Bitcoin surges $400 in minutes, rising above $10,000

The price of Bitcoin has jumped $400 in 30 minutes, rising from $9,850 to its current price of $10,152.

After breaking the $10,000 mark for the first time in six months, the price of Bitcoin shortly fell back below the mark. However, it now appears to have confidently broken through the psychological price point.

The sudden upswing in price has led to a disparity of prices across the various crypto exchanges. While a few exchanges still show the price below $10,000, others—such as BitMart—show its price as high as $10,300.

"We've been in a raging bull market since the start of the year. This last swing is yet another clear testament to the strong momentum," Mati Greenspan, founder of Quantum Economics, told Decrypt.

Bitcoin breaks 500 million transaction milestone

The Bitcoin network has now processed 500 million transactions since it first went live on January 3, 2009. According to data site Satoshi—named after the pseudonymous inventor of Bitcoin—there have now been 500.0165 million transactions on the Bitcoin blockchain. The Bitcoin network had only seen 250 million transactions by 2017. Image: Satoshi. Satoshi, which only started tracking the number of transactions from late 2017, shows that there has been an increase in the number of transactions on...

Gavin Smith, CEO of Panxora, took a different approach. He argued that the Bitcoin halving drove the sudden rally.

"BTC started rising during the market sell off triggered by coronavirus. That was just the short term catalyst," he said, adding, "The underlying driver is the bitcoin halving event in May. Previous halving events have seen some of the larger participants hold off on releasing BTC into the market in anticipation of a rise into the event. We believe this same dynamic is currently in play."

The last couple of months have seen Bitcoin's price break out of a downward trend, into a new upward trend. The price of Bitcoin has risen 50% since its lowest point in the last three months, up from $6,600. Other cryptocurrencies have joined the trend, with Ethereum rising up from $130 to its current price point of $230.

However, altcoins have outperformed Bitcoin in the last few weeks, causing Bitcoin's dominance—its share of the entire market—to fall from 69% to 63%. But it's still leading the market.