Markets
11/12/2017

Bitcoin Nearing $17k As The Cryptocurrency Makes Futures Trading Debut




After bitcoin made its debut inn futures trading on the Chicago Board Options Exchange during the weekend, the cryptocurrency continued its happy journey on Monday and gained about 25 percent in value even as trading had to be stopped at least twice.
 
It is believed that the cryptocurrency has taken its first step towards being included in mainstream currencies and would attract large institutional and corporate investors after its futures launch even and because of the fact that the currency has had a meteoric rise from a value of about $1000 at the beginning of 2017 to reach well over the $16,000 value.
 
Even as several financial institutions and experts have identified bitcoin to be just a huge bubble that is very volatile and is likely to burst at any time, the cryptocurrency is also all set to be launched a futures trading element on the Chicago Mercantile Exchange from starting next week.
 
The CBOE implements a system of circuit breakers to address the issue of high volatility which caused halting of trading in bitcoin on several occasions during the opening hours. And volatility is one issue that has made bitcoin notorious right from the time it was created.
 
The increased traffic related to beginning of bitcoin trading had caused the CBOE website to run slower compared to what it normally does, the exchange said early on Monday.
 
There can be further loosening of bitcoin value and there can also be rise in the value of the cryptocurrency due to the circuit breakers used by exchanges, said Think Markets analyst Naeem Aslam.
 
“One thing which exchanges, and traders do need to keep in mind is that the current circuit breaker limit is too tight,” Aslam said.
 
“This is designed to protect investor and parties involved in this. Bitcoin has a personality which is based on higher volatility, so we would expect the CBOE to adopt and change this as time goes by.”
 
Warnings that the bitcoin bubble would soon pop are seemingly being ignored by investors, asserted FXTM chief market strategist Hussein Sayed.
 
“So far, it seems professional investors aren’t willing to bet against the bitcoin, despite the many warnings of a bubble that will burst soon,” he said.
 
“Many traders aren’t even interested in the price direction, but the listing of the futures contract on CBOE and later next week on the CME, will provide them an arbitrage trading opportunity due to the vast pricing differences.”
 
The ascent of bitcoin could continue relentlessly because there was “no way to short the bitcoin ‘bubble’” properly, said Nassim Nicholas Taleb, the academic and hedge fund manager, on Twitter.
 
“Futures that don’t have deliverables require a very, very deep market. Otherwise someone long in the future can push prices higher at settlement time with impunity,” he said, adding that it "one can't rule out 100K".
 
(Source:www.digitallook.com)

Christopher J. Mitchell
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