Bitcoin (BITCOMP) appears to be holding its ground after another week spent mostly to the north of $60,000. Having quickly retreated from its all-time high on October 21, it opened last week at $60,855 and closed slightly higher at $61,356. In between, it peaked at $63,620 on Monday evening and swiftly recovered from a midweek low of $58,311. 

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The result was a monthly gain for BTC of more than 40% in October.

Following in its footsteps, Ethereum (ETH-X) hit its own all-time high this week. After trading as low as $3,919 on Thursday morning, it jumped to a peak of over $4,444 on Friday afternoon, marginally beating its previous record from May this year. 

Over the weekend, ETH dipped back below the $4,300 level, but still closed the week up 5.3% and the month up 43.2%. A good way to start November. 

Gaming giant moves into crypto

Major gaming developer Ubisoft (UBSFY) has announced that it is looking at incorporating blockchain technology into its business.

In its Q3 results reported on Thursday (October 29), the firm announced that it was “exploring” blockchain technology. The move raises the prospect that the developer could soon begin making so-called ‘play-to-earn’ games, where gamers are rewarded for time spent in games with digital assets.

The gaming industry has been flirting increasingly with blockchain technology, but not all participants are yet convinced, with developer Valve banning anything blockchain-related from its Steam platform recently.

Mastercard gives business access to crypto

Major payments network Mastercard (MA) has said that it plans to open up its payments infrastructure to crypto transactions for businesses ‘soon’.

The firm is partnering with Bakkt, a behind-the-scenes custodial services provider that specializes in crypto. The move means that thousands of businesses and millions of Mastercard holders could soon have direct access to crypto payments infrastructure.

The firm will enable credit and debit cards to spend using crypto and will enable crypto reward and loyalty schemes to function on its network. This could lead to rewards from firms such as airlines being converted into cryptoassets by the recipient. 

According to the firm, there are more than 2.8 billion Mastercard users around the world, making for an unprecedented potential expansion of the availability of crypto at the point of purchase.

Bitcoin creator wallet activates

A bitcoin wallet associated with Satoshi Nakamoto, the pseudonymous creator of the world’s largest cryptoasset, has been activated.

The wallet, which has lain dormant since May 17, 2010, contains 50 BTC, according to the Independent.

It is not the first time that a wallet associated with bitcoin’s mysterious creator has been activated. In September, a larger wallet with 616 BTC related to Nakamoto was activated.

While it is impossible to tell the identity of the holder, wallet contents can be tracked through the blockchain as this information is transparently carried.