This article provides: an overview of how Bitcoin (BTC) has been doing over the past 24-hour period; a recap of interesting recent news that might have affected its price (or might do so in the future), and useful observations from Crypto Twitter.
Bitcoin Price Action
According to data from CryptoCompare, as you can see in the above price chart, the Bitcoin price has been mostly hovering in the range $8,150 and $8,300 during the past 24-hour period.
Crypto analyst/trader Josh Rager says that Bollinger Bands suggest that the next volatile move could come soon:
Bbands pinching here, could only be a matter of days until the next volatile move pic.twitter.com/9qOk8LvzTb
— Josh Rager 📈 (@Josh_Rager) October 21, 2019
Bitcoin Futures
Although trading volume in institutional BTC products decreased in September, as described in the recently-released CryptoCompare Exchange Review report for September 2019, “long positions held by institutional accounts at the CME have been rising again in October” according to crypto data analytics startup Skew:
Long positions held by institutional accounts at the CME have been rising again in October.
For reference, institutions include pension funds, endowments, insurance companies, mutual funds & portfolio/investment managers whose clients are predominantly institutional. pic.twitter.com/96N2XZwo9e
— skew (@skew_markets) October 20, 2019
The Next Bitcoin Halving
As you probably know already, once every 210,000 blocks (approximately every four years), there is a Bitcoin halving event (where the block mining reward is halved, such that miners receive 50% less BTC for verifying transactions); these Bitcoin halving events keep on occurring until the maximum supply of 21 million bitcoins has been minted.
Well, the next Bitcoin halving event is estimated to occur around 14 May 2020; this is when the block mining reward will decrease from 12.5 BTC to 6.25 BTC.
Alistair Milne, Co-Founder and Chief Investment Officer (CIO) of cryptocurrency-focused hedge fund Altana Digital Currency Fund (ADCF), tried to explain yesterday via the following what next year’s Bitcoin halving will mean to BTC sell-side pressure:
To those that think Bitcoin's inflationary schedule is less effective with time …
At current values (~$8200), 2020's halving will remove $51.7million/week of newly mined Bitcoin from the sell-side https://t.co/Sk1ueDK8QX
— Alistair Milne (@alistairmilne) October 21, 2019
Offline Storage of Private Keys
Yesterday, UK-based firm Sword Ltd announced the official launch of Cryptosteel Capsule, a 100% stainless steel device (shockproof, waterproof, acid-resistant, and fireproof up to 1400C/2500F) for offline storage of valuable data such as private keys and passwords.
Cryptosteel Capsule costs between 89 and 329 euros depending on the variant being ordered.
Jameson Lopp, CTO at Casa, received one of these gadgets at last weekend’s Lightning Conference in Berlin Germany, and he put it in his carry-on luggage for the flight back home to the U.S.. Unfortunately, airport security officers in Germany were not too impressed:
In hindsight it was a bad idea to pack this private key backup device that is essentially a sealed steel pipe in my carry-on. Not the first time a gift received at a Bitcoin conference has caused me grief at the airport!
— Jameson Lopp (@lopp) October 21, 2019
Featured Image Credit: Photo via Pexels.com. Photo of CryptoSteel Capsule Courtesy of Sword Ltd.
