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- Bitcoin hit a fresh all-time high of $8,222 per coin Monday morning, according to data from Markets Insider.
- Bitcoin has been on a tear over the last week as more traditional financial services firms dive into the nascent market for digital coins.
Bitcoin, the red-hot cryptocurrency, continued its upward tear on Monday, hitting an all-time high above $8,200 per coin.
The digital coin was trading up 2.35% at $8,222 at 9:31 a.m. ET, according to data from Markets Insider.
The price of bitcoin has been pushed higher as more traditional financial services players look to dive into the nascent market for digital coins.
Square, the mobile payments firm, is running a trial that allows some users of its Cash app to buy and sell bitcoin. In a note out to clients Monday morning, Credit Suisse, the Switzerland-based bank, said the move might push other firms to jump on the bitcoin bandwagon.
"While we are positive on SQ's strategy, to the extent it confers legitimacy on bitcoin and prompts adoption by other providers (i.e. PayPal) the biggest beneficiary may be the crypto-asset industry," the bank said.
Elsewhere, two Chicago-based exchanges are looking to launch bitcoin futures, a product that would allow investors to bet on the future price of the coin. Some believe it would also help dampen the coin's spine-tingling volatility.
Not everyone, however, is convinced that such a product would be good for the economy.
In an open letter addressed to J. Christopher Giancarlo, the chairman of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, Thomas Peterffy, the chairman of Interactive Brokers, one of the largest derivatives traders and a provider of clearing services for hundreds of brokers, expressed his concerns about CME's plan to launch bitcoin futures this year.
Peterffy said bitcoin's unbridled volatility could have a dangerous impact on other futures products trading on the market.
"If the Chicago Mercantile Exchange or any other clearing organization clears a cryptocurrency together with other products, then a large cryptocurrency price move that destabilizes members that clear cryptocurrencies will destabilize the clearing organization itself and its ability to satisfy its fundamental obligation to pay the winners and collect from the losers on the other products in the same clearing pool," Peterffy wrote.
Bitcoin is up 706% this year, according to data from Markets Insider.
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