After two days of losses, bitcoin ended Thursday in the green after markets closed in the U.S.
The gains came amid new signs of growing mainstream adoption of bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies.
State Street, the second-oldest bank in the U.S. with $3.1 trillion in assets under management, announced it is providing the infrastructure for a new bank-grade trading platform for digital assets set to go live mid-year – and that it might eventually use the system itself.
Also, BNY Mellon, the world’s largest financial custodian, would be the service provider for a proposed bitcoin exchange-traded fund (ETF) offered by First Trust Advisors and Anthony Scaramucci’s SkyBridge Capital.
But spot trading volume has not been able to match the rising prices, continuing to drop Thursday on the eight U.S.-focused crypto exchanges tracked by CoinDesk.
Trading volume has been low for bitcoin since the beginning of April, while in March, according to CryptoCompare’s monthly report, the volume on top spot exchanges increased 5.9% from February levels to $2.5 trillion.
While ether’s been trading mostly above $2,000 since it peaked above $2,100 in early April, an analyst argued ether’s latest bull run was supported by a more scant demand from buyers compared with bitcoin.
Philip Gradwell, chief economist at Chainalysis, said on CoinDesk TV’s “First Mover” show that “relatively little” ether was bought at prices above $1,850 and even less was bought at $2,000 or above.
“The persistence of a small, but very bullish, cohort of ether buyers supports my concern that the highest ether prices tend to have a narrow base of support, at least compared to bitcoin,” Gradwell wrote in his weekly newsletter.
Other digital assets on the CoinDesk 20 are mostly higher Thursday. Notable winners as of 20:00 UTC (4:00 p.m. ET):
