If you ever owned a few Bitcoin and sold them any other time but now, you're probably kicking yourself. What began 2017 as a cautious $1,000 valuation has now almost reached 10 times that in just the last 11 months alone. At the time of writing the value of a single Bitcoin has risen to $9,800 and by the time we've finished writing this piece, that may well have changed again. All signs point to Bitcoin being worth $10,000 by the end of the day.
The cryptocurrency has seen a monumental rise in value in recent months. Although it hit $1,200 very briefly back in 2014, between then and the start of 2017 Bitcoin just bumbled along at a steadily increasing few hundred bucks. It was rare to see it crest $600 and it seemed as if the cryptocurrency had finally found its settled valuation. However, due to increasing interest and acceptance around the world in 2017, all that changed.
What began as a steady rise into the low $1,000+ mark at the start of the year has trended onwards and upwards ever since. There have been minor crashes, but nothing like we've seen in the past and today we sit on the threshold of a single Bitcoin, which eight years ago was worth pennies, being valued at more than $10,000.
To give you some context, that rates the original Bitcoin founder, Satoshi Nakamoto's collection of Bitcoins, at more than $10 billion. It means the market valuation of every mined Bitcoin ever is closing in on $170 billion, making its entire net worth more than some of the largest companies in the world - like Disney. That was less than $100 billion just over a month ago, which shows how quickly this currency is exploding.
Of course this is typically what happens with Bitcoin before a big crash, but it's recovered very quickly from them in recent months and they've been far from as devastating as they have been in the past.
Have any of you made money off of Bitcoin's recent surge?
