Bitcoin Price Breaks $1k as Big Businesses Look to Accept it
Bitcoin’s price is currently over $1,000 dollars on Mt. Gox, the world’s second largest bitcoin exchange, and if this story sounds familiar, it’s because it should.
Btcoin’s price was at over $1000 dollars a little over a month ago in November. Then, after news spread of China’s central bank prohibiting financial institutions from processing or insuring the cryptocurrency, bitcocin’s price plummeted all the way down to $450.
However, bitcoin’s price had recovered somewhat, and was hanging around $800 for the past few weeks. It seems that this resiliency was enough for businesses like Overstock.com and Zynga to decide that they would begin accepting the currency, which has in turn helped to bring bitcoin’s price back up to the thousand dollar club.
Overstocks CEO Patrick Byrne, self-professed “small ‘l’ libertarian, seems to be taking to the decentralized cryptocurrency based on political reasons, telling the Financial Times in an interview that “a healthy monetary system at the end of the day isn’t an upside down pyramid based on the whim of a government official, but is based on something that they can’t control.”
While Zynga could not comment further on the subject, it is directing interested parties to the announcement it made on Reddit, saying, “In response to Bitcoin’s rise in popularity around the world, Zynga, with help from BitPay, is testing expanded payment options for players to make in-game purchases using Bitcoin.”
While last year seemed to be the year everyone learned about bitcoin, it seems 2014 will be the year that everyone begins to use the cryptocurrency. It seems very likely that there will be a lot more stories like this in the near future, with some interesting developments in regulation to follow.