Cryptocurrencies Rise Amid Reports of New Futures; Libra Back in Focus
Investing.com - Cryptocurrency prices rose on Monday in Asia following reports that Bakkt, a subsidiary of the Intercontinental Exchange, was given the green light from the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission to launch Bitcoin futures next month.
Bakkt said it planned to launch Bitcoin futures on Sept. 23. The potential of the futures was cited as one of the main drivers of crypto’s rally this year.
Bitcoin rose 2.7% to $10,401.8 by 12:01 AM ET (04:01 GMT). Despite the gains today, the world’s largest digital asset plunged about 15% last week, recording the biggest five-day slide since November.
“People thought at certain points in the last year or so that cryptocurrencies would become the flight to safety trade,” said Matt Maley, an equity strategist at Miller Tabak, in a Bloomberg report.
“The cryptocurrency is losing some of that luster of being considered a safe asset.”
Ethereum jumped 6.3%, while XRP and Litecoin also surged 8.5% and 6.2% respectively.
Facebook’s proposed coin, Libra, made headlines today as a group of six American lawmakers are reportedly set to discuss the cryptocurrency in a visit to Switzerland in the coming days.
The group will hold a meeting with the Swiss Federal Data Protection and Information Commissioner Adrian Lobsiger. It will be led by Maxine Waters, chairwoman of the House Financial Services Committee.
Waters has previously said Facebook (NASDAQ:FB) would “wield immense power that could disrupt” governments and central banks and compared the social media giant to Equifax (NYSE:EFX), a scandal-ridden company that caused harm to its consumers.
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