This week there have been a few major developments in the Bitcoin market ecosystem.

Yesterday MPEx increased its registration fee from the 30 BTC it had been since October 2012 to 50 BTC. Trading on MPEx was initially free until its beta period ended in April of 2012 when a 20 BTC fee was established for those wishing to trade directly on MPEx. Since the fixed fee for a seat at MPEx was established a number of brokers and pass through venues have offered MPEx trading at a lower cost for the casual investor, of which the most notable and storied surviving MPEx broker is CoinBR. The primary advantage of interacting directly with MPEx is its GPG order system which allows incredible levels of security. Mircea Popescu frequently compares having a GPG key registered with MPEx to having a seat at the New York Stock Exchange.

Barry Silbert's GBTC had spent the week trading at roughly twice its implict value with shares representing 0.1 BTC opening today's trading at $45, implying a price of $450 per Bitcoin. This price disconnect from more established Bitcoin-Fiat exchanges suggests a lack of sell side market liquidity capable of handling larger orders. The amount of Bitcoin each GBTC share represents decreases over time due to the deduction of management fees in a net effect reminiscent of economics of perpetual mining bonds. Buying GBTC would require a substantial bullish outlook for Bitcoin relative to the dollar, disinterest in actually possessing Bitcoin, and substantial fiat currency reserves that could not be reasonably invested into Bitcoin in any other way. At press time GBTC is trading at $38 per share.

New York based ItBit continues to assert its alignment with the fiat regime insisting that Bitcoin is somehow incapable of circumventing the legacy, fiat financial system. California also continues to dispute ItBit's claim that chartering as a Trust in New York allows it to legally operate in all 50 states.