Bitcoin Sentiment Shines in Turkey, Diminishes in the Rest of Europe

A report published by ING shows that the percentage of the population that believes in Bitcoin is slowly decreasing, indicating skepticism for cryptocurrencies in general. With the exception of Turkey, Poland, and Romania, most of Europe does not believe that cryptocurrencies will be an integral part of the financial system in the coming years, August 16, 2019. Europe Losing Faith in Crypto? The study, which covers 12 countries in Europe as well as the United States and Australia, is a signal that people are losing faith in the potential of…

Bakkt Is Good For Bitcoin And Ethereum Too – Market Hasn’t Priced That In Yet

Bakkt’s bitcoin futures and custody platform launch on 23 September is a shot in the arm for crypto, but in addition to boosting bitcoin it could also raise the profile of Ethereum. The long-awaited physically settled futures should qualitatively shift market composition toward greater institutional influence. A crypto trading and payments ecosystem, Bakkt is a subsidiary of Intercontinental Exchange, the owner of the New York Stock Exchange. Bakkt hopes to quicken the pace of institutional bitcoin adoption. Its custody pitch for best of class offering comes in its securing of…

Bakkt Is Good For Bitcoin And Ethereum Too – Market Hasn’t Priced That In Yet

Bakkt’s bitcoin futures and custody platform launch on 23 September is a shot in the arm for crypto, but in addition to boosting bitcoin it could also raise the profile of Ethereum. The long-awaited physically settled futures should qualitatively shift market composition toward greater institutional influence. A crypto trading and payments ecosystem, Bakkt is a subsidiaryof Intercontinental Exchange, the owner of the New York Stock Exchange. Bakkthopes to quicken the pace of institutional bitcoin adoption. Its custody pitchfor best of class offering comes in its securing of $125 million of…

Would Blockchain Better Protect User Data Than FaceApp? Experts Answer

FaceApp — the mobile application that has blown up your Instagram feed with pictures of your followers as old people, the opposite gender or babies — has raised a lot of concerns about potential privacy violations for users that upload their photos to be edited. Rumors have circulated that the application might even be taking users’ photos from their phones and uploading them to the FaceApp cloud server without explicit permission.  We reached out to experts in security and data privacy from academia, government agencies, startups and more to comment…

Coinbase and Barclays Part Ways, Will UK Users Be Affected?

It is being reported that Barclays, the London-based global bank, recently stopped banking for Coinbase, the United States-based crypto exchange. Coinbase reportedly found a quick replacement in the form of another United Kingdom-based establishment, ClearBank.  While Barclays connected San Francisco-based Coinbase to the U.K. Faster Payments Scheme (FPS), enabling instant withdrawals and deposits of British pounds at the exchange, ClearBank won’t offer the exchange the same service until at least the end of Q3 2019. Deposits and withdrawals in pounds for Coinbase’s U.K. customers, which once took seconds, will for…

Silvergate Bank Plans to Offer Cryptocurrency-Collateralized Loans

The holding company of cryptocurrency-friendly Silvergate Bank, Silvergate Capital Corporation, announced that the firm plans to offer cryptocurrency-collateralized loans. In an S1/A form filed with the United States Securities and Exchange Commission on Aug. 15 the bank notes: “We believe there may be attractive opportunities to provide digital currency borrowing facilities to deepen our high quality customer relationships and further enhance our interest income.” In the document, the firm states that it found significant demand for cryptocurrency-related borrowing. The service would consist of the client providing crypto assets or U.S.…

Bitcoin Circles $10,400 as Altcoins Rally, XRP Posts 10% Gains

Sunday, Aug. 18 — Crypto markets are seeing a strong surge of green, with altcoins posting the strongest gains and Bitcoin (BTC) circling the $10,400 mark. Market visualization. Source: Coin360 After yesterday’s correction, BTC is today up nearly 2%, bringing it to $10,393 by press time.  While still roughly $1,000 short of its price point at the start of its 7-day chart,  (Aug. 11), today’s recovery has kept the top coin comfortably above the $10,000 psychological price point. During a brief downturn mid-week on Aug. 15, Bitcoin had dropped as…

Top-5 Crypto Performers: LINK, LEO, BCH, ETC, BSV, OKB*

Most top performers of the past seven days are consolidating in a range. At what levels do they become an attractive buy? Let’s look at the charts. The views and opinions expressed here are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of Cointelegraph. Every investment and trading move involves risk, you should conduct your own research when making a decision. The market data is provided by the HitBTC exchange. Only a handful of hedge funds have invested large sums of money in the crypto universe.…

US Lawmakers to Visit Switzerland to Discuss Crypto, Facebook’s Libra

A delegation of the United States House of Representatives will visit Switzerland on cryptocurrency concerns, with Facebook’s not-yet-released stablecoin Libra being in the focus. As local weekly news outlet NZZ am Sonntag reported on Aug. 17, a six-member delegation from the House Financial Services Committee is going to meet with Swiss Federal Data Protection and Information Commissioner (FDPIC) Adrian Lobsiger to exchange views about digital currencies. A spokesperson told NZZ am Sonntag that Libra will be the focal point of the dialogue between the regulator and U.S. lawmakers. The delegation…

$240M in Suspected Scheme Assets Moves in Four Bitcoin Transactions

Over $240 million in proceeds from the alleged crypto scheme PlusToken have reportedly moved through four Bitcoin (BTC) transactions. Whale Alert — a Twitter account dedicated to reporting large cryptocurrency transactions — posted on Aug. 17 that four transactions totaling 22,923 BTC were likely the proceeds of PlusToken. The four transactions moved 6,000 BTC, 5,000 BTC, 7,000 BTC and 4,923 BTC. All the transactions took place on Aug. 17. The monitor admits that, while the transactions are likely associated with the purported scheme, they are unconfirmed.  Largest reported exit scam…