Month: November 2017

Unlike heavyweights in the financial industry like Jamie Dimon and Warren Buffett, Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein has been open-minded about Bitcoin. He foresees a Bitcoin strategy for Goldman Sachs if it gets more established.

Decentralized currencies could have “spillover effects” on the wider financial system if they get too big, Fed supervision chief Randal Quarles said.

November 29 was an exciting day if you were watching bitcoin prices swing back and forth with quite a bit of turbulence. The price of bitcoin touched an all-time high of $11,395 across global exchanges. Then, about an hour or so later, the price went down hard to a low of $9250 on some trading platforms. Although some exchanges had significant operational issues according to upset customers, the Down Detector, and the trading platform’s own website status pages.

See also: Circle Financial Plans to Launch a New Investment App Next Year

Multiple Cryptocurrency Exchanges Suffer From Website Outages and Service Issues

Cryptocurrency exchanges had some difficulties on November 29 as the price had wild and tumultuous price swings all day long. After the big spike and the start of the dip, customers started venting on forums and social media complaining about trading platforms and outages. The forum /r/bitcoin started a megathread dedicated to exchange outages. “Please discuss exchange outages here instead of everyone submitting screenshots of a broken website,” pleaded the subreddit moderator.

According to multiple reports, exchanges such as Coinbase, GDAX, Gemini, Bitstamp, Kraken, Bitfinex, and others had issues with their websites during the day. Traders complained of downtime during the dip, margin trading liquidations, and flash crashes. For instance, the trading platform Gemini has a whole page report on multiple issues of “degraded performance” during the day.

“We have received a few messages where customers see a ‘504 Gateway Time-out’ message,” explains the exchange status page.

We are implementing a mitigation fix due to an enormous influx of web traffic. We are monitoring and will let you all know once we are back up and running. Thank you for your ongoing patience.

Coinbase and GDAX Experience Downtime

Another popular cryptocurrency platform that had issues during the day was Coinbase, and its sister company GDAX also had multiple problems with website operations.

“A portion of customers may be unable to access Coinbase — We are working to restore access to all users,” explained the company. Further, the company’s trading engine GDAX also suffered technical difficulties.

“We are currently investigating performance issues and downtime on the web app and REST API,” said the GDAX on November 29.

Kraken and Bitstamp Outages

Outages also took place on Kraken, as the website Down Detector reveals: the exchange had issues from 8 am to 9 pm EDT. There are multiple comments on the portal of Kraken customers upset with the downtime. Additionally, at the same time Down Detector had recorded some outages that happened over at Bitstamp. The European exchange had over 140 reports of outages between 11 am to 8 pm according to the Down Detector. Bitstamp outages were reported in the U.S., the Czech Republic, Germany, Holland, and many other areas across Europe. The trading platforms Poloniex and Bittrex also had customers who complained about website performance on Wednesday. 

Exchange Downtime and Margin Losses Show the Industry Has Significant Challenges

Throughout the day while exchanges had severe technical difficulties and outages, bitcoin’s price rapidly went from $11,395 and dropped 17 percent following the spike. After that bitcoin crossed the $10-10.5K range multiple times, and again fell to the $9600 territory. Even worse margin traders who utilize the exchange Bitfinex lost a lot of money according to many reports. When visiting the Reddit forum /r/bitfinex many traders are very upset with the trading platform’s performance on November 29. According to the company’s support page, the trading engines margin call limits should stop serious losses. The support page states;

When a position is force liquidated, the system places a limit order at the zero-equity price (rather than simply executing a market order). We do this to prevent a liquidated position creating a negative account balance for the user due to slippage during highly volatile market periods. 

However, a lot of Bitfinex traders say the company’s margin call safety valve did not save their accounts and there are countless posts of people claiming they were forced liquidated.

One company who helps provide exchange infrastructure support to cryptocurrency trading platforms wants to prevent these types of market oddities. The firm Alphapoint and its co-founder, Igor Telyatnikov, believes digital asset infrastructure outages are a problem if the technology gains a more considerable influx of mass adoption.

“Today’s incident highlights the challenges in this space as it continues to mature and attract institutional money,” Telyatnikov explained. “We need a more robust infrastructure for institutional-grade needs.”

What do you think about the massive exchange outages that plagued customers on November 29? Let us know what you think in the comments below.

Images via Shutterstock, Twitter, GDAX, Coinbase, Gemini, and the Down Detector.

Do you agree with us that Bitcoin is the best invention since sliced bread? Thought so. That’s why we are building this online universe revolving around anything and everything Bitcoin. A forum, and a casino, a pool and real-time price statistics.

The post This Week’s All-Time High Brings Massive Bitcoin Exchange Outages appeared first on Bitcoin News.

The post Bitcoin Price Analysis: A Potential Correction Could Be Coming appeared first on Bitcoin Magazine.

A U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent mentions mixing services at exchanges and anonymity-enhancing currencies in Senate testimony.

Bitcoin ABC has quickly become the go-to client for Bitcoin Cash users. It is a very versatile project, and its developers recently unveiled their mid-term development plans. Things are looking pretty good for users of this client, as a few big changes are on the horizon. Advancing Bitcoin Cash will be a big challenge, but the roadmap seems to check a lot of the right boxes. Whether or not all these updates will actually be implemented within 12 months remains to be seen.

Big Changes are Coming to Bitcoin ABC

One thing about Bitcoin ABC that is nothing but commendable is how its developers are willing to collaborate with other project developers. More specifically, the team is in touch with teams from nChain, Parity, Bitcoin XT, and a handful of other projects. All of this helps when it comes to creating more versatile solutions to support the Bitcoin Cash ecosystem. Not surprisingly, all of those projects share a similar vision for BCH and how this ecosystem must evolve in the coming months.

While Bitcoin Cash has made a pretty solid impact over the past few weeks, no one can afford to stand still and rest on their laurels. This is especially true in the world of cryptocurrency, where things evolve at an accelerated pace and community members will gladly share their thoughts and ideas. It is impossible to please everyone, but it seems the upcoming changes will be appreciated by and large. Making Bitcoin Cash more reliable, improving scalability, and reducing fees are some of the top priorities right now.

That is all much easier said than done, but the Bitcoin ABC team has unveiled some of its plans to do so. The next protocol upgrade will occur on May 15th, 2018, and a second major upgrade will happen around November 15th, 2018. It is a bit unclear how many updates can be crammed into the first protocol upgrade. The code will need to be finalized, and the included features will be announced well in advance. So far, a total of four features are planned, but they might not all make it into the first upgrade.

The first feature to look forward to involves increasing the default block size limit. In fact, the Bitcoin ABC team hopes to one day introduce an adaptive block size limit as well. That is an interesting feature to look forward to, as it could help improve on-chain scalability for Bitcoin Cash. It is a bit unclear what block size we are talking about right now, but more information is expected to be released in the next few weeks. There will also be an improved difficulty adjustment algorithm. That is a bit surprising, as the current algorithm was only introduced a few weeks ago.

Furthermore, the Bitcoin ABC team is working on introducing canonical transaction order. Depending on whether or not this feature can be included in the next protocol upgrade, there may even be a complete removal of the transaction ordering consensus as a whole. It will be interesting to see how this affects the Bitcoin Cash ecosystem as a whole. Rest assured there will be some interesting developments in the world of BCH over the next few months.

As one would expect, all of these upgrades will need to be tested properly before they can be rolled out. The Bitcoin ABC team says it welcomes anyone and everyone who is willing to help out in this regard. Moreover, they are also looking for additional people who can contribute code to the project in the coming months. Cryptocurrency development should be about helping one another instead of creating more opposition.

The report by venture capital firm Atomico also found that more than a third of all ICOs were based in the EU.

Another ‘Big Four’ firm joins the bitcoin revolution as the auditing corporation Pricewaterhousecooper’s (PwC) Hong Kong office accepted a payment in bitcoin according to the Wall Street Journal. The accountancy corporation follows the lead of the Deloitte and Ernst & Young (EY) offices that have already started accepting bitcoin for financial services.

Also read: Bitwala: ‘Nobody Uses Altcoins,’ Bitcoin Is the Top Crypto

PwC Hong Kong Accepts Bitcoin for Financial Consultancy Services

PwC is a well-known auditing firm that offers multinational financial services with offices all around the globe. The company is currently the second largest ‘Big Four’ auditing company in the world and has held this record for the past seven years. This week the Wall Street Journal reports that the company’s Hong Kong office has accepted bitcoin as a payment for consultancy services. PwC has been interested in digital currency solutions and blockchain technology for the past three years. The accountancy firm’s Asia-Pacific chairman, Raymund Chao, says the move is a milestone for the company.  

“It is also an indication that bitcoin and other established cryptocurrencies have now developed into more broadly accepted forms of settlement,” explains Chao.

PwC Follows the Other ‘Big Four’ Firms That Have Embraced Bitcoin

The company is a touch behind its competitors as both Deloitte and EY have offices that accept the cryptocurrency and bitcoin ATMs as well. For instance, at Deloitte’s Toronto office the company installed a bitcoin ATM in the lobby and the company uses it to show clients. Deloitte’s Iliana Oris Valiente told news.Bitcoin.com back in September of 2016 that “using bitcoin is vital to understanding the blockchain.” Then in November the firm EY announced its Switzerland branch was accepting bitcoin for financial management services, and also installed an ATM in the main building. The other ‘Big Four’ firm KPMG has not moved towards the cryptocurrency bitcoin just yet, but has been involved with blockchain research.

‘Cryptocurrency Represents the Beginning of a New Phase of Technology-Driven Markets’

PwC joining in on the bitcoin fun is no surprise as the company has applauded the benefits of cryptocurrency for quite some time.

“[Cryptocurrency has] gained acceptance from a critical mass of investors, technologists, regulators, merchants, entrepreneurs, and consumers,” explains PwC.

In fact, in our view, cryptocurrency represents the beginning of a new phase of technology-driven markets that have the potential to disrupt conventional market strategies, longstanding business practices, and established regulatory perspectives – all to the benefit of consumers and broader macroeconomic efficiency.

What do you think about PwC’s Hong Kong office accepting bitcoin? Let us know in the comments below.

Images via Shutterstock, PwC, and PwC’s Hong Kong office. 

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SophiaTX, the first open-source platform to integrate blockchain with enterprise applications such as SAP, has announced a forthcoming collaboration with the power division of General Electric (GE) to design and develop a blockchain solution for GE’s financial efficiency and operations.

A joint Letter of Intent (LOI) announced today by Jaroslav Kacina, CEO of Equidato Technologies, the company behind the SophiaTX blockchain, and Davide Mancini, Finance Executive, GE Power, confirms that the two teams plan to collaborate on a blockchain initiative leveraging the SophiaTX platform.

The initial focus of the collaboration is the design and development of innovative blockchain uses in financial operations, including connectivity to existing systems (such as ERP) and both digital and supply chain applications. The SophiaTX project will also incorporate capabilities to record data from IoT sensors, smart devices, and applications.

“Working with a company of this nature and scale allows new and exciting opportunities for our platform,” explains Jaroslav Kacina, CEO of SophiaTX and Equidato Technologies AG. “We believe that the move of blockchain technologies into corporate ecosystems such as this has the potential to transform the way the organizations collaborate and engage with partners and customers alike.”

SophiaTX Blockchain Reshaping The Way Businesses Operate

SophiaTX is open source and tailored to allow traditional enterprise applications to be extended to more robust, collaborative and decentralized blockchain-enabled business models.

“Integrating blockchain with SAP and other business systems allows businesses to deliver efficiencies, better collaborate along the value chain and even re-shape their business models,” explains Mr Kacina.

The SophiaTX team recently published a white paper and unveiled a working Proof of Concept demonstrating how businesses can use SophiaTX to transparently and reliably exchange information between their enterprise systems in real time.

The SophiaTX project is premised on an in-depth analysis of the technological capabilities of existing blockchains, to ensure a strategy and a platform which can truly add value and provide businesses with not only suitability, but genuinely superior functionality and features. The resulting platform, and its focus on adoption by real businesses, is one of the most innovative advancements of blockchain into the way in which the businesses and their customers interact and how ecosystems are continuously re-defined by digital technology.

SophiaTX Token Generation Event To Begin On 5^th December 2017

The newly signed LOI with GE is the latest milestone for SophiaTX ahead of the company’s Token Generation Event (TGE) on December 5^th 2017.

A number of customers, from various industries, are already in the pipeline. Recently, a separate Letter of Intent was signed with pharmaceutical supply chain specialist KITA Logistics, confirming the intention to develop a specific blockchain solution for the transport of pharmaceuticals and related products.

The SophiaTX platform is fueled by SPHTX (SophiaTX Token), which covers mining and transaction fees; allows access and subscription to the development platform. The platform’s Token Generation Event (TGE/ICO) will start on December 5 and last 10 days.

About SophiaTX

SophiaTX is a blockchain platform and marketplace for businesses of all sizes, and the first open source platform to primarily integrate blockchain technology with enterprise applications such as SAP, Oracle, and others. 74% of transaction revenue worldwide touches SAP systems, and SophiaTX provides a business-appropriate blockchain for B2B collaboration and communication.

About GE

GE (NYSE: GE) is the world’s Digital Industrial Company, transforming the industry with software-defined machines and solutions that are connected, responsive and predictive. GE is organized around a global exchange of knowledge, the “GE Store,” through which each business shares and accesses the same technology, markets, structure, and intellect. Each invention further fuels innovation and application across our industrial sectors. With people, services, technology, and scale, GE delivers better outcomes for customers by speaking the language of industry. www.ge.com

About GE Power

GE Power is a world energy leader that provides technology, solutions, and services across the entire energy value chain from the point of generation to consumption. [It is] transforming the electricity industry by uniting all the resources and scale of the world’s first Digital Industrial company. [Its] customers operate in more than 150 countries, and together [it] powers more than a third of the world to illuminate cities, build economies and connect the world.

The post GE Power To Adopt Blockchain For Financial Operations appeared first on NEWSBTC.

But central banks will likely continue discussing government-backed digital currency, said John Williams of the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco.