Even a ban did not stop China’s most significant financial news provider from supporting cryptocurrencies such as bitcoin.

Sina Finance, the world’s 32nd largest financial news portal, on Wednesday introduced a new cryptocurrency index, which lists the price and time-based performance of all the top digital assets. A snapshot provided by cnLedger, a preferred source of all the crypto-related news from China, showed bitcoin listed alongside bitcoin cash, litecoin, XRP, ether, ethereum classic, and tether.

According to further information provided by cnLedger, Sina Finance also added candlestick charts, accompanied by a cryptocurrency and blockchain news feed.

Bitcoin Demand in China

Sina Finance did not release any press statement regarding its new set of cryptocurrency-friendly features. Nevertheless, the useful integrations follow a string of reports about how the demand for bitcoin among Chinese investors is once again rising. With the cryptocurrency returning to helm after registering more than 200 percent in year-to-date returns, the internet search trend for the keyword ‘bitcoin’ is picking up momentum, reflecting upon the need for services such as the one introduced by Sina Finance.

cnLedger reported in June that an application developed by Huobi, a former Chinese cryptocurrency exchange, was trending higher on China-based Apple’s App Store.

Bulls are back? According to online data service providers (such as Qimai and Kuchuan), crypto app Huobi is now the 7th hottest searched keyword in Chinese iOS App Store. Data source (in Chinese):https://t.co/Xiea2kI5L6https://t.co/nJSqY6p9mW — cnLedger (@cnLedger) June 24, 2019

The data corroborated with a report covered by the Block’s Larry Cermark, which highlighted the volume of Google searches for the cryptocurrency exchanges-related keyword going higher in Asia. So while Binance, Coinbase, and BitMEX reported an increase in website traffic, OkEX and Huobi registered an explosive influx of users.

Simultaneously, Baidu keyword analytics showed a three times surge in bitcoin-related trend last week than during the previous six months. Louis Aboud-Hogben, the general partner at Wyre Capital Management LLC, stated that the numbers for bitcoin went up despite a weaker coverage of bitcoin price rally by Chinese media.

“It looks like the level of activity is already at a meaningful % of the (choppy) numbers seen during the 2017/18 bubble (~40,000 now vs. ~60,000). Not sure how like-for-like this index data is but it suggests the market is a lot hotter in China [region] vs. west.”

Legitimacy Returning?

The latest series of events followed by the bitcoin price boom indicates that the Chinese ban on cryptocurrency trading is not working. The evidence is on the face also because of a pro-bitcoin report published by a state-run media agency in China. The Xinhua News Agency, regulated by the Chinese government, called bitcoin a “safe haven” asset as it discussed the potential of Libra, the Facebook token, to bring more users to the cryptocurrency sector.

“Bitcoin has a good chance to be widely used in the future, but it is still a growing ‘grassroots experiment,’” the report stated.

With Sina Finance supporting it, bitcoin is surely becoming a legitimate asset in China.