The Bitcoin network crossed another milestone earlier today. Thanks to the strong bitcoin trading in the past few weeks, the value of the digital currency has almost reached $600 mark. Simultaneously, keeping up with the increasing bitcoin price, the total market capitalization of the digital currency today crossed $9 billion.

Even though the increase in market capitalization beyond $9 billion was short-lived, it is a milestone to be celebrated nevertheless. The digital currency hit the landmark number when its price crossed $576.50 to reach a maximum of $590.13 resulting in a maximum market capitalization of around $9.217 billion. Since then the wave of price surge has declined to reach $569.3 (at the time of writing) at a market capitalization of under $9 billion.

Bitcoin has been going strong since the past two weeks, where the value of digital currency increased from a stable price of around $450 to reach $569 with brief price hikes extending beyond the final value in between. The increased demand for bitcoin has been attributed to the activity in the Chinese market, where people are said to be investing in digital currency due to lack of other options. As the value of Chinese yuan declines, people are looking for investment options to prevent their earnings from losing value. Strict capital controls implemented by the government has prevented them in putting their money into other international investment vehicles.

In addition, people are more actively investing in the digital currency expecting its value to further increase next month as the Bitcoin network goes through halving. The halving will result in miner rewards for block discovery reduced by 50 percent, which will also mean that the rate of generation of new Bitcoin crypto tokens reduces effectively, which combined with constantly increasing usage will create more demand resulting in an increase in value. Making it more interesting is the favorable regulatory environment, as countries take a wait and watch approach towards the digital currency revolution, lest they hamper innovation by introducing strict regulatory measures.

Market capitalization to exceed $10 billion by the end of this year

At the current rate, we can expect Bitcoin to only strengthen its position in the cryptocurrency ecosystem with the market capitalization further increasing to reach the $10 billion mark. At the current rate, if there is no significant surge in price, we can expect bitcoin to break the $10 billion market capitalization by the end of this year at the price of $625 per bitcoin. However, it can come sooner if the price continues to exhibit a positive upward trend.

Ref: CoinMarketCap.com | Image: CoinMarketCap