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A number of factors are behind bitcoin’s New Year rise, according to analysts, including an increased probability of interest rates being lowered and purchases by large buyers known as “whales.”

Filip Radwanski | Sopa Images | Lightrocket | Getty Images

Bitcoin has begun 2023 on a positive note, with the price of the world’s largest digital token up roughly 26% since the start of January.

On Saturday, bitcoin’s price rose above $21,000 per coin for the first time since Nov. 7.

It’s still a far cry from the $68,990 record high bitcoin notched in Nov. 2021. But it has given market players cause for some optimism.

The month-to-date rally follows a grim 2022, which saw major insolvencies and scandals in the crypto industry, including the collapse of FTX, and a sharp pullback in the broader market linked to central bank actions.

Analysts say that a number of factors are behind bitcoin’s New Year rise, including an increased probability of interest rates being lowered, as well as purchases by large buyers known as “whales.”

New Year, new monetary policy?

Inflation is cooling down, and economic indicators suggest slowing U.S. economic activity. That’s made traders optimistic the Federal Reserve could reverse, or at least soften, its rate hiking strategy.

FTX's collapse is shaking crypto to its core. The pain may not be over

Last week, fresh U.S. inflation data showed a modest retreat, with the consumer price index decreasing 0.1% in December on a monthly basis, in line with Dow Jones estimates.

“Bitcoin looks to have recoupled with macro data as investors shrug off the FTX collapse,” James Butterfill, head of research at digital asset management firm CoinShares, told CNBC by email.

“The most important macro data investors are focussing on is the weak services PMI and the trending down of employment and wage data. This coupled with downwards trend in inflation has led to improving confidence, while it comes at a time when valuations for Bitcoin … are close to all time lows. The prospect of looser monetary policy off the back of weaker macro data and low valuations is what has led this rally.”

The Fed lifted borrowing rates seven times in 2022, forcing risky assets such as stocks — and tech stocks, in particular — into a tailspin. In December, the benchmark funds rate increased to 4.25%-4.50%, reaching its highest level since 2007.

Bitcoin has been caught up in the market drama around lending rates, as it is increasingly viewed by investors as a risky asset.

Backers previously talked up bitcoin’s potential as a “hedge” to buy in times of high inflation. But bitcoin failed to achieve that aim in 2022, instead slipping more than 60% as the U.S. and other major economies grappled with higher rates and living costs.

Yuya Hasegawa, crypto market analyst at Japanese crypto exchange Bitbank, said in a Jan. 13 note that this was “brewing a hope amongst market participants that the Fed will further slow down on the pace of rate hikes.”

The Fed is likely to keep interest rates high for the time being. However, some market players are hopeful that central banks will start easing the pace of rate rises, or even slash rates. Some economists predict a Fed rate cut could happen as soon as this year.

That’s as the risk of a recession is also playing on central bankers’ minds.

Some two-thirds of chief economists surveyed by the World Economic Forum believe a global recession is likely in 2023, according to research released by the Davos organizer on Monday.

The U.S. dollar has also sagged, with the greenback down 9% against a basket of currencies used by U.S. trade partners in the last three months. The majority of bitcoin trades against USD, making a weaker dollar better for bitcoin.

“We are seeing the dollar put in a top, inflation easing, interest rate hikes slowing down – all pointing to markets getting more risk-on over the next few months,” Vijay Ayyar, vice president of corporate development and international at crypto exchange Luno, told CNBC.

‘Whales’ buying BTC

Larger purchasers of digital coins known as “whales” may be leading the latest rally in bitcoin, according to Kaiko.

The crypto data firm said in a series of tweets Monday that trade sizes had climbed from an average of $700 on Jan. 8 to $1,100 today on the crypto exchange Binance, indicating renewed confidence in the market by whales.

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Whales are investors who’ve hoarded large piles of bitcoin. Some are individuals, like MicroStrategy CEO Michael Saylor and Silicon Valley investor Tim Draper. Others are entities such as market makers, which act as the middlemen in trades between buyers and sellers.

Skeptics of digital currencies say this makes the market prone to manipulation by a select few investors with large piles of tokens. The wealthiest 97 bitcoin wallet addresses account for 14.15% of the total supply, according to fintech firm River Financial.

In December, Carol Alexander, a professor at the University of Sussex, told CNBC that bitcoin could see a “managed bull market” in 2023 in which bitcoin travels north of $30,000 in the first quarter, and to $50,000 in the second half. Her reasoning was that with trading volumes evaporating, and the level of fear in the market extremely high, whales would then step in to prop up the market.

Bitcoin mining difficulty rising

There are other factors at play, as well.

Several bitcoin miners have been flushed out by the drop in prices. Bitcoin miners, who use power-intensive machines to verify transactions and mint new tokens, have been squeezed by the slump in prices and rising energy costs.

That’s historically a good sign for bitcoin, according to Ayyar.

Further pain ahead for crypto but bitcoin has been resilient, VC Bill Tai says

These actors accumulate massive piles of digital currency, making them some of the biggest sellers in the market. With miners offloading their holdings to pay off debts, that removes much of the remaining selling pressure on bitcoin.

More recently, however, bitcoin’s network “difficulty” has been increasing, meaning more computing power is being deployed to unleash new tokens into circulation.

Mining difficulty reached a record 37.6 trillion on Sunday, according to BTC.com data, meaning that, on average, it would take 37.6 trillion hashes, or attempts, to find a valid bitcoin block and add it to the blockchain.

“Bitcoin mining difficulty is a measure of how difficult it is to create the next block of transactions,” said Marcus Sotiriou, market analyst at digital asset broker GlobalBlock, told CNBC.

“Bitcoin mining difficulty fell 3.6% before the last update, after a winter storm led some miners to shut down. However, now miners appear to have come back online, with new and more efficient machines.”

2024 ‘halving’

Meanwhile, events further down the crypto calendar could give traders cause for some New Year cheer. It is still a year away, but the so-called bitcoin “halving” is an event that often leads to excitement for crypto investors.

The halving, where bitcoin rewards to miners are cut in half, is viewed by some investors as positive for bitcoin’s price as it squeezes supply.

“There are signs this could be the beginning of a new cycle with Bitcoin, as it typically does around 15-18 months before halving,” Ayyar told CNBC. 

The next halving is slated to happen sometime between March and May of 2024.

However, Ayyar cautioned, “At this point, we’re in overbought territory with Bitcoin and hence could definitely see a dip.” Prices could go for a dip if bitcoin closes below $18,000 in the next few days, he added.

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Google agrees to pay Texas $1.4 billion data privacy settlement

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Google agrees to pay Texas .4 billion data privacy settlement

A Google corporate logo hangs above the entrance to the company’s office at St. John’s Terminal in New York City on March 11, 2025.

Gary Hershorn | Corbis News | Getty Images

Google agreed to pay nearly $1.4 billion to the state of Texas to settle allegations of violating the data privacy rights of state residents, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton said Friday.

Paxton sued Google in 2022 for allegedly unlawfully tracking and collecting the private data of users.

The attorney general said the settlement, which covers allegations in two separate lawsuits against the search engine and app giant, dwarfed all past settlements by other states with Google for similar data privacy violations.

Google’s settlement comes nearly 10 months after Paxton obtained a $1.4 billion settlement for Texas from Meta, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram, to resolve claims of unauthorized use of biometric data by users of those popular social media platforms.

“In Texas, Big Tech is not above the law,” Paxton said in a statement on Friday.

“For years, Google secretly tracked people’s movements, private searches, and even their voiceprints and facial geometry through their products and services. I fought back and won,” said Paxton.

“This $1.375 billion settlement is a major win for Texans’ privacy and tells companies that they will pay for abusing our trust.”

Google spokesman Jose Castaneda said the company did not admit any wrongdoing or liability in the settlement, which involves allegations related to the Chrome browser’s incognito setting, disclosures related to location history on the Google Maps app, and biometric claims related to Google Photo.

Castaneda said Google does not have to make any changes to products in connection with the settlement and that all of the policy changes that the company made in connection with the allegations were previously announced or implemented.

“This settles a raft of old claims, many of which have already been resolved elsewhere, concerning product policies we have long since changed,” Castaneda said.

“We are pleased to put them behind us, and we will continue to build robust privacy controls into our services.”

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Virtual chronic care company Omada Health files for IPO

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Virtual chronic care company Omada Health files for IPO

Omada Health smart devices in use.

Courtesy: Omada Health

Virtual care company Omada Health filed for an IPO on Friday, the latest digital health company that’s signaled its intent to hit the public markets despite a turbulent economy.

Founded in 2012, Omada offers virtual care programs to support patients with chronic conditions like prediabetes, diabetes and hypertension. The company describes its approach as a “between-visit care model” that is complementary to the broader health-care ecosystem, according to its prospectus.

Revenue increased 57% in the first quarter to $55 million, up from $35.1 million during the same period last year, the filing said. The San Francisco-based company generated $169.8 million in revenue during 2024, up 38% from $122.8 million the previous year.

Omada’s net loss narrowed to $9.4 million during its first quarter from $19 million during the same period last year. It reported a net loss of $47.1 million in 2024, compared to a $67.5 million net loss during 2023.

The IPO market has been largely dormant across the tech sector for the past three years, and within digital health, it’s been almost completely dead. After President Donald Trump announced a sweeping tariff policy that plunged U.S. markets into turmoil last month, taking a company public is an even riskier endeavor. Online lender Klarna delayed its long-anticipated IPO, as did ticket marketplace StubHub.

But Omada Health isn’t the first digital health company to file for its public market debut this year. Virtual physical therapy startup Hinge Health filed its prospectus in March, and provided an update with its first-quarter earnings on Monday, a signal to investors that it’s looking to forge ahead.

Omada contracts with employers, and the company said it works with more than 2,000 customers and supports 679,000 members as of March 31. More than 156 million Americans suffer from at least one chronic condition, so there is a significant market opportunity, according to the company’s filing.

In 2022, Omada announced a $192 million funding round that pushed its valuation above $1 billion. U.S. Venture Partners, Andreessen Horowitz and Fidelity’s FMR LLC are the largest outside shareholders in the company, each owning between 9% and 10% of the stock.

“To our prospective shareholders, thank you for learning more about Omada. I invite you join our journey,” Omada co-founder and CEO Sean Duffy said in the filing. “In front of us is a unique chance to build a promising and successful business while truly changing lives.”

WATCH: The IPO market is likely to pick up near Labor Day, says FirstMark’s Rick Heitzmann

The IPO market is likely to pick up near Labor Day, says FirstMark's Rick Heitzmann

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Google would need to shift up to 2,000 employees for antitrust remedies, search head says

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Google would need to shift up to 2,000 employees for antitrust remedies, search head says

Liz Reid, vice president, search, Google speaks during an event in New Delhi on December 19, 2022.

Sajjad Hussain | AFP | Getty Images

Testimony in Google‘s antitrust search remedies trial that wrapped hearings Friday shows how the company is calculating possible changes proposed by the Department of Justice.

Google head of search Liz Reid testified in court Tuesday that the company would need to divert between 1,000 and 2,000 employees, roughly 20% of Google’s search organization, to carry out some of the proposed remedies, a source with knowledge of the proceedings confirmed.

The testimony comes during the final days of the remedies trial, which will determine what penalties should be taken against Google after a judge last year ruled the company has held an illegal monopoly in its core market of internet search.

The DOJ, which filed the original antitrust suit and proposed remedies, asked the judge to force Google to share its data used for generating search results, such as click data. It also asked for the company to remove the use of “compelled syndication,” which refers to the practice of making certain deals with companies to ensure its search engine remains the default choice in browsers and smartphones. 

Read more CNBC tech news

Google pays Apple billions of dollars per year to be the default search engine on iPhones. It’s lucrative for Apple and a valuable way for Google to get more search volume and users.

Apple’s SVP of Services Eddy Cue testified Wednesday that Apple chooses to feature Google because it’s “the best search engine.”

The DOJ also proposed the company divest its Chrome browser but that was not included in Reid’s initial calculation, the source confirmed.

Reid on Tuesday said Google’s proprietary “Knowledge Graph” database, which it uses to surface search results, contains more than 500 billion facts, according to the source, and that Google has invested more than $20 billion in engineering costs and content acquisition over more than a decade.

“People ask Google questions they wouldn’t ask anyone else,” she said, according to the source.

Reid echoed Google’s argument that sharing its data would create privacy risks, the source confirmed.

Closing arguments for the search remedies trial will take place May 29th and 30th, followed by the judge’s decision expected in August.

The company faces a separate remedies trial for its advertising tech business, which is scheduled to begin Sept. 22.

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