New York Digital Investment Group (NYDIG) has partnered with payment giant NCR to expand Bitcoin adoption in the US.
The partnership will enable up to 650 banks to offer Bitcoin services to 24 million customers. While the NCR will provide the infrastructure for mobile apps, the NYDIG will be delivering custodial services to financial institutions that want to offer crypto services to their clients.
Banks to Compete with Crypto Exchanges
The move will put NCR’s institutional clients in direct competition with crypto exchanges, as banks and credit unions reported massive outflows of customer’s savings to make crypto purchases.
According to Douglas Brown, NCR’s president of digital banking, banks could soon follow PayPal’s success with crypto adoption and offer crypto payments for its clients worldwide. Besides, the NCR is exploring the possibility of paying its 200,000 retail clients with BTC.
We’re firm believers in the benefits of crypto and the strategic application. And that’s true for our banking relationships, as evidenced by NYDIG, and across retailers as well as restaurants and the like.
NCR president of digital banking, Douglas Brown
Despite the bearish market, NYDIG has seen massive interest from institutional clients to individual and wealthy investors who want to join the crypto space.
Updated regulations around crypto investments in Germany could lead to a US$435 billion inflow to the crypto economy from German institutional funds.
The new Fund Location Act (Fondsstandortgesetz) comes into play from July 1, pending a final decision by the German Bundesrat (Federal Council).
Big Investment Managers Can Now Invest 20% in Crypto
The new act allows existing German special funds (Spezialfonds) to invest up to 20 percent of their portfolios in Bitcoin (BTC) and Ethereum (ETH). Before this new regulation was passed, these funds were prohibited to invest in crypto.
Spezialfonds are considered the German institutional fund vehicle of choice for most liquid asset classes, and for property within distinct structures.
Jacqueline Winter, Blockchain Capital
blocksize-capital
Sven Hildebrandt, CEO of Germany-based Distributed Ledger Consulting (DLC), said there could be a theoretical inflow potential for crypto assets in the order of US$435 billion.
This won’t happen overnight, but we are talking about the largest investment vehicle that we have in Germany – literally all the money is in there.
Sven Hildebrandt, Distributed Ledger Consulting
This amounts to around 20 percent of the estimated assets under management of these wealth and institutional investment fund managers. Their 4,000 open-end domestic special funds currently have an estimated €1.87 trillion tied up, some of which could flow into crypto. This legislation being passed by one of the economic powerhouses of the world could spell good news for wider institutional acceptance.
Coinbase Crypto Services Approved in Germany
According to a report, Coinbase has recently secured a Federal Financial Supervisory Authority (BaFin) licence to conduct business in Germany.
The Nasdaq-listed company holds the first licence issued by BaFin for crypto custody and trading, which is now legally seen as a financial service in Germany.
Just in case you are wondering, and have never heard of this country, Germany – it is the 4th biggest country by GDP! 😂
In an attempt to combat money laundering and fraud, the German government has issued new regulations that require a licence to deal with digital assets. Coinbase can now legally conduct business in Germany and Japan and could open the doors for new investors.
Coinbase Germany will launch in coming weeks to serve both new and existing German customers more effectively, including by localising our service and increasing our product offering.
Coinbase Germany press release
Will we see the German giants put up a fight against the various other institutional powerhouses across the globe? Watch this space …
More than one in four financial advisers say they will recommend cryptocurrencies to their clients in the next year, according to just-published results of a survey commissioned in March.
Almost half (49 percent) of advisers said clients had inquired about investing in cryptocurrencies over the past six months.
Results of the 2021 Trends in Investingsurvey, conducted by the Journal of Financial Planning and the Financial Planning Association (FPA), and supported by Onramp Invest, were released this week.
Client Base Demands Knowledge, Access and Advice from Advisers
The FPA is the principal membership organisation for certified financial planners, professionals, educators and financial services professionals. Onramp Invest is a technology company providing access to crypto assets for registered investment advisers.
Onramp Invest CEO Tyrone Ross commented:
It is clear from these results that we’ve reached an inflection point in the wealth management space. Advisers are now faced with a client base that demands knowledge, access and advice from their adviser[s] on cryptoassets.
Tyrone Ross, Onramp Invest CEO
The survey received 529 responses from financial advisers of various backgrounds and business models. Cryptocurrencies were first added to the survey in 2018 when 1.4 percent of advisers indicated they were either using or recommending them to clients. That figure fell below 1 percent in 2019 and 2020 but jumped to 14 percent in 2021.
Survey results suggest that investors are concerned about the effect of tax reform on their portfolios, with 40 percent of advisers indicating clients had asked them about this topic, up from 27 percent in last year’s survey.
Youth Leads the Way in Crypto Investment
Last month’s CNBC Millionaire survey showed 47 percent of the world’s millennial millionaires have more than 25 percent of their wealth in crypto. The survey sampled 750 investors with at least US$1 million in investible assets, and indicated that more than a third of cashed-up millennials have at least half their wealth in crypto. Australian millennials are no different, as Crypto News Australia recently reported that this cohort is more interested in crypto than real estate.
More than 25 Bitcoin mining companies have joined forces to make Bitcoin greener thanks to the Bitcoin Mining Council (BMC), founded by MicroStrategy CEO Michael Saylor and backed by high-profile members including Galaxy Digital and Hive Blockchain.
In its first voluntary survey, the BMC has revealed information about Bitcoin’s sustainable energy use from over 32 percent of the current global Bitcoin network. The results show that the global mining sector uses electricity with a 67 percent sustainable power mix, representing a 56 percent growth spurt during Q2 2021.
The results of this survey show that the members of the BMC and participants in the survey are currently utilising electricity with a 67 percent sustainable power mix. Based on this data, it is estimated that the global mining industry’s sustainable electricity mix had grown to approximately 56 percent during Q2 2021, making it one of the most sustainable industries globally.
BMC report
An Attempt to Demystify the Bitcoin Mining Industry
Bitcoin’s energy usage has been the primary topic for its detractors, highlighting environmental concerns in the long term. A new wave of criticism came with Elon Musk’s decision to reverse bitcoin payments for Tesla vehicles, causing the price of Bitcoin to drop even further.
However, recent investigations have shown that banks and gold consume more energy than Bitcoin, and most miners are moving to clean power using hydrothermal and geothermal wasted energy in countries such as Iceland and Norway.
The team at Galaxy Digital Mining wrote an excellent white paper examining #bitcoin’s energy usage.
— Galaxy Digital Research (@glxyresearch) May 14, 2021
A recent example of clean, renewable energy is El Salvador’s plan to build a huge mining operation using its geothermal excess.
Some Pundits Are Not Convinced
It seems this report is backed by the BMC’s own analysis, assumptions and methodologies, and the validity of the data appears unclear as most responses were from a subset of the network.
During a live virtual briefing, Nic Carter, a general partner of Castle Island Ventures, asked Saylor how the Council came to these figures. Saylor said the report was based on an estimate of off-grid and unsustainable power.
Then we allocated another portion that we applied to our BMC sample in order to get a blend. The blend ended up being slightly more than the electricity grid.
I think if you back into it and take the 56 percent and then look at the 67 or 68 percent that we don’t have, that’s the out-of-sample and then you know that number is … 50 percent sustainable … so … generally it works out that the out-of-sample mix is … assumed to be about 50 percent sustainable power and we tested that with a variety of analysts.
Michael Saylor on Bitcoin’s Sustainable Energy Mix
But some people were not convinced, knowing that the responses were from mostly mining companies that worked together to “provide critical information to the general public”.
This is really laughable. No methodology disclosed, very dubious result and super small sample of like 5% of the total hashrate. No one knows what the energy mix will look like until the hashrate from China relocates and a new proper study is conducted. Why do people trust this?
Scammers are sending out fake emails and confirmation messages to Coinbase users in an attempt to lure them into revealing their account details. The exchange users are advised to be wary of such phishing attacks.
When a New Login is Not What It Seems
Coinbase users raised an alarm about the SMS phishing attack on Reddit. In one of the messages, the recipient was informed that there was a new login to their account and the message included a malicious link for the user to disable the login.
Out of panic, unsuspecting users, especially newbies, would easily fall for this trick, given that the malicious domain looks almost the same as Coinbase’s official domain. However, on closer inspection, one could spot the difference as the letter “a” had an odd dot below.
Also note that the fake SMS can come with different messages, as another Redditor shared:
Today’s text was: ‘Here is your Coinbase withdrawal confirmation cxe867zd92d0p. If you did not authorise this transaction, click here to verify your account’.
How to Spot Fake Coinbase SMS and Emails
To begin with, Coinbase has already warned that it doesn’t send out texts to verify transactions: “If you receive a text message reporting that you’ve received digital currency that you did not authorise, it is likely a phishing attempt,” Coinbase cautioned.
Emails or SMSs that claim to be from Coinbase without its official domain are probably fake. Often, the links in the message will point to another web address when you hover over them.
Fraudsters can also claim to be from wallet providers, as seen in the case of Ledger last week.
Despite Bitcoin’s breakout performance in 2020, much of the gains have been erased over the past three months as Bitcoin slid 43 percent amid a barrage of relentless FUD relating to China and environmental concerns.
While the grounds for such concerns can be challenged, there is mounting evidence that Bitcoin may be turning the corner.
A Difficult Bull Market for HODLers
Based on Bitcoin’s halving cycle and subsequent price movements, we ought to be somewhere near the middle of a bull market. Given that Q2 2021’s performance was the worst in eight years, even the most bullish of HODLers have had their conviction tested in the face of persistent, and seemingly coordinated, FUD.
June 2021 brought the most aggressive sovereign assault on #Bitcoin ever. That is not hyperbole, that is fact. Check this timeline- 25 discrete events in 30 days and I'm sure I missed a couple. A massive concerted effort from China. Yet here we are, making blocks & trading $33k. pic.twitter.com/YeRucQsUae
Throughout this latest round of FUD, Bitcoin has been enormously volatile, with ongoing support seemingly around the US$30,000 mark. However, a number of indicators suggest this may indeed be the bottom and that there is cause for optimism in the near term.
This metric explores market cycles from a mining revenue perspective by looking at the supply side of Bitcoin’s economy – Bitcoin miners and their revenue. Miners are considered sellers by necessity since their operating costs tend to be fixed in fiat terms. When the value of Bitcoin mined and entering the ecosystem is too large or too small by historical standards, it can provide an opportunity for investors.
Notice below how the indicator has slipped into the green, last seen in March 2020. For long-term HODLers, now seems to be the time to accumulate.
As short-term HODLers capitulated in droves during May and June, long-term HODLers continued to accumulate, as highlighted in the chart below.
Source: Glassnode
#3 Funding Rates Shifting Away from NegativeTerritory
Funding rates are payments between traders to make the perpetual futures contract price close to the index price, representing the sentiment of traders on the positions they take in the perpetual swaps market. In the simplest of terms, positive funding rates are indicative of bullish sentiment whereas negative funding rates imply many traders are bearish.
Based on the chart below, funding is gradually moving into positive territory, a historically optimistic indicator for short- to medium-term price movements.
Source: CryptoQuant
#4 Bitcoin NVT Ratio Shows Bitcoin is Undervalued
The Bitcoin NVT ratio is equivalent to a traditional price-to-earnings ratio used to assess whether a stock is under- or overvalued.
Based on the chart below by respected Bitcoin analyst Willy Woo, the current price of Bitcoin is operating along the lower bounds of undervalued (marked by the green dotted line). The upper bounds (i.e a strong sell indicator) is the red dotted line, indicating Bitcoin would be overvalued at around US$121,000.
The strategy employed by successful accumulators has been remarkably simple – don’t use leverage, dollar-cost average, and have a long-term horizon of four or more years.
Bitcoin’s logarithmic price chart clearly demonstrates that long-term holders tend to be rewarded. Short-term price volatility, however, is the price they have to pay to enjoy exceptional long-term returns.
Elon Musk’s latest attempt to stay relevant in the crypto space and pump Dogecoin has been met with mediocre success. However, other Doge-inspired meme coins have jumped in value.
Crypto’s greatest ever troll has continued his quest to pump Dogecoin and all of the other copycat meme coins. On 1 July at 8:43 am UTC time, Musk posted a Godfather-themed meme along with the words, “Release the Doge!”
Seconds after, Dogecoin jumped from US$0.24 to $0.261, an 8.75% increase. A sharp sell-off followed but then at 9:24 Musk tweeted again, posting a message consisting of slightly altered lyrics from the viral 2017 children’s song Baby Shark.
After this second tweet, Dogecoin rose about 5 percent back up to $0.260. This could hardly be considered a successful attempt to pump the price of Dogecoin.
Dogecoin chart in relation to Musk tweets
Some in the crypto community suggested Musk’s tweets were beginning to lose their impact on the crypto market.
Even Elon tweeting about Doge doesn't work anymore
Although Dogecoin didn’t pump in response to Musk’s tweets, most of the other Doge-inspired meme coins, sometimes referred to as “Baby Dogecoins”, did. These included Shiba Inu, Baby Doge, which is up over 500 percent since its inception just over three weeks ago, and the brand-new Floki Inu. Musk tweeted about naming his new dog “Floki” on 25 June. In response, Shiba Inu jumped 25%, but Floki Inu went on a moon mission with an insane 3,500% surge in a matter of minutes.
Although Floki Inu did not repeat its lunar launch, it did soar from $0.00000269 to a high of 0.00001280, a 375% rise, between 1 July and 2 July, largely due to Musk’s tweet.
Floki Inu chart around the time of Musk tweet
Musk Walks and Talks the Doge
Musk has been spruiking Dogecoin for months now, which many consider is the primary reason for its meteoric rise. Musk even went on Saturday Night Liveto shill the coin. Since then though, Dogecoin has been steadily falling in price, despite Musk’s best efforts. Some analysts and traders consider this a blatant “top signal” for the whole market.
Richest man in the world went on television to do a skit about dog coin
Move over KYC, connectID is here. Powered by EFTPOS, connectID is an identification hub for the entire Australian identity ecosystem. Think of it as an extension of Australia Post’s Digital iD app combined with your Digital Licence or Proof of Age card and loyalty points program all wrapped into one.
With online shopping and mobile payments part of everyday life nowadays, issues such as online fraud and identity theft have become a real headache for individuals, banks and businesses alike. The constant need to fill in forms and repeatedly upload personal information for proof of identity has only added to the pain. ConnectID aims to streamline the process, offering a neatly packaged one-stop-shop app with identity verification and KYC built in.
In Australia there is a real need to facilitate identity verification methods to help reduce instances of fraud and identity theft, and improve ‘digital trust’ between customers and vendors. We aim to seamlessly combine identity and payments transactions within the same flow and create even better customer experiences.
Rob Allen, EFTPOS ‘Entrepreneur in Residence’
Created with assistance from identity and authentication provider SecureKey, connectID is designed to work within the federal government’s Trusted Digital Identity Framework (TDIF) and the financial industry’s TrustID framework, as well as recognising emerging international standards in distributed digital identity credentials.
Benefits of connectID
Manage risk by knowing who you’re selling to
Protect yourself against fraudulent transactions
Gain customers’ trust with a simple, straightforward experience
EFTPOS says it is providing Australian businesses with a trusted, reliable and cost-effective infrastructure, ensuring all transactions flow quickly and easily through the Australia-based identity hub.
Financial Services, Online Stores and Government Departments to Adopt connectID
Powered by EFTPOS, ConnectID acts as the middleman to connect identity requesters such as financial services, online stores and government departments with every online identity issuer in Australia. Consumers and digital merchants will have secure, private, easy and trusted access to any identity provider in Australia.
Identity providers in turn will be able to offer an additional trust-based service to their customers and connectID enables each of them to talk to the others seamlessly.
Watch the video below to see how connectID works
As previously reported by Crypto News Australia, EFTPOS has also teamed up with Hedera Hashgraph blockchain to develop a micropayments proof-of-concept. This ultimately could lead to the deployment of blockchain technologies in running autonomous vehicles or powering smart cities.
Colourful pop queen Katy Perry will make history as the first artist to release NFTs with live content from her upcoming Las Vegas residency in December. She will also acquire a minority share of the proceeds in partnership with Theta Labs.
Excited & 👀curious👀 to be launching my FIRST ever #NFTs later this year w/ @Theta_Network. Look out for memorable & creative moments from my 🍄 residency 🍄 that’s both a digital collectible AND an IRL experience 😱TANGIBLE😱 Pre-register for more info! https://t.co/kiEwPLZH4Tpic.twitter.com/uYNhpDW8oy
The global pop star and her talent agency – Creative Artists Agency – will launch the collection on Theta Network’s NFT marketplace ThetaDrop. Powered by the Theta protocol, ThetaDrop is a native blockchain that differs from other NFT platforms in that it was built specifically for media and entertainment content.
Katy Perry
The one-of-a-kind digital collectibles will feature content from Perry’s upcoming show Play, coming to the brand-new Resorts World Las Vegas Hotel in December.
I can’t wait to dive in with the Theta team on all the exciting and memorable creative pieces, so my fans can own a special moment of my residency that’s both a digital collectible as well as an IRL [in real life] experience.
Is it time to sell all your crypto in fear of a repeat crash of 2018, or is it a chance to load up on your Theta bags?
Decentralised live video streaming is here and in extremely high demand as platforms such as Theta and newcomer Aioz fight it out to become the next YouTube. Aiming to offer better streaming solutions, these platforms service the huge worldwide audience of consumers looking to watch ever-increasing amounts of video content across the web.
The NFT movement, and its adoption by artists around the globe, is bringing blockchain technology to centre stage. Digital art re-packaged and sold to superfans as rare collectible NFTs is the latest offering from the music industry and will no doubt be a lucrative one. It’s an exciting time for crypto as it continues to cross over into the mainstream in unexpected ways.
Almost six million Ether (ETH) has been staked on the Ethereum 2.0 deposit contract, according to data provided by Eth2 Launchpad. This milestone shows how confident Ethereum users are about this major upgrade, not minding that it could take years to be launched.
Ethereum 2.0 staked ETH chart. Source: Eth2 Launchpad
Over $12.4 Billion ETH Staked
At the time of writing, about 5,958,361 ETH was staked on the deposit contract, worth over US$12.4 billion at $2,090 per coin. In addition, the number of validators has increased to 180,873.
Since the Beacon chain went live in December last year, the number of ETH staked on the network has been increasing at a notable pace. This is evident given more than 5.4 million ETH has been added to the network in that six-month period.
At 6 million ETH, Ethereum 2.0 will account for over 5.1 percent of all ETH in circulation.
Why Ethereum 2.0?
Ethereum 2.0 – also known as Serenity – is a major upgrade to the current Ethereum network. On several occasions Ethereum has suffered network congestion, resulting in slow transactions and expensive fees. This scalability issue led to the proposition of Ethereum 2.0, which will transition the mainnet from a Proof-of-Work (PoW) consensus model to a Proof-of-Stake (PoS).
Most importantly, Ethereum 2.0 will remove the need for miners, since PoS runs with staking, meaning it will be greener. Serenity will bring a lot of improvements to Ethereum and will essentially address the issue of scalability that has been plaguing the network. This simply means it will be faster and cheaper to use the network when Ethereum 2.0 is finally deployed.
Ethereum 2.0 is expected to follow four development phases before launch. We are currently in the first stage (ie, Phase 0 – Beacon Chain), left with the three other phases, which may take up to three years.
