The market for cryptocurrencies is currently at an all-time high. With Bitcoin recently going up over $9,000 for the first time, the market as a whole has been boosted to new highs, too. Estimates say that the cryptocurrency market as a whole is valued at $300.5 billion, and that Bitcoin makes up over $155 billion of that.
To put this in better perspective, the cryptocurrency market was worth just $200 billion at the beginning of November 2017. It was worth only $100 billion in June 2017. The market tripled in capitulation in just five months, highlighting just how popular digital currencies have become, and the amount of potential that people have found in them for the future.
Another way of looking at this shows that this growth is happening even faster. The $300 billion mark was crossed late on November 26th, 2017. At the beginning of the day, the number was set at $285 billion, with Bitcoin representing $151 billion of that. In other words, the market as a whole increased by $15 billion in less than 24 hours, with BTC alone climbing by close to $5 billion.
Bitcoin is not the only currency seeing mammoth growth. Ethereum, the second most widely used cryptocurrency, saw its price jump up to over $75 just recently, a 25 percent growth in just a week. This was a new high for this currency, too. It represents about $46 billion of the total cryptocurrency marketplace right now.
This is not to say that it will only be growth from here on out. It has taken years for Bitcoin to get this sort of traction. For many years, Bitcoin was the only major player in the marketplace, and there was a lot of struggle for the currency to stay viable during that period. The introduction of other currencies has only been able to occur because of the stability of the platform as a whole. Better security, better blockchain procedures, and a better understanding of the potential and utility of digital currencies by traders and investors has allowed for this type of growth. However, this is still a new market, and there are likely to be kinks in the road ahead. We are seeing a period of immense growth, but there will be dips in the market eventually. It’s important that you do your own research before you enter a position or begin to use a cryptocurrency for personal reasons.
As the market grows, it’s easy to make speculations about where things are headed. It’s also really easy for these to be pure guesses. Some have said that Bitcoin is nearing the end of a bubble. Others have said that $9,000 is incredibly low. In fact, some believe that Bitcoin could go up over $100,000 in the future. If that’s the case, this is just the beginning of a huge amount of growth, and not a bubble at all. What we do know is that Bitcoin is just the tip of the iceberg, so to speak. Even if Bitcoin does lose value headed forward, there are plenty of other cryptocurrencies out there that are making headway and will serve different purposes and fill in gaps within the marketplace. This means that investors and traders should move with some caution, but also with a sense of optimism thanks to the huge potential that is before us.
This is an exciting time to be involved in cryptocurrencies. If there is anything to be learned from the past, it is that we should be cautious. There’s a lot of room for growth ahead, but caution is always a strong policy when it comes to the management of your money.