Investing.com - The price of bitcoin was holding below all-time highs on Monday after rising above the $11,800 level on Sunday for the first time in its nine-year history.
On the U.S.-based Bitfinex exchange, Bitcoin was at $11,315.00 by 05:44 AM ET (10:44 GMT) near an intra-day high of $11,545.00.
Bitcoin peaked at $11,842.00 on Sunday, capping a surge of around 30% since Thursday, when prices fell to a low of near $9000 after tumbling more than 20% from last weekend’s high.
Bitcoin, which is known for wild swings, has tended to rebound quickly from pullbacks.
Prices have rallied ahead of the start later this month of bitcoin futures trading, a potentially major step in the evolution of the digital currency.
The U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission said Friday it would allow two major exchanges to launch bitcoin futures.
CME Group, the world's largest derivative exchange operator, said its bitcoin futures would launch December 18 while Cboe Global Markets said it will shortly announce the start date for its new bitcoin contract.
Bitcoin’s price has risen dramatically in 2017. For the year, bitcoin is up around 1,000%, having started 2017 at $968.23 and is the biggest gainer of all asset classes this year.
Its meteoric rise has prompted warnings of an increasingly volatile bubble amid signs that it is moving from the periphery of finance towards the mainstream.
CFTC Chairman J. Christopher Giancarlo on Friday warned investors over bitcoin’s extreme volatility.
“Market participants should take note that the relatively nascent underlying cash markets and exchanges for bitcoin remain largely unregulated markets over which the CFTC has limited statutory authority,” he said.
“There are concerns about the price volatility and trading practices of participants in these markets.”
Last week Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein claimed that Bitcoin was “a vehicle to perpetrate fraud” as the value of the cryptocurrency plunged 20% in less than 24 hours.
Blankfein became the latest boss of a major bank to criticize bitcoin, after JP Morgan’s chief executive Jamie Dimon described it as fraud that would ultimately blow up.
Meanwhile, reports on Monday said that Britain wants to step up regulation of bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies by expanding the reach of European Union anti-money-laundering rules that force traders to disclose their identities and report suspicious activity.
Elsewhere in cryptocurrency trading, Bitcoin Cash was last at $1,501.20, while Bitcoin Gold was at $307.00.
Ethereum, the second most valuable cryptocurrency by market cap after bitcoin, was at $495.93.