The floodgates have opened on Bitcoin Exchange Traded Fund (ETF) applications, with 34 currently pending approval and more joining the queue by the day.
Here's the current list of #Bitcoin and Crypto ETF filings with the SEC. Next big date is still 11/14/21 for VanEck's spot Bitcoin ETF. It will be either approval or denial from SEC — no more delays. https://t.co/Z8phpVlsOKpic.twitter.com/g9ayoibmQN
Advocates for a Bitcoin ETF argue that the complexities of exchanges, crypto wallets and private keys still present a barrier to entry into the crypto space for newcomers. A Bitcoin ETF would enable these investors to gain exposure to Bitcoin without actually having to hold their own cryptocurrency.
A Long and Winding Road
The road toward a Bitcoin ETF has been long and tortuous. Since the Winklevoss twins first filed for a Bitcoin ETF-like trust in 2013, the US Securities Exchange Commission (SEC) has cited concerns over the lack of transparency of trading information, possible market manipulation, and the notion that Bitcoin is fundamentally different from other assets it regularly deals with. It is also worried about a lack of liquidity in the markets, Bitcoin’s inherent volatility, and fears over associated fraud.
Part of the case against a futures-based Bitcoin ETF is the 1 percent annual fund management fee, which detractors warn tends to quietly accumulate, and the added complexity of trading futures, whether they be soy, crude oil, or cryptos.
The government of the southern African republic of Zimbabwe is closely examining the possibility of adopting cryptocurrency and blockchain technology after an ICT Summit last weekend.
According to a local news outlet, the Computer Society of Zimbabwe (CSZ) held an information communication technologies (ICT)-centred summit in Victoria Falls. At the summit, Cabinet Brigadier General Charles Wekwete, permanent secretary and head of Zimbabwe’s e-government technology unit, revealed that talks with the private sector were under way to discuss the possibility of using bitcoin (BTC) as a legal payment method.
Wekwete stated that Zimbabwe is in the process of weighing its options of possibly adopting cryptocurrency as a legal payment service in the country, which has been plagued by a financial crisis for more than a decade.
Government has put in place mechanism(s) to try and gather views from various sectors of society in order to eventually formulate policies. There have been pronouncements by the Minister of Finance and the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe, and it’s such a complex area. Sooner or later government will make statements, but we have not gotten there yet, [though] the consultative process is already under way.
Brigadier General Charles Wekwete, head of Zimbabwe’s e-government technology unit
Wow, massive news!
Another massive country is looking to adopt #Bitcoin as legal payment option.
During the summit, CSZ members asked what the government was doing to adopt cryptocurrency in light of new global trends where transactions are done online, on the blockchain, with low fees. Now Wekwete has invited private sector players who have ideas on how best to facilitate the technology, and how it can be structured to make presentations to government for further consideration.
With Zimbabwe possibly following in the footsteps of El Salvador, Wekwete stated: “Governments are still trying to understand and properly trying to create policies on how to deal with it. In our case, initially we were trying to understand the implication [of cryptocurrencies] because they are a fundamental departure from previously known financial instruments.”
I think you’re to concerned with crypto. You should try to focus on what matters and understand how Bitcoin can empower the people of Zimbabwe.
It is only a matter of time before Zimbabwe allows its citizens to use bitcoin as legal tender and begins to publicly buy and hold the asset in reserve.
Zimbabwe Should Look to Local Solutions
The Zimbabwe Blockchain Technology Think Tank has published a comprehensive study about the adoption of crypto in the country, titled Towards Virtual Assets Regulation and Adoption of Blockchain Technologies in Zimbabwe’s Context. The initial research has been done to start testing out cryptos, but for something so transformative the government is still in its “consulting phase”.
Golix, Africa’s cryptocurrency exchange, could have proven a test case in the Zimbabwean context, but at that stage crypto was banned in the country, leaving the project high and dry.
Another instance was Minister of Finance Mthuli Ncube stating that he had found a remittance solution in Dubai that could be used for Zimbabwe, while there is a local start-up called Uhuru that does exactly that. By empowering entrepreneurs in the country, the government can create a win-win scenario that can put Zimbabwe back on the economic rails.
The cryptocurrency market has hit a new milestone in topping a record high of US$3 trillion market cap, according to analytics website CoinGecko.
Bitcoin and Ethereum Reach New ATHs
The crypto market hit an all-time high (ATH) of US$3 trillion on November 8, thanks to the combined efforts of two of the most traded cryptocurrencies, Ether (ETH) and Bitcoin (BTC). The two assets smashed records in both price and trading volumes.
Bitcoin broke slightly above its previous ATH of US$67,000 by hitting $$68,641.57, as per data from CoinGecko. Ethereum saw substantial gains as well, seeing an ATH of US$4,857.25 the same day.
Main drivers for the ETH price surge include the burning mechanism, which is eliminating circulating coins, the transition to a PoS system with the advent of ETH 2.0, the NFT investing frenzy, along with speculations of its involvement in the metaverse.
The rumours started circulating when Vitalik Buterin predicted that Ethereum could be the network running the metaverse within 10 years.
Bitcoin Futures ETFs Drive Markets
With Bitcoin, we’ve seen a revived interest from institutional clients with the launch of Bitcoin futures ETFs. Two Bitcoin ETFs broke records on their first days. ProShares’ BITO recorded over US$550 million in trading volume from crypto-hungry investors, and Australia’s BetaShares crypto ETF smashed Australian Securities Exchange (ASX) trading records on its debut – over A$40 million on the first day, with A$5.2 million traded in five minutes.
The crypto market currently has a 24-hour trading volume of US$138 billion – this equates to the total market cap in March 2019.
Despite the new Bitcoin ATH, its dominance is still below 50 percent, now marked at 42.8 percent. Back on September 6, 2019, BTC was the undisputed leader of the market with 70.8 percent dominance.
In June of this year, 95 percent of major Bitcoin pools signalled their intention to implement Taproot, an upgrade to the Bitcoin network designed to boost its privacy, efficiency and smart contracts capability. Taproot will be activated when it reaches block #709,632, estimated to be around November 14.
Taproot represents Bitcoin’s first major upgrade since August 2017, when Segregated Witness (SegWit) was implemented. This led to the creation and launch of the Lightning Network.
While SegWit sought to improve Bitcoin’s scalability, Taproot’s focus is on efficiency, privacy and the support of smart contracts. The Taproot upgrade, due to go live on November 14, encompasses three Bitcoin Improvement Proposals (BIPs).
BIP-340 – Focused on Privacy and Reducing Transaction Costs
Introduces the main component of Taproot, deploying a feature known as Schnorr signatures. This helps to fix some privacy and space issues that SegWit introduced back in 2017.
In order to generate public and private keys, Bitcoin uses an elliptic curve digital signature algorithm that allows users to sign a transaction with a private key, revealing a public key in the process. When two or more signatures are used (such as with a multi-sig wallet), multiple public keys are revealed, resulting in larger transactions, thus increasing transaction fees.
BIP-340 therefore improves Bitcoin’s privacy and scalability by adding Schnorr signatures, which allow for key aggregation, making transactions smaller and therefore cheaper.
An upgrade to the Bitcoin protocol which allows supporting wallets to construct a new address type, which can be used for everything from normal payments to advanced usage like Lightning. In many cases, spending is possible without revealing which of these was actually used.
BIP-341 – Focused on Making More Secure Smart Contracts
Introduces Merkelised abstract syntax trees (MASTs) to make smart contracts on Bitcoin more secure.
This feature uses Schnorr signatures to create MASTs to make smart contracts more private and secure. Once live, only conditions that made a smart contract pass will be revealed, rather than all the conditions that it failed on. The idea here is that as as a result, Bitcoin smart contracts will be more secure as hackers have fewer data points or attack vectors to exploit.
BIP-342 – Focused on Improving Future Upgrades and Bringing More Smart Contract Flexibility
Introduces a new scripting language called Tapscript that complements the other two BIPs and makes future upgrades to the Bitcoin network possible through soft forks, rather than hard forks.
In addition, it will provide Bitcoin smart contracts with more flexibility and freedom by removing the 10,000-byte size limit. This is said to enable developers to do more exciting things using Bitcoin smart contracts in the future.
Bitcoin Shoots to New All-Time High
Shortly after printing a new all-time high in October, BTC slipped below US$60,000 following a brief US$1 billion liquidity flush.
However, Bitcoin tends to perform well in Q4 and this one appears no different. Bitcoin balances on exchanges hit the lowest point since August 2018, suggesting investors see significant upside on the horizon. On November 8, BTC shot up US$2,000 in a matter of hours, eclipsing US$65,000.
At the time of publication, bitcoin had surged overnight, reaching a new all-time high of US$67,771.
Welcome to this weekly series from the TradeRoom. My name is Dave and I’m the founder of The Crypto Den, an Australian-based crypto trading and education community aiming to give you the knowledge to take your trading game to the next level.
Crypto Market Outlook
Last week the overall Crypto Market Cap (TOTAL) sat steady at the US$2.6 trillion area and this week is still holding strong, currently at US$2.7 trillion. The flow of money into ALTS has shown some serious bullish price action across the board all week with near perfect conditions as a trader.
Bitcoin dominance is still dropping. Over the past seven days it’s dropped from 44% to 42%, while the ALT market added almost US$100 billion (6% growth).
Total Crypto Marketcap
ALT coin Marketcap
BTC Dominance
Looking at BTC, we are seeing a few key points of interest. First, since last week BTC has been ranging. Despite the BTC.D dropping further, this isn’t a bad thing. Holding steady above US$60,000 and ranging up to US$64,000 shows a bit of consolidation.
After its ATH push, it’s retraced into a golden pocket (61.8% FIB) from its previous level of consolidation, with a series of Lower Highs (LH) and Higher Lows (HL) forming a symmetrical triangle (usually a bullish continuation pattern with a 70% chance of continuing with existing trend).
Our first target in the TradeRoom still sits at US$78,000. As traders we move with the market and change our bias to suit, and at the moment the general consensus is bullish!
BTC/USDT
Something to keep an eye on, however, is the BTC monthly chart. At the moment it’s showing a bit of indecision (Doji Candle) and while there are still three weeks of the month to go, it’s worth keeping in mind. We expect this to change but it’s worth noting.
BTC monthly chart
Last Week’s Performance
SOL/USDT
For the third week in a row, Solana (SOL) has made the top of my list. Why? Because it’s a money-making machine! With another 25% growth in the last week, there just seems to be no stopping it. Painting a bit of a daily Doji candle at the time of writing, however, if BTC does in fact take off I expect SOL won’t be far behind.
Chart I shared in last week’s article
SOL this week!
AXS/USDT
Another trade setup I mentioned in last week’s article is AXS. Since breaking out of its symmetrical triangle, AXS peaked out at 35%, which those of you who leverage trade will know is a significant move, even on a 10x trade.
Last week’s screenshot from a TradeRoom Market Scan
AXS breakout on daily chart
This Week’s Trades
BTC/USD
Let’s go back to BTC. If the bullish sentiment plays out, I’m expecting to see something like this:
Possible BTC target
You can see in its previous run up, BTC peaked at the “future 618” Fib (a common target fib) after retracing 50% of its last push before that. Now, it’s not uncommon for momentum to pick up and only see retraces of 38.2% in a continuation trade. If it follows the same pattern, a target of US$83,000 is likely. Our initial target for BTC is still US$78,000.
MANA/USDT
One of the biggest coins to watch for this week, I think, will be MANA (Decentraland). The momentum is too high to ignore and with all the hype around the metaverse tokens, this has been one nice little performer.
We charted this in the TradeRoom last week and collectively made over 1000% RIO in a matter of hours!
From a technical standpoint, MANA has retraced to the golden pocket (common retrace level based on Fibonacci), bounced off the pocket and the 50 Exponential Moving Average (EMA), and is currently in a descending wedge pattern. This is another bullish continuation pattern we teach in our trading course.
Expect to see something like this play out
It’s important to remember that when trading ALT coins, their price action is heavily dependent on BTC. If BTC takes a bullish path, ALTS will likely follow. If BTC turns bearish, then ALTS will likely dump in price even harder!
If you’d like to become a better trader, you’re invited to join our TradeRoom where we share daily charts and market analysis. In our community we strongly encourage and teach correct risk management strategies to keep our members safe in this new volatile crypto market.
The Crypto Den was created in 2017 to help the rapidly growing crypto community learn and understand the fundamentals of digital currencies and how to trade them.
Since then we have taught thousands of members the basics of technical analysis and trading strategies to further progress and perfect their trading abilities.
In the TradeRoom you will be included in a supportive environment which encourages personal growth, education and community support.
It’s a place to share your trading ideas and follow other experienced traders’ feeds to help keep your finger on the pulse of such a volatile market!
It started with a tweet by long-standing Bitcoin advocate and popular podcaster Anthony “Pomp” Pompliano, of the “Pomp Podcast”. Pomp posed the question as to which US politician would rise to the occasion and accept their salary in bitcoin. Miami’s Bitcoin-friendly mayor, Francis Suarez, accepted the challenge and the rest is history.
It is time. Who is going to be the first American politician to accept their salary in bitcoin?
Suarez Looks to Make Miami the Crypto Capital of the US
Mayor Suarez is quickly becoming one of the most popular politicians in the US, having just won re-election in a landslide victory in which he secured an astounding 79 percent of the vote.
In mid-October, Suarez said that paying Miami government employees in bitcoin was “a major priority” and further, he expressed a strong interest in putting bitcoin on Miami’s balance sheet. He said he also wanted to allow residents to pay their taxes in bitcoin.
Miami Mayor Francis Suarez, speaking at the Bitcoin 2021 Conference. Source: Bitcoin Magazine
And then in September, Suarez launched MiamiCoin, a crypto project aimed at eliminating the need for residents to pay taxes by participating in the mining and staking of the coin.
Whatever your view on his politics, Suarez doesn’t appear to conform to the typical mould you’d expect from a politician – he makes promises and then acts on them with haste.
Fastest I've ever seen a politician act on an idea.
While New York has traditionally been the financial linchpin of the East Coast, there are growing signs that amid ongoing pandemic-related restrictions, high taxes, increased crime and bureaucratic red tape, more traditional finance and crypto businesses are relocating to Miami, a city perceived as being far friendlier to both businesses and residents alike. Mayor Suarez should take a good deal of credit for this trend.
Australian computer scientist Craig Wright once again finds himself at the centre of a legal battle, this time regarding the rights to Satoshi’s 1.1 million BTC wallet, currently valued at US$69 billion.
On November 1, the crypto “Trial of the Century” kicked off in Miami, US, with plaintiff Ira Kleiman facing off against Wright, the self-proclaimed Satoshi Nakamoto, the presumed peudonymous developer of Bitcoin. Many hope that the trial will shed some light on Wright’s claims. However, that’s less the primary focus of the trial than whether the late David Kleiman (Ira’s brother) and Wright were business partners, entitling Ira to half the contents of the wallet.
Given bitcoin’s current price, the wallet’s holdings – assuming the holder started with no net worth – would make its possessor the 15th richest person in the world, according to Bloomberg’s Billionaire Index.
The Fight for ‘Satoshi’s Bitcoins’
Big trial starts today in Florida federal court between Craig Wright and the estate of a now deceased, computer forensics expert Dave Kleimanhttps://t.co/S0kLgGHYHZ
— Former SEC Branch Chief Lisa Braganca (@LisaBraganca) November 1, 2021
Kleiman alleges that his late brother David, who was a computer forensics expert, collaborated with Wright on the creation and early development of Bitcoin. The Kleiman estate is asking for US$11.4 billion, alongside the return of intellectual property or its fair market value. Wright claims he is the sole inventor and thus the only individual entitled to the billions held in the wallet.
Australian crypto pioneer Craig Wright. Source: CoinGeek
The suit alleges that David Kleiman and Wright formed a partnership and established an entity called W&K Info Defense Research, LLC, which they used to mine bitcoin and organise their joint intellectual property, including the Bitcoin source code. It is also alleged that Kleiman was involved in multiple business relationships with Wright. The Kleiman estate has accused Wright of perpetrating “a scheme against Dave’s estate to seize Dave’s bitcoins and his rights to the intellectual property associated with the Bitcoin technology”.
The case file from 2018 states that “it is undeniable … that Craig and Dave were involved in Bitcoin from its inception and that they both accumulated a vast wealth of bitcoins from 2009 through 2013”.
A panel of 10 jurors will have three weeks to hear the evidence and decide the fate of what Wright’s team is calling “Satoshi’s bitcoins”.
Can They Even Access the Wallet?
The still-unsolved mystery of Satoshi Nakamoto’s identity, and Wright’s seeming inability to retrieve the coins in his wallet, means that recovering the coins may not be possible in any case.
According to Aaron Brown, a crypto investor who also writes for Bloomberg Opinion, Wright is definitely “an important early innovator in cryptocurrency, and is also rich from cryptocurrency”, adding: “beyond that, his claims to be the main or only author of the original Bitcoin white paper have little support”.
To this day, Wright hasn’t been able to prove that he is in fact Satoshi or that he even has access to the wallet. After announcing in May 2016 that he would move Satoshi’s bitcoin – proving he had access to Satoshi’s private keys and was, therefore, Satoshi – Wright failed to do so, writing, “I do not have the courage. I cannot”, in a now-deleted blog post. If Wright really is Bitcoin’s inventor, he should presumably have the ability to control the keys.
While Bitcoin SV proponents and Wright’s fans believe the trial will finally prove Wright’s Satoshi claims, others believe it may disprove his theories. If Kleiman wins the case, but Wright is proven not to be Satoshi (or has lost access to the wallet), will Kleiman still be able to access the bitcoin at the heart of the dispute? Most likely not.
Last month, El Salvador’s laser-eyed President Nakib Bukele announced the nation would build an animal hospital using a portion of its bitcoin profits. This month it’s 20 new schools, also to be funded from the surplus of the Salvadorean Trust for the Adoption of Bitcoin.
"Además, quiero anunciar que con unos millones que nos quedan de las ganancias de #Bitcoin vamos a construir las primeras 20 escuelas #Bitcoin, totalmente equipadas y modernas", Presidente @nayibbukele. pic.twitter.com/qU4nMgrEDb
Translation: “I announce that with a few million that we have left from the profits of #Bitcoin we are going to build the first 20 #Bitcoin schools, fully equipped and modern.”
Bukele’s latest announcement was made just after he laid the foundation stone of the public veterinary hospital, a first for the Central American republic and a project that will employ 300 Salvadoreans.
The president took the opportunity to mention that both the veterinary hospital and the forthcoming schools construction were made possible because opposition to his bold national Bitcoin adoption strategy was ignored.
The 20 new bitcoin-funded schools are additional to the 400 schools already announced under the El Salvadorean government’s My New School Program, as reported locally.
El Salvador ‘Buys the Dip’ Again
Late last month, Bukele confirmed via Twitter that El Salvador had again “bought the dip” on bitcoin, with its latest purchase of 420 BTC bringing the nation’s holding to 1120 BTC, or US$70.5 million at the time of writing.
News of the additional schools building plan comes just a week after bitcoin’s price hit an all-time high of nearly US$67,000.
Bitcoin has historically performed well in Q4, and this year has been no exception. Glassnode’s latest on-chain data suggests that following its recent new all-time high, there are compelling reasons to believe that further upside in the near-term remains most probable.
#Bitcoin’s MVRV Z-Score, an on-chain valuation metric, suggests $BTC is halfway between ‘overvalued’ & ‘undervalued.’
Despite the new all-time high, current levels of profit-taking are mild and more closely reflect activity seen in early bull markets. This would suggest that current holders are, for the most part, waiting for higher prices.
Since March this year, long-term HODLers have added 2.42 million BTC to their wallets. Generally, this reflects ongoing bullish sentiments as long-term HODLers tend to offload BTC when the market is overheated.
All things being equal, low balances on exchanges tend to demonstrate increased levels of HODLing as investors shift their coins off exchanges into secure cold storage.
Presently, balances on all exchanges have fallen to 2.74 million BTC, a level last seen in August 2018. Since February 2020, the average rate of outflow has been 30,850 BTC per month. Current outflows are around 22,000 BTC per month, or around 71 percent of the long-term average noted above.
These figures could point to a fundamental shift in the historic Bitcoin bull-bear cycles of the past. Could we be entering a new phase, commonly referred to as the “Bitcoin Supercycle”?
Plan B, one of the most respected voices in the Bitcoin community, has set his price targets for the remainder of the year:
Aug $47K✅ Sep $43K✅ Oct $61K new monthly close ATH!✅ Ok ok, 3% rounding error .. close enough for me Next targets: Nov>$98K, Dec>$135K🚀 pic.twitter.com/7LSnQBYJ33
The Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) has finally given the green light to Bitcoin and Ethereum exchange-traded funds (ETF), allowing investment funds to launch their crypto ETFs by next week.
After a long period of industry consultation, ASIC released a set of guidelines for institutions keen to launch crypto exchange-traded products (ETPs). The paper also published guidelines that allow fund managers to launch ETFs under certain regulatory requirements.
Australian fund manager BetaShares will be the first to list an ETF on the Australian Securities Exchange on November 4. The fund will have the ticker “CRYP” and will allow investors to access a mixed set of crypto ventures, most of them focused on companies whose revenue is derived mainly from the cryptocurrency market.
We know there are millions of people around the world [invested in crypto], and close to 2 million Australians that have actually invested in cryptocurrency directly.
Alex Vynokur , CEO and co-founder, BetaShares
Among the regulatory requirements are that fund managers must appoint a custodian with expertise on cryptocurrencies and blockchain technology, and hold at least A$10 million in net tangible assets. They are also responsible and must compensate for any custodial assets lost.
As Crypto News Australiareported in August, one of the reasons crypto ETFs in Australia have been delayed so long is that ASIC was trying to solve how arrangements with custodians would work.
ASIC Recognises Institutional Interest in Australia But Leaves Altcoins Out
ASIC has signalled its intention to “recognise the interest in, and demand for, ETPs and other investment products that hold crypto-assets in Australia”. The new fund is expected to give the Australian crypto space a big boost as institutional adoption expands rapidly across the globe. The first US Bitcoin ETF debuted in mid-October, breaking record trading volumes of US$1 billion in just 24 hours, turning it into the country’s second-largest traded ETF fund.
However, altcoins were left out, with only Bitcoin and Ethereum ETFs permitted. These funds will allow investors to purchase contracts that track the price of both currencies without having direct exposure to either asset.
Talking about the benefits and risks of cryptocurrencies, ASIC commissioner Cathie Armour said:
Crypto-assets have unique characteristics and risks that must be considered by product issuers and market operators in meeting their existing regulatory obligations. The good practices we published provide practical examples of how these obligations may be met, in a way that maintains investor protections and Australia’s fair, orderly and transparent markets.
