$154 Billion – Bitcoin Price Rally Carries Crypo Markets to New Record

$154 Billion - Bitcoin Price Rally Carries Crypo Markets to New Record

$154 Billion – Bitcoin Price Rally Carries Crypo Markets to New Record

The bitcoin price rallied on Wednesday, leaping 9% to cross $4,200. The wider crypto markets followed bitcoin’s lead, with 93 of the top 100 cryptocurrencies marching into positive territory for the day.

This near-universal advance added more than $10 billion to the total cryptocurrency market cap. After entering the day at $142.5 billion, the total value of all cryptocurrencies burst through the $150 billion threshold to set a new all-time high of $154 billion.

Popular Cryptocurrency Chart

Bitcoin Price Leaps Past $4,200

The bitcoin price had experienced an early-week correction, briefly diving as low as $3,675 on August 22. Theories for this decline include a hashrate shift from bitcoin to bitcoin cash, as well as concerns surrounding the Segwit/Segwit2x debate. However, the bitcoin price had strong support on the Asian exchanges, which helped prevent it from staying below $4,000 for long. Today’s 9% climb brings the bitcoin price to a present value of $4,243 and a market cap of just over $70.1 billion.

Ethereum Price Closes on $350

The ethereum price did not quite keep pace with bitcoin, but it did return a 4% increase for the day. At present, the value of ether is $323, bringing the ethereum market cap to $30.4 billion.

Metropolis, ethereum’s next major protocol upgrade is, quickly approaching. Although these protocol upgrades are implemented by hard forks, they have generally been supported by the community. Consequently, many investors believe the ethereum price will close on $350 as its September release nears.

Bitcoin Cash Price Stumbles Following Difficulty Adjustment

The bitcoin cash price surged close to $1,000 last week, one of several converging factors that made bitcoin cash more profitable to mine than bitcoin. Suddenly, the bitcoin cash hashrate exploded, nearly reaching parity with bitcoin. At its height, bitcoin cash boasted 44% of the combined hashrate between the two coins.

However, the hashrate increase triggered an August 22 difficulty adjustment that caused bitcoin cash mining profitability to plunge. Bitcoin cash is now just 42% as profitable to mine as bitcoin, which has led several miners to move hashpower back to the main blockchain. At present, bitcoin cash has about 27% of the combined bitcoin hashrate.

The difficulty adjustment coincided with a decrease in the bitcoin cash price. Despite the widespread market advance, the bitcoin cash price retreated 7% to $661. Bitcoin cash now has a $10.9 billion market cap.

Ripple Price Soars to 50% Gain

Bitcoin cash was the only top 25 cryptocurrency to decrease more than 1% for the day, and most coins returned significant gains.

popular chryptocurrency charts

Altcoin Price Chart from CoinMarketCap

The Ripple price led the way, posting a shocking 50% increase following a flood of volume on the major Korean exchanges. This rapid advance raised the Ripple price as high as $0.300 for the first time since June 25, although it has since tapered to $0.277. Ripple now has a market cap of $10.6 billion, putting it within striking distance of reclaiming the 3rd spot from bitcoin cash

Fifth-ranked IOTA rose 9% to $0.92, while the litecoin price increased 4% to $48. The NEM price saw just a 2% gain, but it was enough to raise its market cap to $2.3 billion. The Dash price rose 7% to $300, and NEO climbed 9% to about $38. Other than Ripple, ethereum classic was the only top 10 cryptocurrency to rise more than 10%. ETC’s 14% gain helped it secure the 10th place spot from Monero, who rose 8% to a new all-time high of $98.

Author: Josiah Wilmoth on 23/08/2017

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Cryptocurrency fall continues ahead of Bitcoin’s ‘civil war’ conclusion on Aug 1- Ether below $200

Cryptocurrency fall continues ahead of Bitcoin's 'civil war' conclusion on Aug 1- Ether below $200

Bitcoin prices fell below USD 2,100 today and are inching towards breaking the USD 2,000 level, as bears continue their rampage on cryptostreet.

Cryptocurrencies continue to bleed as speculators remain jittery ahead of bitcoin’s scaling debate conclusion on August 1. The total market cap has dropped by USD 9 billion, a 11 percent fall, in the past 24 hours, according to coinmarketcap.com.

Bitcoin prices fell below USD 2,100 today and could soon break the USD 2,000 level, as bears continue their rampage on cryptostreet.

The price slipped to USD 2,057, at time of reporting, according to CryptoCompare.com, a drop of around 32 percent from its all time high of USD 3,000.

Ethereum, bitcoin’s closest rival in terms of market cap, again dropped sub-USD 200 to the levels of USD 186, as per CryptoCompare. After falling 50 percent from its all-time high in June, ether has now hit a 45-day low.

Other major cryptocurrencies like litecoin, ripple, zcash have witnessed a drop of 10-20 percent over the past 24 hours.

The crypto-asset space reached a peak market cap of USD 116 billion in June and since then has lost USD 42 billion, a 36 percent correction over the past one month, entering a bear market, going by conventional definition.

Since the start of 2017, cryptocurrency prices have had a phenomenal rally. Experts believe this was due to speculative buying as prices were being driven by the mania for initial coin offerings (ICOs).

What the ‘fork’

Just when everyone thought it was over, the bitcoin ‘civil war’ resurfaced in June when major mining firm Bitmain announced the launch of a user- activated hard fork (UASF).

In May, a majority of blockchain industry bigwigs reached a consensus regarding the bitcoin scaling solution and agreed to enable the Segregated Witness (SegWit).

The SegWit was supposed to be a soft fork, a temporary solution to make bitcoin's software protocol handle the growing transactions burden.

"The prospect of a bitcoin fork isn't enticing for bitcoiners as it highlights the inability for the project to move forward and the divisiveness in opinions on how to do so," Charles Hayter, co-founder and CEO of cryptocurrency data platform CryptoCompare, had earlier told Moneycontrol.

"The scaling debate has been around for two years now and the ramifications of the present state of play lead to a number of price-sensitive scenarios that are not positive."

n case of a hard fork, if the bitcoin blockchain splits, users are at risk of losing their bitcoin. Bitcoin experts have suggested to not make transactions during the uncertain time period around August 1.

If the Bitmain hard fork happens then there would be two legitimate Bitcoin ledgers on August 3rd. The soft forked version of Bitcoin and the newly forked Bitmain Bitcoin.

David Ogden
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Author: Sidhartha Shukla

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Ethereum’s share of the cryptocurrency market has exploded

Ethereum's share of the cryptocurrency market has exploded

Ethereum is gobbling up share in the cryptocurrency market.

A new report by Autonomous NEXT, a financial technology analytics service, shows that Ethereum's percentage of the total cryptocurrency market has sharply risen since the beginning of the year.

In January it stood at approximately 5%. As of June 22, its marketcap as a percentage of the entire market rose to 30%.

Ethereum's impressive rise has led to a dramatic fall in bitcoin's marketcap as a percentage of the market. It has declined from about 85% at the beginning of the year to just under 40% as of late June. Up until mid June, Ethereum was on track to surpass bitcoin as the world's largest cryptocurrency by market cap, according to Coindesk, but its share of the market has since pulled back.

Still, the shift from bitcoin to Ethereum reflects a change in what the cryptocurrency industry wants from blockchain tech, according to the report.

"Early phase of cryptocurrency market development focused on who will be the “digital gold” – and Bitcoin won through the largest developer and adoption ecosystem," the report said. "However, current battle is for other functionalities, such as global decentralized computing or smart contracts infrastructure."

Ethereum, unlike bitcoin, wasn't built to simply function as a "digital gold." According to Paul McNeal, a bitcoin evangelist, the Ethereum blockchain was built as a platform on which two parties could enter into a so-called smart contract without a third party. As a result, it can be used as a currency and it can "represent virtual shares, assets, proof of membership, and more."

The multifaceted functionality of Ethereum has many folks in financial services bullish on its future. Mike McGovern, the new head of Investor Services Fintech Offerings at Brown Brothers Harriman & Co, is one such person.

"Ethereum is not only cheaper than bitcoin, it is also more robust and has more applications outside of simply financial transactions," he said in a recent interview with Business Insider.

A survey recently cited by Nathaniel Popper in The New York Times indicates that a lot of businesses are singing a similar tune. Almost 94% of surveyed firms said they feel positive about the state of ether tokens. Only 49% of firms surveyed had a positive feeling about bitcoin.

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Author: Frank Chaparro

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Is Solar-Powered Cryptocurrency Mining the Next Big Thing

Cryptocurrency mining is a difficult and costly activity. Miners must pay to build rigs capable of vast amounts of processing power, and then the rigs themselves must be powered with large quantities of electricity. It's all a careful balance between how much the operation costs and how much profit it is able to generate. (See also: What Happens to Bitcoin After All 21 Million are Mined?)

With mining operations for Ethereum, one of the leading digital currencies on the market today, taking up the same share of electricity as that of a small country, miners have to be careful that they aren't spending more than they are making. Because of that, some mining operations have begun to look to solar-powered rigs, set up in the desert, in order to reduce mining costs and make the largest profit possible. (See also: Chinese Investment in Bitcoin Mining is Enormous.)

Solar Panels Provide Inexpensive Power

Mining operations with the tools and resources to be able to set up solar-powered rigs in the desert are finding that it is a good investment. Once you have paid for the solar panel system itself, the cost of mining is virtually free. Getting rid of a hefty electric bill which typically weighs down mining operations leaves more room for profit.

The Merkle recently documented a mining operation focused on Bitcoin in this manner. The setup has been running successfully for almost a year and currently uses 25 separate computing rigs. The process has been so profitable, in fact, that the miner running the operation plans to increase the number of computers to 1,000 this fall.

In the case of this particular desert miner, the individual mining rigs cost about $8,000. This cost has included all solar panels, power controls, batteries, and the Antminer S9 ASIC processor. When fully operational, each miner brings in a profit of about $18 per day.

Balance Between Mining Costs and Crypto Prices

Of course, a cheap mining operation is only part of the equation. In order for miners to make a tidy profit, the price of the cryptocurrencies they are generating must remain high.

In the case of the mining operation in question, Merkle suggests that Bitcoin prices must stay above $2,000 in order for the operation to be profitable. Considering that the price of most cryptocurrencies is highly volatile, and that drops of 205 or more have occurred in many individual days, this keeps a certain element of risk present in any mining operation.

It seems likely that more and more miners will turn to areas in which renewable energy is easily accessed. Iceland has already become a popular destination for Bitcoin miners thanks to its fast, virtually limitless internet. Miners looking to move to the desert should be cautious for other reasons, though: mining in the heat can cause rigs to break down more easily.

David Ogden
Entrepreneur

Author: Nathan Reiff

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$100 Billion Cryptocurrency Market Showing Signs of Maturity as Mainstream Investment Appeal Grows

Cryptocurrency has burst onto the financial scene like a blazing comet, offering investors a new asset class to grow their wealth, hedge against instability and escape the grips of central banking. As the market for digital coins crossed the $100 billion mark, hedge funds and major institutions suddenly found themselves scrambling to make sense of the shadowy world of cryptocurrency.

For the most part, investors no longer question the viability of cryptocurrency, but are instead exploring what shape this evolving market will take.

Cryptocurrencies Come Into Their Own

Though highly volatile, cryptocurrencies have been on a dramatic upward trajectory for the past year. In the case of bitcoin – the pre-eminent digital coin founded in 2008 by a person or entity called Satoshi Nahamoto – the bull market is at least seven years old. The success of bitcoin has spurred a bevy of other so-called altcoins, many of which have latched on to the success of the flagship digital coin.

Bitcoin’s share of the global cryptocurrency market has quickly diminished as alternative payment systems hit the market. At the time of writing, bitcoin represented roughly 41% of cryptocurrency market capitalization. By May, digital currency alternative Ethereum had surpassed half of bitcoin’s market value.

Several other currencies have also crossed the $1 billion mark this year, including Ripple, Litecoin, Ethereum Classic, Dash, NEM, IOTA and Stratis. Many more are worth hundreds of millions of dollars.

Key Investment Drivers

The growth and widespread adoption of cryptocurrency-as-an-asset has dividend analysts and investors seeking to understand the nature of the bull market. The market’s dramatic rise through the first six months of the year has raised fears of an asset bubble with dangerous consequences. But proponents of digital currency say the market has plenty of room for growth as investors seek alternative asset classes. They cite several key investment drivers as proof that cryptocurrencies aren’t overbought, but are instead maturing.

1. Hedge against instability: Despite their volatility, cryptocurrencies are seen as a hedge against central bank intervention and other forms of fiat-currency related instability. China is the most prominent example, as mainland investors have poured into bitcoin to diversify away from yuan devaluation. This compelled the People’s Bank of China (PBOC) to initiate a four-month freeze on bitcoin withdrawals.

2. Increased regulatory certainty: Earlier this year, the Japanese government legalized bitcoin as a form of payment and initiated capital requirements, cyber security laws and annual audits. Japan’s Accounting Standards Board is also in the process of developing a standard government digital currencies.

3. Store of value: Digital payment systems like bitcoin are mined, which makes them scarce digital resources that offer many of the same investment benefits as commodities. Bitcoin has a fixed issuance schedule with a finite supply of 21 million coins.

4. Greater investment appeal: Bitcoin’s success has triggered a fresh wave of buying interest from various segments of the market. Institutional investors and banks have expressed a greater interest in buying bitcoin. Nine of the world’s biggest banks – including Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan and Credit Suisse – are developing a common standard for blockchain that could also hasten the appeal of cryptocurrency-as-an-asset.

5. Decentralized payment system: Today, more than 100,000 merchants accept bitcoin as a form of payment. As the evolution away from fiat currency continues, demand for distributed digital money that exists beyond the purview of central banks will likely grow.

Price Volatility Continues

Despite their widespread appeal and unrelenting gains, cryptocurrencies are prone to dramatic price swings. This trend is expected to continue as the market slowly matures.

Cryptocurrencies sold off again on Friday, with five of the world’s top-ten coins posting weekly losses of 9% or more. Ethereum suffered the largest setback, while bitcoin managed to pare losses. IOTA, BitShares, NEM and IOTA also faced heavy losses.

With more than 700 digital payment systems on the market, analysts caution that not every cryptocurrency offers investment value. Some are clearly riding the coattails of bitcoin, while others are benefiting from speculation.

At the same time, there’s still plenty of room for disruption as alternatives to bitcoin vie for capital. Analysts observe that the the cryptocurrency market will likely see significant diversity for the foreseeable future.

David Ogden
Entrepreneur

Author: Sam Bourgi

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China and Japan Are Largely Responsible for the Current Success of Cryptocurrency

The adoption of digital currencies on both the individual and institutional level in China and Japan is propelling cryptocurrencies to ever greater heights. However, some are still skeptical that they are the finance systems of the future due to their current volatility.

CHINA AND JAPAN’S CRYPTO CRAZE

The age of cryptocurrencies is upon us, and two countries in particular have been instrumental in their stratospheric rise: China and Japan.

Cryptocurrencies have become popular in China due to the government’s stringent control of the yuan — a power they occasionally exercise by artificially devaluing the currency for trading purposes. With private wealth in China growing, affluent individuals have found a more stable and accessible alternative to the yuan in cryptocurrencies.

Additionally, China has an abundance of cheap energy and hardware, which facilitates crypto mining (the process through which new blocks in the blockchain are created and transactions are verified). Chinese exchanges run mining “pools” to generate these blocks, and these efforts constitute 60 percent of Bitcoin’s total hashrate (the speed at which Bitcoin operations are completed).

Japan got its foot in the cryptocurrency door at the beginning of 2017 when the market in China experienced an institutional and systematic crackdown, with the most potent measure being a ban on all cryptocurrency withdrawals. This caused an increase in Japan’s trading volume, which grew from one percent to as high as six percent.

Cryptocurrency adoption was further amplified by currency turbulence in the country. Quantitive easing lead to extremely low interest rates, which have occasionally even become negative, meaning that it costs an individual to save money. As in China, cryptocurrencies therefore became viewed as a more stable asset than the native currency, so more people have chosen to invest and store their money in them.

The final piece in the cryptocurrency success puzzle for both countries is increasing institutional acceptance. In China, this takes the form of the country’s Royal Mint, which has invested resources and money into digitizing the yuan and promoting blockchain technology. Japan, meanwhile, began accepting payments in stores using cryptocurrencies earlier this year, and its three largest banks — MUFJ, Mizuho, and SMBC — have all backed the country’s largest Bitcoin exchange, bitFlyer.

A WORLDWIDE REVOLUTION

The enthusiasm with which China and Japan have embraced cryptocurrency systems has contributed to their worldwide success. Virtual currencies have become more popular and valuable than the vast majority of people could have anticipated upon their inception around a decade ago. The value of a single bitcoin has risen from roughly $0.00075 to $2,500, and the market cap for all cryptocurrencies has exceed $100 billion.

The success of cryptocurrencies is also reflected in their increasing adoption by formal institutions. Wall Street is making moves to start using cryptocurrency systems by next year, a Swiss town called Zug has begun to accept payments in bitcoins, and the Gemini Trust in New York has been licensed to trade ether.

However, some worrying news concerning cryptocurrencies has emerged as well. Recently, in spite of claims that the systems are highly secure, hacks have lead to personal information being leaked and exchanges have been robbed, one to the tune of $79 million.

In addition, while cryptocurrencies may be more stable assets than the native currency in Japan and China, they are not absolutely stable. In fact, they are currently far from it, and though prices continue to rise, rapid drops are not uncommon, and public opinion can have a major impact on value.

Mark Cuban illustrated the issue perfectly — when he took to Twitter to assert that Bitcoin wasn’t a currency, its valuation dropped rapidly. Even more recently, Ethereum lost $4 billion worth of market value when a bogus story that its founder, Vitalik Buterin, had died in a car crash was published on 4chan.

Cryptocurrencies are clearly on the rise, and due to their successes, they can no longer be dismissed as a niche monetary system. The pertinent question is will this rise will lead to the worldwide adoption of an entirely new currency and finance system?

David Ogden
Entrepreneur

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How Balanced Cryptocurrency Portfolio Looks Like: Investment Tips

A large number of investors have started to purchase cryptocurrencies as a short-term and long-term investment, a safe haven asset and an experimental investment to develop a proper understanding of the market and the technology behind cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin.

As a result, even the initial coin offering (ICO) market, which is yet to showcase a viable product or a decentralized applications with an actual active user base, have begun to attract hundreds of millions of dollars in the past few months.

In fact, Tezos, Bancor and EOS, the three largest ICOs to date, have raised more than $485 mln, with the ICOs of EOS and Tezos still ongoing. However, none of these three ICOs have completed the testing phase of their software, leading many analysts to describe the ICO market as a bubble.

Still, the vast majority of investors in the cryptocurrency market are purchasing cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin, Ethereum, Litecoin and Ethereum Classic as long-term investments.

A large portion of investors within the cryptocurrency market wholly support the monetary policy, vision and purpose of popular cryptocurrencies that have evolved into useful alternative financial networks and decentralized infrastructures for decentralized applications.

What is a balanced cryptocurrency portfolio?

As mentioned above, the purpose of investing in cryptocurrencies varies greatly for investors. Most Bitcoin investors consider Bitcoin as a safe haven asset and a digital currency and have purchased Bitcoin expecting it to become a major alternative financial network which could compete with global banking systems and reserve currencies such as the US dollar in the far future.

If an investor remains unclear about the structure, purpose and monetary policies of certain cryptocurrencies and is investing in specific cryptocurrencies as an experimental investment to learn more about the market and various cryptocurrencies, it will be smart decision to maintain a diversified portfolio of a few different cryptocurrencies.

Investment tip from Andreas Antonopoulos

On June 13, Bitcoin and security expert Andreas Antonopoulos revealed his personal investment strategy in establishing a balanced portfolio of crypto assets. Antonopoulos wrote:

“Yes, I own a few different crypto assets as part of a small but diversified portfolio. I only risk as much as I'm willing to lose.”

The latter part of Antonopoulos’ statement is what most investors in the cryptocurrency market fails to consider. The entire cryptocurrency market is still at an early stage, and most cryptocurrencies remain extremely volatile. Hence, investors should not be investing more than they are willing to lose, especially if their investment is experimental and speculative.

Also, it will be beneficial and efficient for investors to utilize platforms such as Cyber Fund’s cryptocurrency portfolio builder Satoshi Pie, which allow investors to track their investments in real time in terms of change in value and performance against other assets.

David Ogden
Entrepreneur

Author: Joseph Young

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Bitcoin could nearly double and reach $5,000 soon, says Standpoint Research

Bitcoin traded near $2,600 Wednesday, according to CoinDesk.

Standpoint Research founder Ronnie Moas said the digital currency could rise to $5,000 "in a few months."

"This is not something I could keep my hands off of," Moas said.

Stock research analyst Ronnie Moas said he bought bitcoin this weekend and thinks it could reach $5,000 within a year.

"$5,000 could happen in a few months. It's only starting to gain traction right now," Moas, founder of Standpoint Research, told CNBC in a phone interview Wednesday. "It's starting to spread like wildfire right now."

He pointed out that since only 21 million bitcoin can ever exist, increasing demand for the digital currency will naturally drive its price up.

Bitcoin briefly tripled in value this year, hitting a record $3,025.47 on June 11, according to CoinDesk. The digital currency traded Wednesday near $2,600, still more than double its Dec. 31 price of $968.

"This is not something I could keep my hands off of," Moas said. "What would be more painful than losing [money in cryptocurrencies] is not acting."

The research analyst said he invested a few hundred U.S. dollars each in bitcoin, ethereum and another digital currency called litecoin through Coinbase.com. After he releases a 40-page report on cryptocurrencies in the next few weeks, Moas said he plans to invest more in them.

The research analyst's view on bitcoin joins the optimistic views of others on Wall Street. On Sunday, Goldman Sachs' technical analyst Sheba Jafari said in a note that bitcoin could rise as high as $3,915.

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Bitcoin could nearly double and reach $5,000 soon, says Standpoint Research Bitcoin could nearly double and reach $5,000 soon, says Standpoint Research

Stock research analyst Ronnie Moas said he bought bitcoin this weekend and thinks it could reach $5,000 within a year.

He pointed out that since only 21 million bitcoin can ever exist, increasing demand for the digital currency will naturally drive its price up.

"This is not something I could keep my hands off of," Moas said. "What would be more painful than losing [money in cryptocurrencies] is not acting."

Goldman Sachs says bitcoin could rise another 50% Goldman Sachs says bitcoin could rise another 50%

"In the next 6 to 12 months you're going to have a little bit of a hysteria," Moas said. However, "this has a long, long way to go before it gets to bubble territory."

Moas' reasoning is so little of global capital is in cryptocurrencies right now that the young digital currencies can absorb more of those funds without becoming overvalued.

McKinsey Global Institute estimated that the value of the world's stocks and debt rose to $212 trillion in 2010.

On the other hand, CoinMarketCap data showed the market capitalization of all cryptocurrencies has grown from below $20 billion at the start of this year to about $100 billion, still less than a tenth of a percent of global capital markets. Bitcoin has a market value of about $42 billion, according to CoinMarketCap.

"There will be scams, there will be accounts wiped out, there will be people that get hurt, like every other technology that is going on," Moas said. But "I think the cryptocurrency is here to stay. I think we're in the second inning of a 9-inning ball game."

Many, including some on Wall Street, believe that the blockchain technology behind bitcoin can fundamentally change the way the world operates, just like the internet did.

David Ogden
Entrepreneur

Author: Evelyn Cheng

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Bitcoin and Decentralized Networks are the Future, Says University Professor

Lorenzo Fioramonti, Professor of Political Economy at the University of Pretoria (South Africa), who also directs the Centre for the Study of Governance Innovation, recently published a write-up stating that money systems are in the process of transitioning from “centralized authority to decentralized networks.”

Cryptocurrencies represent a significant part of such decentralized networks. According to Fioramonti, there is a growing demand for digital currencies. On one hand, he exemplified with the recent adoption of cryptocurrencies in the world. Japan regulated bitcoin in April 2017, while the Russian government – who threatened virtual currencies last year – made a U-turn and even President Vladimir Putin met with Ethereum founder Vitalik Buterin. In addition, China halted its initial freeze on bitcoin exchanges in the country, therefore, the major BTC exchanges in the country resumed trading in June 2017. In the United States and Australia, digital currencies are experiencing higher adoption rates, in addition, the Oceanian country will soon exempt traders and investors from goods and services tax.

The professor stated, in the near future, cryptocurrencies will “become much more common as methods of payment for a wide range of purchases, from online shopping to the local supermarket.” Not just developed, but developing countries are making efforts to implement digital currencies in their economies, Fioramonti wrote.

In Venezuela, where the current economy is facing major problems, bitcoin has become “the leading parallel currency”, the professor wrote. While the official national currency of the South American country is worth almost nothing, bitcoin can be used to perform transactions, buy food along with other basic necessities, and to purchase products from overseas countries bypassing the strict controls on capital.

Local innovators in East Africa implemented the use of cryptocurrencies in cross-border transactions. An example for this is BitPesa. According to the professor, the popularity of cryptocurrencies in South Africa is also on the rise. Since the Nigerian government failed its citizens by conventional money, local traders and activists believe digital currencies has a potential to democratize the economy. Verengai Mabika, founder of BitFinance in Zimbabwe, stated bitcoin is an attractive alternative for conducting online payments and remittances, which “constitute the backbone of the economy.” Verengai told Fioramonti that 37 percent of BitFinance’s customers use cryptocurrencies for savings since the 2008 hyperinflation resulted in the collapse of the Zimbabwe’s financial institutions.

Fioramonti stated that decentralization is the “core of this new trend.” According to the professor, the use of cryptocurrencies “will make economies more resilient against shocks and will support more equitable and sustainable development, by putting users in the driver seat and reinforcing local economic development.”

David Ogden
Entrepreneur

Author: Benjamin Vitáris

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Cryptocurrencies Could Reach $5 Trillion in 5 Years, Says Wall Street Billionaire Bitcoin Investor

Billionaire investor Michael Novogratz, a former hedge fund manager who has been supportive of bitcoin, claims cryptocurrencies could be worth more than $5 trillion in five years, speaking at the CB Insights Future of Fintech conference in New York,

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For this to happen, companies have to develop business principles that satisfy regulators. The recent cyberattack that disabled computers and demanded $300 bitcoin ransom payments is one reminder of the challenge bitcoin faces, following May’s WannaCry attack. Such events reinforce bitcoin’s reputation as a currency favored by hackers and criminals.

Bitcoin Needs A Better Reputation

Novogratz, who formerly managed liquid strategies for Fortress Investment Group LLC and has addressed bitcoin investments since 2013, is among Wall Street’s most visible cryptocurrency supporters, according to Bloomberg. He urged cryptocurrency companies to pay their taxes since “nobody in that space” pays taxes. He said a core group of developers have good intentions, however.

The Nasdaq reached $5.4 trillion in 1999, he noted.

Hack’s Impact Not Great

The recent cyberattack did not impact bitcoin’s price, which at 2 p.m. Tuesday was $2,339.66. Some makers of chips used for bitcoin mining equipment did retreat, however. Bitcoin has gained more than 140% on the year, while Ether has skyrocketed from $8 to $240.

Challenges still face cryptocurrencies, Novogratz noted. The cyberattack struck amidst questions about the strength of the current cryptocurrency rally and about the scalability of digital assets, Novogratz noted.

This week’s downturn in crypto values shrunk the total market cap from $110 billion $90 billion, according to coinmarketcap.com.

Novogratz Bets On Bitcoin

Novogratz said he has profited on the bitcoin and ether surges, and still has 10% of his net worth in cryptos, including assets he acquired in initial coin offerings. He hopes to add more bitcoin if the price falls to $2,000, and more Ether should the price drop between $200 and $150.

Bitcoin could emerge as a store of wealth similar to gold, he said, while Ethereum could provide the foundation for future Facebooks and Googles. He suspects money transfers to securities settlement will discontinue using blockchain technology.

David Ogden
Entrepreneur

Author: Lester Coleman

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