The price of Bitcoin broke the $50,000 threshold early Wednesday in Asia before settling around $49,800.
The coin's price has been appreciating recently after Tesla, Inc. founder Elon Musk announced customers could buy his electric vehicles with the cryptocurrency.
The $50,000 level is an "emotional level for people in the space," said Brian Melville, head of strategy at trading company Cumberland. But it is also a simple result of supply and demand, he added.
Bitcoin's valuation has climbed more than 66% this year. It crested at $40,000 per coin in early January before briefly falling to $30,000 ahead of this latest rise in price.
Tesla threw its weight behind Bitcoin and announced it had purchased $1.5 billion in Bitcoin as part of its cash holdings in a Securities and Exchange Commission filing Feb. 8, pushing the cryptocurrency's price up.
Its current rise in value "blows the doors off prior bubbles," Bank of America Merrill Lynch said. Its previous peak was $25,000 in late 2017.
"It should be considered speculation at this point," Musk said in an interview warning people not to invest their life savings in cryptocurrency.
Still, the latest Bitcoin rally has pushed several large corporate groups and financial institutions to board the cryptocurrency bandwagon.
Mastercard Inc. announced Feb. 10 it would be bringing "select cryptocurrencies" to its network for customers to pay with.
The company said it would support "select cryptocurrencies" directly on its network at some point later this year.
"Our philosophy on cryptocurrencies is straightforward: It's about choice," Mastercard executive vice president Raj Dhamodharan said.
"We are here to enable customers, merchants and businesses to move digital value - traditional or cryptocurrency - however they want.
There are growing calls for better oversight over the untraceable currency and both American Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen and European Central Bank head Christine Lagarde have demanded stronger regulation.
