Binance, the world's largest cryptocurrency exchange by adjusted volume, is actively looking to list more stablecoins in addition to the three it already supports, which include the recently beleaguered tether (USDT).

"We hope to be able to list a few more stablecoins on our platform," chief financial officer Wei Zhou told CoinDesk Thursday.

But that does not mean the Hong Kong-based exchange is souring on USDT, which lost its parity with the U.S. dollar on Monday and has yet to fully recover, trading at $0.976 on Thursday.

"As a whole, we believe things will even out. We will continue to support USDT," Wei said.

Indeed, Binance's interest in expanding its stablecoin options predates tether's breaking of the buck. The exchange added support for Paxos Standard (PAX) in late September, weeks before USDT lost parity, and TrueUSD (TUSD) back in May.
More here: https://www.coindesk.com/binance-stablecoins-tether-crypto/

Another continuance has been granted in the case against against Renwick Haddow, known for his Ponzi and Bitcoin scams. The order for the continuance was signed on October 12th, but was made available to FinanceFeeds late on Monday, October 15th.

The continuance was requested by the US Government. Their motion states that counsel for Haddow and counsel for the Government are engaged in discussions concerning a possible disposition of this case. The negotiations have not been completed but the Government said it planned to continue the discussions.

The Government has requested a 30-day continuance until November 12, 2018, to continue the foregoing discussions and reach a disposition of this matter. The request has been granted by the Court.

This is the sixth order of continuance that has been granted in this case.

In June last year, the charges against Renwick Haddow were unsealed. The criminal complaint charges him with two counts of wire fraud — one relating to the Bitcoin Store scheme and the other relating to the Bar Works scheme. Each charge carries a maximum prison term of 20 years.

Under the allegations, Haddow, who is a citizen of the United Kingdom, from November 2014 through June 2017, solicited investments in start-up companies he created and controlled, including Bitcoin Store — a purported online platform for purchasing, selling, and storing the digital currency known as “Bitcoin”—and Bar Works, which purports to be a company that adapts former restaurants, bar premises, and other locations into co-working spaces. When doing so, Haddow made material misrepresentations about the management, operations, and historical performance of those companies.

For example, Haddow concealed his interest in Bitcoin Store and fabricated the purported “experienced team of leading investment professionals” working at the company. In connection with Bar Works, Haddow adopted the alias “Jonathan Black” to further hide his role in the schemes. He claimed that “Jonathan Black” had an extensive background in finance and had a role in setting up “Car Share,” a car-sharing app.

Haddow solicited investments through his control of InCrowd Equity Inc., which represented itself as a type of crowdfunding portal through which investors could purchase shares of start-ups supposedly vetted by InCrowd. He did so without disclosing to investors that he had an ownership interest in both InCrowd, on the one hand, and Bitcoin Store and Bar Works, on the other. Haddow also misappropriated without permission funds purportedly invested in Bitcoin Store and Bar Works for his own use and the use of others.

The case, captioned USA v. Haddow (1:17-mj-04939), goes on at the New York Southern District Court.
Source: https://financefeeds.com/ny-court-allows-continuance-case-targeting-ponzi-fraudster-renwick-haddow/

Citizens of Venezuela have turned to Bitcoin and gold farming in online games to survive the country’s economic collapse.

It’s been a hellish couple of years for the people of Venezuela. The socialist policies of President Nicolás Maduro have wreaked incredible devastation upon the country’s previously strong economy. People are turning to unorthodox means in order to stay alive, and the latest means to help keep food on the table is Bitcoin and online gaming.

Desperate Times Call for Desperate Measures
The current situation in Venezuela is dire. The economy is in ruins, and the country’s currency, the bolivar, is essentially worthless. The most basic necessities, such as food and medicine, are non-existent. During the course of 2017, the average Venezuelan lost 24 pounds, and 90 percent of the population fell into poverty.


The situation has not improved in 2018. Starving people have taken to killing and eating zoo animals. The Bloomberg Cafe Con Leche Index shows that the price of a single cup of coffee now costs 70 bolivars (or the equivalent of 7 million old bolivars as the government has lopped off five zeroes). This price of either 70 or 7 million bolivars is worth roughly 50 cents and shows an annual inflation rate of 127,173 percent.

The government is now mandating that citizens have to buy passports with the Petro, the country’s national cryptocurrency which is supposed to be released on November 5th. While Reuters recently reported that they found no signs that the Petro actually exists, the reality is that most people are stuck. Which is why they are turning to Bitcoin and online gaming to make ends meet.

Gold Farming for Bitcoin
When people are desperate, they will find a way to survive. Venezuelans are turning to the world of online gaming and gold farming to make some money to keep starvation at bay.

Online games like Runescape and Tibia are popular choices for Venezuelans for their gold farming. The practice of gold farming is when a player in a massively multiplayer online game (or MMO) spends their time harvesting in-game assets, such as gold or items. These assets are then sold on a secondary market to other players for fiat, Bitcoin, or other cryptocurrencies.
More here: https://www.livebitcoinnews.com/venezuelans-turn-to-bitcoin-and-online-gaming-to-survive/

Investors with exposure to the Bitcoin market are well acquainted with the crazy volatility they must deal with. It is widely believed that the big whales, investors who hold high amounts of the cryptocurrency, are responsible for the wild swings in price. One such incident as reported by Bloomberg was the rumored selling of 50,000 Bitcoins by a whale earlier in August leading to a 15% plunge in value.

Research conducted by Chainalysis reveals that it’s not the whales that cause volatility. Contrary to the notion, they help stabilize the price, says the firm. Chainalysis is a blockchain research firm focused on detecting, preventing and investigating cryptocurrency money laundering, fraud, and compliance violations.



Who Are These Whales?
A study of Bitcoin’s largest wallets reveals that 32 portfolios hold close to a million coins worth $6.3 Billion. While the transparency of the Bitcoin blockchains allows anyone to track the transactions being executed from a public address, it is impossible to know the details of the owner of an address. That’s how anonymity is maintained on the network.

Chainalysis analyzed the transactions history of these wallets and categorized them into:

Traders: This is a group of 9 wallets holding 332,000 coins worth $2 billion. These are active traders who make up about one-third of the total whales and regularly trade on exchanges. Most entered the market during 2017.
Early Adopters/Miners: This is a category of people who entered the market before 2017. This group includes 15 people who hold 332,000 coins worth $2 Billion. They are mostly hodlers, and trading activity for this group is low.
Lost: This is a group of 5 wallets holding over 212,000 coins, worth approximately $1.3 billion. The owners of these wallets have lost their private keys, and there have been no transactions from these addresses since 2011.
Criminals: The group includes three wallets that hold over 125,000 coins worth about $790 million in value. Two of these whales are connected to the silk road darknet market while one is involved in money laundering.
Are These Whales Causing Market Volatility?
As the above taxonomy reveals, the active traders represent only about one-third of the 32 wallets, and this is the only group involved in active trading. While the trading pattern of these wallets on the exchanges is not available, the transaction history extracted from the addresses reveals that they were buying more than selling during the dips in 2017 and 2018, leading to a net increase in their holdings. And contrary to the widely held notion, the whales helped Bitcoin stabilize and hold the price, rather than bringing it down.
Source: https://www.livebitcoinnews.com/bitcoin-volatility-not-because-of-whales-research-firm-concludes/

Major cryptocurrencies plummeted on Thursday morning in Asia, impacted by a bearish market and a new report that found cryptocurrency thefts in the first three quarters of this year hit $927 million.

Bitcoin suffered less than other major cryptocurrencies, falling just 5.8% to $6,309.4 by 10:47PM ET (02:47 GMT) on the Bitifinex exchange.

Losses in other currencies were greater in percentage terms. Ethereum tumbled 14.08% to $204.76 and Litecoin dropped 12.89% to $53.253, both on Bitifinex. XRP slumped 15.86% to $0.42452 on the Poloniex exchange.

The bearish mood may have been compounded by a report from cybersecurity intelligence Cipher Trace. The firm found that cryptocurrency thefts in the first three quarter of this year added up to $927 million.

The value of recorded crypto-thefts this year is 3.5 times higher than in the whole of 2017. Several heists in the third quarter ranged between $20 to $60 million for a total of $166 million, according to Cipher Trace.

“This data indicates a pattern of smaller robberies on a regular basis and sophisticated professional cyber thieves who carry out hacks at both the exchange and platform levels by capitalizing on exposed vulnerabilities, as well as by socially engineering employees who work at these companies,” the company said in the report.

Cipher Trace estimated that the value of cryptocurrency thefts could top $1 billion by the end of the year. The company also found that 97% of bitcoins related to crime went to unregulated cryptocurrency exchanges.

“The regulators are still a couple of years behind because there are only a few countries that have really applied strong anti-money laundering laws,” Dave Javens, CEO of Cipher Trace, told Reuters.

In a separate report, the Financial Stability Board (FSB), which monitors the global financial system, said that although digital tokens “do not pose a material risk to global financial stability at this time…vigilant monitoring is needed in light of the speed of market developments.”

The FSB said that if the use of crypto-assets continues to grow, risks including confidence effects, the exposure of financial institutions and others might increase. The digital currencies also “raise several broader policy issues, such as the need for consumer and investor protection; strong market integrity protocols; anti-money laundering and combating the financing of terrorism (AML/CFT) regulation and supervision.”

Despite the fall in the price of cryptocurrencies, 14 people in the blockchain industry, including Zhan Ketuan and Wu Jihan at Bitcoin mining company Bitmain, were added to the list of the wealthiest individuals in China, according to the Hurun China Rich List released on Wednesday.
Source: https://www.investing.com/news/cryptocurrency-news/cryptocurrencies-slump-cryptothefts-reach-about-1-billion-this-year-1639879

Bitcoin and other major cryptocurrencies edged down on Wednesday morning in Asia while Tiberius Technology Ventures moved to stop selling its metal-backed cryptocurrency and plans to refund $1 million to investors, according to the company’s own blog.

Bitcoin dropped 0.46% to $6,629.7 by 11:01PM ET (03:01GMT) on the Bitifinex exchange. ETH/USD fell 0.37% to $230.23 and Litecoin slumped 1.48% to $58.664. XRP fell 1.72% to $0.47754 on the Poloniex exchange.

Tiberius Technology Ventures, part of Swiss commodities fund Tiberius Group, said on Tuesday that unreasonable credit card fees, as high as 15%, had led it to stop sales of its tcoin. The company said it has raised $1 million from 700 investors.

“At the beginning of October we received news that our credit card processors were going to make investing in Tiberius Coin difficult,” Tiberius Technology Ventures said in a statement.

A key feature of tcoin has been its stability, as holders can redeem them for metals including aluminium and copper.

Meanwhile, CNBC reported that Juniper Research expects a gloomy future for digital tokens due to regulatory crackdowns and hacks.

Bitcoin has tumbled 52% this year and more than 65% since December, according to CoinDesk.

“If Bitcoin cannot make gains in such favourable circumstances, then it is unlikely to prosper as and when these issues are resolved. We feel that the industry is on the brink of an implosion,” Juniper’s Windsor Holden said on Tuesday.

Holden’s paper also found out that fewer people want to pay inflated prices for digital tokens. Credit card companies are also not embracing the use of cryptocurrencies while Facebook (NASDAQ:FB) has also prohibited advertisements of initial coin offerings (ICO).

Still, some countries remain eager to experiment with cryptocurrencies. Reuters reported on Monday that the United Arab Emirates (UAE) is set to introduce ICOs in 2019 to make it easier for companies to raise funds. The UAE’s securities watchdog is in the process of writing up ICO regulations.
Source: https://www.investing.com/news/cryptocurrency-news/cryptocurrencies-drop-tiberius-stops-selling-digital-tokens-1638057

Bilang bahagi ng pivot nito sa seguridad at computing, ang kumpanya ng software at dating tagagawa ng BlackBerry ay naglabas ng isang blockchain- power platform. Ang bagong produkto ay nakatuon sa larangan ng pangangalagang pangkalusugan, ayon sa isang pahayag na inilathala noong Oktubre 4.

Alinsunod sa anunsyo, ang BlackBerry ay nakipagsosyo sa firm ng teknolohiya ONEBIO upang bumuo ng isang blockchain-back na "ultra-secure" ecosystem. Ang sistema ay dinisenyo para sa pag-iimbak at pagbabahagi ng medikal na data, kung saan maaaring maipasok ang impormasyon ng mga biometric device sa mga pasyente, laboratoryo, at Internet ng Mga Bagay ( IoT ). Sa sandaling pumasok, ang data ay magiging di-kilala at ibabahagi sa mga mananaliksik. Sinabi ng CEO ng BlackBerry na si John Chen:
Magpatuloy Pagbabasa sa Coin Telegraph

Cryptocurrency prices gained on Thursday. Morningstar analyst Kristoffer Inton’s comments received some attention as he said Bitcoin is not likely to surpass gold in terms of investment and popularity.

“Amid the growing hype, some even floated the idea that cryptocurrency could one day replace gold as one of the world’s most widely accepted investment assets,” said Inton.

“In order to assess the threat, we’ve created a framework to grade any asset class’s viability as a safe haven by focusing on liquidity, functional purpose, scarcity of supply, future demand certainty, and permanence. Through this framework, we conclude that cryptocurrency does not and will not challenge gold as a safe-haven asset class,” he continued.

“If cryptocurrency were to displace gold’s investment case, the implications for gold prices would be devastating. 40% of gold demand relates to investment, so a shift in investment from gold to cryptocurrency would be a seismic shock.”

Bitcoin traded 2.0% higher to $6,611.8 at 12:30AM ET (04:30 GMT) on the Bitifinex exchange.   

Ethereum gained 3.2% to $226.8 in the previous 24 hours.

XRP rebounded 5% to $0.54529  on the Poloniex exchange, while Litecoin also rose 2.9% at $59.145.

In other news, Binance, one of the largest cryptocurrency exchange, said in a statement on Wednesday that it invested A$3.5 million ($2.5 million) in Australian distributed ledger technology (DLT) payment company TravelByBit. The Japan-based crypto exchange is aiming to develop a point-of-sale payment system across airports worldwide, according to the statement.

In August, Brisbane-based TravelByBit received A$100,000 from the Queensland government to promote local tourism
source: https://www.investing.com/news/cryptocurrency-news/crypto-prices-gain-bitcoin-not-likely-to-surpass-gold-in-popularity-analyst-says-1633767