Month: December 2018

The Daily Welcome to the final installment of The Daily for 2018. It seems fitting that the year’s ultimate edition should focus on one of 2018’s overarching themes within the cryptoconomy – stablecoins. We’ve also got space to squeeze in a critique of Augur’s crowdsourced prediction market and to consider yet another bitcoin-based Patreon alternative. Also read: 1 in 7 Chinese Have Invested in Cryptocurrency  Regulated Stablecoins Attract Ire Regulated stablecoins such as USDC, PAX, and GUSD have become increasingly popular Read more …

This year has certainly been a tumultuous one for cryptocurrency. What started off with a bang ended with a whimper as the entire market shed 84% and $700 billion exited the scene. To round out 2018 we will look back at key events in what has been the year of the bear for crypto. Looking Back at 2018 The crypto-sphere was awash with chatter of ‘moons’ and ‘lambos’ in early January when all crypto assets were hitting new all-time highs. Read more …

Hopeful about the recent surge in bitcoin price? Expectant about the entrance of Bakkt and the possibility of 2019 being the year of (real) institutional investment? Then don’t read this article. According to these experts, economists, finance professors, miners, and developers, Bitcoin is on its way out – and will soon be as redundant as Black and White TV. Here’s what they have to say. No Investment Strategies Are Worse Than Cryptocurrencies Robert R.  Johnson, Creighton University Robert R. Johnson Read more …

For many average Joes, Bitcoin’s use case is viewed as nebulous, a concept squirreled off in the ether by crypto’s pundits. Yet, a leading investor took to Bloomberg to accentuate that Bitcoin (BTC) is fundamentally a store of value (SOV), and one that is even better than gold, the de-facto king of investments for millennia. Bitcoin Is Fundamentally Better Than Gold Prominent venture capitalist Lou Kerner, the founding partner of CryptoOracle, sat down with Bloomberg on Sunday to eulogize the flagship Read more …

A recent survey conducted by Chinese blockchain news site PANews made some interesting conclusions. Namely, overall 63% of 4,200 people surveyed think cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin are unnecessary as a payment system. However, 40% would consider investing in cryptos. About 14% of the people surveyed had invested in cryptocurrencies already. The majority of the people who were interested or invested were born after 1990. Younger Millennials Know Crypto Best in China Younger Chinese people believe in crypto investments. The survey broke Read more …

Mining Two companies mining cryptocurrencies have topped a list of the largest consumers of electricity in Georgia. In this crypto-friendly nation, however, that’s not necessarily a sin or a disadvantage. Energy-intensive enterprises in the Caucasian country purchase the power they need at wholesale prices. Also read: Huobi and Major Russian Bank to Provide Legal Help to the Crypto Industry Bitcoin Miners Buy Electricity on Wholesale Market Georgia is among several jurisdictions in the post-Soviet space that have been attracting crypto Read more …

As Kraken adds XRP margin trading, it appears to have been drawn into a Ripple versus XRP naming debate that first emerged earlier this year. How the debate began with Kraken is unclear, but Kraken tweeted in an obvious response to a reference to its adding “Ripple XRP” to the platform and a recent blog post announcing the additions of XRP and Bitcoin Cash (BCH) to its margin trading offering. There does seem to be some ambiguous, and maybe tongue Read more …

Crypto markets lethargic on New Year’s Eve; Bitcoin Cash sliding as usual, the rest immobile. Crypto markets have remained inactive on the final day of 2018. There has been very little movement in any of the major cryptocurrencies as total market capitalization remains just below $130 billion. Compared to December 31, 2017 they are down 77% but the rate of descent has slowed over the past few months. Bitcoin has not moved on the day and remains just over $3,800 Read more …

News In today’s roundup of crypto chatter, Chris Troutner and Andreas Brekken play around with the idea of building an algorithmic stablecoin on BCH. Vin Armani debates with Painted Frog on Bitcoin’s similarities to Visa. Also, Paul Sztorc thinks that understanding Austrian economics is not that important to comprehend Bitcoin.   Also read: Developer Paul Sztorc Launches the First Version of Drivechain Building an Algorithmic Stablecoin on BCH Recently Shitcoin.com CEO Andreas Brekken took to crypto Twitter to wish everyone a happy new Read more …

The confidence of consumers in the mid-term performance of the U.S. economy has declined, placing more pressure on retailers like Walmart and Target that have been struggling since the beginning of the fourth quarter of 2018. Along with major technology stocks in the likes of Apple and Amazon, retailers have been amongst the worst performing stocks in the U.S. market. Hope For 2019 This week, the Conference Board disclosed that the index of U.S. consumer confidence declined from 136.4 points Read more …

Here’s what happened this week in Bitcoin in 99 seconds.    Before we begin, an important update for Electrum users. If when broadcasting a transaction, you receive an error message about a security update, disregard it, this is a phishing attack. For more info visit Electrum.org. “Assist,” a South Korean business school based in Seoul, became the first in the world to offer a master’s degree in cryptocurrency and blockchain tech. Crypto mining giant Bitmain will be firing around Read more …