CryptoCompare recently published its exchange rankings report for Q4 of 2019. The report ranked cryptocurrency exchanges on the basis of various factors such as their legal compliance, level of security, and how well developed the exchange’s back-end is. Surprisingly, itBit took the first place for the first time, scoring an ‘AA’ grade on the list....Read More
CBDCs have been ruffling the feathers of regulators worldwide, eliciting concerns regarding the impact of their use and sale. Regardless of such concerns, however, many nations around the world have joined the race to launch their own fiat-backed stablecoins over the last few years, with countries such as China, Japan, Thailand, and even Singapore taking...Read More
One of the biggest concerns for governments and traditional investors across the world regarding cryptocurrencies is the popular misconception that these have the potential to facilitate bad actors. A recent report by CipherTrace Labs found that individuals are operating illicit crypto-Money Service Businesses (MSBs) at 8 out of 10 U.S retail banks whereas in Europe,...Read More
Deribit exchange continues to maintain its dominance in the Bitcoin Options market, with its trading volume over the last few months continuing to dwarf other exchanges, despite competition from the likes of Bakkt, CME, OKEx, and FTX. Crypto-derivatives data analytics firm Skew recently reported that Bitcoin Options on Deribit had touched a new all-time high....Read More
The past week has been noteworthy for most crypto-assets, with a majority of them recording significant gains. The world’s largest crypto-asset, Bitcoin, surged by over 9% over the past week, while most other altcoins in the top 10 registered double-digit growth. Ethereum and other smaller-cap assets have been outperforming Bitcoin too, with the second-largest coin...Read More
When the concept of a stablecoin was first introduced, it took the cryptocurrency industry by storm. Trading moved faster, liquidity rose, and markets became more efficient. Further, the introduction of stablecoins enabled users to make cryptocurrency payments without the risk of volatility. Though stablecoins have changed the way crypto-markets work, a number of controversies surrounding...Read More
Bitcoin was conceived to ensure the financial independence of people. However, funds stored by users on crypto-exchanges have raised many questions regarding its ownership. Nevertheless, the demand for an established platform to provide custody for cryptocurrencies has only increased and according to Jake Chervinsky, General Counsel at Compound, we are stuck with this custody model...Read More
Ripple has been taking significant steps towards providing its financial solutions all around the world, with a recent development expanding the firm’s presence in one more country. The National Bank of Egypt has signed an agreement with Ripple to aid in easing the remittance process, according to reports. The National Bank of Egypt has now...Read More
The Bitcoin ecosystem has been adaptive to various technologies, with many of them intent on solving Bitcoin‘s utility; one of them is Lightning Network. Bitcoin’s Lightning Network was introduced as a second layer technology to execute micropayments instantly and at low costs. However, there has been a constant debate about whether or not Lightning has...Read More
Turkey has become a crypto-hotspot lately and this is no longer a secret. The hyperinflation of the nation’s fiat currency, the news around the digital lira, and the freezing of millions of bank accounts in 2019 have all contributed to this narrative. In fact, the Turkish government had also listed blockchain adoption as part of...Read More
The digital asset industry is perhaps the only asset class that is so susceptible to market sentiments and changes in geopolitical situations between different nations. Taking Bitcoin as a prime example; a significant part of the community attributed Bitcoin‘s price surge to the rise in tensions between the United States and Iran and the outbreak...Read More
Though Bitcoin is quite heavily misadvertised as an anonymous payment network, it is actually one of the more transparent crypto-networks to transact on. In the early days of cryptocurrency, when KYC and AML regulations weren’t as strict as they are now, it was easier to conduct Bitcoin transactions which couldn’t be traced back to criminal...Read More
They say the opposite of love is indifference; and if one thing has been made clear over the last few years, it is that governments and regulators are no longer indifferent toward cryptocurrencies. Countries like China are announcing national CBDCs left, right and center, while regulators across the world have started becoming more receptive, introducing...Read More
The infamous PlusToken Ponzi scam that resulted in investors losing over $3 billion in cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin [BTC] and Ethereum [ETC] has reared its ugly head again. After a short hiatus, the scam artists have re-surfaced and moved $117 million in Bitcoin, within their addresses. Dovey Wan of Primitive Ventures called out the hefty 11,999.47...Read More
Discussions around central bank digital currencies [CBDCs] have intensified over the last couple of months, especially since China accelerated its plans to launch its own CBDC last year. In fact, talks about CBDCs even found a place at the WEF in Davos this year. While many lawmakers had previously chosen to proceed with caution, with...Read More
Belgium’s Financial Services and Markets Authority (FSMA) is pushing the government to bring regulations for digital currencies, according to a recent report. In a Senate hearing on Feb 10, Jean-Paul Servais, chairman of FSMA, urged lawmakers to establish a legal framework for the sale, purchase, and use of virtual currencies and all related financial products....Read More
UK government is in-between talks of tightening cryptocurrency regulations for some time now. Recently, a UK based start-up, DAG Global, has applied to become the country’s first bank for cryptocurrency businesses despite regulatory caution, according to a report. The digital banking platform said it would resubmit its application for a banking license next month with...Read More
As has been the case with almost all cryptocurrencies so far this year, Litecoin has made substantial gains over the last five weeks. Sporting a price tag of around $74 at the time of writing, Litecoin has a market capitalization of $4.72 billion according to CoinMarketCap. Litecoin 1-day chart Source: LTCUSD on TradingView At its...Read More
The cryptocurrency world had been eagerly waiting for Bitcoin [BTC] to breach crucial resistance at $9.8k and enter the $10k club. Even though Bitcoin’s price did surge past the $10k mark, it couldn’t hold it. Following the $10k spike, Bitcoin fell by 4.55% and despite several recovery efforts, it couldn’t retrieve to $10k. At press...Read More
Bitcoin recently crossed the $10,000 level for the first time since last year, an important psychological level and quite likely a sign of a more positive market sentiment. Though Twitter did see the usual friction between altcoin communities (each thinks the other is a scam), it feels like the cryptocurrency space is gearing up to...Read More
China, with its central bank digital currency, dubbed, ‘DCEP‘ is advancing its development toward replacing coins, banknotes, and other money equivalents. China had recently implemented a law on January 1st, 2020 that aimed to govern password management, as part of its plans for DCEP’s release. While rumors regarding the development of a Chinese CBDC gained traction...Read More
Bitcoin Cash started 2020 at around the $200 level, quite a far cry from the cryptocurrency’s all-time high value. Since the start of the year, however, BCH rose by nearly 125%, valued at around $456 at the time of writing. According to CoinMarketCap, Bitcoin Cash had a market capitalization of over $8.2 billion, with nearly...Read More
Decentralized finance [DeFi] has continued to gain steam in the past couple of months. The latest milestone includes surpassing $1 billion Total Value Locked [TVL]. Source: Binance Research | Monthly unique users in Ethereum DeFi in 2019 Interestingly, Ethereum’s use in DeFi continues to expand since most of the decentralized financial ecosystem, so far, is...Read More
Bitcoin’s surge past the $10,000 mark is, according to many observers, an expected bull run before the halving event slated for later in the year. With Bitcoin’s halving, the scarcity of the king coin is going to increase dramatically and may cement its position as a significant competitor to gold. In a recent Tales from...Read More
Litecoin and other altcoins are certainly experiencing an altcoin rally, however, it’d be premature to call this an ‘alt season’. As for Litecoin [LTC], it has surged by a whopping 105% in just 37 days, pushing its price from $38 to $78. The market cap of Litecoin has doubled from $2.5 billion to $5 billion....Read More
Earlier this month on Twitter, Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin posed the question of whether transactions using CBDCs, such as the one recently proposed by China, would be cryptographically provable. Important tech question about these CBDCs that are starting to pop up (CC @mg0314a): will transactions be cryptographically provable? That is, if I send you...Read More
Thanks to its innovation around building decentralized applications [DApps], Ethereum became crucial for the ICO space. However, the 2017 ICO boom and bust attracted a lot of bad press for the ecosystem since a large portion of many ICO scams leveraged Ethereum blockchain. Highlighting the ICO phase, Camila Russo, the Founder of The Defiant, in the...Read More
Four months since the last coming of the five-figure heaven, Bitcoin is once again back. During the early hours of 9 February, the premier cryptocurrency broke the $10,000 mark. At 0320 UTC, Bitcoin saw a massive 0.5 percent price increase on the 5-minute candlestick, taking it from $9,985 to $10,0025. However, it was not hunky-dory...Read More
Cardano has been taking leaps and bounds with respect to developments on its network. From establishing many strategic partnerships at Davos WEF 2020 to opening up new avenues in a bid to bring about commercialization in the ecosystem, Cardano is on a roll. As revealed by IOHK CEO and Co-founder Charles Hoskinson in an interview...Read More
Market data and charts are key fundamentals that allow investors to analyze potential crypto-assets in the market. And while the crypto-market has been in existence for over a decade, the fact that the industry has been in the mainstream for just a few years makes a constructive study of the market using long-term statistics difficult....Read More
