Something is going on in the cryptocurrency world, but it’s hard to figure out why prices are jumping.Both bitcoin and Ether prices are currently trading at an all-time high.According to Coindesk’s price index, you could buy one bitcoin for $1,343 earlier today.It roughly represents a 6 percent increase in 7 days, and a 34 percent increase in a month.And when it comes to the price of an ether, things are even more impressive.One ether is currently worth $64.04, up around 24 percent in just a week.Ether prices are a bit correlated to bitcoin prices as many people trade bitcoins against Ethers.But it doesn’t explain why it was such a good week for Ether’s price.Bitcoin still faces a scalability issues.It seems like bitcoin stakeholders can’t agree on a solution to make some improvements on the core bitcoin protocol to speed up transactions and lower transaction fees.As a result, it has never been so expensive and slow to send and receive bitcoins.But there’s one thing I noticed.

Prices tend to go up when there’s bad news around the world.If Donald Trump tweets about North Korea, chances are it will have positive effect on cryptocurrencies.Conversely, I noticed a micro-crash minutes after the results of the first round of the French election — prices went up again minutes later.Marine Le Pen arrived second, which was a good sign for traditional currencies like USD and EUR.It’s still hard to predict those market changes as many depend on macro-economic rules in China.But as many worry about the current political outlook, cryptocurrencies could counterintuitively look like a safe investment.CoinbaseCoinbase Adds Litecoin and Prices JumpJeff John RobertsYou've probably heard about the digital currency called bitcoin.But you may not realize there are literally dozens of other so-called alt-currencies out there that work in a very similar way and that, like bitcoin, their value has been soaring in the last year.While bitcoin is far and away the biggest—its market cap is more than twice all the other alt-currencies combined—some of its rivals are gaining traction.

These include Litecoin, a currency introduced in 2013 by former Google employee Charlie Lee, and that is currently the fourth most valuable alt-currency.Litecoin, as its name suggests, is a "lighter" version than bitcoin.It can process transactions four times faster and has not run into the sort of controversies related to scaling for growth that are currently consuming the bitcoin community.Get Data Sheet, Fortune’s technology newsletter.But despite its history and positive reputation, it hasn't experienced the same recent dramatic increase in value as bitcoin or ethereum, which is the No.2 alt-currency on the list.One reason for this could be that Litecoin is harder to obtain than those other two currencies.That changed, however, on Wednesday as the popular digital currency exchange service Coinbase made it possible for people to buy and sell Litecoin.And, indeed, prices jumped over 25 percent on the Coinbase news according to the site Coin Market Cap.The Coinbase tie-in is significant because is by far the most popular way for ordinary people—as opposed to dedicated crypto-heads—to buy and sell digital currency.

Litecoin's appearance on the platform means it is suddenly a lot more liquid as an asset.Lee, the Litecoin creator who is now head engineer at Coinbase, is (unsurprisingly) bullish about the currency's potential.But his optimism is not just due to the fact it's now easier to buy and sell Litecoin.As Lee points out, Litecoin is in the middle of adopting a number of new technologies (such as Segregated Witness or SegWit) that increase its transaction speed—bitcoin backers have been trying to implement similar improvements for months, but the process has been caught up in internecine fighting."We777 bitcoin auctionhave all the cool scaling technology.bitcoin to da moonBut the reason we adopted SegWit was not for the scaling features, but because it allows for instant payments off-chain," said Lee, referring to a method for clearing transactions using a variation of the digital currency's core computer protocol.This week's development is likely to give a boost to Litecoin, though it's unlikely the currency will ever emerge as real challenger to bitcoin—a mantle increasingly being adopted by relative newcomer ethereum.best linux bitcoin mining software

HomeNewsCrypto Chinese Investors Start to Drive up the Litecoin Price Crypto, NewsShutterstock photo As Bitcoin breaks its own all-time high ( ATH ) on multiple exchanges, it appears as though a rising tide raises all boats.Most important, GDAX/Coinbase, a crucial on/off ramp for digital currencies, has taken the lead in ETH/USD volume and is reporting higher ETH/USD than BTC/USD volume over the past 24 hours.This is anecdotal evidence for a key metric of "new money" coming into the space.bitcoin difficulty last changeAlthough the $4-5 premium remains on Bitfinex due to USD withdrawal halt, GDAX now leads in volume and holds a small premium above a few of the other exchanges as well.buy bitcoin by wmzPoloniex and ETH/BTC volume continue to lead globally (not shown).bitcoin crash december 16

Ethereum hash rate also continues to push ATHs almost daily, showing strong confidence in miner support.For weeks now, I've been watching the slow formation of the head and shoulders bearish reversal chart pattern.The pattern convincingly formed with the appropriate and important descending volume profile.The trick with trading these patterns is to not jump the gun.The short entry signal is always a break of the horizontal support on volume.Instead, price held above the 200 EMA and refused a bearish 50/200 EMA cross as well.japan banned bitcoinWhen reversal patterns form and do not play out as expected, that is generally considered to be a strong continuation sign.bitcoin quote apiIt's also possible that this was simply a bullish continuation pennant all along, with a measured move target of ~$115 (0.088).bitcoin brothers review

Going forward, we should watch for price to test previous local highs and push for the 1.618 Fibonacci extension, yielding a target of ~$115 (0.0873).There is also a high probability that a higher high in price will not yield a higher high on the Relative Strength Index (RSI), a momentum oscillator.Although this result is days or a few weeks away at this point, watching out for this now will prevent you from entering a trade based on emotions.Sure, price can go parabolic at any time and break the rules of divergences, but should a divergence form, it suggests continuation is far less likely than reversal.We will also want to be watching volume.If volume does not break previous local highs, it adds to the bearish divergence confluence, all of which would suggest bullish momentum is waning.Summary As Bitcoin breaks ATHs, it's likely that any digital currency on associated on-ramps increases as well, simply by association.Bitfinex ETH/USD premium continues and should continue until USD withdrawals resume, if ever.