Bitcoin hit a fresh all-time high on Thursday, passing the $5,000 mark in early-morning European trade.
The cryptocurrency has held onto those gains into the early afternoon, with bitcoin trading up by close to 8.5% on the day, hitting a value of $5,223 by 12.20 p.m. BST (7.20 a.m. ET) as the chart below illustrates:

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The day's rise comes "as bulls returned to the market with a vengeance," according to Neil Wilson, a senior analyst at ETX Capital.
"Regulatory woes have subsided with reports indicating that China may be ready to allow trading again, albeit with tighter regulation," he added. "The prospect of Goldman Sachs trading Bitcoin is also driving buying as this might give it a toehold on Wall Street that could bring it into the mainstream and attract fresh inflows of capital."
Also this week, a team of analysts led by Gautam Chhugani and Gaurav Jangale from the research house Bernstein
said that bitcoin was still just a "censorship-resistant asset class," out of the reach of state control and yet to form a part of the system of settlement and credit that defines money.
"Fiat money is still the final form of settlement - governments still collect taxes in fiat money and salaries are still paid in fiat money," the team said in a note to clients on Wednesday.