After a relatively low performance over the course of last month, Bitcoin has once again surpassed the $8,000 mark.
Following last's week price growth, the coin has remained stable despite uncertainty, as its price noticed a significant upward spike.
Blockchain Capital partner, Spencer Bogart, described Bitcoin as a tinderbox, just waiting for the factors that will make its price go higher.
Bogart, a regular commentator on the topic, told CNBC's Fast Money that according to him, any number of catalysts could send Bitcoin exploding even higher.
In addition to Bogart's optimism, BTC actually hit a new record this year, passing the 46 percent dominance of market capitalization. This was last seen at the end of 2017, around the time when BTC came close to the industry's high of $20,000. During the previous week, Bitcoin reached up to 47 percent dominance.
As a result of this growth, on Friday, the total market cap attained $300 billion after more than a month. With this surge, the crypto market slowly but steadily might be aiming for a new high, such as the one that happened back in December 2017.
Besides Bitcoin, other major crypto assets noticed a solid growth spurt this week as well.
Monero Successfully Fixes Potential Vulnerabilities
Along with other cryptocurrencies, the privacy-focused coin Monero also recorded a modest price increase over the last seven days. Reaching a worth of above $140-9 percent growth that happened overnight-XMR outperformed some of the top digital currencies.
Additionally, this week was successful for the coin from another aspect as well. After a security review, Monero's web wallet is much more secure for users now, and many of the potential vulnerabilities have been successfully fixed, reducing the security risks.
The security review of the XMRWallet was done by blockchain strategy firm New Alchemy last week. In a detailed report, they explain that the application possesses high-quality user experience, a modern development approach and a clear separation of client and server functionality. However, there were some potential flaws that, as New Alchemy further explained, needed to be fixed.
Monero is not a largely popular digital asset, however, the differentiation in its transactions is what makes this cryptocurrency widely used. In order to make a transaction, a confirmation is needed before it can be recorded on the blockchain.
Additionally, it's one of the reasons why XMR is supported among major darknet markets.
Assassination Bets Appear on Ethereum-Based Prediction Market
Augur, a decentralized oracle and prediction market protocol built on the Ethereum blockchain, made global headlines this week.
Despite trying to distance itself from being compared to crowdfunded assassination campaigns on the dark web, this Ethereum-based prediction platform has indirectly provided a hub for users to bet on the future murder of public figures.
By design, Augur can be used for betting on any type of event using cryptocurrencies. Recently, the platform's markets have been the venue of an increasing amount of bets on the assassination of public figures including Donald Trump, Jeff Bezos and Warren Buffet. In this case, the bets are not directly calling for these people's deaths; however, they can easily provoke it.
More Than 40 Drug Dealers Arrested with the Help of Cryptocurrencies
In other news, more than 35 individuals were arrested this week by the U.S. Department of Justice under the suspicion that they were selling illicit drugs on darknet markets. This was the first nationwide undercover operation targeting darknet vendors and was made possible with the help of Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies.
According to a report from the DoJ, special agents posed as money launderers on darknet market sites, where they exchanged money for virtual currencies in a sting operation for over a year.
Besides identifying drug vendors on the dark web, they also managed to trace $20 million worth of Bitcoins and other cryptocurrencies. The authorities also confiscated Bitcoin mining devices, and computer equipment used in these illicit activities.
