Day: January 7, 2018

The New York Stock Exchange intends to launch five Bitcoin ETFs on its Arca stock exchange #ANALYSIS

Recently, the US Attorney General, Jeff Beauregard Sessions, rescinded Obama-era memos which allowed states that had legalized marijuana (either recreationally, medically, or both) to grow and operate their businesses without too much fear of federal government intervention. While we could talk for hours about this questionable decision from a man who has championed himself as a states’ rights advocate in the past, I wanted to focus on what it may mean for markets and for a cryptocurrency dedicated to the cannabis industry, PotCoin.

Sessions’ decision may have implications for PotCoin

PotCoin is an altcoin that was created to facilitate transactions and banking for the legalized cannabis industry. It was meant to be an option for dispensaries and growers who cannot have a traditional bank account for their business, since federally insured banks do not want to (or cannot legally) hold pot money. This is because on the federal level, marijuana is still a Schedule I drug in the United States. The Obama-era memos only directed that federal resources not be used to pursue marijuana “crimes” in states that had voted to legalize.

So, PotCoin may have been just as dependent on those memos as the entire legal cannabis industry in the United States. Thus, the fate of a coin with a US$83.5 million market cap (at the time of writing) may currently be threatened. Which is a shame, considering that the project is rather interesting and has performed some fun marketing campaigns such as sending Dennis Rodman to North Korea (one of the only countries in the world where marijuana is completely legal). But there may be hope yet for this cheeky altcoin and the industry on which it relies.

Sessions may have just forced the hand of congress

It may sound crazy, but perhaps removing the Obama-era memos makes an even stronger case for Congress to push forward with removing marijuana as a Schedule I drug. Too many states are receiving massive amounts of revenue from the legal cannabis industry to just let that go, and like I already mentioned, even a somewhat unknown cryptocurrency is now worth US$83.5 million. A truly massive amount of money is being generated by the legal cannabis industry, enough that I imagine states will put up a fuss if anyone tries to take that away.

Tangentially connected industries are also being affected. As mentioned in the linked article above, Miracle Gro’s (a fertilizer company) share prices dropped a whopping 5% after Sessions made his announcement. While I realize 5% is nothing for us crypto-geeks, in traditional markets, that’s enormous.

5% crash highlighted with a poorly drawn circle

SMG’s share price has since recovered a bit, but it still demonstrates that cannabis has a butterfly effect on many industries. When people, corporations, and states start to lose money, there is usually a backlash, and I wonder if this will be the push that Congress needs to legalize the cannabis industry entirely.

Many of the leading cryptocurrency exchanges such as Coinbase (GDAX), Binance, Bittrex, Bitstamp and Kraken have struggled in dealing with the abrupt surge in demand for cryptocurrencies.

It has been a pretty interesting weekend for most cryptocurrencies. Although Bitcoin is still struggling as we speak, other currencies are recording new highs. The Monero price, for example, reached a new all-time high in US Dollar value of $475. A very interesting development, especially when considering how this currency doesn’t necessarily have the appeal of other currencies which surge in value these days.

Monero Price Surpasses $475

It doesn’t happen all that often the Monero price gets people excited these days. Unlike most currencies which are in the top 20 ranked by market cap, Monero doesn’t get major pump-and-dump cycles. This is a good thing for people investing in this current for the long term. Speculators, on the other hand, don’t like Monero all that much, mainly because it doesn’t have a tendency to go up in value in any spectacular fashion.

Over the past 24 hours, however, we have seen a pretty solid Monero price increase. As is always the case, maintaining this momentum will be difficult for this currency, as traders are mainly focused on get-rich-quick schemes right now. Despite the odds, the Monero price on Coinmarketcap jumped from $418 all the way to $496. Things have calmed down a bit ever since, although the price is still holding steady around $475 for the time being.

It is important to take this price into consideration. Just because Coinmarketcap notes the Monero price at $475 doesn’t mean all exchange trade close to this value. The price is mainly pushed up thanks to Bithumb trading at nearly $600 right now. In the Western world, the Monero price hovers close to $415. It is still a solid gain all over the world, though, but it’s important to put things into perspective every now and then. It is highly unlikely the West will trade Monero at $597 anytime soon, by the look of things.

With $302m in 24-hour trading volume, Monero is performing well below most other altcoins in this regard. At the same time, the lack of price volatility has always resulted in lower trading volume for XMR. It is not too difficult to obtain, yet people have to jump through hoops to buy Monero in a lot of countries. Trading it against Bitcoin is by far more popular than fiat currency gateways, with the exception of South Korea’s Bithumb exchange.

Speaking of Bithumb, this exchange currently generates 32% of all Monero trades. They are well ahead of HitBTC and Bitfinex in this regard. There are three fiat currency markets in the top 10, which indicates most of the trading comes from people diversifying Bitcoin into altcoins again. At the same time, there is some fresh capital entering the market, which can only be considered to be a good thing. Finding a balance between these two “markets’ is not easy, not even for Bitcoin.  

It is unclear what the future holds for the Monero price. There are quite a few exciting developments to look forward to, although none of them have any official release date. The year 2018 could end up being quite productive for the Monero price. Even though XMR had very few spectacular gains in 2017, the currency still gained over $1,300% in value when everything was said and done. Whether or not 2018 will bring more of the same, has yet to be determined.

Bitcoin was created as a payment system, but fails to become one. Arthur Iinuma discusses the future of still the main cryptocurrency #EXPERT BLOG

In bull markets like cryptocurrency, savvy entrepreneurs and deceitful con men have adopted an array of creative approaches to create value for their projects. One such method that has recently been shown as very successful is the act of rebranding.

If you weren’t involved in cryptocurrency at least two years ago, you’ll likely have no idea what DogecoinDark (DOGED) is. However, most everyone has at least heard of its current nomenclature, Verge (XVG). Verge is simply the rebranded version of DogecoinDark – same coin, same protocol, new name, new logo. In fact, despite what you may have heard, the reality is that Verge’s main developer is also the same person – Dogedarkdev on Bitcointalk.

we have moved to @vergecurrency https://t.co/HNXYYUmm5U freenode: #VERGE

— DogecoinDark (@Dogedcoin) February 15, 2016

Skeptics of XVG universally agree that the recent massive pump was a result of nothing more than exceptionally successful marketing, geared particularly toward new investors. Those who were aware of Verge before the recent run may be surprised that opinions on the coin have changed drastically, so soon after the coin saw a major hack that left those affected out of luck.

Critics of Verge further claim that the coin fails to actually protect the privacy of its users, despite being branded as a privacy coin. At a market cap of over US$2.5 billion, the coin is the second highest-valued privacy coin behind Monero. However, Verge’s privacy functions currently extend only to masking IP addresses on transactions. Ironically, this is the major function of another coin, DeepOnion, which Verge’s lead developer has criticized for having “no privacy software at all”. Monero, for example, on top of masking IP addresses, also masks wallets and transaction details completely.

Supporters of Verge argue that once the Wraith protocol is released, the coin will have many more privacy capabilities. However, the deadline for Wraith’s release has come and passed on three separate dates already.

Like Verge, many teams are adopting marketing-focused approaches as a means to create value for their projects and grow personal profits. Also like Verge, many teams have elected to “rebrand” their coins. There are a number of benefits to doing so, with the only downside being integrity lost in the eyes of serious investors. When coins rebrand, they are able to erase past road maps that reveal unkept promises. Additionally, they can give the same sales pitch to an entirely new crowd. Beyond that, it serves as a source of hype and excitement that does not require any further substance.

In addition to Verge, recent major pumps such as Einsteinium and Experience Points have also occurred following a rebranding. Unfortunately, naive investors are unaware of the past iterations of these coins, and are unaware of the poor performances seen in the past. In January 2016, prior to its rebranding, DogecoinDark was ranked #125 on CoinMarketCap.com and trading with a market cap of just over US$100,000. Of course, altcoins in general have appreciated exponentially since then, but Verge has grown disproportionately to other coins, without much in the way of technical growth to support it.

Before investing in the latest craze, do a bit of research and see if the coin is in its second or third iteration. Before you decide to buy, take a look to see how successfully (or not) it performed before rebranding.

Obtaining debt to invest in cryptocurrencies is highly risky, still small portion of investors do it #ANALYSIS

With the overall cryptocurrency market cap growing by leaps and bounds, it is only normal specific currencies are noting solid gains. Although things have been relatively quiet on the Bitcoin Cash price for some time now, things are heading in the right direction again. More specifically, the Bitcoin Cash price has surpassed $3,000 again for the first time in nearly two weeks. A positive trend, although there’s still plenty of volatility to contend with.

Bitcoin Cash Price Surpasses $3,000 Again

Although the opinions on Bitcoin and Bitcoin Cash will always remain somewhat divided, it is good to have both currencies as part of the overall ecosystem. It just goes to show how the technical aspects of the world’s leading cryptocurrency can be handled in a different manner. Although the Bitcoin Cash price is nowhere close to that of Bitcoin, things are not looking all that bad either. Especially now that one BCH is worth over $3,000 again, it will be interesting to see how things play out for this specific altcoin.

To put this into perspective, the Bitcoin Cash price has struggled to reach $3,000 again since late December 2017. That is not surprising, as a lot of currencies took a pretty big hit during the final days of last year. With the new year upon us, a lot of new opportunities have presented themselves as we speak. For the Bitcoin Cash price, reaching $3,000 once again at this time of the year may very well be a sign of what 2018 has in store for BCH.

Especially when considering how the Bitcoin Cash price was still below $2,400 not that long ago, things look rather promising. There have been a few attempts to reach $3,000 in the past week, but none of them got even close to achieving that goal. This latest trend represents a $370 jump in the past 24 hours. Once people stop taking profits, we will be able to determine whether or not this trend can be sustained for more than a few hours.

With almost $2.1bn in 24-hour trading volume, the demand for Bitcoin Cash seems genuine enough. Although this volume is a lot lower compared to Bitcoin itself, there are a lot of people who remain confident BCH is here to stay for the long-term. Although overtaking Bitcoin may be several bridges too far right now, one never knows what the future holds. The current Bitcoin Cash price momentum certainly seems to indicate things can only get better from here on out.

As one would expect, the majority of BCH trading volume comes from South Korea’s Bithumb exchange. They are trading BCH at a premium of $1,300 right now, which means this currency is worth close to $4,000 in that part of the world. Western exchanges are still stuck below $2,7700 for now, though. HitBTC and OKEx complete the top three for BCH exchanges by trading volume as we speak. Just two fiat currency pairs in the top 5 is not optimal, but it’s nothing to be overly concerned about either.

How all of this will play out for the Bitcoin Cash price, remains to be determined. Right now, the momentum is certainly in favor of this altcoin, but the markets remain highly volatile and unpredictable. There is still a lot of market momentum in the world of cryptocurrency, although no one knows what the future holds whatsoever. It is not unlikely Bitcoin Cash will hit $3,000 in the Western world at some point next week, but nothing has been set in stone just yet.