Bitcoin values skyrocket alongside new transmission statistics. Commentators joke- but could the outbreak actually be good for investors?
So, first of all, let’s just all take a minute to point out -definitively- that the novel coronavirus is in fact, not great for anything. It’s a horrible virus that’s making decent people ill, and to a degree killing them. It’s damaging. It’s heartbreaking. It deserves our respect and attention.
However, with that being said, so far the last few months have been a wild ride for the people of planet earth. With countries constantly feuding, to the point where nuclear war has been threatened, Australia pretty much burning to the ground, Britain leaving the political union that it helped to establish- roughly zero percent of the world is making sense. So why not just pop an epidemic that is worse than SARS and Ebola combined, on top of it all and see how we do.
The chaos that has ensued globally within the last year is a bit staggering. Throwing even the most rational people into nothing short of panic. While we as humans may not be showing our best and brightest colors during this time- bitcoin has actually been flourishing. Bringing new bitcoin traders to the table that are looking for help navigating the financial landscape with the help of platforms like https://bitvavo.com/en/, and seasoned investors desperately seeking a reason behind the coin’s volatility.
While some are quick to pin the coins current success on these tragedies and political instabilities, others are happy to attribute the bullish swing to the inherent volatility that bitcoin has always displayed. Here’s what we know:
What We Know
On Sunday, the 9th of February, Bitcoin once again hit over $10,000. A mark that hadn’t been seen since the coin fell off it’s last run with the bulls in October of 2019. While this isn’t exactly cold hard evidence that the novel Coronavirus- a new brand of a virus similar to that of SARS that is currently trying its hardest to turn into a full-blown pandemic, is actually the main driver of the price pumps, some people still speculate the two incidences are linked.
Bearing in mind that the coin has seen similar break always in both May and March of 2018. Following the massive boom and bust that caught more people’s attention than coronavirus itself in 2017, where the coins value topped out at nearly 20 grand. While it’s fairly easy to take snapshots of the coin’s upward value and place it against whatever new sign of the apocalypse is urgently afoot, there has yet to be any scientific or reliable indicators that bitcoin is fueled by global crises.
Perhaps this is because bitcoin has been exceptionally volatile since the world began to embrace it as the cryptocurrency of choice in 2015. With value’s skyrocketing over the moon and plummeting into the grave in not so regular intervals. Moreover, the global chaos-o-meter has been doing roughly the same. Far-right governments are slowly tightening their grasps, pointless violence continues to flourish, our planet is dying- and hey, so are we. From this perspective, it all seems to be swings and roundabouts that are bound to sync up now and again. Right? Well, maybe.
What People Are Saying
People have been touting bitcoin as the “bail-out” and safe-haven currency of the new millennia for years. As a matter of fact, the coin was released in the wake of one of the biggest global financial crises that the world has ever seen. The paper that Bitcoin inventor, Satoshi Nakamoto released even seemed to cryptically allude that bitcoin was created directly in response to this particular disaster.
With this possibly ominous sentiment in place, bitcoin prices have surly surged in response to reduced faith in fiat systems. The coin again saw a bump as the US-China trade war became heated. But does that really give credence to the warning that meme culture is desperately trying to get us to realize? Are global financial downturns really good for bitcoin?
While it makes sense that bitcoin would be a great safe haven fund for many: It’s largely anonymous, just about anyone can purchase it, it’s decentralized, and it really is available just about anywhere in the world.
The global currency easily circumnavigates banks and other high profile institutions. Depending on the laws in your home country, the coin has yet to be under huge amounts of government pressure and legislation. It’s also relatively easy to convert into fiat and isn’t really subject to exchange rates in the same way other official currencies are. So it makes sense that if you’re in need of a bug-out currency, bitcoin’s it.