Investing.com - Bitcoin was higher on Monday, amid news that BlackRock is exploring cryptocurrencies.
Bitcoin was trading at a six day high of $6,644.40, rising 4.31% on the Bitfinex exchange, as of 8:04 AM ET (12:04 GMT). The digital coin has struggled to gain ground in recent months, falling nearly 70% since its peak of almost $20,000 in December.
Cryptocurrencies overall also rallied to a six-day high. The coin market cap of total market capitalization increased to $266 billion at the time of writing compared to $242 billion on Friday.
Ethereum rose 5.70% to $475.23 on the Bitfinex exchange. Ripple, the third largest virtual currency, increased 4.65% to $0.46806 while Litecoin was at $83.191, up 6.36%.
Financial giant BlackRock Inc (NYSE:BLK) formed a team to look into virtual currencies, Financial News reported. The world’s largest asset manager could also take part in Bitcoin futures market, the report said.
The creation of the team marks a turning point for the firm, as its chief executive Larry Fink said last year that bitcoin was a speculation.
In regulation news, global regulators are setting up a framework to monitor crypto risk, the Financial Stability Board (FSB) said on Monday. While digital coins don’t pose a risk to financial stability, the framework will focus on how virtual coin markets could spread.
"Monitoring the size and growth of crypto-asset markets is critical to understanding the potential size of wealth effects, should valuations fall," the FSB said in a statement on Monday. "The use of leverage, and financial institution exposures to crypto-asset markets are important metrics of transmission of crypto-asset risks to the broader financial system."