Need to know what happened in crypto today? Here is the latest news on daily trends and events impacting Bitcoin price, blockchain, DeFi, NFTs, Web3 and crypto regulation.
The price of Bitcoin
continued to rise on Dec. 5, crossing $44,000 for the first time in 19 months. Meanwhile, a United States Securities and Exchange Commission filing revealed that BlackRock received $100,000 in seed capital from an unnamed investor for its spot Bitcoin exchange-traded fund (ETF), and crypto-related stocks managed to weather a sea of red among tech stocks.
Bitcoin’s price eclipsed $44,000 on Dec. 5, fueled by optimism that the SEC will approve a spot ETF in the same year of BTC’s next quadrennial halving.
The largest cryptocurrency reached a session high of $44,011, according to data from Cointelegraph Markets Pro and TradingView. Bitcoin’s price is up roughly 15% over the past week.
Adding to the bullish optimism is the expectation that the U.S. Federal Reserve will end its rate-hike campaign amid slowing inflation and a weakening labor market.
“Optimism around the Dec #FED rate decision and Jan #ETF decision can push things higher and fuel euphoria, so be prepared for what comes after that,” said Material Indicators, a trading source active on X (formerly Twitter).
The Fed’s final policy meeting of 2023 will take place Dec. 12 to 13, and it’s almost certain that policymakers will leave rates unchanged, according to CME Group’s FedWatch Tool.
The world’s largest asset manager, BlackRock, received $100,000 in seed funding from an unknown investor for its spot Bitcoin ETF in October 2023, a recent filing showed.
The SEC filing revealed that the investor agreed to purchase 4,000 shares for $100,000 on Oct. 27, 2023, at $25.00 per share. The deal would see the investor “acting as a statutory underwriter with respect to the Seed Creation Baskets.”
The latest filing by BlackRock also revealed certain details on the asset manager’s plans to pay the sponsor’s fee, where it plans to borrow Bitcoin
or cash as trade credit from the trade credit lender on a short-term basis. BlackRock can “charge their fees” via a loan instead of having to sell BTC (the ETF asset). That way, they “don’t impact BTC price that much.”
Publicly traded crypto firms have notched up to triple-digit percentage returns in 2023 and closed in the green on Dec. 4 as BTC reached a new year-high of over $42,000.
Crypto exchange Coinbase closed the day at just over $141 with a 5.5% gain, up 320% from its price at the start of 2023, per Google Finance data.
Bitcoin miners Marathon Digital and Riot Platforms closed the day with over 8% gains, recording 337% and 345% year-to-date (YTD) gains, respectively.
Crypto investment firm Galaxy Digital Holdings posted a daily gain of nearly 12% and is up 155% YTD. MicroStrategy — which has the largest Bitcoin holdings of any public company, valued at over $6.6 billion — saw a daily gain of over 6.5% and a YTD rise of 288%.
It comes despite the broader North American stock market seeing a mixed bag of gainers and losers on Dec. 4. Large-cap tech stocks like Microsoft fell 1.43% on the day, while Apple fell 0.95%. Google fell 2.02%, and chip manufacturer Nvidia fell 2.68%.
IG Australia market analyst Tony Sycamore told Cointelegraph the crypto-related stock rally is “coming off the back of Bitcoin’s spectacular gains in recent months,” which is up nearly 152% YTD and is closing in on $42,000, already hitting a 19-month high.
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