Day: February 14, 2018

Are you bullish or bearish? #PRICE_ANALYSIS

The IRS is not accepting Bitcoin, Ripple or Ethereum for taxes yet. #EXPERT_TAKE

The House Committee on Science, Space and Technology seemed excited about blockchain’s applications after Wednesday’s hearing.

The CFTC’s Technology Advisory Committee created two subcommittees devoted to cryptocurrencies and blockchain in its meeting today.

With the cryptocurrency industry becoming a lot more popular lately, it is only normal that there is more competition among exchanges and trading platforms. Right now, most centralized exchanges have a few things in common, including trading fees and a lack of tradable currencies. With COBINHOOD, that situation will change sooner rather than later. It is the world’s first zero-fee exchange for cryptocurrency trading and is entirely funded through its initial coin offering proceeds.

What is COBINHOOD Really?

COBINHOOD is a decentralized cryptocurrency exchange which operates with zero fees for all participants. There are no maker or taker fees to speak of, which is a more than welcome change. The team claims it is the first exchange in the world to offer zero-fee trading at all times, which is rather impressive. It is also worth mentioning that the COBINHOOD exchange is available on mobile devices through a native application, making cryptocurrency trading even more convenient.

Features Which set COBINHOOD Apart

Even though we could use more platforms which do not charge trading fees, it remains to be seen if we will get them. Traders will enjoy this perk as they can maximize their profits with ease, and there is also zero trading fee for spot trading and margin trading with up to 10x leverage. 

Furthermore, the exchange prides itself on storing the great majority of its digital assets in an offline multisignature vault. Using additional security when dealing with other people’s money is no unnecessary luxury in this day and age of exchanges being hacked virtually every other month. COBINHOOD requires 5-of-8 geo-distributed hardware security modules to access the offline multisig vault. Any funds kept in online wallets are fully backed by insurance in order to recover any losses if things were to go awry.

Additionally, COBINHOOD will provide a high-performance order matching engine. Various other exchanges have suffered degraded performance in this regard, which makes the addition of COBINHOOD to this industry all the more important. Its entire infrastructure is fully distributed and automatically scalable to deal with a heavy influx of new users when necessary. It never hurts to take precautions just in case COBINHOOD suddenly were to become the world’s go-to cryptocurrency exchange.

The COBINHOOD Token

To build this new zero-fee cryptocurrency exchange platform, the COBINHOOD team organized an initial coin offering. As part of this crowdfunding project, they issued COBINHOOD tokens, known as COB. COB token holders get 50% off margin trading loan interest when using the token to pay for expenses. Additionally, they will be eligible for future ICO tokens underwritten by COBINHOOD. It is possible that additional benefits will arise in the future, but for now, those are the main selling points.

What Does the Future Hold for COBINHOOD?

Even though this zero-fee exchange platform is fully operational as we speak, the COBINHOOD team’s work is never done. As of right now, the team is working on listing additional tokens and trading markets, as well as improving certain advanced trading features. A fair few tokens are being added every single week, and the company keeps its users updated on Medium in this regard. All things considered, it’s well worth one’s while to keep an eye on this new trading platform.

A recent study has revealed Litecoin to be the second most adopted means of payment among dark marketplaces. The study also indicated a significant increase in adoption of Monero among English-speaking platforms.

Also Read: South Korean Prosecutor Fights to Confiscate Bitcoins from Criminal Proceeds

Dark Marketplaces Increase Altcoin Adoption

The study, conducted by Recorded Future, involved the analysis of 150 leading dark web “message boards, marketplaces, and illicit services” in order to ascertain the scale of alternative cryptocurrency adoption on the part of criminal entities in response to rising bitcoin fees.

Recorded Future states that “The meteoric rise in popularity of bitcoin among household users, speculators, and institutional investors […] since mid-2017” placed “an enormous load on the blockchain network, resulting in larger payment fees.”

Litecoin Is Second Most Dominant Dark Web Currency

The study revealed Litecoin to be the second most dominant currency among dark marketplaces – with LTC payment systems being implemented on 30% of the platforms analyzed in the study.

Despite the Recorded Future claiming to have identified an increasing number of “members of the cybercriminal underground” expressing a “growing dissatisfaction with bitcoin as a payment vehicle” as early as “mid-2016”, 100% of the platforms had integrated BTC payment systems.

Popularity of XMR Grows Among English-Speaking Dark Marketplaces

The study revealed a significant growth in the popularity of XMR on English-speaking platforms not matched by their Eastern European counterparts.

Among English-speaking platforms, Monero was found to be the second most popular means of payment – with XMR payments being integrated onto 15% of platforms. LTC was identified as the third most adopted payment channel among English-speaking marketplaces with 11%, followed by DASH and ETH with 9% each.

On Eastern European platforms, Litecoin was the second most popular means of payment, with 35% of dark markets implementing LTC payment integration. DASH was the third most adopted, with 24% of platforms integrating DASH payments, followed by BCH with 15%, ETH with 9%, ZEC with 4%, and XMR with 3%.

What is your reaction to Recorded Future’s finding? Share your thoughts in the comments section below!

Images courtesy of Shutterstock, Recorded Future

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Forbes’ recently released “Fintech 50” list includes 11 companies related to Blockchain and cryptocurrency. #NEWS