Crypto Today: Bitcoin bulls tackling big $7500 barrier

Here's what you need to know on Monday

Markets: 

• BTC/USD is currently trading at $7,327 (+1.25%) in the afternoon in U.S. hours, as the bulls try to break down $7500 barrier. 
• ETH/USD is currently trading at $132.15 (+3.20%), a reclaim of the $140 territory was seen, after proving to be a problem for upside. 
• XRP/USD is currently trading at $0.1928 (+8.30%), bulls made a strong push back above $0.2000, following Binance announcement to introduce XRP traded futures product to its platform. 
• Among the 100 most important cryptocurrencies, the best of the day are REN $0.038779 (+10.60%), KNC $0.200604 (+9.49%) and DASH $55.79 (+9.50%) and The day's losers are SNX $0.959887 (-17.90%), ABBC $0.0.071142 (-11.70%) and VSYS$0.084752 (-4.70%).

Chart of the day:

XRP/USD daily chart.( XRP/USD biggest daily gain seen since 25 October 2019).

Market:

• Binance, added XRP to its Futures trading platform. The coin is available in the form of XRP/USDT perpetual contract with leverage up to 75x. It means that XRP is now available for margin trading. 
• Ripple CEO Garlinghouse said: “Ripple owns a lot of XRP, we’re very interested in the success of XRP, but the accusations of us dumping, that’s not in our best interests to do that. We would never do that and in fact, we’ve taken steps to lock up most of the XRP we own in escrows so we can’t touch it.”
• Cardano’s ADA is trading higher, as founder Charles Hoskinson speaks highly on the foundation’s developments and progress. He was recently speaking within an AMA session, noting that ADA will be the most predominant force in the cryptocurrency space by the end of 2020. He is also expecting it to become a true social operating system.
• Recent data suggest that based on a seven-day average, the hash rate for Bitcoin has risen sharply from approximately 93 exahashes per second (EH/s) on Dec. 30 to more than 106 EH/s on Sunday. The best day overall was Jan. 1 when the hashing power exceeded 119 EH/s, surpassing the previous record of 114 EH/s set back in October.

Regulation:

• The South Korean Presidential Committee on the Fourth Industrial Revolution (PCFIR) has recommended the government to allow financial institutions to launch cryptocurrency-based financial products.
• Qatar has put a ban into effect on digital asset services, particularly trading. The ban was implemented by the Qatar Financial Center (QFC) Regulatory Authority, which is responsible for authorizing and regulating firms and individuals conducting financial services in or from the QFC, according to regional news outlet International Investment,

Industry:

• The People’s Bank of China recently published an update on the development of its national cryptocurrency, stating that it is ‘progressing smoothly.’ 
• China now has more than 33,000 registered companies claiming to use blockchain technology in their businesses, according to the country’s Center for Information and Industry Development. The information was released at a recent blockchain conference hosted by a Chinese municipal government and several state-backed research institutes. 

Quote of the day:

For those Bitcoin bugs excited about Bitcoin's 4% rally in 2020, think about this.  Gold is also up by about the same percentage this year, only with significantly less downside risk.  If this is the best rally Bitcoin can muster, how will it ever hit 50K, let alone 1 million?

Peter Schiff