The $5 billion move

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December 20, 2018 BILLIONS MOVED: Crypto exchange Coinbase wants to dramatically expand the number of digital assets listed on its platform – and maintain its security in the process. To that end, the firm has launched an upgraded storage model, and last week moved its retail traders’ crypto assets – worth around $5 billion – into the new system. Coinbase head of security Phillip Martin told CoinDesk that the migration took four months to plan, as it "was a fundamentally new architecture from the ground up."  The exchange worked with regulators to ensure that the move would not impact the crypto markets. The move included a new key generation process, which began in October, and a number of other security factors. The migration included 5 percent of all bitcoin in circulation, 8 percent of all ethereum and 25 percent of all litecoin. Martin said the company’s cold storage process can fit any asset that is added to the platform going forward. Full Story CIVIL REBORN? Civil is launching a new token sale amid a soft reboot – only this time, the company wants to focus more on the journalism and less on the tech, according to a new blog post by co-founder Matthew Iles. The company faced a major setback after a failed token sale this past October. Now, the CVL token will go on sale again in February, and unlike its first attempt, there will be no deadline or cap. Rather, the tokens will remain on sale until all 34 million have been claimed. Civil also intends to launch new registry and publisher products, which aim to help journalists participate in the governance of its network of news organizations. As Iles wrote Wednesday, “Civil was never about ICOs and tokens or even blockchain. We’re about community-ownership, transparency and trust. We believe journalism (and media at large) should compete on craft, but collaborate on infrastructure.” Full Story HYPERLEDGER FRICTION: IBM and Intel appear to be engaging in a tug-of-war battle between the IBM-backed Hyperledger Fabric implementation and the Intel-backed Sawtooth platform, as evidenced by the Hyperledger governing board’s recent decision to approve a new supply chain project. The project, presently called Sawtooth Supply Chain, is the consortium’s first to operate in the application layer of the software stack, and is built on the Sawtooth framework. Previously, Hyperledger has only been designing lower-layer software, allowing vendors to build out their own proprietary application layers, such as IBM and its food-tracking supply chain platform. The decision resulted after a contentious vote, which pitted IBM and Intel against each other, and as Hyperledger grows past its origins as an organization dominated by IBM. Technical Steering Committee chair Dan Middleton (of Intel) said “it’s important that no one of [the] organizations [supporting Hyperledger] undermines the legitimacy of having an open source organization.” But Bitwise CEO James Mitchell is more suspicious of IBM’s motives. Full Story Many people have learned about bitcoin through the lens of macroeconomics. While there are several industry-wide cited cases where macroeconomic uncertainty led to interesting purchase action around bitcoin — Brexit and Indian demonetization in 2016 are two popular examples — the exercise of seeing bitcoin act as a macro-hedge is often performed in the abstract. But thanks to LocalBitcoins data from Coin.dance, Argentina's inflation problem now provides another empirically provable example. While LocalBitcoins activity normally tracks price, recent results from Argentina see it tracking inflation there. Lessons learned from Venezuela?  BUMP AHEAD? More evidence of a credible bullish bitcoin price reversal emerged this morning in the form of a convincing move above $4,000. As a result, more bargain hunters will likely enter the market, creating further upward pressure on prices. The focus now is on the next big resistance of $4,410 (Nov. 29 high), and that may be a tough nut to crack. Full story   BEST OF THE BEST REUTERS: Asia’s cryptocurrency firms are having a hard time insuring themselves against hacks and loss, according to a piece from Reuters. Further, the issue may be putting off big funds from investing in the crypto market. Most institution-focused crypto companies would like to have proper insurance in place and it can be a regulatory or legal requirement. But “getting such coverage is almost impossible despite their best efforts,” said an industry expert from PwC. However, insurers say they aren’t leaving crypto firms without cover. Aon has had at least 20 insurance inquiries from crypto exchanges and storage services seeking insurance, according to a regional director. Yet because the crypto sector is new and has had lot of negative press around security breaches, “applicants need to make an effort to distinguish themselves,” they said. THE REST HOLLYWOOD REPORTER: The entertainment industry now has a group that aims to promote the adoption of blockchain tech, says a report by Hollywood Reporter. Called the Blockchain Global Entertainment Alliance, the non-profit will also develop standards and best practices. Blockchain has the potential to “fundamentally change the way our business is conducted in addition to helping us solve the piracy problem,” according to founding board member Rouslan Ovtcharoff from Millennium Media. While no media giants are so far involved, other industry members of the group at launch include Millennium Media, FilmTrack, Capstone Group, RightsTrade, Purely.Capital, Home Box Office Singapore and more. Hollywood film studios and giants like Netflix may ultimately join, but “It might take time because of their size. The idea to organize the BGEA was born last month and I have not spoken to any of them yet,” said Ovtcharoff. YAHOO FINANCE: In January of this year, Square rolled out bitcoin buying and selling to all of its Cash App users. But the move has only seen the firm reap a profit of $975,000 to date. So was it a waste of time? Far from it, says a piece in Yahoo Finance. “It was a brilliant customer acquisition strategy,” KeyBanc Capital Markets analyst Josh Beck said in the article. Other analysts agree that the profits brought in by the bitcoin service aren't the point. “It was a marketing move to raise awareness of Cash App, and it worked,” says Yahoo, and the figures seem to back that up. Analyst Dan Dolev crunched the numbers and found that Cash App had passed Venmo in terms of all-time cumulative downloads for the first time in July, although Venmo likely still has the lead on monthly active users. Square’s Cash App lead, Brian Grassadonia, said direct profit is "certainly not why we [launched the bitcoin service]. It comes back to democratizing access to financial tools that have historically been really complicated, intimidating, and stressful.” WHO WON #CRYPTOTWITTER Copyright © 2018 CoinDesk. All rights reserved. Our mailing address is: 250 Park Avenue South New York, NY, 10003, US Want to change how you receive these emails? You can update your preferences or unsubscribe from this list