What happened
All in all, cryptocurrencies had a good weekend, headed by the No. 1 crypto bellwether Bitcoin (BTC 0.69%). In mid-afternoon trading on Sunday, the token that launched thousands of other cryptos was up by nearly 5% across the previous 24 hours. That was on the back of several news items that were generally good for Bitcoin individually, and cryptocurrencies in general.
So what
Many investors are shedding the caution brought on by the war in Ukraine and its immediate economic after-effects, most notably a spike in oil prices. Such events tend to make many people nervous. When investors are nervous they tend to bail out of speculative assets and buy ones considered safer.
Image source: Getty Images.
Now that the world has adjusted to the new reality, investors are plowing back into those more speculative plays. This positively affects the vast speculative grouping that is cryptocurrency.
Meanwhile, for Bitcoin specifically, there have been several bullish developments in recent days. Late last week, the head of Russia's State Duma committee on energy Pavel Zavalny said his nation might allow "friendly" countries to pay for its oil in cryptocurrency, specifically singling out Bitcoin.
The country, reeling from sanctions imposed over the war, recently announced it would execute such sales only in rubles.
Also, Bitcoin is being used as a reserve currency by Luna Foundation Guard, a nonprofit organization dedicated to "promot[ing] a truly decentralized economy." Luna Foundation's director is Do Kwon, who is also the CEO of Terraform Labs, the entity behind the Terra coin and its related currency, the TerraUSD stablecoin.
The Foundation has added significantly to its Bitcoin reserves. Various media outlets over the weekend reported that heavy additions over the past few days have swelled the Foundation's Bitcoin wallet by roughly $1.1 billion worth of the coin.
Now what
These moves are clearly bringing those previously skittish investors back to Bitcoin, in what seems like a genuine rally. I should caution, though, that it's early days, and much depends on how risk-sensitive investors will be in the coming days and months.
