Buying pressure appears to be mounting in Bitcoin markets, according to the so-called 'Coinbase Premium', which measure the difference in BTC’s. Therefore, while Bitcoin has waffled over $49,000 over the last few days, definitive movement over $50,000 could be imminent. At press time, the price of Bitcoin on Coinbase was $47,288.80; this was roughly $60 more than its price on Binance, where the price was $47,228.40.
Coinbase’s price data plays a particularly important role in the short-term movements of Bitcoin because of the large amounts of retail users that use Coinbase.
Therefore, price movements on Coinbase may be a good indicator of what retail investors are doing (or about to do) across the board: when prices on Coinbase are relatively low, the premium moves lower; when prices are higher on Coinbase, retail investors may be looking to buy.
However, the Coinbase Premium has not been consistently strong over the last 24 hours, a sign that traders are watching to see if Bitcoin will fall further or if there is enough momentum to get past $50,000.
A recent report by CoinTelegraph cited a Tweet by CryptoQuant Chief Executive, Ki Young Ju, who said that: “[Bitcoin] breaking 50k looks pretty tough as Coinbase premium becomes -$45.” In other words, the price of Bitcoin was roughly $45 lower on Coinbase than on Binance. CryptoQuant publishes a chart called the 'Coinbase Premium Index', which measures the difference in Bitcoin price between Coinbase Pro and Binance.
At the time, Ki Young Ju wrote that “buying power doesn't come from Coinbase. No more Coinbase premium compared to Binance/Huobi/OKEx. Be careful.”
However, now the tides seem to have turned. But, for how long?
"It's Going to Take a Few Tries."
Some analysts believe that Bitcoin could be over $50K by the end of the day. Anthony Pompliano seemed to anticipate that Bitcoin would go to $50K already on Sunday, February 14th. “Today feels like a good day for Bitcoin to break $50,000,” he wrote.
However, others believe that it may be a little while. Twitter user @Mandrik wrote that investors should “savor the buildup to $50k #Bitcoin - it's going to take a few tries. The release will be epic, and likely trigger the next big wave.”
Either way, BTC’s proximity to $50K seems to have attracted the attention of a number of large-scale investors in the United States and abroad. After Tesla announced a $1.5 billion investment last week, whispers of investments by Apple, Microsoft and other large companies have also appeared in the news.
As such, Finance Magnates reported that Hester Peirce, a Commissioner at the US Securities and Exchange Commission, has declared an urgent need for clear cryptocurrency regulations.
In an interview with Reuters Peirce praised the involvement of a new generation of investors in financial markets. However, she said that it is still too early to draw policy conclusions from the recent WallStreetBets-driven rallies in GameStop Inc (NYSE:GME) and other stocks.
