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Blockchain platform connects Indian farmers to UAE food industry

Blockchain platform connects Indian farmers to UAE food industry

Agriota E-Marketplace may give farmers in India more access to the UAE’s multi-billion dollar food industry.

Food industry officials in the United Arab Emirates may soon have a blockchain-based supply chain to obtain agricultural products directly from India.

According to an Aug. 31 report, officials in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) will be using Agriota E-Marketplace, a new platform that employs blockchain technology to bridge the gap between farmers in India and the nation’s food industry. Agriota reportedly provides transparency by verifying the food supply chain from Indian farms to food processing companies, traders and wholesalers in the UAE.

Essentially, the platform will allow Indian farmers to connect directly with food industry firms in the UAE to offer cereal, seeds, fruits, vegetables, spices and condiments. India exported more than $1 billion of food products to the UAE in 2019, according to data from the country’s Agricultural and Processed Food Products Export Development Authority. 

“The UAE has a comprehensive plan in place to ensure food security and champion agribusiness trade facilitation, with the ultimate goal of positioning our nation as a world leading hub in innovation-driven food security,” said Pavan Kapoor, the Indian Ambassador to the UAE. 

Backed by the Dubai Multi Commodities Centre (DMCC) and developed with Indian company CropData Technology, Agriota will also reportedly offer secure transactions through a multi-tier escrow structure. The DMCC was formed in 2002 by the government of Dubai to provide financial infrastructure and stimulate interest in the global commodities trade.

A number of blockchain firms are working with the agriculture industry to increase efficiency and help farmers earn better revenue. Cointelegraph reported in July that one of India’s largest farm producer organizations would be integrating blockchain to help rural farmers receive higher pay. In May, another blockchain-based startup signed an agreement with the Indian government to create a peer-to-peer marketplace for farmers and buyers.



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Vitalik Buterin compares DeFi tokenomics to the Fed’s money printer

Vitalik Buterin compares DeFi tokenomics to the Fed’s money printer

Ethereum’s co-founder has taken aim at coins designed to incentivise yield farming, comparing their underlying economics to irresponsible monetary policies

Vitalik Buterin, the co-founder of Ethereum (ETH), has again taken to Twitter to warn against naive bullishness in the decentralized finance (DeFi) sector, comparing the economics of yield farming tokens to the Federal Reserve’s money printing.

Yield farming - providing liquidity to earn interest in the form of tokens - has taken the crypto community by storm and sparked the DeFi boom.

However, Buterin highlighted the aggressive supply inflation of many governance tokens, saying this puts downward pressure on the prices of “coins that are getting printed nonstop to pay the liquidity providers.”

Seriously, the sheer volume of coins that needs to be printed nonstop to pay liquidity providers in these 50-100%/year yield farming regimes makes major national central banks look like they're all run by Ron Paul.

Buterin is not alone in his assessment of these inflationary aspects of the DeFi sector, with Twitter user ‘Larrypc’ likening yield farming to “a giant Ponzi scheme.”

Not everyone is a skeptic, with investor David Lach responding: “If you see those printed coins as new cryptocurrencies (like BTC, ETH etc.) then yes, it's insane. But if you see them as equity in new crypto startups/projects that generate cash-flows, it's not that crazy. There will always be new startups with real potential in crypto.”

But Buterin countered that he sees “no plausible path” for many projects to generate cash flow, emphasizing the need for fee-generating applications to sustain a project over the longer term:

So far the only strategy toward generating long-term fees that I see is some kind of weird financial attack to grab liquidity and steal network effect from Uniswap. And I'm pessimistic on that strategy.

Buterin’s comments come in the light of decentralized exchange and yield farming platform SushiSwap exploding in popularity over the weekend owing to an aggressive governance token distribution strategy intended to incentivize early users, with 10 times the base rate of 100 SUSHI per block set to be paid out to liquidity providers.

The yield farming frenzy has reignited concerns regarding Ethereum’s scaling capacity, with the complex smart contract executions underpinning the transactions of many DeFi projects resulting in fees in triple-figures to perform basic operations.

The decentralized exchange (DEX) for ERC-20 tokens, Uniswap, has emerged as the network’s largest source of gas fees — driving roughly $7 million in fees over just the past month.



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Analysts predict Yearn Finance's ETH vault could spark renewed Ether bull run

Analysts predict Yearn Finance's ETH vault could spark renewed Ether bull run

Excitement for Yearn Finance’s yETH vault has reached a fever pitch after rumors of the product’s release circulated on Twitter.

Analysts predict that the imminent launch of yETH by Yearn Finance could trigger a renewed surge in buying pressure on the ETH markets. The product, which is being voted on by YFI token holders, will automatically find the highest yielding decentralized finance (DeFi) protocol/strategy for Ether (ETH) deposits.

Yearn Finance’s core products are ‘vaults’ that seek the best returns for yield farmers, while also pooling funds to reduce gas fees. With Yearn’s vault purporting to guarantee the highest returns while removing the labor and research needed to maximize the profitability of yield farming, combined with hype around the brand, the yETH vault is expected to drive up demand for ETH.

Some members of the crypto community speculate that guaranteed premium yields may attract capital that might have otherwise been designated for Ether staking in phase 0 of the ETH 2.0 rollout.

Nuggets News founder Alex Saunders also believes that yETH has major potential:

The new product that has me excited & even more bullish on ETH, is yETH. This adds to a long list of catalysts for Ethereum, but it also reduces the available supply. Anyone who owns ETH can earn the best yield automatically by HODLing yETH

However, some crypto media outlets reporting that Yearn Finance’s Ether ‘vault’ was voted into existence last night, a thread on the project’s governance forum suggests the vote is yet to have taken place — with user ‘Juanma’ describing reports of yETH’s launch as “clickbait.”

Yearn Finance’s founder Andre Cronje tweeted on August 21 that the first community built strategy for an ETH vault was “coming soon.” Then, on August 31, the Twitter account of DeFi Farmer John announced yETH had launched after a test candidate for the project had been deployed. 

However, Yearn developer Banteg replied, stating: “There will almost certainly be another deployment since we’ve already identified a few things to improve.”

Meanwhile, demand for Yearn’s governance token YFI has also reached a fever pitch, with the token more than doubling in price over three days and its market cap growing to more than $1 billion for the first time. YFI currently ranks as the 27th-largest crypto asset and is trading for nearly $34,000.

Despite YFI’s massive price relative to other cryptocurrencies, Saunders believes many traders are underestimating the room that YFI still has to grow given its maximum supply of just 30,000 tokens,

Messari’s Ryan Watkins similarly asserted that people are “being too conservative with their YFI targets,” offering $1 billion as a somewhat tongue-in-cheek price target.

Yearn Finance is currently the sixth-ranked DeFi protocol with $792 million in locked funds according to DeFi Pulse.



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Malaysian authorities arrest crypto miners for $600K power theft

Malaysian authorities arrest crypto miners for $600K power theft

The two crypto mining operations stole almost $20,000 in electricity monthly.

Officials in the Malaysian state of Johor shut down two crypto operations which had stolen more than $600,000 worth of electricity over three years. 

According to a Sept. 1 report from local news site The Star, Malaysia’s Energy Commission, power utility firm Tenaga Nasional Berhad (TNB), and local officials arrested individuals responsible for the theft of more than $600,000 in electricity used for crypto mining. The authorities raided two mining operations in the city of Iskandar Puteri.

Nazlin Alim Sadikhi, a regional director with the country’s Energy Commission, said one of the crypto mining operations with 100 rigs had been operating nonstop for three years. The other setup with 48 rigs chugged along mining crypto for two years. The owners only paid $7-14 monthly for electricity, but together with the rig operators siphoned almost $20,000 worth of power monthly.

“We found that illegal wiring was installed so that electricity was supplied directly and not through the TNB meter,” Sadikhi said.

Bitcoin (BTC) mining operations illegally obtaining power are an ongoing problem in Malaysia, though crypto mining and trading are allowed in the country. 

Under Section 37 of Malaysia’s Electricity Supply Act, those who steal electricity in some place other than a “domestic installation” for more than one offence face a maximum penalty of $1.2 million or ten years’ imprisonment. However, The Star reported the individuals responsible for the recent theft may face ten years in jail or a maximum fine of $240,000 if found guilty.

TNB engineer Mohd Satari Mohamad said authorities had raided 90 similar installations in 2020, totaling 288 since 2018. Cointelegraph reported last year that TNB had lost more than $25 million in electrical costs as of June 2019, with one August raid taking down 33 operations that had stolen $760,000 worth of electricity.



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Major Swiss health insurance company now accepts crypto payments

Major Swiss health insurance company now accepts crypto payments

Policyholders can pay in either Bitcoin or Ether through Bitcoin Suisse.

A major health insurance provider in Switzerland has made Bitcoin and Ether payments available to its policyholders.

According to an Aug. 31 announcement, Atupri Health Insurance is partnering with crypto financial services company Bitcoin Suisse for its 200,000 customers to make payments using Bitcoin (BTC) or Ethereum (ETH). Atupri, based in Bern, will not be holding any digital assets itself, but rather just receiving fiat payments in Swiss francs once the BTC or ETH is exchanged by Bitcoin Suisse. The insurance company — with roughly $887 million in annual sales as of 2019 — will have customers paying for any fees associated with mining. 

“As digital pioneers in the healthcare sector, we anticipate social trends and offer insurance solutions with long-term prospects, said Caroline Meli, Head of Marketing and Sales at Atupri. “Blockchain technology and the associated use of cryptocurrencies are becoming increasingly important.”

Bitcoin Suisse custodies more than $1 billion in assets and has been making forays into different financial sectors for some time. In May, the crypto broker added custodial support and staking services for Tezos (XTZ), and included gold, silver and platinum for trading on its platform. It also reportedly has plans to hold a security token offering next year and list its assets on the stock exchange by 2022.

Residents of Switzerland are often at the forefront of crypto solutions. The country is home to the ‘Crypto Valley,’ a FinTech-friendly region based in the city of Zug where many institutions and even public transportation accept crypto. The Swiss municipality of Zermatt also recently rolled out a Bitcoin tax payment option in partnership with Bitcoin Suisse.



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Mysterious Bitcoin mining pattern potentially solved after seven years

Mysterious Bitcoin mining pattern potentially solved after seven years

We may not know who Satoshi Nakamoto was, but at least this is one mystery we think we can solve.

We reported last week about the latest findings of Sergio Dermain Lerner, who is known for his discovery of the so-called "Patoshi pattern". His latest research suggested that Satoshi Nakamoto likely used a single pc to mine approximately 1.1 million Bitcoin (BTC). However, it appears that there was something of even greater importance lost in the excitement about this discovery. If Lerner's latest findings are accurate, it would put an end to seven years worth of speculation concerning the meaning behind the mysterious pattern.

Patoshi pattern. Source: Sergio Darmain Lerner's blog.

Lerner first wrote about the mysterious Bitcoin mining pattern back in March of 2013. Some privacy flaws in the original Bitcoin code allowed him to discover Satoshi's mining idiosyncrasies. The crux of the pattern arises from the fact that Satoshi's mining code incremented the ExtraNonce field differently than the default Bitcoin code. A couple of months ago, Lerner also suggested that Satoshi refrained from mining in the first five minutes of the block. This gave rise to growing speculation about the meaning behind this pattern.

Some have suggested that Satoshi was intentionally 'marking' their Bitcoins. Others say that this was a way for the Satoshi team to demarcate their portions of the fortune. Some speculate that Satoshi optimized their equipment or code, allowing them to mine faster than anyone else. Yet others believed that the pattern originated from the fact that Satoshi was using around 50 machines for mining. This latter theory may have given Craig Wright the idea to claim that he used a Bitcoin farm in Australia to mine his coins.

The truth, however, appears to be less exciting but more sound. Satoshi was using a multi-threaded pc for mining (Lerner also suggested to us that possibly Satoshi was using a Field-programmable gate array, which would be consistent with Satoshi apparently 'pre-inventing' GPU mining and would not affect these conclusions). In order to avoid redundancy, Satoshi would limit each thread to a distinct non-overlapping nonce space. During Bitcoin mining, a nonce gets incremented with every unsuccessful attempt to solve a hash puzzle. Thus, the mysterious pattern may not have been created by choice, but rather as a side effect of Satoshi's unique mining setup. Lerner agreed with this conclusion, potentially allowing us to put the speculation over this theory to rest once and for all.



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Price analysis 8/31: BTC, ETH, XRP, LINK, BCH, LTC, BSV, CRO, BNB, EOS

Price analysis 8/31: BTC, ETH, XRP, LINK, BCH, LTC, BSV, CRO, BNB, EOS

Bitcoin and altcoins have bounced off their range lows, but they are likely to encounter resistance at higher levels.

The U.S. stock market is on track to clock its best August performance since 1984. Meanwhile, Bitcoin (BTC) is attempting a positive close for the month after having declined consecutively in August 2018 and August 2019. However, gold futures and the U.S. dollar index (DXY) have not been in favor, as both could end the month in the red.

Berkshire Hathaway disclosed a 5% stake each in five leading Japanese trading companies, and just a few days back, the company announced that it had a stake in a gold mining company.

Daily cryptocurrency market performance

Daily cryptocurrency market performance. Source: Coin360

Max Keiser of the Keiser report believes that these recent purchases by Berkshire are an indication that Buffett is diversifying away from the dollar. Hence, Keiser expects Bitcoin, gold and silver to make new all-time-highs in the near term.

While anything is possible in the markets, does Bitcoin’s chart show bullish setups that support the view of a sharp rally in the short term?

Let’s analyze the charts to find out!

BTC/USD

Bitcoin broke out of the 20-day exponential moving average (EMA) ($11,559) on Aug. 30, which is a positive sign. The bulls will now try to propel the price above the $12,113.50–$12,460 resistance zone.

BTC/USD daily chart

BTC/USD daily chart. Source: TradingView

If they succeed, it will signal the possible resumption of the uptrend with the next target objective at $13,000 and then $14,000.

However, the 20-day EMA is flat, and the relative strength index is just above the midpoint, which suggests a balance between supply and demand. 

If the price turns down from the overhead resistance, the BTC/USD pair could remain range-bound between $12,113.50 and $11,000 for a few days. 

A break below $11,000 will indicate weakness, and the pair will turn negative on a drop below the critical support zone of $10,400 to $10,000.

ETH/USD

The bulls pushed Ether (ETH) above the 20-day EMA ($400) on Aug. 28 and followed that up with a strong up-move on Aug. 30, which brought the price above the $415.634 resistance.

ETH/USD daily chart

ETH/USD daily chart. Source: TradingView

With this rise, the 20-day EMA has again started to slope up, and the RSI has broken out of a downtrend line, which suggests that the bulls are in command.

If they can propel and sustain the ETH/USD pair above $446.479, the uptrend is likely to resume with the first target at $480 and then $550.

Contrary to this assumption, if the pair turns down from the overhead resistance, it could spend some more time in consolidation. The momentum will weaken if the bears sink the price back below the critical support at $366.

XRP/USD

The bulls pushed XRP above the 20-day EMA ($0.28) on Aug. 30, which suggests strong buying at lower levels. The 20-day EMA has flattened out, and the RSI has risen above the 50 level, which suggests that the selling pressure has reduced. 

XRP/USD daily chart

XRP/USD daily chart. Source: TradingView

If the bulls can sustain the price above the 20-day EMA, a move to $0.295 and then to $0.326113 is possible.

Contrary to this assumption, if the XRP/USD pair again dips back below the 20-day EMA, the bears will try to sink the price below the 50-day simple moving average ($0.26). If they succeed, the decline could extend to the 61.8% Fibonacci retracement level of $0.241068.

LINK/USD

Chainlink's LINK broke above the symmetrical triangle on Aug. 29, which suggests buying at lower levels, but the bears are not willing to give up without a fight. They are currently attempting to stall the up-move at $17.6738.

LINK/USD daily chart

LINK/USD daily chart. Source: TradingView

However, the 20-day EMA ($15) is sloping up, and the RSI is in the positive territory, which suggests that bulls have the upper hand.

If the bulls do not give up much ground, the possibility of a break above $17.6738 increases. Above this level, a retest of $20.1111 is likely. If the bulls can push the price above this level, the uptrend is likely to resume.

Contrary to this assumption, if the bears sink the LINK/USD pair below the 20-day EMA, a deeper decline to the 50-day SMA ($11.72) is possible. 

BCH/USD

Bitcoin Cash (BCH) has bounced off the $260 support but is facing resistance at $280. The 20-day EMA ($282) is also placed just above this resistance; hence, the bears will try to defend this level aggressively. 

BCH/USD daily chart

BCH/USD daily chart. Source: TradingView

If the BCH/USD pair turns down from the current levels, the bears will once again try to break below the $260 support. If they succeed, a decline to $245 and then to $232 is possible.

Currently, the 20-day EMA has flattened out, and the RSI is just below the midpoint, which suggests a balance between supply and demand. However, if the bulls push the price above the 20-day EMA, a move to $300 and then to $326.30 is likely. 

LTC/USD

Litecoin (LTC) soared above the 20-day EMA ($59.24) and the downtrend line on Aug. 30, which suggests that the bulls are back in the game. However, the bears are currently attempting to stall the relief rally at the minor resistance of $64.

 

LTC/USD daily chart

LTC/USD daily chart. Source: TradingView

If the LTC/USD pair turns down from the current levels, a drop to the 20-day EMA is possible. 

The 20-day EMA has started to turn up, and the RSI has jumped into the positive territory, which suggests a minor advantage to the bulls. If the pair rebounds off this support, the bulls will once again attempt to push the price above the $64–$68.9008 resistance zone.

This bullish view will be invalidated if the bears sink the price below the 20-day EMA. In such a case, a drop to the 50-day SMA ($54.72) is possible.

BSV/USD

The recovery in Bitcoin SV (BSV) is currently facing resistance at the breakdown level of $200. Both moving averages are placed just above this resistance; hence, the bears are likely to defend this level aggressively.

BSV/USD daily chart

BSV/USD daily chart. Source: TradingView

The 20-day EMA ($201) is sloping down and the RSI is in the negative zone, which suggests that the bears have the upper hand.

If the BSV/USD pair turns down from the current levels, the bears will again attempt to sink the price below the $180 support. If they succeed, the decline could extend to $160 and then to $146.20.

Contrary to this assumption, if the bulls can push the price above the 50-day SMA ($203), a move to the downtrend line is possible. A break above this resistance will suggest that the bulls are attempting a comeback.

CRO/USD

Crypto.com Coin (CRO) broke above the $0.176596 overhead resistance on Aug. 30, which is a bullish sign. The bulls will now try to push the price to $0.191101, and if this level is scaled, a move to $0.20 is possible.

CRO/USD daily chart

CRO/USD daily chart. Source: TradingView

The 20-day EMA ($0.169) is sloping up, and the RSI has broken above the resistance at 65, which shows that bulls have the upper hand. 

However, the bears are unlikely to give up without a fight. They will try to pull down the price back below $0.176596 and trap the aggressive bulls. If they succeed, a drop to the 20-day EMA is possible. A break below this support could result in a fall to $0.154322.

If the CRO/USD pair rebounds off the 20-day EMA, the bulls will once again attempt to resume the uptrend. Hence, this is the critical support to watch out for on any dips.

BNB/USD

Binance Coin (BNB) is currently facing resistance at the $23.91–$24.4588 zone, which shows a lack of demand at higher levels.

BNB/USD daily chart

BNB/USD daily chart. Source: TradingView

However, if the BNB/USD pair rebounds off the 20-day EMA ($22.53), the bulls will make one more attempt to push the price above the $23.91–$24.4588 resistance zone. If they succeed, a rally to $27.1905 is possible.

Conversely, if the bears sink the price below the 20-day EMA, a drop to the $20.5710 support is likely. The bulls are likely to defend this support aggressively. If they succeed, the pair could consolidate between $23.91 and $20.571 for the next few days.

EOS/USD

EOS broke above the 20-day EMA ($3.22) on Aug. 30, which suggests that the bears are losing their grip. If the bulls can sustain the price above the 20-day EMA, a move to $3.4275 and then to $3.63 is possible.

EOS/USD daily chart

EOS/USD daily chart. Source: TradingView

However, if the EOS/USD pair turns down from $3.4272, a few days of consolidation is possible. The flat 20-day EMA and the RSI just above the midpoint suggest a balance between supply and demand.

Contrary to this assumption, if the pair turns down from the current levels and plummets below the 20-day EMA, a drop to the 50-day SMA ($3.03) and then to $2.83 is possible. A break below this level will be a huge negative.

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.

Market data is provided by HitBTC exchange.



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Secret contracts may soon bring privacy features to public Blockchains

Secret contracts may soon bring privacy features to public Blockchains

Programmable privacy is about to become a reality.

Open-source Blockchain protocol Secret Network announced its intention to add privacy-based secret contracts to its mainnet. The upgrade will take place on September 15 once the proposal is passed by the community.

According to the foundation’s announcement, developers will have the opportunity to build and deploy so-called “secret” smart contracts that use encrypted inputs, outputs, and states. Secret contracts could enable many different blockchains to utilize private data in decentralized apps without compromising their user’s personal security.

The foundation explained:

“Secret contracts allow for programmable privacy, allowing for arbitrarily complex data privacy controls to be implemented inside applications. The flexible encryption capabilities and controls offered by programmable privacy unlock the potential value of the decentralized web.”

Secret Network is focusing on onboarding new secret contract developers, secret node operators, and community members to help to increase the mass adoption of secret contracts among public blockchains.

The foundation will also launch secret tokens, which are privacy-based assets that are programmable like ERC20s, but private like zCash. Secret Network noted that it expects this will strengthen the mass adoption of DeFi as well.



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Cred to enable in-app staking through Klever wallet

Cred to enable in-app staking through Klever wallet

Crypto wallet app Klever will allow users to stake cryptos in Cred’s staking programs from within the wallet.

Cryptocurrency wallet platform Klever will allow users to stake Bitcoin (BTC), Ether (ETH), Tron (TRX) and other cryptocurrencies in Cred’s staking programs from within the wallet.

Cred is a cryptocurrency staking and lending platform that allows users from across 190 countries to lend their cryptocurrency funds in return for monthly rewards in stablecoins, cryptos and fiat currencies. 

The new feature will allow Klever users to opt for any of the staking programs listed on Cred in return for monthly rewards. Once the in-app staking goes live, it will allow users to stake Bitcoin, Ether, and Tron without having to hold any minimum threshold. 

Users will also be able to choose whether they prefer to receive the monthly interests in ERC-20 stablecoins or other cryptocurrencies such as BTC, ETH, TRX, Chainlink (LINK) and Basic Attention Token (BAT).

Both companies are working with a revenue-sharing model, meaning Klever would keep a commission for facilitating the staking process for its users with Cred, CEO of Cred, Dan Schatt, explained.

Misha Lederman, Director of Communications and Marketing for Klever, said that initially, users will not be able to receive rewards directly in fiat currencies, as is possible on Cred. But they will be able to do so in the coming months after the launch of their new product Klever Bank.

In addition, Klever would now also allow its users to swap Cred’s utility token LBA for BTC, TRX, ETH, Tether (USDT) and Klever’s native token KLV.

While currently Klever only supports three public chains — Bitcoin, Ethereum and Tron — Lederman revealed that the platform will add support for more chains including Litecoin (LTC), DigiByte (DGB), DogeCoin (DOGE), EOS (EOS), Stellar (XLM), Bitcoin Cash (BCH) and XRP. Furthermore, he said cryptocurrencies supported on these blockchains “will be available in the future for staking with Cred inside the Klever App.”



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Mining rig manufacturer Canaan announces narrowing net loss in Q2 results

Mining rig manufacturer Canaan announces narrowing net loss in Q2 results

A vastly improved gross margin on sales contributed to a reduction in net loss of over 90% compared to figures from a year ago.

Bitcoin mining rig manufacturer Canaan on Aug. 31 released its unaudited financial results for the second quarter of 2020.

While gross profit was up both year on year and quarter on quarter, the company still posted a net loss, albeit one which has narrowed significantly in the last twelve months.

The amount of computing power sold in its application specific integrated circuit (ASIC) hardware was 2.6 million THash/s. This represents an increase of almost 200% on Q1 figures of 0.9 million THash/s, but is an 18.2% drop on figures from the previous year.

Revenues were also up 160% on last quarter, but down a quarter from last year, at RMB 178.1 million ($25.2 million).

However, gross profit of RMB 43.3 million ($6.1 million) was up over 300% year on year, and over 1,700% on figures from Q1.

This was accompanied by a significant increase in gross margin for the quarter to almost 25%. For comparison the gross margin was 3.5% in the previous quarter and 4.5% in Q2 2019.

The result of this was a reported net loss of RMB16.8 million ($2.4 million). This was less than half of the net loss posted in the previous quarter and over 90% less than the RMB 263.1 million reported in the same quarter last year.

Canaan was the first mining rig manufacturer to successfully hold an IPO, in November 2019, although it raised less than 25% of the $400 million projected. Share price has crashed some 75% since then, with today’s value being just $2.19 of their initial $9 sale price.



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Ethereum: This price resistance stands in the way of ETH hitting $500

Ethereum: This price resistance stands in the way of ETH hitting $500

Ethereum price soared above the $400 resistance recently, kickstarting what could be a powerful rally to $500.

As the price of Ethereum’s native digital currency Ether (ETH) has been showing massive strength recently, the path seems to be continuing toward new highs. Ether price ran from $220 to $445 in the previous five weeks and this is one of the biggest surges for the altcoin in the past 18 months. 

However, as the rally didn’t provide many opportunities for laggards to hop on the train, is $500 the next target for Ether? Let’s examine the technical setup. 

Crypto market daily performance

Crypto market daily performance. Source: Coin360

Ether flips crucial level for support fueling bullish momentum

As Ether broke through the magical barrier of $340-360 as crucial resistance, it was crucial for the bulls to flip this area into a new support zone. 

ETH/USDT 1-day chart

ETH/USDT 1-day chart. Source: TradingView

The chart proves this level’s significance, as the $340-$360 zone became support throughout the previous bull market. However, the breakdown in August 2018 led to a two-year accumulation range.

Similarly, a previous test at the $340-$360 range in July 2019 failed to break through this crucial resistance zone. Recently, a renewed breakout led to a breaker, as the chart confirms the support/resistance flip.

Next to that, Ether is rallying above the 100-day and 200-day moving averages, which are crucial for bullish momentum. As long as Ether sustains support above these moving averages, further bullish continuation is likely to expect.

Trend reversal was confirmed on smaller timeframes

The smaller timeframes signaled an apparent trend reversal, as the chart shows.

ETH/USDT 4-hour chart

ETH/USDT 4-hour chart. Source: TradingView

First of all, the crucial higher timeframe support zone between $340-$360 provided support once again. 

This support confirmed support through the double bottom structure on smaller timeframes, signaling a potential bottom confirmation. 

As a trader, the next confirmation you’d like to get is a new higher high, which was confirmed once the price of Ether broke through the high at $408 (the red line). This breakthrough led to a further surge of the price, which is almost a new yearly high. 

The bullish scenario for Ether

ETH/USDT 4-hour bullish scenario chart

ETH/USDT 4-hour bullish scenario chart. Source: TradingView

The price of Ether is currently fighting the final hurdle before new highs. If that happens, a renewed rally towards $500 is very likely to occur.

However, the crucial area to hold for ETH price can be found in the lower green box. As long as Ether sustains support at the $396-$410 area, further continuation is likely.

As a breakthrough in the recent high at $445 is crucial for continuation, the new targets can be defined through the Fibonacci extension tool.

Using this tool, a new target at $500 can be drawn and it’s very likely to be hit once ETH breaks through the recent high.

The bearish scenario for Ether

ETH/USDT 4-hour bearish scenario chart

ETH/USDT 4-hour bearish scenario chart. Source: TradingView

The same areas are also crucial in the bearish scenario. If the price of Ether rejects at the current resistance zone and fails to hold the $396-$408 area for support, a further decline is very likely to occur. 

The targets for a downtrend structure can be defined using both the Fibonacci extension and price action. It’s very likely to expect a failure of the $360 support area if the price of Ether gets to that level again. 

If the price of ETH drops towards the $360 area, it’s more likely to expect a further decline, and then the eyes are focused on the $310-$320 area.

However, in the current climate and the current strength, the bearish scenario is a lot less likely than the bullish scenario. 

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.



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Is Ethereum Left and Bitcoin Right?

Is Ethereum Left and Bitcoin Right?

Hacktivist Bitcoin developer Amir Taaki took aim at Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin on Twitter recently for essentially writing off smart contracts inventor Nick Szabo as a right-wing crank. Taaki wrote that this sort of attitude was typical of an “Eth[ereum] culture which is about sparkling burner parties, privileged digital nomads, microdosing LSD, sex orgies and […]

Hacktivist Bitcoin developer Amir Taaki took aim at Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin on Twitter recently for essentially writing off smart contracts inventor Nick Szabo as a right-wing crank.

Taaki wrote that this sort of attitude was typical of an Eth[ereum] culture which is about sparkling burner parties, privileged digital nomads, microdosing LSD, sex orgies and social-justice / vague doing-good.

Pretty much everyone had the same initial thought: Why arent I getting invited to these parties?

But Taakis comments also highlighted the political divisions between Ethereum and Bitcoin. Is it really as simple as Bitcoiners lean to the right and Ethereans lean to the left?

You can make up your own mind about Nick Szabos views, thanks to this obsessively curated list of his tweets. Buterin characterizes Szabos utterances as bad faith arguing and incholate yelling. He appears to regret naming a denomination of Ethereum after Szabo.

But Taaki, who is British-Iranian, took exception to white-leftypol Ethereans canceling Szabo because he doesnt fit their worldview and wrote in a tweet that they reminded him of white left (fake socialists) on an anti-rascist crusade.

Its neo-colonialist white saviour attitude, he wrote. Eth is exactly this.

A savior to savor

To be fair, Ether isnt exactly like that, but there are definitely some elements that might lead you to draw that conclusion.

To take one example, the man sometimes referred to as Ethereums chief economic thinker is self-proclaimed social liberal radical Glen Weyl, who founded RadicalxChange. Thats the sort of progressive, nonprofit outfit that thinks the No. 1 most crucial thing to inform new visitors to its website is not what it actually does some sort of think-tank stuff? but that it stands with the social justice movements Black Lives Matters and Global Pride.

Buterin is a big fan of Weyls and sits on the board of RadicalxChange. The pair have held lengthy email exchanges about his societal engineering ideas, which include imposing a tax to penalize using standard white English or taxing masculinity to subsidize femininity. A proponent of a Universal Basic Income and quadratic voting, Weyl gave a speech at Ethereums DevCon that he described as a rally cry against extreme individualism and capitalism. At its conclusion, he explicitly asked for questions from women and minority groups first. Of course, Ethereum conferences are just as full of nerdy white men as the rest of crypto, but at least the first guy to ask a question had the good grace to apologize for that fact.

Try that kind of left-wing malarky at a meet-up for hardcore Bitcoiners, though, and you could bring a firestorm down on your head, as the author of Mastering Bitcoin: Unlocking Digital Cryptocurrencies, Andreas M. Antonopolous, found out when he asked his audience for a few suggestions of podcasts he could appear on that werent the stereotypical white, male, finance-focused podcasters he talks to endlessly, as he wanted to reach out to a broader audience.

This seemingly innocuous request outraged his fanbase (which may have some crossover with the Gamergate crowd) and caused a Twitter storm, with users complaining about how Bitcoin doesnt care about identity politics and getting their noses out of joint at his outrageous rejection of meritocracy by trying to chat to some different people. Even Bitcoin icon Hodlonaut questioned his focus on race and gender.

Antonopolous was unrepentant. I will not apologize for being an SJW, he wrote, characterizing the backlash as: A lot of whining because I didnt allow the implicit bias to drive 90% of my podcast interviews but only 75-80%. Oh the horror.

Eth wing

Bitcoiners and Ethereans clearly have differences, which is why Crypto Twitter is beset with largely pointless debates about supply gate and pre-mined coin scams. When Peter McCormack, the host of What Bitcoin Did, asked his followers What is BTC v ETH really about? influencer American Hodl summed it up as: Liberals do Ethereum and Conservatives do Bitcoin.

Its not quite that simple of course: Plenty of left-wing people are into Bitcoin, and plenty of right-wing people like Ether. Even Weyl cant be easily boxed into the left or the right, as he somehow manages to combine his love of socialism with a love of right-wing libertarian hero Ayn Rand. As Bitcoin.com founder Roger Ver told Cointelegraph Magazine: Both camps are so big now that there are people from every political persuasion involved now.

And politics understandably comes a distant second when theres money to be made. As DeFi influencer Degen Spartan said when explaining that hes not a Bitcoin maximalist or an Ethereum maximalist: Im a profit Maxi.

But still, there is a widespread perception that those with conservative or right-wing ideas are more drawn to Bitcoin and those of a more progressive bent support Team Ethereum. A CoinDesk survey of 1,200 crypto users in 2018 lent weight to this idea, finding that 55% of Ethereans tended left, while 55% of Bitcoiners tended Right. A further 3% of Bitcoiners claimed to be nihilists, which may explain all those Pepe the Frog crypto edgelords on 4chan.

(As an interesting aside, the more hard currency focused the coin, the more right wing, with Monero coming in at 57% right wing, Bitcoin Cash (63%) and Litecoin (69%). The DASH guys must have cupboards full of MAGA hats and Tiki Torches because 78% of them are on the right.)

Quantum Economics founder Mati Greenspan says there are philosophical differences between the two leading cryptocurrency projects that help explain these tendencies.

It makes sense given the nature of what the coins do, he said. I would assume that most people that are into Bitcoin are people who advocate for less government intervention and especially less government intervention in money simply because thats what Bitcoin was built for.

As far as Ethereum is concerned, that has many more practical applications that dont necessarily have to do with governments or banking or even finance in general. It appeals to anyone whos into technology.

Greenspan cautions that hes not basing his views on hard data but says that from what hes observed: People who prefer Bitcoin are the type of people who are kind of set in their ways, or that are of a strong mind. Whereas people who use Ethereum and other altcoins are generally going to be more people who are more open to new ideas.

Bitcoin as right-wing software

Professor David Golumbia is the author of The Politics of Bitcoin: Software as Right-Wing Extremism. In the polemic, he argues that not only was Bitcoin borne out of the right-wing libertarian culture of the cypherpunks but that the technology itself is inherently right wing.

Theres little doubt that key figures in Bitcoins prehistory such as Eric Hughes, Timothy C. May and John Gilmore were staunch libertarians. They opposed big government and taxation and worried about privacy, the rise of the surveillance state and freedom of speech.

Golumbia says the ideas of right-wing Austrian economist Murray Rothbard, who coined the political philosophy anarcho-capitalism, were also very influential to Bitcoins early days. That extremely libertarian form of politics that advocates for the elimination of centralized states in favor of self-ownership, private property and laissez-faire style free markets obviously will sound familiar to anyone who has been around Bitcoiners.

It was born out of anarcho-capitalism, Golumbia says of Bitcoin. Rothbard has these ideas that there is a single thing called the State whose only point of existence is to enslave people. The only free individual is somebody who is free of government. And these people believed and they still believe that it was possible to use encryption technology to hide oneself from the state.

In Golumbias view, Bitcoin was designed to become the currency of this new realm, money outside of the control of the state. (Golumbias theory runs into trouble attributing this political ideology to Satoshi Nakamoto directly, and he barely mentions him in our hour-long chat.)

Needless to say, Golumbia is not a fan of the whole culture. He calls May the author of the Crypto Anarchist Manifesto a pretty racist, sexist, very disturbing guy and paints a portrait of the cypherpunk mailing list as a sort of alt-right techie version of the Tea Party.

It is really loud and vicious when you read it, full of hate directed at a lot of people. It intersects with a lot of other anti-government movements we have in the world, he said.

Needless to say, this view is highly contested. McCormack called it insulting when I described it to him.

They were certainly paranoid, and I think legitimately paranoid, said McCormack. But I wouldnt say right wing at all. I would almost imagine a lot of them apolitical. They just wanted to build a better world.

I consider them a group of freedom fighters who recognize the overreach of the state, the risks associated with lack of privacy, increases in surveillance, and abuse of the money system by corrupt politicians. They wanted to build tools and technologies to free themselves.

I think if anything, theyre a group of fucking heroes.

Everybody was an AnCap

Bitcoin.com founder Roger Ver said that when he got involved in 2011, the early Bitcoiners were all libertarians with a strong belief in free markets. He doesnt see such views as right wing. Just read about the thoughts of early Bitcoiners like myself, Ross Ulbricht, Gavin Andresen, and others, he said. We were all libertarians, not conservatives or right-wingers.

Voluntaryism which is an offshoot of anarcho-capitalism was what motivated me and others to get involved and promote Bitcoin early on.

Bitcoin was made up and promoted by a bunch of anarcho-capitalists originally. Later, its development community was taken over by a bunch of blue-haired San Francisco leftists types. Most of the AnCaps have moved on to coins like BCH, or ETH.

Kain Warwick, the founder of Ethereum-based DeFi protocol Synthetix, said that no one involved in the early days of Bitcoin could correctly be called a conservative.

You couldnt be a conservative in the sense of trying to maintain the status quo in the legacy financial system. You had to see some problem that you thought needed to be solved in order for Bitcoin to make sense to you, he said.

Meanwhile, in San Francisco, those blue-haired leftists were gaining numbers. Buterin describes two strands of political thought growing together in Bitcoins early days. In the crypto space, as early as in 2010 or 2012, there were a lot of people interested in libertarianism, and a lot of people interested in socialism, Buterin said. There was this kind of idealistic energy.

While the two strands can be reconciled, Ethereans approach to rapid technological progress and evolving codebases is much more difficult to reconcile with Bitcoiners who are invested in protecting the fundamental properties of Bitcoin. successfully merge. As Bitcoins ideology around hard money, fixed supply, decentralization and security became stronger, the Bitcoin community became more resistant to changes to its fundamental properties. Something Ver discovered during the damaging block size debate that led to the creation of Bitcoin Cash.

Bitcoin Magazine co-founder Buterin also ran up against an unwillingness to experiment when he argued in 2013 that Bitcoin needed a scripting language for application development. When he failed to get support, he launched Ethereum in January 2014.

Viewed this way, the BitcoinEthereum battle is not so much Left vs. Right, but Progress vs. Stability. If, as Warwick said, no one in the early days of Bitcoin could be conservatives, then have Bitcoiners now become the new conservatives set on maintaining the crypto-financial order?

Jonathan Haidt, in The Righteous Mind: Why Good People Are Divided by Politics and Religion, makes the point that Liberals and Conservatives are both largely correct about their central concerns they just prioritize different values and dont understand where the other side is coming from. The same is probably true for Bitcoin and Ethereum.

For many Bitcoiners, its all about hard money, stability, immutability and security, so theyre unwilling to risk whats been built. Why improve on perfection? That makes Ethereum a fail. But for many Ethereans, its all about experimenting in the name of making technological progress, which makes Bitcoin a fail. If a few things get broken along the way like the DAO hack, ICO scammers and DeFi smart contract bugs thats just the cost of progress.

Id rather avoid left and right wing, said Bitcoiner McCormack. Id rather say Bitcoin is conservative; therefore, its likely to attract more people with conservative viewpoints.

Move slowly. Dont fuck this up. This is the best money weve ever had. Its slowly, slowly simple, simple.

And yes, Ethereum you could argue is McCormack clearly couldnt bring himself to call Ethereum more progressive. Instead he said: I think Ethereum people just want to go out and experiment, kind of like scientists, experimental technologists. They want to do a lot more with it.

Mad scientist

Warwick is one of those scientists who is comfortable with change. Synthetix began life as a stablecoin project, morphed into synthetic derivatives, and continues to reinvent itself once or twice a year as new ideas come along.

He attempted to integrate Bitcoin with online payments in 2012 but saw the technology as a starting point, rather than a finished product.

People who wanted to opt out of the legacy financial system, a lot of those people, you know, ended up in Bitcoin, he said. And then people who wanted to kind of extend the power of Bitcoin and extend the potential of what could be built ended up in Ethereum. If you didnt end up in Ethereum, almost by definition, you were someone who was kind of less open to innovation and more conservative.

Greenspan makes the point that Bitcoin is also much bigger, which limits its ability to turn on a dime.

Bitcoin is a whale compared to Ethereum, which is more like a fly but you know, flies can move a lot faster than whales can, he said. They can do different things. Sometimes theyll keep running into a window in the hope of finding an exit, whereas whales are pretty predictable. Theyre not going to suddenly turn around and go the other way.

Warwick believes that the Ethereum community embraces more progressive politics.

The Crypto Twitter that Im in is very deep Ethereum Twitter, he explained. There is an awareness of societal issues outside of just financial infrastructure. I think that people are much more open to these things and some questioning of the structure of society and how its evolved, he said.

This political bent shares some similarities with Silicon Valleys left-wing, utopian politics, where technology is seen as something that can kind of solve all of the worlds problems.

I am very sympathetic to that view, Warwick said. One of the interesting things about Ethereum is this idea of restructuring the financial infrastructure of the world to make it more open and transparent, and lower barriers to entry. I think its really powerful. Technological progress could be one of the biggest levers that weve ever seen in terms of improving the world. So, I still am hopeful and optimistic about technological progress.

Which isnt to say many Bitcoiners dont also dream of a better and brighter future due to Bitcoins innate properties. But theres also considerable focus on Bitcoin as an insurance policy against hyperinflation and the collapse of fiat, which is an altogether more dystopian future.

The flipside of the utopia

McCormack has a much less positive view of Ethereums grand ambitions. I think theres a lot more interference on the left, a lot more desire for rules about what you can, you cant do, for that kind of stupid equality of outcome, he said. I think, I think you may find that a little bit of that in the Bitcoin versus Ethereum thing. I have noticed that Vitalik tends to express more socialist opinions, which is perhaps why Ethereums monetary policy is looser than that of Bitcoin.

Having an undisputed leader like Buterin in a decentralized project also sees Ethereum accused of top-down control and centralized planning. Bitcoin maximalist Samson Mow from Blockstream attacked Buterin on McCormacks podcast in mid-August for saying years ago that the internet of money should not cost five cents a transaction.

That is very anti-free market, Mow claimed. Thats a Soviet-type economic event. Thats a central planning agency that sets the levels of production wages and prices of goods, whereas I think most Bitcoiners are very free market and capitalists, which is, you know, transactions will cost what they cost.

On HackerNoon, journalist Kay Kurokawa wrote of Ethereum that its leftist tendency is made clear by the grandiose plans of its developers and the actions it has taken to resolve difficult situations such as the DAO hack. Their proposed move to proof of stake will certainly move Ethereum even further to the left.

But for all of this criticism of Ethereums politics, its not a particularly ideological project. McCormack himself made this point at the end of the Buterin/Samson Mow debate.

For me, I think whats really missing in Ethereum is a strong philosophical backbone, he said. And thats what Bitcoin has, and why we dont have yield farming and YAMs and all this bullshit existing on Bitcoin because its very simple and just focused on one thing, which is what I like about it.

The love you take is equal to the love you make

In the end, what unites people in the blockchain world is arguably more important than what divides us. One thing that almost everyone interviewed for this piece agreed on was that there continues to be a wide streak of libertarianism running through crypto culture.

Although what is known as Libertarianism is most closely associated these days with guns and freedom lovers on the American right, there have been plenty of left-wing libertarian movements over the years from the peace and love hippies to anti-authoritarian punk rockers. Libertarianism is probably best described as a preference thats at the opposite end of the scale to authoritarianism.

I think a lot of the people who are building the space truly believe that there are fundamental flaws in the status quo and want to fix them, and I think that most of the time, or quite often, that does come from some sense of anti-authoritarianism or being against the establishment, said Warwick.

At a deeper level, anti-authoritarianism seems baked into the design of blockchain itself. Authoritarian elements on the far left and the far right might want to impose their crackpot ideologies by force, but that cant happen with a genuinely decentralized blockchain project because there is no central authority able to impose it.

Decentralization is a libertarian concept by nature. For sure, said Greenspan.

 



via cointelgraph.com
Bitcoin will hit new high ‘in near term’ as Buffett exits USD — Keiser

Bitcoin will hit new high ‘in near term’ as Buffett exits USD — Keiser

The Sage of Omaha is getting out of the world’s reserve currency, Max Keiser claims, and that’s a prelude to Bitcoin hitting a new record.

The U.S. dollar is getting so weak that even Warren Buffett is getting out and Bitcoin (BTC) will see all-time highs, says Max Keiser.

In his latest forecast for macro, the RT host warned that safe havens would seriously outperform fiat. Buffett, he implied, knew what was coming.

Keiser: Buffett “getting out of USD”

“Buffett’s move into Japan, along with his GOLD investment, confirms he’s getting out of USD BIGLY,” Keiser wrote on Twitter Monday. 

“USD is trending lower today, about to break key support. Bitcoin - Gold - Silver Will all make new ATH in the near term.”

He was referring to Buffett’s move into Japanese assets, taking a 5% stake in the country’s five biggest trading houses in a move which totals $6 billion, Reuters reports.

“The five major trading companies have many joint ventures throughout the world and are likely to have more. I hope that in the future there may be opportunities of mutual benefit,” the publication quoted him as saying.

The announcement came days after the Federal Reserve confirmed that it would let inflation rise above its 2% target as a temporary measure, something which weighed heavily on the dollar.

After volatility, the USD currency index (DXY) began plumbing new depths on Monday, bouncing off its lowest levels in two years. Late in July, when those levels first appeared, Bitcoin saw a price jump to $12,500.

As Cointelegraph reported, expectations remain that further dives in DXY will produce similar effects.

USD currency index 1-day chart

USD currency index 1-day chart. Source: TradingView

An unlikely Bitcoin bellwether

Buffett meanwhile is well known for his macro moves, even as he remains a steadfast Bitcoin skeptic. 

Last week, the so-called “Buffett Indicator” warned about a stock market crash, even as large-cap equities continued their climbs higher.

Prior to that, Anthony Pompliano, co-founder of Morgan Creek Digital, publicly bet on Buffett eventually buying Bitcoin after he revealed moves into gold.

At the time, Keiser claimed that the gold entry alone would spark a run among investors, helping push BTC/USD to $50,000.

Perhaps Buffett’s most famous quip about Bitcoin is from 2018 when he referred to cryptocurrency as “rat poison squared.”



via cointelgraph.com
FTX buying Blockfolio continues consolidation trend in crypto industry

FTX buying Blockfolio continues consolidation trend in crypto industry

Major crypto exchanges are consolidating smaller, niche services to expand their overall market reach.

The past few months have seen a number of major crypto companies facilitate some serious big-money acquisitions. For example, on Aug. 25, blockchain software firm ConsenSys bought out JP Morgan’s enterprise-variant of the Ethereum blockchain Quorum. Similarly, earlier this year, global cryptocurrency exchange Binance announced that it was acquiring CoinMarketCap, one of the most referenced crypto data websites.

In this regard, crypto derivatives exchange FTX, too, announced on Aug. 26 that it had recently come to an agreement with Blockfolio to take over the digital asset portfolio tracker for a total sum of $150 million.

But a pertinent question that FTX’s latest acquisition raises is: What will happen to all of Blockfolio’s existing user data, and should users be wary of their holdings being disclosed to tax authorities?

Cointelegraph reached out to Ian Balina, the founder and CEO of Token Metrics — an AI-based cryptocurrency ratings and price predictions platform. In his view, FTX’s purchase of Blockfolio will not result in a mass exodus of users from the platform because most people who have used the service in the past have grown accustomed to its user interface, something that Balina believes will be hard to replace easily. Regarding user data privacy, he stated:

“I think what we can learn from user applications is that people value ease of use over privacy. TikTok and Facebook show us this, so I don’t believe concerns about how an exchange will utilize users’ data will be a concern for the majority of users.”

Finding a market edge

Launched in 2019, FTX has witnessed somewhat of a meteoric rise in recent months, which has been exemplified by the company’s decision to shell out a handsome sum for Blockfolio’s 6-million-strong user base, as the crypto exchange looks to rapidly fuel its ongoing growth. 

Speaking on how this latest development will spur FTX’s overall market presence, Jared Polites, a partner at LaunchTeam — a marketing agency — believes that the deal will help raise brand equity and hasten FTX’s growth: “Potential benefits include user growth, doubling down on mobile analytics and UX, and liquidity as more exchange services get integrated into Blockfolio.”

Additionally, Blockfolio’s acquisition is going to be a big advantage for FTX when it comes to the liquidity side of things, especially since an established brand is not part of the equation. On the topic, Sam Bankman-Fried, a co-founder and the CEO of FTX, recently stated: “From the beginning, our goal at FTX has been to build the best quality trading experiences with the deepest liquidity for the widest possible cross-section of traders.”

Lastly, FTX’s deal will also help gear the company’s image toward a more mainstream crypto audience that might include a number of future traders. In regard to how Blockfolio’s acquisition will allow FTX to increase its market dominance, Balina opined: “Blockfolio is one of the most undervalued applications in the cryptocurrency space, and I think this is a smart move by FTX.”

Investment season for big crypto companies

Since the start of the year, the digital asset sector has witnessed a number of major deals go through, such as Binance buying CoinMarketCap as well as major Indian exchange WazirX. Similarly, earlier this year, Coinbase, too, announced that it was acquiring Tagomi, a prime brokerage platform meant primarily for institutional investors. In the wake of these deals, there seem to be several reasons for such high profile consolidations in the crypto space.

It’s important to recognize the fact that even though on paper these deals appear to be substantial, the crypto sector as a whole is still in its infancy and has yet to witness any significant merger-and-acquisition-related activity, especially when compared with the traditional finance sector. Expounding his views on the subject, Polites added:

“The deals we have seen have been valued very high, and this is likely due to these novel services having a stronghold on their niche and exchanges realizing replicating these would be very difficult, even with vast resources. I expect to see more of these deals and some consolidation within the Tier 1 exchanges and niche products. This will help exchanges become larger, more diversified businesses.”

Additionally, if and when top tier crypto exchanges reach a stage of “consolidation saturation,” players such as Binance and Coinbase may eventually become as big as various mainstream banks or large media houses that have multiple operational wings and can serve a number of different industrial domains in addition to their existing crypto buy/sell capabilities.

When it comes to big-name firms like FTX acquiring platforms like Blockfolio, the goal of these companies seems to primarily be to expand their existing market reach as well as to onboard new users. For example, Blockfolio currently sits at the top of the crypto user acquisition funnel and is one of the first applications that people tend to use when they start investing in digital assets.

The crypto market will consolidate further

As the cryptocurrency market continues to evolve and grow, it would be unsurprising to see more of these deals take place on an increasingly regular basis. Also, it is worth noting that not all of the aforementioned acquisitions have been solely for monetary reasons. Doug Leonard, the CEO of Mainframe — a decentralized lending protocol — told Cointelegraph:

“At this stage of maturity in the cryptocurrency space, it is important for platforms to consolidate services and subsequently improve their user experiences. [...] Traders want to maintain their diverse options without having to toggle through multiple tabs, applications and wallets.”

Lastly, Bryan Routledge, an associate professor of economics at Carnegie Mellon University’s Tepper School of Business, also believes that if one were to take evidence stemming from other, more traditional market settings such as equity and commodities, it would only be natural for the crypto industry to also follow suit and start consolidating around a few big exchanges — something that could eventually lead to an increased amount of investor confidence.



via cointelgraph.com
On quantitative easing, crypto and modern monetary theory

On quantitative easing, crypto and modern monetary theory

Crypto needs financial products — simply positioned and simply transparent — to preserve and grow people’s assets in difficult times.

With the COVID-19 crisis showing no signs of abating in the United States, central banks around the world have deployed financial airbags in the form of quantitative easing, and they plan to do a lot more. Modern Monetary Theory has taken center stage, and we are witnessing it in action. It’s a sight that will leave you awestruck: like witnessing the financial version of the first atomic explosion of Los Alamos and the Manhattan Project. 

What is going on with the world’s economy is unprecedented. We are entering completely new and uncharted territories, and all bets are off with respect to inflation/deflation. How will different asset classes react to the stimulus? Will we see price inflation, price stability or chaos? No one knows. One thing is certain: More absurdity is surely in store, and one should keep their wits about them and pay close attention.

QE 2020 vs. QE 2008

In 2008, the QE money printed did not enter circulation — it stayed at the Federal Reserve in a charter account of the member banks in the form of accounting entries on computers. This was just ignorance of how the financial flows worked, even though the net effect was positive: Bitcoin (BTC) was born as a reaction to QE.

The QE of today is, however, one of a different animal — it is meant to go to households and small businesses to pay for food and rent, or simply put, prevent famine, mass homelessness, general riots and societal breakdown. What we have been witnessing is the end of 19th-century industrial capitalism and the reign of monetary capitalism. This has been true since the end of the Bretton Woods Agreement some 50 years ago, but not entirely evident for all. The goal is humanistic: to avoid death, misery and social upheaval. This new money has entered circulation all at once — no questions asked — directly into the bank accounts of households and small businesses as deposits pumped by the Fed, and these have inadvertently found their way into the financial markets. The result: a monster rally in the equity markets that has snapped a few necks and caught sociopathic short-sellers by surprise.

Do not bet against the Fed. Doing so will give you a quick, unglamorous and leveraged death. While Robinhood traders are typically thought to be behind the market’s rallies, the truth is, operators directly linked to the Fed do the bulk of the “behind-the-scenes” buying, and they buy everything from bonds to index funds and single equities, and soon –– cryptocurrencies.

What does this mean for crypto?

Ironically, crypto heads are uniquely conditioned to understand what is going on with the current monetary system and market-led shenanigans — it’s all in the market-making order books. Cryptos never had a real economy backing them — they have no endogenous cash flows. Their main economic value propositions are (1) speculation; (2) drugs and tax evasion; and (3) alternative stores of value outside the traditional banking system.

In short, they are valid financial instruments. Increasingly, stocks are becoming uncorrelated from the underlying economic value and rely solely on the supply and demand dynamics of the financial markets, without economic underpinning. The economy is crashing, yet stocks are going skywards — this is not a paradox, but a feature: This is exactly what is happening with cryptocurrencies.

The paradox of zero cash flows and infinite valuations is one of perception. Asset backing is important. Cryptos, in general, have held their own as an investment class even with little asset backing and –– perhaps! –– because of it. Since cryptos are not directly linked to the health of the economy, their movements have been largely independent of economies. They performed well as stores of value by paring March’s losses and seem poised, as of this writing, to break out going forward. This is pure supply and demand logic — the psychology of a numerus clausus financial assets (limited supply of only 21 million BTC) and a seemingly infinite wall of liquidity chasing them. What you are seeing is an inflow of financial and monetary demand, not economic demand on the demand side of the order books of market makers, both in stock and crypto markets.

Forget fundamentals, narratives and traditional valuation methodologies. Stocks are now like crypto: a store of value that exists in the traditional economy and purely in exchanges. Something’s value is determined by whatever someone is willing to pay for it. Pay attention to the flow of new money and the technical depth of the order books in front of it. The wall of liquidity is huge, yet the order book pales in comparison.

The main way to value a stock is not through its economic value but through the exchanges and the technical arcana of market-making bots. A stock’s worth is determined by whatever someone is willing to pay for it, similar to that of crypto. This layer of indirection among economy, exchanges and stocks/coins allows for a decoupling of price from cash flow and can be a blessing when the economy crashes. This is at the heart of what is generally going on in the financial markets at the moment.

When Tesla’s stock rallies to increase twofold in a couple of months while Elon Musk blabs incoherently about weed, predatory Lithium mining and a regime change he instigated, you would think that the company’s stock is the new darling overachieving asset class in an attempt to rationalize the rally.

When analysts and your friends cry in disbelief at what is going on in delusional public markets, the crypto cultists should feel smug in their knowledge that ab initio stores of value can and do in fact exist, with BTC as the poster child. You are not witnessing an increase in economic demand for electric Tesla cars, or whatever Musk is tripping about at the moment, you are witnessing an increase in the monetary demand for Tesla’s stock, probably helped by the unhinged rants of Musk himself.

These are purely technical financial moves, not economic, and are nothing new. Stocks behave more like cryptos now in how they find valuations, and investors are the main source for demanding cashing financial instruments. This is why trusted brands are so important. What is this economy you speak of?

The QE/crypto irony

At a time of economic hardship, it is somewhat sociopathic to focus on the narrow and cold-hearted technical details of a speculative financial instrument and the arcana of monetary issuance — but herein may lie the keys to social stability and the future of money. The wall of liquidity that has hit the public markets is now finally finding its way, almost by overspill or trickle-down, to the crypto markets.

Money has been looking to take new shapes, for such is the spirit of money. QE will reach more people through these channels. It’s QE that will soon land us on the moon. It is ironic. We actually expected this sooner, but it seems to be underway at the moment. What was seen first as a rally in alt-coins is now a rally in Bitcoin and Ether. Where alt-coins don’t move is a bullish sign for cryptos in general. This may spell the beginning of a monster rally — the pendulum has swung from the crypto winter and the trough of disillusionment.

With literally nothing to anchor the valuations, the price of cryptos is technically and psychologically positioned to exponentially blow up. And this price is a direct function of the fiat QE sloshing around the financial markets and a direct function of the monetary levels. It is ironic that QE is actually propping BTC when it was born in antagonism to said QE.

Where do we go from here?

What may have delayed the move up is that getting into crypto is still a complicated affair. Liquidity in the crypto markets remains opaque. Most exchanges are vast washing machines that do not serve any social purpose but perpetuate pump-and-dump schemes, which are just proxies for degenerate gambling. Dealing with custody and keys is still a thing and a complicated affair for most people. Wallets are mostly useless, and there are a plethora of them — but they are making progress.

We should all pay close attention to the fact that U.S. banks have just been cleared to do crypto custody, thereby removing one of the biggest technical hurdles to retail and institutional growth outside of the crypto ghetto. While we are still a long way from the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation insurance on deposits, this is a significant step, and crypto may yet play a central role in the future of money and banking.

Bank custody will create unprecedented retail and institutional comfort and, thus, demand. Those who want to live outside the banking system, for whatever reason, ideological or legal, still can, and those who want the security of the traditional banking system (essentially, the vast majority) can do that as well. Having more options is always good, and crypto maximalism and dogmatism are just that — a series of “isms.”

Understanding the different schemes of crypto is difficult and time-consuming even for savvy investors. Due diligence is meaningless and almost impossible — you really have to take a deep dive to know whom to trust, what to trust, who knows what they are doing, who is still high on the unicorn powder of blockchain for good, and who will preserve and grow your money as opposed to blow it all on flimsy tech no one needs or has asked for. Similarly, some newfangled financial products have raised eyebrows, prompting people to ask themselves: “How can anyone offer 8% APY on crypto when we are entering an era of negative interest rates on fiat?”

These are still the many elephants in the crypto room. All those things that seem to defy (pun intended) logic and financial gravity are enough to deter newbies — for if it seems too good to be true, it is probably too good to be true. We need to shed all linguistic pretense of tech pompousness and grandiose societal schemes. Cryptos work well as stores of value — they are either volatile stores of value, such as BTC or ETH, or stablecoins.

In short, we need stable growth coins. We are seeing the rise of stable growth hybrid coins, such as FF1 by TwoPrime or Bitcoin trust by Greyscale, that marry upside potential with downside protection and leverage what the crypto markets do well. Expect more to come as the DeFi wave stabilizes and cashes in.

All in all, the crypto markets have been lagging behind the equity markets in terms of feeling the impact of QE. It simply means the critical mass is still not here. It’s easier, safer, more liquid and simply more expedient to buy Tesla stock for twice the return in three months via your 401K than to gamble on an obscure pump-and-dump that promises gains of up to 10 times. But with thinner and lower liquidity, cryptos will also feel the pressure in an exponential way when the QE tsunami hits its shores — it won’t be doubled... It may increase by 40 times. Who knows. We may be in the middle of this movement — the mother of all rallies. It will be swift and brutal. Don’t miss out; don’t short out; don’t hold out; and don’t chicken out. Pay attention to what is happening around you — these are once-in-a-lifetime events.

This article does not contain investment advice or recommendations. Every investment and trading move involves risk, readers should conduct their own research when making a decision.

The views, thoughts and opinions expressed here are the author’s alone and do not necessarily reflect or represent the views and opinions of Cointelegraph.

Marc Fleury is the CEO and co-founder of Two Prime — a financial technology company that focuses on the financial application of crypto to the real economy. Building upon his financial expertise spanning from his role advising private equity firms to his academic pursuits in modern monetary theory and banking theory, he provides the strategic direction for core vision investment strategy and partnerships for the firm.


via cointelgraph.com