We’re starting off this week on the upside, with a minor increase in value since our last update on Friday. The weekend trading brought no steep and sudden changes, but was mostly marked by a steady rise in value and volume. However, the current value of $616.8 is up for a challenge, as the trends suggest there might be changes coming over the next two days.
In other updates from the Bitcoin world, last Friday saw another US government official turn into a Bitcoin advocate at the annual meeting of the Institute of International Finance. During her speech at the IIF, the US Federal Reserve Governor Lael Brainard spoke of blockchain technology as “compelling” and a possible replacement for the “long and opaque intermediation chains” that are currently employed by correspondent banks,
More precisely, Brainard said that the technology can be used to make notable improvements over the speed of processing and lower the costs and “counterparty risks” in cross-border trade finance and payments. She also stated that the Federal Reserve are keeping a close eye on blockchain technology and recognize its potential of turning into the “most significant development” when it comes to settlement, clearing and payments.
Bitcoin Continues Slow Rise
Just like last week, we’re starting this Monday with a slow rise, without any significant changes brought on by the weekend trading. But even though we didn’t see the $620 breakout we hoped for, the current situation is still an improvement.
The closest we reached to $620 was this morning when the price raised briefly to $617.84 – a $4+ dollar rise since past midnight when the value reached its lowest point of $613.51. The small weekend price increase was also accompanied by an increase in volume which has been climbing slowly to the current $51,774,500 as of Saturday. The volume changes hint at further increases – a signal that the oscillators and moving averages also share.
As our technical analysis suggests, the current trading situation is strongly inclined towards buying, with 8 out of 12 technical indicators and 2 out of 12 moving averages being pro-buy. The SMA 100 is above the SMA 200, which indicates a possible upside trend that might finally lead to the $620 breakout. However, the Stochastic indicator had already hit the Overbought threshold this morning, which signals a risk that the market will turn towards selling, even though it has been very pro-buy thus far.
As always, you should keep a close eye on the trading situation, as the market may change from the bullish pull of the past week within the hour.
McAfee’s Mining Company Enters Phase-2
John McAfee’s Bitcoin mining company, MGT Capital Investment, has recently announced phase-2 of its operations. The company only moved to Bitcoin mining at the end of June, after the creator of the famous McAfee Antivirus took over the steering wheel, but has already turned significant profits.
During its phase 1, the company’s has earned more than $50,000, or over 90 BTC (at the value of $611) in mining revenue and generated 2.6 PetaHash. According to their announcement, they now plan to reach a new milestone in their phase-2 and hit 5 PetaHash.
For this purpose, the company’s invested in serious mining hardware that will see even bigger returns in the future. As stated by McAfee himself, the company is currently among “the top five Bitcoin miners in the U.S.” and with their projected goal or reaching 10 PetaHash by the first quarter of 2017 they aim to become global Bitcoin leaders.