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Bitcoin Price Hoists Market to $90 Billion As Segwit Lock-In Looms

Last Updated March 4, 2021 4:58 PM
Josiah Wilmoth
Last Updated March 4, 2021 4:58 PM

Bitcoin’s price led the crypto markets to a widespread advance on Thursday as miners neared consensus on segwit activation.

bitcoin price
Chart from CoinMarketCap

Four top 10 coins, including bitcoin, rose by at least 10%, causing the total value of all cryptocurrencies to surge past the $90 billion threshold. This represents a nearly 50% increase since July 16, when the total crypto market cap fell to $61 billion.

bitcoin price
Chart from CoinMarketCap

Bitcoin Price Breaks Through “Psychologically-Important” Barrier

Uncertainty about Bitcoin scaling contributed to bitcoin price volatility in recent weeks. Now, the miners appear to be reaching consensus on segwit activation. On July 19, 80% of the hash rate signaled for segwit. The network most likely needs one more major mining pool–which some expect may be Slushpool–to signal to lock-in segwit activation, but consensus appears imminent.

bitcoin price
Bitcoin Price Chart from CoinMarketCap

The bitcoin price responded to this news by rapidly vaulting past the psychologically-important $2,500 barrier. After spending most of Wednesday hovering at ~$2,350, the bitcoin price increased by 11% to its present value of $2,586. This is the highest mark for the bitcoin price in almost two weeks. Thursday’s rally brought the bitcoin market cap to $42.6 billion.

Ethereum Price Rally Stalls

Yesterday, ethereum defied the static market to bring investors a 9% daily gain. On Thursday, however, the ethereum price rally stalled, as the ether token increased just 1% to $229. Nevertheless, this did represent a $37 increase from its Wednesday low. Ethereum now has a market cap of $21.5 billion.

ethereum price
Ethereum Price Chart from CoinMarketCap

The ethereum community is currently dealing with the fallout from yesterday’s $32 million Parity wallet hack. The hacker exploited a flaw in Parity multi-sig wallets, allowing him or her to gain control of the wallet funds. Several Ethereum project development teams–including Swarm City–lost millions of dollars. Normal Parity wallets, as well as all other ethereum wallets, remain unaffected by the breach.

Dash Price Steals the Show

Altcoins generally saw positive movement on Thursday. The Ripple price rose about 1% but was unable to swing its market cap back to $7 billion. The litecoin price rose 3% to $44. The Ethereum Classic price declined by 0.2%, giving it just a $45 million market cap edge on Dash. Seventh-ranked NEM  rose8% to $0.140, while he IOTA price recovered from yesterday’s decline, rising 11% to $0.277. The Monero price rose 9% to just under $40. Stratis rounds out the top 10 with an 11% gain to $4.75.

The day’s best performance, however, goes to 6th-ranked Dash. The Dash price rose to $191 on Thursday after dipping as low as $120 earlier in the week. On Thursday alone, the Dash price rose 16%–a full 5% better than any other top 10 coin.

Dash price
Dash Price Chart from CoinMarketCap

Dash now has a market cap of $1.42 billion, placing it within striking distance of Ethereum Classic. If Dash can continue to outpace Ethereum Classic, it could claim the 5th-place spot within a matter of days.

Bitcoin Increases Market Dominance

bitcoin price
Chart from CoinMarketCap

Bitcoin gobbled up nearly 2% of the total cryptocurrency market capitalization on Thursday, increasing its share to 46.7%. Ethereum’s share fell to 23.9%, and Ripple’s dipped back below 8%. Litecoin’s portion, which had slowly grown to 3% over the past few weeks, has tapered to 2.5%.

Featured image from Shutterstock.