Archives for July 5, 2018

The launch of “institutional grade” cryptocurrency custodian services by Coinbase and others is easing the path of major investors into cryptographic assets

Computing giant IBM has been awarded a landmark contract to develop blockchain and other digital technology initiatives for the government of Australia. Announced on Thursday, the five-year, AUD $1 billion (~USD $740 million) contract is Australia’s latest attempt to make good on its goal to become one of the world’s “top-three digital governments” by 2025

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Technically and if we can take a top-down approach, Litecoin is trending higher. However, given the events of yesterday where we saw gains clipped by as much as 10 percent down from 14 percent earlier this week,  Litecoin bulls stand on a shaky ground. Because of this, it’s likely that prices may continue reversing July 2 gains and in that case I suggest take a wait and see approach.

From the News

What a time to be alive. Too much popcorn for decentralized currencies “poised to revolutionize the world”. At this rate, many are opting to have a time stamp receipt at their local grocery shop rather than using fast settling cryptocurrencies like Litecoin and even Bitcoin Cash. Well, there are many reasons why. First, the declaration by Binance that they are creating a SAFU for their users following that API keys compromise that saw the price of SYS temporarily spike to 96 BTC is not a joke. Even Charlie Lee picked it up and posted this new announcement to his followers meaning it’s a weighty issue and a joke to decentralization.

pic.twitter.com/9uSdlB9Dd0

— Doge Sun Tzu (@DanyF19015410) July 4, 2018

What that mean is that going forward, they will channel 10 percent of their trading fees to this fund as a safety net in case there is an attack leading to losses. Funny enough, all this is happening within the confines of a technology that is meant to be hacker proof. It’s technically the weakness of having a centralized entity taking charge of systems that should be in theory trustless. Remember, Binance is now acting as a charity exchange and would compensate those affected using their own coin, BNB.

We don’t know yet but maybe Binance being a powerful, multi-billion Exchange might just be setting up precedence for other exchanges to follow suit. This boosts and even encourages hackers to aim for the higher jack pot because they know these exchanges would compensate those affected.

Litecoin (LTC) Technical Analysis

Weekly Chart

Obviously, Litecoin prices have been on a one way slide since testing their highs late last year. And yes, there are many theories that claim to explain this depreciation but there what we do know is that this loss won’t go on forever. In early June, LTC sellers pushed prices below $110 and the accompanying volumes and size of candlestick pointed out to a typical bear break out.

Because break outs are usually followed by a pull back, it’s likely that this week might be the beginning of a pull-back retesting $110. It may also be LTC bulls snapping back into the general trend set in pace in Q3 of 2017 more so if there is a strong break above $110 and later $130.

So, in light of this technical set up and last week’s rejection of lower lows right at main support, my suggestion is to load longs if this week ends up bullish. That would mean the completion of a three bar bull reversal pattern, The Morning Star.

Daily Chart

Complementing our assertions in the weekly chart are these nice higher highs bouncing of that double bar reversal candlestick on June 29-30 and on July 2. There we can see buyers rejecting lower prices and printing higher.

So regardless of yesterday’s lower lows, the only thing can cancel our bullish projection is if prices dip below $70. As it stands, prices are inside July 2 high lows and clearly rejecting $90. Today with might see prices adding to their losses and despite that, we shall hold a bullish view until our short trade conditions are met or until prices bolt above $90.

Disclaimer: Views and opinions expressed are those of the author and aren’t investment advice. Trading of any form involves risk and so do your due diligence before making a trading decision.

The post Litecoin (LTC) Technical Analysis: Litecoins Bulls Are Shaky appeared first on NewsBTC.

Altcoins though swinging-are on a recovery path and none stands out like IOTA. Gains have been consistent and they continue to partner with strategic industries. As that is happening Tron SRs election is on-going and so far there haven’t been market moving news events injecting demand.

Let’s have a look at these charts:

EOS Technical Analysis

In an effect versus cause, effort versus result comparison, we can clearly see that sellers are in charge. That’s if we consider the six-month time frame since the beginning of the year. In this time frame we can clearly see that EOS has been on a down trend.

This is irrespective of the fundamental aspects that their mainnet is now live and Block Producers are busy validating transactions. In the last week though, prices have been recovering but is our buy projection really valid? Well, it depends and that’s more so if we see gains above $9 like we have been reiterating in previous analysis.

For strong buys, traders should first see gains reversing June 22 depreciation and that means valuation above $12. This applies for risk-off traders who needs confirmations. However for risk-on, aggressive type traders, buying above $9 on every dip means conservatives targets at $15 with stops at $7.

Litecoin (LTC) Technical Analysis

Overly, LTC prices are stable even in a midst of an otherwise bear trend. The events of the past weeks are bound to change this narrative especially if we see gains above $90, our immediate resistance line and lower edge buy trigger we have been emphasizing in our analysis.

Note that, despite that strong bullish candlestick of July 2, LTC is stuck in a range mode. This is normal and should not mean sells instead it could imply that there is a lower-level accumulation in progress. Mind you, the only thing that cancels this bullish projection is a dip below $70 or June 29 lows.

Stellar Lumens (XLM) Technical Analysis

Like before, July 2 strong move above 20 cents triggered our buys and we continue to be long in line with our trade plan. There are pockets of sells but buy momentum seems to outweigh that as July 3 and 4 candlesticks shows.

As it stands, we can see that prices are still moving inside July 2 bullish candlestick and so for those planning to enter, wait until there is a move above 22 cents of July 2 highs. Thereafter, you can begin to load or wait until prices gains above 25 cents to trade with the trend with stops at 18 cents and 23 cents respectively.

Tron (TRX) Technical Analysis

The execution of the Tron mainnet and election of the 27 Super Representatives have been meticulous and near-perfect to say the least. We can easily conclude that the planners of this execution and Justin Sun PR were attentive to detail, learning from EOS failings.

Their constitution is not yet out but going by how they have been handling stuff, Justin Sun would probably want it to be free of controversy especially when it comes to the power vested on their network super nodes.

On to the charts and TRX prices are stable. Of course, picking bottoms is a dangerous games and since TRX prices was literally stuck in a consolidation before that explosion in late 2017, we would take a conservative approach.

By this I mean my buy suggestion would take effect once we see up-thrusts above 5.5 cents, the upper edge of this trade range. Otherwise, for now we remain neutral even if we have those higher highs. Any break below 3.3 cents and sellers are likely to drive prices to 2.5 cents, the lower limit of the trade range.

IOTA (IOT) Technical Analysis

As we have mentioned before, IOTA user case qualifies this coin as a long term buy and what a good time to buy this coin. After bouncing off the support at 90 cents, IOTA gains have been consistent and in the last 24 hours, they are up three percent. I suggest buying at current prices with stops at 90 cents or June 29 lows and stops at $2.5.

Disclaimer: Views and opinions expressed are those of the author and aren’t investment advice. Trading of any form involves risk and so do your due diligence before making a trading decision.

The post EOS, Litecoin, Stellar Lumens, Tron, IOTA Technical Analysis: D.C.A, Buy Altcoins on Dips appeared first on NewsBTC.

Bitcoin Press Release: Beijing: In yet another move to improve capital accessibility for blockchain startups, Sonic Zhang, a serial entrepreneur and the co-founder of Valuenet Capital, has announced that he is investing 25k ETH in ZEEX through his new crypto fund, LedgerZ.

According to Guy Melamed, ZEEX CEO and Cofounder, the investment will go a long way in helping the company achieve its goal of turning cryptos into a payment method for everyday goods and services.

This will be possible by making cryptos seemingly and effortlessly convertible into real vouchers and gift cards. ZEEX is a sister company of ZEEK Group, a leading Europe-based marketplace for buying and selling of gift cards.

“Zang has a rich history of choosing strong, long-term values and we’re humbled to say he has done so with us as one of the first strategic investments for LedgerZ”, says Melamed.

The investment, therefore, is a vote of confidence on ZEEX ability to deliver to investors’ expectations.

While this is the first investment from ledgerZ fund, it is not the only one that has received backing from the Beijing-based entrepreneur. In March this year, Zhang through Valuenet Capital entered into a partnership with the Komodo platform to launch the world’s first decentralized ICO.

Other blockchain startups that have received investment from crypto funds associated with Zhang include Power Ledger, Celsius Network, WAX, OmiseGo, and Binance. He is also a co-founder and global director of 20 Nations League of Blockchain (B20), an international NGO focused on bridging blockchain and crypto-currency communities worldwide.

One thing that is common among all these projects is that they are all geared towards making the cryptos accessible to the masses.

“From my involvement in various projects going from energy sector to dapps, exchanges, gaming, and finance solutions, one thing is becoming very clear, there is a lack of infrastructure layer protocols that can support everyday users to interact with the decentralized web in a seamless way,” says Zhang.

The ZEEX project is, therefore, a special one among all his projects given that it is the first to provide a crypto-based solution that addresses the day to day challenges of the ordinary person.

According to Melamed, the positive reception by investors through the crypto fund and also the private sale has encouraged the company to launch a public pre-sale to give the ordinary person an opportunity to invest.

The presale will begin on July 5^th and will take 24 hours.

Get the latest in Asian Bitcoin news here at Coin News Asia.

For more information on press releases, please do contact us at info@coinnewsasia.com or use our contact form.

The post Sonic Zhang Launches LedgerZ Fund, with a Premiere 25K ETH Investment in Zeex appeared first on Coin News Asia.

I have been reading a lot about Comino’s GPU miner and finally got the chance to review it. As soon as I learned that it was the supposed “ultimate home mining solution,” I decided to leave the white gloves in the office and bring her home. 

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At first, I was a little bit scared of the size of the device, but considering that the 8 GPUs are liquid cooled and 2 PSUs are air cooled, it’s understandable why the device would be so big. That said, it’s still 4-5 times smaller than a comparable air-cooled rig.

When I was unboxing the device, I was so excited that I totally forgot to take any pictures — my bad. When it came out of the box, however, I was really surprised. It really is a piece of engineering. The whole house is made of aluminum and it seems laser cut.

After the disassembly, I realized that the weight is coming from the water cooling.

The design is almost perfect — who said that miners should be ugly? However, I wouldn’t say my wife would consider this the nicest decoration of the living room but, compared to any other solutions, it looks really nice and quiet.

But let’s get down to business and see the specs!

Miner Specifications

Let’s first start with the heart — the miner is powered by 8 Nvidia P106 6GB Gigabyte GPU. These cards these are basically the 1060Ti series, but made specifically for mining — no HDMI outputs or other useless nasties. These cards were built for mining (yes, there is a difference) and come with a one year warranty.

Below are the specs:

• Card name: Gigabyte GV-NP106D5-6G rev1.1
• Graphics Engine: NVIDIA P106-100
• Bus Standard: PCI Express 1.1
• Video Memory: GDDR5 6GB
• Engine Clock: GPU Boost Clock: 1708 MHz GPU Base Clock: 1506 MHz
• CUDA Core: 1280
• Memory Clock: 8008 MHz
• Memory Interface: 192-bit
• Power Connectors: 1 x 6-pin
• Dimensions: 9.45 ” x 5.16 ” x 1.5 ” Inch / 24 x 13.1 x3.8 Centimeter
• Ethash hashrate: approx: 200±5% mH/s
• Operating system: Comino OS (Customized Ubuntu)

What’s inside?

As soon as I received the Comino miner, I was sure that I would disassemble it.

The inside of the machine is incredible. All the parts are designed and manufactured for this miner, specifically, and everything is in just the right place. There are no loose cables or noisy fans. Everything is just where it needs to be and is served by water cooling, making for silent mining.

Installation

The installation process is quite straightforward. You power it on, press the right button, and let it boot up. After the successful booting procedure, connect to the Comino_xxxx named wifi and use your password given in the manual. Connect and setup.

Reset WiFi

If you don’t have the right password, just press the “Mode” (left side) button 3 times, then choose option 2 to reset the password. After that, the wifi name and password will be displayed on the screen.

After you are connected, there will be a pop-up screen asking for login credentials — just shoot in admin/admin and it will be fine. In that screen, you can set up you wifi. It’s pretty easy. Just choose your network and input password then save it. You can set up your GPU settings here as well.

Ready to mine

Under the wifi settings, you can add your Ethereum address and save it. Reboot the device and you are ready to go!

You can access the device remotely via my.comino.com and make some more advanced setups — by default, the device is currently supporting Ethereum and Zcash. However, according to the company’s statements, it will be able to mine other altcoins soon.

There is no option to change the pool or the coin, which might seem strange for some experienced miners it is strange — but this thing is just working out of the box.

Of course, you can reach your miner on the local network by typing the IP address of the device — which is pretty easy since it is displayed on the front screen.

The setup is easy, but it would be nice to have a manual added to my.comino.com which includes the serial number and secret key. However, if the miners end up on the second-hand market, users may still contact Comino via email and request the transfer of a device to another account. This method actually helps prevent theft.

Conclusion

This is a really nice device and, compared to any other mining solution, it is really easy to setup and really silent. I am not sure that it would be a good idea to put it in your bedroom, however, but it definitely lets you sleep if there is a wall in between.

The design is really nice but uses a lot of aluminum and water cooling — making it quite heavy. As far as I can see, the miner is made from quality materials and parts. Comino designed the raisers using only gold-plated sockets, cables, controller board operating cooling system, and chassis. Meanwhile, the Noctua iPPS fans and HWlabs radiator are some of the very best found on the market, so they won’t let you down. (If you ever tried building a rig, you already know the Chinese risers, adapters, and parts will make your rig a nightmare.)

I think that this is not a data-center big business solution. (Comino has an enterprise solution for that.) If you want to start home mining with an easy configuration and want to have a nicely designed miner in your home or office, here you go.

Mining stats

For the first 10 hours of mining, my average rate was 199.87 mH/s with the default configuration — so we can say the device is working as promised!

What do you think of Comino’s miner? Let us know in the comments below!

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Images courtesy of

The post Is the Comino N1 Miner the Apple of Miners? (Review) appeared first on Bitcoinist.com.

Chinese cryptocurrency exchange Huobi announced this week that trading has begun on its newly-launched platform in Australia. Huobi’s global push is no surprise, as most crypto exchanges have been pursuing untapped markets in a bid to grow their user bases. The exchange — now based out of Singapore, with offices in Canada and Brazil — said trading

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California-based blockchain and cryptocurrency security firm CipherTrace released its Q2 2018 report in July 2018 and noted the rise of cryptocurrency crime, money laundering, and other illicit activities. One particular item of note was that $1.2 billion has been laundered through cryptocurrency tools such as bitcoin tumblers and privacy-centric altcoins like zcash and monero. Criminals

The post $1.2 Billion in Cryptocurrency Laundered Through Bitcoin Tumblers, Privacy Coins appeared first on CCN

Europe’s largest trader of exchange-traded funds, or ETFs, is taking steps into the cryptocurrency space in attempts to capitalize on the volatility of the current market. This is despite the fact that its regulator urges against buying and selling the coins.

Flow Traders Moves into Crypto

According to co-CEO Dennis Dijkstra, the Amsterdam-based speed trader Flow Traders will be the first to offer exchange-traded notes (ETNs) based on Bitcoin and Ether. Another firm, Sweden-based XBT Provider (an issuer of crypto ETNs) said that Flow Traders has “dramatically increased” the trading of its securities in the last few months.

Currently, several U.S. speed traders are making markets in cryptocurrency futures or the underlying currencies. Of note is that Flow Traders is the first firm — Europe, U.S., or otherwise — to disclose it’s buying and selling crypto notes listed on regulated stock exchanges, according to Bloomberg.

Moving forward, Dijkstra believes that publicly traded notes or funds will broaden the appeal of digital currencies as an asset class by providing a straightforward and cheaper way of investing in the the coins.

“People underestimate crypto,” Dijkstra said. “It’s big, and it is to be regulated very soon. The market participants are much more professional than people think. Institutional investors are interested – we know they are because we get requests.”

Dutch Authority for the Financial Markets

Despite this enthusiasm from investors, Flow Traders’ regulator, the Dutch Authority for the Financial Markets (AFM), is against the move into the crypto space, primarily because they don’t regard digital currencies to be an asset class. That said, there isn’t much the watchdog can do to stop a firm from trading regulated securities or derivatives on a regulated exchange. In a statement, Nienke Torensma, a spokesperson for the AFM, said:

“We discourage activities in cryptos both by consumers and professional license holders. By virtue of its newness and the anonymity it potentially offers, it is very prone to abuse. Given its inability to serve the promised purpose as a currency, we don’t regard it to be an asset class.”

Flow Traders traded 244 billion euros ($284 billion) of ETFs globally in the first quarter of 2018, including 143 billion euros in Europe, making it the region’s biggest trader of the securities.

Like its rivals, last year’s weak trading volumes in its core market was what prompted Flow Traders to move into the crypto space. Digital currencies are particularly attractive because speed traders make the most money in the most volatile markets.

“With the growing interest from institutional clients willing to invest in digital assets, I can see why so many proprietary trading businesses are now focusing on this new asset class,” Laurent Kssis, managing director at XBT Provider, said. 

Featured image from Shutterstock.

The post Dutch Speed Trader to Enter the Crypto Space with ETNs Based on Bitcoin and Ether appeared first on NewsBTC.