Despite the sharp fall this week, Bitcoin price has jumped nearly 14 times this year, leading to some regulators caution the public dealing with the cryptocurrency.

Volatility in Bitcoin prices continued on Friday, with the value of the cryptocurrency or digital currency falling below $13,000 at day's low on Bitstamp, a cryptocurrency exchange based in Luxembourg. Bitcoin prices have swung wildly this week. From a record high of $19,666, hit on Sunday, bitcoin prices fell over 33 percent or lost one-third of its value, to hit $12,793 at day's low. Despite the sharp fall this week, Bitcoin's price has jumped nearly 13 times this year, leading to some regulators caution the public dealing with the cryptocurrency. At 12:15 am, Bitcoin was trading at $13,811 on Bitstamp, down around 18 percent.

Here are five things to know about Bitcoin vs dollar:
1. The bitcoin's rapid gains this year - its price has soared about 19 times when it hit a record high above $19,000 - have spurred caution and alarm among some policymakers.

2. Indian markets regulator Sebi (Securities and Exchange Board of India) will come down heavily on illicit 'initial coin offers' seeking public investments with promise of high returns from bitcoins and other virtual currencies, amid a mushrooming of such schemes in the absence of any regulatory regime, according to news agency Press Trust of India. Bitcoin or any such cryptocurrency, is not an approved product by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) or any other agency.

3. The Income Tax Department is set to issue notices to 4 lakh to 5 lakh high net worth individuals across the country who trade on the exchanges of bitcoins, Press Trust of India had reported earlier. The department, the news agency said citing official sources, found that out of the estimated 20 lakh entities registered on these exchanges, about 4 to 5 lakh were "operational" and indulging in transactions and investments.


4. Bitcoin's journey this year has been anything but volatile this year. Bitcoin hit a record high of $19,666 on Sunday, when the exchange giant CME Group launched bitcoin futures, one week after its rival Cboe Global Markets listed the world's first bitcoin futures. In November, it tumbled almost 30 per cent in four days from $7,888 to $5,555. In September, it fell 40 per cent from $4,979 to $2,972.

5. Singapore's central bank this week issued a warning against investment in cryptocurrencies, saying it considers the recent surge in their prices to be driven by speculation and that the risk of a sharp fall in prices is high. South Korea's Financial Supervisory Service said on Tuesday it does not consider bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies to be currencies of any kind. Japanese Finance Minister Taro Aso said on Tuesday that bitcoin had not been proven as a credible currency.

No, The 1mb block size is the limit on how many transactions can fit in a block and this has nothing to do with fees.

No, there is no maximum fee rate. The fee rate is market-based. The block size limit means that standard transactions are limited to 1,000,000 bytes and Segwit transactions are limited to 4,000,000 bytes.

Satoshi/byte = the fee rate you are paying based on that limit. 1 Satoshi = 0.00000001 BTC. Median transaction size is 226 bytes. You can do the math.

Looking at the dump which is going on for last couple of days do you guys think it's the beginning of the end for bitcoin or its just one more dump and pump time for bitcoin which we have witnessed in the past ? Kindly respond with your valuable feedback considering the rise of altcoins and ICO , bitcoin being under the eyes of regulators , some rumours that most of EU will ban bitcoin starting with France.

When Prashant Sharma and Niti Shree were planning to marry, they decided to ask for something unusual as a wedding present - the cryptocurrency, Bitcoin.

The couple, who live in the south Indian city of Bangalore, are founders of a digital start-up and many of their friends also work for technology companies.

"So we thought of merging technology with gifting for the future," said Mr Sharma. "We explained it to our parents and they were very receptive."

The wedding took place on 9 December, just four days after India's central bank issued its third warning cautioning investors against buying Bitcoins.

But that didn't seem to discourage their friends and family.

market capitalization : $46,530,492,935 USD / 2,728,836 BTC
price : $2,759.02 USD (26.69%) / 0.16180600 BTC (39.81%)

Now, with Bitcoin futures trading on both the CBOE and the CME, Bitcoin has become available to the larger players with big pockets, which includes short sellers. It will be interesting to see what will happen with the cryptocurrency when the first bear attack.

The uptrend and the momentum remain intact as long as the virtual currency trades above the trendline. Our upside target for the cryptocurrency stands at $24,291.58.  

However, if the trendline support breaks, Bitcoin will become weak. It will become bearish and indicate a larger fall once it falls below $15,200 levels. What is the downside target?

Once the 20-day EMA breaks, the digital currency can fall to the 50-day SMA, which is currently at about $10,333 levels. Therefore, traders should trade with a stop-loss.

Bitcoin has a serious problem which only becomes more apparent over time. Spending a lot of money as a transaction fee is never a fun experience.

With bitcoin continuing to rise in value, executives at the Deutsche Bank are in agreement when they claim that the digital currency isn’t going anywhere anytime soon.

Speaking at a global market outlook breakfast in Manhattan on Tuesday, Peter Hooper, an economist at Germany’s largest bank, the Deutsche Bank, said to Bloomberg that the digital currency was here to stay, adding:

The whole idea has a potential future, but it could be better designed. Ultimately, we are going to have to find a way to accommodate and regulate to avoid the problems.

INCREASED NETWORK TRAFFIC

The Bitcoin and Ethereum networks are currently experiencing record high traffic, resulting in higher miners fees and longer confirmation times for transactions.

The main problem of BTC transations is the unpredicteble time to receive the payments. Will Bitcoin in the future have faster transations? And what about the fees? Will the fees decrease on the future? What solutions are being developed? What will be the future of Bitcoin about these questions?