The prices of bitcoin and bitcoin futures rose in trading Thursday, resuming a record-breaking bull run, or speculative bubble, that has now been partly blamed on Japanese housewives.

Bitcoin futures on the Cboe Global Markets exchange, having slumped yesterday as investors invested in alternative cryptocurrencies, were up across one-month, two-month and three-month contracts. The prices of the futures sat at $17,900, $17,930 and $18,110, respectively, as of 10:45 p.m. EST. Bitcoin itself saw a rise from an intraday low of $16,155.77 to $17,315.67.

There have been many reasons put forward for the speculative bubble that has pushed the price of bitcoin to constant record highs this year, but the newest one, perhaps as speculative as the price rise itself, is Japanese housewives.

Deutsche Bank AG is reported to have said in a note to investors Tuesday that “Mrs. Watanabe” is behind bitcoin’s rise this year. According to Investopedia, Mrs. Watanabe is a generic term used to describe an “archetypical Japanese housewife who seeks the best use of her family’s savings.” The same investor note did add that it’s more likely Japanese men fueling the rise, given that 79 percent of all trading accounts are held by them. But either way, it’s investors in Japan, versus South Korea, that are driving bitcoin speculation, with around 50 percent of all bitcoin trades globally emanating from the country.

While Japanese men or women speculate on bitcoin, back across the Pacific an unnamed bitcoin investor has pledged the equivalent of about $86 million in bitcoin to charity.

Called the “Pineapple Fund,” the bitcoin-based charity is aiming to give generously to multiple causes. “Sometime around the early days of bitcoin, I saw the promise of decentralized money and decided to mine/buy/trade some magical internet tokens,” the founder of the fund said. “The expectation shattering returns of bitcoin over many years has lead to an amount far more than I can spend.

“What do you do when you have more money than you can ever possibly spend? Donating most of it to charity is what I’m doing,” he or she added. “For reference, The Pineapple Fund is bigger than the entire market cap of bitcoin when I got in, and one of the richest 250 bitcoin addresses today.”

It’s difficult to ascertain how legitimate a charity is when its founder remains anonymous. But at least one group, med-tech charity Watsi, confirmed on Twitter that it had indeed received a donation from the fund.

Photo: kaybee07/Wikipedia Commons