Investing.com - Cryptocurrency markets rose on Thursday, with Bitcoin rising over $10,500 after Singapore regulators said they were looking into protecting investors from digital currencies.
Bitcoin was trading at $10,812, up 3.67% as of 8:41 AM ET (13:41 GMT) on the Bitfinex exchange after hitting an overnight low of $10,265. Bitcoin has struggled to stay above $11,000 since it hit a two-month low of $6,000 in early February.
Singapore’s central bank is considering if additional regulations are needed to protect cryptocurrency investors, an official said on Thursday. The central bank already regulates virtual currencies if they pose a risk, such as anti-laundering requirements for exchanges and others providing cryptocurrency services.
"We are assessing if additional regulations are required for investor protection," Ong Chong Tee, deputy managing director (Financial Supervision), Monetary Authority of Singapore said.
As the virtual currencies grow in popularity, regulators around the world have been debating about the best way to regulate cryptocurrencies.
In the U.S., the Securities and Exchange Commission is investigating the initial-coin-offerings (ICO) industry. The agency has issued dozens of subpoenas to request information on companies tied to crypto markets, including insight into the structure of ICO sales and pre-sales.
"A number of concerns have been raised regarding the cryptocurrency and ICO markets, including that, as they are currently operating, there is substantially less investor protection than in our traditional securities markets, with correspondingly greater opportunities for fraud and manipulation," SEC chairman Jay Clayton said in a statement.
ICO’s are a fund-raising method whereby companies issue their own virtual coins, in exchange for Bitcoin or another asset. The market is rather unstable, with 46% of new ICOs having already gone out of business this year.
Other virtual currencies were up, with rival Ethereum, the world’s second largest cryptocurrency by market cap, inching up 0.52% to $867.49 on the Bitfinex exchange.
The third largest cryptocurrency, Ripple, was up 5.42% to trade at $0.94039 and Litecoin was last at $209.48, a rise of 1.69%.