Global crypto market hits $2 trillion, Bitcoin surges again

Photo: IANS


As the global cryptocurrency market hit $2 trillion for the first time in nearly three months, the industry players on Friday said the surge in the market cap indicates a wider acceptance of crypto assets across the globe, including in India.

Bitcoin has crossed the $46,000 mark (more than Rs 34 lakh for a single coin) once again. The most popular cryptocurrency has been trading in the green with a market cap of more than $848 billion, according to CoinMarketCap.

“The world’s oldest cryptocurrency, Bitcoin has witnessed a fantastic rally recently and the latest Ethereum upgrade, also known as London Hard Fork, has boosted the Ether price,” said Shivam Thakral, CEO, BuyUcoin.

The surge followed the significant jump in Bitcoin, Ethereum, and few altcoins over the past week. While Bitcoin jumped 19 per cent to a three-month high of over $46,500 on Wednesday, Ethereum scaled 21 per cent to more than $3,200. Likewise, Binance Coin was up nearly 19 per cent, Cardano around 22 per cent, XRP 32 per cent, etc. At the time of filing this report, the total market cap of all coins on CoinGecko had slipped to $1.9 trillion.

Crypto assets are moving towards becoming mainstream with many brands around the world accepting cryptocurrency as a form of payment.

“The current bull run is expected to continue, and we are highly optimistic that Bitcoin will hit the $100,000 mark by the end of this year,” Thakral said in a statement.

In India, Cryptocurrency exchange WazirX has witnessed a massive 2,648 per cent growth in user signups from tier 2 and 3 cities in the country, observing higher participation from women from smaller towns compared to their urban counterparts.

The cryptocurrency exchange currently has more than 7.3 million users and has clocked over $21.8 billion in trading volume in 2021 till date.

“Crypto has immense potential to remove the financial barriers for rural India, and provide cheaper access to capital, more online jobs,” Nischal Shetty, CEO, WazirX had said.

There are more than 1.5 crore Indians holding over Rs 1,500 crore worth of crypto assets. According to industry experts, crypto may become the most important asset class of the 21st century.