For Traders, Bitcoin is a Bubble Unfolding Right Before Their Eyes

Bitcoin adds more than $1,000 in the week around Thanksgiving and is the talk of traders on Twitter.
Conor Sen, a portfolio manager at New River Investments, was quick to compare bitcoin’s surge to the tech-stock bubble of the 1990s
On the other hand, T3Live Chief Strategist Scott Redler tweets the future of bitcoin is “unknown,” but investors can still apply technical trading strategies.

By Evelyn Cheng | @chengevelyn

As Wall Street traders refocused on markets after the Thanksgiving holiday, their Twitter feeds lit up with talk about bitcoin’s rapid march toward $10,000.

“Certainly nothing seems to be stopping Bitcoin this morning, which seems to have captured the entire financial social media as it breaks towards $10,000,” Peter Tchir, head of macro strategy at Brean Capital, said in a Monday morning email to clients.

Bitcoin has caught Wall Street’s attention this year by multiplying more than nine times in price. Top banking executives such as JPMorgan Chase’s Jamie Dimon have called the digital currency a “fraud.” But well-known investors Bill Miller, Mike Novogratz and Josh Brown, CEO of Ritholtz Wealth Management and a CNBC contributor, have bought bitcoin.

Many on financial Twitter were a little more skeptical.

Conor Sen, a portfolio manager at New River Investments, was quick to compare bitcoin’s surge to the tech-stock bubble of the 1990s. Sen has 26,800 followers on Twitter.

Conor Sen
@conorsen
Never thought we’d see a bubble like late ‘90s tech again.
5:50 PM – Nov 26, 2017

Wedbush’s Ian Winer pointed to moves in an actual stock that reflect how much of a bubble bitcoin is in.

Ian Winer
@Ian_Winer
If you don’t think Crypto is a bubble – check out RIOT!
5:19 AM – Nov 27, 2017

Ian Winer
@Ian_Winer
RIOT! Only in this tape could a biotech company with nothing going on change its name to include “blockchain”, buy 10% of some crypto currency and have its stock go up 700%..
5:45 AM – Nov 27, 2017

Riot Blockchain, the biotech company that added “blockchain” to its name in October, was down more than 30 percent Monday morning but held gains of more than 300 percent for the year. Overstock.com, a larger stock that has surged more than 260 percent this year on news of its blockchain business, attempted slight gains.

Charlie Bilello, director of research at Pension Partners, went on an 11-tweet streak about bitcoin’s rapid price gains and market value.

Charlie Bilello
@charliebilello
Bitcoin’s market cap just passed Disney’s.

Yes, that Disney:
Mickey Mouse
Frozen
Star Wars
Marvel
Pixar
ABC
ESPN
12 Theme Parks, 51 Resorts, 387 stores
195,000 employees
$55 billion in revenue$BTC.X $DIS pic.twitter.com/ka16BZ2VAn

Charlie Bilello
@charliebilello
Bitcoin is up 874% so far this year. If it were to gain that much in 2018 it would be worth over $1.5 trillion, more than the market cap of any company in the world. $BTC.X
9:52 AM – Nov 26, 2017

Other traders on Twitter were more excited about bitcoin:

Peter Brandt, author of “Diary of a Professional Commodity Trader,” tweeted to his 84,700 followers about the “biggest bull market” in his 43 years as a trader.

Peter Brandt
@PeterLBrandt
Wow!!! $BTC challenging upper resistance line of parabolic advance. This is biggest bull market of my 43 years of as a trader.
4:07 PM – Nov 25, 2017

T3Live’s chief strategist, Scott Redler, tweeted to his 57,200 followers that the future of bitcoin is “unknown,” but investors can still apply technical trading strategies.

Scott Redler
@RedDogT3
U can use technicals to Trade/manage/invest an class of assets. Especially when the future is unknown #bitcoin https://twitter.com/reddogt3/status/934799201359290368 …
7:03 AM – Nov 26, 2017

Bitcoin climbed more than $1,000 in a week to a record high of $9,732.76 Monday morning, according to CoinDesk. The digital currency has surged 50 percent in November alone and now has a market value of about $161 billion, according to CoinDesk. That’s bigger than General Electric and slightly less than MasterCard.

Bitcoin was also the talk on the physical trading floor Monday.

Art Cashin, UBS director of floor operations at the New York Stock Exchange, said on CNBC’s “Squawk on the Street” that “bitcoin has gone parabolic. I think we’re in the fear-of-missing-out phase now.”

U.S. stocks were little changed, near all-time highs midday Monday

Jeff Morris Jr., director of product management, revenue, at Tinder, tweeted Saturday that “most of the smartest thinkers I know are working in the cryptocurrency space” and skeptics should try to understand why “so many brilliant people are dedicating their lives to this emerging field.”

Jeff Morris Jr.
@jmj
Most of the smartest thinkers I know are working in the cryptocurrency space. You can call this a bubble. Or you can educate yourself and try to understand why so many brilliant people are dedicating their lives to this emerging field.
3:56 PM – Nov 25, 2017

Sven Henrich of NorthmanTrader, who has 46,200 followers, had few words for the digital currency except a “laughing, crying tears of joy” emoticon and a bitcoin surge chart:

Sven Henrich
@NorthmanTrader
SPOTTED: #bitcoin weeeeeeeeeeeeee
9:09 AM – Nov 26, 2017

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