CONVERGENCE: The Litecoin Foundation, the non-profit that supports the sixth-largest cryptocurrency, has acquired a nearly 10 percent stake in a German bank. This unusual deal is the result of a new strategic partnership with TokenPay, a crypto-to-fiat payments firm, which traded its 9.9 percent equity stake in WEG Bank AG to the foundation for the latter's technical assistance. Full Story
THIS AUGURS WELL: The launch of Augur appears to have been well received in the crypto community, at least by one measure. Just 12 hours after its launch, the decentralized prediction market became the fifth-most popular dapp on the ethereum blockchain by total users, even surpassing CryptoKitties, the popular virtual game. Full Story
IN THE SANDBOX: The London Stock Exchange Group and the Financial Conduct Authority, the U.K. financial regulator, are working with two blockchain startups to test out tokenized equity. Full Story
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BANK SHOT: The price of litecoin soared to a session high of $81 on Wednesday following the news of the Litecoin Foundation's acquisition of a stake in a German bank. But the technical charts remain biased in favor of the bears. Full Story
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| BEST OF THE BEST
You might not know it from the headline, but Bloomberg columnist Noah Smith is a bitcoin bull. Of sorts.
Bitcoin is called "digital gold" for good reason. Much like gold, it has a finite supply and a positive expected return, Smith writes. Citing finance theory, he notes that an asset with high expected rate of return should also be volatile. Indeed, the world's largest cryptocurrency by market cap has declined by about two-thirds this year, but it's still worth three times more than a year ago. Though the volatility makes bitcoin less useful as money, Smith argues, it's also unlikely that interest in bitcoin will ever die out. And before you question whether he has skin in the game, Smith says he owns some.
THE REST
QUARTZ: Coinbase has seen a slump in app downloads amid a price rout in bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies. The once top-ranking U.S. finance app, in terms of downloads, has fallen to 40th in the June rankings, its lowest level since April 2017. The article suggests the drop reflects the "fleeting fancy" of retail investors, who are the major players in crypto markets.
FORBES: Telegram, the Russian-developed messaging app, is filling a void in the initial coin offering market while all the major social media companies in the U.S. have banned ICO advertising, Kenneth Rapoza writes. The messaging service is now the biggest ICO hub in the world.
CNBC: Israel’s state attorney’s office indicted a former employee of cybersecurity company NSO Group for stealing source code tied to a software product that’s sold as a surveillance tool for government clients. The alleged data thief, who hasn’t been identified, attempted to sell the code to the company’s competitors for $50 million in cryptocurrency.This CNBC report shows how the Israeli company traced down the alleged data theft.
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