Bitcoin has hit record highs for a second day after Elon Musk's car company Tesla said it had bought about $1.5bn (£1.1bn) of the cryptocurrency.

Bitcoin rose above $48,000 (£34,820) before falling back, but it remains about 25% higher than a week ago.

Some investors took Tesla's move as a signal that Bitcoin would become a mainstream financial asset.

However, there was some criticism about a green car firm investing in such an energy intensive currency.



Bitcoin currently uses more energy than Argentina every year, according to analysis from the University of Cambridge.

Production of the cryptocurrency, known as "Bitcoin mining", needs energy-hungry computer hardware and ever-greater amounts of processing power.

Mike Butcher, an editor at news website Techcrunch, tweeted: "Tesla: Sells carbon credits to buy Bitcoin, which requires as much energy (not always Green energy) as a small country to mine."

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The cryptocurrency has already risen in value by 62% this year, on top of a 300% rally in 2020, as investors search for alternative assets at a time when interest rates in many countries are at record lows.

Bitcoin has had some interest from big investment firms, including Blackrock, which recently changed a handful of investment mandates to allow some of its funds to invest in the currency.

However, central banks remain sceptical about the cryptocurrency. In October, Bank of England governor Andrew Bailey cautioned over Bitcoin's use as a payment method, saying it lacked "intrinsic value" unlike cash or gold.

Some institutional investors are also wary of the price volatility of Bitcoin.

Robert Pavlik, senior portfolio manager at Dakota Wealth, said: "The average institutional investor is shaking their head.

"For these folks who are believers in cryptocurrency, [Tesla's investment] gives them another layer of support that crypto is the future."

But Bitcoin scepticism does not mean that central banks and regulators are against digital currencies per se.

In China in particular regulators are starting to embrace issuing their own digital currencies for everyday use.

More info: https://www.bbc.com/news/business-55984393

It’s not a secret that in China, Polkadot resembles a newer, better EOS, the public blockchain that swept the Chinese crypto ecosystem in 2018.

Both projects have inspiring foreign—in particular Caucasian leaders—who frequent China’s blockchain conferences and cocktail parties. (I don't want to sound racist but the fact that they are white plays a huge role. Some Chinese ponzi scams have actually hired white actors during their roadshows to fool retail buyers.)

EOS and Polkadot are backed by Chinese capitalists, who spread the Ethereum-killer narrative whenever they can on crypto Wechat. These capitalists, especially exchanges such as Binance, Huobi, and MXC, come with a war chest of funds to lure entrepreneurs to the Polkadot ecosystem. Both projects have attracted strong interest from Chinese retailers but somehow are far lesser-known abroad.

Despite the two projects’ perceived similarities, Polkadot has developed its own narrative and community. This week’s da bing examines the rise of Polkadot and how that reflects the state of crypto in China.

More info: https://decrypt.co/55163/polkadot-china-hottest-crypto?amp=1

The School of Public Policy and Management offers to its best students a great opportunity to become a participant of an Exchange program for a semester at one of the universities partners . This year 7 best second-year GGL students took part in the Exchange Program.
Elena Drozdova, Alina Serykh and Aleksandr Nikolashvili have chosen the Carleton University in Ottawa, Canada while Mark Melamed, Alfred Markelov, Pavel Zharkov and Kirill Skoropupov decided to take a semester at Leiden University in The Netherlands

Elena Drozdova (Canada): Actually, I don’t have enough words to share the admiration and excitement which overflow me after this wonderful trip. I can say that it’s one of the most impressive, incredible, and unforgettable experiences in my life! Personally for me, it was quite challenging and because of this even more fascinating, as we had to adapt to the new conditions of life across the ocean from the home-country sufficiently fast, also, we had to get used to new types of tasks and requirements at the university; but all these details made the experience I gained from the semester even more amazing. It goes without saying these 4 months spent abroad were very useful for me as I gained a lot of life and learning experience: I improved my writing skills a lot, as we had to write several research papers on various serious issues; I realized that it’s possible to combine studying the programs of two universities simultaneously. Moreover, it was a great chance to compare the way of getting education at Canadian university to the one we get in Russia as well as to challenge myself to have high enough scores with this new, unusual and sometimes quite difficult educational system. Hence, this experience was an invaluable contribution to self-development both in education and everyday life.


More info: https://medium.com/@ggl.bachelorprogram/the-amazing-experience-of-being-an-exchange-student-6d8aae82993c

আমরা যারা ছোট মেম্বার আছি ফোরামে তাদের জন্য ছোট্ট একটা পোস্ট করা হল দয়া করে মনোযোগ দিয়ে পড়বেন আশা করি সবাই উপকৃত হবেন।

*💖ফেরামে যতটা পারেন সময় দিন ।
*💖সবার সাথে Positive বিষয় নিয়ে  আলোচনা করুন ।
*💖আপনার knowledge কে ফোরামের বিষয় গুলো দিয়ে বুঝানোর চেষ্টা করুন ।
*💖গুরুত্বপূর্ণ টপিক গুলো মনযোগ দিয়ে পড়ুন ।
*💖ভালো মানের পোস্ট করুন যেটা পড়ে অন্য কেউ উপকৃত হতে পাড়ে ।
*💖অবান্তর পোস্ট করা থেকে বিরত থাকুন ।
*💖বিষয়ভিত্তিক পোস্ট করেন এবং নিয়মিত active থাকুন
*💖Writing skill বাড়ান।
* 💖সবার সাথে সুসম্পর্ক গড়ে তুলুন।
*💖স্পামিং থেকে বিরত থাকুন ।

এই বিষয়গুলো যদি আপনি পরিপূর্ণভাবে পালন করতে পারেন তাহলে আপনি ফোরামে পড়বেন ইনশাআল্লাহ।

সিনিয়র ভাইদের দৃষ্টি আকর্ষন করব যে ফার্মিং আইডি কি এটা কেন ব্যবহার করবো আমরা এটির গুরুত্ব কতটুকু সবকিছু একটু বুঝাইয়া বলবেন ।

সার্ভিস বোর্ড সম্পর্কে যদি কোনো সিনিয়র ভাই জেনে থাকেন তাহলে দয়া করে নিচে জানিয়ে যাবেন সার্ভিস বুটের উপকারিতা কি।

AME টোকেন নিয়ে মোটামুটি এক ধরনের ঝর শুরু হইছে। অনেকে দেখি এইটা কিনতেছে আমি বাউন্টি থেকে কিছু পাইছিলাম তাই বিক্রি কইরা দিছি। এটা কিরকম হবে কেও কি এটা দেখছেন ভালোভাবে। যে এটার ভবিষ্যৎ কেমন হতে পারে। এক্সচেঞ্জ এ লিস্ট হওয়ার পর কি IEO প্রাইস অতিক্রম করতে পারবো?

কোডিং সম্পর্কে যদি কেউ জেনে থাকেন তাহলে দয়া করে পোস্টটি আলোচনা করবেন এতে করে সবাই জানতে পারবে এবং আমরা সবাই উপকৃত হব।