Bitcoin reaches $1 trillion value

Bitcoin’s market value reached $1 trillion for the first time, a surge that’s helping cryptocurrency returns far outstrip the performance of more traditional assets like stocks and gold.

The largest token has added more than $450 billion of value in 2021 to about $1 trillion, data compiled by Bloomberg show. The Bloomberg Galaxy Crypto Index, which includes bitcoin and four other coins, has more than doubled.

Speculators, corporate treasurers and institutional investors are thought to have stoked bitcoin’s volatile ascent.

Critic predicts interest hikes

Former U.S. Treasury Secretary Lawrence Summers warned that the Federal Reserve will likely be pressured into raising interest rates sooner than markets expect, and perhaps as early as next year.

An overheating economy and rising prices could force the Fed’s hand, Summers said in an interview with David Westin for Bloomberg Television’s “Wall Street Week” to be broadcast Friday.

Summers, a top official in the past two Democratic administrations, has emerged as one of the leading critics among Democrat-leaning economists of President Joe Biden’s $1.9 trillion pandemic plan.

He’s argued that the measure will pump too much cash into the economy, pushing it past capacity limits and triggering inflation, and called for a focus on longer-term investments instead.

From wire reports