Bitcoin extends weekly profits

On Friday, cryptocurrencies rallied, with Bitcoin on track to conclude the trading week in the green – the third time in a row.

Bitcoin jumped by 1.39% hitting $6,943.10 on the Bitfinex exchange, thus demonstrating a 7% weekly profit. However, it has slumped nearly by 70% since its mind-blowing maximum of $20,000 in December.

Crypto assets generally tacked on, with the crypto market cap of total market capitalization at about $225 billion versus Thursday’s outcome of $220 billion.

Ethereum, which turns out to be the second-biggest alternative crypto asset by market cap, managed to tack on by up to 0.49% coming up with an outcome of $278.42. As for XRP, which happens to be the third-largest crypto asset, it jumped by 0.90% trading at $0.32821. Additionally, Litecoin demonstrated $60.008, adding 1.61%.

Approximately 160 digital exchanges are eager to enter the Japanese market, as the country’s Financial Services Agency revealed. Now up to 16 crypto exchanges are officially licensed in this Asian country, while another 16 have been permitted to operate while their applications are being scrutinized.

With preliminary consultations and inquiries as for registration, nearly 160 operators are expressing their willingness to enter the crypto market of Japan, the agency revealed to bitcoin.com.

The Japanese market turns out to be one of the top markets for crypt trading, although it faces challenges over hacking and cybersecurity. The watchdog has started inspecting all exchanges and it hasn’t approved any new companies so far in 2018.

Meanwhile, China keeps doubling down on the crypto industry. On Thursday the Chinese government forbad promotional activities having to do with crypto assets in the special economic zone of Guangzhou. The news of that ban extension showed up right after China-based multinational techy giant Baidu was ordered to shut down all crypto-related online chat rooms this week.