$56.3K Bitcoin price and $1T market cap signal BTC is here to stay

Bitcoin price hit a new high at $56,368, cementing its status as one of the most valuable assets on the planet.

As Bitcoin (BTC) price pushed above $55,300 in the morning trading session, its market cap surpassed $1 trillion for the first time on Feb. 19. The breakout continued throughout the day and within the past hour BTC price hit another all-time high at $56,368. 

Now that Bitcoin has cemented its status as a trillion-dollar asset among the likes of Amazon, Apple and Google, legacy banks are showing increasing interest in offering cryptocurrency custody services for their customers.

According to Treyce Dahlem, an analyst at TheTIE, social media conversations including ‘Bitcoin’ as a keyword have increased by 38% since Feb. 18. More than 102,000 tweets have been sent out in the past 24-hours, and this is only “30,000 tweets shy of setting a new record high.”

Dahlem said:

“The number of Twitter users talking about Bitcoin on a daily basis has reached a new all-time high of 38,500, up 325% from a year ago.

Altcoins rise as DeFi and CeFi begin to merge

Multiple altcoins joined BTC and Ether (ETH) in establishing new all-time highs as both centralized and decentralized exchange tokens experienced strong breakouts.

Binance Coin (BNB) continued to benefit from the growing influence of the Binance Smart Chain (BSC) as surging volume lifted the token to a new high of $348.72.

This parabolic rally secured BNB’s spot as the third-ranked project by market capitalization behind Bitcoin and Ether.

DeFi-related projects like PancakeSwap (CAKE) and Venus (VXS) are two of the top attractions on the BSC and both hit new highs at $20.62 and $101.50 respectively. REN also made waves after its recent integration with BSC helped lift the token to a record high at $1.69.

Traditional markets close the week mixed

Following a week of new highs for the major indices, traditional markets closed the week mixed on Friday as the U.S. economy faces continued fallout from the pandemic and rising unemployment.

The NASDAQ finished the day up 0.07% while the Dow was flat. The S&P 500 declined by 0.19%.

Bullish momentum may extend through the weekend

As traditional markets close up for the week, the bullish momentum propelling Bitcoin and altcoins high is showing no signs of slowing down. Recent historical data shows that Bitcoin’s rallies in 2021 have a tendency to occur on the weeked and many analysts believe the top-ranked digital asset could attack the $60,000 level over the weekend.

The round the clock nature of the crypto sector means that markets are always active somewhere on the planet. As the current bull market attracts wider attention from retail and institutional investors, the trend of trading volume decreasing on weekends seems to no longer be in effect.

While Ether (ETH) price has remained pinned below $2,000, it still managed to rally to a new all-time high at $1,974.

There are increasing bullish murmurs that institutional investors are deeply interested in the returns being offered through staking on Eth2 as well as participating in the growing DeFi sector, both of which are the driving force behind the growing demand for Ether.

Recent price breakouts from top tokens like Bitcoin and Binance Coin and DeFi superstars like REN and CAKE have also helped lift the total market capitalization of the cryptocurrency sector to a new record $1.705 trillion. Bitcoin’s dominance currently stands at 61.1%