The cryptocurrency broke through $7,000 around 6:00 a.m. EST, and then reached $7,355.15 at approximately 07:15 a.m. EST, according to the CoinDesk Bitcoin Price Index (BPI).
At the time of report, the digital currency had pulled back slightly, trading at roughly $7,015, additional BPI figures show.
[Ed note: Investing in cryptocoins or tokens is highly speculative and the market is largely unregulated. Anyone considering it should be prepared to lose their entire investment.]
Bitcoin has managed to surpass several milestones lately, breaking through $5,000, $6,000 and $7,000 all within the last 30 days.
The digital currency's market cap recently surpassed $100 billion, a significant figure that helped provide Bitcoin with greater legitimacy.
Futures Announcement
More recently, Bitcoin's price enjoyed tailwinds after exchange operator CME Group announced plans to offer Bitcoin futures later this year.Several market analysts lauded the move, emphasizing that it will provide valuable hedging opportunities and potentially new investors for the broader digital currency space.
The creation of futures will make it easier for new market participants to get involved, said cryptocurrency fund managed Jacob Eliosoff.
These derivatives will provide new trading opportunities, as they will increase the number of trades that can be made using the same amount of Bitcoin, emphasized Tim Enneking, managing director of Crypto Asset Management.
By providing a means of hedging, CME Group could make it easier for Bitcoin exchange-traded funds to obtain approval from the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.
Hard Fork Anticipation
Another major development that some analysts have cited as pushing Bitcoin's price higher is anticipation of the pending hard fork, which is scheduled to take place later this month.When the Bitcoin network implements this change, it could split the currency's blockchain in two, resulting in one chain that is based on the new Segwit 2x rules and a separate chain that uses Bitcoin's more traditional protocol.
By holding Bitcoin ahead of this event, investors could potentially receive "free money" should the digital currency's blockchain split, creating two separate tokens.
"Momentum is driving bitcoin higher as the good news keeps coming," said Charles Hayter, co-founder and CEO of levered digital currency exchange CryptoCompare. "The fork situation followed by the CME announcement have ratified bitcoin status," he added.
Further, institutional money could pour into the space, a development that has been pushing Bitcoin prices higher, said Hayter.
