The last 24 hours have seen steady growth for almost all of the top cryptocurrencies, including bitcoin (up 3.43%) and dogecoin (up 3.07%).

Litecoin remains the third most valuable cryptocurrency by market cap but fell slightly, down 0.39% to $21.81 (£13.35) per coin and still some way behind bitcoin at $840.17, according to CoinMarketCap.com.

The biggest winner was vertcoin, which saw gains of more than 167%, continuing from a 70% gain the previous day; the currency stands at $2 per coin and is now the 23rd most valuably coin by market cap.

Other winners include mooncoin - up 65% to $0.00012 per coin - and novacoin - up 15.5% to $12.26.

After suffering a 12% fall the previous day, 42Coin, the world's most valuable cryptocurrency, saw gains of almost 6% to $190,551 per coin. Mining remains painfully slow however, with 1.20 coins now available, up 0.1 in 24 hours.

Bitcoin payments come to 200,000-hotel travel agency

Bitcoin's acceptance gained a boost early this week when California-based travel agency CheapAir.com announced it would accept the virtual currency for booking holidays in some 200,000 hotels. The website has accepted bitcoin payment for flights since striking a deal with Coinbase in November last year.

Speaking to CoinDesk, CheapAir founder and CEO Jeff Klee said: "Bitcoin gets a bad rap in mainstream media. What I found is that the people who use bitcoin are great, they're passionate and they're looking to solve a lot of the problems inherent in the economic system and the world."

Klee said the expansion to hotel booking came after a "better than anticipated" response from customers using bitcoin to purchase flights.

100 bitcoin ATMs coming to Australia

Australian bitcoin owners will soon be able to convert the currency into local dollars, thanks to the imminent arrival of 100 bitcoin ATMs, according to a local radio report from state broadcaster ABC.

The ATMs will be distributed by a company called Australian Bitcoin ATMs, whose CEO Chris Guzowski told the radio show: "You can type in how many bitcoins you want to sell, then our ATM goes onto an overseas bitcoin exchange and executes that transaction for you and will spit out the cash for which you sold the bitcoins for. And the opposite also applies, so you can put cash in and purchase bitcoin."

Bitcoin ATMs are also expected to hit the streets of London later this month, as two startups race to offer the cash machines first in what could be a lucrative industry.