Bitcoin price reached $18,000. Will the rally continue?

At the time of writing, Bitcoin rate hovers around $18,000 per coin, let’s recall the main growth drivers and figure out whether it is worth diversifying risks now or taking a HODL-position.

Reasons for Bitcoin growth

Paypal allows the buying and selling of cryptocurrencies

The largest international payment system added cryptocurrency support for authenticated US citizens to its arsenal, later in 2021 users from other countries will be able to buy and sell cryptocurrency. At the beginning,  the payment system will allow people to buy and sell Bitcoin (BTC), Ethereum (ETH), Bitcoin Cash (BCH) and Litecoin (LTC), as well as store them in the integrated wallet.

In addition, in 2021, the users of the app will be able to pay with digital assets in 26 million retail outlets, the payment system said. Stores will not accept cryptocurrency directly but after conversion to dollars.

Daniel Schulman, CEO of the company, hopes that the addition of cryptocurrencies will accelerate the process of recognition of this digital asset by the global community.

 As the saying goes: “Welcome to the family!”

Quiet haven

The coronavirus pandemic has hit the Chinese economy and then the entire world, resulting in a drop in production, the death of the tourism industry and a huge unemployment rate. For example, Dow Jones Index was down 20,3%, while the NASDAQ fell 30%. 

In these conditions of uncertainty and panic, large institutional investors rushed to withdraw their funds from the stock market into cash or protective assets like gold. Gold on the background of discouraging news showed growth and reached the highs of 2013, trading at $1,600 per ounce. 

Bitcoin also fell along with the entire market in March 2020, but unlike other assets, it showed a twofold growth in a few months.

Billionaires are going to crypto

“Some hedge fund investors are shedding their wariness of bitcoin as it continues to soar. Stanley Druckenmiller, who built his $4.4 billion fortune as the head of Duquesne Capital Management and claimed in 2018 he “didn’t want to own bitcoin,” revealed on CNBC that he did buy some bitcoin and thinks it could perform better than gold, though he still holds more of the precious metal. Also, Druckenmiller said that he bets against the US Dollar.” – Forbes

Also remember billionaire Bill Miller as mentioned in a CNBC report that he called Bitcoin “Single best-performing asset class” for the next year, 5 and 10 years.

Funds also did not stand aside: Grayscale Investments, a cryptocurrency fund manager, is actively buying Bitcoins and currently has over 500 million coins in its Bitcoin Trust. The amount of Bitcoin assets is now $ 8.35 billion and accounts for 2.69% of Bitcoin’s (BTC) total supply and market cap.

A year after halving

Bitcoin halving is an event when the reward for mining one block is cut in half, it happens every 4 years in order to control the inflation of coins. The first halving on the network happened in November 2012, then miners began to receive 25 bitcoins instead of 50 for the mining of a block. At that time, the digital currency fluctuated around $12, but within a year the price jumped to $260. The next halving took place in 2016 when the coin was traded at a price of $600, and after 12 months the price reached $2,600.

Let’s take a look at the dynamics of price changes during this halving year. We see that before the halving, the price was moving up, and after that, there was a calm or slow pace of growth. In 2016, growth began only six months later in December.

Such fluctuations and subsequent growth may be associated with the fact that the market does not immediately feel the effect of scarcity when miners reduce the sale of new coins, the price of which does not meet their expectations. And as we know, a decrease in the supply of coins to the market causes demand pressure, which will provoke growth in the future. 

More recently, Bitcoin has had another halving, and we are seeing a significant reduction in the balance of cryptocurrency exchanges, from which we can conclude that the share of the influence of miners as sellers has increased significantly.

Can Bitcoin keep its insane growth? Let’s figure it out

The share of Bitcoin HODLers has reached a historic high

The share of wallet holders (those who have not sold their bitcoins in recent years) has reached a historic high of 44%. Again, as in previous halvings, this demand-side pressure will push prices upward and could be a catalyst for another explosive growth. 

The next waves of COVID-19

To begin with, let’s recall the seemingly distant start of the COVID pandemic again. The pandemic shocked the global world and plunged many countries into a recession comparable to the Great Depression and the mortgage crisis of 2008 in the United States, which entailed a crisis around the world, from the consequences of which not everyone has recovered. 

As stated earlier, Bitcoin went down along with the entire stock market, and according to the Tradingview, the price fell to $4,600 on March 16. As before, everything was connected with investors who moved from high-risk assets to more stable ones.

Our point of view is that there may be second and third waves of the coronavirus pandemic, which could lead to another lockdown, and we will have an even greater impact on the already weak global economy. Despite the fact that large investors are starting to look closer at the digital currency as a protective asset, there is still an option where Bitcoin can begin to fall along with the entire market.

On the other hand, final testing of a coronavirus vaccine is nearing completion in many countries. The results show good indicators, and if the world defeats the infection in the near future, the economy will also undergo significant changes.

US Presidential Election

Joseph Biden unofficially became the new President of the United States of America. We are faced with the question of what measures the representative of the Democratic Party will take in relation to the decentralized currency. So far, the potential 46th president has no official position on Bitcoin, however, the Biden presidency could lead to more regulation of cryptocurrency, reversing Trump’s mostly hands-off approach. 

We note that Gary Gensler, the former chairman of the CFTC, has been named leader of Biden’s financial policy transition team. Earlier, he announced his “blockchain duck test” in which he concluded that Ethereum and XRP should be considered securities.

This is exactly what Ray Dalio warned about, saying that the US government, in theory, will not allow a decentralized currency to flourish without proper regulatory measures.

Technical analysis

Technical analysis on the daily chart is showing signs of weakness. The RSI index (the relative strength index is a momentum indicator used in technical analysis that measures the magnitude of recent price changes to evaluate overbought or oversold conditions in the price of a stock or other asset) shows that a short-term bearish divergence.

MACD (Moving Average Convergence Divergence) has not yet shown a strong decline. Nevertheless, we advise you to periodically review this indicator to be ready for a possible trend reversal.

These indicators may promise a correction for Bitcoin in the near future, but it is too early to talk about a trend reversal. Now we are near the support zone of $17,500, and if the price holds and makes a bullish breakout, we will see a new all-time high of $ 19,500, although such a scenario is unlikely in the near future.

Conclusion

Based on the foregoing, we believe in the long-term success of Bitcoin, but there are chances that the BTC price will undergo a slight correction, so we advise you to evaluate the current market situation and diversify risks.

Any professional investor’s portfolio must have a share of cash in order to pick up a falling asset and get into a more profitable long position. If your portfolio consists entirely of cryptocurrency projects, then you do not have to go to the exchange and exchange assets for fiat money and store them on a card, in the world of decentralized finance there has long been an alternative – stable coins, which serve to reduce portfolio volatility.

On our service, you can quickly exchange your crypto asset for a stablecoin for hedging – we have over 200 exchange coins. All payments are decentralized and anonymous, you don’t even need to register.

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Disclaimer: Please keep in mind that the content of this article is not financial or investing advice. The information provided is the author’s opinion only and should not be considered as direct recommendations for trading or investment. Any article reader or website visitor should consider multiple viewpoints and become familiar with all local regulations before cryptocurrency investment. We do not make any warranties about reliability and accuracy of this information.