Monero price tops $45 after strong gains

Monero has been the best-performing major cryptocurrency over the past 24 hours, with its price rising above $45 for the first time in over a month.

While most digital currencies have been on the rise in today’s trading, monero is currently the only coin in the top 10 to post double-digit percentage gains over the past 24 hours. While there isn’t an obvious reason for the coin’s strong performance, the price jump may suggest that there is growing demand for privacy-focused digital coins.

Bitcoin (BTC) transactions are often associated with privacy and anonymity, but the blockchain of the original cryptocurrency is actually quite transparent. Every single transaction is logged and public, so everyone can see how the money moved around. Monero on the other hand, is specifically designed to facilitate anonymous transactions.

Just a few of days ago the world’s largest bitcoin mixer, Bitmixer.io, announced it was shutting down its operations effective immediately. The move, which came just three days after a joint effort by law enforcement agencies from the US, Europe, and Thailand to shut down to shut down two of the largest dark web marketplaces, was aimed at making the “Bitcoin ecosystem more clean and transparent”, according to Bitmixer’s administrator. The statement also urged competing services to follow Bitmixer’s example.

It’s not clear whether Bitmixer’s voluntary closure has had any impact on the Monero price, but it seems reasonable to expect that people who want more privacy will explore other options. The only other alternative among the 10 biggest cryptocurrencies is dash, which has enjoyed strong over the past few days. But that rally was mainly due to Apple’s decision to allow dash-based applications to be published on the App Store. As of 14:49 BST, the dash price stood at $195.53, down 1.14 percent from the same time yesterday.

Meanwhile, the monero price was at $44.92. The coin, which was trading at over $45 earlier today, has gained 12.1 percent over the past 24 hours.