Art Cashin writes:

The price of Bitcoin, the bizarre digital currency, has been skyrocketing.  And everyone's calling it a bubble.

But it's not like most other bubbles.

Art Cashin, UBS' man on the New York Stock Exchange trading floor, contrasts the Bitcoin bubble to the Dutch tulip mania of the 17th century.  Here's Cashin:

Trading Tulips In Real Time – It is rare that we get to see a bubble-like phenomenon trade tick for tick in real time.  Usually it's kind of regional aggregate pricing like real estate reports.  But, all that may be changing – before our very eyes – quite literally.  The bubble du jour may be something called a "bitcoin."

Business Insider's Joe Weisenthal made this same point.

"You can go here and watch Bitcoin trade tick-by-tick, which is not something you could ever do with these other unconventional micro-bubbles."

Everyone's trying to figure out what's going on with Bitcoin.

Without explicitly arguing for causation, Cashin points to a correlation.

The bidding for Bitcoins has turned a bit more aggressive since the Cyprus "bailin" and the seizure of a portion of bank deposits.  The Bitcoin recently traded at an amazing $100 (it had been $50 just two weeks ago).

We have yet to see Bitcoin make a major down move.

"Last night trading turned a bit whacky and the Bitcoin spiked above 145 before plunging in a few trades back to $126," wrote Cashin.  "Just what the world needs – a "safe" currency."

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