The price of Bitcoin (CRYPTO: BTC) was about $38,400 as of 12:45 p.m. EDT on Thursday, according to CoinDesk -- up sharply from its weekly low of about $35,000 on Sunday. There were two big news items for Bitcoin over the past week. The first concerns a social media post by Tesla CEO Elon Musk, which may only be a short-term catalyst. However, the Bitcoin blockchain is also now officially scheduled to receive an important upgrade, which could be a more long-term demand driver.
However, it's not as though technology company MicroStrategy (NASDAQ: MSTR) needed any more reasons to buy Bitcoin. The company is already taking on as much debt as it can to buy more and more bitcoins, as we'll see in a minute. And considering how much it owns, it's not surprising to see its stock rise with the price of Bitcoin in recent days. So far for the week, MicroStrategy stock is up 21%.
And with the price of Bitcoin rising, stocks that benefit from mining are also up for the week. As of this writing, Riot Blockchain (NASDAQ: RIOT) stock was up 13%, Canaan (NASDAQ: CAN) was up 8%, CleanSpark (NASDAQ: CLSK) was up 9%, and Ebang International Holdings (NASDAQ: EBON) was up 13%.
For further details see:
Why Bitcoin Stocks Like MicroStrategy and Riot Blockchain Were Up This Week