BitOasis Secures Preliminary Approval With UAE Financial Regulator

United Arab Emirates-based cryptocurrency exchange BitOasis has reportedly secured preliminary approval with financial regulators, Bloomberg reported on May 13. Founded in 2015, BitOasis claims to be the Middle East’s first digital currency wallet that uses multi-signature technology. The company previously announced that it was seeking to be fully licensed in the financial center Abu Dhabi Global Market (ADGM) before the end of this year. Ola Doudin, the founder and CEO of BitOasis said then that “we are hoping to be one of the first regulated exchanges to get that licence.”…

Tyler Winklevoss Pitches Paying Elon Musk in BTC to See Your Email

By CCN: Have you ever wanted to send Elon Musk an email, only to abandon the idea because he would probably never see it? Tyler Winklevoss has an idea that could increase the chances not only that the email will arrive in the Tesla CEO’s inbox but also that he’ll read it. Winklevoss envisions a crypto-fueled market-based email system, one that charges a “digital postal fee” to keep moonshot ideas in and spam out. He tweeted: “Sending an email to Elon Musk and effectively renting his time to read it would…

Bitcoin (BTC) Taps $8,000 Twice Amid Bakkt Futures News, eBay Crypto Rumor

Bitcoin Roars Back After 10% Pullback What. The. Hell. On Monday morning, Bitcoin (BTC) tapped $8,000… twice. For some reason or another, no one predicted this move. This sudden surge comes after the cryptocurrency stumbled on Sunday, falling to $6,800 in a flash-esque crash after flirting with $7,500 in a massive daily candle. Funnily enough, many analysts didn’t expect this bullish continuation. As Ethereum World News reported over the past few days, a number of notable traders speculated that BTC was reaching a local peak, looking to technical factors, on-chain…

ICO Market Down Almost 100% From a Year Ago, Raised $40 Million in Q1 2019

The initial coin offerings (ICO) market is down 97% on a year-on-year basis making $40 million so far in 2019, according to research by cryptocurrency exchange BitMEX released on May 13. In the first quarter (Q1) of 2019, the ICO market has reportedly dropped by 97% based on the amount of attracted capital. The slump followed the 2017–2018 cryptocurrency boom, with low investment returns among ICOs through most of 2018. Per the report, the top 10 ICO projects in terms of capital raised in 2018 were EOS, Telegram, blockchain-based cloud…

Ethereum Co-Founder: ETH Scalability Going Exponential Over Next 2 Years

Ethereum co-founder Joseph Lubin has made the claim that his currency will achieve an exponential increase in scalability over the coming years. Speaking in an interview with CoinTelegraph, Lubin stated that ETH scalability–the most prominent issue to be addressed in the massive Ethereum 2.0 overhaul–will improve by 1,000 times in the next 18 to 24 months. Lubin highlighted the Ethereum 2.0 update, also codenamed Serenity, as the primary driver for the increase in scalability. Despite the growing landscape for cryptocurrency, the majority of top coin projects such as Ethereum and…

Bitcoin (BTC) Clears $7,500, This Is Just the Beginning–Mati Greenspan

Bitcoin (BTC) surge, up 34 percent Mati Greenspan confident that Bitcoin prices will surge to new highs as momentum builds up Prices may correct, that’s a possibility. However, unlike the deep correction of 2018, there is increasing awareness around Bitcoin and cryptocurrency in general. That is perhaps the reason why Mati Greenspan of Etoro is confident that BTC is in the early stages of a humongous bull rally in waiting. Bitcoin Price Analysis Fundamentals It’s all about price and ROI, and if that is the metric for gauging success, then…

Microsoft Builds Decentralized Identity Network Atop Bitcoin Blockchain

Microsoft is building a decentralized identity (DID) network atop of the bitcoin blockchain, the tech giant announced on May 13. In a blog post, the company said the infrastructure, known as the Identity Overlay Network (ION,) is based on an evolving set of open standards developed in conjunction with the Decentralized Identity Foundation. Microsoft claims its approach addresses throughput issues that mean “the most robust, decentralized, public blockchains operate at just tens of transactions per second, nowhere near the volume a world full of DIDs would demand.” By contrast, the company says its…

Grayscale Reports Vast Majority of Investments in Q1 2019 Were in Bitcoin Trust

American digital asset manager Grayscale Investments reported a 42% growth in its product inflows in Q1 2019 over the previous quarter, the firm announced in a new financial report on May 13. Grayscale was specifically bullish on major cryptocurrency bitcoin (BTC), reporting that the vast majority of investments in Q1 2019 were in its Bitcoin Investment Trust (BIT). According to the report, Grayscale Bitcoin Trust secured $3.2 million in average weekly investment out of total average weekly investment of $3.3 million. As such, non-bitcoin investment products amounted to less than…

Bakkt CEO Kelly Loeffler Targets July for Thrilling Bitcoin Futures Launch

By CCN: It’s finally happening. The Intercontinental Exchange (ICE), the parent company of Bakkt, has officially filed for bitcoin futures approval with the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), according to a blog post this morning by Bakkt CEO Kelly Loeffler. Although the CFTC hasn’t approved the new platform yet, Loeffler seems confident it will, stating: “…bitcoin futures will be listed on a federally regulated futures exchange in the coming months.” What We Know About the Platform Loeffler sheds some light on the upcoming platform launch in her post. Here’s…

Samsung, JP Morgan—Microsoft are Ethereum (ETH) Primers, Next $250?

Ethereum (ETH) up 21.7 percent The platform is way ahead of competitors and could replace Bitcoin as a store of value Mike Novogratz is an experience institutional investor is positive on Ethereum (ETH) saying that the platform is “way ahead.” His comments mirrored our previous assertion and reflected on the level of on-chain development gauged from the number of monthly active developers. In a bullish breakout pattern, it is likely prices will expand towards $200 and $250 in days ahead. Ethereum Price Analysis Fundamentals In the race to superiority, Ethereum…