With cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin, Ethereum, Doge, Shiba Inu and Solana touching all-time highs, the number of traders has also grown exponentially, said market watchers. Top exchanges have recorded a 200-500% jump in the number of day traders who make money merely by taking positions in various crypto assets.
“I haven’t encountered many who would try to put up more barriers for new users,” said Maria Shen, a partner at Electric Capital, a venture capital firm focused on cryptocurrencies. Still, she added, “the wallet space is fairly competitive, so it’s not unthinkable.”

That seems to be the overall message from most. Even Innes, who has been critical of bitcoin and crypto-trading for quite a while, admits that this doesn’t mean the blockchain is bunk. He, in fact, sees things looking up. “If this base can hold,” he says, “[the price will] start drifting up.” But not because of fervor or blind faith that bitcoin is the future, but due to advances on the technology side.
OK perhaps that’s a little far-fetched. But what is behind crypto’s crazy climb over the past 18 months, we hear you ask? We don’t mean to suggest that the pandemic hasn’t been involved, because we think it has, but not in the way that this chart criminal implies — not, in other words, because it’s some kind of safe haven that traders flock to when they are worried about Covid cases rising; the data don’t bear that idea out.