Price and capitalization of bitcoin

Main article: Bitcoin

2024: Bitcoin market capitalization is 8.4% of gold capitalization

Main article: Investment in gold

The market capitalization of Bitcoin by the end of May 2024 is 8.4% of the market capitalization of gold.

• Bitcoin is valued at $1.4 trillion.
• Gold is valued at $16 trillion.

Unlike gold, bitcoin has a fixed reserve: 94% of 21 million coins have already been mined (19.7 million in circulation).

Gold supply continues to grow and is projected to reach 250,000 tonnes by 2030.

2022: Bitcoin accounts for 44% of the total value of cryptocurrencies

In May 2022, Bitcoin regains its dominance in the cryptocurrency universe. According to CoinGecko, at the end of May 2022, it accounts for 44% of the total market value of cryptocurrencies, the largest since October 2021, shortly before the peak of the last bull market.

Bitcoin's renewed hegemony is a reflection of how TerraUSD's collapse has devastated smaller tokens such as Avalanche and Solana.

2021

In May 2021, the price of Bitcoin collapsed to $33 thousand dollars

As of April 1, 2021, bitcoin is worth almost like all silver in the world.

2020: Bitcoin has risen in price 4 times and took 73.7% of the cryptocurrency capitalization from the top 30

The market capitalization of the 30 largest cryptocurrencies in 2020 increased by 308% and reached $552 billion, while in 2019 the positive dynamics was significantly lower (+ 62%). This is evidenced by CoinGecko data.

Bitcoin showed the best results in the five largest coins, which in 2020 went up by about four times (in 2019 - by 95%). Ethereum looked even better, the price of which increased by 472% after near-zero dynamics over the previous 365 days.

Bitcoin's share in the total market capitalization of the 30 largest cryptocurrencies in 2020 reached 73.7%, an increase of 0.9 percentage points compared to the previous year. A similar indicator of "ether" rose by 3.6 percentage points, to 11.5%.

Market capitalization/spot trading indicators TOP-30 cryptocurrencies (data for January-December 2020)

During the growth of bitcoin by the end of 2020, to levels above $29,000, its capitalization became almost equivalent to the value of the company, Facebook amounting to 5.6% of the estimate of all gold mined. In 2020, Bitcoin looked noticeably better than indicators of traditional assets. In comparison with the leader Nasdaq Composite , the growth was seven times higher - 303% versus 43%.

Analysts suggest that the growth in the value of bitcoin in November 2020 was associated with the flow of investments from gold

Tether's largest stablecoin (USDT) also increased market share - from 2.4% to 2.9%, while the share of other digital coins from the top 8 decreased. The market was largely influenced by the debut of Polkadot (DOT), which accounted for about 1.2% of the total capitalization.

TOP-30 of leading cryptocurrencies (data for January-December 2020)

According to a CoinGecko study, a rapid increase in stablecoins was recorded in 2020. Thus, the cost of USDT increased by 388%, USDC - by 652%, DAI - by 2698% and BUSD - by 397%. The total capitalization of the listed tokens, as well as PAX in 2020, increased by 439% - from $4.7 billion to $27 billion.

The volume of the DeFi token segment in September 2020 reached 4.6% of the total capitalization of the cryptocurrency market. By the end of the year, the ratio had dropped to 2.5% amid the rise of other coins.^[1]

2019: Bitcoin volume in circulation by $213 billion

The gold supply as of August 2019 is $8.7 trillion, the US dollar supply is $1.7 trillion.

Bitcoin market capitalization by year:

• 2010: $1.4 million
• 2011: $33m
• 2012: $143m
• 2013: $9.4 billion
• 2014: $4.3bn
• 2015: $6.4 billion
• 2016: $15.3 billion
• 2017: $213.9 billion
• 2018: $66.9 billion
• 2019: $130bn
• 2020: $141.8 billion (as of 05.03.2020)

2013: Rate growth 7-fold in 2 months thanks to shenanigans

In January 2018, the Journal of Monetary Economics published an article on artificial manipulations on the stock exchange, as a result of which in 2013 the exchange rate cryptocurrencies bitcoin increased sevenfold in two months.

Researchers Neil Gandal, JT Hamrick, Tyler Moore and Tali Oberman analyzed the impact of suspicious activity on the Mt cryptocurrency exchange. Got, which filed for bankruptcy in 2014. According to them, it was the transactions on this site that led to a sharp increase in the cryptocurrency exchange rate.

The article analyzed the impact of suspicious trading activities on the Mt exchange. Got, which acquired about 600,000 bitcoins (BTC) worth $188 million, the researchers write. - During the specified period, during the suspicious trading activity, the USD-BTC rate rose on average by 4% per day, and during the lull it slightly decreased. Based on a thorough analysis, we concluded that suspicious trading activity probably caused an unprecedented surge in the bitcoin exchange rate at the end of 2013, when the rate jumped from $150 to more than $1000 in two months.

The reason for the 7-fold take-off of Bitcoin was fraud

Basically, the transactions were carried out with the help of two Markus and Willy bots, which created the appearance of real transactions in the market. However, according to the researchers, the bots did not have bitcoins that they traded. During a hacker attack on Mt. Gox these bots carried out fake deals worth millions of bitcoins, manipulating the price of BTC. At the same time, the study says that the Willy bot could also be used to disguise an earlier hacker attack on Mt. Gox. According to one version, in 2011, hackers stole from Mt. Gox about 650 thousand bitcoins.

The high activity of fraudsters on the exchange stimulated users to trade in bitcoins, so the average volume of transactions on all exchanges trading bitcoins was much higher on the days of bot activity. Crypto exchange Mt Gox did not show concern due to suspicious transactions, as they made a profit from them thanks to transaction fees.

It is noted that the attackers managed to influence the course due to low demand and a small number of participants in the market. Mt. Gox was one of the largest trading platforms: about 70% of all bitcoin transactions passed through the exchange. In early 2014, Mt. Gox went bankrupt and ceased operations. Total Investor Losses Mt. Gox is estimated at 850 thousand bitcoins.

The essence of the study is simple: if bitcoin wants to be taken seriously, it needs to end the fraud on the stock exchange. Of course, large players could significantly influence the limited bitcoin market in 2013. Moreover, the big players can still influence it, according to the researchers. But as the market grows, so does the number of investors. Decentralization of the industry, in turn, must independently regulate the market.

With many investing in cryptocurrency assets and some countries taking steps to legalize bitcoin as a payment system (as Japan did in April 2017), manipulation of cryptocurrency markets is becoming a major problem, the researchers note.

In January 2018, the cryptocurrency market is experiencing a decline. So, on January 17, the cost of bitcoin more than halved compared to the records of a month ago. In December, the bitcoin exchange rate reached $20,000 , and the total capitalization of this cryptocurrency exceeded $330 billion. ^[2]]