Bitcoin (BTC) continued its mid-June surge, surging to a one-year high above $31,000 on Friday morning ET before retreating below that threshold later in the day. The largest cryptocurrency by market value was recently trading at $30,894, up about 2.1% over the past 24 hours, according to CoinDesk Indices.
It has risen by about 20% in the past week. The last time BTC was priced above $31,050 was in June 2022. It briefly broke through $31,000 on April 10. BlackRock, the world's largest asset management company, applied for a Bitcoin spot ETF earlier this week. A few days later, Bitcoin began to soar, and two other financial services giants, Invesco and WisdomTree, also resubmitted applications for similar products.
Investors were alarmed by the Securities and Exchange Commission’s (SEC) lawsuit against cryptocurrency exchanges Binance and Coinbase earlier this month, but were cheered by the ETF filings, which underscore the continued commitment of large institutional investors to expand their influence in the digital asset space.
“A sustained move above $31,000 would signal that we are entering a new phase where market participants start to re-price some of the previous regulatory anxiety,” Strahinja Savic, head of data and analytics at Toronto-based crypto platform FRNT Financial, wrote in a Telegram group.
“Despite hostile rhetoric from some regulators, the Bitcoin spot ETF filing amplifies the view that institutions remain interested in cryptocurrencies,” Savic added. “Despite regulatory complexities, there are serious players looking to increase their involvement in the digital asset space, and Bitcoin’s move above $30,000 seems to acknowledge that.”
K33 Research similarly noted in its weekly newsletter on Friday that “BlackRock’s Bitcoin spot ETF filing raises expectations that an institutional-driven price rally is imminent.”
Most other major cryptocurrencies have joined Bitcoin in its gains. Ethereum (ETH), the second-largest cryptocurrency by market value, was recently up 0.5% from the same time on Thursday, trading at $1,901. Earlier this week, ETH reclaimed the $1,900 mark for the first time since early June.
Litecoin (LTC) and DOT, the token of smart contract platform Polkadot, have recently risen by more than 5% and 6%, respectively. AVAX, the native cryptocurrency of the Avalanche blockchain, has risen by nearly 4%.