I am new here. I don't really see why bitcoin went up so much recently. I have been reading but I don't get it. I also noticed there is currently 11,000,000 or so outstanding bitcoins, and yet, very few are being sold, even though the price of bitcoins went up recently very drastically. This does not make sense to me, for so many people with 11,000,000 bitcoins, to just sit and watch after the price went up so much. What are they waiting for? It seems to me, that the runup in the price has already occurred. Why aren't they selling? It seems to be a strange marketplace, from my own experiences elsewhere. Normally, if the price goes up, they jump all over it and take all the profits as quick as they can. Where did all these big money investors come from, that are willing to pay $100 or $200 for one bitcoin?
As far as I can tell, the price in bitcoins has gone up on light volome, in comparison to the 11,000,000 bitcoins out there, and as such, normally there should be a large market correction, back down again. I am not meaning to be pessimistic. But what is propping up the price for so long?
Market manipulation? Maybe electric companies saw a noticeable drop-off when gpu miners shut down when it was costing much more to mine than gpus could earn. So they hire and fund a firm to get gpu miners back on the meter.
Accidental? Someone's trading bot's algorithm is off by a decimal point causing chaos at the exchange. It's happened more than once on wall street..
Supply < Demand? People notice the market value trending higher so they place an order to sell at some ridiculously high asking price relative to the current market. Then a large buy order engulfs all the sell orders and suddenly the market value soars to the formerly ridiculously high asking price.
Or one of many other reasons.