Highs and Lows of Cryptocurrencies in 2021: Year in Review

Highs and Lows of Cryptocurrencies in 2021: Year in Review

Marius Reitz , Luno ’s GM for Africa, provides an overview of the important milestones during the year. Luno is South Africa’s homegrown crypto platform now operating in over 40 countries. Here, Reitz looks at cryptocurrencies’ wild ride through 2021 and the many firsts it achieved: All-time highs The Bitcoin price burst through its all-time high of $68,000 on 5 November, showing a massive increase on the $28,000 range in which it was trading in December last year. But the crypto market also took some brutal hits. Cryptocurrencies are still a new alternative asset class and volatility is expected to characterise crypto for a while yet. Businesses and institutions get on board In the US where regulation allows for entry into crypto, sophisticated firms like Fidelity , Goldman Sachs and JP Morgan are entering the crypto market and the Proshare Bitcoin ETF (world’s first Bitcoin ETF) saw record inflows into the fund. Microstrategy , the NASDAQ-listed business intelligence company, continued to buy additional Bitcoin during the year and now has holdings worth about $6billion. The move was widely viewed as a green light from the corporate USA for crypto. Fintech and traditional payment providers began to adopt blockchain and crypto