Bitcoin
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The bitcoin price had doubled since the beginning of the year but has fallen back over the last month as uncertainty grips the market, putting pressure on top ten cryptocurrencies ethereum, BNB
Now, after Tesla billionaire Elon Musk shot down reports X (Twitter) could be about to blow up the bitcoin and crypto market, China’s Hong Kong has issued the first licenses under its new crypto regime, opening up crypto trading to the mass market.
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China president Xi Jinping has led a crypto crackdown in the country over the last few years, which … [+]
The first licenses were awarded this week to bitcoin and crypto exchanges HashKey and OSL, allowing them to serve retail customers in the city of Hong Kong, a so-called special administrative region of China.
A HashKey spokesperson said the exchange “successfully underwent a simplified process to obtain the license upgrade … to expand its business scope from serving professional investors to retail users, fulfilling market demand for a licensed platform that offers users a safer and simpler process for buying and storing cryptocurrencies.”
“This is a significant first-mover advantage,” OSL chief executive Hugh Madden said in a statement, saying traders can now trade bitcoin and ethereum on his platform.
Earlier this year, Hong Kong announced its new crypto licensing regime, designed to help the city become a global bitcoin crypto hub amid a global crypto crackdown that’s sent some of the biggest U.S. bitcoin and crypto companies scrambling to find new homes around the world.
China’s 2021 bitcoin, ethereum and crypto crackdown, which saw it expel crypto companies and so-called miners who maintain blockchain networks, sparked a sudden price crash, wiping billions of dollars from the combined crypto market and sparking panic among traders.
Some have said they expect the re-opening up of China to bitcoin and crypto could trigger the next price boom. In June, the chief executive of the stablecoin issuer Circle, Jeremy Allaire, who oversees the $28 billion USDC
“Hong Kong is clearly looking to establish itself as a very significant center for digital assets markets and stablecoins and we are paying very close attention to that,” Allaire told Bloomberg at the World Economic Forum in Tianjin, China.
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The bitcoin price has sent sharply lower in mid-2021 when China announced a major crypto crackdown, … [+]
For now, the bitcoin and crypto—including major coins ethereum, BNB, XRP, dogecoin, cardano, solana, tron and polygon—are stuck in a holding pattern with volatility declining and potentially setting bitcoin up as a gold alternative.
“Bitcoin continues to demonstrate resilience around the $29,000 support level,” Rachel Lin, the chief executive of crypto derivatives platform SynFutures, said in emailed comments.
“The recent decline in volatility isn’t an isolated incident; we’re observing one of the most tranquil periods in the history of bitcoin and the broader crypto market. The market’s stillness over the past six months is so pronounced that bitcoin’s volatility has dipped below equity markets such as the S&P 500 and even traditionally safe assets like gold. If this stability persists, bitcoin could become a viable choice for risk-averse investors seeking exposure to the crypto space.”