One of China’s largest chemical producers has launched a new Blockchain Warehouse Receipt Platform to help the industry combat the rising costs of operations and trade financing. An increased demand for more environmental and safety measures amid the pandemic has further driven costs up in China’s petrochemical trade. Small enterprises were already struggling to meet the credit conditions of financial lenders, as a lack of effective risk control and difficulties in securely tracking transaction processes of bulk commodities have led financial institutions to tighten lending on warehouse financing. Major players…
Month: October 2020
Korean blockchain lobby calls for crypto tax plan to be put on ice
The Korea Blockchain Association has called for the government’s new 20% crypto trading tax plan to be delayed for another two years. According to an Oct. 14 report from News1 Korea, the Korea Blockchain Association, or KBA, is requesting regulators postpone the South Korean government’s implementation of its long awaited new tax strategy until Jan. 1, 2023. The KBA doesn’t explicitly state it is against the 20% tax rate but said that crypto exchanges and companies in the industry need a “reasonable period” to prepare for the Income Tax Act.…
Agriculture giants team up on blockchain platform to track grains in Brazil
The world’s largest grains and oilseeds companies, American giants Bunge and Cargill, have joined together to create the joint venture Covantis, which will use blockchain technology in the agricultural sector in Brazil. The unprecedented project foresees the exchange of information between all members of Covantis, which also includes the participation of other agribusiness giants such as the French Louis Dreyfus Company (LDC), the Chinese state-owned company Cofco International and the Dutch multinational Glencore Agriculture. Together the companies that make up Covantis move around 550 million tons of grains and oilseeds…
Bitcoin price must hold $11,000 for October rally to continue
Bitcoin (BTC) price broke upward in the first half of October, resulting in a rally from $10,500 to $11,700. However, the momentum may be shifting once more as strength diminishes across the cryptocurrency market. A similar setup also happened prior to Bitcoin’s latest upward break with sideways consolidation in BTC causing altcoins to drop south heavily, especially the Defi sector. Rangebound and holding $11,000 But significant support at $11,000 is now a must-hold level to resume the bullish momentum, which may find difficulty clearing current levels as renewed coronavirus lockdowns…
Global shipping leaders join IBM and Maersk blockchain platform
Two of the world’s largest container carriers announced a full integration onto IBM and Maersk’s TradeLens blockchain platform. CMA CGM, a French container and shipping company, along with MSC Mediterranean Shipping Company have joined the TradeLens network to enable a complete digital transformation of their supply chains. Marvin Erdly, head of TradeLens for IBM Blockchain, told Cointelegraph that as supply chains become digitized, manual paper-based processes, like processing bills of lading, are removed from the equation. “These processes are now embedded in blockchain networks and smart contracts that are trusted…
Blockchain VC deals are on the upswing despite Covid-19
Despite Covid-19’s chill on the investment industry, investors are still keen on the blockchain industry — with a notable shift in interest and money toward Asia, according PwC and Crunchbase.a. A new report by PwC, the professional services consultancy, has found that crypto M&A investment activity continues to shift away from the Americas, with 57% of deals occurring in Asia and Europe during the first half of 2020. This is up from 51% in 2019 and 43% in 2018. PwC’s aggregated data shows that $597 million was spent in 60…
Zenit St. Petersburg are creating collectible blockchain cards of their players
Zenit St. Petersburg — the top soccer club in Russia’s Premier League — has signed on to the Ethereum blockchain-based fantasy soccer game Sorare platform. As of Oct. 15, Zenit players will be released as collectible and tradeable digital cards as part of the blockchain-based game, joining 100 other international soccer clubs among them Juventus, PSG, Atletico Madrid and Paris Saint-Germain. Blockchain player cards can be exchanged with other managers and gamers can play games as soon as they have a minimum of 5 digital cards. The score of each player card…
Five mega exchanges hold 10% of Bitcoin’s entire supply
Roughly 10.6% of Bitcoin’s (BTC) circulating supply is currently held on just five centralized exchanges, according to data published by Chain.info. More than 1.96 million BTC is currently held between the major exchanges Coinbase, Huobi, Binance, OKEx, and Kraken. Likely owing to its custody services, Coinbase holds by far the most, with 944,904 BTC currently spread across approximately 4.39 million different wallet addresses. Huobi ranks second with 323,665 BTC held in roughly 901,600 unique wallets, followed by Binance with 289,961 BTC across nearly 2.7 million addresses. OKEx has 276,184 BTC…
BitMEX charges send ‘a message’ to global exchanges: Crypto Mom
United States Securities and Exchange Commissioner Hester Peirce — better known as “Crypto Mom” — believes the recent action against BitMEX may be a wake up call for crypto firms. In an interview with “Unchained Podcast” on Oct. 13, Peirce told host Laura Shin that the recent charges laid against BitMEX by the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) has put the international crypto industry on notice about U.S. anti-money laundering (AML) and know your customer (KYC) regulations. “I think that the message has…
Cornell University shared a surprising revelation about this blockchain paper
A Ph.D. dissertation On Scalability of Blockchain Technologies has become the most downloaded dissertation at Cornell University in the past eight years. The paper was penned by Adem Efe Gencer in 2017, under the direction of computer scientists Emin Gün Sirer and Robbert van Renesse. When the university asked Sirer about the paper, he praised the work: “Dr. Gencer’s thesis represents a tour de force in the burgeoning area of blockchains and cryptocurrencies. It unveiled a brand new consensus protocol, improving upon Satoshi Nakamoto’s highly successful protocol that powers Bitcoin.” He…