Day: July 1, 2018

It has been coming for some time now, but GDAX is finally rebranding to Coinbase Pro. Although the functionality will remain largely the same, this new platform will potentially attract more users. It is an important development for Coinbase as a company. So far, some users are reporting major site issues, which doesn’t bode well.

The Era of Coinbase Pro Begins

When Coinbase first announced its second trading platform years ago, people were intrigued by how the company continued to evolve. The launch of GDAX was well-received by the cryptocurrency community. It also allowed institutional traders and big players to buy and sell their favorite cryptocurrencies without crashing the Coinbase market in the process.

A few months ago, Coinbase announced a big forthcoming change: GDAX would cease to exist and be rebranded as Coinbase Pro. The new platform was built on top of GDAX’s trading engine, but it is tailored more toward active traders rather than regular consumers. The name change confirms that Coinbase wants to target both regular buyers and institutional investors and traders alike.

Tapping into both markets at the same time appears to be a smart idea. There is a lot of interest in cryptocurrency, either for speculative purposes or simply to drive prices down. Coinbase Pro users will be able to trade various digital assets on an insurance-backed platform. Additionally, the Coinbase Pro platform uses 0% maker fees and volume-based discounts on taker fees, which is very different from how the main Coinbase platform operates.

It is also worth noting that all existing Coinbase users can “upgrade” to a Pro account. The big question is whether or not a lot of users will be inclined to do so. That will mainly depend upon which digital assets can be traded on the Pro platform. At the time of writing, that list was comprised of Bitcoin, Ethereum, Litecoin, and Bitcoin Cash. All of these currencies can be traded against the US Dollar and euro, with Bitcoin also having a GBP pair at this time.

For users of GDAX.com, virtually nothing has changed. Their GDAX accounts have been converted over to the new platform, including their individual trading histories. Moreover, the API used for GDAX will continue to function until December 31. Coinbase Pro uses the same API model with a slightly different address.

All of this goes to show that the cryptocurrency industry is still evolving. While the launch of Coinbase Pro may not be a big deal to some, it is evident that there is a difference between novice cryptocurrency users and expert traders. Having separate platforms for these two groups is an interesting decision, as not everyone needs advanced features to buy or sell digital assets.

The Austrian Federal Police and the Spanish Guardia Civil, under the guidance of the European Union Agency for Law Enforcement Cooperation (Europol), have conducted the biggest lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD) raid in European Union history. The criminal organizations responsible were operating on the darknet and laundering their profits with cryptocurrency, resulting in EUR 4.5 million of cryptocurrency including Bitcoin, IOTA, and XLM being seized during the raid.

Two laboratories in the provinces of Granada and Valencia in Spain were raided and dismantled, resulting in the confiscation of 800,000 doses of LSD, a new record for the European Union. LSD is a popular but illegal drug which gives powerful psychedelic experiences. In total, drugs with a market value of EUR 12 million were seized. Additionally, EUR 700,000 of cash was seized, EUR 1.6 million was seized from an Austrian bank account, 3 properties were confiscated with a total value of EUR 1 million, ten luxury vehicles were impounded, and 8 were arrested and accused of drug trafficking and money laundering.

Apparently, the crime group responsible for the two darknet drug laboratories had been operating in Spain since 2012 and had been sending drugs to over 100 countries through the mail. The drugs from the laboratories were sold exclusively on the darknet, and they were supplying two websites that had become the most popular darknet drug markets in the world. However, the names of the darknet markets associated with this raid were not disclosed.

This raid and announcement comes on the heels of the biggest undercover darknet sting in United States history, suggesting there is an ongoing international crackdown on darknet drug markets and the use of cryptocurrency for drug trafficking. In the United States 2,000 Bitcoins were seized, while this Europol raid took in 510 Bitcoins.

Fortunately, Bitcoin’s price is no longer tied to darknet criminal activity, so this raid will not impact the market. A study by blockchain analytics firm Elliptic shows that only 1% of all Bitcoin transactions are related to crime. Fiat cash is used far more than Bitcoin for illegal activity.

That being said, darknet markets will continue to favor cryptocurrency as a means of money transfer due to cryptocurrency’s relative anonymity and cryptographic security. Considering how easy it is to set up a darknet market, the destruction of darknet markets in recent raids across the globe will only lead to new ones popping up, and the war between police and drug traffickers will continue across the darknet.

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Bitcoin detractors always spout that the coin will go to zero, but is that even a possibility nowadays?

An Oxford graduate living in Hong Kong has been identified as Britain’s youngest Bitcoin billionaire at the age of only 34, according to the Mail Online.

Ex-student Ben Delo founded crypto company BitMex, a trading platform created by a selection of finance, trading, and web-development experts, in 2014 and has subsequently amassed a fortune of $3.6 billion along with his co-founders.

Delo, who studied maths and computer science at Worcester College, Oxford and graduated in 2005 with a first-class degree, said that he worked 18 hour days to build up his platform renting out spare bedrooms on Airbnb and creating a space in his living room to make extra money.

After a spell in the City of London, he moved to Hong Kong to take a position with JP Morgan prior, to starting up his platform with Samuel Reed, a computer programmer.

Like something from a Howard Hughes biography, Delo certainly hasn’t let things go to his head though, reportedly living a frugal life in Hong Kong with his wife Pan Pan Wong, to the extent that he and his wife use food vouchers to buy food at McDonald’s. His aim is to be a Bill Gates style philanthropist donating most of his wealth to worthy causes.

There are other young entrepreneurs who are rapidly following in Delo’s footsteps who may not be a billionaire just yet but are well on the way.

At only 23 Charlie Shrem owns Evr, one of Manhattans most famous gastropubs, renowned for being one of the first establishments to accept Bitcoin for food and drink in New York. He is also a BitAngel, an investment group created to invest in Bitcoin startups.  Shrem made his initial fortune buying thousands of bitcoins at $20 each in 2011 and is thought to be worth $450 million.

At the young age of 24 Vitalik Buterin, co-founder of Ethereum has a net worth conservatively estimated to be around $450 million, although, in a recent interview with Forbes, Buterin stated that he now owned less than 0.4% of the company.

At the top of the Bitcoin Billionaires club would be the enigmatic creator and developer of Bitcoin who reportedly owns an estimated 1.1 million bitcoins.

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Shaping the future of a cryptocurrency is not an easy process. In the case of Zcash, there has been a recent community voting process which displayed some interesting results. A new proof-of-work algorithm will be introduced, and there is no real desire to remain ASIC-resistant.

The Future of Zcash Looks Intriguing

In the world of cryptocurrency, ASIC miners have been considered to be both a blessing and a curse. While these machines provide plenty of hashpower to keep blockchains safe, they also lead to more mining centralization. Some of the smaller currencies recently suffered from 51% attacks, all of which were potentially facilitated by ASIC mining hardware coming to market.

In the case of currencies such as Bitcoin, ASIC miners have not disrupted things in a significant manner. It has become apparent that Antminer represents most of the mining hardware on the market, but it seems unlikely the company can take advantage of its position anytime soon. Even so, it has raised a lot of questions for other top currencies that wish to remain free from ASIC mining interference.

In the case of Zcash, it would appear the community is not too bothered by the introduction of ASIC mining hardware. In fact, the recent vote made it clear they aren’t too concerned about preserving ASIC resistance at this stage, nor are they interested in discouraging the use of such hardware in favor of GPU mining equipment. It’s a very interesting and somewhat surprising development, all things considered.

There may be a good reason for this outcome, though. In the same round of elections, the community confirmed they wouldn’t mind a change to the Zcash proof-of-work algorithm. This will occur in the form of a hard fork in late 2020. That means there will be two more years of using the same algorithm and potentially dealing with an influx of ASIC miners. There is still a chance this will lead to some troublesome developments, but for now, it is what the community thinks best.

The new mining algorithm will not be ASIC-resistant, but it will be a system that is not in use by other cryptocurrencies at that time. Additionally, the Zcash Foundation will form a plan to host and build an open hardware specification for this new algorithm. Similar to Siacoin, it appears Zcash may have its own ‘native’ ASIC equipment in a few years from now, if this plan is finalized by then.

Last but not least, the election also involved the Zcash monetary policy and supply schedule. This vote was a rather close one, although most community members think there should be no discussion of changes to either of these aspects. It is a pretty interesting decision, although there doesn’t appear to be any reason to change things overnight. Zcash is doing just fine the way it is right now. Even so, it’s good to have a plan in place for the future.

Chinese media platform Global Finance is reporting that tens of thousands of Bitcoin mining rigs have been drowned in floods in Sichuan, China. Apparently, 70% of Bitcoin mining rigs are in China, and 70% of Chinese Bitcoin mining rigs are in Sichuan. This is due to an abundance of cheap hydro-electric power in the region. The Bitcoin mining hash rate actually dropped significantly at the time the floods occurred, from 43.1 exhash/s on 23 June 2018 (the all-time record for Bitcoin mining hash rate) to 30.5 exahash/s on 26 June. Global Finance says the timing of the dip in mining hash rate corresponds exactly with the Sichuan floods.

It can’t be known for sure whether the drop in Bitcoin’s mining hash rate was caused by the floods in Sichuan, but when looking at a long-term mining hash rate chart the drop in hash rate is much greater than normal variations. This is possibly the biggest drop in mining hash rate in Bitcoin’s history. The hash rate did recover to 39.5 exahash/s on 27 June, still 3.6 exahash/s below the all-time high set on 23 June, and this difference could possibly represent machines that were damaged or destroyed in the flood and offline.

According to the Global Finance news report, during the peak of flooding some hydro-electric power plants went offline due to heavy debris in the water. Bitcoin mining in China largely depends on cheap hydro-electric power, so perhaps hydro-electric power plants turning back on can explain the quick recovery of Bitcoin’s mining hash rate on 27 June.

Heavy continuous rains have impacted parts of China this week, probably associated with the monsoon which is a common summer phenomenon. 31 rivers in 6 different provinces have overtopped their banks. Flooding was especially bad in Sichuan and Shandong, with vast amounts of cropland and houses damaged. At this time estimated damage is USD 111 million, but fortunately, no one has died in the floods.

Overall, perhaps the lesson from this story is that Bitcoin mining needs to be spread out geographically to maintain a secure network. If a large amount of Bitcoin mining is concentrated in one spot it can be destroyed all at once by a disaster, which is detrimental to network security.

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Developers of malicious software have shown a great aptitude for cryptocurrency integration. This has become painfully obvious due to the recent malware and ransomware trend. In this day and age, most criminals are interested in cryptojacking, which still remains a very profitable venture. A new McAfee security report shows how quickly this industry is growing.

Cryptojacking Continues to Gain Traction

Over the past few months, there has been a more than noticeable increase in the number of cryptocurrency mining malware samples. It appears this trend has been directly influenced by the mining of cryptocurrencies through a web browser. Although this is generally a perfectly legitimate business model, criminals have begun injecting such code into websites they do not own or control.

Thanks to this cryptocurrency browser mining code, site visitors will – unknowingly – dedicate CPU cycles to the mining of Monero. That cryptocurrency balance will then be distributed to the criminals who injected the code in the first place. It has become a very problematic venture, as hundreds of websites have been infected with such mining code in the past six to eight months.

Unfortunately, the injection of mining code into websites is not the only problem computer users have to contend with. There has been an equal increase in cryptocurrency mining malware samples disguised as regular computer applications. Some video games have even been targeted in this regard. It is evident that criminals continue to favor this business model despite the falling price of Monero and other cryptocurrencies.

According to the McAfee Labs Threats Report June 2018, the rise of cryptojacking is far from over. Several major distribution campaigns have been identified, ranging from the Winter Olympic Games to Lazarus and the most recent GhostSecret campaign. The latter attack focused on various sectors, including telecommunications and healthcare. It is still active to this very day and has proven nearly impossible to detect.

Perhaps the most worrisome aspect of cryptojacking is that it continues to evolve. New distribution methods have been uncovered, but the coding of the tools themselves is also becoming a lot more sophisticated. Coin-mining malware saw a 629% increase in popularity between Q4 2017 and Q1 2018. That is an extremely worrisome development, and may only represent a fraction of the Q2 2018 figures.

As such, the question becomes what the future holds. Based on this McAfee Labs report, it seems unlikely cryptojacking will become less popular over time. It is even becoming a bigger and more lucrative industry compared to ransomware, as one doesn’t need to make people buy cryptocurrency. It has also become apparent that this trend affects not just computers, but also smartphones and tablets.

It seems the cryptocurrency markets will close the weekend in the low red. Most currencies have lost value in the past 24 hours, whereas a few others have gained a bit of value in the process. A remarkable trend, yet also an aspect that makes cryptocurrency so appealing. The NEO price, for example, is trying to mount somewhat of a comeback in this regard.

NEO Price Surpasses $30 Again

Over the past few weeks, there has been very little focus on NEO or the NEO price among cryptocurrency speculators. With all cryptocurrency markets suffering from unrelenting bearish pressure, it seems some altcoins are on the verge of becoming far less appealing in this regard. For NEO, that situation is seemingly changing again.

Looking at the chart, there is a modest NEO price increase over the past 24 hours. It is a positive trend after everything that has happened throughout 2018 so far. Reaching the all-time high EO price of $155 will be pretty much impossible this year, unless something changes drastically. For now, that seems rather unlikely, as the current momentum just isn’t positive.

As one would come to expect, this current NEO price gain is made possible thanks to a small improvement in the NEO/BTC ratio. Thanks to a 2.7% increase in favor of the altcoin, things are looking up, for the time being. It is evident this momentum can – and probably will – turn around on a dime, which is not something to look forward to.

Similar to most other cryptocurrencies, NEO is enjoying a slight increase in 24-hour trading volume. Although $74m is far from impressive compared to a few months ago, it is still better than some other altcoins on the market today. If this volume keeps up for a few days, there may be some further NEO price gains to enjoy.

No one will be surprised to learn Binance is the largest exchange for NEO trading volume. Its BTC and USDT pairs are clearly ahead of CoinEX’s, BCEX’s, and CoinEgg’s BTC pairs. No fiat currency markets in the top five can be quite problematic for NEO moving forward. although it remains to be seen if Bitfinex’s USD market can mount a surprising push tomorrow.

Ending the weekend on a high is quite positive for NEO price speculators. Whether or not the value will remain above $30 for much longer, is a different matter altogether. Something has to change for all cryptocurrency markets in the coming days, or things will undoubtedly turn different shades of red once again.