Marking a massive increase in holdings since the beginning of 2019, BitMEX’s insurance fund now reportedly holds more than $312 million worth of bitcoin, holding 0.15 percent of all BTC currently in existence. The Need for Bitcoin Insurance The massive cryptocurrency leverage trading platform serves as a facilitator for derivatives contracts between multiple parties. Using…
Kunal Kalra, a resident of Los Angeles, California, has pleaded guilty to running an unlicensed cryptocurrency exchange operation which catered to drug traffickers. An announcement published by the U.S. Department of Justice indicated that Kalra, who went by the pseudonyms “Kumar” and “Coinman,” has plead guilty to four charges, including operating an unlicensed money transmitting…
If blockchain analysis firm Chainalysis is right, only a small fraction of coins sent to and from bitcoin mixers are used for illicit purposes. In a recent webinar titled “Cryptocurrency Typologies: What You Should Know About Who’s Who on the Blockchains,” the blockchain analytics firm suggested that users of mixing services mostly leverage the option…
Script, the smart-contract programming language for Bitcoin, has gotten an upgrade. Developers are addressing challenges on the network through local Socratic Seminars. A Bavarian entrepreneur is promoting Bitcoin through a multisport race. And the curious case of the Asian mafia behind the PlusToken racket. Scams The PlusToken Scam This week, we looked into the case…
Chaincode Labs engineer Carl Dong is one of the most prolific and promising Bitcoin developers today. In the beginning of his career, he made significant contributions to the 21dotco protocol (which turned into Earn.com). Subsequently, he joined Blockstream and is doing perpetual work on Andrew Poelstra’s Rust Bitcoin implementation. But Dong truly came into his…
It’s been nine years since the first bitcoin exchange opened its domain to customers, but some of the world’s largest banks still have problems with their clients sending their money to these trading posts. When bitcoin was in its infancy, exchanges created unexplored financial territory, and many banks were hesitant to approve wire transfers to…
This article was originally published by 8btc and written by Lylian Teng. Over 30 percent of Chinese cryptocurrency investors polled predicted that the bitcoin price will surpass $30,000 over the next 12 months, according to a recent survey conducted by local crypto financing company BabelFinance. The survey, collecting hundreds of valid responses, found that the…
This article was originally published by 8btc and written by Lylian Teng. China is about to roll out its central bank digital currency (CBDC), which features a two-layer operation mechanism, with China’s central bank running the top layer and business institutions running the second layer, said Mu Changchun, deputy chief at the Payment and Settlement…
Summary: Following a large drop, the bitcoin market saw a bullish retest of a known support/resistance level. The $10,800 level has been a major pivot point for our market structure and, if we can manage to reclaim it as support, it would be a huge sign of strength in the market. However, if we fail…
In a world of Bitcoin-powered businesses, where the technology’s cypherpunk roots seem to fade over time, Hodl Hodl is making extensive efforts to popularize the noncustodial and privacy-friendly exchange model. Just a couple of weeks after BitPay announced identity and location verification for refunds and payments larger than $1,000 and $3,000 respectively, for instance, Hodl…