The crypto market continued its bullish run on Wednesday with most of the major cryptocurrencies moving higher. There wasn't any major news about the industry overall, but small tidbits are giving investors enough reason to buy.
Bitcoin (BTC -1.92%) is up 3.2% over the last 24 hours as of 4 p.m. ET, Solana (SOL -5.10%) has jumped 10%, and Near Protocol (NEAR -1.87%) is up a whopping 18.6%.
The crypto industry takes small steps forward
Last night it was announced that Blackrock, Nasdaq, and the Securities and Exchange Commission met yesterday for a second time to discuss rule changes to list a Bitcoin exhcnage-traded fund (ETF). The possibility of an ETF coming to market has been speculation all year and these appear to be at least small steps toward making that a reality.
An ETF could bring new money into the crypto industry by making it more accessible. It's still relatively difficult to buy and sell cryptocurrencies, so a low-cost exchange-traded fund would allow investors to get access without having crypto wallets or working with centralized crypto exchanges.
Solana's rise continues, helped by news that it's now home to more decentralized trading volume than Ethereum. Solana's low cost and fast speed have made it a go-to blockchain for developers and that's helping push the token higher.
Near Protocol is seeing an inflow of investor interest today as the blockchain attracts more developers and collaborations, opening up potential use cases.
Investors and utility
The two drivers of cryptocurrency right now are the flow of funds into the industry and the utility being built on the blockchain. All three of these cryptocurrencies are benefiting from that.
A Bitcoin ETF could bring in more investors with a low-cost financial instrument and that could pave the way to more cryptocurrencies getting ETFs. And the SEC ruling positively, in this case, could lead to a thawing for crypto regulation in general.
I think the long-term driver of the industry will be a growing number of use cases for the blockchain. From financial instruments to logistics uses, companies big and small are testing how they can use the blockchain. I think that will open up more use cases and companies built using this technology.
It's less clear how that will benefit specific tokens. Solana, for example, is so low-cost that even a large rise in transactions won't increase the fees, and tokens like the stablecoin USD Coin can be used as the medium of transaction.
Speculation is still rampant in crypto and that's driving a lot of the increase in value short-term. But there are improvements in the underlying technology and utility, which investors shouldn't overlook. And as long as there's an inflow of funds and an increase in innovation the market can keep moving higher.
