Crypto Sale

2022-05-06 21:45:00 ​​Google’s Cloud Unit to Provide Technologies to Cryptocurrency Developers Building Web3 Applications

The technology company is making an indirect entrance into the crypto space with the launch of a Web3 team.

With the rising interest in Web 3 technologies, Google’s Cloud unit has disclosed that it is putting up a team that will build services for developers creating Web3 applications.

In an internal email as seen and published by media outlet CNBC, Amit Zavery, a vice president at Google Cloud, noted that the aim of the initiative is to make the Google Cloud platform the favorite choice for developers building different Web 3.0 applications.

“While the world is still early in its embrace of Web3, it is a market that is already demonstrating tremendous potential with many customers asking us to increase our support for Web3 and Crypto related technologies,” excerpts of the email shared by Zavery reads.

While several firms, including Facebook, are already making significant efforts toward becoming a major player in the Web 3.0 space, Google is hoping to stay ahead of the race by offering back-end services to developers seeking to build their own Web 3 applications.

Zavery noted that the move does not imply that Google is planning to gain direct involvement with cryptocurrencies. However, the company’s Cloud unit is only focused on providing the necessary technology that developers can adopt to benefit from the disruptive nature of Web3.

“We’re not trying to be part of that cryptocurrency wave directly. “We’re providing technologies for companies to use and take advantage of the distributed nature of Web3 in their current businesses and enterprises,” Zavery said.

Per the announcement, the new group will be led by James Tromans, a former Citigroup executive. Open / Comment

2022-05-04 21:00:04 ​​Wisdomtree, cryptocurrencies are an asset not to be ignored

A digital asset manager at Wisdomtree, one of the world’s leading ETF providers with more than $78 billion in assets under management, has described crypto as a key asset.

Crypto will revolutionize the financial system making it a more inclusive and accessible world
Jason Guthrie, head of digital asset management at investment firm Wisdomtree, spoke about cryptocurrencies during an online event on Monday.

Wisdomtree is a New York-based investment fund and one of the world’s top managers of exchange-traded funds (ETFs) and exchange-traded products (ETPs). For several years, the company has been focusing on its products that invest not only in traditional assets, but also in digital ones. In December, the SEC rejected its application for a spot ETF on Bitcoin.

Guthrie said:
“We are past the point where there is speculation around whether or not this is a trend that’s here to stay. Cryptocurrencies have firmly established themselves as a new asset class and it truly is something that people can’t ignore”.

According to the investment firm executive, crypto and digital assets in general will soon be so prominent that many investors will choose their investment firms based on their ability to get them into the digital asset markets.

Nonetheless, the executive acknowledges that the digital asset market is highly speculative and should therefore be approached with the utmost caution and without investing an excessive amount of one’s capital.

Indeed, he adds that:
“I don’t think anybody is out there advocating 50% of somebody’s portfolio should be in cryptocurrency. This is how you account for risk, by making risk-assessed allocations”.

Guthrie explained how according to his firm’s choices, cryptocurrency investments should cover a percentage of invested assets ranging from 5% to 11% for the most aggressive portfolios. He also said he is confident that the percentage of crypto investors will inevitably grow exponentially in the coming years.

Guthrie states that:
“2% or so of the global population is involved in crypto at the moment, that’s only going to grow. Cryptocurrencies have firmly established themselves as a new asset class and it truly is something that people can’t ignore”. Open / Comment

2022-05-02 23:55:00 ​​Fidelity's digital assets executive Christine Sandler exits firm to join a crypto investment firm

Christine Sandler, former executive at the crypto division of asset manager Fidelity, has left the firm for a new position as general partner at crypto asset investment firm Walden Bridge Capital. Sandler announced the news via her LinkedIn.

Sandler was at Fidelity for just over 3 years as the head of sales and marketing for its digital assets division. In an interview last year with The Block, Sandler shared that the crypto unit experienced 4x growth during 2020.

"Our overall account growth was absolutely phenomenal," Sandler said at the time. "We saw participation across all segments. So whether it was corporations adopting it and putting assets on their balance sheet, or hedge funds beginning to approach this from a strategic perspective, registered investment advisors, family offices, ultra-high net worth individuals."

Sandler previously held positions at Coinbase as Director of International Sales and the New York Stock Exchange as Executive Vice President of Global Sales. Her new role, effective today, is at Walden Bridge Capital, a crypto asset investment firm based in Chicago, as General Partner. Open / Comment

2022-04-29 21:46:43 ​​WisdomTree CEO: We Will Be First to Bring Passive Investing to the Blockchain

WisdomTree will be the first asset manager to bring passive investing to the blockchain, the company’s CEO said, doubling down on past statements about the firm’s bullishness on the crypto space.

The fund group eclipsed $80 billion in assets under management for the first time this month, executives said during a Friday earnings call. It plans to roll out its blockchain-native financial services mobile app, WisdomTree Prime, later this year.

Jonathan Steinberg noted the importance of being a first-mover, noting Vanguard’s pioneering of passive investing within the mutual fund wrapper and BlackRock’s iShares creating the first comprehensive passive suite of ETFs.

Vanguard manages about $8 trillion in assets, and BlackRock, the world’s largest asset manager, has more than $2 trillion within its nearly 400 US ETFs alone.

Steinberg said that virtually all financial assets, through tokenization, will eventually come to the blockchain. WisdomTree Prime is set to allow users to save, spend and invest in cryptoassets, such as bitcoin and ether, blockchain-enabled funds and tokenized versions of physical assets such as gold.

Companies that don’t adapt to the changing financial services landscape could resemble newspaper groups that failed to harness the power of the internet, he added, or camera companies that were replaced by smartphones.

“There will be spectacular winners and many who get disrupted and disintermediated out,” the CEO explained. “It is easy to envision a world where many of today’s leading financial services companies look like yesterday’s newspaper groups.”

WisdomTree is set to launch the beta testing of its new app during the second quarter.

Steinberg said having a mobile financial app will be “table stakes” in 2023. He noted that some investors will likely use WisdomTree Prime as a neo-bank, while others will use it as a registered investment advisor (RIA) of sorts.

“Regardless of how different consumers use it…by being first in tokenizing the underlying exposures and by being native to the blockchain in our design, WisdomTree will deliver unique and better functionality,” he said. “Nothing can potentially scale faster than a successful mobile app.”

A glimpse at future products
Will Peck, WisdomTree’s head of digital assets, told Blockworks the company intends to launch more products in Europe, as well as enhance existing ones. He declined to comment on specifics.

WisdomTree added Solana, Cardano and Polkadot ETPs to various exchanges across the continent last month.

In the US, WisdomTree is one of many asset managers to file for a spot bitcoin ETF. The company amended its application for the fund in December, a week after the SEC rejected its proposal.

Industry executives remain unsure when the agency could approve a spot bitcoin ETF, though most believe one won’t launch until 2023 at the earliest.

The firm also filed in April 2021 to launch a Digital Short-Term Treasury Fund, which would have a record of share ownership digitized on the blockchain. The following month it revealed plans to launch an Ethereum trust.

While the outlook for a bitcoin ETF in the US remains “muted,” Jarrett Lilien, WisdomTree president and COO, said during the Friday earnings call, the firm launched a separately managed account (SMA) strategy for the US wealth channel.

“Consider that there are $30 trillion in assets in the US wealth channel alone,” Lilien said. “So even a 1% allocation to crypto in just the US would yield a $300 billion market opportunity for crypto exposures, and the realistic opportunity to be multiples of that.” Open / Comment

2022-04-27 14:25:00 ​​Coinbase Reveals Surprise Support for Secretive Ethereum Competitor, Sparking Altcoin Rally

An altcoin built to bring privacy and scalability to the crypto market is blooming after receiving a surprise listing from Coinbase.

The leading US-based cryptocurrency exchange says that Oasis Network (ROSE) will start trading on Coinbase Pro paired with Tether (USDT) once appropriate liquidity conditions are met.

The Oasis ecosystem is a mid-cap Ethereum competitor that bills itself as the first blockchain network to support confidential smart contracts.

Oasis also seeks to reduce the high transaction costs common among layer-1 protocols as well as increase data transfer speed and efficiency.

Regarding how consumers can monetize their personal data, the project’s website says,

“With Tokenized Data users can earn rewards by staking their data with apps that want to analyze it or control how their most sensitive information is consumed by the services they use.”

The project’s native utility token ROSE can be used for staking, delegation and covering the cost of network transaction fees.

The network’s Parcel software development kit (SDK) seeks to harness the power of user data while also maintaining privacy and security. Open / Comment

2022-04-25 20:00:05 ​​Afghan Citizens Turn to Stablecoins, Not Bitcoin, to Protect Wealth

Afghan citizens are turning to stablecoins to protect their finances as fears of a Taliban crackdown on wealth grow.

Citizens are worried that the Taliban will seize assets, which would worsen an already declining economy. And the focus of their investments is not bitcoin, but rather stablecoins.

The idea is to have their wealth pegged to fiat currencies. Executives from the country’s crypto exchanges note that demand is high, and people are no longer storing wealth in cash or jewelry, preferring crypto instead.

Afghan citizens also say that the Taliban is raiding homes and seizing belongings, prompting the switch to cryptocurrencies. Reports from earlier in the year also corroborate this mass adoption of crypto. Some in Afghanistan have used their crypto holdings to flee to Pakistan.

The U.S. has blocked $9 billion in foreign-exchange reserves, the economy is on the brink of collapse, with people only allowed to withdraw $400 a week

Afghanistan ranks in top 20
In 2021, Afghanistan was ranked 20th among 154 countries in Chainalysis’ Crypto Adoption Index, one of several countries facing economic problems. Just one year before, the company considered Afghanistan’s crypto presence to be so minimal it did not even rank.

This isn’t the first time that a country’s citizens have taken to crypto to protect their finances. Venezuela and Argentina are among those most commonly cited examples of crypto helping a country’s citizens. Both countries have experienced a surge in crypto usage following economic downturns.

And in Myanmar, the government in exile has recognized Tether as an official currency as it seeks to fund a campaign to topple the military junta that seized power last year

Ukraine has received tens of millions in donations in the form of cryptocurrencies. Crypto has proven to be a lifeline for millions and can be an effective way to fight repression and economic hardship. Open / Comment

2022-04-24 16:55:00 ​​Brian Armstrong: Apple Does Not Allow Features That Makes Phones Crypto-friendly

Apple’s App Store policies, according to Brian Armstrong, CEO of Coinbase, have impeded the company’s product plan. He blamed Apple for prohibiting features from their app and overall being unfriendly to the crypto business.

Brian Armstrong Bashes Apple
On a recent episode of the Superstream Podcast, Coinbase’s CEO and co-founder Brian Armstrong chastised Apple for “potential antitrust issues”

Armstrong came on the Superstream Podcast on April 20 to discuss the current situation of cryptocurrency, entrepreneurship, and Coinbase, the firm he cofounded.

Before going on to criticize Apple, he implied that crypto investors would one day be able to utilize “crypto-compatible” devices with special hardware characteristics built-in.

He claimed that “Apple so far has not really played nice with crypto” claiming that the business had disallowed a number of features that they wanted in the app but that Apple would not allow.

“Apple so far has not really played nice with crypto, they have actually banned a bunch of features that we would like to have in the app, but they just won’t allow it – so there’s potential antitrust issues there,” he said.

When asked if Coinbase would ever release its own hardware wallet, Armstrong revealed the information. He claimed that the company already has a co-branded hardware wallet with Ledger, but that the two big mobile operating systems need to expand their ecosystem of products to include crypto. Open / Comment

2022-04-23 16:10:00 ​​Ethereum is Currently Down by 2.39% in the Last 24 Hours

Ethereum (ETH) has made its way to CoinMarketCap’s trending list, standing at number 2. ETH is positioned behind Bitcoin (BTC) and right in front of Tether (USDT).

In terms of market cap, ETH is currently ranked second according to CoinMarketCap. This once again places ETH behind BTC and in front of USDT.

In the last 24 hours, ETH has seen a drop of 2.39% but when looking at the weekly numbers, ETH is only down by 0.51%.

In the last 24 hours, ETH has also seen a trading volume of $21.94B. At the time of writing, ETH currently stands at $3,011.01 which translates to 0.07413854 Bitcoin. For some perspective, Ethereum’s all time high was $4,891.70.

The retracement in ETH’s price can be attributed to a number of factors. One is the retracement that the majority of the crypto market has experienced over the last week. Another factor could be traders and investors taking profit and cashing out for the weekend.

However, Ethereum’s relatively flat price movement could be due to the recent announcement that The Merge, an event that will see Ethereum shift from Proof of Work (PoW) consensus to Proof of Stake (PoS) consensus, has been delayed yet again.

Ethereum is at risk of losing its market dominance in the market as its competitors have all implemented scalability measures in their networks. If Ethereum does not complete The Merge soon, then we may see ETH’s competitors such as Cardano and Solana taking over the market as the de facto DApp development platform. Open / Comment

2022-04-22 12:55:00 ​​The Politicization Of Hash Rate Is An Attack Vector On Bitcoin Miners

The U.S. Treasury came out today and sanctioned Bitriver, a Russian bitcoin mining company that hosts miners on behalf of large miners. Any Americans who have their miners hosted at Bitriver or own any significant amount of equity in the company must stop interacting with Bitriver immediately, highlighting the risk one takes when they don't control their infrastructure and host their miners in areas that are subject to increased political risk. Political risk comes in many different forms.

Here in the United States, it is politically risky to host your miners in the state of New York as it is run by freedom-hating Malthusians who are dead set on preventing Bitcoin from flourishing within its borders. It was proven to be politically risky to mine in Quebec in the mid-2010s as the government there freaked out and began treating bitcoin miners who were utilizing excess electricity produced by Hydro Quebec like second-class citizens by singling them out and increasing their electricity rates and sales tax. Making their operations unprofitable and, therefore, nonviable. And now, we are learning that it is politically risky to host your miner within Russia if you are a U.S. citizen because the government seems determined to sever Russia's connection to the western world in reaction to the invasion of Ukraine.

There are many American citizens and companies who are now scrambling to figure out what to do with their miners after the Treasury Department made their order today. Will Bitriver give them their machines back? Will the U.S. government let these people receive their machines if Bitriver is an ethical business and attempts to do so? These are questions I don't know the answer to at the moment, but are questions miners should ask themselves before loading their operations up with third-party risk.

As Bitcoin continues to grow — and with it, the target on its back — bitcoin miners should be hyper-aware of these third-party risks and attempt to mitigate them to the best of their ability. This is why your Uncle Marty is very bullish on vertically integrated off-grid mining operations that are more distributed, housed in states that respect freedom and property rights and significantly harder to identify and shut down when the government inevitably decides to focus the ire of their manic anti-human insanity on the bitcoin mining industry.

I am a big fan of the incredible work large-scale miners are doing here in the U.S. and Canada, but I do worry that the federal governments in the U.S. and Canada will find them to be easy political targets to pick on in the future. I truly hope this does not come to fruition, but it is hard to argue that they aren't massive sitting targets that insane federal governments can try to wage attacks against.

I feel terrible that Bitriver and their customers have been dragged into a political shit show and are now being financially damaged because those in the political class are gung-ho on escalating geopolitical tensions as they continue their massive Deep State dick measuring contest in front of the world. Honest, hard-working people are being harmed as the proxy war between warring super powers wages on.

If you're running a mining operation make sure you take the Deep State dick-measuring contests, the political environment of your local government and the size of your operation into consideration when building it out. All present points of failure and you do not want to concentrate your risk in one area. Open / Comment

2022-04-21 14:10:00 ​​Bonds Are Down 30% From All-Time Highs

The below is an excerpt from a recent edition of Bitcoin Magazine Pro, Bitcoin Magazine's premium markets newsletter. To be among the first to receive these insights and other on-chain bitcoin market analysis straight to your inbox, subscribe now.

U.S. 30-Year Treasury Yield Hits 3%
Recently, the U.S. 30-year Treasury bond yield hit over 3% as the Treasury bond market across durations and broader credit markets continue selling off.

The rise in yields has resulted in much higher bond market volatility and significant drawdowns for investors. The iShares 20-year Treasury Bond ETF, TLT, which tracks an index of long duration maturities, is now down over 30% from the all-time high back in July 2020. The latest drawdown is the fastest deceleration across a 30-day percentage change since May 2009.

For context, bitcoin is only down roughly 39% from the all-time high. So much for long-dated U.S. Treasuries providing low volatility, portfolio hedging performance and “risk-free” rates.

It’s important to keep in mind the long-term outlook of the global economic system when evaluating the performance of bitcoin and debt securities.

Because of the realities of a historic debt burden that worsened post COVID-19 economic lockdowns, followed by the historic stimulus that followed, debt as an asset class was a promise of return-free risk. Debt is not merely an agreement between borrower and lender, but in the global economy it underpins the entire financial system as a liquid asset class (the largest one at that).

Because of the reality of roughly $100 trillion worth of credit promising return-free risk (nevermind the assets that are priced off of the historically negative real rates: equities, real estate, etc.), our case has repeatedly been that the perfect asset in theory to hold at this stage of a long-term debt cycle is one with no counterparty risk and zero dilution risk.

Theory met reality with the advent of the Bitcoin network in 2009.

Now, as the entire investing world is working to figure out how to outpace the historic inflation regime we are faced with today, there stands bitcoin, which continues to look remarkably cheap against the market valuation of every other asset on the planet. Open / Comment