Despite a stack of obituaries, Bitcoin is now selling for over $390, the highest price the cryptocurrency has seen in a full year.
Six years into Bitcoin’s lifespan, the technology is notorious for volatility and what the Economist calls an “unfair” reputation of association with drug trafficking and overzealous supporters. In 2013, after U.S. law enforcement shut down the Silk Road black market and put Bitcoin into the world media’s spotlight, the currency’s value rapidly shot up to over $1,100 per bitcoin, only to take a series of wounding falls down to below $200. It was a sobering global introduction.
Today, Bitcoin’s era of violent swings seems to have passed. After all the turbulence Bitcoin has been through, how did this rise happen?
China China is such a powerful driver for the Bitcoin economy that the Chinese yuan now is trading in
88 percent of all Bitcoin transactions, compared to just 9 percent of transactions using the U.S. dollar.
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