Why Bitcoin prices tend to move aggressively on weekends

Recent Bloomberg data revealed that spikes in weekend trading activity since May accounted for 40 percent of Bitcoin's price gains this entire year.

With crypto exchanges operating 24/7, and short term traders using Saturdays and Sundays to get ahead of the competition, weekends have become a Wild West for the crypto market.

While traditional stock markets see all activity halt on Friday afternoons, crypto trading is a world of its own.

A recent report found that some of the biggest spikes in the price of Bitcoin happened during the weekend-including the infamous ATH Bitcoin saw on Saturday, Dec. 17, 2017.

It's hard to say what factors cause investors to trade on the weekends.

Retail investors using weekends to get ahead of the market.

Tawil believes that more experienced traders expect most market-moving announcements to be made on Mondays, which is why they try and stay ahead of the game by trading on weekends.

"The market is, by and large, retail individuals and I think that weekends are a time when those people have more free time to read the week's news, to chat with friends, to pitch friends on exciting things they heard about during the week."

Others, like Bloomberg Intelligence analyst Mike McGlone, the international operations lead at Decred, believe that most spikes are recorded on weekends as there are fewer people trading altogether.

McGlone agreed with the statement but added that it could also be that "Sophisticated traders" in Asia are picking the path of least resistance to profit.