Bitcoin hits new annual high at $15,977, Zhao Changpeng shares bullish tweet for September: "This is not investment advice, it's face-slapping advice."

Bitcoin surged past $14,000 yesterday and according to Coinbase trading data, it hit a new yearly high of $15,977 today. This surpasses the opening price of January 8, 2018. Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao also expressed confidence, stating that the price could reach the historical high of $20,000.

Bitcoin Price Returns to January 8, 2018 Levels

Yesterday evening, U.S. stock indices rose across the board, led by gains in tech stocks such as Netflix, Apple, and Microsoft, with the Dow and S&P indices both rising over 2%. Bitcoin, which has remained correlated with the U.S. stock market, surged 12% in the past 24 hours, reaching a price of 15,977 at one point before dropping to $15,611 at the time of writing.

Breaking the Hundred-Day Mark Above Ten Thousand

Previously, the longest streak of Bitcoin trading above ten thousand lasted for 62 days from December 2017 to January 2018. As of September 29 this year, Bitcoin has surpassed the $10,000 mark in both opening and closing prices for 63 consecutive trading days, reaching a milestone of 100 days as of today (11/6).

General Optimism Across Various Sectors

Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao (CZ) has long been known for his bullish stance on Bitcoin. In August of last year, he publicly stated that selling Bitcoin below $10,000 would not be advisable. When Bitcoin previously dropped below this level, his statement was often criticized within the crypto community and labeled as a "contrary indicator."

However, CZ has somewhat proven his point today (11/6) by claiming that Bitcoin's price will reach $20,000 and sharing a tweet from September 5, when he mentioned:

Bullish on Bitcoin to rise to $12,000. Not financial advice, just a slap in the advice.

A Strong Rebound in a Few Altcoins

Over the past 24 hours, a few altcoins have outperformed Bitcoin, with some experiencing gains exceeding Bitcoin's. These include development platform NEAR Protocol (NEAR), financial platform Uquid Coin (UQC), synthetic asset Synthetix (SNX), lending platform Aave (AAVE), and decentralized exchange Uniswap (UNI), all of which are top hundred coins with gains exceeding 24%.

Spencer Noon, head of DTC Capital, also noted that new participants in the market are more likely to drive the rise of altcoins during a bull market. He mentioned:

A $15,000 Bitcoin is the best advertisement for the crypto market in years, but new participants in the market tend to buy altcoins instead of Bitcoin. Since Bitcoin can be divided into smaller units, they psychologically prefer to hold a whole token rather than fractions of Bitcoin.