Luke Parker

Using Bitcoin to send donations is a well-worn and proven concept, and 2017’s unprecedented bitcoin gains have enabled various early adopters to launch philanthropic endeavors.

Wikileaks became the first to take advantage of bitcoin for donations in 2010, and has championed its use ever since. The first rush of mainstream charities accepting donations was in 2015.

The age of Bitcoin investments going mainstream is nearly upon us, at least for traders in the US market. Last Wednesday, the highest-volume derivatives market in the world, CME Group, announced that it will open its Bitcoin Futures market on December 18th. The second largest market, the Chicago Board of Exchange (CBOE), then one-upped the CME and announced that they’ll be the first to launch Bitcoin futures trading on December 10th.

The ASIC mining hardware manufacturing industry has so far largely been dominated by Chinese manufacturer Bitmain, which has sold equipment equivalent to about 60% of the current hashrate. However, several reputable companies have made promising announcements lately about entering the ASIC mining hardware industry with cutting-edge new equipment. 

The drama surrounding Bitcoin in recent times has almost entirely revolved around conflicting opinions on how the network should scale to accommodate increasing demand and reduce transaction delays. After years of debate the two sides remain — those who believe Bitcoin to be a digital cash-like payment system, and others who primarily view it as a store of value, like gold.

Bitcoin price reached a record high on Wednesday, as news broke that the Segwit2x hardfork had been cancelled. The highly contentious hardfork, which was considered an upgrade to Bitcoin, would have increased the base block size to 2MB and was the second part of the New York Agreement (NYA) scaling plan.

On Tuesday, CME Group — the world’s largest derivatives trading house by volume — announced that it will launch trading for Bitcoin futures contracts before the end of the year, pending approval by the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC). Bitcoin’s price has seen a steady bull trend since the announcement, rising more than ten percent the following day — and continuing to hit all-time highs throughout the week.