Bitcoin Just Broke $10,000, and It Could Go Even Further

The Bitcoin cryptocurrency broke the $10,000 mark on Tuesday, reaching an all-time high and dipping into the sort of five-figure valuations its early investors could only dream of. The community around the currency could barely believe its luck, following a turbulent month that saw the project split twice.

“And here I am laughing when I remember the day when bitcoin hit $1 and everyone was saying that the bubble ought to pop soon,” said Reddit user NoochAdmin.

On the CEX exchange Tuesday morning, the price edged past the $10,000 mark after days of speculation that such a jump was just around the corner. The Bitcoin subreddit itself also saw a spike, overtaking the “investing” community with just under 500,000 subscribers.

At the start of the month, Bitcoin appeared to face difficulty as investors piled onto Bitcoin Cash, a hard fork of the project that made transactions faster. This was followed by Bitcoin Gold, which changed the way cryptocurrency miners harvested tokens to end the user of specialized hardware. But less than a week after reaching $8,000, the currency jumped again to $9,500 on Sunday before edging further.

The Bitcoin subreddit shared memes to celebrate the new figure. Not exactly surprisingly, celebratory Ron Paul was involved.

That $10,000 price is a big figure, but the biggest is possibly still to come. Former Fortress hedge fund manager Michael Novogratz claimed hours before the $10,000 spike that Bitcoin could reach far higher heights over the coming year.

“Bitcoin could be at $40,000 at the end of 2018. It easily could,” Novogratz said Monday on CNBC’s Fast Money. “Ethereum, which I think just touched $500 or is getting close, could be triple where it is as well.”

Others think it could go even further than that. In May, Saxo Bank analyst Kay Van-Peterson said that the currency could reach $100,000 over the next 10 years. The biggest days may still be yet to come.