Amid Bitcoin touching five-month lows near $30,000, JPMorgan Chase analysts suggested that large institutional investors are now dumping Bitcoin (BTC) in favor of gold. In its Tuesday note to clients, JPMorgan suggested that institutional investors are going back to gold, reversing a major bullish cryptocurrency market action that drove Bitcoin's price above $64,000 in mid-April. Citing open interest data in Bitcoin futures contracts on the Chicago Mercantile Exchange, the American megabank said that BTC futures now saw the first biggest decline since the bull market that started in late 2020: “The bitcoin flow picture continues to deteriorate and is pointing …

Amid the ongoing concerns over Bitcoin’s (BTC) energy consumption, a new study states that the traditional banking system consumes much more energy than the Bitcoin network. Michael Novogratz’s cryptocurrency firm, Galaxy Digital, released a report Friday titled “On Bitcoin’s Energy Consumption: A Quantitative Approach to a Subjective Question,” providing open-source access to its methodology and calculations. Compiled by Galaxy’s mining arm, the study estimates Bitcoin’s annual electricity consumption to stand at 113.89 terawatts per hour, including energy for miner demand, miner power consumption, pool power consumption and node power consumption. This amount is at least two times lower than the …

Morgan Creek Capital Management founder and CEO Mark Yusko believes Bitcoin’s next market cycle could see the asset rival gold by market capitalization and trade for more than $200,000. While appearing on CNBC’s Trading Nation on Sunday, Yusko compared the rapid adoption of Bitcoin (BTC) to the growth of FAANG companies — Facebook, Apple, Amazon, Netflix, and Google. “This is a network, and networks grow in an exponential way. This is the fastest network in history to a trillion dollars of value, right on the heels of the FAANGs that took, you know, 15 to 20 years depending on which …

Bitcoin (BTC) and other cryptocurrencies have opened the doors to a whole new world of finance. In their most basic form, cryptocurrencies allow people to transact in a fully trustless, transparent and efficient manner, cutting out the centralized intermediaries and counterparty risk previously associated with digital money transfers. Thanks to blockchain technology, value can now be transferred on a worldwide scale within seconds/minutes and with relatively low fees — and that’s not all. However, Bitcoin and Ether (ETH) are still too volatile to be used as currency, a factor that has hindered their mass adoption. Although Bitcoin and blockchain technology …

Eric Weinstein, managing director of Thiel Capital and host of the popular podcast The Portal, urged his followers over the weekend not to get caught up in Bitcoin’s (BTC) daily fluctuations. He seemed to feel that it was wiser to focus on the cryptocurrency’s ability to hedge against currency debasement at the hands of central banks. Bitcoin and other “hard-money” assets like gold and silver could be sound alternatives to the “disguised actions” of central banks, Weinstein tweeted to his nearly 485,000 followers. “Figuring out how we hedge against central bankers printing and devaluing fiat currency remains our upcoming rendezvous …

Kinesis, a gold-backed monetary system based in the Cayman Islands, has launched a Sharia-compliant version of its product in Indonesia, setting the stage for wider acceptance of its solution in the world’s largest Muslim-population country. The product, PosGO Syariah, is described as the first mobile ecosystem business in Indonesia to be compliant with Islamic law. Delivered as a mobile application, PosGO is a digitized physical gold trading platform that also allows users to conduct real-time, peer-to-peer transfers of gold and fiat currency. The platform also offers a payment gateway and a “Gold Mecca” community savings program for the Hajj, the …

Major United States asset manager Grayscale has just surpassed $50 billion in cryptocurrency assets under management for the first time. Grayscale’s AUM is creeping ever closer to the $57-billion holdings of the largest commodity ETF. MILESTONE: We just reached $50 billion AUM. Yet another reason to #GoGrayscale. pic.twitter.com/Jrk7n6TAOI — Grayscale (@Grayscale) April 14, 2021 The company has plans to convert into an ETF when regulations allow. If the ETF had been approved already, Grayscale would be the second-largest commodity ETF behind SPDR Gold Shares. GLD is a physically backed gold exchange-traded fund with listings on stock exchanges in the U.S., …

After rallying more than 100% in 2021, Bitcoin (BTC) seems to be struggling to turn the $60,000 level into support. After all, what is so special about this magic round number and its accompanying $1 trillion market capitalization? Gold's $11 trillion market cap might hold the answer, as Bitcoin's current trading volume and the amount held by institutional investors seem to match 10% of the precious metal's numbers. Technical indicators and derivatives data provide interesting short-term insights. But to analyze cryptocurrencies in a broader context, one should focus on market capitalization, precious metals and global wealth. More Bitcoins than in …

JPMorgan Chase expects Bitcoin (BTC) to reach $130,000, while Ark Invest anticipates the market valuation of BTC to surpass that of gold. The optimistic macro prediction from both funds revolves around the scarcity of Bitcoin, which has buoyed its popularity as a safe-haven asset. Why are both high-profile funds so optimistic about Bitcoin? As Cointelegraph previously reported, the outlook of the U.S. dollar index is on the decline. The fear of inflation and the increasing liquidity in the financial markets is causing reserve currencies, like the dollar, to depreciate. Ark Invest, as an example, sees Bitcoin nearing $500,000 in the …

Galaxy Digital CEO Mike Novogratz believes Bitcoin (BTC) is on track to meet or exceed gold’s market capitalization amid a rapid wave of retail and institutional adoption of the digital asset. In an interview with CNBC’s Squawk Box, Novogratz said cryptocurrency “adoption’s happening much faster than I predicted,” adding that “it’s shocking to me how fast people are moving into the system.” Novogratz, who has been involved in Bitcoin since 2013 when the digital currency was valued at around $100, explained that his previous BTC price target of $60,000 was too conservative. The initial target was based on Bitcoin achieving …

As the Bitcoin (BTC) price edges closer to $59,000, its value relative to gold is approaching new all-time highs, possibly hinting at the emergence of a new preferred store of value. Measured against gold, Bitcoin’s price reached 34.94 ounces on Tuesday. The BTC-gold comparative peaked at 35.35 ounces on March 13 as Bitcoin surged past $61,000. Bitcoin’s value relative to gold has more than doubled over the past three months and has grown nearly sevenfold since October 2020. Gold futures, meanwhile, plunged below $1,700 a troy ounce Tuesday on the Comex division of the New York Mercantile Exchange. The price …

Tether Holdings Limited, a company behind the world’s largest stablecoin Tether (USDT), has released an assurance opinion to confirm that Tether tokens are fully backed by its reserves. In a statement shared on Twitter Tuesday, Tether provided the company’s Consolidated Reserves Report, or CRR, accompanied by an assurance report from accounting network Moore Cayman. Signed on March 26, the accountant’s report intends to prove the accuracy of Tether’s CRR compiled on Feb. 28. “In our opinion, the CRR as prepared by the management of Tether Holdings Limited Group as of February 2021 at 11:59 PM UTC is presented in accordance …