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Showing posts from January 22, 2021

MLB Team Washington Nationals Partners With Terra Blockchain Community, Ballpark Plans to Accept UST

On February 9, the American professional baseball team based in Washington, D.C., the Washington Nationals, announced the team has partnered with Terra, the open-source blockchain platform and decentralized autonomous organization (DAO). The Washington Nationals detail that the team is a “leading innovator” and is “consistently introducing new technologies to enhance the fan experience.” Washington Nationals Ink Long-Term Deal With Terra Major League Baseball (MLB) team the Washington Nationals has partnered with the blockchain platform and DAO Terra, according to an announcement published by the team on Wednesday. The deal with Terra follows a slew of sports-related deals with crypto firms, but the MLB team will be the first to partner with an open-source blockchain project. In addition to the partnership, the algorithmic stablecoin UST that’s issued on the Terra blockchain will be “accepted as a payment method at Nationals Park as early as next season.” “The Nationals continue t...

Premium on Grayscale’s GBTC Drops as Reports of New Trusts Emerge: Chinese Crypto Community Unhappy

Following the recent bitcoin price pullback, the latest Skew data now indicates that the premium rate on Grayscale’s GBTC is under 10%. The lower rate comes just weeks after the premium peaked at 41% towards the end of December. The GBTC premium is a measure of the extent of differences in the value between the crypto asset on the open market and in the Grayscale fund. The same data also shows that between late October of 2020 and January 21 of the current year, this premium averaged 22%. However, in the seven days leading up to January 21, this rate dropped to 7.3%. According to Bohdan Prylepa, the CTO at Prof-it.bz, this “decrease indicates the sale of shares by some investors after the end of the freeze period.” This is in contrast with a rising premium, which according to the CTO, is an indication of “high demand for GBTC.” Dropping Demand for GBTC Also agreeing with Prylepa’s view is Justin Barlow of Thetie.io, who goes on to add that “GBTC has traded at a premium to the unde...

Montana County to Hold Public Hearings on Zoning Rules for Crypto Miners Amid Growing Complaints

Another U.S. county is facing troubles related to crypto mining activities within its territory. This time, the second-largest county in Montana is the protagonist of the story, who will look forward to revisiting local zoning for mining operators. Authorities to Decide on Making Current Rules Permanent According to KPAX , Missoula County authorities seek to hold a series of public hearings addressing the matter. In fact, they are targeting to make zoning rules for bitcoin ( BTC ) mining activities permanent in the county. The Missoula County Planning Board already held the first conversations at the start of this week, said the local media outlet. The tale of the county’s relationship with crypto mining dates back to April 2019. Hyperblock, a Canadian company, built several 20-megawatt mining warehouses at the time. In the beginning, authorities praised the fact that such a move brought several jobs and revenues to the county. However, neighbors started to complain about the m...

Altcoins rally while Bitcoin bulls are thwarted by resistance at $34K

A handful of altcoins posted double-digit gains while Bitcoin’s relief rally was halted by resistance at $34,000. Bitcoin’s ( BTC ) tumble below $30,000 was short-lived as the top cryptocurrency found a new wave of support, including a $10 million ‘buy the dip’ moment from MicroStrategy.  Data from Cointelegraph Markets and TradingView shows the strong inflows have helped lift BTC 4.92% to a daily high at $33,866. As the prospect of the Biden administration passing massive stimulus packages to help get the United States economy going again, conversations about Bitcoin becoming a reserve currency are beginning to pop up again. Although Bitcoin’s recent volatility has some analysts saying BTC is a cyclical asset rather than a hedge , the price recent movements have caught the eye of retail investors who have shown a renewed interest in cryptocurrencies in general. Daily cryptocurrency market performance. Source: Coin360 Even the Bank of International Settlements has a...

Privacy-Centric Cryptocurrency Firo Suffers 51% Attack on Its Network

The proof-of-work (PoW) cryptocurrency Firo announced that its protocol came under a 51% attack, notifying its holders to stop transactions. Formerly known as Zcoin, the privacy coin was reportedly subject of a blockchain reorganization attack. Firo Team Clarified the Attack Cannot Be Attributed to a ‘Coding Error’ According to a series of tweets published by Firo, the attacker breached the protocol on January 19, and they are working to restore operations. However, the Firo team clarified that the 51% mining attack is not the result of “a coding error but [the] nature of PoW.” One of the first reports about the attack came from the Binance CEO, Changpeng Zhao, who said : XZC (FIRO) 51% attack, 306 blocks rolled back, to 2021-01-18 17:24:20(UTC). Another messy situation. At the time of making the attack public, Firo posted a tweet that said: We are working with exchanges and pools currently. Chainlocks that would have prevented this were being tested on testnet and was week...

DeFi surge, rising TVL and new partnerships underpin Ren’s 100% rally

The DeFi boom and search for projects offering interoperability recently sent Ren’s price and total value locked to new all-time highs. Interoperability between blockchains is rapidly becoming one of the buzz phrases being thrown around when discussing decentralized finance and the coins most likely to rally during an altcoin bull run.  The rapid growth of DeFi, its ever expanding total value locked and soaring ETH gas fees further highlight the sector’s need for a layer 2 option that also supports the ability to transact value across different networks. REN’s open protocol is designed specifically to fill this need by providing interoperability and liquidity between the top blockchains including Bitcoin, Ethereum and Zcash. Over the past three weeks the price of REN has increased by more than 200%, going from $0.251 on Dec. 27 to a new all-time high of $0.778 on Jan. 20 driven by a record $369 million in 24-hour volume. REN/USDT 4-hour chart. Source: TradingView Three re...

Bitcoin's biggest mining pool may be behind the BTC price drop, but buyers stepped in

This week's volatility may come down to a tug-of-war between F2Pool selling and Grayscale buying. Bitcoin ( BTC ) fell to lows of $28,950 on Jan. 22 thanks to miners likely selling huge amounts of their holdings — but big buyers made sure that the dip was minimal. According to data from on-chain monitoring resource CryptoQuant , the past few days saw vast outflows from mining pools, which in turn corresponded to BTC/USD shedding 20% in a week . F2Pool daily outflows hit 10,000 BTC Beginning Jan. 15, outflows from F2Pool — currently the largest mining pool comprising roughly 15% of total hash rate — in particular, began to rise. By Jan. 17, daily outflows had reached 10,000 BTC ($313 million), these continuing for three days in a row before returning closer to normal levels. F2Pool appears to be responsible for the vast majority of outflows, which do not necessarily mean that miners sold BTC on the open market, but simply that they moved mined coins from their original wallet...

Hive Blockchain Buys 6,400 Bitcoin Miners From Canaan, Capacity Reaches 1,229 PH/s

Canadian bitcoin miner Hive Blockchain has bought 6,400 next generation mining machines from Canaan. The Avalonminer 1246 miners will add a combined 576 petahash per second (PH/s) to Hive’s existing hash power. ● With the addition of the new machines, Hive’s total hash rate will increase to an estimated 1,229 PH/s, well beyond the company’s original cumulative hash rate target of 1,000 PH/s for 2021. ● In a statement this week, Hive said the equipment will be delivered in eight tranches in 2021, with 500 miners delivered in May and June, and 900 miners delivered each month until year-end. ● Vancouver-based Hive said the latest purchase, which is double the 3,500 miners bought last year, “is part of our continuing strategy to increase our bitcoin mining capacity.” For the December 2020 quarter, the firm mined 140 bitcoins and over 22,000 ethereum ( ETH ). ● According to Canaan’s Web Store , the Avalonminer 1246 is selling for $1,450 each. The miner is the Chinese company’s ...

The ‘central bank of central banks’ is building a CBDC settlement platform

The Bank of International Settlements has outlined plans to embark on a variety of CBDC trials worldwide this year. CBDC research has been announced as a top priority for the Bank for International Settlements’ Innovation Hub, or BISIH, in 2021. According to its annual work program, BISIH, plans to “explore the feasibility of faster and cheaper cross-border payments” using central bank digital currencies. BISIH also stated it will explore prototypes of “tiered retail CBDC distribution architectures” and distributed ledgers to issue “tokenized green bonds to retail investors.” The BIS initiatives will be driven by the Innovation Hub Centres in Hong Kong, Singapore, and Switzerland — which have been established in conjunction with local central banks. The BISIH center in Singapore has been tasked with building an “international settlement platform” on which regulated banks and payment firms can settle transactions using different CBDCs. The Hong Kong center will work on the green ...

Crypto Fear and Greed index drops to October 2020 levels

The Crypto Fear and Greed index shows that the cryptocurrency market sentiment has just shifted from “Extreme Greed” to “Fear.” With the Bitcoin ( BTC ) price dipping below a $29,000 threshold , the investor mood is worsening and the Crypto Fear and Greed index has plunged to October 2020 levels. On Jan. 22, the Crypto Fear and Greed index sharply dropped to a value of 40, moving the market sentiment from “Extreme Greed” to “Fear.” The index dropped to this low for the first time since Oct. 3, 2020, when Bitcoin was trading at around $10,500 . Crypto Fear and Greed Index one-year chart. Source: Alternative.me Similar to the fear and greed indexes in the traditional markets , the Crypto Fear and Greed index is a tool that measures two of the primary emotions that influence how much investors are willing to buy crypto like Bitcoin.  According to Alternative.me, the extreme fear level can be a sign that investors are too worried, which could mean a good buying opportunity. In...