Day: October 24, 2018

UK Blockchain Startup to Enter EU Settlement System After French Regulator’s Approval

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U.K. blockchain startup Setl is about to enter an E.U. settlement system after receiving approval from the French securities regulator to run a central securities depository, the Financial Times (FT) writes Tuesday, Oct. 23. Setl, which develops blockchain solutions for the financial sector, received a license from the Autorite des Marches Financiers and can now connect to the Target2-Securities platform — a €1 billion pan-European network for securities settlement run by the European Central bank with the aim to increase the speed of cross-border payments. As per the FT, official…

Bitcoin Price Intraday Analysis: BTC/USD Retests Interim Resistance

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The Bitcoin-to-dollar exchange rate on Wednesday traded at 6435-fiat after jumping 1.76 percent from the previous day’s low. The pair is now reversing its upside action to extend the prevailing sideways bias. Selling pressure got renewed near the interim resistance level at 6450-fiat and BTC/USD gyrated above 6620-fiat as a result. The pair is now looking to the US Securities and Exchange Commission’s latest comments on VanEck and SolidX ETF for extended bullish movements. Meanwhile, the US Dollar Index is losing momentum after establishing fresh tops at 96.50-fiat. The overall…

South Korean Financial Regulator Says Crypto Funds Violate Capital Markets Act

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South Korea’s Financial Services Commission (FSC) has issued a statement to warn investors to be cautious while investing in cryptocurrency funds, according to documents published on the official FSC website on Oct. 24. According to the FSC, investors might be misled by cryptocurrency funds, mistakenly believing that those public funds represent legal investing tools that comply with South Korea’s Capital Markets Act. Citing the act, the FCS stated that public fundraising schemes must be approved and registered with the commission in order to operate legally. However, according to the FCS,…

Tether Destroys 500 Million USDT

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Tether Limited, the issuer of the USD-pegged USDT cryptocurrency, has destroyed 500 million units of the embattled stablecoin. Blockchain data reveals that earlier today, the firm transferred 500 million USDT from the token’s treasury address to this address, which the firm’s website indicates is the official USDT issuing address. Immediately following that transaction’s confirmation, the issuing address revoked the tokens, not only removing them from circulation (as tokens within the treasury are not counted as circulating) but also — once the transaction is confirmed — destroying them completely. Source: Omni…

David Chaum on Digital Privacy: “The Cat Is Out of the Bag”

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David Chaum, the cryptographer credited with starting the cypherpunk movement in the 1980s and launching eCash, an early form of virtual money in the 1990s, thinks people are taking financial privacy a lot more seriously these days. “Consumers are starting to lose faith in online services and privacy protections they hoped were in place,” he told the audience at Money 20/20 in Las Vegas on October 23, 2018. Pointing to recent failings of social media sites like Facebook and hinting that far better privacy options are around the corner, he stated:…

CoinMarketCap Excludes Some Tether Data After Clarification by Bitfinex

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CoinMarketCap, the most-visited aggregator of cryptocurrency market data, has changed the way it uses data from the Bitfinex exchange in response to a report by CoinDesk. On Tuesday, CoinDesk pointed out that a trading pair shown on CoinMarketCap – seemingly, for trades between the tether stablecoin (USDT) and U.S. dollars – did not, in fact, represent a pair that’s available for trading on Bitfinex. From looking at CoinMarketCap data, the ostensible pair appeared to be the second-highest by 24-hour volume on the exchange at the time the article was written.…

Chinese E-commerce Giant Alibaba Wins Preliminary Injunction Against Alibabacoin

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Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba has won a preliminary injunction against Dubai-based Alibabacoin Foundation in a lawsuit over the misleading use of Alibaba in their name, financial website MarketWatch reports Wednesday, Oct. 24. The U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York has sided with the Chinese corporation during the trademark infringement case hearing Monday, Oct. 22. Judge James Paul Oetken, as cited by MarketWatch, said that consumer confusion could occur due to the similarity of trademarks; therefore, the Alibabacoin Foundation should not use the confusing “Alibaba” part for…

Nasdaq Wins Blockchain Patent for Smart Contract-Based Information Release System

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The world’s second largest stock exchange by market cap, Nasdaq, revealed a new blockchain patent award Tuesday, October 23, in a bid to tackle the release of information for the media industry. The application, originally filed in January of last year, makes reference to “an information computer system […] provided for securely releasing time-sensitive information to recipients via a blockchain.” The issue at hand, Nasdaq states, is the often convoluted process of releasing timely information to the media while keeping it secure and watertight from a legal standpoint. Blockchain technology,…

Why New Generation Stablecoins are Crucially Based on Ethereum

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TrueUSD (TUSD), Circle Coin (USDC), Gemini Dollar (GUSD), and Paxos (PAX), new generation stablecoins competing against Tether (USDT), are all based on the Ethereum blockchain network. Crucially, all of the three above mentioned stablecoins are fully audited, transparent, and regulated, which allow them to obtain stable banking services and guarantee the ability of consumers to redeem the tokens based on a 1:1 ration with the US dollar. Ethereum-Based Tokens Deploying a stablecoin on top of the Ethereum blockchain protocol instantaneously improves the compatibility of the asset with existing infrastructure. For…

Crypto Exchange Bitfinex Denies Allegedly ‘Fake’ Tether Volumes Listed on CoinMarketCap

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Major crypto exchange Bitfinex has responded to a recent media report that accused the exchange of publishing trading volume data from “a market that doesn’t exist,” in a tweet posted Oct. 23. The controversy centers on an article from crypto media outlet CoinDesk, which had alleged that Bitfinex’s data on popular crypto statistics aggregator CoinMarketCap (CMC) was misleadingly inflated by reporting on a stablecoin Tether (USDT)-U.S. dollar trading pair, which as of press time appears to account for $33,598,474 — or 18.30 percent — of a total 24-hour traded volume…