Thursday, September 13, 2018

September to remember

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WHAT A LONG, STRANGE TRIP: With the 10-year anniversaries of the global financial crisis and the bitcoin white paper approaching, CoinDesk's David Floyd takes stock of how the cryptocurrency's relationship with the establishment it sought to subvert has evolved.

As Wall Streeters jump to crypto startups and financial institutions experiment not only with blockchain technology but crypto investment products, the narrative is a lot more complicated than "us versus them." Full Story

PARK IT HERE: Speaking of Wall Street-crypto convergence, the South Dakota Division of Banking approved BitGo to be a qualified custodian, meaning it can now store digital assets on behalf of regulated financial institutions.

Unlike BitGo's other custodial solutions, the one to be offered through BitGo Trust meets regulatory know-your-customer and anti-money-laundering requirements.

The general public has 30 days to appeal the state's decision, but BitGo said it's ready to go live with the new service if and when the period ends without objections. Full Story

CHEAT SHEET: Constantinople is a fitting name for the coming upgrade to ethereum. Incorporating five different ethereum improvement proposals (EIPs), it could fairly be described as byzantine.

To help readers get their arms around this complex but hugely important code change to the second-largest blockchain, CoinDesk's Christine Kim offers a handy explainer.

From improving the network's efficiency to delaying the so-called "difficulty bomb," we break down the key features of the approaching hard fork. Full Story

Bitcoin has many qualities that are attractive. Tell us what you think is best in our poll.

Store of Value: This protects holdings stored over long periods of time from eroding due to inflation or faulty monetary policy. This is due to the fixed 21 million supply of bitcoins and the lack of centralized manipulation.

Medium of Exchange: This allows users to easily transact to purchase goods and services. Thus bitcoin must be convenient, easy to use, and cheap no matter the amount or size of transactions.

Censorship Resistance: This protects users from getting locked out of the financial network. Many people around the world may find themselves banned from mainstream financial services and turn to bitcoin for its emphasis on freedom of transaction through its decentralized structure.

For more research insights check out the CoinDesk Research section here.

SPONSOR SECTION

We made the first blockchain-recorded property deal in California a reality via our proprietary Transaction Platform. If you are looking to diversify your portfolio, we can help you find and securely pay with crypto for an investment property anywhere in the world. Visit our website for new opportunities.

BULLISH SIGN: Bitcoin broke through the $6,400 resistance level, auguring well for a corrective rally — with some caveats. Full Story

BEST OF THE BEST

BLOOMBERG: Wall Street bank Morgan Stanley is planning to offer trading in complex derivatives tied to bitcoin, the newswire reports, citing an anonymous source.

The investors will not be trading in bitcoin, rather they will be dealing in bitcoin futures contracts.

THE REST

CNBC: As the crypto industry grows, educational institutions are adapting. Top universities like University of California Berkeley and University of Pennsylvania now offer courses such as “Blockchain and CryptoEconomics."

The professors attribute the high volume of blockchain/crypto-related jobs to the rise in interest in these courses. However, Cornell Associate Professor of Computer Science Emin Gün Sirer cautions that that over-specializing early on in one’s career path would be a mistake.

TECHCRUNCH: Hacera aims to do for blockchain what Google and Yahoo did for the web. It announced the release of Hacera Network Registry, a searchable database of all blockchain projects.

The startup aims to verify every project before addition to the registry, which is built on the Hyperledger Fabric blockchain platform.

We've launched our new podcast, Late Confirmation, which are the top stories in the blockchain world, delivered daily from the team at CoinDesk, sponsored by the Oxford Blockchain Programme.

Listen to Latest Episode and Subscribe

WHO WON #CRYPTOTWITTER

ConsenSys Jobs
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Circle Jobs
BitGo Jobs

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BitMEX CEO wants ETH dead

September 13th, 2018

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QUOTE OF THE DAY

"We cannot become what we need to be by remaining what we are."

- Max Dupree

MARKET

COIN	PRICE	24H

BTC	$6,314.824752	-0.29%

ETH	$191.809857	-2.28%

XRP	$0.26504	-3.1%

BCH	$465.097375	-2.5%

EOS	$4.95	-1.85%

*Information as of 9:30 AM EST

NEWS

BitMEX CEO Accused of Manipulating the Price of Ethereum

DOUBLE DIGIT SH*TCOIN

It is no secret that BitMEX CEO Arthur Hayes doesn't like Ethereum (ETH)
On August 14th, Hayes called out Ethereum for being a "double digit sh*tcoin" that will drop below $100 in the BitMEX newsletter that is automatically sent to all BitMEX users
Ethereum's mention in the newsletter was because BitMEX has since released its ETH/USD perpetual swap which allows investors to trade Ethereum with up to 50x leverage using Bitcoin

CAUSING THE PLUNGE

Now, as Ethereum creeps to new lows, the community is partially blaming Hayes for the price plunge

Many in the Ethereum community are pointing to a message Hayes posted in the BitMEX chatbox about the new ETH/USD perpetual swap the exchange offers:

"If you are a bitcoin based speculator this is the perfect way to punt on the ETH/USD price."

This comment sparked outrage in the Ethereum community as many believe Hayes is encouraging BitMEX users to short ETH/USD
Today, though BitMEX has a clear agenda against Ethereum, the crypto exchange still handles $3 billion of daily ETH trading volume

NO REGULATION, NO PROBLEM

BitMEX is largely unregulated and no legal action has been brought against Hayes for allegedly using his influence to drop the price of Ethereum
In addition, BitMEX doesn't allow users from the United States due to regulations, however, it is assumed that majority of BitMEX users are actually located in the United States and use VPNs to access the exchange
Further, Hayes himself is an American citizen assumed to be located in the United States due to his appearances on American television
In closing, it's likely that BitMEX knows a large chunk of its users are from America, yet continues to turn a blind eye to the matter

NEWS

OKEx Founder Released From Police Station After Fighting Fraud Allegations

SETTING THE STAGE

Yesterday, OKEx cryptocurrency exchange founder Star Xu was detained by Chinese police over allegations that Xu defrauded investors
The allegations stem from Xu's possible involvement in a blockchain WiFi sharing project called WFEE Coin
Supposedly, Xu holds equity in the startup and after it committed illicit activity, Xu was brought in for questioning

XU WALKS FREE

Following his questioning, Xu was able to prove that he had no connection with WFEE
OKEx COO Andy Cheung confirmed Xu has no relationship with the startup and OK Blockchain Capital also denied Xu's alleged connection
Following his detaining, Xu explained in an interview with Honeycomb Finance that it was "normal" for Chinese citizens to exercise their right to make allegations and he fulfilled his "duty" as a citizen to answer the authorities' questions respectively

DEEPER PROBLEMS

In addition to Xu's hiccup with WFEE, there is also another allegation pending that blames OKEx's system failures as the reason for losses amounting to "around 300 million yuan"
According to the case, when OKEx went down, traders were unable to close or modify their positions in a time of crisis
In addition, since OKEx offers 20 times leverage, losses could exceed much further than a traditional exchange
So far, however, nothing has come of the allegations as the case remains stagnant

MARKET

ETH Shorts Hit All-Time High... Again

ETH BEARS IN FULL FORCE

Ether has been rocked by this bear market, even more than a lot of other altcoins
It seems like investors don't think this is the end of ETH's demise
ETH/USD shorts just hit an all-time high on Bitmex and 248,247 surpassing last Friday's record high of 247,611
Short bets are a whopping 200% higher than four weeks ago

SHORT SQUEEZE COMING?

In certain situations, a large number of short positions can result in a sharpe move in the opposite direction, this is known as a 'short squeeze'
Someone with a short bet is borrowing ETH from someone that they need to pay back
If the price of ETH begins to rise, short sellers will have to go into the market and buy ETH to repay the borrowed asset
This adds more buying pressure as the price is already rising, it is sort of a domino effect, as the price rises more people need to cover their short and buy more ETH

NEWS

A Brazilian Soccer Club is Having an Initial Coin Offering

WHY ICO?

The Avaí Futebol Clube, a Brazilian Series B soccer team, just announced that it will be launching its own cryptocurrency and is raising funds via an initial coin offering
The team hopes to raise $20 million dollars and has the goal of helping the team qualify for Series A tier and investments into the teams infrastructure
20.46 million tokens will be sold for $1 each and the club will hold onto another 1.54 million tokens
SportyCo and Blackbridge Sports are assisting the club with the ICO which will take place on October 3rd

Avaí president Francisco José Battistotti talked about his hopes for a global outreach with this ICO:

"With our ICO, we are actively ... engaging all Avaí FC in Florianópolis and Brazil, working together towards our goal – to become a stable member of Brazil's Série A and qualify for the Copa Libertadores. We are delighted to do so in partnership with SportyCo and be the first sports company to do an initial coin offering, paving the way for other clubs all over the world to approach financing their sporting activities in this novel way."

WHY BUY A SPORTS TOKEN?

Token holders will be able to use the token to purchase tickets, merchandise, and have access to "unique experiences"
Avaí is not the first sports club to issue a cryptocurrency, recently, French club Paris Saint-Germain announced they were issuing a crypto
However, Paris Saint-Germain's token will have no monetary value, rather only be used for fan voting

BITS

Morgan Stanley plans to offer trading in complex derivatives tied to Bitcoin.
The trustee of the long-defunct bitcoin exchange Mt. Gox has announced that corporate creditors can now enter claims to claw back trapped bitcoin through a recently approved rehabilitation process.
Binance is teaming up with the Malta Stock Exchange (MSX) to enable security token trading.

COIN OF THE DAY

Swarm (SWM)

Swarm Fund is the blockchain for private equity. It's a fully decentralized capital market place that democratizes investing by using the power of the blockchain to open up high-return, alternative investment classes to smaller investors through asset-backed funds using cryptocurrency tokens. It makes traditionally exclusive investment opportunities, such as private equity and hedge funds, inclusive for the Swarm by pooling together smaller investments into larger, institutional-sized blocks.