DB azt mondja, hogy egy japó felelős a bitcoin robbanásért
KoffeinJapanese men, historically engaged in leveraged forex trading, are now dominating the cryptocurrency market, Deutsche Bank says
Criminals, drug dealers, and crooks aren’t the ones driving the price of bitcoin higher—it is Japanese men.
At least that is the theory put forward by analysts at Deutsche Bank. They reckon Japanese traders in their 30s and 40s, who historically engaged in trading real currencies such as the yen and dollar, have turned their sights to cryptocurrencies such as bitcoin.
And while the name Mrs. Watanabe has often been used to describe the proverbial Japanese retail investor—homemaker and yen trader—Deutsche Bank says it is these “Mr. Watanabes” who are currently driving cryptocurrency prices higher, often borrowing heavily to do so.
“[Japanese] retail investors are shifting from leveraged foreign-exchange trading to leveraged cryptocurrency trading,” Deutsche Bank wrote in a note to clients. “With few investors leaving and a steady inflow of new investors, the investor pool has been expanding.”
Millions of individual Asian investors have piled into bitcoin this year, helping fuel its explosive rally. The attraction lies in the fact that bitcoin is an alternative to paper money, with trades that match up over computers without the involvement of banks or governments.
Bitcoin recently traded at $17,212, according to research site CoinDesk. It started the year below $1,000.
Bitcoin has been particularly appealing to investors in Japan,
the world’s third-largest economy, where the yen is one of the world’s
most-traded currencies. Technology and foreign-exchange trading are
already prominent businesses there, and bitcoin allows investors to
combine both in one product.
Japan currently accounts for the bulk of bitcoin’s trading volume. Some 40% of bitcoin trading is currently yen-denominated, according to data provider Coinhills, a firm that tracks digital currencies.
It helps that Japanese regulators have been friendlier toward the cryptocurrency market than other countries such as China, which has banned cryptocurrency exchanges and initial coin offerings, a new method of corporate fundraising that circumvents traditional capital markets.
Earlier this year, Japan established bitcoin as a legitimate payment method and enacted new rules on the exchanges such as minimum capital requirements, segregating customer accounts, and monitoring potential criminal activity.
“More than a few Japanese investors positively value volatility,” Deutsche Bank said. “Japan’s investment style is typified by a combination of low-risk, low-return deposits and high-risk, high-return investments.”
In the global foreign-exchange market, Japan accounts for roughly half of all forex margin trading—otherwise known as trading on leverage, Deutsche Bank says. That strategy could be even riskier in cryptocurrencies than in traditional currency markets.
“The risk of incurring losses greater than margin is higher than in normal FX trading, due to high intraday volatility,” Deutsche Bank says. “As a result, we believe that brokers also face a higher risk of failure.”