In the past two days since our last update, the price of Bitcoin went through important fluctuations, especially during the past 24 hours when the cryptocurrency was at one point sold over the $580 mark – a fluctuation that hasn’t been seen since last week when the value shortly came to $600, only to quickly drop below $570 and raise again to remain fairly unchanged and near $580 for an entire week.
Apart from the value changes, this week also brought us news of the sale of $1.6 million worth of the currency in a US Marshals Service government auction, where an unidentified buyer bought 2,700 Bitcoins in what was seen as a low-turnout auction involving only 5 bidders, as well news of Bitfinex’s effort to compensate users who suffered damage in their recent hacking attack.
Volume Doubled; Possible Price Increases
During the past 48 hours, the Bitcoin price jumped for a brief period only to settle back near the $580 mark where it has remained for the past 24 hours, during which it only suffered a 0.12% drop. The highest recorded in the past two days was $584.48, while the lowest Bitcoin was $579.10.
The price fluctuations can be attributed to the significant change in volume that this week brought. Only two days ago the volume dropped to $37,405,000, but in the period since it has almost doubled in size and now amounts to $75,254,300, which indicates a trend towards buying and possible price increases. The current market cap is $9.2 billion.
The sell signal suggested by the volume increase can be also confirmed by looking at the technical indicators, where 4 out of 11 indicators send a sell signal, 3 are pro-buy, and the rest are neutral. However, the moving averages show a different picture and an overall pro-buy signal, with only 2 out of 12 moving averages being pro-sell.
Of course, the numbers only show the current state of the market which might change within the hour, so a strong lookout for price fluctuations is advised.
Bitfinex Offers Equity as Compensation
The Bitcoin exchange Bitfinex, is now seeking to repair the damage from their recent hacking attack which left the currency exchange short of 120,000 Bitcoins and caused a major blow to the price. The compensation comes in the form of equity in the company, which the exchange service hopes will make up for any suffered losses.
As the deal suggests, those users who were given BFX tokens can exchange them for equity in their parent company iFinex Inc. via the Special Purpose Vehicle which will be set up for the occasion by the Bitcoin investment service BnkToTheFuture Ltd.
How the entire exchange will unfold we are yet to see, as both companies are still arranging all the details and are yet to release them. For now, the only question that still remains unanswered is whether this compensation deal will be able to cover all the losses inflicted in the hack attack which were estimated to be at $65.6 in Bitcoin value.