The daily business briefing: July 26, 2021

Bitcoin jumps to 6-week high after bullish comments, stock futures fall after last week's records, and more

Bitcoin
(Image credit: OZAN KOSE/AFP via Getty Images)

1. Bitcoin jumps to 6-week high

Bitcoin surged to a six-week high early Monday, with its price rising by more than 20 percent to $39,112, according to CoinDesk. A rival cryptocurrency, ether, rose by more than 16 percent. Tesla CEO Elon Musk recently said he and another of his companies, SpaceX, hold bitcoin, and that Tesla would probably start accepting bitcoin as payment again as soon as the energy-intensive process of "mining" it becomes less dependent on fossil fuels. These and other comments supporting cryptocurrency have prompted investors and speculators to "build up their positions and buy back bitcoin," said Bobby Lee, founder and CEO of cryptocurrency hardware wallet Ballet. Bitcoin is still 40 percent below its mid-April high of nearly $65,000.

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Harold Maass, The Week US

Harold Maass is a contributing editor at The Week. He has been writing for The Week since the 2001 debut of the U.S. print edition and served as editor of TheWeek.com when it launched in 2008. Harold started his career as a newspaper reporter in South Florida and Haiti. He has previously worked for a variety of news outlets, including The Miami Herald, ABC News and Fox News, and for several years wrote a daily roundup of financial news for The Week and Yahoo Finance.