Investing.com — Bitcoin prices rose on Friday, tracking a risk-driven rise in broader markets as a positive U.S. labor market helped ease some concerns that a recession was imminent, and altcoin prices also rose.
rose nearly 7% to $60,916.2, paring some gains after rising as high as $61,712.3.
The token was also poised for mild weekly gains after a drop of more than 10% in the previous week.
The world's largest cryptocurrency has recovered most of its losses this week, after falling as low as $49,000 on Monday amid a broader market rout.
Bitcoin price rises as fears of recession and rate hikes ease
The token followed a rally in broader markets, especially stocks, as better-than-expected weekly data fueled bets that a US economic slowdown was not as imminent as initially feared.
Recession fears had hit risk assets over the past week and the first half of this week, fueled by data showing a sharp decline in .
Less hawkish comments from Bank of Japan officials also helped improve risk appetite, after the central bank raised interest rates and announced further increases during a meeting last week.
Bank of Japan officials said this week that the bank will not raise rates during periods of market volatility, helping to improve sentiment. Losses in the Japanese yen also indicated a recovery in risk appetite.
Cryptocurrency price today: XRP rally cools after SEC fine, but altcoins rise
Among the broader cryptocurrency markets, it fell after a strong rally in the previous session when Labs, the token issuer, was hit with a $125 million fine in a long-running lawsuit with the Securities and Exchange Commission.
While the fine was a fraction of the $2 billion the SEC was reportedly seeking, the ruling also slapped Ripple with a court order requiring it to register any additional securities sales.
Additionally, the case did not answer the long-standing regulatory question of whether crypto tokens qualify as securities. The SEC is also expected to potentially appeal an earlier ruling that said Ripple’s XRP sales to retail investors did not qualify as securities sales.
With the exception of XRP, the broader altcoins rose in tandem with Bitcoin. The world's No. 2 token rose 10.6% to $2,681.80.
and rose 1.5% and 3.6% respectively, while among meme tokens, they added 4.7%.
