For traders on social media, bitcoin is a bubble unfolding in real time right before their eyes
- Bitcoin adds more than $1,000 in the week around Thanksgiving and is the talk of traders on Twitter.
- Conor Sen, a portfolio manager at New River Investments, was quick to compare bitcoin's surge to the tech-stock bubble of the 1990s
- On the other hand, T3Live Chief Strategist Scott Redler tweets the future of bitcoin is "unknown," but investors can still apply technical trading strategies.
As Wall Street traders refocused on markets after the Thanksgiving holiday, their Twitter feeds lit up with talk about bitcoin's rapid march toward $10,000.
"Certainly nothing seems to be stopping Bitcoin this morning, which seems to have captured the entire financial social media as it breaks towards $10,000," Peter Tchir, head of macro strategy at Brean Capital, said in a Monday morning email to clients.
Bitcoin has caught Wall Street's attention this year by multiplying more than nine times in price. Top banking executives such as JPMorgan Chase's Jamie Dimon have called the digital currency a "fraud." But well-known investors Bill Miller, Mike Novogratz and Josh Brown, CEO of Ritholtz Wealth Management and a CNBC contributor, have bought bitcoin.
Many on financial Twitter were a little more skeptical.
Conor Sen, a portfolio manager at New River Investments, was quick to compare bitcoin's surge to the tech-stock bubble of the 1990s. Sen has 26,800 followers on Twitter.
Wedbush's Ian Winer pointed to moves in an actual stock that reflect how much of a bubble bitcoin is in.
Riot Blockchain, the biotech company that added "blockchain" to its name in October, was down more than 30 percent Monday morning but held gains of more than 300 percent for the year. Overstock.com, a larger stock that has surged more than 260 percent this year on news of its blockchain business, attempted slight gains.
Charlie Bilello, director of research at Pension Partners, went on an 11-tweet streak about bitcoin's rapid price gains and market value.
Other traders on Twitter were more excited about bitcoin:
Peter Brandt, author of "Diary of a Professional Commodity Trader," tweeted to his 84,700 followers about the "biggest bull market" in his 43 years as a trader.
T3Live's chief strategist, Scott Redler, tweeted to his 57,200 followers that the future of bitcoin is "unknown," but investors can still apply technical trading strategies.
Bitcoin climbed more than $1,000 in a week to a record high of $9,732.76 Monday morning, according to CoinDesk. The digital currency has surged 50 percent in November alone and now has a market value of about $161 billion, according to CoinDesk. That's bigger than General Electric and slightly less than MasterCard.
Bitcoin was also the talk on the physical trading floor Monday.
Art Cashin, UBS director of floor operations at the New York Stock Exchange, said on CNBC's "Squawk on the Street" that "bitcoin has gone parabolic. I think we're in the fear-of-missing-out phase now."
U.S. stocks were little changed, near all-time highs midday Monday
Jeff Morris Jr., director of product management, revenue, at Tinder, tweeted Saturday that "most of the smartest thinkers I know are working in the cryptocurrency space" and skeptics should try to understand why "so many brilliant people are dedicating their lives to this emerging field."
Sven Henrich of NorthmanTrader, who has 46,200 followers, had few words for the digital currency except a "laughing, crying tears of joy" emoticon and a bitcoin surge chart: