Bitcoin surpasses Netflix in market value after breaking through $4,500

According to CoinDesk data, Bitcoin rose about 2% to a record high of $4,522.13 on Thursday. Earlier on Thursday, the price of Bitcoin on Huobi.com in China once broke through the 30,000 yuan mark, setting a record high.

Its market value surged by $30 billion to $74 billion in August, surpassing Netflix, which has a market value of $72.7 billion.

Netflix shares have risen about 35% overall this year, but fell about 8% last week after Disney announced it would remove its movies from Netflix and develop its own streaming platform.

Bitcoin's recent astonishing rise is mainly due to the following reasons:

Institutions are optimistic: Since the "hard fork" on August 1, the new version of Bitcoin solution has been recognized by the outside world, and institutional investors have become increasingly interested in Bitcoin. Their investment has caused the price of digital currency to increase more than four times this year.

On the 12th of this month, Goldman Sachs once again raised its short-term maximum price forecast for Bitcoin to $4,827. In early July, Goldman Sachs had predicted that the price of Bitcoin would rise to $3,915, a value that had already been exceeded.

However, it is worth noting that the "hard fork" dispute in August has not come to a complete end, and Bitcoin may still be at risk of splitting in the future. Developers and miners are in full opposition over whether to expand the capacity. In November, three versions of Bitcoin will appear on the market. (For more details, see "Can you avoid August but not November? Bitcoin's "Second Civil War" will be even more tragic...")

Political factors: Last week, the conflict between Trump and North Korea caused geopolitical risks to surge, which boosted demand from South Korean and Japanese investors and became a major driving force behind this round of Bitcoin surge.

In addition, Bitcoin trading saw a major breakthrough late last month: U.S. regulators gave the green light to digital currency derivatives trading for the first time. The U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) said on July 24 that it had issued a license to LedgerX, a New York-based Bitcoin options exchange, allowing it to trade and settle Bitcoin derivatives contracts.

However, as Bitcoin skyrocketed, its risks also attracted the attention of relevant departments. Bitcoin is being included in the scope of strict regulation. Xinhua News Agency pointed out in an article that Bitcoin's price surged by 50% in half a month, the risk increased, and the institutional cage needed to be tightened. Another country joined the camp of strict regulation of Bitcoin.

On Thursday, Australia announced a series of reform measures to bring digital currency exchanges under the supervision of the Australian Transaction Reports and Analysis Centre (AUSTRAC). The reform bill aims to strengthen anti-money laundering and counter-terrorism financing laws and will enhance the powers of the Australian Transaction Reports and Analysis Centre.