According to data by CryptoCompare, at 08:40 BST (or 7:40 UTC) on Tuesday (July 21), Bitcoin surged above the $9,350 level for the first time in 12 days, as you can see from the two-week BTC-USD price chart shown below:
Since then, the Bitcoin price has come down slightly; at the time of writing, Bitcoin is trading around $9,340, up almost 2% in the past 24-hour period:
Now a 2% “surge” might not sound like something to write home about, but it becomes easier to understand why some Bitcoin HODLers are celebrating right now when you consider that for the past 12 days Bitcoin has mostly been trading in the range $9100–$9300 and many are hoping that this small break to the upside could be a sign of things to come (such as a rally that moves the price past $10K, a level not seen for over seven weeks).
20 minutes after the Bitcoin price went above $9,350, Simon Dedic, Co-Founder of crypto-focused research firm Blockfyre, tweeted:
Well hello good old friend… $BTC pic.twitter.com/dRHTaCmrGL
— Simon Dedic (@scoinaldo) July 21, 2020
As Binance Co-Founder and CEO Changpeng Zhao (aka “CZ”) mentioned yesterday in an interview with Bloomberg Television, Bitcoin’s recent price volatility has been so low that some members of the crypto community were mockingly calling Bitcoin a stablecoin:
“I think sooner or later it’s going to break out. But right now, for the last little while, Bitcoin has been really stable, and people have been calling it a stablecoin now.”
Some fans of Ethereum found the jubilation over BTC’s 2% price increase amusing:
$BTC $eth
pumping 1%. pumping 2% pic.twitter.com/8DluuzidH3— CryptoBeggar (@cryptobeggar_) July 21, 2020
Whole feed is talking about the 1.5% $BTC pump.
HELLLLOOOOOO #Ethereum just pumped 2.1% can I get some NOISE from our altcoin boys???
— The Crypto Dog📈 (@TheCryptoDog) July 21, 2020
One reason for Bitcoin’s “exciting” move today could be due to the episodic bouts of positive correlation between Bitcoin and equities that we have witnessed since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic.
As CNBC reported a short time ago, Europe’s stock indices moved higher this morning “after European Union (EU) leaders reached a deal on a 750 billion euro ($857 billion) recovery fund to help the region recover from the coronavirus crisis.”
European Council President Charles Michel said in a press conference that announced this agreement:
“We did it! Europe is strong. Europe is united… These were, of course, difficult negotiations in very difficult times for all Europeans.”
Another cause for positive investor sentiment could be the good news that was announced yesterday regarding the COVID-19 vaccine (AZD1222) being developed by Oxford University in the UK and British-Swedish multinational pharmaceutical and biopharmaceutical company AstraZeneca.
As STAT News reported yesterday, data from “a phase 1/2, single-blind, randomised controlled trial” published in the medical journal the Lancet shows that “the vaccine caused side effects, including fever, headaches, muscle aches, and injection site reactions, in about 60% of patients, but fortunately “all of the side effects were deemed mild or moderate, and all resolved themselves over the course of the study.”
Featured Image by “Pexels” via Pixabay.com
