Bitcoin Rallies Closer to All-Time High Levels as ETF Debut Looms, Memecoins Start Week With a Surge

Bitcoin began early Monday with big gains after a dip over the weekend, ahead of an anticipated US exchange-traded fund (ETF) approval. The largest cryptocurrency by market capitalisation has risen more than 6.5 percent since Friday morning to trade at $62,071 (roughly Rs. 46,70,532) at the time of writing. On Indian exchanges like CoinSwitch Kuber, the cryptocurrency is trading at a much higher valuation of Rs. 48,52,236 (roughly $64,485) — a 1.15 percent increase over the opening value this morning. With the first futures ETF tied to the token expected to debut this week, Bitcoin may well see levels reach past the $65,000 mark soon.

While Bitcoin investors have quite the week to look forward to, Ether backers are positive too. Gadgets 360's cryptocurrency price tracker suggests that the Ethereum-based crypto-asset rallied by over 12 percent in value in the week that ended on October 17 after a minor dip in the week before. Ether opens the week at Rs. 2,99,390 (roughly $3,977) and is already up by 0.67 percent, trading at Rs. 3,01,380 (roughly $4,005) at the time of publishing.

It's a good start to the week for the two most popular memecoins around in Dogecoin and Shiba Inu. While SHIB is up by 7.46 percent and valued at Rs. 0.002103 (roughly $0.00003), Dogecoin has moved up to Rs. 18.86 (roughly $0.25065), marking a 1.03 percent rise. Cardano, Ripple, Uniswap and Chainlink, meanwhile, begin the week with sharp falls.

While Bitcoin is primed to challenge its record highs amid the ETF debut, there could be resistance past the $63,000 as investors might look to book their profits at some level.

Closer home, short video app Chingari has launched a crypto token of its own named $Gari, alongside a full-fledged NFT marketplace too. $Gari will have Bollywood actor Salman Khan as its brand ambassador, who was also present at its launch event in Mumbai.

Developed in collaboration with the Solana blockchain, $Gari is being advertised as a social token instead of a financial token, where creators will be able to accumulate coins based on their content.