are the new capital controls really so draconian that this rally can continue? What happens if/when the Chinese government steps in and cracks down, like they did in December13/January14? Is there any solid Western demand, or is China the only source of major demand as in Nov13?
I don't really think it is the capital controls that's driving it. It's a whole mix of stuff. More than anything, if you just look back at the history of bitcoin valuation, it's basically doing the bitcoin "thang".....big rise, collapse, retrace to 20% of the last rise, wait a long time for the price to get fully compacted, then another big rise and price in the new fundamentals.
Things like the Eu ruling and the Chinese devaluation are just the sparks that light the tinder. The reason I think that is because there have been so many 'sparks' during the last 2 years - everything from Overstock to ETF rumours and bitcoin didn't do anything. On the other hand, I've got massive deja vu right now from 2013 and the jump up to 266 in April of that year. That was Cyprus according to everyone but actually what happened is that it was ripe for a rise. Then it compressed around $70-$90 for months till Christmas before taking off again.
I think it's just the growth pattern. Fundamentals grow and get priced in in jumps, not linearly. I wouldn't be surprised if we got a jump to $2-3000 then a retrace to say $1000. (Or if I may be so bold, a jump to $6000 then a retrace to $1500).
Of course it could always puff out at $500. But the thing is, the longer cryptocurrencies survive, the more they defy the critics and the more "fear" gets into people about being left out. They also get huge amounts of publicity whenever there's a rise and the infrastructure's getting more user friendly all the time. Wait till Dash delivers Evolution - that's going to be a massive jump in useability for all crypto. So it's a kind of self-fuelling cycle that brings adoption ever closer to inevitability.
Update: Here we go, Zerohedge is
talking about Bitcoin every day now. Soon eyebrows will be raised all over the place including Bloomberg.