Cryptocurrency News Update: Bitcoin volatility is about to explode

Here's what you need to know on Friday

Markets:

BTC/USD recovered from the intraday low of $9,179 to trade at $9,270 by press time. The first digital asset has stayed unchanged since the start of Friday and gained over 1.3% in the recent 24 hours. The coin is moving within the short-term bullish trend amid low volatility.

At the time of writing, ETH/USD is changing hands at $231.30. The price touched $233.29 during early Asian hours, but failed to gain the upside momentum. ETH/USD has stayed mostly unchanged both on a day-to-day basis and since the beginning of Friday. The coin is moving within a short-term bullish trend amid low volatility.

XRP/USD is hovering at $0.1822. The price recovered from Thursday's low of $0.1785 and has been trading in a tight range marginally above $0.1800 since that time. Now it is moving within a short-term bullish trend amid low volatility.

Among the 100 most important cryptocurrencies, Bitcoin Diamond(BCD) $0.7225 (+10.12%), Celsius (CEL) $0.3310 (+9.3%), Ontology (ONT) $0.6428 (+8.5%). The day's losers are Flexacoin (FXC) $0.0028 (+14.55%), SwissBorg(CHSB) $0.1209 (-10.8%), Aave(LEND) $0.1271 (-3.83%), 

Chart of the day:

BTC/USD, 30-min chart

Markets

Bitcoin regained ground above $9,300 on Friday; however the market participants are bracing for an increased volatility during the day ahead of $1 billion bitcoin options expiry. Stock markets movements may also influence BTC momentum as the digital coin has been tracing the stocks since the start of the day. The second wave of COVID-19 infections swept across the US states that chose to re-open their economies too early. Now they may derail the fragile economic recovery and trigger massive run to safety. While Bitcoin is often considered a safe-haven asset, it tends to go down, when market hits the panic button.

A legendary investor and a founder of Miller Value Partners, Bill Miller, stays bullish on Bitcoin despite the recent unimpressive momentum, Speaking in a recent episode of the FutureProof webcast he said that it was the safest asset.

At the current price, at the high $9,000s, I think it's much safer than where it has ever been before.

Industry

In the past week, Grayscale Investments purchased 19,879 BTC (about $184 million) for its Bitcoin Trust, which is less than has been mined during the same period. Now the total number of coins in the Trust reached approximately 400,000. Moreover, since Bitcoin's Halving in May the company has been buying BTC three times faster than it has been minted. Crypto analyst Kevin Rooke, wrote on Twitter:

Grayscale *alone* has taken all BTC mined + 14,000 more BTC off the table since the halving.

Central Banks around the world might want to have their own CBDC in the nearest future, to deal with the shortcomings in the existing payment systems, according to the report by the Bank of International Settlements (BIS). Contrary to a popular opinion, BIS experts believe that the creation of stablecoins is not the key factor behind the central bank's focus on digital currencies.  

One option at the frontier of policy opportunities is the issuance of CBDCs, which could amount to a sea change. CBDCs could offer a new, safe, trusted and widely accessible digital means of payment. But the impact could go much further, as they could foster competition among private sector intermediaries, set high standards for safety, and act as a catalyst for continued innovation in payments, finance and commerce at large.

Regulation

Telegram will pay a penalty fee of $18.5 million to the SEC and return 70% of the money received from investors during the initial coin offering (ICO).  Under the proposed settlement with the regulator, the company will also have to notify the SEC if it plans to issue a token or a cryptocurrency within the next three years.  

Pavel Durov, CEO of Telegram, commented in his Telegram group:

Today’s proposed settlement reconfirms our commitment to repay the remaining funds to purchasers under the Purchase Agreements. We’ve already repaid more than 1.2bn to the purchasers either directly or in the form of loans.