Bitcoin Passed $7,000 On Thursday

Bitcoin surpassed the $7,000 barrier for the first time on Thursday, reaching an all-time high of $7,355.35, confirms CNBC.

Following the CME’s announcement that it will introduce bitcoin futures contracts, the digital currency simply flourished. The cryptocurrency jumped more than 7 percent on Thursday to reach $7,355.35.

The overall cryptocurrency price was affected!

And Bitcoin’s enormous rise got the total market value of all cryptocurrencies to top $189 billion for the first time today. Just this crypto coin itself is responsible for more than $121 billion.

But the digital coin’s value saw this peak just two days after the CME Group, the world’s largest derivatives operator, said it would introduce Bitcoin futures contracts, proving that the news is strongly related to the coin’s huge rose. Considering the fact that such a product could bring more institutional investors into the market, analysts are sure that this caused the boom.

“This is Bitcoin crossing the divide from the wild west of finance to the mainstream,” said Charles Hayter, CEO of cryptocurrency comparison website Crypto Compare. Bitcoin futures contract would be cash-settled and based on the CME CF Bitcoin Reference Rate (BRR), a co-production between the American financial market company and London-based online trading platform Crypto Facilities.

Hayter added that futures from an incumbent exchange bring Bitcoin and cryptocurrencies into the regulatory fold, creating more complex financial products that will finally bring institutional money.

A spectacular price increase, since January 1

Since the beginning of the year, Bitcoin’s price has seen a 600 percent growth. However, regulatory concerns are something to discuss about. In September, China banned “initial coin offerings” (ICOs), a crowdfunding method for firms to raise funds by selling new cryptocurrencies. Later that month, the Chinese government also  closed down domestic Bitcoin exchanges.

The cryptocurrency has seen a lot of hate lately, with banking executives like JPMorgan CEO Jamie Dimon and Blackrock CEO Larry Fink criticizing it, as well as calling it a “fraud” or an “index of money laundering.”