Trading volumes on major cryptocurrency exchanges reached a daily peak on Monday of over $68 billion, research shows, reflecting the trading fever that has followed bitcoin’s charge to an all-time high.
Bitcoin reached a new high of $34,800 on Sunday, drawing on a 2020 boom that saw it more than quadruple as larger US buyers leaped into the market.
It then fell sharply on Monday in the wake of uncertainty in heavily leveraged futures markets, before restoring losses. The second-biggest cryptocurrency, ethereum, which appears to trade in tandem with Bitcoin, also touched its highest level on Monday since January 2018, hitting $1170 (roughly Rs. 85,600).
Total daily trade volumes of cryptocurrencies amounted to $68.3 billion (roughly Rs. 4.99.600 crores), data from the UK consulting company CryptoCompare revealed on Tuesday. Regular volumes reached $13.1 billion (roughly Rs. 95,800 crores) in 2020.
Bitcoin’s record peak was less than three weeks after it reached $20,000 (roughly Rs. 14.6 lakhs) for the first time on December 16.
Fuelling Bitcoin’s surge has been the belief it will serve as a buffer against the possibility of inflation as policymakers and central banks turn on the stimulus taps to fight the COVID-19 pandemic. Its capacity for rapid gains has also drawn demand.
Crypto trading volumes increase periodically through times of extreme price fluctuations, demonstrating the crucial role of speculative traders in digital currency trading.
