A new era seems to be beginning for the cryptocurrency industry that is becoming popular after a year of skyrocketing cryptocurrencies, most notably the largest of them, bitcoin. The bitcoin price jump, which reached unprecedented levels of $65.000 a few days ago to fall to around $63.000 in two days, reflects the growing interest of investors and the growing activity in the industry. It is accompanied by frequent announcements of large investment banks and companies that are increasingly accepting cryptocurrencies in their transactions.
It has inevitably intensified the concerns of central banks, many of which are designing their own digital currencies. The prospect of regulation in the industry brings with it a variety of possibilities, including even a possible market split.
The catalyst for the developments may be the introduction of the largest cryptocurrency exchange, Coinbase, which was introduced to the New York market last week on the Nasdaq high-tech index. In fact, it immediately approached the $100 billion target it had set for its market value, even if it retreated to the next meeting with its market value being at around $84 billion.
The cryptocurrency industry is confident that the listing of Coinbase will accelerate developments in two directions, both in terms of further market development and enforcement.
It is indicative that the results of the public consultation on the digital euro published by the ECB during the week show that 43% of Europeans want the digital euro primarily for its secrecy and secondarily for its security and usability for payments throughout the Eurozone.
In theory, industry regulation could be beneficial in fully legitimising and allowing a large market, such as Wall Street to invest in cryptocurrencies. Equally visible, however, is the prospect that the regulations will abolish the technology innovation on which the cryptocurrency market is based.
