Bitcoin continues its resurgence today, breaking beyond the $8,000 price milestone to reach a new two-month high. The top-ranked cryptocurrency has risen by over $500 to move from $7,700 to $8,200 in another day of a massive price surge. Bitcoin’s weekly gains now stand at 18 percent.

All other cryptocurrencies in the top ten rankings according to market capitalization are also beginning to experience a price increase. In the last few days, the BTC price trajectory had seemed decoupled from that of the market. However, it appears that the positive BTC sentiments are beginning to influence the altcoin market with Stellar, EOS, and Bitcoin Cash among the top gainers.

Brian Kelly, founder and CEO of BKCM LLC, a crypto-focused investment fund, believes that the current price rally is for real. Speaking to CNBC, Kelly outlined three reasons why the strong bullish sentiments aren’t going away anytime soon.

According to Kelly, speculations about a possible BTC ETF approval by the SEC has whipped up a storm of optimism in the market. As a result, more money is coming into the market in anticipation of a massive price surge in the aftermath of a positive ETF decision by the SEC. However, Kelly admitted that a BTC ETF approval by the SEC in 2018 seemed highly unlikely.

Kelly also identified the influx of big-money players into the market as institutional investors begin to take the emerging asset class a little more seriously. The BKCM chief also mentioned the recent $20 billion hedge fund investment secured by Coinbase for its custody service.

Finally, Kelly drew attention to the imminent shift from Web 2.0 to Web 3.0. According to Kelly, the move away from databases to databanks will catapult cryptocurrency to a level of higher priority as a more trusted means of making payments.

With the recent upward price trajectory has come the return of the Bitcoin bulls. Speaking to Express.co.uk, Matthew Newton of eToro said that the current run isn’t similar to previous rallies that turned out to be false negatives saying:

“The short squeeze on the market that occurred after the pattern completed, caused some concern that we were seeing a repeat of what happened in April when bitcoin failed to break $10k. By soaring past those key barriers of resistance, it would seem history is not repeating itself and there’s real strength in the move. If bitcoin can close above $8,000 today, we could assume that we may have a good run toward $10,000.”

The coming days and weeks will reveal how far the current run will take the price of Bitcoin. Some analysts like Bitmex CEO, Arthur Hayes believe the present surge is a short squeeze and that the price will still test $5,000 before increasing later in the year. Others like Digital Currency Group, CEO, Barry Silbert, are confident that BTC reached its bottom in June 2018.

On the subject of end-of-year Bitcoin price predictions, Samuel Leach, CEO of Yield Coin was a little bit more cautious saying:

“Personally, I feel bitcoin could at $12-$15k by end of the year, if the news remains to be positive and regulatory acceptance and growth continues. On the flip side if we see more bans and strong regulatory action against cryptos we could see bitcoin around $5.5k-$6.5k at the end of the year.”

The post Bitcoin Price Flies North of $8,000, Analyst Declares Price Rally to be ‘Real’ appeared first on UNHASHED.

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