Day: August 28, 2017

Uber has reportedly chosen Expedia chief Dara Khosrowshahi as its new CEO. Under Khosrowshahi’s lead, Expedia started accepting bitcoin. He is also a personal investor in Bitcoin startup 21 Inc.

Also read: Japan’s Largest Rewards Site Operator With 5 Million Users Launching Bitcoin Exchange

Uber Picked Bitcoin-Friendly Chief

Uber Technologies Inc reportedly chose Expedia CEO Dara Khosrowshahi as its new CEO on Sunday, according to two sources with knowledge of the matter. Bloomberg reported:

Uber Technologies Inc. will appoint Expedia Inc.’s Dara Khosrowshahi to run the global ride-hailing leviathan.

Khosrowshahi began serving as the CEO of Expedia in August 2005, helping the company extend its global presence to more than 60 countries. “Under his leadership, Expedia, Inc. has grown to become the largest online travel company in the world,” his business profile shows. The Brown University graduate became the highest paid CEO in the S&P 500 in 2015, with compensation totaling $94.6 million, according to a report compiled by Equilar and the Associated Press.

In March 2015, he personally invested an undisclosed amount in the $116 million Series B fundraising round for 21 Inc. In addition, his Linkedin profile shows that he is a member of the professional Bitcoin P2P Digital Currency group.

If Khosrowshahi accepts Uber’s offer, he would be replacing founder Travis Kalanick, who resigned after a shareholder revolt. At press time, he has not yet accepted the offer.

Expedia & Bitcoin

During Khosrowshahi’s leadership, Expedia started accepting bitcoin on June 11, 2014. However, the option is only available for hotel bookings, which is still the case today. For flights, the only payment options are debit/credit cards and Masterpass currently.

Bitcoin payments for Expedia are processed by Coinbase. Customers paying with bitcoin are directed to Coinbase’s website. Michael Gulmann, Expedia’s vice president of global product, explained at the time that “Coinbase immediately converts all customer bitcoin transactions into U.S. dollars with its instant exchange feature, so we at Expedia never actually collect or hold any bitcoin.”

Uber & Bitcoin

While Uber does not accept bitcoin, some Uber drivers have independently explored the option.

In July 2016 in Argentina, Uber drivers began accepting payments using Bitcoin wallet and card service Xapo to bypass a political roadblock stopping them from accepting credit cards within the country. News.Bitcoin.com reported at the time how holders of the Xapo debit card could use Uber’s existing card readers, giving Argentinians a way to pay for their Uber rides in addition to cash. The political embargo stopping Uber from using credit cards did not affect Xapo’s debit card since they are topped up using bitcoin, Xapo explained.

Do you think Uber will start accepting bitcoin soon if Dara Khosrowshahi accepts the job? Let us know in the comments section below.

Images courtesy of Metronews.ca, Expedia, Uber, The Financial Times

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Many people worldwide enjoy eating meat. I am one of those people. However, I do recognize that growing meat can be an environmentally disastrous and, at times, morally dubious thing to do. This is why I was excited when I read that a company called Memphis Meats has some new and powerful backers. The project aims to grow edible meat in labs instead of relying on the raising and slaughtering of animals for our meat products.

Bringing Home the (Lab-Grown) Bacon

Recently Memphis Meats announced that it had some new and exciting backers. DFJ, a venture capital firm that is known for having backed SpaceX, Skype, and Tesla, courted big-name investors to help raise US$17 million for Memphis Meats. Among these investors were Bill Gates and Richard Branson. Other investors included Cargill, New Crop Capital, and Inevitable Ventures.

Collectively, the company has netted US$22 million in investment to date. This capital will be used to scale up Memphis Meats’s production capabilities and further product research. The company ultimately aims to make its meat cheaper than traditionally-sourced meat.

Is All This Really Necessary?

The first time I heard about this project, I wondered if it really needed to exist. However, after doing some research I tend to agree with the project’s view that this is both necessary and inevitable. Clearly, people with far more business acumen than I agree with them. Global demand for meat is on the rise and unlikely to slow down. In the United States and other western nations, we tend to forget that other countries do not share our access to opulence, though they are getting there. Lab-grown meat probably is the most efficient way to address that market demand. After all, the meat industry is nearly a trillion dollar market.

Once the research and development connected to producing meat efficiently and on a large scale is completed, businesses like Memphis Meats may quickly expand beyond the traditional meat market. While I have no doubt that traditional meat production will stick around, it may be in the form of a more expensive and artisanal experience. I say this because growing an animal and slaughtering it requires an incredible amount of resources. Water, feed, medicine, humane slaughter equipment, removal of waste products, and more all drive up the price of meat. Growing meat in a lab only requires sufficient resources for those fast-growing cells, rather than also maintaining discarded and uneaten parts of an animal for years. This would also positively impact the environment by requiring less resources and cutting down on waste materials.

While the chances of most people eating meat that does not come from an animal anytime soon are slim, the recent influx of cash to this project means we will likely get there sooner than was expected. Personally, I cannot wait.

Even though cryptocurrency ICOs are a real hype right now, not all projects will succeed. Some ventures won’t even make it to their ICO stage either. GroceryX is one of those projects which got canceled before the official ICO even began. Their pre-ICO event failed to raise enough money to keep funding the project. Having … Continue reading GroceryX Pre-ICO Fails to Raise Enough Funds, Investors Will get Refunded

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Although this has been brewing for quite a long time, the Litecoin price has finally broken through the $60 ceiling overnight. After a few weeks of seemingly sideways trading, LTC has finally picked up the pace and started moving in the right direction. With the current Litecoin price sitting at $62.52, things are looking quite good for this particular altcoin. Moreover, the Litecoin market cap is quite growing as well and is knocking on the proverbial door of $3.3bn.

Litecoin Price Surge is Pretty Exciting

Most cryptocurrency users may recall the last time we saw some major Litecoin price momentum. After all, this particular trend took place back in 2013 during the first major Bitcoin price explosion. Similar to Mt.Gox artificially pumping the Bitcoin price, the Litecoin price took a similar path. At its peak, one Litecoin could be traded for just under $34, which was considered a very high value for LTC at that time. Granted, Litecoin had virtually zero use cases and not too many technological advancements in 2013.

However, ever since that time, we have seen a massive Litecoin price decline. Back in late 2014 and early 2015, the Litecoin price hovered around the $2 mark for a very long time. It took until early 2017 before things finally picked up the pace once again. People who purchased Litecoin at $2 and still have it today have increased their portfolio value by 3,000%. It is not as profitable as holding Bitcoin ever since that time, but it still goes to show Litecoin is a solid investment regardless of what some people may claim.

That being said, we are now in the midst of a major Litecoin price surge. No one can deny good things are happening to Litecoin as we speak. Ever since the network successfully activated Segregated Witness, things have shifted into a high gear. The activation of SegWit has elevated the Litecoin price to $40 in recent months, which was considered to be a major price jump. However, it is also evident this is only just the beginning of what the future may hold moving forward. Some people expect LTC may go as high as $100, although that may be a bit too optimistic.

Then again, the current trend toward $60 is quite significant as well. With nearly $1m in 24-hour trading volume, Litecoin is certainly getting a lot of attention from traders and speculators all over the world as we speak. The majority of trading volume comes from both Korean and Chinese exchanges, which is pretty interesting. Bithumb is leading the charge, of course, but OKCoin and Huobi are also contributing their fair share of trading volume. No Western exchange comes even close to these markets, that much is evident.  

That being said, it is unclear why these markets are the ones driving up the Litecoin price as we speak. There haven’t been any major development related to this altcoin, other than the LND client update to make cross-chain atomic swaps a lot more convenient in the future. Do keep in mind this technology is still in the very early stages and a lot of work has to be done before it can be turned into a viable project. It does indicate Litecoin is of keen interest to a few developers and even other alternative cryptocurrencies right now.

Speculators would like nothing more than to see the Litecoin price maintain its current momentum. One has to admit, however, that will not be easy by any stretch of the imagination. So far, there is no reason to think the Litecoin price will drop again, but cryptocurrency markets have an unusual way of correcting themselves every now and then. It will be interesting to see how things evolve over the coming hours and days. Right now, the momentum is clearly in favor of Litecoin, but there are other cryptocurrencies to take into account as well.

Cryptocurrency exchange CoinExchange has undergone and survived DDOS attempt Saturday Aug. 26.

Low cost electricity and hyperinflation are two main reasons why Venezuelans turn to cryptocurrency mining.

Just days after resigning from South Africa’s central securities depository, the former CEO reveals plans to enter the blockchain space full-time.

Cyber hackers from North Korea have reportedly targeted Bitcoin exchanges in South Korea in retaliation to new sanctions imposed by the United Nations against the hermit kingdom as of late August 2017.

Russia has unveiled plans to forbid investors who are not ‘qualified’ from purchasing cryptocurrency.

With the weekend behind us, the time has come to look toward the cryptocurrency markets once again. It looks like some interesting changes are taking place, especially where Monero is concerned. Although it appears the Monero price momentum would grind to a halt over the weekend, the trend has picked up steam again. Reaching that $150 mark is still a distinct possibility, although it will take some effort.

Monero Price Train Just Keeps on Rolling

It is quite amazing to see how much the Monero price has appreciated these past few days. For some reason, this currency has successfully flown under the radar for the longest time. Many people disregarded XMR as a viable currency, even though it has the anonymity traits so many people actively looking for right now. While it is certainly true Monero isn’t as convenient or easy to spend as Bitcoin – which is very limited in itself in this regard – things are certainly improving for the XMR ecosystem as we speak.

Moreover, it seems a lot of people are actively taking a liking to Monero as we speak. If that wasn’t the case, there would be no price jump like the one we are seeing right now. Pushing the Monero price to $150 and possibly beyond is certainly subject to market manipulation and massive speculation. Then again, we have seen Dash go from nearly no value to around $400 this year as well. There is no reason to think Monero can’t see a similar price pattern, as the current trend certainly looks pretty bullish.

One thing that will certainly help the Monero price move along is the listing on Korea’s Bithumb exchange. It has been mentioned by us previously how this exchange is known for shaking up cryptocurrency markets quite a bit. In an email sent out to customers earlier today, the company mentions how XMR trading will go live on August 31st. However, the market itself is open for action and it appears Monero is getting a lot of volume already.  Right now, they value one XMR at $170, compared to around $150 across Western exchanges.

It is important to note there no longer appears to be a “premium ‘price” difference between Western exchanges and Bithumb. In the past, we would see most Asian exchanges trade 5% or more above the normal market average. That is no longer the case, and Bithumb is an exchange which operates on a zero-trading fee structure. If they value XMR at $170, the rest of the world will have to follow their lead in one way or the other. Whether or not that will be the case, remains to be determined.

Having this fiat currency gateway for Monero will certainly open up new opportunities. The Korean won is quickly becoming the go-to fiat currency market when it comes to cryptocurrency trading. It can easily dwarf USD, EUR, and GBP volumes combined, even on a bad day. It is evident for everyone to see South Korea has become the new China when it comes to dictating cryptocurrency prices right now. Bithumb is certainly one of the leaders in this market, although Coinone shouldn’t be discounted either.

All things considered, there are plenty of reasons to get excited about the Monero price. It is a great day for speculators and market makers once again. A lot of people still have high hopes for a massive Ethereum price jump, but it looks like the market is pretty much divided on this front. Then again, Ethereum has seen its biggest price jump to date already and it remains doubtful history will repeat itself for this particular currency. The altcoin season is in full effect as we speak, that much no one can deny.

China UnionPay, the payment card giant, hopes to patent a system for connecting a network of ATMs using blockchain tech, public records reveal.

Tuur Demeester, prominent bitcoin analyst and investor, recently stated that bitcoin price is leading its fourth attempt to surpass the $4,500 mark to establish its new all-time high.

Unfortunately for investors and traders, bitcoin price experienced a minor correction earlier today on August 28, struggling to test its attempt to rise past $4,500 and sustain its upward momentum in the short-term.

An optimistic indicator of bitcoin’s short-term trend has been its stable daily trading volume, which has been above $1.6 billion straight for the past four straight. Prior to that, when bitcoin price was nearing $4,500, the daily trading volume of bitcoin reached nearly $4 billion, as the daily trading volume of the entire cryptocurrency market surged past the $6 billion mark.

Although it is difficult to justify bitcoin’s struggle to overcome its correction and surge past $4,500, many analysts believe it can be attributed to the congestion of the bitcoin network. Between the Bitcoin Cash mining instability and the lack of SegWit-enabled transactions, the bitcoin network has been failing to clear its mempool of transactions at a sufficient rate.

As the Bitcoin Core development team’s scaling and transaction malleability solution Segregated Witness (SegWit) becomes more widely integrated, the number of SegWit-transactions will increase as a result. As wallet platforms implement the functionality, bitcoin fees will also decrease for users dealing with SegWit transactions. However, for users sending and receiving normal transactions, fees will likely be high until the next difficulty adjustment.

The bitcoin network has already improved in terms of network congestion in the past week, as the size of the mempool decreased from over 103 million bytes to 61 million bytes, a 40% improvement. Many transactions that have been stuck in the mempool without any confirmations from miners were cleared, returning stability to the network.

Once bitcoin transaction fees start decreasing at a fast pace due to a decrease in Bitcoin Cash mining profitability, larger adoption of SegWit by service providers and increased number of SegWit transactions, it is likely that bitcoin could test the $4,500 region and sustain its upward trend until $5,000.

Jihan Wu, the co-founder of Bitmain, operating company of the largest bitcoin mining pool in Antpool, also announced earlier this week that the company is working on fixing bitcoin and Bitcoin Cash mining errors:

“BCC/BTC mining together caused lots of error in the mining pools and empty block is a fall back security measure. It is solved now,” said Wu.

Mining of full blocks by Antpool and other large mining operators will also allow the bitcoin mempool to clear at a faster rate and allow bitcoin transaction fees to decrease. The bitcoin network needs stability in terms of mining and transactions due to its heavy congestion that has left tens of thousands of transactions unconfirmed for days in the past week.

Improvement in scalability caused by SegWit, decrease in transaction fees and stabilization of the bitcoin network will lead to a rise bitcoin price, in the short-term.