Track market-moving stories before they get noisy

Posted: December 4, 2019

Decentralized finance, popularly known as DeFi, has been one of the greatest use cases of the Ethereum network. With most of the DeFi applications developed on the Ethereum blockchain, DeFi has a total of about $660.2 million locked in the platform. However, Dragonfly Research’s Haseeb Qureshi claims to have pointed out a potential threat to the Proof-of-Stake [PoS] algorithm.

While the Ethereum community has been gearing up for the network’s transition from Proof-of-Work [PoW] to PoS with Ethereum 2.0, Qureshi’s latest post questions the working of PoS in the network. With DeFi’s most popular sector being the lending and borrowing platform, this on-chain lending platform not only affects traditional secured lending, but also the PoS consensus.

Qureshi, in his post, elaborated on how secure the PoS system is and wrote,

“A PoS system is secure when there are lots of coins actively staked for the network. In most PoS algorithms, so long as 2/3rds of all the staked assets are owned by honest actors, the blockchain will be secure.”

There are two possible ways a person could attack the PoS system. The first one would be fairly difficult and expensive as it requires the attacker to acquire 1/3rd of the remaining stake. However, Qureshi listed out a second option that would require the attacker to influence present stakers to discontinue staking and take over the much cheaper network by offering them a better yield elsewhere. This could be possible as stakers require rewards that are big enough in order to be incentivized to stake. He further detailed the reason behind the same and wrote,

“But if they can get better returns elsewhere, then you should expect a rational staker to unstake their assets and put them wherever they earn a higher return.”

This could possibly transfer the demand away from staking which would make the network comparably less safe. Taking into consideration on-chain lending markets, they directly challenge staking further testing the security of the entire protocol. Furthermore, while Ethereum is yet to dive into the PoS algorithm, Qureshi described the only way to defend the possible attack. He wrote,

“The only realistic way that this can be defended against is by using flexible monetary policy to offer competitive rates when necessary. Any fixed inflationary regime is vulnerable to this kind of attack, since an attacker always knows exactly how much they need to subsidize the lending market in order to cannibalize stakers.”

While Ethereum’s Vlad Zamfir dismissed Qureshi’s post and labeled it “ancient long-adressed bullsh*t,” Co-founder of the Ethereum network, Vitalik Buterin, elaborated on why the research doesn’t hold. In a series of tweets, Buterin said,

The assumption that deflationary monetary policy implies R approaches zero is wrong, it ignores transaction fees

Obviously if rewards *and* fees approach zero percentage staked approaches zero

— vitalik.eth (@VitalikButerin) December 3, 2019

Additionally, Qi Zhou, Founder of QuarkChain, commented on Qureshi’s Medium post suggesting another possibility, “suppose a block producing reward (not include tx fees) equals to staker_token / sum_of_all_staker_token.” Zhou pointed out that there is a chance of stakers unstaking and lending their tokens if the rate of return of PoS would be worse than lending. This would further lower the total staked token and increase the return rate of PoS, which would help in attaining an equilibrium. He concluded by stating,

“Admittedly, this may hurt the system security but it seems that 100% percentage lending from the figure seems to be impossible.”

Institutions Aren’t Buying Crypto, They’re Buying the Rails

3 Bullish Signals Suggest Ethereum May Be Undervalued in April

Posted: March 31, 2020

The latest bullish appraisal was indicative of the fact that the downturn in the crypto-market was short-lived as the collective market cap sprung to $180 billion. Unfortunately for the bears, a continuation of this upward momentum could potentially help recover the substantial losses incurred by many of these coins during the 12 March market crash, especially in the case of Alts like Tezos, Augur, and FTT.

Tezos [XTZ]

In a recent development for the Tezos ecosystem, the token XTZ was recently listed on the crypto-exchange Poloniex. On its price side, however, the token failed to maintain an upward movement and despite a bullish streak in the early days of 2020, XTZ collapsed to $2.00-level. However, the latest rally did drive the price closer to its resistance level.

At press time, Tezos’s price stood at $1.59, while holding a market cap of $1.12 billion. Additionally, the token registered a trading volume of $90.05 million after surging by 4.21% over the last 24-hours.

Resistance: $2.57, $3.18

Support: $1.23, $0.76

MACD: The signal line hovering below the MACD indicated a bullish phase for the coin.

Chaikin Money Flow: The CMF also noted an upward movement towards the bullish zone.

Augur [REP]

Augur recently announced the fork of MolochDAO, which is focused on funding the development of Ethereum 2.0, to create OracleDAO. This DAO is essentially a smart contract that aims to coordinate efforts to build tools and market Augur, and its token REP.

Augur [REP] was also enjoying the latest price movement as it was up by a whopping 6.67% which drove its price to $10.34. At press time, the coin had a market cap of $113.7 million and registered a 24-hour trading volume of $42.23.

Resistance: $12.75, $17.28

Support: $6.39

Parabolic SAR: The dotted markers were below the Augur price candles which was indicative of a bullish trend.

Awesome Oscillator: The AO indicator also depicted a bullish price trend for the coin with its green closing bars.

FTX Token [FTT]

The recent price action of the crypto-platform FTX’s native token, FTT, has not been very impressive. One of the factors was speculated to be Binance delisting all leveraged tokens linked to the FTX Exchange.

However, following the latest market rally, FTT token was also up by 6.99%, propelling its coin to climb to a value of $2.41. At press time, the token held a market cap of $230.4 million and a 24-hour trading volume of $3.34 million.

Resistance: $2.81

Support: $2.007

Klinger Oscillator: The KO line above the signal line suggested a bullish flip for the token in the near-term.

RSI: RSI spiked from the oversold zone to the 50-median neutral zone, meaning a revival of interest among the investors in the FTT market.

Stellar to Match XLM Donations to Six Non-Profits During April

Another week, another round of Crypto Tidbits. Bitcoin has effectively been flat on the week, recently returning to around where it started the week after briefly interacting with the ever-important $7,400 resistance. Altcoins, interestingly, came into their own this week, with Ethereum, Link, Tezos, EOS, among other top altcoins posting double-digit percentage gains in the past seven days.

Bitcoin’s stagnation over the past week comes as the stock market has mounted a strong comeback, with the S&P 500 rallying 12% from last Friday’s close to Thursday’s close despite 6.6 million new unemployment claims in the U.S. and the ongoing coronavirus outbreak.

Despite the non-action, analysts are still bullish on BTC and the rest of the cryptocurrency market. In fact, as reported by NewsBTC previously, BitMEX CEO Arthur Hayes said that while he could see Bitcoin revisiting $3,000, his year-end price target “remains $20,000,” which is 180% above the current price.

As to why he thinks this is the case, he cited that the monetary and fiscal solutions that governments and central banks are enlisting to stave off precision:

“Everyone knows the shift is upon us, that is why central bankers and politicians will throw all of their tools at this problem. And I will reiterate, that is inflationary because more fiat money will chase a flat to declining supply of real goods and labour. There are only two things to own during the transition to whatever the new system is and that is gold and bitcoin.”

Related Reading: Crypto Tidbits: Bitcoin At $7,000, FATF Regulation, Coinbase Backs Ethereum DeFi Bitcoin & Crypto Tidbits Crypto Industry Sees Layoffs: The Bitcoin community and broader crypto space have not been spared in the recent economic carnage. According to a “100% user-generated” list of companies on recruiting/job site Candor, Bitcoin.com, crypto mining firm Bitfarms, and mining hardware manufacturer Bitfury are among the firms in this industry that have begun to lay off staff over the past few weeks. Outside of this, one of the original crypto companies, Factom, has purportedly gone into liquidation, despite securing millions of dollars worth of funding over the past five years and garnering a grant from the U.S. Energy Department. Ethereum DeFi Has Seen Stellar Growth: In a report published April 9th, blockchain analytics site DappReview revealed that transaction volume across Ethereum-based DeFi projects has increased by nearly 800% when comparing Q1 2020’s metrics to that of Q1 2019. Much of this growth was attributed to projects like Maker and Compound — which offer decentralized loans and stablecoin solutions — and derivatives providers like Synthetix and Augur. This growth comes as crypto upstart Thesis and other partners are soon to release tBTC — a project that will act as a decentralized representation of Bitcoin on the Ethereum blockchain. Analysts expect for the launch of this project to boost DeFi adoption, with both ETH  and BTC holders Bitcoin Cash & Bitcoin SV See Block Reward Halvings: Both Bitcoin Cash and Bitcoin SV have seen their block reward halvings pass in the past 72 hours. As a result, both networks saw their hash rates and difficulty drop. The halving resulted in an instant 50% reduction in mining revenues for those operating on the BCH and BSV chain, forcing operators running on tight margins to turn off their machines or mine on other networks. Fewer machines mean fewer computers processing blocks, resulting in slower transactions. South Korea Launches Digital Currency Project: On Monday, South Korea’s central bank, the Bank of Korea, revealed that it has launched a pilot program for testing a digital won, which is slated to run to December 2021.  A release outlining this move said the program will determine if there are a legal case and ample technical capability to launch a digital currency in South Korea. This comes just six weeks after the South Korean National Assembly passed legislation that will provide a comprehensive framework for the regulation and legalization of cryptocurrencies and Bitcoin exchanges. Twitter CEO & Bitcoin Bull Jack Dorsey Pledges $1 Billion to COVID-19 Relief: Jack Dorsey announced in a Twitter thread this week that Yesterday, Dorsey announced in a Twitter thread — it’s quite fitting, I must say — that he will be “moving $1 billion of my Square equity,” which purportedly corresponds with around 28% of his total wealth, to a LLC called “Start Small” to “fund global COVID-19 relief.” Start Small existed prior to this outbreak, but this is the first time it has seen mainstream attention. The Bitcoin bull intends to allocate the rest of the donation to the promotion of Universal Basic Income and girl’s health and education, calling both issues critical. Fidelity Sees Growth In Crypto Demand: Fidelity Digital Assets — the crypto services division of Wall Street giant Fidelity Investments, a firm with trillions under management — has confirmed it has seen an uptick in interest. Speaking to Frank Chaparro of The Block, a spokeswoman for the firm said that:
“From a trading perspective, we continue to onboard new clients every month and are seeing significant pipeline growth. […] And in recent weeks, we’ve seen more momentum across our business.”

Photo by Sandro Katalina on Unsplash

First DApp on Ethereum Was Prediction Market Augur

The Komodo platform is many things – a unique blockchain, a coin that pays interest, a decentralized exchange, a development blockchain with many additional features being planned for the future.

The Komodo blockchain is a fork of the ZCash blockchain, which itself was forked from the Bitcoin blockchain, making Komodo a descendent of Bitcoin. It includes the zk-snark technology that Zcash was built upon, and adds a delayed proof of work consensus algorithm to make Komodo more robust and secure.

The ultimate goal of Komodo is to create an entire ecosystem comprised of diverse partnerships that will send the platform forward into the future. Because it was designed to be used by developers of any level and in any industry it is extremely versatile.

In this comprehensive review, I will give you everything that you need to know about the Komodo platform.

How Komodo WorksThose doing development on the Komodo platform are not building onto the blockchain, but are instead building their own standalone blockchains. It’s not a fork or sidechain, and the Komodo platform doesn’t act as a parent to the new blockchain.

Each project is an independent blockchain that becomes connected to the Komodo ecosystem. This is crucial because the fact that each blockchain is independent means that future development won’t be limited by Komodo in any way.

Benefits of the Komodo Platform

Komodo was also designed from the ground up as a modular ecosystem. This allows developers to choose which technologies they wish to use in their own projects.

Perhaps most importantly, Komodo was developed with security as a top priority. In addition to using the Zcash zk-snark protocols for anonymity and privacy, Komodo uses a delayed proof of work (PoW) protocol to provide Bitcoin level security to even the smallest blockchains and projects. As stated on the Komodo website itself:

Komodo’s innovative dPOW (delayed proof of work) provides a security layer that creates backups of your blockchain’s data and notarizes it to Bitcoin’s blockchain, providing even the smallest of blockchains with Bitcoin-level security.

In essence, Komodo is using Bitcoin’s hashrate to ensure immutability for the Komodo blockchain.

Komodo PrivacyKomodo was created as a form of the Zcash blockchain, using their technology known as ‘Zero Knowledge Proofs’. This technology allows each transaction on the blockchain to be 100% anonymous or as transparent as necessary given the requirements of each situation.

Anonymous transactions are important to many users because they hide the amount, sender and recipient of the transaction, but still make it possible for miners to verify that the transaction is valid and without any double-spending. Alternatively transactions can be left transparent, in which case information shows just as it would for a Bitcoin transaction.

Anonymous transactions help protect user privacy, but they provide a more important function, and that is to preserve fungibility, which is a basic requirement for any currency.

Komodo SecurityAfter including privacy by forming from Zcash, the developers of Komodo provided for enhanced security of the blockchain in a unique manner. They created a proof of work token, but modified it to be Delayed Proof of Work, allowing it to recycle Bitcoin’s hashrate to ensure immutability of Komodo’s blockchain.

Komodo does this by using 64 “notary nodes” that work to notarize blocks in the Bitcoin blockchain. This provides protection for Komodo because an attacker would have to alter both the block in the Komodo blockchain and the block in the Bitcoin blockchain.

Steps in the Komodo Delayed Proof of Work

As long as the Bitcoin blockchain is secure, so too will Komodo – and all the other blockchains built using Komodo – remain secure.

This mechanism can now be used by any cryptocurrency that wishes enhanced security. By using Komodo the new blockchains are connected to Bitcoin, benefiting from the security of the Bitcoin blockchain, while also saving on transaction costs.

Komodo TeamThe Komodo project is based on anonymity, so it comes as no surprise that many of the Komodo team members initially chose not to reveal their identity. The founder and one core developer of Komodo went by the moniker JL777, but is now known as James ‘JL777’ Lee.

The CTO of the project was known as CA333, but we now know him as Kadan Stadelmann. This increased transparency has come about as Komodo grows in size and scope and is attracting more investors.

The full team is now nearly 30 members spanning leadership, development, marketing, and community development. And speaking of community, there are numerous contributors from the community, both developers and community outreach ambassadors.

Some of the Komodo Team Members

Currently, the general manager of Komodo is Ben Fairbanks, who is also the founder and CEO of RedFOX Labs, an incubator that is helping to launch Komodo based companies in emerging markets. Prior to joining Komodo and launching RedFOX, he served as COO at the ride-hailing service Grab. He brings extensive business and marketing experience to the project.

The CTO of the Komodo project, almost since the very beginning, has been Kaden Stadelmann. He also serves as CTO of RedFOX Labs. He previously worked as an IT security analyst and software developer, and founded the company satoshihack back in 2011, making him a pioneer in the blockchain space.

Core development is led by founder James Lee, and he is joined by Adam Bullock and Mihailo Milenkovic as well as roughly a dozen full-time developers and another dozen community volunteer developers.

KMD CoinThe Komodo native currency (KMD) was launched in an ICO in February 2017 at a price of $0.10. Since then the price of the coin has risen and fallen with the fortunes of the project and the markets. As of mid-March 2018 it was trading at $2.73 and was ranked the #48 coin by market cap on Coinmarketcap.com.

Even though 2018 saw many coins losing 90% or more of their value, KMD held up fairly well in the face of the bear market. It rallied in April, topping $4 and slowly sank from that level, finally dipping under $1 in November 2018 and hitting a low of $0.492329 on November 25, 2018.

It slowly recovered from that low and by February 2019 had doubled in price as it traded back above $1. It remained above $1 for nearly all of 2019, and nearly hit $2 in July 2019, but the price has recently dropped and as of August 9, 2019 stands at $0.863399.

KMD Price Performance. Image via CMC

The fundamentals for the coin continue to look solid thanks to the 5% annual interest rate paid to KMD holders, and the current low price is more a reflection of broad-based weakness in the cryptocurrency markets.

There are currently 115,389,114KMD in circulation, with a planned total supply of 200 million coins, which is projected to be reached in 2031. Until that time, KMD holders will continue to receive a 5.1% annual interest payment (called Active User Rewards) on their KMD holdings, so long as they keep more than 10 KMD in a wallet where they control the private keys. The KMD had an all-time high of $12.54 on December 21, 2017.

Buying & Storing KMDKMD can be purchased on a good number of exchanges, with the largest volume on CoinBene. There is also good volume at Binance, CoinEx, and HitBTC. Other good choices for buying KMD include CoinEx and Bittrex.

Given that there is strong volume across a number of exhanges, it bodes well for the liquidity of KMD. Improved liquidity means that you can execute large block orders on these books without much slippage in the price of the coin.

Register at Binance and Buy KMD Coin

In order to earn the 5.1% annual interest users must hold their KMD in a supported wallet. The top two based on the Komodo website are the Verus Agama wallet, which is a multi-coin wallet from the Verus Coin project, or the native Komodo OceanQT wallet. Other options include the Guarda Wallet and the ZelCore wallet.

Development & RoadmapWhen it comes to determining the amount of work that has been done by a project, there are a number of metrics one can look at.

However, one of the most effective that I have found is to take a look at the coding activity in the project's public repositories.

Therefore, I decided to jump into the Komodo GitHub to get a better sense of what the developers have been pushing over the past year. Below is the total code commits to two of their development repos.

Commits for Select Repos over past 12 months

As you can see from the above, the team has been quite active pushing code to their core repository over the past year. It is also worth pointing out that there are a further 56 other repositories with varying degrees of activity.

This is more development activity than we have seen at most other projects. In fact, if we were to compare Komodo to its peers, it is ranked 30th in terms of commits and 12th for overall coding activity on coincodecap.

This perhaps makes sense when viewed in the context of the numerous projects being built on the Komodo platform (more below). 

In terms of the upcoming roadmap, the two most important remaining milestones for 2019 are the release of the developer portal as well as the GUI for the fully mobile-ready wallet/DEX hybrid.

If you want to keep up to date with development on the project then I suggest you jump into their discord and meet the team. They also encourage community developer contributions to the core.

Komodo Platform ProjectsThere are a number of standalone projects that were developed for the Komodo platform. Those that are farthest along in development and have been released as at least betas include Decentralized ICOs, BarterDEX along with a built-in “tumbler” service called Jumblr.

However, as of July 2019 Komodo has launched its Antara Framework, which is the basis for nearly all current services on Komodo.

Decentralized Initial Coin Offerings (ICOs)The Decentralised ICO concept was meant to be an exciting option for startups as it would mean that they could launch their process much easier. It would also have given them access to the Komodo technology, marketing channels, and consultants.

However, given the regulatory pressure that has been placed on ICOs recently, this initiative seems to have fallen by the wayside. Of course, the lackluster performance of most recent ICOs has not helped the process.

The Komodo team had plans to launch a number of Decentralised ICOs. In May of last year they planned to release their first with the BlocNation dICO. However, this did not seem to materialize and the Blocnation project seems to have gone dead (with the site down).

The dICO that never materialized... Image via Komodo Blog

Despite this though, Komodo will accept pre-existing blockchain projects on other platforms that would like to migrate to Komodo to receive your own fully customizable, high performing independent blockchain.

As of August 2019 there are a number of projects that have launched on Komodo.

JumblrJumblr is a cryptocurrency anonymizer developed by Komodo which is decentralized and open-source. It can be used to increase privacy when using the Komodo platform.

Anonymizing funds is actually a fairly straightforward and simple practice. The Jumblr will take KMD tokens from a non-private address and send them through a number of zk-snark addresses.

Once these untraceable addresses have processed the coins they are sent to a new address where they are completely anonymous. The fee for using the Jumblr service is 0.3%, which is payable in KMD tokens.

BarterDEX Rebranded to AtomicDEXBarterDEX was previously called EasyDEX but was rebranded in July 2017. It is a decentralized exchange utilizing atomic swaps, and more recently etomic swaps, which bridge the gap between Bitcoin and Ethereum based blockchains.

The use of atomic swaps and etomic swaps lower counterparty risk, transaction fees and speeds the transfer of assets. BarterDEX can support trading of any cryptocurrency, and will also support fiat in the future. Already the decentralized exchange is capable of performing swaps for 95% of the cryptocurrencies in existence.

BarterDEX also solves the liquidity problem encountered by most decentralized exchanges by producing Liquidity Nodes that stabilizes prices by buying and selling assets in the order books.

Screenshots from the AtomicDex App. Image via atomicdex.io

In July 2019 the BarterDEX platform got another upgrade and rebrand and has been re-launched as AtomicDEX in a closed public beta. AtomicDEX provides a secure, reliable, and completely decentralized method for trading digital assets.

Trades no longer have to pass through an intermediary but are done from wallet to wallet. AtomicDEX will act as a multi-currency wallet and as a fully decentralized trading platform. At its beta release, AtomicDEX has support for 13 different coins, but can technically support 99% of all existing cryptocurrencies. New coins will be added with each update to the DEX.

The Antara FrameworkThe Antara Framework was launched on the Komodo mainnet on July 15, 2019, completing a rebrand that stretched out for nearly a full year. This relaunch has included several new developments, such as the beta release of the Antara Smart Chain Composer, which allows anyone to launch their own SmartChain blockchain in just minutes, including full seed nodes and mining nodes.

The Antara Framework is an adaptable framework for simple, end-to-end blockchain development. Antara makes it easier than ever before to launch a chain, activate modules, and start building blockchain-based applications.

Antara has maintained the independence and privacy of building with Komodo. Each independent chain has its own consensus rules, hashing algorithm, decentralized network, and coin. Blockchains launched with Komodo’s technology never depend on the KMD chain, network, or platform.

Antara Network Recently Going live. Image via Komodo Blog

It’s an open ecosystem so there is no vendor lock-in. Creating a chain from the CLI is permissionless and free. The Komodo team is not informed when a chain is created so there's no way to track a chain after launch.

The framework also comes with built-in modules, making development speedy and easier. This allows developers to natively support any software, dApp or blockchain-based games.

With 18 different customizable Smart Chain parameters, any blockchain can be built to serve any business need. The Antara Integration Layer also offers several white label products such as a multi-coin wallet, block explorers, full seed nodes, a branded DEX, a crowdfunding app and integration with SPV Electrum servers.

CompetitionBecause Komodo is involved in so many aspects of the blockchain it is facing competition from many different directions.

Decentralized exchanges are becoming increasingly popular, and the AtomicDEX exchange is in competition with BitShares, EtherDelta, and Waves, as well as many other smaller players.

As a privacy coin, KMD competes against the larger Dash and Monero coins, and of course against the Zcash that it was forked from.

Komodo faces stiff competition from Ethereum as it is the leader in the ICO and smart contracts field, but other established blockchains such as NEO, NXT and Waves are also competing for ICO traction.

And now we also have initial exchange offerings (IEOs) from the likes of Binance and other exchanges growing in popularity. Smart contracts have also found their way into most projects. One strength for Komodo is that it is the first to offer a fully decentralized exchange with atomic swap capabilities.

ConclusionThe Komodo project is an extensive and ambitious large-scale project that aims to solve many issues that centralization of cryptocurrencies and blockchains face.

In addition to being its own blockchain and coin, it is also tackling the decentralized exchange, atomic swap, and decentralized ICO space. It includes options for anonymity and has a unique proof of work consensus algorithm that promises enhanced security, even for new blockchains based off Komodo.

Needless to say, that’s a lot to bite off, but the Komodo team has shown itself to be up to the challenge time and again. In a world where deadlines are often missed by months, the Komodo team has not only delivered but also delivered early and with few bugs. The team also takes user feedback into consideration and has been known to pivot quickly based on the needs of the community.

If the Komodo team continues to deliver it could make a long-term lasting impact on the cryptocurrency space, but it is too early to tell if this will be the case. In any event, it is certainly a project worth watching.

In the roughly 18 months since this review was first prepared the Komodo team has continued to deliver an exceptional product, and with the July 2019 release of the Antara Framework, it has advanced to the first composable SmartChain platform in the industry. This first-mover advantage keeps Komodo on the cutting edge of blockchain development.

Disclaimer: These are the writer's opinions and should not be considered investment advice. Readers should do their own research.

How & Where to buy Cardano: Complete Guide

The 24-year-old of the Ethereum project originally proposed the creation of the network late in 2013. Buterin has kept to his word and is still at Ethereum and is working hard to make it better than ever! In the past, the founder of Ethereum, Vitalik Buterin has sat down in many interviews to discuss all things related to the decentralised network. The unofficial ‘CEO’ has gone onto explain in an MIT interview as to why the network can only be truly decentralised after it stops looking to him for answers. 

The 24-year-old of the Ethereum project originally proposed the creation of the network late in 2013. Even so, he revealed that it was time for him to start taking a back seat for Ethereum rather than being full-on. This will allow the community to grow and grow in a decentralised way.

This sparks up the query as to whether Buterin is getting ready to leave Ethereum.

Some Twitter users took his words of taking a back seat as Buterin planning an exit strategy similar to how Dan Larimer has left numerous blockchain projects. 

Dan ended up developing the blockchain tech of Graphene that gave fuel to BitShare and the Steem coin but he ended up leaving the project to start Steemit after he founded BitShares in 2013. Then two years ago, he went onto leave Steemit and joined Block.one as it Chief Technology Officer (which had an exciting year, to say the least!) and marched a successful crowdfunding to create EOS. 

In a tweet aimed towards Buterin, he accused him of planning his exit strategically and prompted him to reply and correct his speculation.

“Looks like @VitalikButerin is getting ready to pull a @DanLarimer. Exited!!. People continue to NOT understand what a Decentralized #Blockchain is & why #Bitcoin does NOT compete w/ nonsense like #Ethereum $ETH or #EOS $EOS, it compets w/ $USD $EUR $GOLD”

Responding to the tweet, Buterin said:

I am not leaving. No plans to stop or reduce blog posts / ethresearch posts / github commits. Vitalik is "in charge": ETH is centralized! Vitalik is not "in charge": Vitalik is pulling a Dan Larimer! This is why BTC maximalists have zero credibility.” This was an interview, Buterin did last year but one year on and to this day, Buterin has kept to his word and is still at Ethereum and is working hard to make it better than ever! It makes you question what the protocol would be like without Buterin overlooking it. If you take his words for granted then it would be more decentralised!

Tagged:

BTC Halving Countdown, Kobe Death Exploited, Donut Row: Hodler’s Digest, Jan. 27–Feb. 2

Prominent angel investor Armando Pantoja recently commented on the popular claim within the crypto community from critics labeling XRP as a “dead coin.”

The market commentator disagrees with this categorization. According to him, the claim is devoid of logic, as XRP remains the fourth-biggest crypto asset in the market. He stressed that a “dead coin” obviously cannot have a $112.8 billion market cap and rank just behind Ethereum and Bitcoin.

XRP Stands Strong Over Ten Years and Counting Drawing from his over a decade of experience in the crypto industry, Pantoja pointed out that the crypto assets making the top ranks today are entirely different from those of the past. In particular, some crypto assets that once ranked in the top 100 by market cap have now faded into oblivion.

Indeed, historical data from CoinMarketCap confirms that tokens like BitShares (BTS), Dash, NXT, Paycoin (XPY), and MAID were among the top ten precisely ten years ago, in March 2015.

However, these coins have now been completely relegated to the back seat. Meanwhile, during this time, XRP was even the second biggest crypto, behind Bitcoin only. Ten years later, XRP continues to defend its position among the most prominent crypto assets.

Top ten crypto ten years ago with XRP Pantoja cited this data to emphasize that the argument labeling XRP as “dead” is wholly misplaced and lacks sincerity. In his words:

“People don’t realize that all these other coins—hundreds, even thousands of coins—that were supposed to be great projects are gone now. XRP has held on, and that shows it’s not a dead coin. This is what we call success bias.”

He argued that supporters of such negative views are driven by a sense of rivalry. Pantoja stressed that commentators often fail to recognize all the failures and focus only on the successful projects. As a result, they’d look at XRP and assert, “Well, these other coins are more successful, so XRP is a failure.”

For Every Few Coins That Outperform XRP, 10,000 Others Failed In terms of price performance, Pantoja argued that out of the three or four coins that may have done better than XRP over the years, there are at least 10,000 coins that have failed completely.

He used this argument to dismiss the critical views concerning XRP’s failure to establish a new all-time high in seven years. At press time, XRP trades at $2.03, down 47.1% from its 2018 peak of $3.83.

DisClamier: This content is informational and should not be considered financial advice. The views expressed in this article may include the author's personal opinions and do not reflect The Crypto Basic opinion. Readers are encouraged to do thorough research before making any investment decisions. The Crypto Basic is not responsible for any financial losses.

Analyst Shares Quick Survival Guide for Altcoin Traders Amid November Fear

The halving has just commenced, and plenty of bargains abound. Cardano and ICON are among the altcoins being mentioned as potential candidates for a recovery in 2025, while the smart money is betting on low-cap gems with major moon potential in presale opportunities like DeeStream. DeeStream is widely expected to become one of the top performers out of newly launched cryptos in 2024 thanks to its unique decentralized live streaming platform that seeks to provide THE Web3 alternative to YouTube. Learn why DeeStream could be in line for parabolic profits in 2024, regardless of whether Bitcoin and Ethereum perform well.

Will ICON ever make a comeback?ICON is the native token of the Layer-1 ICX blockchain, founded at the height of the 2017 bull market. ICX is an interoperability-focused project featuring the ICON Cross-Chain Framework that enables cross-chain development. ICON last hit all-time highs in January 2018, when it peaked at $13.16 per ICON token. Since then, however, ICON token prices have plummeted to 98.2% below their previous all-time highs, changing hands at $0.24 as of press time. However, ICON holders and prospective investors looking for a retest of its all-time highs in 2024 and 2025 will be better off investing in low-cap gems without a chance to undergo a proper bull market yet—including DeeStream.

Cardano continues to lag behind other altcoinsCardano was a big-time performer in the previous bull cycle after breaching all-time highs of $3.09 back in September 2021. However, since then, Cardano has been among the worst performers of any of the top-20 cryptocurrencies by market capitalization. As of press time, Cardano was trading at $0.49, far below its September 2021 all-time highs. Cardano, in fact, isn’t any closer to hitting $1 ever since scaling heights of $0.77 in March.

DeeStream seeks to make waves as the “YouTube of Web3”DeeStream is among the hottest new presale investment opportunities of 2024, with the projects building the premier Web3 alternative to streaming platforms like YouTube, Twitch, Kick, and TikTok. As of stage 2 of its presale, DeeStream is putting up its DST token for sale at just $0.06, indicating what could be a perfect entry opportunity into a project with 100x potential. DeeStream has the talent, team, and tech to establish itself as the “YouTube of Web3” with its robust, full-featured live video streaming and distribution platform paired with blockchain technology and principles.

DeeStream will enable content creators to publish and distribute premium, studio-quality content without the exploitative and censorious practices associated with traditional platforms. Using its native token DST, both content creators and audiences will have access to diverse monetization and engagement opportunities. Content creators could earn more using the myriad of Web3-based earning opportunities, while early adopters will be entitled to passive income from a revenue share on platform fees. With industry insiders forecasting a potential 20x to 100x increase for DeeStream, there’s no better time to join the launch than right now.

Website

Disclaimer: This article is a press release. COINTURK NEWS is not responsible for any damage or loss related to any product or service mentioned in this article. COINTURK NEWS recommends that readers carefully research the company mentioned in the article.

Crypto markets still range bound; Bitcoin, BCH and BSV moving marginally, Litecoin, BNB and ADA fall back.  Market Wrap It has been another day of consolidation for crypto markets as they end the week flat. Very little movement outside of the channel has occurred this week as total market capitalization has been range bound around the $250 billion level. Things have picked up marginally for some crypto assets but others have lost ground.

Bitcoin hit an intraday high of just above $8,300 a few hours ago but pulled back to its current price of $8,230. The move is bullish but not strong enough to break the resistance at this level. Volume has picked up again and is approaching $20 billion which is a sign that further gains could be on the cards.

Ethereum is still flat and holding around $255. There has been very little momentum in the ETH camp and it is down 1.5 percent on the day. Volume is declining as the head and shoulders formation reaches its closure and a drop could be imminent. Current support for ETH lies at $230.

The top ten is showing more red than green during Asian trading this morning. The only two aside from Bitcoin that are up on the day are Bitcoin Cash with 2.5 percent and Bitcoin SV with 3.5 percent. The rest are in the red with Litecoin and Binance Coin dropping the most at over 3 percent each.

Top twenty movements are also minimal with a couple of percent being dropped by Cardano and Tron. Gaining a similar amount are Cosmos and NEO reaching $6.25 and $13.13 respectively. The rest are plus or minus a percent or so as the crypto consolidation continues.

FOMO: Chainlink Spikes on Google Hints It comes as no surprise that today’s top one hundred top performer is Chainlink. The 43 percent spike came after Google Cloud dropped hints that it would be working with Ethereum based LINK. The Reddit feed went wild and the altcoin spiked in volume from $24 million to $390 million as the fomo frenzy gathered pace. Binance is getting the majority of trade at the moment with 67 percent.

Energi is a newcomer to the top one hundred with a 30 percent pump as NRG gets listed on KuCoin. Bytom has also had a productive 24 hours with 14 percent added. As predicted the big dump is Aurora as it peaks and troughs on a daily basis, today dumping 50 percent for no obvious reason.

Total market cap 24 hours. Coinmarketcap.com Total crypto market capitalization is currently marginally higher than this time yesterday at $262 billion. Markets are still range bound however and are unlikely to see any bigger moves until Bitcoin breaks out. The push back above $8,200, albeit briefly, is a bullish sign though so the weekend in crypto land could get interesting.

Market Wrap is a section that takes a daily look at the top cryptocurrencies during the current trading session and analyses the best-performing ones, looking for trends and possible fundamentals.

Crypto markets reach 2019 high; Bitcoin still in charge, XRP and BNB pumping, LTC retreating slowly. Market Wrap Crypto markets have reached their highest level since July 2018 in terms of market capitalization. The momentum has come from Bitcoin hitting another 2019 top, and Ripple’s XRP pumping on a new partnership announcement.

Bitcoin has been grinding higher for the past 24 hours until it topped $9,400 briefly marking its highest price since early May 2018. There is heavy resistance above this and BTC quickly started to retreat back to the $9,200 area where it was trading this time yesterday. According to coinmarketcap.com daily volume dumped 25% in an unnatural looking spike so the figures could be spurious.

Ethereum has been static again and remains at $270 where it was this time yesterday. Without any solid fundamentals ETH remains sluggish and unable to push towards $300. It is still 80 percent down from its all-time high and ‘altseason’ has yet to materialize.

The top ten is a mixed affair during Asian trading today but the top performer is XRP. The Ripple token surged 9 percent after the announcement that the company was partnering with MoneyGram. The deal would involve the deployment of xRapid for cross border transfers using XRP. After topping $0.46 XRP corrected to $0.44 where it currently trades.

An industry defining milestone: together, @MoneyGram and @Ripple are solving the challenges with cross-border payments using the speed and efficiency of #XRP. https://t.co/xIfeJJgSy7

— Brad Garlinghouse (@bgarlinghouse) June 17, 2019

Binance Coin is also doing well today adding 5 percent as the exchange announced that it will issue a number of crypto-pegged tokens on Binance Chain in the coming days, starting with $BTCB, a BEP2 token pegged to $BTC. BSV is up marginally and Litecoin is starting its pullback, dropping 3 percent back towards $130.

The top twenty is also mixed but red is dominating over green as altcoins slide again. NEO and Tezos are dumping 5 percent a piece right now and IOTA and NEM are not far behind dropping 3 percent. Only Cosmos is making anything with 3 percent added on the day.

FOMO: Chainlink Churning Higher Today’s top one hundred top performer is LINK which has cranked 18 percent to hit $2. The fomo is still lingering from the Google Cloud tie up as this altcoin climbs the charts to 24th with a market cap of $700 million. Japan’s Monacoin is also on a roll today adding 15 percent, unsurprisingly most of it on Bitbank in JPY. Zcash is the third most popular altcoin today making 13 percent.

The two usual suspects are at the bottom end of the performance pile, Maximine Coin and Aurora.

Total market cap 24 hours. Coinmarketcap.com Total crypto market cap hit a new 2019 high of $290 billion a few hours ago. The move was driven by BTC and XRP which both pumped within a few hours of each other. Market cap is currently back at $286 billion where it was this time yesterday. BTC is still in the driving seat.

Market Wrap is a section that takes a daily look at the top cryptocurrencies during the current trading session and analyses the best-performing ones, looking for trends and possible fundamentals.

The cryptocurrency market doesn’t appear to be in the best of shape. Most cryptocurrencies are losing large chunks of value in the last 24 hours, and the total market capitalization has dropped with $6 billion in a few days to the current level of $187 B.

The second-largest cryptocurrency, Ethereum, is among the worst-performing altcoins. ETH lost over 7% during the last day, and it’s currently trading at $132. Its latest hard fork, called Istanbul, was released a week ago, but it doesn’t seem to have a positive effect on the price as of yet.

Ripple’s price has been struggling for months, and now it went as low as $0,19 on Bitfinex, before bouncing back to the current level of $0,196. It broke below the strong support level at $0,215 earlier this week, and if it closes below $0,20, the next one will be at $0,185. Last time XRP was under $0,20 was back in 2017 before it skyrocketed to its all-time high of $3,80.

The situation with other major altcoins is not any different. Litecoin is below $40, EOS has lost almost 8%, and it’s at $2,34, and Binance Coin has decreased to $13,08, which is a 10% decline since yesterday. Somewhat unsurprisingly, only one digital asset is green in the top 10, and that’s Tezos. XTZ continues its positive trend as of late surging with 4.5% against BTC and 2% against the dollar.

CryptoMarket. Source: Coin360 As far Bitcoin goes, it’s down with 2.7% to $6,870 on Bitstamp but also tested the $6,800 support level, which managed to keep its stance. If it keeps going down, $6,500 is the next level, and if it reverses, the first resistance is $7,000. With so much blood in the altcoin market, BTC’s dominance is actually increasing, and it has reached 67.2%, after being at 66.4% three days ago.

Total Market Capitalization: $187 B | Bitcoin Market Capitalization: $125 B | Bitcoin Dominance: 67.2%

Major Crypto Headlines The Next Crypto Trend for Exchanges? Coinbase Is Now The Largest Tezos Validator. Tezos is quickly rising as a favorite within the community, and the largest U.S.-based crypto exchange, Coinbase, has become the largest validator for XTZ. People began wondering if this could be the newest trend and if users will be able to choose a specific baker.

You may also like: Market Meltdown: MemeCore Crashes 76% as MIM Breaks Peg to $0.50 Bitcoin (BTC) Dips Below $62K, Ethereum (ETH) Plunges 6% Daily: Market Watch XRP’s Price Could Explode to $8, But This One Zone Is Holding It Back Ready To Explode: Bitcoin Longs Surge 12% To A New ATH, Squeeze Might Crash Bitcoin Price. The number of BTC long positions placed on Bitfinex has reached its all-time high, and it could be related to the following drop. Generally, too many open longs mean that the price of the asset is set to decrease.

Bitmain’s Miner Manufacturing Subsidiary Had $680K In Assets Frozen In a Contract Dispute. One of the largest mining companies, Bitmain, had assets worth $676,000 frozen as ordered by a district court in Shenzhen, China. The decision came after another company, Dongguan Yongjiang Electronics, filed an application for asset protection to dispute a contract with the defendant.

Significant Daily Gainers and Losers Waves (26%) WAVES rises above all other cryptocurrencies in the top 100 with its increase with 26% against the dollar, and it’s currently trading at $0.89. Moreover, it skyrockets with almost 30% against Bitcoin to 12840 SAT. The company recently published an updated explaining how Waves staking works, and it also conducted a Twitter giveaway.

Fetch.ai (12.9%) FET is next on the list, with almost 13% gain against USD. The rise to $0.05 also means that the market cap has reached $34,5 M, and with so many altcoins losing value, FET has broken into the top 100. It surges with 16% against Bitcoin to 765 SAT. The company is set to launch its mainnet today and apparently has attracted severe attention to itself.

Aurora (-27.40%) While red is the predominant color, AOA has taken the lead with its loss of over 27% in the last 24 hours. The current price is $0,0048, and the market cap has plunged to $31,7 M, which actually threatens Aurora’s place in the top 100. Oddly enough, the drop comes a day after the popular crypto exchange, Bithumb, announced a 40,000,000 AOA airdrop event to take place this week.

Tags:

Internet penetration has reached so far that, currently, more than half of the world’s population has an Internet connection. Today, everything is migrating toward the Internet, including businesses, education, communication, and, of course, jobs. For example, the segment of global e-retail sales amounted to $2.8 trillion last year. You don’t need to drive to the office every day or follow corporate rules anymore; everyone is free to work online and follow their own schedule. That's why the number of freelancers increases every year; there are currently 53 million freelancers in the US alone. 

Finding a freelance job online is becoming easier, and this trend is likely to increase in the coming years. Thus it’s very important that freelancers and their employers could have a reliable platform where they could communicate, make deals, and accept payments for the work they do, minimizing the risk of fraud. 

There will always be the problem of trust. On one hand, there are a lot of malevolent people who would leave a freelancer without payment after receiving the results of his/her work. On the other hand, many people would take money with great pleasure and disappear without moving a finger to do the job they were tasked with. That's why it's necessary to have an arbitrary third party, a freelancing platform that keeps the funds in its custody when two parties agree on a task only to release it upon completion (or solve the dispute).

Source: websiteplanet.com

Undoubtedly, freelancing platforms are priceless for those who don't have regular employers and have to deal with new, unknown customers everyday. But they also have a handful of hidden problems. 

Global freelance platforms: pros and consCurrently, any freelancer can find a job that would suit his/her skills on many sites:

Upwork is a platform targeted to IT professionals  Fiverr has many different categories, but it's famous for its cheap, creative freelancers from around the world Freelancer is the oldest platform and includes many categories Peopleperhour is a lesser known platform, which can be an alternative to the previously listed ones  Guru.com has some rare categories, including legal  If you have any skills that could be sold online, there's a chance that you'll be able to find a task on any of these platforms. But there’s also a chance that you'll face problems with employers who may try to persuade you to accept other forms of payment outside of the safety of the platform, and after doing the work they will refuse to pay. Not only are the employers are abusing the system, but freelancers can often deliver low-quality work and still demand payment, as the platform only counts the fact that the task has been delivered, not that it is quality work. And to top it off, both parties face fees up to 20-30%, taken by the platforms for its middleman services.

So, the problem of trust isn’t fully solved by existing solutions. They’re good, but they have flaws. Perhaps blockchain technology could be a better alternative? 

Smart contracts improving the freelance experienceWhat is a smart contract? It’s basically a program that contains the condition of its execution. 

Person A places a reward in the form of cryptocurrency and a condition. If Person B fulfills the condition the contract is executed automatically and Person B gets the reward. 

It doesn’t require trust, so the smart contract can be created between total strangers and can involve any amount of money - both parties can be assured that the deal is safe.

Source: slideshare.net/SergeiTikhomirov

For the freelance field, it's the exact thing that everyone needs. Smart contracts can bring:

Trust - Since you know for sure that the other party can’t be malicious, it locks up money in the contract in the moment of creating the contract, and if you deliver the work, you get the money released. Confidence - Freelancers can concentrate on their tasks instead of worrying about payment.  Transparency - Any smart contract can be checked. It’s publicly visible that at the certain address there’s a certain amount reserved.  So if a freelancer doesn’t believe his customer, he can take a look by himself.  Also, there are more benefits compared to centralized platforms - such as increased security. A smart contract is protected by the principle of blockchain technologies. In a brute-force attack it would take more time than our universe exists to find the correct private key containing funds. Also it’s said that the chances of hacking a wallet is equal to winning a Powerball nine times in a row. 

Decentralized freelance platformsAs blockchain technology continues to improve, more and more solutions are being introduced. We’ve picked three interesting platforms for freelancers that may serve the mission of connecting the freelance workforce with employers in the future.

The first one is Freelanex. It has the ambitious goal of creating a global, decentralized platform for all kinds of freelancers and to fight unemployment among young people. The project is integrated with Hyperledger, which is used by half of the biggest companies implementing blockchain today. Also, it uses ERC20 tokens, a universally accepted standard, as the means of payment within the platform. 

Another platform is StormX. It’s a bit different from the previous platform, because it’s designed for microtasks; participating in surveys, watching videos, trying new products, and all similar things that can be done in 5 minutes. The payments are released instantly upon task completion, from the pool reserved for a task by a person/company who creates it. The platform has its own Storm Tokens working on Ethereum network, but it also supports payouts Bitcoin and Ethereum. 

CryptoTask is a more traditional freelance platform, supporting all standard categories you may find on a centralized freelance site, such as freelancer.com. It works on the Aeternity blockchain and it targets the eastern European and African countries such as Kenya and Croatia. The platform works as a decentralized app containing a system of smart contracts, which defines how all participants interact.

For those people who want to be able to work at the legal and global platform, the most convenient solution may be the Freelanex platform, since its competitor, CryptoTask, is oriented toward non-Westernized countries. So, what advantages does Freelanex have over all the centralized platforms? 

Nobody controls your work and your earningsFreelanex aims to provide the most user-friendly experience for all participants. That’s why it doesn’t restrict payments only to cryptocurrencies like many other blockchain services do; it supports both crypto and fiat. Those users that adopt FLXC get discounts if they create tasks, or they receive more tokens if they complete tasks. Freelancers pay an 8% fee, clients pay a 10% fee, but initially after the launch the platform will be operating without any fees. So, it might be a good idea to try it as an early adopter. 

All operations get regulated by smart contracts and operate independently in a decentralized manner, which excludes the possibility of fraud from any one party. Also, there is a KYC procedure which isn’t obligatory for freelancers, but they get a FLXC bonus for completing it. 

Also, Freelanex has a very noble incentive. They say that currently there are 73 million young men and women who don’t have a job. The platform plans to establish courses and laboratories to provide free online training for those who are unemployed for free in order to promote the freelance economy and create more jobs.

The only issue we can see with the platform is the possibility of the smart contract to be hacked, as it’s often prone to human error. Smart contracts rely on blockchain security, but if they contain any security holes due to poorly written code, it can be exploited to withdraw funds from the contract. Last year, EOS users lost more than $500,000 in EOS smart contracts because of such an exploit. That’s why it’s crucial to choose a reliable and safe platform if you want to use a decentralized solution.

ConclusionThe freelance economy, or “the gig economy” as it’s often called, is growing fast. 50 years ago, people would work at one job their whole life, but now everything has changed. The job market, thanks to the Internet, has become global, and now professionals with good skills can work and earn from any place on the planet. The more people connected to the Internet, the more jobs will be created. According to Intuit, by 2020 the number of people participating in the gig economy will grow to 43%.

Source: upwork.com

People use freelance earnings as a secondary income; some people freelance to increase their savings, in some poor countries it allows people to earn more than they would get working a normal day job. The gig economy even creates new jobs for those with disabilities. It’s highly probable that in the future everyone will be employed in a freelance activity. Forty-seven percent of Millennials are already calling themselves freelancers, more than any other generation, and there will be more and more young people accustomed to online work. All this workforce will need reliable platforms to communicate and interact, and blockchain will play a huge role in this future economy.

IBC Media is all set to organize the largest Blockchain Developer conference in India – Genesis Devcon 2019. The event is set to happen at NSCC at IISC Campus, Bengaluru on November 24th and 25th. The event has an excellent line of speakers from various sectors of Blockchain such as public chains, private chains, enterprises, startups, academia, etc.

Raghu Mohan is the CEO of IBC Media, he is a seasoned marketing professional with over 9 years of experience in helping startups scale from the ground up. He has worked in various marketing managerial roles at some remarkable companies like YourStory, HackerEarth and Udacity.

We at Blockmanity had a chance to catch up with Raghu in an exclusive interview.

Blockmanity: What is your take on the Blockchain developer ecosystem in India?

Raghu: It is a mixed bag if you look at it in terms of absolute numbers, India has the second-largest Blockchain developer base in the world. As with most other developer segments, we will be the first in one or two years. On the enterprise side of things, I am seeing a very good Blockchain community there is a lot of system integrator level Blockchain work that is happening for overseas clients. The exposure to private Blockchains seems to be more than public Blockchains. The hobbyist/enthusiast community in India is not as big as it is for other technologies like machine learning or mobility for example.

I think it has been a mix of lack of awareness or general associative connotations of the government’s stance on Cryptocurrencies that probably have deterred developers away from this tech who would have usually taken this up. Thirdly, there is also a general lack of awareness in this space because avenues to make money as a developer is not established yet. I foresee in a year or two before this ecosystem picks up a critical mass and can be compared to other tech areas. It is growing and is vibrant with some exceptional people working on it but in terms of absolute numbers nowhere close to AI, IoT or other tech.

Blockmanity: What was the intent behind this event and how is it different from other Blockchain events?

Raghu: The main objective is that developers are the precurses to users and adoption. When the developers and the builders pick up a technology the users automatically follow, decentralization has really strong use cases in many areas and in order for it to be adopted in masses, you need enough builders around it. This was one of the main learnings we had from IBC one where the majority of the audience was mostly non-tech and non-builders. A majority of the Blockchain movement in India is driven by product and business folks and I think for real adoption to happen in India you need developers and builders at a grass-roots level.

So we started a developer program called Genesis and this event marks the end of the first cycle of Genesis wherein we have built a good developer community, conducted a hackathon and it all kinda concludes at the developer event that we are doing. So, as a whole, it is to get people who are building to attend and to speak. It captures the mind of the Indian developer and we hope more people start talking about this amazing technology.

Blockmanity: Who is your target audience for the event?

Raghu: Our core target audience is someone with some capability of writing software and has some knowledge of computer science with an interest in distributed computing and Blockchains. I would say if you are in business or marketing it is important for you to know the technology that you are building your product around and the capabilities of it. This conference will also be good from an understanding standpoint but it is primarily aimed at developers.

Blockmanity: Could you tell us more about the speakers attending the event?

Raghu: You can break the editorial in 4 parts: Startups who are building innovative products, Enterprise side working on large scale system integration, Academics and the Public chain side. On the public chain side, you are looking at guys from Aeternity, Tezos, and NEO who I am sure need no introduction.

On the enterprise side, Dilip Krishnaswamy from Reliance Jio is someone exciting to talk to. He is building a nationwide Blockchain network and he is specifically speaking on Blockchain microservices which may give you an insight on what Reliance itself is probably thinking about with respect to Blockchain in India. There is also Raghavendra Deshmukh from SAP, he is the director of computer science there and is involved in production level deployment of Blockchain which is quite rare as most Blockchain projects are at POC level.

We have got a good Indian contingent as well which includes Matic, Nucleus Vision, Elevon 01 among others. There are some very interesting updates coming from there as well. We also have people from Kotak Mahindra Bank. The founder of Curl Analytics, who is a speaker at the event was also the former CIO at Societe Generale and has a lot of insights into Fintech.

On the academic side, we found out that there are only 3 people in India who are doing cutting edge research on Distributed Computing – Dr. Narendra Kumar, Head of Computer Science wing and is building the Blockchain offering for the RBI. Kannan Srinathan, IIIT Hyderabad who has done a lot of work in Cryptography and is doing interesting work in Blockchain. And of course, there is Sathya Peri from IIT Hyderabad who is one of the three people that we could get to speak at the event. There is also a great contingent of researchers from NUS Singapore who will be speaking on sharding, Zero-knowledge proofs, and other interesting topics.

There are a total of 35 speakers who have been carefully picked based on what value and content they will be sharing.

Blockmanity: Apart from the speaker sessions you also have workshops for developers, could you expand on that?

Raghu: Sure. We want the workshops to be hands-on at the moment, but it is not restricted to tech. There is a workshop by Rohas Nagpal from Primechain on how to build a Blockchain startup from India, this is something that we think is essential for developers who are trying to start their ventures.

There is a workshop by Tezos on who will go into the details of building Blockchain products on a Proof of Stake based Blockchain (Proof of Bake as they call it). There is also the folks at Matic who are building scaling solutions on Ethereum, this workshop would be super interesting to developers who are looking to build scalable Dapps on Ethereum. Blockstack will also be conducting a workshop, given their approach developers can use Javascript to build on their network which is great from an adoption standpoint as there are a lot of Javascript developers based in India.

There are also some other really good workshops that we will be announcing in the coming days.

Blockmanity: Who is sponsoring the event and what are the fees you are charging for the attendees?

Raghu: With respect to sponsors, I think we have a good spread of public chains, Dapps and Entreprises. Tech Mahindra has been a supporter of IBC from early 2018 and we continue to work with them. The Tezos Foundation launched in India recently, they have an aggressive developer agenda here. I see a lot of exciting work coming from them.

Microsoft and we have been working together behind the scenes on a very large project and it is kind of come into fruition at the developer conference where we will be announcing something really big as to what we will be doing with Microsoft in the coming days.

Aeternity is running their first edition of Starfleet accelerator in India and IBC is running that as well so the conference is an opportunity for them to launch the conversations around it. Elevon 01 and Nucleus Vision have been supporting us in our ventures through IBC one, Genesis to where we are right now. I am quite excited about what they are launching at the event too, a real-world Blockchain implementation that they build at a production level so stay tuned for that.

These are forward-thinking companies that have invested in a very foundational layer of this ecosystem which are the developers and I can’t thank them enough.

As far as the attendees are concerned, we wanted to keep the entry barrier as low as possible. A full ticket is at Rs. 1500 but you can get a 50% discount by using the coupon code BLOCKMANITY. The only reason why we are taking a fee is to commit to attending, our aim for enough people to have the least barrier to entry in learning more about Technology.

Discuss this news on our Telegram Community. Subscribe to us on Google news and do follow us on Twitter @Blockmanity

Did you like the news you just read? Please leave a feedback to help us serve you better

Disclaimer: Blockmanity is a news portal and does not provide any financial advice. Blockmanity's role is to inform the cryptocurrency and blockchain community about what's going on in this space. Please do your own due diligence before making any investment. Blockmanity won't be responsible for any loss of funds.

Aeternity is a Blockchain protocol started in 2016, Aeternity Ventures is the investment arm of the project started in 2017. Nikola Stojanow is the Co-Founder of the Aeternity project and is the CEO of Aeternity Ventures.

We at Blockmanity had a chance to interview Nikola on a call recently. We hope you enjoy the interview.

Blockmanity: Hey Nikola, I would love to know more about your background and the story of how you got into this space.

Nikola: To start my journey from the beginning, I was born in Bulgaria and raised in Germany. While I traveled a lot for most parts of my life, I decided to move my base back to Bulgaria for the last couple of years. Before starting AE Ventures in 2017, I worked in the corporate world for a while, specifically in the pharmaceutical sector in Europe, MENA and Asia and Pacific regions. I last held the position of Director, Business Development until I felt a need for change. I entered the realm of blockchain technology with a travel company that was built based on decentralized open source bookings technology where I was involved with fundraising campaigns. The entrepreneurial bug bit me and I moved back to Berlin where I met my old friend Yanislav Malahov, who is now my co-founder at æternity. He was looking for a business guy and invited me to join the æternity team. From there we toiled and managed to build one of the few blockchain unicorns in Bulgaria. 

It was during our journey at æternity that we realized the significance of quality startups and projects adopting our infrastructure and so I created AE Ventures, the company that would do exactly that: incubate, accelerate and invest into startups around the world. 

At that point, Sofia had an incredibly vibrant startup ecosystem that welcomed me and showed how much potential we locally have and how people have the desire to innovate and work towards a positive change and so we decided to set up AE Venture in Bulgaria. That I would say was one of my best decisions as things developed really quickly and strongly, our Starfleet accelerator started growing and is now on several continents. We are building an amazing international team, which is creating a global ecosystem, where people actively collaborate with us around the world, allowing us to be at multiple places, at the same time!

The immense potential and seeing how much need there is for funding and proper mentoring has been my fuel to nurture my desire to do more and help more people to get the chances that we got, when we started off with the Starfleet Program.

Blockmanity: æternity was founded in 2016 and the mainnet launched in late 2018, How has the journey been so far? And how would you describe æternity to those who haven’t heard about it?

Nikola: Yes, we launched the mainnet in November 2018 and since then the race to bring blockchain technology to the mainstream has begun. æternity has been constantly improving and developing, numerous implementations have been made and we are happy to see that the ecosystem is growing. æternity blockchain is a public blockchain protocol that is highly-scalable and is interoperable with several other blockchains. Developers can build dApps or æpps, as we’d like to call it, with several features that include accessing oracles and state channels to use real-world data in a trustless environment. In its essence, æternity aims to solve problems of scalability, and security making it more economical and user-friendly when it comes to accessing the smart contracts on the network.  

Blockmanity: So how is æternity similar and different to other Blockchains like Ethereum, Tezos, etc?

Nikola: æternity is one of the few blockchain protocols that have solved the fundamental problems that lie in archetype protocols like Bitcoin and Ethereum -it is decentralized, public, global, censorship-free, tamper-proof transaction technology.

It’s a scalable smart contract platform that can handle more transactions and smart contract calls and has far more advanced features capable of handling an enormous amount of people all over the world.

One of the main differences between æternity and earlier blockchains lies under the hood: æternity is written in Erlang, which is a proven functional language for distributed systems.

Blockmanity: Ok now let us get into AE Ventures, what is the vision for the fund and tell us more about the Starfleet accelerator program. 

Nikola: AE Ventures is built on the vision to enable the creation of decentralized businesses that would be a great improvement on the prevailing systems. With this conviction, we work towards funding blockchain startups from around the world alongside providing them with the advisory and training to built market-ready products that can solve real-world problems. 

This is something we have brought to life through direct investments and with the Global Accelerator Programme for Blockchain startups – Starfleet. With three editions completed over the last two years, we’ve invested over $1.9 million in 18 startups. We are drawn to people who not only build exceptional products that go past the proof-of-concept stage that can be taken to the market, but to those who are solving problems that contribute to the greater good of society.

Blockmanity: At what stage of the startup do you mainly invest in? And do they have to build exclusively on the æternity blockchain to get funded? 

Nikola: We usually like to enter at a seed/pre-seed level and predominantly through the Starfleet accelerator program. We are very industry-agnostic – the only common thread we look at is the use of Blockchain tech and its implementability.  

The participating startups need to build the product entirely or as a part of æternity blockchain as it is one of the most scalable and interoperable blockchains out there. And this way, we can provide the startups with the right kind of help and hand-holding required to build their products. 

Blockmanity: What are the best use-cases for Blockchain that you have seen so far and what use-cases are you excited about for the future?

Nikola: I truly believe that Blockchain has the power to impact every sector. Every Starfleet program reveals interesting use-cases solving real-time problems. It is not surprising that DeFi is developing very rapidly. I expect a huge boom and adoption in this sector. It also makes a lot of sense since blockchain technology serves the financial sector with almost instant transactions at almost no cost. 

In the future, essentially everything might be tokenized. There is a whole other world of opportunities with tokens.

Identity management is another critical segment with a focus on individuals owning their own data and deciding who to share with and for what. With the recent concerns of privacy, we have seen some very interesting use-cases in this aspect as well.

Another sector that I am very keen to explore is bringing in more transparency in political campaigns, voting etc. We have seen political parties collaborate with the open-source blockchain and developer platform in order to optimize the participation processes of citizens in internal voting. This is the need of the hour in every democratic nation and more and more players from the ecosystem should focus on it.

Other interesting applications of blockchain use-cases include banking with fiat on and off-ramps, decentralized exchanges and of course gaming!!

Blockmanity: Could you share some names and numbers from your portfolio of startups you have already invested in?

Nikola: We are proud to say that so far we have invested directly or through our acceleration program more than $2mln in 19 startups. To name a few: WeiDex (Bulgaria) – decentralized exchange for cryptocurrencies, which just recently released their cross-chain atomic swap widget called Jelly. AmpNet (Croatia)- a whitelabel, all-in-one platform for running energy cooperatives and energy communities. Abend (Germany) – the cashless, on-site payments platform aiming to be an “own little economy” for each festival and club around the globe. Cryptic Legends (Serbia/Malta) — blockchain-based, team management game in an awesome ancient fantasy world. SmartCredit (Switzerland) – a platform for crypto-loans creating 2-click consumer credits (money on demand) for the borrower and tools like credit tokenization, credit transferability and interest-bearing to the holder. 

Blockmanity: Recently you teamed up with IBC Media to build a presence and get Indian startups to apply for the program, what is the thought process behind this and what other markets are you targeting? 

Nikola: India has a booming blockchain ecosystem and armed with its strong developer pool and the burgeoning startup ecosystem with over 27,000+ start-ups, there is tremendous scope for a decentralized future. Raghu and his team from IBC Media have shown great potential in tapping the Indian market and identifying blockchain startups with interesting use cases. We had over 175 blockchain-based early-stage startups up registering for the Starfleet India in its first edition, of which we have shortlisted 13 very interesting startups for the Genesis Week. We are hoping to see strong Indian problems being identified and looking forward to solving them with blockchain technology. We are happy to partner with IBC Media to launch the first edition of the Global Starfleet program here in India and look forward to successfully finding these Indian startups gems with a proven capability to build technology products that can scale, and a strong underlying blockchain use case. 

Blockmanity: What is in store for the æternity ecosystem in 2020, what are you most excited about? 

Nikola: I am extremely happy to watch how the æternity ecosystem is growing. All the startups we invested in brought value and some diversity. It is also great to observe how the projects are building partnerships between each other and creating synergy. In 2020, we organized the First Indian edition of our Starfleet accelerator. We are confident that we are on the right place as we are confident that people Developing countries such as India, Kenya, and others in East Africa are discovering and implementing an increasing array of applications for blockchain, the decentralized ledger technology that promises a secure, low fee, peer-to-peer mechanism for verifying and validating information. 

We are also very excited about the development of the blockchain startup which we accelerated as now it is their time to prove their concept.

Blockmanity: If a startup founder is reading this, where can he/she apply for your program?

Nikola: Well, we’ve closed applications for Starfleet India this year and we’re well on our way with the Genesis Week. However, if you’re a startup that has a great product that is built on blockchain, you’re more than welcome to contact us on our website. However, do keep in mind that when you’re pitching your idea you have to be as clear as possible and give us a suggestion of how we can work together to improve your product and perhaps, fund it if it makes it through the selection process. And more importantly, take a good look at the æternity blockchain and do your due diligence. See where it can help your product become a better version of itself; don’t try to force-fit it. 

Blockmanity: Last but not the least, which is your favorite company in Crypto other than your own?

Nikola: Interesting question, but not simple to answer. There are numerous companies that I have been following for some time now, but with the market and interests changing rather quickly, new interesting projects are coming to light more often.

For me, the most interesting Dapps have not been developed yet, as the idea is to have them function in a way, where the user does not need a Ph.D. in Computer Technologies or Cyber Security, in order to use a product. 

Simplicity should be key, without jeopardizing the integrity or security of users and product. If I would have to choose, I would go with either wallets, payment gateways, or products that engage the user to do something, in order to receive tokens (positive incentivization to do good seems to be quite a powerful medium, in order to have a large number of people to positively impact their surrounding).

But as mentioned above, I admire all projects that have a sincere agenda and want to improve or innovate in a space, which has not seen innovation in a long time, as simply building products and having projects succeed is what excited me most in the entire space, rather than a single favorite company.

ak_YybQNedGUDY74VFxHWe68Bx28Ne71NJsGWyegY6y2v9AqphE9

Discuss this news on our Telegram Community. Subscribe to us on Google news and do follow us on Twitter @Blockmanity

Did you like the news you just read? Please leave a feedback to help us serve you better

Disclaimer: Blockmanity is a news portal and does not provide any financial advice. Blockmanity's role is to inform the cryptocurrency and blockchain community about what's going on in this space. Please do your own due diligence before making any investment. Blockmanity won't be responsible for any loss of funds.

The value of the cryptocurrency Tezos rose by 26 percent last night, the slow-burning result of Coinbase’s announcement that it would reward customers for "staking" the cryptocurrency on its platform. But what does that actually mean?  

In practice, staking allows customers to earn what is essentially interest on any cryptocurrency they hold, rewarding HODLers with a stream of passive income. Coinbase’s estimated annual return for users staking Tezos is 5 percent. 

To earn rewards, customers must first stake Tezos for around 35-40 days, after which they will start to be rewarded with interest every three days. 

Tezos is a proof-of-stake coin, meaning it has no miners. Instead, those who verify transactions stake coins on the validity of the transaction to help keep things running smoothly. Those who stake the coin have the chance to generate new Tezos, and provide the liquidity that underpins the network. Previously, Tezos users had to set up a “baker”—the proof-of-stake equivalent of a “miner”, to earn rewards. This was a relatively complicated process, requiring specialist knowledge. 

On Coinbase, staking rewards are issued automatically, and customers do not have to take any further action to enter into the program. “This makes earning staking rewards much easier,” Nic Carter, a partner at Castle Island Ventures tells Decrypt.

Tezos, which is similar to Ethereum and allows distributed applications to be built on its blockchain, was started in 2014 by Kathleen and Arthur Breitman, a married couple who had significant fintech experience on Wall Street and beyond. The company raised $232 million in a 2017 ICO in Switzerland—which was a record fundraise at the time. In a long feature about the internecine struggles of the young company, "Inside the Crypto World's Biggest Scandal," Wired said that "the name 'tezos' became crypto-world shorthand for ICO avarice."

The company has since recovered from its governance crisis.

Interestingly, though Coinbase announced the Tezos staking program late morning California time, it didn’t start to surge until around 7:30PM PST. Then it took off like a rocket as traders raced to get in on the action. Carter said he couldn’t find any specific reason that the price jumped so dramatically so late in the day.

“Markets aren’t particularly good at incorporating information,” he said. That's particularly true in the crypto market, which Carter says is especially slow to respond to news.

For Coinbase, encouraging staking of Tezos could supply its exchange with a steady stream of the coin, adding liquidity to its exchange. This is helpful for the exchange, which Carter says is transitioning to being the equivalent of a “crypto native bank with a full custody offering.” Carter says the announcement is “a good incentive to have retail owners of Tezos deposit them with Coinbase.”

(We reached out to Coinbase and Tezos to understand more about the deal and will update the article when we have more information.)

Coinbase’s announcement follows rival cryptocurrency exchange Binance, who launched its own staking platform last month. It supported the following eight cryptocurrencies: NEO (NEO/GAS), Ontology (ONT/ONG), Vechain (VET/VTHO), Stellar (XLM), Komodo (KMD), Algorand (ALGO), Qtum (QTUM), & Stratis (STRAT). Stellar staking has finished, but several more pairings have been added: TRON, Elrond, Fetch.ai, and ONE. 

Binance’s CEO, Changpeng Zhao has previously hinted at Binance’s future support for Tezos staking.

Of course, though stakers might be consistently rewarded with 5 percent of the coin’s value—the value of the individual coin is still subject to fluctuation. Binance estimates that staking Algorand, for example, will yield over 15 percent, but Algorand is a more volatile cryptocurrency. The Algo, worth $0.26—down from highs of $3.28 in June—has netted investors minus 92 percent in returns.

And, as Carter tells Decrypt, staking comes with risks: staking funds on Coinbase requires customers to keep funds on Coinbase. If the exchange—or the customer—gets hacked, then they could lose their Tezos. 

Additionally, Carter says that staking on large exchanges means that “Coinbase and other exchanges will come to own a huge fraction of supply for these staked coins.” This, says Carter, is a potential risk: “the security model ultimately could degenerate into a few large custodial institutions signing blocks.” 

Crypto analyst Eric Wall echoed Carter's caution: “I'd keep a worried eye on this. It's about time Proof-of-Stake really gets battle-tested in the context of a fully matured industry. We’ll soon see which tools and services become popular—then we can work out which threats are the most concerning, the same way we've done for Proof-of-Work.”

Daily Debrief NewsletterStart every day with the top news stories right now, plus original features, a podcast, videos and more.

Crypto-Games.net – An Online Crypto Casino with More than 4 Billion Bets Registered and Growing

Stratis, a blockchain infrastructure platform, has announced the successful launch of its new Layer-1 blockchain based on the Ethereum codebase. The new blockchain aims to provide a secure and scalable environment for Decentralized Finance (DeFi) and gaming applications.

TLDR Stratis launches new Layer-1 blockchain based on Ethereum codebase Integration of zkSync Layer-2 scaling solution for high transaction throughput and low costs Designed to support DeFi and gaming use cases with high security and scalability Immediate staking available, with plans for liquid staking in the near future $1M incentive program available for developers and users One of the key features of the new Stratis blockchain is the integration of zkSync, a Layer-2 scaling solution. zkSync is designed to significantly increase transaction throughput and reduce transaction costs without compromising security. This is particularly important for gaming developers, as it ensures that gamers can experience nearly instant in-game transactions, resulting in a smoother and more enjoyable gaming experience.

The launch of the new mainnet also brings immediate benefits to Stratis users, who can now participate in staking. The platform plans to introduce liquid staking in the near future, which involves minting a new token that represents a claim on the underlying staked asset. Liquid staking has gained popularity among DeFi users as a way to maximize yield from a set amount of capital.

The Stratis EVM mainnet is live

Staking and Masternode DeFi Protocols are live https://t.co/MEHmfc3TYj pic.twitter.com/cdMSAhSyWh

— Stratisplatform (@stratisplatform) March 21, 2024

To further enhance the DeFi ecosystem, Stratis is working on establishing bridges that allow seamless exchange of crypto assets between the Stratis mainnet and other prominent blockchains. The team is also exploring potential lending and borrowing use cases and building integrations with major Decentralized Exchanges (DEXs) that serve the Ethereum ecosystem.

Chris Trew, Co-Founder and CEO of Stratis, expressed his enthusiasm for the launch, stating, “I’m pleased that all projects on Stratis will be transitioning over to the new chain, and we can’t wait to build out more DeFi options over the coming months.”

To support the launch of the new mainnet, the Stratis Foundation has allocated approximately $1 million for developer and user incentives. These incentives are available for dApp developers who leverage zkSync’s scaling capabilities to build DeFi and gaming applications. Users who engage in activities such as staking, liquidity provision, and bridging will also be eligible for the incentive program.

The launch of the new Stratis Layer-1 blockchain marks a significant milestone in the platform’s mission to develop highly usable blockchain infrastructure.

With the integration of zkSync and the focus on DeFi and gaming use cases, Stratis aims to provide a secure, scalable, and user-friendly environment for developers and users alike.

Oliver Dale

Editor-in-Chief of Blockonomi and founder of Kooc Media, A UK-Based Online Media Company. Believer in Open-Source Software, Blockchain Technology & a Free and Fair Internet for all. His writing has been quoted by Nasdaq, Dow Jones, Investopedia, The New Yorker, Forbes, Techcrunch & More. Contact [email protected]

After a few days of trading sideways, Bitcoin’s price appears to be headed north. It was trading at around $7,100, and it surged to over $7,650 on Bitstamp before retracing slightly to the current level of approximately $7,500.

Bitcoin marks a 4.6% increase at the moment. The interesting thing is that BTC’s dominance is also on the move. Currently standing at 68.9%, it’s obvious that Bitcoin claims a larger part of the market share as altcoins struggle to note any serious gains.

Ethereum has broken the $130 level, currently at $132, which is an increase of 2.7% against the dollar. However, when we compare it to BTC, it loses 2.24% of value to 0.0176 SAT. Ripple is up with 1% against USD but XRP/BTC is 3.35% down.

Binance Coin is trading at $13.77 and at 0.0018 SAT, meaning а 2.34% USD increase and а 2.59% BTC decrease.

Tezos has been one of the best performers in the last several weeks, but it’s currently down against both USD and BTC – 0.71% and 5.22%, respectively.

Altcoins/Bitcoin. Source: coin360.com Total Market Capitalization: $198 B | Bitcoin Market Capitalization: $136 B | Bitcoin Dominance: 68.9%

Major Crypto Headlines Binance Partnership With FTX Exchange: Follows In The Footsteps Of BitMEX In Futures Trading. Binance recently made a strategic investment in the popular cryptocurrency derivatives exchange, FTX. It raises the question if this partnership is a step towards disrupting the dominance in the Futures trading market of BitMEX, OKEx, and Huobi.

You may also like: Brutal Bitcoin Liquidation Cascade Imminent Below $59K, Warns Analyst Bitcoin Price Crashes Below $60K as Strategy’s MSTR Plunges 10% Mining Profits Dry Up Across Bitcoin, DOGE, LTC, and BCH Cryptocurrency Exchange Poloniex Enables No KYC For Level One Accounts. The popular U.S.-based crypto exchange is allowing users to register only with an email and a password for their level one accounts. Even though they would still have restrictions and new regulations from the U.S. and the E.U., the community wonders if this is heading in the right direction.

Recent Political And Economic Tension In India And Hong Kong Highlights Bitcoin’s Benefits. Indian banks will reportedly start turning down customers based on their religion, while protesters in Hong Kong are boycotting HSBC due to bank account closures. Bitcoin’s decentralized nature can be used by anyone from anywhere, which had the community highlighting its benefits once again.

Significant Daily Gainers and Losers Silverway (8.90%) SLV is currently surging with almost 9% to $0.72 against the dollar and with 4% against BTC to 9560 SAT. Its market cap has also increased to over $72 M, which places it at 58th place among the top 100 cryptocurrencies. With not much recent news from Silverway, the surge may come somewhat of a surprise at the moment.

Siacoin (5.8%) Siacoin is next on the list, now reaching $0.00145 against the dollar and 19 SAT against BTC. The market cap is also on the rise, breaking the $60 M level. Siacoin’s co-founder recently appeared on a podcast, outlining S.C.’s history in the market, being an active project since 2015.

Matic Network (-14.43%) Unfortunately for Matic Network, it’s once again the most notable loser among the top 100 coins. MATIC is losing almost 15% against the USD, currently trading at $0.016. It goes even lower against BTC with -18% to 215 SAT. After the massive drop to $0.012 a few days ago, it managed to recover to $0.020 yesterday, but it’s again on the downtrend.

Tags:

Top Performing Cryptocurrencies In February Including Ethereum (ETH), Chainlink (LINK) And Kyber Network (KNC)