expiry. That’s because sellers – typically institutions or sophisticated traders with ample capital supply – often try to push the price toward the max pain point by buying or selling the asset on spot or futures markets. 

The bullish spin is that if bitcoin makes it through Friday without a major correction, a major overhang will be lifted.

Continue reading at nasdaq.com

Bitcoin’s price struggled to push higher after briefly touching $59,000 when markets opened in the U.S. on Friday.

Investors continued to monitor the potential fallout from U.S. Treasury bond yields, which some analysts warn could lead to a correction in risky assets from bitcoin to stocks.

The 10-year Treasury note yield went as high as 1.74% on Friday, the highest since January 2020, after the Federal Reserve signaled Wednesday it would keep loose monetary policy for the foreseeable future.

“If we continue to see the U.S. bond market questioning the Fed forward guidance, it could lead to more downside pressure in risk assets and start to weigh on bitcoin by extension,” Joel Kruger, cryptocurrency strategist at LMAX Digital, told CoinDesk. “We think this is a risk worth considering, especially with bitcoin already having moved so far and fast in 2021 thus far.”

Continue reading at finance.yahoo.com