Total Crypto Market Cap Hits 7-Week High At $400 Bln, BTC Holds Near $9K

The crypto market is continuing to grow with only slight dips today, April 23, as Bitcoin remains close to $9,000 after two weeks of gains and total market cap hits a 7-week high, according to data from CoinMarketCap.

Crypto market visualization from coin360.io.

BTC is currently trading at around $8,840, down around 0.70 percent over a 24 hour period to press time, according to data from Cointelegraph's BTC price index.

Ethereum is up around 0.10 percent over a 24 hour period to press time, trading at around $636, according to data from Cointelegraph's ETH price index.

Of the top ten coins on CoinMarketCap, Bitcoin Cash is up the most, more than 12 percent over a 24 hour period to press time, and trading at around $1,400.

The notable growth could be attributed to an announcement of a scheduled May 15 hard fork network upgrade that will increase the maximum blocksize to 32MB. Crypto payment processor BitPay's update announcement today that allows BCH to be accepted on their BitPay Checkout app could also have contributed to BCH's price rise.

Total market cap of all cryptocurrencies - which hit $400 bln today for the first time since March 8 - is currently around $399. Goldman Sachs, which had previously refuted claims it would open a crypto trading desk - although the bank has owned a stake in one since 2015 - reported today that they have hired crypto trader Justin Schmidt to lead their digital assets markets and help clients gain exposure to crypto.

Sources also told Bloomberg this week that investment banking giant Barclays is considering opening a crypto trading desk as well.

Barclays and Goldman Sachs eyeing to enter the cryptocurrency marker by launching trading desks.

If the two banks open crypto trading to their millions of clients, a new level of liquidity can be expected.