New Delhi: Bitcoin hit a six-month high on Friday, approaching the April record as traders became increasingly confident that regulators would approve the launch of an exchange traded fund based on its futures contracts. The world's largest crypto was raised nearly 4% to record $59,664, its highest since mid-April.
It has doubled this year and is near the record high of $64,895 in April. The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission is poised to allow the first U.S. bitcoin futures exchange market to close Thursday, Bloomberg News reported citing people familiar with the matter.
Ben Caselin, head of research and strategy at Asia-based exchange AAX, said Bitcoin's price jump above $59,000 wasn't inadvertent and long-term investors had been accumulating it for a while.
It is widely expected that Q 4 will see significant progress around a Bitcoin ETF in the U.S., he said.
Friday's moves were also influenced by a tweet from the SEC investor education office, he said.
Before buying Bitcoin futures, make sure you carefully weigh the potential risks and benefits, the SEC tweeted.
Cryptocurrency investors have been waiting for news of approval of the country's first Bitcoin ETF, and some of bitcoin's rally in recent months has been in anticipation of this move and how it could speed up its mainstream adoption and trading.
Several fund managers, including the VanEck bitcoin trust, ProShares, Invesco, Valkyrie and Galaxy Digital Funds have applied to launch bitcoin ETFs in the United States.
In Canada and Europe, cryptocurrency ETFs were launched this year. The SEC chair Gary Gensler has previously said the Crypto market involves many tokens that could be unregistered securities and leaves prices vulnerable to manipulation and millions of investors open to risks.
The Bloomberg report said that the proposals by ProShares and Invesco are based on futures contracts and were filed under significant investor protections that Gensler have said provide mutual fund rules. The SEC did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the Bloomberg report