As you may know already, Facebook made a decision on 18 February, 2021 to ban Australian news sites from publishing on Facebook effective immediately. Crypto News was no exception.
Update 26/02/2021: Our Facebook page is now back online.
The crypto news Facebook page may stilll be visible to you, but our publishing functions are disabled, and they have removed our cover image.
Facebook page missing Posts link and cover image
Why was it banned?
As quoted in the Sydney Morning Herald: “to even the playing field amid the market monopoly of Google and Facebook and to protect public interest journalism”. “Media companies say their content helps Google and Facebook make money by offering the reliable, fact-checked information users are looking for. The tech giants say the internet should stay free and that publishers benefit from the click-throughs from their sites. And, with the rest of the world watching Australia’s code closely, both companies fear it could trigger copycat regulation forcing them to pay for news all around the globe.”
What does this mean for you?
Not much really. Just follow us on our Twitter page or Telegram channel to get the latest crypto news stories. Hopefully Twitter doesn’t apply this ban too – that would be mayhem. This highlights the control that these huge centralised companies have on our society and may lead to decentralised social platforms becoming more popular over the coming years.
The Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) is one of major central banks researching the concept of Central Bank-issued Digital Currency (CBDC).
In a meeting on Friday about the payment system in the country, the Payments System Board of the central bank admitted that they don’t see any strong case for issuing a retail CBDC in the country. They are mostly focused on researching the feasibility of launching a wholesale CBDC instead.
RBA is Sceptical About Retail CBDC
Retail central bank digital currencies are the ones launched for the general public, just like the Chinese long-planned digital yuan. On the other hand, a wholesale CBDC would be specifically designed“for the settlement of transactions in wholesale markets, such as purchases of financial assets or large-value payments.”.
Having discussed the ongoing CBDC development taking place internationally, the Board said there wasn’t any strong case for launching a retail CBDC. However, the bank will continue its collaborative effort with a number of external parties to research the possibility of a wholesale CBDC.
The Board is following this work closely but continues to be of the view that there is not a strong public policy case at present for issuance of a retail CBDC in Australia. The Bank is continuing its collaborative research project on a wholesale CBDC with a number of external parties, which is due to be completed in the coming months.
Reserve Bank of Australia [media release]
RBA Collaborated with Banks on CBDC
Back in November 2020, the central bank of Australia collaborated with some banks in the country, including the Commonwealth Bank, National Australia Bank, and blockchain company, ConsenSys Software. The consortium was driven by the objective of exploring the implications and potential benefits in issuing a wholesale CBDC on blockchain technology. At the time, the RBA planned to develop a proof-of-concept (POC) to pilot the CBDC via a tokenized form.
It’s been an impressive week for the Binance ecosystem. Starting with the Binance Coin (BNB), the-now third-largest cryptocurrency caught many people by surprise following the massive increase in the price to slightly over US$300 during the time of writing. On that value, the BNB coin had a market capitalization of over US$46 billion.
Following the boom in Binance Smart Chain (BSC) also, one of the leading cryptocurrency exchanges in Australia, Swyftx, has announced plans to list the native digital currency of two projects running on the BSC.
Swyftx to List PancakeSwap and DODO token
As the crypto exchange tweeted on Friday, it’s set to launch the native cryptocurrency of PancakeSwap (CAKE) and DODO (DODO) on its platform, extending support for the Binance ecosystem to Australia. The exchange didn’t mention any trading pairs for the cryptocurrencies. However, once they are listed, the users will be able to purchase and sell these cryptocurrencies right from the Swyftx exchange.
The CAKE and DODO tokens are also seeing an increase in market value. During the time of writing, the CAKE token was trading at the value of US$17.47 on Coinmarketcap. CAKE has a circulating supply of over 119 million and a market capitalization of $2.079 billion. At the same time, the DODO token was trading at $US5.94, which represents over a 28 percent increase on a 24-hour count. It has a circulating supply of 95,459,184 DODO and a US$567 million market cap.
What’s With Binance Smart Chain
The boom in BSC is coming as the transaction fee on the Ethereum blockchain is hitting the roof. Many people are diverting to BSC due to the low transaction cost, for instance, DODO. Interestingly, the Binance Smart Chain now records more transactions than Ethereum, which is considered a major flippening.
It’s no longer news that the institutions are beginning to throw in support for cryptocurrencies amid the massive upticks in their value since the last quarter of 2020. Also, many investors are resorting to cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin due to the fear of inflation.
Thus, in preparation for the incoming wave of new institutions in the crypto space, LGCY, a fork of the TRON network, has collaborated with an Australia-based digital currency custody service and DeFi platform to enable secured crypto storage support for investors.
Crypto Custody and DeFi Service for Enterprise
Institutions in the cryptocurrency space are looking for an all-in-one solution that can provide access to a secured crypto-asset storage facility and decentralized finance (DeFi) applications, according to LGCY. The partnership with the Australian crypto custody platform will enable the company to provide such a solution for institutions to securely store their digital currencies.
To achieve this, LGCY will integrate a white-label version of Unido’s wallet, per the announcement on Thursday. The developers on the LGCY network will equally be able to leverage Unido’s Core API to develop decentralized applications (Dapps) designed for enterprise solutions.
“LGCY and UNIDO are excited to announce that both platforms will be working together to deliver the security of the Unido EP multi-sig platform to LGCY enterprise clients users. The integration of the LGCY blockchain into the Unido platform will be completed as LGCY approaches mainnet launch,” the companies noted.
Interest in DeFi Keeps Growing
Interest and activities in the decentralized finance industry have been increasing notably since the start of the year. At the moment, there is more than US$41 billion worth of digital currency locked in the DeFi industry. Interestingly, more Bitcoin is being tokenized on Ethereum for DeFi protocols, which indicates BTC also has a strong demand in that market. There are currently over 172k Bitcoin locked in DeFi, according to data from Dune Analytics.
The American business magnate and billionaire Bill Gates seem unbothered with the current trends in the Bitcoin market. Many prominent figures and companies are beginning to support and add the leading cryptocurrency as part of their reserve assets. However, the billionaire disclosed on Thursday that he is rather staying neutral with Bitcoin. A few days ago, the president of Microsoft also mentioned that the corporation doesn’t have any new plan to invest in cryptocurrency either.
Bill Gates is Neutral on Bitcoin
While speaking with CNBC Squawk Box on Thursday, the co-founder of Microsoft confirmed that he holds a neutral view about the cryptocurrency. Gates told CNBC that he doesn’t have any investment in Bitcoin, neither is he shorting the cryptocurrency. “I do think moving money into a more digital form and getting transaction costs down, that’s something the Gates Foundation does in developing countries.”
"I don't own #Bitcoin. I'm not short Bitcoin," says @BillGates. "I do think moving money into a more digital form and getting transaction costs down, that's something the Gates Foundation does in developing countries." pic.twitter.com/DDe5X196ax
Gates had once made an opposing view about cryptocurrencies. Back in 2018, the billionaire voiced that digital currencies like Bitcoin are killing people in a “fairly direct way.” He blamed the fact that the anonymity of cryptocurrencies can be taken as an advantage by malicious users to launder funds and also fund terrorist groups. Gates also mentioned that many people are using cryptocurrencies to purchase hard drugs, which are unsafe.
Microsoft doesn’t have any plan for Bitcoin
Gates’ statement today is coming two days after the president of Microsoft, Brad Smith, disclosed that the company has no new conversation on whether to allocate part of their reserve in Bitcoin. However, he didn’t state that Microsoft will never invest in cryptocurrency.
Looks like Justin Sun, CEO of Rainberry and founder of Crypto-platform TRON, has been caught shilling TRX again, now trying to get Marques Brownlee —a popular YouTuber and influencer— into promoting the cryptocurrency on Twitter.
In a recent upload, Marques Brownlee shared his thoughts about Dogecoin, but midway through the video, Brownlee revealed that TRON—or someone representing it— contacted him via email, asking to promote TRX via Twitter, without looking like a promoted tweet.
Funny enough, Marques was referring to these types of emails as “the opposite end of the Dogecoin strategy”. The Youtuber also referred to these strategists as “insincere” and “tryhard”.
The email specified he should not make it look like it is promoted —although, Harry.eth, from MyCrypto, published how you can easily contact celebrities like Lindsey Lohan or Ne-Yo on Cameo:
A few days ago, Sun tried to promote TRX using celebrities after losing millions of dollars in the GameStop saga, a strange fight between Wall Street and Reddit. Sun was unconditionally supporting the people from r/WallstreeBets, later investing $10M —now worth less than $2M.
Sun tried to defend himself in a Twitter thread, stating that the TRON Foundation is not involved with such activities, but most users liked to differ.
Yes, I’m sure Lindsey Lohan has become incredibly passionate about decentralized permisionless blockchain
Again, it’s worth acknowledging that Tesla’s Bitcoin purchase announcement was a very significant event for the cryptocurrency market. It has literally unlocked more interest and caused many other prominent institutions to start considering holding Bitcoin on their balance sheets. On Wednesday, Rick Rieder, the chief investment officer at BlackRock, confirmed that they have started to dabble in Bitcoin.
This is another important piece of news, just like that of Tesla. For the record, BlackRock is the world’s largest digital asset manager. The institution reportedly manages more than US$7 trillion worth of assets.
BlackRock is Making Moves to Bitcoin
The BlackRock investment officer made this known while discussing with CNBC’s SQUAWK BOX. According to Rieder, people are increasingly looking for storehouses of value and places that could appreciate their holdings while inflation hits. This is typically one of the reasons Microstrategy, a publicly-traded business intelligence company, got into Bitcoin in the first place.
On that note, Rieder admitted that the world’s largest asset manager has begun dabbling into the leading cryptocurrency. However, he couldn’t mention the exact percentage that BlackRock intends to allocate to Bitcoin. Many people expect BlackRock to allocate at least one percent of its reserve to the cryptocurrency, which runs in tens of billions of dollars.
Earlier this year, the asset manager filed with the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), disclosing their intent to allow their funds to engage in futures contracts based on Bitcoin.
Industry Experts Reacts to BlackRock News
The news today is another big development for the Bitcoin market, to be precise. One percent of BlackRock’s reserve going to Bitcoin will catapult the market value to a great level, and this has got many crypto experts talking, including Anthony Pompliano and Kraken’s Dan Held.
Blackrock is reporting that they have "dabbled" in Bitcoin.
The daily trading volume of Ethereum has reached over $75 million —almost doubling its previous amount, $40 million. The increase comes just a week after Ethereum Futures were launched on the Chicago Mercantile Exchange.
According to data from Glassnode, the open interest for Ethereum has increased at least $62 million as well. The institutional demand for Ethereum is also increasing, as corporations are exploring the world’s second-highest market cap crypto.
Institutional demand: One week after #Ethereum futures launched on CME, daily trading volume reached a total of $75.8M yesterday – almost doubling Friday's volume of $40M.
Meanwhile, open interest has increased to $62 million.
Likewise, the number of addresses in the Ethereum blockchain is more active than ever, with over 450K wallets with funds of almost $2,000 in ETH interacting with the network.
The increase in activity and trading volume was also driven following Coinbase’s announcement, allowing users to earn rewards by staking ETH 2.0.
Accordingly, the waitlist is live now, and customers will earn at least 7.2 in yields, by simply holding ETH.
This month, Ethereum broke the 200 billion market cap —currently, 208,567,363,632— as it soared over 150% at the beginning of 2021. This reflects the number of whales moving millions of dollars in Ethereum and XRP, as Bitcoin reached $50,000.
A report by the Australian Financial Review on Wednesday confirmed the growing interest in Bitcoin among retirees in Australia. Self-managed super funds or SMSFs are increasingly accumulating more Bitcoins for clients, not minding the increased market value of the cryptocurrency.
On Wednesday, the price of the leading digital currency, Bitcoin (BTC), soared to another record level of over US$51,100. This indicates that retirees in the country are more confident with allocating their funds to the cryptocurrency.
A Five-fold Increase in 2020
Last year, the Bitcoin purchases of self-managed super funds increased by five-folds, according to BTC Market, the largest cryptocurrency exchange in Australia. The average crypto trade amongst these funds also spiked by 20 percent within the last quarter of the year, as Bitcoin began seeing more institutional and corporate investors, like MicroStrategy, MassMutual, Square Inc., and many others.
“Previously trade sizes for SMSFs were in the tens of thousands of dollars, but we’re now seeing in the hundreds of thousands of dollars,” according to Caroline Bowler, the chief executive at BTC Markets. This is probably because many Australian retirees now prefer the cryptocurrency to gold as a better asset to hedge against the declining value of fiat currencies, the report reads.
“Bitcoin as a store of value is interesting to SMSFs holders. People are researching it and getting better educated around it. They look at it as a deflationary asset, and I think they understand the concept behind that,” Bowler added.
Interested in buying crypto with your Super? Need help? Speak with Cryptocurrency Superannuation Expert at New Brighton Capital Book a Free 20 min Consultation
Only 21 Million Bitcoin Will Ever Exist
Fiat currencies like the British Pounds and Australian dollar are issued and controlled by the government and the central bank of the nation. There is no limit to the number of currencies these authorities can issue. However, Bitcoin is pre-programmed to cap at 21 million; nothing more, nothing less. This supports the idea that the cryptocurrency can serve as an inflation hedge asset. As of February 17, there was over 18.6 million BTC in circulation.
For today’s trading news, we’re looking at three Altcoins that might breakout this week by showing bullish trends in the charts.
1. Dogecoin (DOGE)
Dogecoin (DOGE) is based on the popular “Doge” Internet meme and features a Shiba Inu on its logo. The open-source digital currency was created by Billy Markus from Portland, Oregon, and Jackson Palmer from Sydney, Australia, and was forked from Litecoin in December 2013. Dogecoin’s creators envisaged it as a fun, light-hearted cryptocurrency that would have greater appeal beyond the core Bitcoin audience since it was based on a dog meme. Tesla CEO Elon Musk posted several tweets on social media that Dogecoin is his favorite coin.
Dogecoin Price Analysis
At the time of writing, DOGE is ranked 12th cryptocurrency globally and the current price is $0.0751 AUD. Let’s take a look at the chart below for price analysis.
Last week retested the high of DOGE’s +1100% January pump to $0.1092 AUD.
Despite highly manipulated price action, traders could still hunt for lower-timeframe longs. Monday’s retest of the area between $0.0643 AUD and $0.0589 AUD showed some signs of support.
The area between $0.0532 AUD and $0.0498 AUD contains a gap that overlaps with the 0.705 retracement, which increases its chances of giving support. The level near $0.0468 AUD could also form support, although with a higher risk of breaking on a retrace to January’s open.
While the higher-timeframe market structure remains bullish, probable resistance has formed between $0.0713 AUD and $0.0856 AUD, Traders satisfied with their profits could look to exit here if the price returns to this level.
More hopeful bulls could aim for the highs near $0.0985 AUD. If the price breaks through this level, it could reach the 0.27 extension near $0.1253 AUD, with a sustained breakout possibly touching the 1.0 extension near $0.1752 AUD.
2. PundiX (NPXS)
Pundi X is a leading developer of blockchain-powered devices with the aim of transforming retail businesses with its blockchain-based point of sale solution. The solution allows retail merchants and consumers to conduct instantaneous in-store transactions on its blockchain.
The company, which has its headquarters in Singapore, has shipped its XPOS solution and devices to over 25 markets including the United States, Spain, Argentina, Korea, Australia, Colombia, Spain, and Taiwan.
NPXS Price Analysis
At the time of writing, NPXS is ranked 124th cryptocurrency globally and the current price is $0.0012 AUD. Let’s take a look at the chart below for price analysis.
February provided NPXS holders with a respectable +233% return before the price returned to a range around $0.001 to consolidate.
Monday retested a lower-timeframe 0.62 retracement level, which overlaps with a gap beginning at $0.00081 AUD. This level could provide support during the consolidation and potentially offer an aggressive entry on a local lows retest.
The gap near $0.00065 AUD provides a lower risk-reward entry, while a full retrace of January’s move could reach probable support near $0.00048 AUD, just above the February monthly open.
The recent equal highs near $0.00109 AUD cap a resistance area down to $0.00102 AUD while providing a likely near-term target. Probable resistance technically reaches up to the last significant swing high at $0.00175 AUD. Still, a break of this resistance could reach the 0.27 extension at $0.00195 AUD and potentially the 1.0 extension at $0.00253 AUD.
3. Secret (SCRT)
Secret is the native coin of the Secret Network, a decentralized network for private/secure computation. Nodes on the network (known as secret nodes) can perform generalizable computations over encrypted data, which allows smart contracts (known as secret contracts) to use private and sensitive data as inputs. Our focus is on computational privacy, not just transactional privacy. Developers can build decentralized, privacy-preserving “Secret Apps” on the network. The privacy functionality of the Secret Network is critical for many fields, including decentralized finance, Web3, machine learning, access control, and many more.
SCRT Price Analysis
At the time of writing, SCRT is ranked 151st cryptocurrency globally and the current price is $3.12 AUD. Let’s take a look at the chart below for price analysis.
SCRT launched nearly +180% upward during February before retracing on Monday to the gap beginning near $2.86 AUD.
Below this gap, the next likely areas of support begin at $2.24 AUD and $1.95 AUD in the consolidation that spawned February’s bullrun.
Equal highs near $2.98 AUD, over the resistance beginning near $2.613 AUD, provide a tempting first target. February’s swing high near $3.65 AUD gives a second target. A move through these levels could reach the .27 extension near $3.78 AUD
If the current support holds, overlapping extensions near $3.95 AUD and $4.36 AUD could hint at the next resistance areas.
Where to Buy or Trade Altcoins?
These 3 Altcoins have the highest liquidity on Binance Exchange so that would help for trading on USDT or BTC pairs. However, if you’re just looking at buying some quick and hodling then Swyftx Exchange is a popular choice in Australia.
