Investing.com - Bitcoin soared Friday as bargain hunters piled into the popular crypto after its earlier-day plunge to key support levels.
Bitcoin rose nearly 6% to $8,105, up from a low of $7,450. The popular crypto's move above the key $8,000 level comes a day after a plunge toward the low $7,000 area attracted a wave of buyers.
Despite the sunnier end to the week, Bitcoin remains in correction territory, down about 11.1% from its year-to-date peak of $9,100, and looks set to snap its 10-week winning streak.
While traders were hard pressed to find a specific reason for the rally, some attributed the move to growing expectations that Facebook's (NASDAQ:FB) soon-to-be launched cryptocurrency will ramp up institutional demand.
"(Facebook's crypto launch) puts competitors on notice. What’s Google, Apple, Amazon), Tencent, Rakuten, Alibaba… what are they going to do now if Facebook launches a coin that gets traction around the world?" Sonny Singh, chief commercial officer at BitPay, told Bloomberg.
Following the rally, bitcoin's total market cap, often use to gauge demand, jumped to $143 billion from about $136 billion a day earlier.
The surge in bitcoin saw demand for other cryptos gather pace as XRP/USD rose 7.54% to $0.42695, ETH/USD climbed 4.62% to $252.93 and LTC/USD surged 16% to $119.21.