Bitcoin prices are back to all-time records today. After clearing $1000 on both MtGox and BTC China last week before briefly falling back down, the milestone has now been achieved on Bitstamp, as prices hit a high of $1033 today. In terms of news that is leading to today’s rally, Shopify has announced that it is integrating bitcoin payments for its 75,000 plus merchant client base.
Among the largest bitcoin exchanges by volume, Bitstamp pricing has become more widely used as the pseudo official price of bitcoins. Becoming the proxy of pricing, Bitstamp replaced MtGox as that exchange has seen its values soar above others due to delays in handling dollar based transactions.
Bitstamp itself had its own scare last week as prices of bitcoins traded above those on MtGox for the first time in months as the firm notified clients that a surge of interest led to two day delays in funding processing. However, that issue appears to have settled itself off with MtGox again trading at a huge premium to Bitstamp. As seen in the prices below, spreads between exchanges are once again rising with MtG0x prices around $100 to $200 above those of Bistamp and BTC-e. In addition to the funding delays that have led to premiums, as prices rise, it also had led to thinner market depth. The lack of meaningful market depth allows for quick spikes in prices as it takes less money to move the market.