DAILY TL;DR W/ CHESLINK
JANUARY 29TH – FEBRUARY 2ND
January 29th
- BTC NEWS
- IN OTHER NEWS
MARKETCAP ANALYSIS
Recap from 11/20
Market Cap: $243,311,416,536
24h Vol: $7,403,167,283
BTC Dominance: 56.2%
As of 12/31
Market Cap: $592,941,301,681
24h Vol: $33,207,433,786
BTC Dominance: 38.0%
As of 1/8
Market Cap: $743,509,110,252
24h Vol: $49,897,768,988
BTC Dominance: 34.2%
As of 1/15
Market Cap: $644,874,662,903
24h Vol: $38,996,461,258
BTC Dominance: 34.4%
As of 1/22
Market Cap: $508,289,748,517
24h Vol: $30,645,248,592
BTC Dominance: 35.0%
As of 1/24
Market Cap: $537,183,052,350
24h Vol: $28,587,095,263
BTC Dominance: 34.5%
As of 1/29
Market Cap: $569,531,115,703
24h Vol: $21,957,402,021
BTC Dominance: 33.4%
BTC/BCH NEWS
Starbucks Says No to Bitcoin
• http://www.ibtimes.com/starbucks-ceo-says-bitcoin-has-no-future-currency-trusted-cryptocurrency-coming-2645896
Howard Schultz, the CEO of Starbucks, believes there will one day be a cryptocurrency that achieves legitimacy and widespread use—but he doesn’t believe that digital currency will be Bitcoin.
When the call turned to the topic of payments and future innovations, Schultz brought up Bitcoin just to shoot it down. “I don't believe that Bitcoin is going to be a currency today or in the future,” he told investors on the call.
“I'm talking about the new technology of blockchain and the possibility of what could happen not in the near-term, but in a few years from now with a consumer application in which is trust and legitimacy with regard to a digital currency,” he said. Schultz acknowledged that when one of those currencies goes gain mainstream acceptance, Starbucks intends to adapt and allow consumers to use the cryptocurrency to make their purchase.
“I personally believe that there is going to be a one or a few legitimate trusted digital currencies off of the blockchain technology,” Schultz said, noting that the legitimacy of those currencies will have to be made legitimate by companies accepting them. Until then, though, the Starbucks CEO seemed content to sit and wait to see how everything plays out.
IN OTHER NEWS
Status Invests $5 Million into Matrix AI
• https://venturebeat.com/2018/01/29/status-invests-5-million-in-matrix-to-create-a-blockchain-messaging-superpower/
Enter Status, the mobile Ethereum client built entirely on peer-to-peer technologies. Today, Status has announced a significant investment in New Vector, the company behind Matrix.org — the open standard for secure and decentralized communication.
“Matrix will use the capital to expand its team significantly over the course of 2018 and continue development of both the Matrix protocol and improving the Riot.im client,” Status cofounder Jarrad Hope told me. “Matrix is already used by millions of people worldwide, and in 2018 this number may reach the tens of millions.”
Within Matrix, the user can collaborate on projects across different communication apps and third-party tools within one workspace. External networks include Slack, IRC, Twitter, Gitter, and more. Users can have hosted services and integrations from New Vector run on their own server, providing teams with full end-to-end encryption.
This new collaboration is expected to create a bridge between Matrix and Whisper — Ethereum’s own real-time communication protocol — and allow Status dApps to be integrated as widgets within Riot.im. It also allows the Status Network token to be used, enabling cryptocurrency payment mechanisms in Riot.im.
MATRIX AI Network³ is an adaptive, self-optimising and interoperable “Blockchain 3.0” solution that supports smart contracts and machine learning services. By combining AI and blockchain technology MATRIX aims to revolutionise the user experience of executing smart contracts, by making the whole process faster, easier and safer. As per the technical white-paper⁴:
With MATRIX, no programming expertise is needed anymore for designing smart contracts. The unique code generation technique of MATRIX allows automatic conversion of an abstract description of a smart contract into an executable program. MATRIX only requires users to input the core elements (e.g. input, output, and transaction conditions) of a contract with a scripting language. Then a code generator based on a deep neural network is able to automatically convert the script into an equivalent program.
To return to the quote from the Quartz article, this is a potential game-changer. MATRIX will allow anyone to use natural languages to directly implement smart contracts in their business. The MATRIX neural networks will generate a library of templates based on initial inputs, that are then automatically refined and evolved based on historical data, as per the below visual representation from the MATRIX business white-paper⁵.
Hong Kong Chooses Education over Bans
• https://crypto-lines.com/2018/01/29/crypto-education/
The Financial Service Treasury Bureau (FSTB) and the Investor Education Centre (IEC) all subsidiaries of the Securities and Futures Commission (SFC) have teamed up to launch a campaign aimed at raising awareness of the potential risks associated with ICO’s and the trading of cryptocurrencies. This will include TV campaigns and print media to warn the public to stay away from cryptocurrencies.
“The increase in media coverage and hype around ICOs and ‘cryptocurrencies’, such as bitcoin, has aroused public interest. However, the public might use these as speculative tools without full understanding of their nature and potential risks. Through this series of public education initiatives, the Government aims to provide the public with a correct and comprehensive understanding of ICOs and ‘cryptocurrencies’, so that they can thoroughly assess the risks before making transactions or investment decisions.” Mr Joseph Chan, Secretary for Financial Services, and the Treasury.
This crypto education strategy was also implemented by Thailand when the government choose to educate its citizen rather than ban cryptos.
OMERS Planning to Raise $50 Million
• https://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/omers-expands-cryptocurrency-presence-with-50-million-ethereum-public-company-offering/article37764394/
Ontario pension giant OMERS is pushing further into the rapidly expanding cryptocurrency business through the creation of an Ethereum-focused public company that is planning to raise $50-million.
Newly-formed Ethereum Capital Inc. announced Monday morning that it is launching a private placement co-led by Canaccord Genuity Corp. and CIBC Capital Markets to sell 20 million subscription receipts for $2.50 each. Its plan is to then amalgamate with publicly-listed B.C. shell company Movit Media Corp., with investors set to receive one share in Movit for each Ethereum Capital receipt after the offering's anticipated closing date of Feb. 16. The combined firm will be known as Ethereum Capital Corp.
3iQ Announces Glocal Cryptoasset Fund
• https://www.investmentexecutive.com/news/products/3iq-announces-global-cryptoasset-fund/
Toronto-based 3iQ Corp. has received formal approval from Canadian securities regulators to act as a portfolio manager and investment fund manager permitted to invest in multiple cryptoassets, the firm announced Thursday. 3iQ’s Global Cryptoasset Fund will invest directly in units of bitcoin, ether and litecoin, three of the leading cryptoassets.
“We have worked diligently to provide a pure, low-cost, secure method for both accredited and institutional investors to assume a core position in this new and expanding asset class,” says Frederick Pye, 3iQ CEO, in a statement.
Blockstream Aiming to make Fiat Currency with Blockchain Tech
• https://www.trustnodes.com/2017/11/21/blockstream-issue-fiat-currency-using-blockchain-tech-raises-25-million
“Blockstream’s Elements Platform sits at the heart of the recent launch of DG Lab DVEP™ (Digital Value Exchange Platform), an advanced framework for real-world payment systems built on blockchains.
DG Lab DVEP™ is an application and business logic layer built on top of Blockstream’s Elements Blockchain and will enable rapid development of use cases and services for the Japanese market,” Blockstream said.
DG Labs is seemingly building trademarked products on top of Blockstream’s elements project, which appears to mainly include the Lightning Network and Liquid, a hardware based sidechain of sorts. They have further agreed to collaborate with Tokyo Tanshi Co with the aim of “issuing and circulating local currencies using blockchain technology and entering the cryptocurrency OTC market.”
Bloomberg describes Tokyo Tanshi Co. as a company that “provides inter-dealer and money market brokerage services in foreign exchange and currency funds, IRS, currency swaps, FRAs, OTC options, and financial futures transactions.
Its activities include call funds, buying and selling of bills, buying and selling the domestic commercial paper, mediation of interbank deposits, securities loan transactions, and fluidization commodity, as well as buying, selling, and mediation of property.”
Walton Annual Meeting Overview
• https://medium.com/@thelatemercutio/huge-news-from-the-2018-waltonchain-annual-meeting-a-full-overview-e44cde81ccb1
Waltonchain recently announced they were finalizing a partnership with the China Mobile IoT Alliance, and skeptics have called into question the validity of the agreement. This statement about mobile-phone integration, combined with the attendance of the Deputy Manager of Shenzhen China Mobile, a subsidiary of China Mobile Communications Corporation, seemingly puts this to rest.
As far as the actual integration goes, I suspect Walton may implement their NB-IoT (Near Band) chips. They broadcast over long distances and will probably be used for their smart waste management system to connect real world data to the Walton blockchain, which specifically uses mobile communication networks and GPS to improve efficiency, among other things.
https://t.co/V4xofh9gSA
On Jan. 23, Waltonchain’s affiliate Xiamen Citylink Technology Co., Ltd. (Citylink) officially signed a partnership with Zhangzhou Branch of China Telecom Corporation Limited.
This partnership between Citylink and China Telecom Zhangzhou is the first step for domestic cooperation between Waltonchain and China Telecom. Waltonchain will put its maximum efforts to help China Telecom Zhangzhou build a smart city. We also believe that the full support from China Telecom Zhangzhou will promote the innovative construction of blockchain-based Value Internet of Things and the development of the innovative layout of commercial ecosystem applications by Waltonchain.
Lamden Clove Early Access Program
• https://blog.lamden.io/introducing-the-clove-early-access-program-62ca9cb9d6a8
This program will be available to select businesses to allow them to use the Clove atomic-swap protocol in their products once the alpha launches, helping their users to interface with their product using any major cryptocurrency.
Clove is a decentralized atomic-swap protocol that will allow users to easily swap coins between all major chains. This will allow users to more easily interact with blockchain services. Clove works through Lightning Network inspired payment channels. Transactions initiate from private chains, and utilize the ledger as a public service for managing secure and guaranteed remittance of funds from chain to chain.
ACES Bitcoin/ARK Interoperability
• https://medium.com/@arkaces/aces-completes-bitcoin-ark-service-updated-website-and-releases-marketplace-api-documentation-95e26be49e11
The Bitcoin/ARK service is an interoperability application to allow for liquid movement between Bitcoin and ARK, in both directions. It leverages the Bitcoin Listener and ARK Listener we released in 2017. The service includes the ability for consumers to open channels with the service provider to connect a Bitcoin address to an ARK address, and vice versa. We are calling this a channel service.
The ability to create channel services allows for a dynamic service with Service Linking. In the diagram below you can see how we connect two independent channel services together to create one long service. The service below shows a BTC to ETH channel service. With this link, any time BTC is received at the BTC Service Receiving Address, ETH is moved to the ETH receiving Address. Service linking will allow new blockchains to simply connect to a single coin to gain access to all the blockchain services that exist on the ACES marketplace.
Enjin Coin Announces Efinity
• https://blog.enjincoin.io/enjin-coin-announcing-efinity-and-our-new-updated-roadmap-c7616cc7ab79
Efinity is our upcoming game-channel network for performing highly scalable gaming transactions.
By opening a game channel with an Efinity network, a game will be able to perform nearly infinite volumes of transactions between millions of players and the game server — at high speeds and nearly no costs.
These transactions remain trust-less and verified on the Ethereum blockchain.
After meetings with multiple game developers who are adopting Enjin Coin, we’ve added new features to support more advanced items systems on the platform. Speed and scalability has also become a major topic of focus, and our plans are described later in this update.
First Part of Sharding is Nearly Done
• http://archive.is/CN23U
Ethereum is getting closer to deploying new technology that would allow the network to scale, its founder said.
"It seems like part one of phase one is getting something like being already done," Vitalik Buterin said in a developer meeting.
The technology, known as sharding, attempts to split the ethereum blockchain's data into more manageable parts. Buterin went to state that the next phase of the four-stage scaling proposal will be completed in "a month and a bit," adding that development work will likely circulate on stateless clients, a type of ethereum software that does not need to process the complete history of the platform.
"Then from there we're going to try and shard it into a working test, a kind of test network," the ethereum founder said.
In the meeting, Buterin also reflected on Casper, ethereum's new consensus protocol that is currently in testing. As detailed by CoinDesk, the test network has been derailed by issues with the software it deploys. However, Buterin said that in spite of hiccups, the core of the project is sound, or as he put it: "the Casper aspect of Casper… is totally successful."
Stellar Lumens to $4 in 2018
• https://investinghaven.com/growth-stocks/stellar-lumens-price-forecast-4-usd-2018/
When assessing the intrinsic value of a cryptocurrency, we consider the use and volumes as the best reflection of the current and projected intrinsic value. The projects mentioned above are key to spreading the use and adoption of Lumens therefore increasing its value over time. The key for the adoption to continue (and not just peak and free fall) is scalability, speed and cost of transactions. Those are the key factors investors (especially those in for the long HODL) should keep an eye on.
When trying to understand XLM or Lumens intrinsic value is the fact that they support ICOs (while offering low transaction fees and fast settlements) and the planned Lightening Networks integration in 2018. We expect this to be an important success factor for this Cryptocurrency in 2018.
For a long term perspective, we can see in the following chart that 4 USD is very likely in 2018 provided the Team continues on delivering on their commitments, no major security flaws in their code (watch also the exchanges supporting Lumens) and of course the overall sector performance. And always remember, investing in Cryptocurrency is a high risk high reward investment. They key is to know what you are investing in, score the lowest entries and stick to charts so you don’t panic sell.
Blockchain Technology Overview for the National Institute of Standards and Technology
• https://csrc.nist.gov/CSRC/media/Publications/nistir/8202/draft/documents/nistir8202-draft.pdf
Long blockchain overview with fairly technical analysis.
ICONOMI CEO Interview
• https://medium.com/iconominet/ceo-insights-tim-m-zagar-8fd236c16cd4
When the whole world began measuring time the same way, it was a huge change for the world economy. Blockchain puts everything over the same denominator in a similar way. Lately, the Internet has begun to develop in the direction of computer applications talking to each other in networks. Blockchain provides a uniform language for this kind of communication.
We offer software, a platform for Digital Asset Arrays (baskets of digital assets), and managers pay us for the use of our services. Comparing the opportunity to invest in this new industry to finding gold in the Wild West: we are not the ones looking for gold, we are the ones selling shovels. We see where people are digging, but we do not know whether or not there is gold there.
Today, through our platform, people can invest small amounts in start-up companies. This was not possible in the past; you couldn’t invest 50 euros in Google. Start-up companies were dependent on a small number of large-scale venture capital funds. Our technology allows people to invest in start-up companies without the intermediary of venture capital funds. We provide financial and technology experts with the tools to buy the crypto coins of different companies and place them in baskets. Then an individual can buy this basket instead of buying twenty different coins individually. Disruptive investments are generally more meaningful, but what pushed us to create ICONOMI was the realization that people would want to invest in the crypto-economy and that it makes more sense to invest in the industry as a whole than to buy shares in individual companies.