Bitcoin crosses $30,000 mark as it continues to rally in 2021

The world's largest cryptocurrency advanced almost 50% in December, when it breached $20,000

Bitcoin has topped $30,000 mark for the first time, just weeks after breaching through $20,000 level. Reuters

Bitcoin, the world’s largest cryptocurrency, topped $30,000 for the first time, just weeks after passing another major milestone.

The currency gained almost 6 per cent on Saturday to reach nearly $31,000, before slipping back to about $30,800 as of 1.15pm in London. It advanced almost 50 per cent in December, when it breached $20,000 for the first time.

The latest gains top an eye-popping rally for the controversial digital asset in 2020, which rebounded sharply after a severe crash in March that saw it lose 25 per cent amid the coronavirus pandemic.

Bitcoin has increasingly been “embraced in more global investment portfolios as holders expand beyond tech geeks and speculators”, Bloomberg Intelligence commodity strategist Mike McGlone wrote in a note last month.

Proponents have seized on the narrative that the coin could act as a store of wealth amid supposed rampant central-bank money printing, even as inflation remains mostly muted.

Bitcoin should eventually climb to about about $400,000, Scott Minerd, chief investment officer of Guggenheim Investments, told Bloomberg Television in a December 16 interview.