Category: Cryptocurrency News

A member of South Korea’s National Assembly has called on the state to “open up the road” to Initial Coin Offerings (ICO) by easing regulations, South Korean financial outlet Economy reports October 2. According to the article, Min Byung-doo, a Democratic Party lawmaker, will introduce a project of for ICO legislation at the next round of the National Assembly. He claimed that the purpose of the new legislation is to allow ICOs while enforcing strict regulation for the negative parts Read more …

Crypto mining behemoth Bitmain announced Monday it has acquired the startup behind an open-source bitcoin cash wallet called Telescope. The browser-based wallet was launched earlier this year in an effort to enable instant bitcoin cash transactions. At present, Telescope can operate on Google Chrome or Mozilla Firefox, according to a press release, though the team it plans to expand to other platforms following the acquisition. Supported by BitPay and moneybutton.com, the wallet stores cryptographic keys within a browser extension, meaning Read more …

Sandeep Goenka recently closed down his Bitcoin exchange in India, but he remains optimistic towards the digital currency that began the financial decentralization movement. In his latest tweet, the co-founder of the now-defunct Zebpay said that he is more bullish on Bitcoin than he ever was. Goenka is not the first entrepreneur or investor who has expressed his upside bias towards the digital currency. But the statement comes at a time when Zebpay is facing criticism from former users for Read more …

Exchanges Traders hope and expect the exchange they’re trading on takes security seriously. But while all crypto platforms pay lip service to good cybersecurity practices, many fail at even the most basic measures such as enforcing strong passwords. New research has found 54% of all cryptocurrency exchanges have poor security in at least one area, leaving them and their users vulnerable to attack. Also read: Japanese Regulators Urgently Respond to Zaif’s Hack Despite Hundreds of Millions of Dollars in Hacks, Read more …

A French security official with the Direction Générale de la Sécurité Intérieure (DGSI) was indicted last week and taken into custody on charges of selling state secrets in exchange for payments in bitcoin. According to local French media Le Parisien, the unnamed agent was allegedly arrested for peddling economic information and falsifying administrative documents. Protecting French Data While no link to terrorism has been found yet, the news outlet reported that the agent had contact members of the organized crime, as Read more …

A digital advertising startup with the goal of “building a better internet” for web users, publishers and advertisers is embarking on the second round of its token offering – but with a twist. Varanida says its blockchain has been built for three reasons: improving transparency for brands, increasing revenue for publishers, and giving the public a better experience when they are browsing the internet. The company plans to achieve these goals by “improving online digital content and creating incentives for Read more …

“Traditional” venture capital (VC) investment in blockchain and crypto firms has almost tripled in the first three quarters of 2018, according to a new Diar report published September 30. Diar cites data from Pitchbook that indicates that blockchain and crypto-related firms have raised almost $3.9 billion in VC capital in so far this year — a 280 percent rise as compared with last year. The rise comes not just in terms of an increasing number of deals, but also in Read more …

The Italian Banking Association (ABI) has revealed they successfully passed the initial phase of testing their blockchain-powered interbank system, Italian financial media outlet Ansa reported September 29. By applying distributed ledger technology (DLT), the group of 14 Italian banks is planning to improve interbanking processes. Specifically, the association intends to boost the processing time of operations, increase the transparency of banking information, and enable the verification and exchange of information directly within the application. According to local Italian source Corriere Read more …

Bitcoin may never replace the greenback, but the flagship cryptocurrency could achieve significant adoption in the two-thirds of countries without stable currencies. That statement might sound like a thesis put forward by an early bitcoin adopter, or perhaps a forward-thinking hedge fund manager. In actuality, though, that bullish forecast was issued by J. Christopher Giancarlo, the top derivatives regulator in the United States. #Bitcoin is a commodity, but how do you characterize the rest? @giancarloCFTC, the man in charge of Read more …

Coinbase’s leadership expansion continued Tuesday as it added Charles Schwab advisor Chris Dodds to its board of directors and tapped former Instinet CEO Jonathan Kellner to be its new managing director of the Institutional Coverage Group. In one blog post, Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong introduced Dodds, who sits on the board of directors at Charles Schwab, one of the largest brokerage firms and banks in the U.S. Dodds is also a senior equity advisor for the firm, and has spent Read more …

A Ukrainian legislator has urged parliament during a speech on Monday, October 1 to review his alternative bill on cryptocurrencies that offers to freeze taxes for crypto traders up to 2030. MP Yuriy Derevyanko, a member of the anti-corruption Movement of New Forces founded back in 2017 by former Georgian politician Mikheil Saakashvili, introduced his version of the bill at the conciliation board of The Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine, the country’s unicameral parliament. “The bill provides tax exemptions for all Read more …