Bitcoin's heightened volatility indication of a bubble?

New York

BITCOIN'S astronomical rally has cryptocurrency bulls feeling vindicated. Not so fast, skeptics say. The digital currency's more than 100 per cent surge in the past two months looks eerily familiar, argue the bears, pointing to November 2013 when the price quintupled in short order to top US$1,000 for the fist time. By Valentine's Day it was worth half that, and spent the better part of the next two years languishing below US$500.

Then it absolutely exploded - jumping more than US$1,400 in two months. At its height last week, one bitcoin could buy about two ounces of gold. Its champions touted the arrival of blockchain into the mainstream, the coin's underlying technology which they say can lift the poor out of poverty and make transactions more secure, inexpensive and efficient.