Investing.com - Bitcoin prices surged on Wednesday after the world’s top 20 economies expressed no desire to call for a clampdown on the crypto markets. Prices of other popular digital coins also jumped.
Bitcoin was trading at $9,068.7 by 1:59AM ET (05:59 GMT) on the Bitfinex exchange, up 7.8% over the previous 24 hours.
Ethereum, the world’s second largest cryptocurrency by market cap, surged 9.3% to trade at $581.99 on the Bitfinex exchange.
Ripple's XRP token jumped 4% to $0.70608 on the Poloniex exchange.
Meanwhile, Litecoin was trading 8.9% higher at $172.90.
The group of 20 nations (G-20) said on Tuesday they agreed to “monitor” the movement in crypto, while keeping the door open to regulate the booming industry at a later stage. “We call on international standard-setting bodies (SSBs) to continue their monitoring of crypto-assets and their risks, according to their mandates, and assess multilateral responses as needed,” G20 leaders said.
Bitcoin prices surged and clawed its way back above the $9,000 mark following the news, as traders were relieved the G-20 ministers did not call for immediate regulation. Investor were concern about a coordinated clampdown after the ministers said earlier this week there would be a discussion on “a common approach to cryptocurrencies” at their meeting in Buenos Aires.
The G-20 communique said that digital coins are assets, which “lack the key attributes of sovereign currencies," and that “at some point they could have financial stability implications.”
Bitcoin is still down more than 50% from an all-time high of almost $20,000 in December.