Bitcoin Touches $48,800 As Spot ETFs Start Trading — $50,000 BTC Soon?

Bitcoin neared the $49,000 mark Thursday after the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission approved spot bitcoin exchange-traded funds (ETFs), a landmark decision for the crypto space that could dramatically widen the investor base for the alpha cryptocurrency.

Bitcoin soared to as high as $48,844, up from just below $46,000 before the approval news emerged on Wednesday afternoon. 

Bitcoin Pops 9% As Ether Hits $2.6K

Bitcoin is up roughly 8.9% today in the wake of U.S. regulators’ approval of the first spot Bitcoin ETFs.

The groundbreaking vehicles were finally given the green light on Wednesday, a decade after they were first proposed. They commenced trading on Thursday.

In a statement following Wednesday’s action, SEC Commissioner Hester Peirce (aka “Crypto Mom”) said that the Wall Street regulator had “squandered a decade of opportunities to do our job,” only begrudgingly continuing with the approval process after a “court called our bluff.”

The SEC’s decision to finally approve spot Bitcoin ETFs came after a judge in August ordered the agency to reevaluate Grayscale’s bid to transform its GBTC fund into a true ETF. The judge ruled that failing to give a coherent explanation for the denials was “unlawful.”

Bitcoin’s positive sentiment extended to other cryptocurrencies as well.

Ether, the industry’s second-largest cryptocurrency, has jumped by 11.4% in the past day, trading hands for $2,655.39 as investors bet on the likelihood of the possible proposal of an ether exchange-traded fund following the Bitcoin ETF approval in the United States. Notably, traditional finance titans BlackRock and Fidelity have previously filed S-1 forms with the SEC for their spot ether ETFs. 

Solana (SOL) is up 12.3% in 24 hours and is priced at $104.95. Ripple’s XRP is also doing well, surging by around 9.9% in the past day. The sixth largest cryptocurrency by market cap is currently valued at 61 cents per coin.

Looking ahead to the next milestone, crypto services platform Matrixport predicts BTC will explode to $50,000 before the end of January.