Bitcoin Price Leaps to $6,900 as BitMEX Shuts Down for Maintenance

Bitcoin (BTC) jumped 4% overnight, reaching a two-week high, the first positive change for the crypto coin after it lost nearly 30% of its value at the start of August. According to data from coinmarketcap.com, BTC was sitting at $6,400 before it rose to $6,900. This marked the first time Bitcoin traded above $6,700 since August 7.

Ethereum’s digital token (ETH) was up 1.5%, while Ripple (XRP) rose 2% and was selling at 34 cents. Last week the price of Bitcoin, ETH, and XRP fell rapidly after SEC announced it would postpone its decision on a proposed bitcoin ETF (exchange-traded fund).

The reason for the spike is unclear, but Bitcoin commentators attribute it to the fact that popular cryptocurrency trading platform BitMEX permits traders to short Bitcoin on margin. Cryptocurrency exchange Bitfinex reported shorts orders are almost at all-time highs, with 39,542 short orders outstanding on the exchange, the second highest level since April 12 of this year.

Bitcoin’s price jump did coincide with BitMEX’ scheduled maintenance. The site went offline at 1:00 UTC, just before BTC spiked from $6,466 to $6,745 in under a minute. The maintenance was related to a denial of service attack during which hackers managed to take BitMEX’ platform down earlier that day.

Earlier today the Hong Kong Economic Times reported BitMEX leased the 45th floor of the Cheung Kong Center in Central Hong Kong, one of the most expensive office districts in the world. The building is home to some of the most notable financial institutions in the world, such as Goldman Sachs Group Inc., Barclays Plc, Bank of America Corp, Bloomberg LP, as well as Hong Kong billionaire Li Ka-shing’s foundation. According to the newspaper, BitMEX initially planned to rent only half of the floor, but expansion plans prompted the company to rent the full 20,000 square feet.