Several central banks have resorted to unprecedented monetary expansion and aggressive rate cuts to support their respective economies badgered by the coronavirus pandemic. Record liquidity has resulted in sharp rallies in the S&P 500, gold, and Bitcoin (BTC), which suggests that investors are plowing money into assets of their choice. While gold is way below its all-time high set in August, both the S&P 500 and Bitcoin are near their all-time high. The last five trading days of the year and the first two of the next year have historically been bullish for the S&P 500, dubbed as the "Santa …

The current crypto bull run has been spearheaded by Bitcoin (BTC). As the United States Securities and Exchange Commission has previously hinted that Bitcoin is not a security, the regulator’s current lawsuit against Ripple is unlikely to stop the institutional inflow of money into Bitcoin. However, a few altcoins that may be at risk of facing a similar fate as Ripple could face selling pressure. Due to a change in sentiment, retail investors may sell some of their altcoin holdings and shift to Bitcoin. Even retail investors who plan to spend their stimulus checks for buying crypto-assets may prefer Bitcoin …

MicroStrategy CEO Michael Saylor recently tweeted that he purchased another 29,646 Bitcoin (BTC) at an average price of $29,646. With this purchase, the company has deployed the $650 million raised through a recent convertible debt offering. The business intelligence firm now holds 70,470 Bitcoin and that makes it the fifth-largest individual holder of Bitcoin. The current Bitcoin bull run has largely been driven by institutional investors. Analysts at JPMorgan Chase believe that in order for the uptrend to continue, fresh institutional money needs to keep trickling in as it has done in the past few weeks, or Bitcoin could witness …

Christopher Wood, the global head of equity strategy at Jefferies, has dumped five percent of their physical gold position in order to buy Bitcoin (BTC). This move shows that a growing number of institutional investors consider Bitcoin to be at par or a better store of value than gold. Wood also said that if Bitcoin were to have a big correction, he would buy more. The fact that institutional investors are content purchasing in the $16,000 to $20,000 range suggests that institutional investors are not worried about a pullback as they view it as an opportunity to accumulate for the …

The Stellar Development Foundation has invested Settle Network, the largest digital assets settlement network in the Latin American region. It marks the fourth investment this year from the SDF enterprise fund, bringing the total to more than $9.2 million in 2020. The fund is a venture-style trust for growing the Stellar network and developing partnerships for cross-border payments. It has previously invested in Abra and SatoshiPay. The investment of around $3 million will be paid in lumens (XLM) and help bolster Settle’s current suite of payment tools which include fiat to crypto onramps, payment processing, and merchant gateways. The platform …

Crypto traders and investors received an early Christmas gift today as Bitcoin (BTC) price cleared the $20,000 psychological milestone for the first time in history. Today's breakout is equally significant as it serves to heal the scars of the traders who may have bought right at the top in 2017 and held their positions until now. The current uptrend in Bitcoin has been all about institutional adoption. The latest institutional investor to have announced a position in Bitcoin is the United Kingdom-based investment manager Ruffer Investment Company Limited. As has been the case with most institutional purchases this year, Ruffer …

Strategists at JPMorgan said in a note that MassMutual’s $100 million Bitcoin (BTC) purchase shows that insurance firms and pension funds are now adopting Bitcoin. According to the analysts, typically this class of institutional investors is conservative in their style of investing so the recent allocation is quite significant. However, the strategists said that even if the pension funds and the insurance companies in the U.S., Japan, the U.K., and the Euro area keep 1% of their assets in Bitcoin, that could amount to an additional inflow of about $600 billion into Bitcoin. These investments by institutions may have increased …

Bitcoin (BTC) price has been gradually giving up ground for the past few days and that has a few investors afraid that a sharp correction or a bear market similar to the one in 2018 could occur again. However, there are major differences between the previous bull market and the current one. The most notable difference is the arrival of institutional investors. The latest institution to have taken a position in Bitcoin is Massachusetts-based insurance firm MassMutual, which recently purchased 5,470 BTC for roughly $100 million. To date, a variety of institutional players ranging from hedge fund managers to publicly …

Germany’s Bankhaus von der Heydt, or BVDH, has launched a Euro stablecoin on the Stellar network. The bank claims the token is the first of its kind to be issued by a banking institute.The EURB stablecoin, which went live today, was developed on the Stellar blockchain in partnership with tokenization and digital asset custody technology provider Bitbond. The asset, which is fully regulated and backed one-for-one with Euros, will not be openly traded on exchanges due to tight regulatory and Know Your Customer requirements. If a customer wants to acquire the stablecoin, a fiat currency transfer is held in an …

In a recent Reddit “Ask Me Anything” session, billionaire Ray Dalio warned investors that the current astronomical pace of money printing is unlikely to stop in the near future and holding wealth in cash could lead to losses. Dalio said that Bitcoin (BTC) “could serve as a diversifier to gold and other such storehold of wealth assets.” A new report from CoinShares shows that the transition from gold to crypto products may have already started. The report highlights outflows of $9.2 billion from gold investment products and inflows of $1.4 billion into crypto products during the same period. Interestingly, along …

The price of several big-name alternative cryptocurrencies fell especially hard following a Bitcoin pullback to $17,650 on Dec. 9. Namely, XRP and top decentralized finance (DeFi) tokens YFI and AAVE dropped by as much as 10% to 20% in the past 18 hours, with Bitcoin (BTC) losing up to 7%. The two main reasons behind the short-term correction of altcoins are likely the current high level of uncertainty among traders and low overall volume. Bitcoin price at a crossroads: Bad news for alts Altcoins often reflect the price trend of Bitcoin, with steeper price movements to both the upside and …

Recent news reports suggest that U.S. lawmakers may announce a new round of economic stimulus worth about $908 billion before the end of today. This second package, if announced, will add to the existing debt pile and may send the U.S. dollar index (DXY) lower. The index is already trading near its lowest level since April 2018. The slow economic recovery, expansionary monetary policy, overvalued stocks and negative bond yields are some of the reasons that have forced investors to search for alternative assets to safeguard their portfolios. Gold has been one of the favorite safe-haven assets of investors for …