The price of Bitcoin hits $1000 point at the start of the year according to Coindesk Bitcoin Price Index Chart and to some exchanges such as Coinbase and Bitfinex. However, China has even reached more than $1000 of the Bitcoin price in its equivalent in Yuan, at ¥7100 or approximately $1022.35, based on Cryptocoinsnews. This price outcome still makes China’s trading volumes a huge contributor to Bitcoin’s demand and rise in value.

According to Cryptocoinnews, Bitcoin price at Bitstamp is at $998.50 in the first day of January and just reached the $1005.75 mark today, January 2 at 3:47 (UTC). Base on Cryptocoinsnews’ observation, Bitcoin’s price started surging at 10:00 (UTC) in January 1st 2017 with a flying spike from $965.36 to $974.59 in just one hour. At 16:15 (UTC), another quick rise started again from $976.91 to $993.97 in just one hour and at 18:45 (UTC), it settled on $998 high on the same day.

This memorable event in Bitcoin has been observed by many people in the Bitcoin and Blockchain community, which adds up to the anticipation that Blockchain startups bring in the year 2016. Ethereum, Zcash, Monero and other Altcoins have catched everyones’ attention and Bitcoin has been continuously increasing in value up to the start of this year. All of these may lead to increase Bitcoin’s potential and as well as of the Blockchain technology.

Also, Cryptocoinsnews mentioned that this year might hopefully be the time to solve the scalability debate as Trump administration shows a positive effect to Bitcoin and the rest of the Fintech scene. Many hope that he may change double taxation policy in the US, eliminate BitLicense and implement a security mechanism in line with UK’s progressive approach to Fintech.

The website also pointed out Ethereum projects that was launched last year will now be tested for reliability in the real-world scene. Some of them are already reaching a critical mass and more are expected to pilot this year as experiments on Blockchain technology continues. Also, many anticipates about the integration of common applications with blockchain this year which will soon be deployed and used fully in the years to come.

Now, with the friendly approach of US regulations to blockchain technology, developments and innovations will likely to speed up since the country has the most demand for the technology. Blockchain has gone mainstream as financial industry leaders started to be aware and adopt to Bitcoin, Ethereum, Zcash and some other blockchain public startups.

With these expectations, will 2017 be the year for Bitcoin? Based on Coindesk’s “What Will the Bitcoin Price Be in 2017?” article, many of the market participants have predicted the price of Bitcoin by the end of the year 2017. Bobby Lee of BTCC said that the price this year will be much more higher than its previous high which is at $1,150. Vinny Lingham of Civic, ambitiously predicted the price to be between $2k to $3k and might exceed the $3000 point. Petar Zivkovski of Whaleclub predicted $2000 by the end of this year while Joe Lee of Magnr expected Bitcoin’s price to stabilize at $1500.