Day: February 15, 2018

Ever since the launch of Bitcoin back in 2009, blockchain technology has started to transform various aspects of our everyday lives. Through the use of this technology, we are able to streamline transactions in a completely decentralized way, thereby allowing for maximum transparency. However, the use of crypto is still heavily restricted by issues related to usability and geography. Additionally, there also exist various systemic risks due to bottlenecks that make it hard to convert traditional assets to digital assets (and vice versa).

The Jibrel network consists of a decentralized platform that has been designed to help with the easy tokenization of digital assets. These tokens will serve as equities, currencies, commodities, etc. that will be fully usable within the Ethereum blockchain. They will be referred to as Crypto Depository Receipts (CryDR) and will make use of smart contracts for all transaction purposes.

Since digital financial assets can be cumbersome to trade, users often have to make use of various services to exchange these commodities in an easy manner. However, through the conversion of these assets into a single tokenized entity, Jibrel allows different currencies and assets to be traded via a single platform.

Overview of Jibrel

• Makes use of ERC20-compliant tokens
• Allows global transactions to occur within a matter of seconds
• Supports a wide array of fiat currencies including USD, GBP, EUR, RUB, and AED.
• Solid backing — has support from established names within the blockchain sector such as Don Tapscott, Saul Hudson, and Mohammed Al Sehli.

Key Features

The Jibrel Network is designed to help turn digital assets such as currencies and equities into ERC20-compliant tokens.

Users will be able to use the native CryDR token for various purposes such as:

• Sending and receiving payments across the globe with the single click of a button
• Trading various assets without having to switch between different platforms
• Creating hedge funds

Tiered architecture model used by Jibrel (courtesy of the company whitepaper)

In addition, native Jibrel tokens can also be employed for use with decentralized financial instruments such as bonds and securities.

From a functional standpoint, Jibrel has the potential to solve some of the major problems that are currently being faced by financial trading companies built on the blockchain. Some of the core issues that Jibrel addresses are those of high transaction fees as well as slow transfer times.

Additionally, we can see that this platform is designed to make asset storage as well as local currency conversions easier. In a nutshell, users can simply transfer their digital assets to the Jibrel platform without having to trade them first.

Lastly, Jibrel allows decentralized organizations and funds to diversify into traditional assets.

How Jibrel works

Jibrel makes use of a public blockchain, but company representatives indicated in the whitepaper that they will adopt a cross-chain communication module if such technology becomes scalable in the near future.

Overview of the working mechanism (courtesy of the company whitepaper)

It also comes with a fully-working online exchange that has been designed to facilitate the trading of fiat as well as digital assets. Not only that, but it also allows users to easily convert their funds to crypto and traditional assets. All of this is carried out using tethered tokens that are backed by real assets. What this means is that for every tethered token that is created, there is a traditional asset held to back it up.

Importantly, the Jibrel Network also makes use of guarantors to ensure that all of its tethered tokens remain stable in value.

Flowchart representing the API workflow (courtesy of the company whitepaper)

Lastly, through the use of tethering mechanisms, app developers also have the opportunity to create a wide array of dApps that can include payment processors, wallets, and other innovative crypto trading platforms.

About Jibrel

Since its inception in May 2017, the Jibrel Network has caught the attention of many blockchain enthusiasts around the globe. The project is currently headed by Yazan Barghuthi, who is also its co-founder. According to his LinkedIn profile, Yazan has been in the financial sector for nearly a decade, and previously worked at management consultancies such as Oliver Wyman and Deloitte.

Victor Mezrin serves as Jibrel’s technical lead. He has over 10 years’ worth of experience in the app development domain. Victor was responsible for running a top-3 altcoin mining pool (pool.mn) between 2014 and 2016. Lastly, Talal Tabbaa is the company’s biz dev lead. He previously worked as a financial adviser at PwC, and is proficient in programming languages such as Python and SQL.

The project is also backed by big names such as Ruslan Gavrilyuk, the CEO and founder of TaaS Fund; Abbas Zuaiter, a capital markets adviser; and Dr. Moe Levin, the CEO of Keynote.

Token Performance History

Since the token (JNT) has only recently entered the trading market, it is hard to quantify its future potential.

Jibrel token lifetime performance chart (courtesy of CoinMarketCap)

Since launching with a base value of US$0.42 on the 6th of February, the token’s price had climbed to US$0.62 by the 11th. Its price has since stayed steady, and the value of a single JNT currently stands at US$0.594 as of the 15th of February.

Final Thoughts

While still in its infancy, the Jibrel Network is already offering the market a unique platform that will digitize various assets by placing them on the blockchain. As a result, users may gain access to a blockchain-based ecosystem providing a secure way of transferring physical assets through the use of a digital currency.

If you’d like to start investing in Jibrel, JNT trading pairs are currently being offered on Bibox and IDEX.

This article originally appeared on Bitcoin Magazine.

The price of Bitcoin appears to be recovering well from the dramatic fall it experienced at the end of last year. The cost to buy a single unit of the world’s most popular cryptocurrency reached a two week high on Thursday, topping out at just above the $10,000 point. The second time passing, the five-digit psychological barrier seemed to offer little resistance as the price barely paused between $9,000 and the two week high.

The recent price surge seems largely driven by various news events clearing the fear and uncertainty surrounding the space of late. So far in 2018, doubt was cast over the market thanks to South Korea’s musing over a cryptocurrency ban. The government there had mentioned the possibility of them taking such a harsh step but have since stated that there is no intention to eradicate the crypto-craze that’s been sweeping the nation for some time. One report suggests that instead of the government there are others seeking to license cryptocurrency exchanges. This would serve to further legitimise the industry, as well as making the environment safer for investors.

Elsewhere, the latest round of SEC Senate hearings about Bitcoin is doing their fair share to dispel the doubt about cryptocurrencies that’s been creeping in since late December. During the hearing, the chairman of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, Christopher Giancarlo, said:

“We owe it to this new generation to respect their enthusiasm for virtual currencies, with a thoughtful and balanced response, and not a dismissive one.”

What’s good news for Bitcoin is usually good news for the entire space. This was highlighted by similar gains across all major cryptocurrencies. Many within the top 20 by market cap have seen price leaps between two and 25 percent in the last 24 hours. This is according to industry price website Coinmarketcap.

Meanwhile, Tom Lee of Fundstrat Global Advisors believes that the price per BTC should exceed the previous all-time high by July of this year. The longtime Bitcoin advocate noted in a report earlier today that during “bull” periods of upward trends, Bitcoin recoveries take 1.7 times the amount of time the initial decline lasted for. For Lee, this “implies that 85 days are needed to recover prior highs — this is July 2018.” His end of 2018 price call remains $25,000.

Mati Greenspan, senior market analyst of eToro, spoke to CNBC via phone interview about the recent breakout of prices:

“FOMO (fear of missing out) is back in the markets… Crypto investors have been sitting on the sidelines waiting for a rally. Yesterday it was Litecoin which had a clean break out from its resistance levels and investors jumped on and are still riding it today… There’s been a lot of FUD (fear, uncertainty and doubt) over the past few weeks. The FUD is fading now.”

The post We’re Back! – Bitcoin Price Back Above $10,000 appeared first on NewsBTC.

As things currently stand, the freelance market is completely centralized, and as a result, industry leaders such as UpWork and Fiverr charge up to 40% in basic transaction fees. However, the core issue here is the involvement of too many middlemen who not only make the freelance market expensive, but unsustainable as well. Through the use of the blockchain, work can be easily distributed in a streamlined manner, thereby allowing workers as well as employers to enjoy maximum returns.

StormX is a rebranded version of the already popular microtask application BitMaker. Its core use is to help in the integration of blockchain technology within app environments via the use of a native currency called Storm. Additionally, Storm Play will be the customer portal that will allow users to enter StormX’s existing microtask marketplace.

In its current incarnation, the Storm Market makes use of promotional tasks that are designed to engage customers. However, in the future, the platform’s devs envision the use of 3 different types of tasks that will allow for increased customer participation. They include:

(i) Promotional content that will allow users to earn tokens for completing simple tasks

(ii) Freelancing opportunities that will range from microtask completion to app testing

(iii) Shopping opportunities wherein users will be able to earn revenue for simply trying out sample products and goods

Overview of Storm

• Allows users to avail themselves of freelance opportunities more easily
• Makes social engagement easier, more fun and rewarding through the use of an incentive-based model
• Possesses an established platform that currently boasts over 250,000 monthly users
• Is intuitive and quite easy to use

Key Features

Earning avenues Storm offers its users (courtesy of the whitepaper)

The Storm platform has three distinct components through which users can earn virtual currency. The first is called the Storm Play module. It can be thought of as a mobile ad-tech app which allows incentives to be earned by completing certain ad-related tasks.

Similarly, the Storm Shop is a marketplace that rewards its customers for buying certain listed products in the form of native tokens. These earned coins can then be exchanged for other digital items of one’s choosing.

The third avenue available to customers is called Storm Gigs. As the name suggests, these are tasks that involve the use of a smart contract and are coordinated exclusively between the job poster and task performer. The task’s price is established before any work is performed, and all payments are executed as soon as the job has been completed.

According to the company’s official whitepaper, the Storm Market aims to reduce transaction fees for connecting buyers and sellers from a market average of around 40% to a minuscule 1%.

How does Storm work?

The Storm network utilizes a gamified task model designed to increase user participation. Gamification is essentially the process by which micro tasks are made more accessible to users through the use of certain game-like elements. This process can be implemented in gaming as well as non-gaming contexts, and thus its possibilities are enormous in today’s blockchain-oriented market.

Gamification can be easily incorporated on websites, apps, and services, and has been statistically found to improve things like:

• Motivation to participate
• Customer engagement
• User loyalty

Operational model employed by the Storm platform (courtesy of the whitepaper)

Since it is a fully iterative process, it can be used within a framework in which the user has an end goal to reach. This can be observed in many of today’s games such as Candy Crush, Clash Royale, and Clash of Clans.

When using the Storm system, experienced users are provided with greater rewards. Incentives are also provided for things such as:

• Creation of microtasks that have defined goals and objectives
• Completion of tasks
• Managing other Storm Players that have been referred by a third party and ensuring that they complete tasks
• Assisting with the categorization of tasks and allowing them to be ranked in a specified order for increased maneuverability

About Storm

Founded a couple of years ago, the Storm platform has evolved tremendously in its overall usability and features. It is headed by Simon Yu, who is the company’s CEO. He describes himself as an entrepreneur who has been in the business domain for a decade now.

Rui Maximo serves as the company’s CTO. He has been in the software development domain for over 25 years, and has been personally responsible for the creation of over 20 commercial products. Arry Yu is the company’s COO and is responsible for the management side of things. She has been in this sector for over 20 years, and has worked for companies such as:

• Giftstarter (CEO and founder)
• Galvanize (Advisor)

It is also important to note that Storm is backed by some of the leading industry experts within the blockchain domain including:

• Bill Shihara — CEO and founder of Bittrex
• Charles Hoskinson — CEO of IOHK (Ada/Cardano); former CEO and co-founder of Ethereum 
• Anthony Di Iorio — CEO and founder of Jaxx and Decentral; co-founder of Ethereum

Token Performance

Launched at the end of last December, Storm has remained relatively stable as far as its value goes.

Storm token lifetime performance chart (courtesy of CoinMarketCap)

As can be seen above, the price of a single token was US$0.021 on the 25th of December, while its value currently stands at US$0.038 (as of the 15th of February). Storm reached its peak value on the 10th of January when it touched US$0.234.

Final Thoughts

With smartphone usage at an all-time high across the globe, the introduction of a platform that allows for the gamification of everyday tasks can be highly lucrative.

Considering the market backing that the Storm platform currently possesses, it would not be surprising to see this token rise considerably in value this year.

If you’d like to start investing in Storm, trading pairs are currently being offered on Binance.

A number of Coinbase users report unauthorized charges to their bank accounts, in some cases draining funds and leaving them with overdraft fees.

Crypto markets continue to experience period of slight growth, with Bitcoin hitting $10k. #NEWS

Bitfinex, the well-known cryptocurrency exchange, has just raised the bar for decentralized cryptocurrency exchanges. This week, it announced the launch of a new decentralized cryptocurrency exchange called “EOSfinex.”

EOSfinex is different from other decentralized exchanges on the market due to its underlying technology, which will combine the scalability and speed of EOS.IO with Bitfinex’s expertise. The platform is an “on chain” exchange designed to offer a fast, transparent and trustless system for the trading of digital assets.

EOS.IO is a blockchain protocol being built by the company block.one. EOS.IO enables horizontal scaling of decentralized applications, allowing developers to efficiently create high performance distributed applications. The EOS.IO software provides accounts, authentication, databases, and the scheduling of applications across multiple CPU cores and/or clusters. This allows for a number of benefits including horizontal scalability and the replacement of user fees with an ownership model, and it powers the simple deployment of decentralized applications.

According to Bitfinex, the company has continually sought to research and sandbox the capabilities of various protocol-level technologies that meet the rigorous requirements of a high volume, blockchain-based trading platform. This vision led the company to EOS.IO, whose goal of processing tens of thousands of transactions per second, with minimal fees and confirmation times, is heavily aligned with Bitfinex’s ambitions.

“Existing blockchain platforms are unable to meet the high performance requirements demanded by decentralized exchanges. We believe EOSfinex will be an ambassador for the capabilities fundamentally enabled by EOS.IO,” said Brendan Blumer, the CEO of Block.one.

Bitfinex has recently been under fire for its association with Tether (USDT), a token that has claimed to be backed by U.S. dollars, but has no proof that this money exists. Tether is owned and operated by the same individuals who run Bitfinex.

Being one of the largest cryptocurrency exchanges in the world (Bitfinex handles a daily trading volume of around US$2 billion), Bitfinex has also become a target for hacks. On November 19, 2017, Bitfinex revealed that the exchange had been threatened with a coordinated attack designed to disrupt the market.

With this information in mind, it’s no wonder that Bitfinex has shown interest in decentralized exchanges. Decentralized platforms are gaining traction, as they are proving to be more secure trading outlets since trades are conducted between users, in a peer-to-peer fashion, rather than through an exchange itself.

In a way, centralized exchanges act as a bank, broker and clearing house because they hold users’ money and charge fees. This is problematic, which could be a reason as to why hacks often happen on centralized exchanges.

What This Means For Centralized Crypto Exchanges

Ultimately, Bitfinex’s creation of EOSfinex could mean a few things for leading centralized exchanges.

First, it demonstrates interest in adapting to a new model that allows users to trade in a peer-to-peer fashion. Rather than keep users’ money on an exchange that is prone to hacks, decentralized exchanges provide a sense of security.

Secondly, the implementation of EOS.IO technology shows that decentralized exchanges are capable of hosting millions of transactions in a matter of seconds with new infrastructures.

Yet the major point to keep in mind here is that large crypto exchanges are looking for new ways to secure their platforms. This could very well result in an increase in the number of decentralized exchanges in the cryptocurrency marketplace.

Spain looks like the latest nation to be warming up to the opportunities created by the ever-expanding blockchain industry. According to reports by Bloomberg, Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy’s People’s Party is in the process of drafting legislation governing the space. This could include tax breaks for companies and individual cryptocurrency investors, as well as a regulated framework governing initial coin offerings.

It’s hoped that by creating favourable conditions for startups in the space to flourish, the People’s Party will be able to lure some of the most cutting-edge companies to their soil. Garcia Egea, the lawmaker drafting the legislation, spoke to Bloomberg at his office in The Cortes Generales:

“The level of the digitalisation for companies will be key… We hope to get the legislation ready this year.”

The primary innovation behind cryptocurrency has attracted attention from a variety of established industries. There are many who believe blockchain and distributed ledger tech could transform the way contracts are settled, as well as providing innovative new models for data storage and revolutionising transaction methods. With industries from business and finance, to health and education amongst those experimenting with blockchain, it’s clear why Spain would want them to set up shop there.

In addition, the People’s Party is also reported to be considering ICO-specific legislation. It’s hoped that regulation will make it safer and more convenient for investors and firms alike. This will further strengthen the appeal of the Iberian nation for those on the hunt for a centre of operations for a new crypto company. Garcia Egea continued:

“We want to set up Europe’s safest framework to invest in ICOs.”

Finally, Egea told the publication that the bill might include a threshold under which investments in cryptocurrency would not need to be reported.

With such progressive legislation potentially on the cards, Spain appears to be taking the initiative shown previously by the likes of Switzerland in attracting the latest wave of technology startups. The small town of Zug in the central European nation has become a hive of activity for blockchain startups. Thanks to the nation’s favourable tax legislation and private banking, all manner of cryptocurrency and distributed ledger companies have decided to call the small Swiss town home. These include payment processors Monaco, innovative exchange platform Shapeshift, and mobile Ethereum OS Status. Spain got its own Blockchain Consortium last year – If the People’s Party legislation follows the hints that one of its drafters has dropped, Spain could soon have a “CryptoValley” of their own.

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