Day: September 7, 2018

South Korea’s blockchain prowess is gaining international reach as reports show that the Eastern European nation of Belarus is opening its doors for South Korean investors, as its national postal service Korea Post seeks cryptocurrency know-how from Goldman Sachs executives.

Belarus

As reported by local news outlet Korea JoongAng Daily, the deputy foreign minister and ambassador of Belarus Andrei Dapkiunas told reporters that the European nation is open to investment into Fourth Industrial Revolution (4IR) technologies; this includes blockchain, Artificial Intelligence (AI), Robotics and the Internet of Things (IoT).

Between meetings with the Joint Committee of Belarus and Korea during a visit to Seoul, the ambassador noted that Belarus had made “groundbreaking state legislation regarding the IT sector”, adding, “We are the partner in Eastern Europe making innovative strides on blockchain, cryptocurrency, start-up development and software production.”

Business relations between the two countries are healthy, with South Korean exports to Belarus including IT products, vehicles, electronics, while Belarus supplies goods such as semiconductors, lasers and optical instruments.

Highlighting the potential future success of a 4IR relationship with South Korea, Dapkiunas said, “…we feel that this potential is not fully realized. We believe that there is a significant potential for mutually beneficial cooperation in such fields as aerospace, artificial intelligence, biotechnologies, electric and self-driving vehicles, robotics and electronics, nanomaterials and digital economy.”

It wouldn’t come as a surprise should South Korean investors see the benefits of such a cooperation. This is due to the governments of South Korea and the United States having a cooperative partnership in place for the coming 4IR era.

Goldman Sachs and Korea Post

Earlier this week, Bloomberg reported that the South Korean postal service is actively seeking an understanding of cryptocurrencies.

The president of Korea Post, Kang Seong-ju, said that he had spoken about cryptocurrencies with David Solomon, a Goldman Sachs chief effective, at a New York meeting.

Staff members of Korea Post are said to be meeting with the Goldman Sachs crypto-research team in Hong Kong to educate themselves on blockchain, digital assets and other technologies such as AI.

Kang said, “I asked Goldman to pass on their know-how in the cryptocurrency area… Since cryptocurrencies are considered to have potential, and are something many people are watching, we’ll need to learn the strengths and weaknesses.”

According to the Bloomberg report, Korea Post presently has no intention of investing in cryptocurrencies. However, the meeting in Hong Kong should prove fruitful given its national status and the present hype of blockchain in South Korea.

 

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National Nigerian banks have teamed up with US-based software development company Hashcash to combat the African nation’s widespread issue of financial exclusion through a blockchain banking implementation.

The collaboration aims to promote economic growth by banking a large number of the mainly rural residents that do not have accounts, as well as offer more efficient methods of transferring money. Right now, the primary method of delivering cash outside of towns and cities relies on bus transfers, a situation that is highly vulnerable to pillaging en route.

Across Nigeria, there is a lack of traditional bank branches and technology such as desktops for citizens to access their bank accounts. Mobile phones capable of managing blockchain wallets are, however, something most Nigerians do have in their possession, making the project to overturn economic exclusion a highly feasible solution for success.

What can blockchain banking bring Nigeria?

Blockchain banking can improve the situation for unbanked Nigerians by allowing them to make financial transactions of any size to another individual with a blockchain-backed wallet, no matter the geographical location of both parties. This adds enhanced security over traveling across the nation that is suffering from civil disruption with cash, also saving people the time they would take to physically travel.

Another benefit that blockchain provides is transparency over the movement of finances, something NGOs have been fighting for because a lack of evidenced bank transactions can hinder demographics that are attempting to move into the larger economy. Take, for example, the difficulties of renting a property in a major city without providing your banking history. Blockchain banking solutions in Nigeria have the potential to increase productivity with a nearly immediate effect while supporting the empowerment of women and marginalized communities who can not access traditional bank accounts in the country.

Blockchain in developing nations

Blockchain solutions have been touted by many experts as key in helping developing nations progress through the technology’s fundamentals of transparency, security, and accountability. David Crosbie, a lecturer at the University of Pennsylvania, said earlier this year that the decentralized technology can also bring developing states the same levels of convenience that countries such as the US take for advantage. Crosbie’s analysis focuses fundamentally on bringing trust to these societies in order to bring about progression.

 

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The NEO Name Service is designed to bring NEO’s blockchain to the masses. This project provides accessibility and ease-of-use. It offers benefits for both regular users and developers to explore. 

The NEO Name Service Concept

Similar to Ethereum, NEO now has a Name Service to make the project more discoverable. It is an open source distributed name service to improve the usability of NEO’s blockchain. It can become an integral part of realizing the project’s native smart ecosystem. Initiatives like these can make a positive impact, although their mainstream appeal will always be limited.

How Does it Work

As one expects from a name service, it makes data easier to read. More specifically, it replaces irregular strings and turns it into human-readable data. This includes blockchain wallet addresses and smart contract hashes, among other things. Instead, it transforms this data into something with a .neo extension. It is very similar to how domain names work on the internet, but this is specifically for NEO blockchain projects.

For the users, this is a welcome development. It shows there is an easier way of sending and requesting money over the NEO blockchain. For developers, it can make their applications a lot more approachable. Given the current dApp development taking place in this ecosystem, the NEO Name Service may not be an unnecessary luxury either.

More importantly, the NEO Name Service offers speed improvements. The team claims it will make transactions on the blockchain faster. Combined with the native zero transaction fee of NEO’s ecosystem, it can elevate this platform to a whole new level. Moving tokens on the blockchain will also become a lot easier and faster, which is of great value to developers. There are also loyalty rewards to community members in the form of the NNC token.

The NNC Token

It is interesting to take note of this native NNS token. Known as NNC, it powers the transactions on the NEO Name Service. Moreover, it is a reward token for users who believe in this project and the overall ecosystem. Offering this reward to users is designed to spur adoption of the NEO Name System during the initial stages.

The Road Ahead

With this reward offer, initial interest in NNS appears to be guaranteed. Maintaining the momentum over the long term, however, is a different matter altogether. The NEO Name Service has a lot of potential, assuming the project continues to evolve as a whole at its current pace. Reaching out to the masses and getting them excited will prove to be an intriguing social experiment.

The post What is the NEO Name System? appeared first on NullTX.

The increasingly high positive correlation between Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies is bringing their prices down, now that the tide has turned against Bitcoin since the spectacular rally towards the $20,000 area in mid-December 2017.

With a market capitalization of $111 billion, the BTC continues to recoup the cryptocurrency market dominance it once had.

Correlation Between Bitcoin and Altcoins at 0.7, Up from 0.1 in Early 2018

Correlation amongst assets is the degree to which they move in tandem.

A value close to zero reveals not much dependence between them. This tends to be the case between digital currencies and the stock market. Correlation values range between -1 (returns move in opposite directions) and +1 (returns move in the same direction). However, cryptocurrencies usually present values corresponding to strong positive relationship (0.5 – 1) and moderate positive relationship (0.3 – 0.5).

The 90-day Pearson coefficient show extremely high correlations between Bitcoin and Bitcoin Cash (0.88), Litecoin (0.86), Ethereum (0.83), NEM (0.83), Zcash (0.82), Monero (0.82), Ripple (0.78), Stellar Lumens (0.78), Siacoin (0.77), Nxt (0.76), Dash (0.69), Lisk (0.68), Ethereum Classic (0.6), and Augur (0.55), according to the cryptocurrency correlation matrix by Sifr Data.

The ties between Bitcoin and these altcoins have led to significant damage in their market valuation in 2018. As the BTC moved throughout the year from its $20,000 peak to approximately $6,500, where it currently stands, Bitcoin Cash plunged from $3,400 to the $500 line.

Litecoin fell from $366 to $56. Ethereum dropped from $1,377 to $218. NEM crashed to $0.10 down from $1.90. Zcash declined from $888 to $127. Monero fell from $494 to $112. Ripple dived from $339 to as low as $0.29 as the cryptocurrencies continually print new lows in 2018.

The strong positive relationship between Bitcoin and altcoins prices wasn’t always a given. Correlation between Bitcoin and MVIS CryptoCompare indexes of the 10 biggest and the 100 smaller coins has jumped to 0.7 from lower than 0.1 at the start of the year. The highest correlation this year was found in April, where it went as high as 0.9 in April, virtually mimicking each other in a bearish momentum.

The 90-day Pearson rolling correlation also shows an interesting behavior as Bitcoin Cash moves higher from the third place (0.79) to become the digital currency with the strongest positive correlation against Bitcoin (0.88).

Ethereum, which was in the lead 90 days ago with a coefficient of 0.90, dropped gradually to the second place (0.83). Ripple also made a downward trajectory during the last three months, easing from 0.84 to 0.78.

The number of digital assets available for trading in the cryptocurrency market has increased continually, completely disregarding this year’s downward slope in volumes traded – $31 billion on January 01, 2018 to $13 billion today – and market capitalization – $613 billion on January 01, 2018 to $203 billion today.

There are now 1,926 cryptocurrencies being traded in 13,727 exchanges around the world, according to CoinMarketCap, but BTC dominance keeps rising.

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French energy group ENGIE has partnered with consulting firm Maltem to establish a blockchain software offering for commercial clients

Bithumb is conducting season 1 of its ‘Super Airdrop Festival‘, where it refunds traders 120% of trading fees. It has set aside a limit of KRW 1 billion per day for the refunds, which comes out to KRW 167 million (USD 149,000) of rewards each day. Clever traders have seized this opportunity to make profits by conducting wash trading.

Wash trading is when a user sets up two accounts, placing a sell order on one, which is bought immediately by the other. This generates fake trading volume on crypto exchanges and is commonly used to inflate trading volume stats to push crypto exchanges up the CoinMarketCap rankings. Due to the Bithumb airdrop, users now have an incentive to wash trade, since they can make easy profits.

Doing the math, Bithumb charges 0.3% fees, yielding a rebate of 0.36%. Therefore KRW 278 billion (USD 247.6 million) of wash trading can produce the KRW 1 billion limit for trading refunds. And this is exactly what’s been happening – at the time the airdrop reward resets every day, there has been a KRW 252 billion spike in Bitcoin trading on average for a moment, representing one person or many people jumping on the opportunity to make easy money via wash trading.

Bithumb has experienced tremendous problems since it was hacked in June 2018, resulting in the loss of USD 31 million of crypto and the shutdown of the exchange. It has just become fully operational again and has opened registration for new users. Simultaneously, it launched the trading fee refund airdrop.

These events give Bithumb the appearance of having strong liquidity, which attracts traders. It has shot up to #5 in the world on CoinMarketCap with over USD 450 million of trading volume. That means Bithumb’s true trading volume is over USD 200 million per day, much higher than it was before the hack.

In fact, the USD 200 million of real volume generates USD 600,000 of profits per day from trading fees, which is more than enough to pay for the airdrop with a nice profit on top. Perhaps Bithumb will continue doing the airdrop long term, since it is attracting real volume to the exchange and is, therefore, a profitable strategy.

 

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Sunny King, the developer of Peercoin and Primecoin, is developing a new cryptocurrency algorithm called Supernode Proof-of-Stake (SPoS). Considering King has been called “the single most original altcoin developer out there” by Ethereum’s Vitalik Buterin, it may be worth looking into this new algorithm.

SPoS expands on PoS, which is when a user holds coins in their wallets and lets them stake to receive freshly-minted coins. This is because computers running PoS cryptocurrencies maintain the network, in the same way miners maintain a Proof-of-Work (PoW) network. PoS is widely embraced because it is more energy efficient than PoW, and is being used by numerous popular cryptocurrencies. The first PoS cryptocurrency was Peercoin, which was launched by King in 2012.

With PoS, anyone with a computer and an internet connection can stake and mint new coins. With SPoS, special computers called supernodes will be required. Supernodes will have much higher memory and bandwidth than a normal personal computer, and staking will be concentrated with these supernodes. This is advantageous because the supernodes can process far more transactions than a typical PoS network which uses weak personal computers. King’s goal is to build a platform where millions of blockchains can run simultaneously while maintaining efficiency and cryptographic security.

Essentially, SPoS would lead to cryptocurrencies being scalable like never before. Scalability is an issue that cryptocurrencies have struggled with, especially Bitcoin. Highly-scalable blockchain technology is needed if any crypto is to ever compete with mainstream payment processors like Visa.

It is unclear when SPoS will become public since the supernode hardware has to be released. Virtual Economy Era (VEE) will possibly use SPoS eventually. VEE is King’s newest cryptocurrency and will initially use PoW, PoS, and PoW based on finding prime numbers, which is Primecoin’s algorithm. In the VEE white paper, it says they will consider adding other consensus mechanisms in the future, and perhaps that means they will add SPoS once it is ready.

 

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This week Yougov Omnibus released a host of encouraging new survey data, new numbers, and among their findings “48% of millennials would be interested in using cryptocurrency primarily…A vast majority (79%) of Americans are familiar with at least one kind of cryptocurrency.”

Also read: Square’s Big Week: Crypto Patent, Shares Leap, and Lightning Plug

Some Encouraging Bitcoin & Crypto Numbers

Amid sagging crypto market prices, it’s heartening for enthusiasts to receive survey data like that recently released by Yougov Omnibus. Their findings concluded, “By far, the most well-known cryptocurrency among Americans is Bitcoin, with 71% of people saying they’ve heard of it. The next best-known is Ether/Ethereum, with 13% saying they have heard of it. Overall, men are more likely than women to have heard of almost every kind of cryptocurrency. About three in ten (27%) women say they have not heard of any cryptocurrency, compared to only 16% of men who chose the same answer.”

Yougov is a London-based internet market research firm. For nearly two decades, it has mostly been known for its UK political acumen, but of late has taken on a more international scope. It largely employs online methodology, involving surveying users based on demography. It can draw from as many as 5 million people across the globe, with nearly ⅕ of those from the UK alone. Since not everyone uses the internet, even in 2018, the company is sometimes criticized for a lack of boots on the ground, as it were. Though for cryptocurrency it does seem to be a tight way to gather attitudes. Poll analysis specialists Fivethirtyeight graded Yougov a “B”, having called nearly 90% of political races without bias. Since 2007 they’ve gobbled up US research firms in Palo Alto, CA, Princeton, NJ, Connecticut, and Portland.

The less than enthusiastic deeper dive within the present crypto survey shows that even though Americans have heard of bitcoin, “87% have had no interaction with it, meaning they haven’t bought, sold, or mined it. About half (49%) in this group say ‘I’m glad I didn’t buy Bitcoin earlier, and I don’t plan to buy it,’ while 15% say ‘I wish I had bought Bitcoin earlier, but I feel like it’s too late now.’ About one in five (21%) people between 35 and 54 chose this response, while only 11% of people 55 and up did,” Yougov detailed.

Half Empty, Half Full

On a slightly more positive note, “more than one-third (36%) of people think that cryptocurrencies will become widely accepted as a means of transaction for legal purchases within the next 10 years. Millennials (44%) are the most likely of any age group to say cryptocurrency will be widely accepted. About one-third (34%) of Gen X’ers and 29% of baby boomers agreed,” which could bode very well for both the immediate and longer term future.  

There is still a stigma when it comes to cryptcurrencies, a battle enthusiasts have been waging against since decentralized money’s founding nearly a decade ago. “One quarter (25%) say they think cryptocurrencies are used more for illegal purchases rather than legal ones,” Yougov stresses.”Only 17% think they’re used more for legal purchases, and 19% think cryptocurrencies are equally used for legal and illegal purchases. Hispanic Americans are particularly likely to believe that cryptocurrencies are mostly used for legal purchases.”

On a cup half empty, cup half full tone, the survey reveals, “Of the people who believe that cryptocurrencies will become widely accepted, over one-third (36%) say they would be interested in converting to primarily using a cryptocurrency rather than the US dollar. However, a majority (57%) say they would not be interested in converting away from the US dollar. Millennials are almost equally split between being interested (48%) and not interested (50%).”

ls the future bright for cryptocurrencies? Let us know in the comments section below.

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Images courtesy of Shutterstock, and Yougov.

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The post Bitcoin’s Hopeful Numbers: 70% Familiar in the United States appeared first on Bitcoin News.

Co-founder of mining pool F2Pool has published a list of cryptos and types of miners, showing when coins become unprofitable to mine

A Swiss blockchain company which has gained regulatory approval in the alpine pro-cryptocurrency nation is to seek a banking license.

Startup Smart Valor has won approval to operate in the country’s buoyant financial market and will be regulated by the local Financial Services Standards Association (VQF) rather than the national regulatory agency, the Financial Market Supervisory Authority (FINMA).

This means that Smart Valor as yet is the only company to have been given this scope, allowing it to be monitored by FINMA. Its next step will be to apply for a banking license which it hopes will allow the company to offer security investments early next year.

The proposed launch will be an online platform for alternative investments which will also include crypto, tokenizing all platform assets. Smart Valor’s founder Olga Feldmeier commented:

“Most of these investments have previously only been available to a small elite of high-net-worth individuals and institutional investors… Tokenization transforms the way people own things, improves liquidity, and makes these investment opportunities accessible to a broader audience of investors.”

Smart Valor was founded in 2017 by Feldmeier in an attempt to disrupt Switzerland’s banking system after jumping from China-based Bitcoin wallet Xapo. In a formal statement from the company it outlined the scope of its plans for 2019:

“Pending regulatory approval, the VALOR platform will expand its offering to asset-backed tokens, such as equity in blockchain companies, blockchain-related infrastructure projects, real estate, crypto funds, venture capital, and private equity funds.”

Along with Gibraltar and Malta, Switzerland is fast becoming a global hub for blockchain and cryptocurrencies, with investors from all over the world moving there. Towns such as Zug, a small town of 120,000 people just a short drive from Zurich, and the southern Italian-speaking Swiss town of Chiasso, are beginning to make a name for themselves in the global crypto space.

 

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According to a recently conducted survey, the number of Australians who own cryptocurrency has nearly tripled in 2018 alone, signaling that the current bear market is not an accurate signal of interest in cryptocurrency, which is growing at rapid rates.

The new report comes on the heels of Bitcoin plunging nearly $1,000 to its current price of just over $6,400.

The survey was conducted by Finder-backed brokerage firm HiveEx, who surveyed a total of 2,000 Australians, finding that of the sample group, cryptocurrency ownership totaled at 13.5% in August, as compared to 5% in January, reports News.com.au.

HiveEx also found that the reasons behind the growing cryptocurrency ownership vary, with 50% of the surveyed group holding crypto as an investment, 34% holding it because of “fear of missing out” (FOMO), and 26% using it to save for retirement. Notably, more than a third of Australians holding cryptocurrency mentioned that they were planning on paying their taxes using their cryptocurrency.

An important statistic found in the survey is that 80% of respondents said that they would be open to using crypto for their daily purchases on the condition that it was as easy to use as Australian Dollars.

The survey also found that the main reason behind some individuals not holding crypto is due to lack of knowledge. Of those who responded, 65% said that their lack of cryptocurrency ownership can be attributed to lack of understanding or difficulty in use or acquisition. Over 20% of those who don’t hold cryptocurrency also indicated that they believe it is a “scam,” and the same percentage of respondents thought it was a “bubble.”

Other Reports Coincide with Cryptocurrency Ownership Statistics

The HiveEx survey comes on the heels of a SharePost survey that also analyzed cryptocurrency interest and ownership, but on a more international scale. This survey also found that despite a persisting bear market, consumer interest in cryptocurrencies is at nearly an all-time-high.

This survey found that 59% of investors, and 79% of consumers, will be adding to their crypto portfolios over the course of 2018, coinciding closely with the statistics from the HiveEx survey. The report also found that non-crypto holding consumers are mainly interested in Bitcoin as their first crypto investment, while crypto investors are looking towards ETH and XRP as the greatest investment opportunities.

The report notably states that:

“Among cryptocurrencies, Bitcoin has seen a surge in optimism over the past six months. 80 percent of investors and 64 percent of consumers believe Bitcoin offers the most potential for future success. However, enthusiasm for Ethereum decreased during the same period as companies increasingly use their own individual blockchains to launch tokens instead of Ethereum.”

The statistics coming from these reports signal that although the markets are sitting near their year-to-date lows, and sentiment from investors is overwhelmingly negative, the crypto markets are still in their infancy. Investors can find confidence in the fact that interest from “no-coiners” is nearing an all-time high, regardless of the current state of the markets.

Featured image from Shutterstock.

The post Report: Australian’s Cryptocurrency Holdings Triple in 2018 Despite Bear Market appeared first on NewsBTC.

After the midweek bloodbath, markets have slightly stabilized today, although many coins continue to shed value, with Bitcoin trading around $6,400