Bitcoin experienced a relatively stable week, with minor gains for the week. The rest of the top 5 cryptocurrencies — including EOS coming back to number 5 — followed BTC, fluctuating slightly. In other important news, multiple crypto exchanges delisted Bitcoin SV (BSV) following accusations of fraud regarding Craig Wright’s claim of being Satoshi Nakamoto, the launch of Binance Chain, a partnership between two industry leaders in Wirecard and TON, the promising future of venture capital investments in 2019 for crypto, and a tighter regulation in Japan regarding cold wallets will be explored.

Here’s what you need to know about last week’s happenings in the crypto world:

1. Cryptocurrency Market Analysis

Bitcoin (BTC) opened the week at $5,167.32, and its price decreased throughout the day to reach the lowest price of the week at 5,024.07. On Tuesday, BTC started the day at $5,066.58, grew 3.3% and closed the day at $5,235.56. The next few days remained stable, with lesser changes. Towards the weekend, Bitcoin’s value rose slightly and closed above $5.3k from Friday to Sunday. The high of the week came on Sunday, when BTC reached $5,359.93, a 6.7% increase from the low on Monday. The crypto week closed with Bitcoin at $5,314.53, with a 0.4% loss for the day and a 2.8% gain for the week. Bitcoin’s market capitalization was $89.4B on Monday and on Sunday it had gained 4.9% to close the week at $93.8.

Bitcoin 7-day price chart. Source: Coin360

Ethereum (ETH) started at $167.9 on Monday, and its price deflated 5% during the day, bottoming out for the week at $159.56. On Tuesday and Wednesday, ETH’s price stayed inside the $160s and by Thursday, the price had spiked to reach $175.37. Friday opened at $173.79 and closed at $173.71, experiencing little change throughout the day. The high of the week came on Saturday, at $176.71, 10.7% higher than the week’s low on Monday. On Sunday, ETH’s price decreased and closed the week at $170.05, with a 2.1% loss for the day and a 1.3% gain for the week. Ethereum’s market cap started the week at $17.1B, gained 5.3% during the week, and closed at $18B on Sunday.

Ethereum 7-day price chart. Source: Coin360

Ripple (XRP) opened Monday at $0.328841 and shred 3.3% during the day to reach the week’s low at $0.318090. The high of the week took place on Thursday at $0.345289, 8.6% higher than the low on Monday. Thursday also experienced the highest closing of the week, at $0.337065, and the weekend saw the XRP coin’s price slowly deflate, closing at $0.331902, $0.328476, and $0.322449 on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday respectively, with a 1.9% loss for the last-mentioned day and a 1.9% loss for the week. Ripple’s market cap started the week at $13.47B and had a 0.5% gain to finish Sunday at $13.5B.

Ripple 7-day price chart. Source: Coin360

Bitcoin Cash (BCH) opened the week at $288.70, and while it was the lowest opening of the week, Monday also held the high of the week, growing 15% to peak at $332.28. Unlike the aforementioned cryptocurrencies’ fashion, BCH’s price went downwards as the week progressed. From Tuesday to Thursday the coin stayed above $304.74 (Thursday’s low). The weekend saw BCH’s price fall under the $300 mark again and the low of the week came on Sunday, with BCH bottoming out at $281.90. Sunday ended with BCH at $290.48, experiencing a 3.4% loss for the day and a 0.6% gain for the week. Bitcoin Cash’s market cap on Monday was $5.6B and by Sunday it had lost 7.5% of its value, closing the week at $5.2B.

Bitcoin Cash 7-day price chart. Source: Coin360

EOS (EOS) is back in the top 5, taking Litecoin’s spot in the rankings. EOS opened Monday at $5.55, and held the second lowest price of the week, at $5.31. The high of the week occurred on Wednesday, with EOS peaking at 5.62 USD. By the end of the day, however, it had gone down to $5.46 where it hovered until Saturday. On Sunday, the low of the week took place, with the currency plummeting to $5.06, a 10% fall from the week’s highest price. By Sunday’s end, EOS was at $5.25, with a 4% loss for the day and a 5.4% loss on the week. EOS’ market cap closed Monday at $4.9B, lost 2.5%, and closed Sunday at $4.8B.

EOS 7-day price chart. Source: Coin360

2. Self-proclaimed Satoshi Nakamoto sues Peter McCormack for defamation

Craig Wright, who has claimed to be the person behind the mysterious pseudonym Satoshi Nakamoto, filed a libel claim on Apr. 19 against crypto podcaster Peter McCormack. The idea behind the claim is to reportedly prevent the podcaster from making additional “fraudulent claims” about Wright and his claims about him being the real Satoshi.

It has also been reported that Wright believes that these accusations are actually a way to hurt Bitcoin SV (BSV), as he states that its “massive on-chain scaling (…) represents an existential threat to the future of other cryptocurrencies”.

3. Binance, ShapeShift and Kraken delist Bitcoin SV after Craig Wright’s allegations

Binance Exchange announced on Apr. 15 that they would delist the currency from the exchange and cease trading on all trading pairs for Bitcoin SV on Apr. 22. The same day, Eric Voorhees—CEO of ShapeShift—tweeted that the company had decided to follow Binance’s move, and proceeded to delist within the following 48 hours. Kraken also decided to delist Bitcoin SV following a community poll made on Twitter on Apr. 15, in which 71% voted to delist. Kraken’s press release mentioned “behavior completely antithetical” on BSV’s side as the reason behind the delisting.

Bitcoin Cash (BCH) was also affected as Japanese exchange SBI Holdings announced on Apr. 16 they would delist the cryptocurrency this June and would not list Bitcoin SV. OKEx exchange, on the other hand, stated in a series of tweets that after a rigorous review, BSV did not meet their delisting criteria, and would not be delisted in the foreseeable future.

4. Binance Chain launches mainnet and announces date for the swap

An Apr. 18 announcement confirmed that Binance Chain had successfully deployed its genesis block and that the mainnet swap of its native token BNB would take place on Apr. 23. Until then, the Binance Chain Explorer and Web Wallet will be closed to public access and will only be made available to selected partners.

The statement also provided information regarding the conversion of ERC-20 BNB tokens to the native Binance Chain BNB (BEP2) coins, a process for which Binance will provide assistance. The statement announced that as all BNB tokens will be migrated to Binance Chain, the withdrawal of ERC-20 BNB tokens will not be supported after Apr. 23. Binance will also release more BEP2 coins as more users convert their ERC-20 BNB tokens to the BEP2 protocol, burning ERC-20 in order to keep the total supply across both networks constant.

5. Forbes releases its “Blockchain’s billion dollar babies” list

On Apr. 16, Forbes announced its “Blockchain’s billion dollar babies” list, in which the leading 50 companies that are actively exploring blockchain tech are featured. The company highlighted the financial record keeping Depository Trust & Clearing Corp (DTCC), as it represents “most of the world’s $48 trillion in securities”. Among the household names are U.S.-based crypto exchange Coinbase, Ripple, and mainstreams like Facebook, Amazon, Walmart, and more. Forbes also mentioned that global corporations are embracing blockchain tech to “speed up business processes, increase transparency and potentially save billions of dollars.

6. Reuters: venture capital crypto investments to reach an all-time high in 2019

An Apr. 17 report from Reuters shows that venture capital investment will reach new heights in 2019, likely trumping last year’s figures. Thus far, the industry has already raised $850 million in funding, coming from 13 investments. This, when contrasted to the $2.4 billion in funding that the industry received in 2018 from 117 investments, shows a great deal of optimism for venture capital investments in 2019.

Reuters also reported that investors are contributing larger sums in crypto, though some remain hesitant about being involved directly with cryptocurrency handling. This explains why only 13 investments have managed to raise almost $1 billion.

7. Gate.io achieves nearly $3 billion in orders in first phase of IEO for native token

A blog post on Apr. 14 confirmed that the first phase of the Gate.io POINTs sale and distribution saw $2.984 billion worth of orders placed, $350 million of which happened on the Apr. 13 sale. The sale is for Gate.io POINTs, which will be redeemable for Gatechain Tokens (GT) in the future, when they are released. GT will enable users of Gate to pay for trading fees on the exchange.

The exchange has now entered into the second phase of the POINTs sale. GT will be released as a part of Gatechain, a blockchain ecosystem that is currently set for a Q4 2019 launch.

8. Wirecard announces partnership with Telegram’s TON

The German financial services provider announced on Apr. 17 that they are partnering with the development team behind Telegram’s blockchain ecosystem. According to the press release, the collaboration will see the development of digital financial products which include joint digital financial services, payments and a banking platform.

No further information about the products has been given as the press release states that information about them will be revealed as the date where these services become available approaches. Alexander Filatov, managing partner at TON Labs, was quoted as saying that they were partnering with “one of the world’s most dynamic and innovative financial technology companies to bring synergetic new generation fintech solutions to the market.”

9. Binance increases profits as Coinbase earns less than predicted

Binance exchange has reportedly registered a 66% profit increase during Q1 2019 in comparison to Q4 2018, bringing in $78M. 830,000 BNB were burned during the last quarterly BNB burn, which represents 20% of Binance’s net profits for the first quarter.

Coinbase registered profits of around 60% less than predicted, bringing in $520M during 2018, as opposed to the estimated $1.3B. Coinbase generated $923M in revenue during 2017, which makes last year’s half a billion dollar earnings 44% lower than the year before.

10. Japan to enforce tighter regulations on cold wallets

As per an Apr. 16 Reuters report, the Japanese Financial Services Agency (FSA) is looking to make Japanese crypto exchanges further tighten the security and internal oversight of their cold wallets. The FSA had already restricted the use of hot wallets in 2019, prompting exchanges to switch over to cold wallets.

The reason behind the tighter regulation is in case of possible oversight within Japanese crypto exchanges. Some of the 19 registered Japanese crypto exchanges—some of which are not operational yet—do not have safety protocols in place that involve the rotation of people in charge of the storage, a situation that increases the possibility of internal theft.

11. Binance quietly rewords repurchasing plan section on their BNB white paper

Binance silently reworded a section dedicated to the quarterly manipulations with BNB coin. The previous version of the white paper, which can be accessed through the Wayback Machine service, mentions a “repurchasing plan”, which was simply replaced by “the burn” on the newer version. The new version simply explains that every quarter, Binance Coin will be destroyed based on the trading volume on their platform. Both versions state that these quarterly manipulations would carry on until 50% of all Binance Coins were destroyed.

Changpeng Zhao, the CEO of Binance, stated that the rewording of the white paper doesn’t really change anything, and that it was only a measure designed to clarify that the exchange does not actually repurchase any BNB, and that it is simply a measure to reduce the number of tokens.

12. Forecast: US federal government to raise its blockchain spending by a 1,000% by 2022

According to an Apr. 18 forecast published by IDC Government Insights, the federal government of the US is expected to raise its blockchain spending to $123.5 million by 2022, an amount that, when compared to the $10.7 million spent in 2017, signifies an increase of over 1,000%.

A similar increase is forecasted for state and local governments—from $4.4 million in 2017 to $48.2 in 2022—while the spendings of federal civilian agencies and the Defense Department are forecasted to spend $80 million and $40 million respectively in 2022, quadrupling and doubling their figures from 2017. The research director of the IDC, Shawn McCarthy, explains that early spending will focus on supply chain and asset management solutions, whereas spending in later years will include mode identity management and complex financial transactions. Additionally, the IDC notes that blockchain will probably become a cornerstone technology for trade legislation, becoming a standard for authorized international trade and government procurement.

Final Thoughts

While the cryptocurrency market shows itself mostly in the green for this upcoming week, last week’s gains did manage to tip the scales. Despite the low profits from big exchanges, the forecasted increase in blockchain spending by both federal and state governments and the new heights that venture capital investments are expected to reach shine a light over the future of cryptocurrencies. Hopefully, the encouraging sale figures from Gate.io and the partnership between Wirecard and TON will also be beneficial for the future of crypto.

We wish you a great week,

The Coin360 Editorial Team

The COIN360 Editorial Team

Last week did not repeat the encouraging performance from the week before, when all major coins in the cryptocurrency market experienced big rises and Bitcoin got all the way up to the high 5k USD range. Regardless, this week showed a certain stability for a few coins and some big dips for others. In other important news, another social media giant gets involved with blockchain tech, South Korea’s biggest exchange got hacked last month, 2018’s great losses are added to, the Token Taxonomy Act is reintroduced in the US, and research suggests the end of the current bear market is imminent.

Here’s what you need to know about last week’s happenings in the crypto world:

1. Cryptocurrency Market Analysis

Bitcoin (BTC) opened Monday at $5,199.84 and closed at $5,289.77, 1.7% higher than the opening price. It is accurate to say that this was Bitcoin’s dynamic throughout the week, with the biggest difference between opening and closing happening on Thursday, when the coin opened at $5,325.08 and closed 4.9% lower at $5,064.49. The peak of the week occurred on Wednesday at $5,421.65, and by Friday, it had gone down 8.6%, to land on $4,955.85, the week’s lowest price. This past week, Bitcoin (BTC) managed to almost stay above the 5k USD mark every day, with the exception of Friday. By Sunday, Bitcoin’s price closed the week at $5,167.72, with a 1.4% gain for the day and a 0.6% loss on the week. The leading coin’s market cap opened the week at $93.3B and it closed Sunday at $91.2B, losing 2.25% of its value.

Bitcoin 7-day price chart. Source: Coin360

Ethereum (ETH) opened the week high at $174.45 and went up 5.7% during the day to reach the week’s peak at $184.38. Monday closed at $180.26. Tuesday and Wednesday also saw prices above $180. Thursday and Friday experienced a drop in the coin’s price, closing at $165.5 and $164.74 respectively. Friday was also the day of ETH’s lowest price of the week, at $161.03 — 12.7% lower than the coin’s peak on Monday. The weekend was rather calm and Sunday closed at $167.84, with a 2% loss for the day and a 3.8% loss for the week. Ethereum’s coin market cap started the week at $19B and lost 6.8% during the week, closing Sunday at $17.7B.

Ethereum 7-day price chart. Source: Coin360

XRP (XRP) started Monday at $0.361143 and went up during the day to reach its high for the week’s $0.367036. By the day’s closing however, it had gone down 2.4%. The rest of the week shared the same dynamic, with closings being lower than openings almost every day. Just like the aforementioned coins, XRP followed a similar course and had its lowest price on Friday, at $0.321167. This decrease was more drastic, with XRP losing 12.5% from the week’s peak on Monday. Saturday showed almost no difference between opening and closing prices and Sunday closed at $0.328809, with a 0.8% gain for the day and a 9% loss for the week. Ripple’s market cap on Monday was at $15B, and by Sunday it had shed 8.2% of its value, closing at $13.7B.

XRP 7-day price chart. Source: Coin360

Bitcoin Cash (BCH) opened Monday at $319.77 and during the day the price went up to reach its peak of the week at $326.92. By the end of Monday it had lost 5.1% of its value, closing the day at $310.16. On Tuesday BCH experienced a 4.5% loss opening at $309.95 — the high of the day — and closing at $296.04. Wednesday’s performance was slightly better, peaking at $312.09. The low of the week came in the next day, at $259.02 and the weekend did not go higher than $289.54 on Sunday. BCH closed the week at $288.65, with a 3.3% gain for the day and a 9.7% loss for the week. Bitcoin Cash’s market cap was $5.5B on Monday and through the week suffered a 6.9% cut, closing Sunday at $5.1B.

Bitcoin Cash 7-day price chart. Source: Coin360

Litecoin (LTC) opened Monday high at $92.33 and soon after posted its high of the week at $93.82. The rest of the week, LTC’s price did not go above $90, with the exception of Wednesday’s high — $90.35. The low of the week happened on Friday at $76.44, and the rest of the weekend, Litecoin’s price didn’t go higher than $82.94 on Sunday’s closing. LTC ended the week with a 6% gain for the day and a 10% loss for the week. The market cap for Litecoin was $5.5B on Monday and $5.1B on Sunday, decreasing in price by 7.2%.

Litecoin 7-day price chart. Source: Coin360

2. Telegram begins private testing of the TON Blockchain

According to an Apr. 11 report from Russian news outlet Vedomosti, the global messaging app Telegram has launched a private beta of the Telegram Open Network, their own blockchain, limited to only select global developers.

Some of the reported testers of the Telegram’s blockchain revealed that it has an “extremely high transaction speed”, although no specific information or indicators could be shared at the moment, given that the smart contracts and the code of the TON blockchain are also in the process of testing.

3. Bithumb suffers further losses in crypto

Bithumb, South Korea’s largest exchange, saw 14B won—$12M—disappear last month. The company stated that the amount was all in EOS, and part of company-only funds. This is not Bithumb’s first security breach, which is why customers’ funds have remained in cold storage wallets, where the rest of the company’s funds have been moved after the latest attack. Due to the hack, Bithumb has conducted an external audit of its funds. Executives from the exchange believe this attack was orchestrated by an insider, but nothing more has been revealed.

To add to the exchange casualties, Bithumb experienced losses of $180 million in 2018’s BTC bear market. Despite having grown 17.5% in sales in comparison to 2017, it did not escape the record-breaking lows of 2018, going through major staff cuts last month.

4. DAI users vote for a further 4% increase of stability fees

An Apr. 8 governance poll showed that there was a clear majority among users of DAI stablecoin to pass another increase in stability fees. Other options included keeping the current stability fee as is, or increasing it by 1, 2 or 3%, but a substantive majority opted for the fees to be increased by 4%.

This will bring the stability fees of DAI stablecoin to 11.5% per year, a number that has increased five times from the initial 7.5% of stability fees per year in 2019. The need behind the increase—and the support from the user base—is driven by the need to keep DAI pegged to the US dollar in a 1:1 relationship, something that it has failed to do as of late.

5. The Ethereum DApps user base decreases as TRON’s becomes the fastest growing

A DApp.com report shows a 4% decrease in terms of DApp active users on the Ethereum chain compared to last year’s numbers. The number decreased to 72,422 active users, who are mostly concentrated in DEXs and gambling apps. TRON, on the other hand, boasts more than 300,000 DApp users, with roughly 85% of them interacting with a DApp in Q1 of 2019, making it the most active chain.

However, the Ethereum blockchain is still preferred among developers. According to the report, more than half of the 504 DApps that were added to DApp.com were Ethereum-based, making it the number one choice for developers. However, the report also indicates that there have been almost 600 Ethereum DApps that have not reported a single transaction in Q1 2019.

6. Fewer ICOs are raising funds in Q1 2019

As reported by ICObench, the first quarter of 2019 had fewer ICOs compared to Q4 2018. Q1 2019 saw roughly 330 ICO projects, which raised nearly $1 billion in total, which is lower by roughly $0.5 billion compared to the money raised by ICOs in Q4 2018.

Out of all the 328 ICOs of Q1 2019, 107 of them managed to raise funds while 221 failed to do so. Q4 2018 reportedly had 585 ICOs, and 207 of them raised funds, while the remaining 378 did not.

7. The NYDFS denies Bittrex’s BitLicense application

In a letter to Bill Shihara, CEO of Bittrex, the New York Department of Finance Services explained that the reason why Bittrex’s BitLicense application—required to conduct business related to virtual currencies in New York—were, among others, inadequate policies regarding AML, KYC and OFAC standards. The NYDFS also ordered Bittrex to stop its operations in New York by Apr. 11.

In response to this, Bittrex stated that the regulations in New York do more harm than good, and also proceeded to disagree with the statements regarding the AML and compliance practices and other points mentioned in the letter, arguing that there were many factual inaccuracies.

8. Pewdiepie Partners With Blockchain Livestreaming Platform DLive

Pewdiepie, currently on the verge of reaching 100M subscribers on his Youtube channel, has partnered with DLive, a Blockchain Livestreaming platform that will be Pewdiepie’s exclusive livestreaming channel, according to an Apr. 9 press release.

DLive is based on the Lino blockchain protocol, and it features a rewards system for both streamers and viewers, who will be rewarded with Lino tokens by creating and consuming content respectively. Pewdiepie’s first stream, which consisted of him donating money on other content creators’ streams, took place on Apr. 14.

9. Opera releases new web browser with built-in crypto wallet

As per an Apr. 9 report, the Opera web browser released Opera 60 (dubbed officially as Reborn 3), a browser with a built-in crypto wallet (named Opera Wallet) and a Web 3.0 explorer, which will enable its users to conduct transactions and access blockchain functionalities on the internet. The new browser also possesses a VPN feature, which strengthens the privacy and security of its users.

Additionally, there is a synchronization feature which will allow users to sync their Opera Wallet to the crypto wallets that are currently in the mobile version of the Opera browser. This feature will allow users to receive notifications on their smartphones to sign a transaction on the blockchain, which can be subsequently signed or approved by using features of the smartphone such as fingerprint recognition.

10. US Congressmen Reintroduce Token Taxonomy Act

In order to make the US a competitive world leader in terms of cryptocurrency regulations, the Token Taxonomy Act has been reintroduced, which would preclude cryptocurrency from being classified as securities. The Token Taxonomy Act was first introduced in December of 2018 by Warren Davidson and Darren Soto.

The main difference between the first introduction of the Token Taxonomy Act and the current one is that the new version of the Act clarifies the jurisdictions of the Commodity Futures Trading Commision (CFTC), the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), and other regulatory rulings that had previously confused the issue. Additionally, the Token Taxonomy Act also introduces preemption provisions that would supercede other existing regulations such as New York’s BitLicense.

11. Diar: Institutional Bitcoin Trading Volumes Up for 4th Consecutive Month

According to an Apr. 8 report from Diar, there has been a steady growth in 2019 for the trading volumes of institutional Bitcoin, reaching a 19% in April. The institutional products that are the focus of the report are the CBOE and CME Bitcoin futures and Grayscale’s Bitcoin Investment Trust (GBTC).

This marks the fourth month in a row in which there’s been an increase of institutional Bitcoin trading volumes, after having 15% in January, 17% in February and 18% in March. Additionally, this steady growth is happening during a period wherein the Bitcoin exchange trading volumes have reached their lowest point since 2017.

12. The International Chamber of Commerce to Support Blockchain Adoption

With help from Singaporean blockchain company Perlin, the ICC will roll out technology in order to bring in and support the adoption of innovative technologies among the 45 million businesses that the ICC represents in over 130 countries. The working relationship between the ICC and Perlin was communicated in an Apr. 12 press release.

The partnership will allow Perlin to easily connect with the ICC’s vast member pool, which includes national chambers of commerce and companies such as Amazon, Coca Cola, Fedex, McDonalds and PayPal. Perlin will be offering free access to its blockchain platform during the initial stages, focusing on efficient and scalable blockchain traceability and transparency systems for value chains.

13. Facebook is seeking $1 billion to develop crypto project

As reported by Nathaniel Popper, tech reporter for the New York times via Twitter on Apr. 8, the social media giant is looking for venture capital (VC) firms to invest in their cryptocurrency project. Popper reports that Facebook is targeting big sums—as much as $1 billion. The report also cites the project as a stablecoin: “Facebook has been designing the coin to keep a stable value, pegged to a basket of foreign currencies held in bank accounts.”

The idea of a company as big as Facebook seeking outside investment might have raised some eyebrows, but Popper states that this could keep Facebook’s cryptocurrency project more in line with the decentralized nature of cryptocurrency technology.

14. Research: Current Prices Could Suggest End of Bear Market

The Apr. 11 Binance Research bulletin, centered around current phenomena and trends within crypto, suggests that Bitcoin and altcoin prices could have already hit their lowest point.

The bulletin underlines the effects high correlation periods among cryptoassets and their cyclicality. Namely, the all-time high correlation of composite altcoins with Bitcoin coincided with Bitcoin’s fall from the $6,000 mark to $3,000. And then: “Having emerged from a period of the highest internal correlations in crypto history, the data may support the notion that the cryptomarket has already bottomed out.”

15. Survey: 80% Of Organizations are not Using Blockchain Technology At All

The 2019 edition of Stack Overflow’s developer survey included questions about blockchain technology. The most important takeaway is that, out of the roughly 50,000 developers who answered, 80% of their organizations are not using blockchain technology.

Regarding developer opinions on blockchain technology, which had more than 60,000 respondents, more than half of them said that Blockchain technology is useful. However, this optimism is mostly concentrated among young developers. More experienced developers tended to say that it is a “passing fad” (16.8%) or “an irresponsible use of resources” (15.6%).

Final Thoughts

Despite every top 5 cryptocurrencies in the market experiencing losses this week, rebounds were taking shape across the board towards the end of it, restoring hope in the notion of BTC continuing to go up, after having crossed the $5k mark the week before. The end of the bear market suggested by Binance research shows great hope for the future of Bitcoin and cryptocurrencies in general, a future that seems even more positive if social media giants Telegram and Facebook join in the game.

We wish you a great week,

The COIN360 Editorial Team

Coin360 Editorial Team

An exciting week for the cryptocurrency markets ended in some double digit losses on Sunday. Coinbase’s CEO weighed in on the QuadrigaCX saga, institutions are announcing new blockchain-based tokens, Samsung will incorporate private key storage to its newest phone, and a survey reports millennials trust crypto exchanges more than stock markets.

Here’s what you need to know about last week’s crypto market and headlines:

1. Crypto Market Analysis

Bitcoin broke the $4,000 threshold for the fourth time in 2019, but was not able to hold its position, losing $4B in market cap over the weekend. In spite of this, the price of Bitcoin is still well above where it was in early February, and actually closed with a 7-day gain. Monday began at $3,671.37 and peaked at $3,936.67. Tuesday finally broke the psychological barrier, peaking at $4,010.88, but it would be short-lived, as the day ended at $3.947,09. The following days followed the same pattern, surpassing the $4,000 mark at some point but closing the day just below it. This would change once Friday rolled around, beginning at $3.952,41 and closing at $4.005,53. Sunday would then see a 1.57% surge, which brought the week’s high point, $4.210,64. Sunday’s crash would eventually mean a 8.1% loss in Bitcoin’s price: from $4.145,46 to $3,810.43. Despite the 8.1% loss on the day, the price of Bitcoin experienced a 3.8% gain on the week.

Ethereum (ETH) started the week at $133.03 and peaked at $149.72 on Monday. Tuesday’s high was $149.28 and it dropped to $145.35 by the day’s close. Wednesday the 20th saw Ether fluctuate between $142.50 and $149.55, closing at the latter. Thursday closed at $146.13 and by Friday, the price was surging again, closing at $149.09. Saturday and Sunday had the highest prices of the week, $159.13 and $165.55 respectively, though by the end of the weekend, the price of Ethereum had slumped along with other cryptocurrencies, closing the 24th at $135.858, a loss of almost 18% from its highest on that day alone. Ethereum closed last week with a 2.1% gain on the week and 14.5% loss on the day.

Ripple (XRP) started Monday at $0,3030 and peaked on Tuesday at $0.3436. Wednesday’s high point was $0,3336, and Thursday and Friday closed almost exactly at the same amount: $0,3213 and $0,3219 respectively. Even though Saturday had one of the highest closings of the day at $0.3326, Sunday experienced the lowest of the week with $0.2993, losing almost 13% of its value, compared to the highest on Tuesday. Ripple ended Sunday at 0,3014 with a 9.5% loss on the day and a 0.5% loss on the week.

EOS opened the week at $2.88 and only went up from there, gaining 20% that day and closing at $3.47. Tuesday to Friday saw little change, opening on Tuesday at $3.51 and closing on Friday at $3.89, fluctuating in a 10% corridor between those days. When the weekend surge came, the price of EOS closed on Saturday at $4.27. The week peaked on Sunday the 24th at $4.44. By the end of Sunday, the EOS coin had gone back down to $3.59, experiencing a 16% loss on the day and a 24.6% gain on the week.

Litecoin (LTC) had three distinct surges this week, but lost most of the advantage by the close of Sunday. Monday started at $43.88 and peaked at $49.22 (first big surge: 12.1%). Tuesday peaked around the same level and swung under before surging for a second time, arriving at Wednesday’s high point of $52.16. Thursday disappointed LTC investors with a 6.3% loss that settled in until Saturday, when the altcoin shot from $49.67 to the week’s peak, $53.42 on Sunday: a final surge of 8.9%. In a few hours, however, Sunday would close at $44.68, for a 13.5% loss on the day and a 1.82% gain on the week.

2. QuadrigaCX: Coinbase CEO comments and Ernst & Young Hold Coins

Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong as has expressed his opinion that Quadriga CX did not in fact plan an exit scam. Armstrong supports his claims explaining that the crypto exchange in question was one of the oldest exchanges in existence, and that if they were planning to scam people, their timing would have been better. He also says that is likely that people at the QuadrigaCX headquarters knew about the wallets and used the untimely death of their CEO as “an outlet to let the company sink”.

On the 19th the Supreme Court of Nova Scotia assigned Miller Thompson and Cox & Palmer to represent the 115,000 customers affected by the “missing” wallets. The next hearing is scheduled for March 5th. According to a report published by Ernst & Young on February 20th, QuadrigaCX sent all crypto assets it still held in hot wallets over to the aforementioned auditing firm back on February 14th: 51 Bitcoin, 952 Ethereum, 822 Litecoin, 33 Bitcoin Cash, and 2,033 Bitcoin Gold. This amounts to roughly $410,000 which will be held in Ernst and Young’s cold storage, “pending further order of the Court,” as the report reads.

3. Education certificates on the blockchain and new research center

The Principality of Andorra and Malta both have announced plans to store education certificates on the blockchain. Andorra’s plan is to digitize higher education academic degrees by storing them on-chain, with Andorra Telecom providing blockchain access. The government stated that this will create a more secure register system while reducing administrative expenses, and that they plan to include secondary educational degrees in the near future. Malta, on the other hand, will have all its schools issue certificates on the blockchain – including state, church, and independent schools.

While some schools want to implement blockchain tech in their infrastructure, others want to study it in its own right. Fudan University (China) opened their new blockchain research center on February 15th: the Shanghai Blockchain Engineering Technology Research Center. The center will carry out blockchain research, application, and talent training. This will help promote the development of the blockchain community, which will eventually facilitate—allegedly— the development of Shanghai’s economy.

4. Two new crypto tokens announced

This week saw the announcement of two brand new cryptocurrency tokens. The first of them is ReitzBZ, to be released by Brazil’s Banco BTG Pactual SA, the largest investment bank of Latin America; the other is J-Coin, a stable-coin that is going to be the cryptocurrency of the Mizuho Financial Group, an important banking firm in Japan. ReitzBZ is backed by distressed real estate assets in Brazil, whereas J-Coin will be Yen-pegged, with the current plan pricing putting one J-Coin at 1 yen per unit.

The plan for ReitzBZ is to enable investors to purchase real estate assets at a lower cost than usual for future profit. In a somewhat ironic turn of events, ReitzBZ will be available almost worldwide by using GUSD or ETH—with Brazil and the United States being the only exceptions. This is only due to the current regulatory landscape, so soon enough people will be able to purchase ReitzBZ in Brazil. J-Coin, on the other hand, will bridge the gap between 56 million different customer accounts. Through the use of a proprietary mobile app, users will be able to use QR codes for everyday transactions, and will not have to endure credit checks. Additionally, there is no age restriction for J-Coin, meaning that even people under the age of 18 will be allowed to use the crypto service.

5. Tech moguls on crypto

On Feb. 10, Elon Musk was invited to the ARK Invest podcast to talk about the future of Tesla, and, as a curveball question, he was asked to give his opinion on Bitcoin. Musk was quite straight-forward in saying that Bitcoin’s structure was “quite brilliant”, and that it is a “far better way to transfer value compared to pieces of paper”. However, he also stated that he doesn’t see Tesla getting involved with crypto, as they are “just really trying to accelerate the advance of sustainable energy”. Additionally, his main criticism to Bitcoin was in regards of the amount of energy it consumes. He tweeted on Feb. 21 that he only has 0.25 BTC and has no other crypto holdings.

Another tech giant, Mark Zuckerberg, stated recently that a decentralized system use case for Facebook may give users more control over their data. In an interview with Harvard Law professor Jonathan Zittrain, Facebook’s CEO mentioned he would like to incorporate blockchain, which could potentially allow users to have control over their personal information, enabling them to log into different sites directly, without an intermediate.

6. Users report a blockchain mining scam in Thailand

As reported by the Bangkok Post on February 18th, 30 people filed claims against CryptoMining.Farm, an alleged Thai Bitcoin mining service offering lifelong mining contracts with annual returns of 70 percent. The complaints claim that this service is an investment scam that has led to the loss of 42 million THB (roughly $1.34 million USD), and authorities state that the total amount of people affected by the scam numbers up to 140.

Initially, the site allowed withdrawals anytime, without any conditions or limitations. Then the service started imposing certain conditions for withdrawals. One user claims that the problems started in August, when limitations and conditions were introduced. The situation started getting worse, and it came to a head at the start of February, when the service announced that they would pay investors back in 84 instalments, or seven years. The suspects have already been charged with conspiracy to defraud and money laundering, but they pleaded not guilty in November 2018.

7. The Central Bank of Lithuania updates its position on virtual assets

The Bank of Lithuania has recently released an updated version of its position regarding virtual assets and ICOs. The updated version substitutes the term virtual currency for “virtual assets”, but it still defines how and when virtual assets can be used for payments. Financial market participants (FMP) are still prohibited from receiving this type of payment, but it allows them to hire third parties to manage said payments and convert them to fiat. The document also defines the circumstances under which FMP can accept virtual assets as collateral.

The previous limitations largely remain, but the creation of funds for professional investors that include digital assets, as well as the use of third-party services to process crypto payments, are a major breakthrough. New ICO regulations and a new anti-fraud mechanism are in the works following the 305% ICOs growth Lithuania’s had lately, which is around $567 million compared to 18 months ago, situating the country as one of the leaders in crypto.

8. Samsung Galaxy S10 to include crypto wallet feature

The new Samsung Electronics smartphone, the Galaxy S10, was unveiled during a press event on February 20th. It was also revealed that the Galaxy S10 would include storage for private cryptocurrency keys. However, Samsung actively avoided the term “crypto wallet”. Instead, the new feature was pushed as an all-in-one blockchain platform called Knox. As revealed by Heslin Kim on Twitter , the smartphone comes with blockchain tutorials, as well as minimalistic and user-friendly Bitcoin and Ethereum wallets.

It has been theorized that Samsung may be avoiding using the term “cryptocurrency wallet” because it could scare many potential users. The decline in value that cryptocurrency suffered recently and the $150 million QuadrigaCX saga have tarnished the public image of cryptocurrencies, which could explain Samsung’s careful approach. Samsung has also integrated PUF technology into the phone’s Exynos 9820 chip, which already makes it more secure than other existing crypto wallets.

9. The FBI is looking for Bitconnect victims

More than a year has passed since Bitconnect closed in January 2018. And now, the investigation of the 2.5 billion USD Ponzi scheme has entered a new stage, where the government is talking to people who were victims of the Bitconnect scam. All Bitconnect victims can apply online by answering a questionnaire, which could be used in the investigation.

Bitconnect is currently facing multiple lawsuits which have exposed it as a Ponzi scheme. But even so, there have been attempts in the BitConnect community to spark life back into BCC. In late December 2018, a Bitconnect Coin Community on Twitter popped up, claiming that Bitconnect is now fully decentralized and not dependent of any platforms. A Discord server is also active, where people are also trying to bring BCC back to life as a community effort.

10. Roughly half of millennials trust crypto exchanges over the stock market

A survey conducted by the investment platform eToro U.S. showed that millennials trust cryptocurrency exchanges more than the U.S. stock market. The nationwide investigation surveyed 1,000 online traders of different generations, and its results indicate that 43 percent of millennial traders trust crypto exchanges more than stock exchanges. This contrasts directly with the survey results for Gen X traders, as 77% of them trust stock exchanges more.

The fact that younger generations are more welcoming of newer technologies shouldn’t surprise anybody, but the difference in results between the two generations speaks volumes of the skepticism that is felt among older traders. Likewise, skepticism can also be felt among younger traders, as it showed that 71% of millennials that don’t trade crypto would invest in it if it were offered by traditional institutions, and that 93% of millennials that already trade would invest even more if that happened. The managing director of eToro U.S. says that the negative experience of millennials with the stock market led to loss of trust and to the perception that crypto exchanges are less likely to be subject to manipulation.

After a rough week, most top ten cryptocurrencies are back in the green at press time, after experiencing major losses in the early morning. Will crypto prices continue to rise steadily throughout the week and follow last week’s curve? It remains to be seen whether the positive outlooks of Zuckerberg and Musk on crypto will weigh enough to spark another brief rally or if we will have new developments in the QuadrigaCX saga.

We wish you a great week,

Coin360 Editorial Team

Coin360 Editorial Team

Last night, Sunday 17th, put an unexpected surge at the end of a week that had consolidated Bitcoin under the $3,700 barrier. The team at QuadrigaCX seem to have pocketed some money into company cryptocurrency wallets (though they still claim they cannot move any assets), and a libertarian tax-free government-free settlement in Norway has adopted crypto as its sole currency.

Here’s what you need to know about last week’s markets and headlines:

1. Cryptocurrency market analysis

February 8th’s falling wedge breakout had investors predicting a rally to take Bitcoin’s price over the $4,000 psychological barrier. Alas, this past week’s performance discouraged the bulls. Bitcoin shed some value since that $3,691 peak on the 8th, but consolidated near $3,600 during the week days. On Monday 11th, Bitcoin’s price peaked at $3,665. It lost 1.2% of its value by Tuesday, but recovered back to $3,664 by Wednesday 13th. In a roller coaster pattern, Thursday saw the coin fall to $3,609. It regained 0.9% to reach Friday’s highest point, at $3,642. Bitcoin’s price peaked at $3,650 on Saturday, and finally managed to break over $3,700 on Sunday. At press time, Bitcoin is trading at $3,899, for a 7.45% gain on the day.

Ethereum (ETH) regained it’s second place once more, leaving Ripple (XRP) behind in third. The graphs show a pretty steady performance throughout the crypto week, starting on the 11th at $120.86. Monday peaked at $123.11 and Tuesday’s highest point upped it by 0.3%, peaking at $123.47. Wednesday through Saturday didn’t show major changes, peaking at $125.45 on the 13th, dropping 1% of its value on Valentine’s Day. On Friday, the ETH coin dropped another 0.6%, regained it on Saturday, and the peak of the week was on Sunday, when Ethereum’s price surged 10%, peaking at $137. Ethereum is trading at $144.88 at press time, with a 12.7% gain on the day.

Ripple (XRP) started the week on the 11th at $0.308, dropping to $0.300 at one point on Tuesday. The peak of the week happened on Wednesday at $0.310, but it didn’t last long, as the XRP coin was at $0.306 the next day. It went further down by 2.2% on Friday, when the coin was at its lowest price at $0.299. The weekend didn’t show much improvement, peaking at $0.303 the 16th and bottoming again at $0.299 on the 17th. Towards the end on Sunday, however, the coin was at $0.306 again and the price kept going up into the new week. At the time of press, Ripple is $0.323, the gain on the day at 7.69%.

TRON (TRX) started the week on the 11th at its peak, with the price of the coin at $0.0261. However, by the end of the day it had sunk more than 6% at $0.0245. On Tuesday the highest point was at $0.0252 but the price of TRX stayed within the $0.024 almost thoughout the entire day. The rest of the week showed little changes, prices staying between the $0.0236 and $0.0249 on the 17th and the 13th respectively, evidencing a decrease towards Sunday. The TRX coin is at $0.02525 at press time, with a 5.17% gain on the day.

EOS took its 4th place back from Litecoin this week thanks to its performance going in towards the end of Sunday 17th. Monday 11th varied from $2.74 to $2.80 and small fluctuations set the tone of the week. The peak of the week occurred on Tuesday, with EOS price at $2.98 towards the evening, and it peaked again early on Wednesday. During the rest of the weak, prices remained in the $2.74 - $2.92 range. Towards the end of Sunday, things began to pick up again, like the rest of the market’s coins, but in a flash the EOS coin gained momentum and at press time is at $3.52, with an impresive 25.03% gain on the day.

2. Ethereum News: ProgPoW and Create2

An online vote asked users last week about the implementation of “ProgPoW”, an ASIC resistant proof-of-work algorithm which is set to replace ETHash (Ethereum’s current proof-of-work algorithm). Results show that a majority of voters (76%) are in favor of the change. In this case, “ASIC-resistant” means that the algorithm would decrease (but not eliminate) the efficiency advantage of ASIC miners over generic hardware like GPUs. These voting results will not be binding.

In other news, Vitalik Buterin and other core devs were forced to dismiss allegations that Create2, a new smart contract creation feature to be introduced through the Constantinople hard fork, would introduce attack vectors into the network. Create2 is intended to allow for interactions with “addresses that do not exist yet on-chain but can be relied on to only possibly eventually contain code.” In a discussion held on February 15th, developer Jeff Coleman stated that “one of the things that is counter-intuitive about Create2 is that theoretically redeployments can change the contract byte code, because the address is only a commitment to the init code.” You can watch the developers’ meeting here.

3. Altcoins Making Headlines: Litecoin, Binance Coin and Ripple

Litecoin (LTC) is currently the fifth largest cryptocurrency by market cap, trading at $46.27 at press time. After Litecoin’s incredible surge the week before last, which led Friday 8th’s crypto rally, speculators are suggesting investors may be preparing for the mind reward halving coming later in the year. On August 8th, the LTC mining reward will be reduced from 25 LTC to 12.5 LTC. This hypothesis is backed by the fact that Litecoin also rallied before their first halving, in August 2015. Meanwhile, Binance Coin (BNB) has retained its position as tenth biggest coin, and set a new all-time high in Bitcoin-denominated value (do not mistake for its USD-denominated value) when it reached 0.002688 BTC at 10:00 UTC on February 11th. At press time, the price of BNB stands at $9.44.

Ripple made a couple headlines last week as well, for two reasons. First, the remittance company SendFriend, which uses Ripple’s XRapid product for cross-border payments, converting between USD, XRP and Philippine pesos, secured $1.7M in an investment round which counted MIT Media Lab, Barclays, the Mastercard Foundation, Ripple, Techstars, Mahindra Finance, 2020 Ventures, and 8 Decimal Capital as backers. Secondly, Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse was quoted saying that J.P. Morgan’s cryptocurrency, the new JPM coin, misses the point of cryptocurrency. More on this below.

4. J.P. Morgan launches its own cryptocurrency

In a very unlikely move, J.P. Morgan became the first major US financial institution to launch its very own cryptocurrency, JPM Coin, on February 14. “Unlikely” is putting it mildly; CEO Jamie Dimon has openly criticized cryptocurrencies before, going as far as to call Bitcoin a fraud in 2017. The asset, JPM coin, will be primarily used to increase settlement efficiency between clients within three of its main operations, but Umar Farooq, JPM’s blockchain chief, recognizes the potential in the different applications of blockchain technology. He discussed instant settlement for securities issuance, mobile payments, and U.S. dollar replacement for subsidiares that use their treasury services as other possible uses for JPMorgan’s cryptocurrency.

The coin will run on top of Quorum, a private Ethereum blockchain that J.P. Morgan had been developing. The plan, however, is to eventually expand into other platforms, and to make JPM Coin operable on all standard Blockchain networks, according to their FAQ.

However, there are still many people who criticize the coin, mainly for being proprietary bank-issued digital coins. Among these critics is Brad Garlinghouse, CEO at Ripple, who tweeted that JPM Coin missed the point, and would only contribute to further fragmenation in the cryptocurrency landscape; while other critics have gone as far as to say that JPM Coin isn’t even a real cryptocurrency.

5. International cryptocurrency news

In international news, Luxembourg passed a bill this week that will provide a legal framework for market participants to issue securities using blockchains, updating a bill from 2013 which “dematerialized securities.” Meanwhile, Brazil is facing a new case of crackdown against crypto: Bradesco bank will be closing Bitblue Exchange’s banking accounts—and the owner’s private bank accounts—on February 26th, reported Portal do Bitcoin. The local Association of Crypto and Blockchain (ABCB) reported the case to the Brazilian Administrative Council for Economic Defense (CADE), claiming that the bank violated free competition laws. The precedent is favorable: last October, the Federal District Court dictated that Banco do Brasil and Santander Brasil had to reopen accounts for Brazilian crypto exchange Bitcoin Max.

Finally, the Indonesian Commodity Future Trading Regulatory Agency (BAPPEBTI) is requiring crypto traders to, among other things, keep a deposit of 80 billion Rupiah (or USD $5.7 million) in order to participate in futures trading. Traders are complaining these measures will strangle the sector.

6. Follow ups on the Quadriga CX saga

The QuadrigaCX saga continues. The fact that CEO Gerard Cotten filed a will 12 days before his deathwithout making any reference to the cold wallets, that QuadrigaCX has continued to accept deposits well after being aware that they couldn’t access those wallets and the evidence that shows that there have been outgoing transactions from the company’s crypto wallets have only fueled suspicions. This has led to extensive research among the community, who have made yet another discovery.

This comes from a report made by the firm Ernst & Young, appointed by the court as a monitor to Quadriga’s hearings. It stated that, on February 6th, Quadriga transferred 103 BTC to its cold wallets, which at press time is more than $380,000 USD. After this, a user on reddit discovered five wallets that are allegedly associated to QuadrigaCX exchange platform, which seem to be only a portion of all the cryptocurrency wallets involved. These findings are not proof for anything, but are regarded by the community as important leads towards the truth. Supreme Court Judge Michael Wood was supposed to decide the law firm who would represent as many as 115,000 Quadriga CX users by February 14th, but the decision has been delayed by a week. Finally, a Bloomberg report from February 15th revealed that Cotten claimed back in 2014 that QuadrigaCX used paper wallets to store private keys.

7. Liberstad adopts City Coin as its sole medium of exchange

Liberstad, a private smart city in Norway, has adopted its proprietary token as its official medium of exchange, as stated in their official press release. City Coin (CITY), their cryptocurrency, is based on City Chain, their smart city platform that enables “design, implementation and use of next-generation services for smart cities and their inhabitants”. This platform is set to do away with government entities for their inhabitants, who can engage and carry out civic duties through the use of the platform. A municipal app, called City Hub, is where inhabitants can interact with the community and engage in voting and other civic functions. Liberstad is a project that has been backed by 100 investors from 27 countries.

City Coin is the first crypto currency that is being adopted as the official crypto currency of a smart city. It is also based on a Proof-of-Stake algorithm, which allows CITY holders to receive 20 CITY for every staked block, rewarding users who secure the network with passive income. CITY is already available for trading on the p2pb2b and Liberstad’s Block exchanges. The mainnet is already live, so it is possible for users to explore the blockchain and view the cryptocurrency transaction history.

8. Fake Metamask App

On February 8th, an app that contains malware that replaces your crypto wallet addresses was discovered on Google Play for the first time. This discovery was made by ESET, who published a blog post reporting the issue. The malware, known as “clipper”, can be found on Google Play under the name MetaMask, and it also shares the same interface and style as MetaMask wallet. The idea is to trick users into thinking that it is an official MetaMask app, while in reality it replaces clipboard information in an attempt to replace your cryptocurrency wallet addresses with addresses that belong to the attacker. After it was reported by the ESET team, the app was quickly taken down, but it will still go down as the first time an app such as this makes it past Google’s security protocols. In response to this incident, MetaMask tweeted that things like these happen because Google Play doesn’t reserve trademarked names, allowing for impostors to impersonate legit companies. The ESET team suggests users to keep their devices updated and constantly double check to see if wallet addresses have been tampered with.

Something similar happened on February 15t, when Symantec reported findings of cryptojacking adds found on Microsoft Store. The eight apps that contained malicious XMR mining code were reportedly among some of the most popular free apps, but have been thus removed from the store.

9. Venezuela’s New Fees and Taxes on Crypto

The government of Venezuela keeps strengthening its regulations on crypto. Right at the end of last week, the Venezuelan government’s National Superintendency of Crypto Assets and Related Activities (SUNACRIP) introduced regulations for crypto remittances. This was announced via Gaceta Oficial n°41,581, the government’s official media outlet. The regulation consists of taxation in the receiving and sending of cryptocurrencies, along with many other limitations. The decree indicates that the minimum fee that SUNACRIP will charge in each crypto transaction will be of $0.28, but it also states that SUNACRIP can also charge up to 15% of any transaction. What’s more, the decree seems to allow SUNACRIP to arbitrarily decide the taxation fees.

Additionally, there is a USD $600 (or 10 Petro) monthly limit for crypto remittances. If this limit is exceeded, an approval from SUNACRIP is needed, which could move the limit up to the hard limit of $3,000 (or 50 Petro). These limitations are part of a regulatory framewok that we covered last week, which has already decreed that business must register with SUNACRIP, or face a 100-300 Petro penalty.

10. Binance DEX to launch its testnet this week

On Feb. 11, Changpeng Zhao has announced via Twitter that Feb. 20 is the target release date for the testnet of Binance Chain, the native blockchain that’s being developed to support the DEX. Zhao also hosted an ask-me-anything on Twitter to provide more details about the DEX, in which he answered 73 questions in 45 minutes.

In the AMA, Zhao revealed that Binance Chain will provide support for hardware wallets, having Ledger’s Nano S wallet already integrated, and it will be available on all platforms (Windows, Linux, Mac OS, iOS and Android). He also stated that the current TPS is “a couple thousand”, but that can be scaled up if the need arises. He emphasized that right now Binance DEX can handle the volume of Binance.com. He revealed that there will be a listing fee, but it will be a high one in order to reduce the number of crypto scams; he reported that it will be an amount close to $100,000 USD, but that can be adjusted as well. All of these developments are happening amidst a string of successful events for Binance, whose coin reached an all-time-high in its Bitcoin-denominated value.

11. Bitcoin ETFs on the horizon

On Friday 8th, US SEC commissioner Hester Peirce stated that the agency’s staff are working on “supplemental guidance” to help projects determine “whether their crypto-fundraising efforts fall under the securities laws.” In other words, she announced plans to clarify when securities laws might apply to cryptocurrency token sales.

On Friday 15th, the SEC announced it was reviewing a Bitcoin ETF rule change proposal filed by NYSE Arca and Bitwise Asset Management on February 11th. They have only 45 days to make its initial decision on whether to approve, reject or extend the proposal. NYSE Arca and Bitwise had actually announced a Bitcoin ETF and filed for a rule change proposal earlier this year, but the SEC was unable to publish the filing in the Federal Register due to the government shutdown, so the proposal was never examined. These news are being received with much enthusiasm due to commissioner Robert Jackson’s hopeful words regarding the SEC’s eventual approval of Bitcoin ETFs, a headline we covered last week.

Perhaps the highlight of the crypto week has been J.P. Morgan’s change of heart (or complete misunderstanding, if Garlinghouse is to be headed) regarding cryptocurrencies. Either way, the fact that a major financial institution has launched something that at least intends to be a cryptocurrency, in the same month that the SEC seems to be letting its guard down for Bitcoin ETFs, has many speculators on the edge of their seats. 2019 might be a year of huge changes in the institutional treatment of cryptos.

We wish you a great week,

Coin360 Editorial Team

2. Litecoin leads crypto market rally

On Friday, February 8th, the crypto market added more than $10B in a matter of hours. The surprising rally was lead by Litecoin, which is most probably surging thanks to CEO Charlie Lee’s announcement that the team is exploring the idea of using MimbleWimble to implement anonymous transactions on the Litecoin network. MimbleWimble is a scalable, privacy-based blockchain protocol that verifies transactions without needing to store the entire history of the chain. Implementing MimbleWimble in Litecoin will not require a hard fork according to Lee. Analysts were actually agreeing days ago that Litecoin was looking bullish and might surge soon.

Just during February 8th, Litecoin (LTC) increased by 25% and became the 4th largest currency in the global cryptocurrency market, taking EOS’s place. At press time, the price of Litecoin is $44, which represents a 16% gain on the day and a 33% gain on the week.

3. BitTorrent (BTT) Launchpad consequences: gains, controversy and CoinPayments integration

The BitTorrent token (BTT) sale on Binance’s Launchpad platform last January 28th raked in over $7M, and pushed Binance Coin (BNB) into the top ten largest. From the BTT sale until the peak of the February 8th rally, the price of BNB gained 40%. This was a complete success for Binance and TRON, but not so much for the general public. People took to social media reporting they were unable to participate because of multiple errors, in addition to the fact that 28.44% of the tokens appeared as sold a mere 3 seconds after the commencement of the launch. One YouTube channel even put out a three part video series postulating what nearly amounts to a conspiracy theory. Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao apologized for the glitches via Twitter, and TRON airdropped 5K BTT to users who failed to get their orders through (equivalent to around $4).

Today BitTorrent is also in the news for something else: it is partnering with CoinPayments crypto payments gateway, which will now offer BTT token support. Justin Sun, CEO of TRON, said the partnership with CoinPayments is a bid to “make BitTorrent (BTT) liquid in the online marketplace before [the token] is fully integrated into our desktop and mobile products.” BTT increased its value 6 times over with the Launchpad ICO but has since shed some of it.

4. AdvisorShares and Sabretooth Advisors’s new ETF

The investment management firm AdvisorShares and the investments advisory company Sabretooth Advisors have partnered up, and announced on February 7th that they are launching an ETF focused on cloud and blockchain technologies on the NASDAQ exchange: the BKCH.

BKCH began trading that same day. To be clear, the BKCH ETF does not invest in cryptocurrencies, but rather, as their announcement reads, “BKCH invests in U.S.-listed equities and American depositary receipts (ADRs) of digital and cloud companies.“ The team believes that companies that use cloud computing and implement emerging tech like blockchain can realize increased profitability and appreciation in stock prices over time.

5. The QuadrigaCX saga continues

The plight of QuadrigaCX’s lost crypto funds continues. Users have been complaining for over a monththat they cannot withdraw their funds, and suspicions of a scam were already in the air before it was announced this week that CEO Gerald Cotten reportedly died of complications from Crohn’s disease on December 9th in India; and that he had held “sole responsibility for handling the funds and coins,” and left behind an encrypted laptop with no evidence of the private passwords. This meant the exchange might have no way to access the $190M USD ($53M in fiat and $137M in crypto) that Cotten’s widow claimed it owed to 115K users. Last week, QuadrigaCX went offline for “maintenance.” A Nova Scotia Supreme Court judge has granted the exchange 30 days to recover the cryptocurrencies or find another way to reimburse customers.

It took until this week for Cotten’s death statement and a death certificate to become public, and users still speculate the CEO may not even be dead (notice that the death certificate misspelled his last name as “Cottan”). Another point of controversy lies in the fact that Cotten had claimed in 2015, that the exchange used multi-signature wallets – so, did Cotten single-handedly manage all of the signatures, or was this security precaution never really taken? QuadrigaCX had already faced legal trouble in November 2018, when a judge ruled in favor of a Canadian bank that had frozen $19.6M in the exchange’s accounts, because it was unable to determine the funds’ owners.

6. SEC commissioner sparks expectations for SEC approved crypto ETF

An interview has leaked to Twitter this week in which US SEC commissioner Robert J. Jackson Jr. claims that, eventually, a proposal for cryptocurrency-based funds will pass the minimum requirements and get accepted. “Getting the stamp of approval from the deepest and most liquid capital markets in the world is hard, and it should be,” said Jackson, adding “Eventually, do I think someone will satisfy the standards that we’ve laid out there? I hope so, yes, and I think so.”

It has proven extremely difficult for cryptocurrency ETFs to pass the SEC’s bar; 10 proposals have been rejected so far. Bats BXZ Exchange’s proposal to list Winklevoss Bitcoin Trust shares was rejected last July over lack of surveillance. About the twins’ case, Jackson commented “There you had a situation where the risk for manipulation and for people getting hurt was enormous. The liquidity issues in the market were very serious.”

7. Bitcoin trade volume rises and crypto regulation hardens in Venezuela

In the midst of their political crisis, Bitcoin trading volumes have skyrocketed in Venezuela, surpassing 2K BTC (or $6.8M) on the peer-to-peer exchange LocalBitcoins during last week. Sources report that many Venezuelans are actually trading from within neighboring countries. Colombia and Venezuela account for 85% of trading volumes in the exchange, with 8571 transactions in Venezuela and 1709 in Colombia during the first five weeks of 2019.

Charities have popped up in the past to provide humanitarian aid in Venezuela through cryptocurrencies, and some think this is a good use-case to prove their worth. Starting this week, however, Venezuela has issued a regulatory framework for crypto service providers, including exchange platforms and miners. According to an official government document, businesses working with crypto assets will now have to register with Sunacrip, the Venezuelan superintendency of crypto-related activities. Failure to register will mean a 100–300 petros penalty. Maduro’s government has also hinted it may limit the number of crypto exchanges that are allowed to operate in the country.

8. International adoption

The island state Mauritius has announced it will begin issuing Crypto Custodian Licenses by March 2019 through the Financial Services Commission (FSC) in order to offer a regulated place for digital assets. Those obtaining a license will be held to similar standards of existing financial institutions following anti-money laundering and counter-terrorism funding laws.

In other international news, as a response to US sanctions and following the lead of Venezuela’s “Petro”, Iran has officially launched PayMon, a gold-backed cryptocurrency, as reported by the Financial Tribune. One billion PayMon will be released by Iran Fara Bourse, an OTC crypto exchange. The collaboration between blockchain company Kuknos as well as Bank Pasargad, Bank Melli, Bank Mellat, and Bank Parsian will allow Iran to bypass economic sanctions and aid in domestic and international transactions.

9. Facebook hires Chainspace researchers, Telegram says TON 90% complete

According to a report by Cheddar, Facebook has aqui-hired Chainspace, a blockchain startup from University College London. Facebook is reportedly looking to expand skills and expertise in the blockchain field with four researchers from this company. In 2017, Chainspace made strides with cryptography and security described in their academic white paper illustrating Chainspace as a smart contracts platform with the goal of bringing speed to transactions through blockchain technology. Their alpha system running in Golang does sharding, consensus, and executes smart contracts.

Meanwhile, Telegram has released an investor update on the developments of its Telegram Open Network (TON). The public was surprised to hear that TON is already 90% complete (the mainnet launch has been delayed for this March). TON is working to get its native token, GRAM, listed on Asian exchanges such as Huobi, Binance, and OKEx. With 200 million active users, GRAM can expect to see strong support. Media expects there will be paralleled competition with TRON as a top crypto coin.

10. Bitcoin Lightning torch continues its odyssey, reaches Jack Dorsey

The Bitcoin Lightning Torch continues its journey after reaching Jack Dorsey, CEO of Twitter and payment app Square. Dorsey explained on Twitter that he is a long proponent of Bitcoin because “it is native to internet ideals.” He took on the torch and passed it to Elizabeth Stark, CEO of Lightning Labs. Each participant in this game has added 10K satoshis. The torch has reached over 30 countries.

Twitter users and Bitcoin enthusiasts have called on Elon Musk to take on the torch and continue the LN Trust Chain to show just how powerful and valuable Bitcoin lightning network can be. The torch, started by a Bitcoin user known on Twitter as Hodlonaut, has a hard-coded limit of 4,390,000 satoshis. Once it hits the limit, the satoshis will likely be donated to a charitable cause.

11. Plan to revive MtGox revealed

Brock Pierce, chairman of the Bitcoin Foundation, has launched efforts through the movement Gox Rising to recover assets lost in the Mt. Gox bankruptcy. Pierce plans to “maximize creditor recovery through quick payout of the estate’s current $1.2B in assets. This includes an ongoing effort to recover and distribute the missing Bitcoins,” as described on the new site, goxrising.com.

The hack of 2011 led to a complete collapse in 2014, resulting in the loss of 850K BTC as stated in a Mt. Gox press release. By recovering and redistributing lost assets, Pierce and the Gox Rising team hope to revive the platform as well as launch “Gox Coin”. However, this week it was discovered through incomplete BitPoint transaction scans that Mt. Gox trustee, Nobuaki Kobayashi had been selling off BTC and BTH for a total of $318M and creating devaluations in the currencies.

The crypto community is ecstatic this week; the $10B added to the crypto market and the stoked expectations of a cryptocurrency ETF have put a pleasant mood in the air (one that continues to be egged on by TON’s advances, the limits imposed by Canadian courts on the QuadrigaCX saga, etc). One word of caution: let’s not get ahead of ourselves. After all, no Bitcoin ETF’s have yet passed SEC regulations, market tides may change, and deadlines can eternally be pushed forward. Let’s wait and see.

We wish you a great week,

Coin360 Editorial Team

A few days before,I have written an article about ENERGI (NRG) world. Now,its time to adapte to POS(ProofOfStake) model. Today I want to tell you about their new model.

Lets begin;

As they mentioned in their last article, The Consensus Mechanism Algorithms of Energi, cryptocurrencies rely on consensus algorithms to reach agreement among nodes within the blockchain network and those who validate a block receive a reward. Proof-of-Stake (POS) models use a simple method to help secure the blockchain network. To become a contributor or validator, a participant must lock up (or stake) a number of coins or tokens into the blockchain. The amount being staked will determine the participant’s chances to have their block included and claim a reward. Energi (NRG) will soon be transitioning to a POS consensus model, which will allow for a far easier method for participants to earn Energi. In this article we will capture Energi’s POS model at a high-level and compare it to other top cryptocurrencies with POS.

Energi’s Proof-of-Stake Complexity

Like many POS cryptocurrencies, participants will be able to stake Energi in the Energi Core Wallet. Once Energi is stored within the wallet, participants will then unlock their wallet for staking and leave their wallet connected to the Energi blockchain network. As long as the wallet remains unlocked for staking and connected to the network, participants will be rewarded Energi. Considering Energi’s POS model is relatively easy to set up and earn rewards, this will attract many users who don’t have the expensive equipment to mine or the large amount of Energi needed for a masternode, to earn rewards.

Energi’s Proof-of-Stake Reward Rate

Energi’s POS will distribute 10% of the newly emitted Energi per month to stakers. To determine how much Energi participants can earn when staking, let’s use the following numbers as examples. If a user is staking 1,000 NRG and there is a collected total of 1,000,000 NRG being staked, multiply by 10% of the newly emitted Energi (100,000 NRG) to determine the monthly return:

(1,000 NRG / 1,000,000 NRG) * 100,000 NRG = Monthly Return

That is an astounding 120% yearly return. This is arguably the largest rate of return any cryptocurrency has to offer to stakers.

To see how much a single Energi participant can earn, let’s use an example and compare the potential return against other cryptocurrencies. Given the example we used above (1,000,000 NRG staked collectively), let’s breakdown how much the return will be if someone had a $1,000 investment for each of the following POS cryptocurrencies:

As we can see from the table above, Energi’s POS model is far superior to any other cryptocurrency’s POS model within this space.

Conclusion

Other than Proof-of-Stake’s energy efficient benefits, the reduction of centralized risks from miners and it’s flexible design, Energi is looking to become a lead cryptocurrency that provides users with an effortless and innovative experience on earning rewards.

To prepare for our transition to Proof-of-Stake, download the latest version of our Energi Core Wallet by visiting the link below:

https://www.energi.world/downloads

Coinchase is a Community-based Cryptocurrency Financial Services Network.

It is a new generation of financial services network. As traditional finance has lost its vitality, the emerging and fast-growing blockchain industry brings rapid development in this sector and high returns to customers. Coinchase is based on cryptocurrency: it aims to build a community-based financial network composed by individuals. Individuals are both creators and beneficiaries of the network. Coinchase acts as the organizer and service developer of its network.