Bitcoin

Payment industry mega-mergers continue with $21.5B deal; the cryptocurrency is up 140% this year, including 70% this month.

Bitcoin slumped Friday bringing this month’s spirited surge to a halt and taking rival coins down with it.

Some of the biggest venture capitalists in the field are backing a new digital currency being offered by a leading blockchain academic.

Although the euphoria over blockchain has dissipated recently, many still see it as vital to the future of banks and the economy at large. Following are key issues being hashed out.

"Institutional support" spurs cryptocurrency price gains; the regulation limits what banks can charge for going negative on accounts.

Bitcoin jumped to almost $8,000 and didn’t look back, as its longest winning streak since 2013 continued to rekindle the global cryptocurrency market.

Some banks have backed away from the technology, but Northern Trust, State Street and JPMorgan Chase are among those actively working on blockchain projects.

Binance, one of the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchanges, said hackers withdrew 7,000 bitcoins worth about $40 million via a single transaction in a “large scale security breach,” the latest in a long line of thefts in the digital currency space.

Fidelity Investments, which began a custody service to store bitcoin earlier this year, will buy and sell the world’s most popular digital asset for institutional customers within a few weeks, according to a person familiar with the matter.

Martin Chavez, global co-head of the securities division at Goldman, suggested the bank is unlikely to fully support crypto until such currencies have the backing of the U.S. government.