As bitcoin continues to hover around $40,000, we’ve reached out to market analysts and crypto experts to hear their price predictions for 2021 and beyond.

They are mostly positive, though Pankaj Balani, CEO of Delta Exchange, says he doesn’t believe we are “completely out of the woods yet” and that more losses could be on their way before a proper rebound kicks in.

“The selling pattern last week was more serious than that of a typical bull market pullback,” he tells The Independent.

Others remain firmly bullish, with price predictions well north of $100,000.

You can read the full story here.

With bitcoin back above $40,000, renowned market analyst PlanB has once again stood by his theory that we are still in a bull market.

The Dutch crypto advocate is best known for his stock-to-flow model, which is based on the relationship between the existing supply of bitcoin and the cyclical production rate of new bitcoins.

One version of the model puts the peak of this current cycle at $288,000. The price of bitcoin has a long way to go before it gets anywhere near that level, but the recent bump makes his latest proclamation that “$60k was not the top” seem a lot less far off.

Janice McAfee, the wife of imprisoned cyber security pioneer John McAfee, has likened Elon Musk’s market-moving tweets to those of her husband - claiming that Musk does it “with impunity”, while her husband “faces the real possibility of dying in prison for allegedly engaging in similar activities”.

I spoke to John McAfee’s lawyer Andrew Gordon back in March, who is representing him for his case in New York, relating to crypto securities, and his case in Tennessee, relating to tax charges.

“This is certainly a very different case,” he told me. “While it’s not the first crypto criminal tax indictment, it’s definitely one of the first, and the most high profile.”

Whatever the outcome, it could set a benchmark for future cases.

Dogecoin co-founder Billy Markus has thanked Elon Musk for clarifying his stance relating to the meme-based cryptocurrency.

The Tesla CEO has been dogecoin’s most prominent cheerleader during this latest market rally, with his tweets and comments often pushing it to new record highs.

Despite briefly changing his Twitter bio to “CEO of Dogecoin” back in 2018, Musk tweeted that “no one reports” to him due to the decentralised nature of the technology and the community surrounding it. In a separate Twitter post yesterday, Musk explained why he favours dogecoin over other, more technically advanced, cryptocurrencies like Ethereum or Cardano.

“Doge has dogs and memes,” he said. “The others do not.”

The price of bitcoin is back above $40,000 on Wednesday morning for the first time since last week. It’s been several days now of steadily recuperating its losses, with $40k proving to be a key resistance point.

Passing the milestone, which it only passed for the first time in its history back in February, appears to have also given a boost to other major cryptocurrencies.

Cardano (ada), Ethereum (ether) and Binance Coin were all up by between five and 15 per cent overnight, with the latest gains also meaning that the crypto market is now up week-on-week and heading back towards that $2 trillion market cap.

Elon Musk has once again caused a stir within the crypto world by revealing that he is in discussions with bitcoin miners in an effort to address climate concerns within the industry.

The Tesla CEO, who withdrew support for cryptocurrency payments earlier this month, hinted at a “potentially promising” solution, but gave no further details.

There are already a number of mining operations that use renewable energy, as well as various crypto projects that do away with the vast energy requirements altogether.

The Independent’s Joe Sommerlad takes a deeper look at what Musk might be alluding to. You can read all about it here.

Imprisoned cyber security pioneer John McAfee has been tweeting about the promise offered by cryptocurrency from his cell in Spain.

The founder of the eponymous antivirus software is currently being detained on tax evasion charges in a prison just outside Barcelona, but also faces a lawsuit for allegedly promoting cryptocurrencies in order to profit from them.

“The war [between government and cryptos] is on and I am a major target,” he says. “Do not be afraid. Crypto is our last hope for financial independence.”

I interviewed McAfee back in November about his latest stint behind bars. You can read about it right here.

Imprisoned cyber security pioneer John McAfee has been tweeting about the promise offered by cryptocurrency from his cell in Spain.

The founder of the eponymous antivirus software is currently being detained on tax evasion charges in a prison just outside Barcelona, but also faces a lawsuit for allegedly promoting cryptocurrencies in order to profit from them.

“The war [between government and cryptos] is on and I am a major target,” he says. “Do not be afraid. Crypto is our last hope for financial independence.”

I interviewed McAfee back in November about his latest stint behind bars. You can read about it right here.

The price of bitcoin has partly recovered from the crash that briefly took it below $31,000, but it remains a long way off the $64,000 all-time high it saw last month.

Ethereum, dogecoin and other major cryptocurrencies have also experienced massive volatility in recent weeks, so in an effort to make sense of the crypto market chaos we invited two experts to take your questions about the current state of the cryptocurrency space.

Dr Iwa Salami, a senior lecturer in financial law at the University of East London, and Fred Schebesta, a crypto advocate and founder of the comparison platform Finder.com, joined me at the end of last week in a 45 minute Q&A session.

Is this the end of the great 2020/21 bitcoin bull run? Which other cryptocurrencies are they excited about? And what are their price predictions for 2021 and beyond?

You can find out the answer to these questions and more right here:

Less than two weeks after announcing that Tesla will no longer accept bitcoin payments due to environmental concerns, Elon Musk has tweeted that there may be a “potentially promising” solution.

The technology billionaire and crypto advocate revealed that he has met with bitcoin miners in North America about renewable operations - a trend that has increased significantly in recent years according to the latest data.

The last time Musk tweeted about bitcoin and its negative impact on the climate, the price crashed massively. If there is a solution that would encourage Tesla and others to begin accepting payments, we could see a similar movement for the crypto market, though this time in the other direction.