Day: June 1, 2018

South America

Welcome to our weekly roundup of all important blockchain and cryptocurrency news from around the world. Follow the latest developments in the cryptocurrency space continent by continent, country by country.

Chile

Bank reopens account of crypto exchange: A Chilean bank reopened the accounts of cryptocurrency exchanges following a court ruling in their favor. The accounts were suspended after the three major banks in the South American country stopped handling crypto exchange accounts of users and the top three exchanges, including Buda.com and cryptomkt, appealed to Chile’s Tribunal for the Defense of Free Competition (TDLC) and got a ruling in their favor.

Bancoestado became the first of these three banks to accept the decision and reopened the accounts in the first major win for cryptocurrencies in the country. The other two banks, Unibanc and Itau, are set to appeal the decision of the top court after having their previous appeals rejected by the competition court.

Brazil

Crypto seen as a way to circumnavigate Brazil’s notorious bureaucracy: According to Ruairi Luke McCallan of Hacker Moon, cryptocurrencies and blockchain can help improve social justice and entrepreneurship in Brazil and bypass its notorious red tape that hampers free trade development.

While banks and other financial institutions are looking into the business of adopting blockchain, McCallan sees that cryptocurrencies can help the country improve its free trade through decentralization, as it is seriously affected by lengthy government legislation and over-regulation.

The Brazilian Association of Cryptocurrencies and Blockchain (ABCB) is reportedly in the thick of things but there hasn’t been an overwhelming response from the Brazilian government as of now.

Venezuela

Bitcoin mining gaining momentum in Venezuela as hyperinflation reaches 18,000%: Venezuelans are increasingly looking to Bitcoin and cryptocurrency mining to survive the massive hyperinflation in the country, according to a report by Bloomberg.

The capital city Caracas has become a crypto mining hub according to Daniel Cancel, a resident of the city also into crypto mining, earning more than USD 6 per day. Venezuelans are pooling money into cryptocurrency mining with some combined ventures earning more than USD 1,000 per day, a small fortune in the country considering its hyperinflation statistics.

According to Cancel:

“One key to my mining pals’ success: electricity, while spotty, is basically free, the result of an odd combination of hyperinflation and government-mandated utility price freezes. (It’ll cost you 900,000 bolivars—or about USD 0.90 at the black-market rate—for a coffee, pastry, and juice at a cafe, but you can pay your monthly electricity, water, gas, internet and phone bills for about 300,000 bolivars.).”

The Venezuelan government is also banking a lot on its own cryptocurrency Petro for international trade following heavy US sanctions but it is experiencing a hard time in getting it recognized from the international community.

India rejects Petro to pay for crude oil: The Indian government has rejected using Venezuela’s state cryptocurrency Petro citing cryptocurrencies being outlawed by the national bank. The move comes after the South American country offered discounts of up to 30% if the payments were made in its own cryptocurrency.

The Reserve Bank of India banned the use of cryptocurrency and cryptocurrency exchanges in the country last month following a sweeping measure to protect investors from fraudulent activities.

So far, no country has promised to use the Petro for payment of crude oil, the largest export from Venezuela thus causing problems in the adoption of the cryptocurrency.

One satoshi now more valuable than Bolivar Fuerte: Hyperinflation in Venezuela has gripped the nation; 1 Satoshi is now worth more than 6 Venezuelan Bolivars. A satoshi is the smallest denomination of Bitcoin (0.00000001 BTC) and still it is now more than six times as valuable as the local currency.

The economic crisis in the country is now a national problem with the government at a loss on how to resolve the crisis.

Argentina

Country planning to install 30,000 Bitcoin ATMs: Argentina is now in full grip of the Bitcoin revolution with the country planning on installing more than 30,000 Bitcoin ATMs even as the worldwide Bitcoin ATMs number just over 3,100.

A pre-agreement for 4,000 machines has already been signed. Rising Bitcoin prices and inflation in the country is forcing many to turn to cryptocurrencies for a sound investment.

Columbia

Football superstar James Rodrigues announces JR10 Coin. James Rodriguez, one of the Columbia’s biggest football stars, has announced a new cryptocurrency called JR10 according to latest reports from USA Today.

The football star is not the first sports icon to launch the coin with Floyd Mayweather and Michael Owen also planning on launching their own cryptocurrency. Lionel Messi has also been affiliated with Sirin Labs for a blockchain smartphone.

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The post South America: Crypto and Blockchain News Roundup, 25th to 31st May 2018 appeared first on BitcoinNews.com.

This article originally appeared on Bitcoin Magazine.

The world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange based on trading volume announced the formation of an investment fund. The $1 billion fund setup by Binance will be used to back cryptocurrency and blockchain startups.

Binance Looks to Strengthen the Blockchain Space with Investments and Incubation of Startups

The fund will be known as the ‘Community Influence Fund.’ It was announced in an online broadcast by the Binance Labs CEO Ella Zhang. The fund will be largely based around the exchange platform’s native cryptocoin BNB.

Yesterday’s broadcast was the first made by the team behind Binance Labs. As well as Ella Zhang, other team members in attendance included Chloe Zhang, Christy Choi, Benjamin Rameau, and Teck Chia. Ti He, the co-founder of Binance, hosted the conference which also included the participation of over 600 investors.

As well as the Community Influence Fund, the exchange is also creating the Binance Ecosystem Fund with the collaboration of around 20 partners. This news was broken to Tech Crunch by a spokesperson for the company. The representative told the publication that further details would be released soon.

During the conference, the team also spoke about the first project that would be ‘incubated’ by Binance Labs. Dache Chain is a ride hailing platform that has been founded by Weixing Chen and Jun Yang – both successful entrepreneurs in similar fields. NewsBTC reported on Dache Chain and its founders earlier this week.

Binance Labs defined themselves as comprising of the following three wings:

• Institute: A research division focusing on blockchain tech and the cryptocurrency economy.
• Ecological Fund: An influence fund that favours an approach that serves the blockchain ecosystem rather than strictly returns on investments.
• Incubator: With a focus on nurturing young startups and providing funding. This, they say, will ’empower top blockchain and cryptocurrency talent.’

Finally, Binance Labs stated that they have already invested in four projects. These are: the cryptocurrency MobileCoin, a high-performance public blockchain by Oasis Labs, verification platform known as Certik, and a crowdfunding platform called Republic.

The Binance exchange platform was formed less than one year ago. They have quickly established themselves as the leading trading venue in terms of daily volume according to cryptocurrency price website CoinMarketCap. The company is currently based in Hong Kong, but is currently in the process of relocating to Malta. The small European island nation’s government has been particularly keen to embrace blockchain technology. This has made the country an attract place for startups in the industry, Binance included.

Featured image from Shutterstock.

The post Binance Announces the Formation of a $1 Billion Blockchain Investment Fund appeared first on NewsBTC.

During the Cannes film festival, a blockchain media company announced it will broadcast the Beyond Bitcoin documentary via its streaming platform #SPONSORED

One of the more interesting aspects of the cryptocurrency industry is that all coins require a network of nodes to keep the ecosystem healthy. Running a node can be done in many ways. One team has deployed a bunch of Raspberry Pis to create a cryptocurrency node cluster.

Node Clusters in the Cryptocurrency World

Although it is not exactly groundbreaking to use a Raspberry Pi to set up a cryptocurrency node, this particular project has attracted a lot of attention. As most people are aware, there is a growing need for more decentralized nodes when it comes to any cryptocurrency. A lot of users and companies prefer to set up nodes on centralized servers, mainly because it is a lot more convenient to do so.

Setting up a cluster of nodes would, in theory, require a fair few computers to do all of the heavy lifting. For currencies with smaller blockchains, using a Raspberry Pi is sometimes possible as well, depending on which model is being used. In the case of Bitcoin, a Raspberry Pi 3 Model B+ should do the trick just fine.

However, a team of enthusiasts has come together to build a network of nodes in a slightly different matter. The team uses Kubernetes to provide a capable and reliable distributed network of nodes to guarantee uptime at all times. This is done by using Docker containers which are all based on hosted images to ensure that the proper configuration can be achieved.

In this case, the team used a Litecoin-based cryptocurrency. While Faithcoin is not necessarily the most popular currency on the market today, it goes to show that this concept can easily be applied to various ‘lightweight’ cryptocurrencies as well. All one needs is an ARM-compatible binary of the node software in order to apply this concept to any cryptocurrency out there.

The unfortunate side effect is that there are virtually no ARM-compatible images for cryptocurrency node software on the market today. Most projects only focus on the main operating systems and architectures, although it is theoretically possible to set up any cryptocurrency node on an ARM device these days. There’s also ROKOS, which may help in achieving this goal, although it remains to be seen if anyone will pursue that option.

It is evident that there are a lot of things one could do with Raspberry Pis when it comes to cryptocurrencies. Given the cheap price of this device, it is an option more people should explore, especially when attempting to decentralize particular ecosystems. Even so, setting up a node cluster will take a fair bit of time and may be too complicated for most consumers at this point.

Bitcoin has fallen by $100 since yesterday, and is now trading for just over $7,400. Many analysts claim that bitcoin’s long-term effects will take it to new highs, though a bull run doesn’t lie in the coin’s immediate future. For now, the coin doesn’t appear capable of jumping beyond the $8,000 mark.

According to one source, bitcoin is having trouble moving beyond $7,500. A recent sell-off that ultimately “ran out of steam” brought the currency down to $7,270 during the early morning hours, though a later rally brought the currency up to its present $7,400 position. This source suggests the $200 rise in question is a sign that the bulls are once again taking control. It also says that bitcoin could potentially reach as high as $7,800 early next week, but would have to strike $7,700 by Sunday to test and obliterate its current resistance.

The article predicts:

“Bitcoin will likely soon rise to $7,870 (descending trendline hurdle) in the next 24 hours. A high-volume break above that level would allow a re-test of the 50-day moving average, currently located at $8,522. Bearish scenario: the moving averages are maintaining a bearish bias, so a drop to $6,900 could be on the cards if the bulls fail to capitalize on the break above $7,500 and the price drops below $7,270 in the next 24 hours. Bitcoin (BTC) is working its way through the key supply zone above $7,500 and could test resistance at $7,870 in the next 24 hours, the technical charts indicate.”

Following Chinese President Xi Jinping’s comments regarding the power of the blockchain, China is beginning to walk a different route when it comes to cryptocurrency and its respective technology, and it’s interesting to see one of the most stringent countries towards bitcoin and the blockchain suddenly loosen up a bit.

Jinping has explained he’ll be opening national laboratories to better develop and research the blockchain infrastructure, as he wants China to be prepared for any further technology revolutions in the coming months. In addition, the Chinese State Council’s 13th five-year economic plan, released in 2016, mentions blockchain technology twice, and several startups within the region are now partnering with local government branches to perform what they call “necessary” blockchain research and implementation.

Further support for the blockchain and bitcoin came from the Bank of England’s governor Mark Carney, who in the past, has been particularly harsh towards these technologies, going so far as to call bitcoin a “failure” and part of a “speculative mania.” Speaking at a conference in Sweden, Carney reiterated the power of the blockchain to his listeners, and called it crucial to the future development of the globe’s economic infrastructure:

“Is our role going to be changing the payment systems and helping private providers of digital money, or will we go all the way to a central bank-issued digital currency? This is one of the most exciting and important areas, and certainly the most important area to get right.”

Very unlikely candidates are now shifting their focus from negative to positive, and see the blockchain as a powerful entity that could hold the key to the world’s financial future.

Den Norske Bank (DNB), Norway’s largest financial services group, and the IOTA Foundation (IOTA) have signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) of partnership, according to a press release on 31 May, writes Cointelegraph.

This is the second of such announcements by IOTA recently in which applications of the IOTA Tangle, a “third-generation” distributed ledger technology (DLT) have been planned to be utilized to enhance existing systems. Last month, the United Nations Office for Project Services (UNOPS) announced a similar collaboration with IOTA to examine the feasibility of DLT streamlining its operations.

The press release suggests that DNB and IOTA will combine to find new business models to better understand DLT technology to support the bank to work with its clientele, offering them opportunities to use the tech to their advantage. Less Meholm, Den Norske Bank head of DLT, added:

“Among other things, the Tangle technology is designed to handle hundreds of thousands of microtransactions per second. We will not let go of the market associated with this ecosystem that arises around these transactions.”

David Sønstebø, an IOTA founder, feels that the collaboration between his company and the bank may improve current relationships between Norwegian banks and the crypto industry, commenting, “I hope and believe it. The IOTA Foundation will contribute to separating useless crypto-projects from the serious ones.”

Earlier this month, a Norwegian crypto exchange Bitmynt lost its case against Nordea Bank for closing its account, due to over concerns of inadequate anti-money laundering mechanisms. Last month, Bitcoin News reported an official document was released by Norway’s central bank (Norge bank) announcing intentions of launching its own cryptocurrency. However, the bank was quick to point out that a central bank digital currency wouldn’t interfere with customers normal banking requirements, as long as demand continues to exist for cash.

DNB also has several ongoing projects including Ethereum, Hyperledger and EOS, and has been researching blockchain tech through the R3 consortium.

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The post DNB, Norway’s Largest Bank, Breaks the Ice with IOTA Tangle Tech appeared first on BitcoinNews.com.

A big change has come to the TRON ecosystem. After many months of preparation, the project’s mainnet was scheduled to go live yesterday. Assuming this launch is successful, it will also mark the transition from an ERC20-based token to a currency issued on the native TRON blockchain.

A Big Day for TRON

It has been coming for quite some time now, but TRON is finally getting its mainnet launch. Although this is a major development for the project as a whole, it will be interesting to see if this technology can live up to people’s expectations. Known as Odyssey 2.0, the TRON blockchain is the first step toward making this project completely independent.

This also means the TRX token which people have grown accustomed to will be converted to the mainnet currency in the coming weeks. That exchange of tokens will be facilitated by most of the cryptocurrency exchanges out there, although users will need to take some steps to ensure the transition takes place.

#TRON Mainnet is awake! Our journey to independence begins. Stay tuned to Twitter for the livestream conference in less than 1 hour… #TRX $TRX pic.twitter.com/fs6k3cH7m7

— Justin Sun (@justinsuntron) May 31, 2018

Even so, there is still some time left before TRX is converted from Ethereum to Tron’s public blockchain. Users will have until June 21 to get everything in order. Before this transition takes place, there will be a public beta of the TRON mainnet.

As one would expect, people are genuinely excited about the launch of the TRON mainnet. After all, TRON is valued at a steep price despite lacking an official mainnet prior to May 31. Some people have speculated that this project is way overvalued at this stage, whereas others will respond that the valuation is correct once the mainnet has officially gone live.

The past year has been rather impressive for TRON. More specifically, the project has seen a value increase of over 2,150%, despite the hardship affecting all cryptocurrency markets since late 2017. Things may continue to head in a positive direction once the official mainnet has launched, although it remains to be seen how the market will respond.

Airdrops are well established idea here at the launch of the EOS mainnet, so its startups are way ahead of being the first to give free tokens away.

With the news that an Estonian invite-only entrepreneurs’ community has raised USD 2.3 million to develop a “founders to founders” skill-sharing platform, Estonia continues to make its mark on the crypto space in the region.

Estonian World reported that the new platform, Lift99, aims to “build an online community of influencers and startup talents to lead this revolution. As the E-residency program has shown, it’s in the local DNA to think outside of the box, especially in the startup world”.

The e-residency program, introduced in 2014, allows non-Estonians access to Estonian services such as company formation, banking, payment processing, and taxation. The program also allows anyone in the world to apply for a digital ID card and gain access to Estonian e-services when planning to start a company in the country.

“We’re working to make e-residency the best option globally for entrepreneurs launching a trusted ICO, while proceeding with three variants of our own ‘Estcoin’ under consideration,” Kaspar Korjus, managing director of e-residency at Enterprise Estonia, wrote in a Medium blog post.

Many crypto companies are now doing business in Estonia. According to Cryptovest, the Baltic region is becoming a “Northern crypto-paradise” with Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia experiencing an economic boom recently. Estonia’s widespread adoption of cryptocurrencies and fintech has become a breeding ground for new startups.

Estonia is a country with a significant internet penetration and now boasts its own Bitcoin ATMs established back in 2015 when the capital Tallinn saw the installation of its first machine. The government has also recently considered its own token, the ‘Estcoin’.

Another reason for Estonia’s raised profile in the region is due to the country’s proximity to Russia, where the future of cryptocurrencies continues to be uncertain, despite Vladimir Putin’s recent comments regarding adopting a state crypto-rouble, according to Entrepreneur Europe. Crypto adoption in Russia still remains at a punitive stage, until the country makes its next change of direction. This makes neighboring states an attractive proposition for Russian investment.

The region also has a relatively high concentration of Bitcoin full nodes, which strongly correlates with cryptocurrency knowledge and adoption. Along with a favorable tax policy, supportive regulators and safe ICOs, it appears that Estonia remains on solid ground in the crypto space.

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The post Estonia’s $2.3M Platform Supports ‘Northern Crypto Paradise’ Tag appeared first on BitcoinNews.com.

The Visa card payment network is down across UK and Europe, highlighting the need for decentralized options like Bitcoin, which has been functional 99.99% of time since 2009

Washington Sanchez, co-founder of the well-known decentralized marketplace OpenBazaar, recently expressed his frustration over the high fees associated with Bitcoin (BTC) transactions.

On May 4, Sanchez tweeted, “I personally wasted so much time in the Bitcoin scaling civil war that I could have used designing/building dapps and opening up OpenBazaar to multiple currencies. Instead, we had to wait for fees [in BTC] to cripple any consumer usage before we woke up.”

Since 2014, OpenBazaar has been accepting Bitcoin payments, which have made up the majority of its transactions. Yet due to high transaction fees and wait times, the e-commerce website that was one of the first to accept cryptocurrency is looking to support a wider range of cryptocurrencies optimized for e-commerce.

Whereas OpenBazaar plans to emphasize alternative cryptocurrency payments, the leading e-commerce blockchain protocol, CyberMiles, has announced the launch of an online marketplace that is among the first platforms to support only cryptocurrency.

The marketplace, known as Blocktonic.io, exclusively accepts the CyberMiles ERC-20 token, CMT, as a payment method. Consumers can purchase more than 60 different products on Blocktonic.io, including electronics and the CMT Cube, which is CyberMiles’ new crypto mining machine.

“We’re excited to bring a true blockchain (crypto-only) e-commerce site,” Dr. Lucas Lu, founder of the CyberMiles Foundation, said. “Blockchain technology promises to revolutionize e-commerce, and we’re confident Blocktonic is a step towards that, enriching the CyberMiles ecosystem with real application.”

No Transaction Fees

While there are several unique aspects of the Blocktonic marketplace, the most notable is the exclusive acceptance of CyberMiles’ token.

According to statistics from transactionfee.info, Bitcoin’s median fee fell to a low on April 4 and 5 of 6.86 satoshi/bytes (sat/B). As of May 29, the transaction fee is 9.71 sat/B.

Alternatively, the CyberMiles blockchain waives transaction fees for consumers using CMT on the Blocktonic marketplace.

“Little to no transaction fees is necessary to encourage consumers, even and especially in the crypto community, to shop [on] blockchain-based marketplaces like Blocktonic,” Michael Yuan, CyberMiles’ Chief Scientist, told me. “This was a strategic decision on our part, having no upfront transaction fee and only a nominal (1%) gas fee on the back end for ETH withdrawals from customer accounts. The proof is in the popularity—nearly 10,000 product orders within a few hours of the site’s launch alone.”  

Additionally, products that consumers purchase on Blocktonic.io are essentially free, as payments will be refunded over an extended period of time under a spending cashback program. Through the program, Blocktonic will offer a 100% rebate within a year to buyers who use CMT to purchase the CMT Cube. And Blocktonic shoppers can earn referral bonuses when they invite their friends to shop on the marketplace, which currently supports languages such as English, Korean and Vietnamese.

Why BTC Transactions Aren’t Optimal For E-Commerce

While Bitcoin might be considered a good investment for some cryptocurrency holders, it was never a great means of payment. High transaction fees and the volatility associated with Bitcoin prevent it from being a practical form of payment.

And while it’s convenient for merchants to sign on to accept cryptocurrency via specialized payment platforms, the rate of volatility and high transaction fees make it impractical for e-commerce merchants to implement. In July, Morgan Stanley issued a report saying merchants’ acceptance of Bitcoin was on a downward trend just as the cryptocurrency’s exchange rate went through the roof.

Due to the issues affecting Bitcoin payments, the few decentralized e-commerce marketplaces in the crypto space like OpenBazaar and Blocktonic will need to find alternative payment methods. OpenBazaar has mentioned plans for a site redesign to accommodate multiple cryptocurrencies, while Blocktonic will use the CMT token to avoid transaction fees and long wait times for purchases.

Dutch data center ITB2 – one of most energy-efficient in Europe – opens crypto mining lab for BTC and ETH