In older days, people heard tales about how a man's words could not only reach millions but might also be enough to make people lose or win money. The old tale has come true, at least in <a href="https://www.wionews.com/topics/elon-musk">Elon Musk’s case</a>.

<h4>Once bitten, not shy</h4>

In August 2018, Elon Musk had used his Twitter account to claim that he had "funding secured" to take his company Tesla private at a price of $420 per share. While the information was manipulated and not completely true, the effect of his statement was very true.

Also read |&nbsp;<a href="https://www.wionews.com/trending/would-dinosaurs-be-alive-if-they-had-spaceships-tech-mogul-elon-musk-believes-so-388379" hreflang="en">Would dinosaurs be alive if they had spaceships? Tech mogul Elon Musk believes so</a>

Musk was challenged by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and&nbsp;was charged with securities fraud the next month. While the two sides reached to a quick settlement, Musk had to step down from his position of Chairman of Tesla.

He was also asked to get all his public communications (mainly, Twitter) checked and approved by his team of lawyers. In addition to this, the tech billonaire was fined $40 million.

<h4>‘High’ly vulnerable</h4>

However, that has not stopped Musk from tweeting ‘dangerous’ things. In the early months of 2019, Musk tweeted an estimate of how many cars Tesla would be able to produce in that financial year. Since the number was higher than the goal stated in company’s official guidance, the tweet was not appreciated by the SEC, especially after the board realised the tweet in question was not approved by his lawyers.

Also read |&nbsp;<a href="https://www.wionews.com/business-economy/bitcoin-tumble-slows-with-help-from-elon-musk-386180" hreflang="en">Bitcoin tumble slows with help from Elon Musk</a>

Later, famous for his odd-timed tweets, Musk on the evening of July 29 replied to Ryan McCaffrey about solar roofs. In response to Musk’s "Tesla megapack", Ryan had tweeted, "How’s solar roof tile progress going? You were working on a new version (V3?) of that, right?"

Musk, within minutes, replied, "Spooling up production line rapidly. Hoping to manufacture ~1000 solar roofs/week by end of this year".

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Spooling up production line rapidly. Hoping to manufacture ~1000 solar roofs/week by end of this year.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) <a href="https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1156005185656782848?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">July 30, 2019</a></blockquote>
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After this tweet, the SEC warned Tesla that Musk’s tweets about solar power and Tesla car production were another breach of the settlement, to which Tesla lawyers argued that it was nothing but "wholly aspirational".

Also read |&nbsp;<a href="https://www.wionews.com/technology/elon-musks-tesla-halts-bitcoin-purchases-amid-concerns-of-increasing-carbon-emissions-384647" hreflang="en">Elon Musk's Tesla halts bitcoin purchases amid concerns of increasing carbon emissions</a>

While the two sides agreed on stricter vetting for Musk’s tweets, the space junkie did not steer clear of trouble. While the world fought with the pandemic, in May 2020, the entrepreneur tweeted, "Tesla's stock price is too high imo."

His tweet resulted in a drop of 10 per cent in the share prices that night and the SEC warned Musk and Tesla that the tweet reflected the company's financial condition. Not a big fan of the agency, Musk dismissed the claims by saying the tweet was simply a "personal opinion", and not a factual claim.

Master of coin

There was less harm when Elon Musk was limited to his own company's shares. However, recently, the SpaceX founder has started tweeting about cryptocurrencies, especially since Tesla invested in the same.

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If you’d like to help develop Doge, please submit ideas on GitHub &amp; <a href="https://t.co/liAPQMFaQB">https://t.co/liAPQMFaQB</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/dogecoin_devs?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@dogecoin_devs</a>
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) <a href="https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1396916392629137409?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">May 24, 2021</a></blockquote>
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His tweets on crypto and digital currencies, and, recently, dogecoin, have sent their prices up and down within seconds. The interesting part of him dwelling in cryptocurrencies is that these commodities are not controlled by the SEC, thus giving Musk the freedom to tweet without getting into much trouble.

Recently, when China signalled a new crackdown on&nbsp;cryptocurrency, the prices were set for a devastating fall. However, one tweet from Musk cushioned the loss. The virtual currency had fallen to nearly&nbsp;$30,000 but quickly climbed back to&nbsp;$39,500 after Musk's tweet:

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Tesla has 💎 🙌
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) <a href="https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1395027147161489412?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">May 19, 2021</a></blockquote>
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'Baby Shark crushes all!'

It is not just solar panels or cryptocurrencies, Musk has also diverted his attention towards children’s entertainment media. He recently replied to South Park’s tweet of meme stars by saying, "Baby Shark crushes all! More views than humans."

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Baby Shark crushes all! More views than humans. <a href="https://t.co/48Ol3ZzhjP">https://t.co/48Ol3ZzhjP</a>
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) <a href="https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1399874980062633985?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">June 1, 2021</a></blockquote>
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His one tweet about the 'Baby Shark' dance video resulted in an increase in the shares of Samsung Publishing in the Asian trading by nearly six per cent.

Tech-y advice

Elon Musk has also indulged in advising the masses on which messaging app is a better choice, purely out of personal opinion. In the early months of 2021, Musk asked people to switch to a messaging app called Signal over WhatsApp and Facebook due to a change in&nbsp;the latter's policy which has raised privacy concerns.

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Use Signal
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) <a href="https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1347165127036977153?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">January 7, 2021</a></blockquote>
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Shortly after the announcement, the demand for the app shot up and more than 100,000 users installed Signal across the app stores of Apple and Google within two days.

Conquering new markets

After successfully launching his automobile and space companies, Elon Musk is hoping to soon launch a drive-in food chain across the US, in the locations of Supercharger. Local reports stated that an application has been submitted to the&nbsp;United States Patent and Trademark Office, which will cover the areas of "Restaurant services, pop-up restaurant services, self-service restaurant services, take-out restaurant services".

However, the reports have not yet been verified by the company or the serial tweeter, Elon Musk, yet.

In older days, people heard tales about how a man's words could not only reach millions but might also be enough to make people lose or win money. The old tale has come true, at least in Elon Musk’s case.

In older days, people heard tales about how a man's words could not only reach millions but might also be enough to make people lose or win money. The old tale has come true, at least in Elon Musk’s case. Once bitten, not shy In August 2018, Elon Musk had used his Twitter account to claim that he had "funding secured" to take his company Tesla private at a price of $420 per share. While the information was manipulated and not completely true, the effect of his statement was very true. Also read | Would dinosaurs be alive if they had spaceships? Tech mogul Elon Musk believes so Musk was challenged by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and was charged with securities fraud the next month. While the two sides reached to a quick settlement, Musk had to step down from his position of Chairman of Tesla. He was also asked to get all his public communications (mainly, Twitter) checked and approved by his team of lawyers. In addition to this, the tech billonaire was fined $40 million. ‘High’ly vulnerable However, that has not stopped Musk from tweeting ‘dangerous’ things. In the early months of 2019, Musk tweeted an estimate of how many cars Tesla would be able to produce in that financial year. Since the number was higher than the goal stated in company’s official guidance, the tweet was not appreciated by the SEC, especially after the board realised the tweet in question was not approved by his lawyers. Also read | Bitcoin tumble slows with help from Elon Musk Later, famous for his odd-timed tweets, Musk on the evening of July 29 replied to Ryan McCaffrey about solar roofs. In response to Musk’s "Tesla megapack", Ryan had tweeted, "How’s solar roof tile progress going? You were working on a new version (V3?) of that, right?" Musk, within minutes, replied, "Spooling up production line rapidly. Hoping to manufacture ~1000 solar roofs/week by end of this year". Spooling up production line rapidly. Hoping to manufacture ~1000 solar roofs/week by end of this year. — Elon Musk (@elonmusk) July 30, 2019 × After this tweet, the SEC warned Tesla that Musk’s tweets about solar power and Tesla car production were another breach of the settlement, to which Tesla lawyers argued that it was nothing but "wholly aspirational". Also read | Elon Musk's Tesla halts bitcoin purchases amid concerns of increasing carbon emissions While the two sides agreed on stricter vetting for Musk’s tweets, the space junkie did not steer clear of trouble. While the world fought with the pandemic, in May 2020, the entrepreneur tweeted, "Tesla's stock price is too high imo." His tweet resulted in a drop of 10 per cent in the share prices that night and the SEC warned Musk and Tesla that the tweet reflected the company's financial condition. Not a big fan of the agency, Musk dismissed the claims by saying the tweet was simply a "personal opinion", and not a factual claim. Master of coin There was less harm when Elon Musk was limited to his own company's shares. However, recently, the SpaceX founder has started tweeting about cryptocurrencies, especially since Tesla invested in the same. If you’d like to help develop Doge, please submit ideas on GitHub & https://t.co/liAPQMFaQB @dogecoin_devs — Elon Musk (@elonmusk) May 24, 2021 × His tweets on crypto and digital currencies, and, recently, dogecoin, have sent their prices up and down within seconds. The interesting part of him dwelling in cryptocurrencies is that these commodities are not controlled by the SEC, thus giving Musk the freedom to tweet without getting into much trouble. Recently, when China signalled a new crackdown on cryptocurrency, the prices were set for a devastating fall. However, one tweet from Musk cushioned the loss. The virtual currency had fallen to nearly $30,000 but quickly climbed back to $39,500 after Musk's tweet: Tesla has 💎 🙌 — Elon Musk (@elonmusk) May 19, 2021 × 'Baby Shark crushes all!' It is not just solar panels or cryptocurrencies, Musk has also diverted his attention towards children’s entertainment media. He recently replied to South Park’s tweet of meme stars by saying, "Baby Shark crushes all! More views than humans." Baby Shark crushes all! More views than humans. https://t.co/48Ol3ZzhjP — Elon Musk (@elonmusk) June 1, 2021 × His one tweet about the 'Baby Shark' dance video resulted in an increase in the shares of Samsung Publishing in the Asian trading by nearly six per cent. Tech-y advice Elon Musk has also indulged in advising the masses on which messaging app is a better choice, purely out of personal opinion. In the early months of 2021, Musk asked people to switch to a messaging app called Signal over WhatsApp and Facebook due to a change in the latter's policy which has raised privacy concerns. Use Signal — Elon Musk (@elonmusk) January 7, 2021 × Shortly after the announcement, the demand for the app shot up and more than 100,000 users installed Signal across the app stores of Apple and Google within two days. Conquering new markets After successfully launching his automobile and space companies, Elon Musk is hoping to soon launch a drive-in food chain across the US, in the locations of Supercharger. Local reports stated that an application has been submitted to the United States Patent and Trademark Office, which will cover the areas of "Restaurant services, pop-up restaurant services, self-service restaurant services, take-out restaurant services". However, the reports have not yet been verified by the company or the serial tweeter, Elon Musk, yet.

Is Tesla’s Elon Musk a master manipulator of markets?

Many cryptocurrency firms are not meeting Britain`s anti-money laundering and financing rules and, as a result, unprecedented numbers of them have withdrawn applications to register with the country`s financial watchdog, it said on Thursday. 
 
The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) said it would extend the date of its temporary registrations regime from July 9 to the end of March 2022. The extension will allow crypto firms to carry on their business while the regulator conducts further checks, it said in a statement. 
 
The cryptocurrency sector has been plagued through its 12-year life by lax standards on money laundering and other illicit activities. 
 
While standards are widely seen to have improved, global regulators and policymakers have in recent months voiced concerns over the illicit use of crypto. 
 
Since January, cryptocurrency-related firms have had to comply with UK laws on anti-money laundering and counter-terrorist financing. 
 
"The FCA will only register firms where it is confident that processes are in place to identify and prevent this activity," it said.

Many cryptocurrency firms are not meeting Britain`s anti-money laundering and financing rules and, as a result, unprecedented numbers of them have withdrawn applications to register with the country`s financial watchdog, it said on Thursday.

Many cryptocurrency firms are not meeting Britain`s anti-money laundering and financing rules and, as a result, unprecedented numbers of them have withdrawn applications to register with the country`s financial watchdog, it said on Thursday. The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) said it would extend the date of its temporary registrations regime from July 9 to the end of March 2022. The extension will allow crypto firms to carry on their business while the regulator conducts further checks, it said in a statement. The cryptocurrency sector has been plagued through its 12-year life by lax standards on money laundering and other illicit activities. While standards are widely seen to have improved, global regulators and policymakers have in recent months voiced concerns over the illicit use of crypto. Since January, cryptocurrency-related firms have had to comply with UK laws on anti-money laundering and counter-terrorist financing. "The FCA will only register firms where it is confident that processes are in place to identify and prevent this activity," it said.

Cryptocurrency firms not meeting anti-money laundering rules, UK regulator says

Bitcoin dipped 11.33% to $33,250 at 16:00 GMT on Sunday, losing $4,248.98 from its previous close.

Bitcoin, the world's biggest and best-known cryptocurrency, is down 48% from the year's high of $64,895.22 on April 14.

Ether, the coin linked to the ethereum blockchain network, dropped 16.59 % to $1,915.34 on Sunday, losing $380.97 from its previous close.

Bitcoin markets operate 24/7, setting the stage for price swings at unpredictable hours.

"Many point to Bitcoin’s volatility as untenable," wrote RBC Capital Markets' Amy Wu Silverman in a research note published on Saturday. "Indeed, Bitcoin makes severe and dizzying swings."

Bitcoin had been under pressure after a series of tweets last week by billionaire Tesla Chief Executive and cryptocurrency backer Elon Musk, chiefly his reversal on Tesla accepting bitcoin as payment.

In addition, on Friday China cracked down on mining and trading of the largest cryptocurrency as part of ongoing efforts to prevent speculative and financial risks.

China's Financial Stability and Development Committee, chaired by Vice Premier Liu He, singled out bitcoin as the asset it needs to regulate more.

The statement, which came days after three Chinese industry bodies tightened a ban on banks and payment companies providing crypto-related services, was a sharp escalation of the country's push to stamp out speculation and fraud in virtual currencies.

China's latest campaign against crypto came after the U.S. Treasury Department on Thursday called for new rules that would require large cryptocurrency transfers to be reported to the Internal Revenue Service, and the Federal Reserve flagged the risks cryptocurrencies posed to financial stability.

Bitcoin dipped 11.33% to $33,250 at 16:00 GMT on Sunday, losing $4,248.98 from its previous close. Bitcoin, the world's biggest and best-known cryptocurrency, is down 48% from the year's high of $64,895.

Bitcoin dipped 11.33% to $33,250 at 16:00 GMT on Sunday, losing $4,248.98 from its previous close. Bitcoin, the world's biggest and best-known cryptocurrency, is down 48% from the year's high of $64,895.22 on April 14. Ether, the coin linked to the ethereum blockchain network, dropped 16.59 % to $1,915.34 on Sunday, losing $380.97 from its previous close. Bitcoin markets operate 24/7, setting the stage for price swings at unpredictable hours. "Many point to Bitcoin’s volatility as untenable," wrote RBC Capital Markets' Amy Wu Silverman in a research note published on Saturday. "Indeed, Bitcoin makes severe and dizzying swings." Bitcoin had been under pressure after a series of tweets last week by billionaire Tesla Chief Executive and cryptocurrency backer Elon Musk, chiefly his reversal on Tesla accepting bitcoin as payment. In addition, on Friday China cracked down on mining and trading of the largest cryptocurrency as part of ongoing efforts to prevent speculative and financial risks. China's Financial Stability and Development Committee, chaired by Vice Premier Liu He, singled out bitcoin as the asset it needs to regulate more. The statement, which came days after three Chinese industry bodies tightened a ban on banks and payment companies providing crypto-related services, was a sharp escalation of the country's push to stamp out speculation and fraud in virtual currencies. China's latest campaign against crypto came after the U.S. Treasury Department on Thursday called for new rules that would require large cryptocurrency transfers to be reported to the Internal Revenue Service, and the Federal Reserve flagged the risks cryptocurrencies posed to financial stability.

Bitcoin falls 11.3 per cent to USD 33,250, ether down 16.6 per cent

Bitcoin tumbled below the $40,000 mark on Wednesday for the first time in more than three months after China banned financial and payment institutions from providing cryptocurrency services.

Trading in cryptocurrencies has been banned in China since 2019 to prevent money laundering as leaders try to stop people from shifting cash overseas. The country had been home to around 90 percent of the global trade in the sector.

<div class="videoWrapper trancodeVideo"><iframe allowfullscreen="" autoplay="1" class="includeVideo" frameborder="0" height="350" src="https://www.wionews.com/videos/china-extends-its-cryptocurrency-ban-to-banks-385962/embed" style="width:100%;max-width:560px;" width="560"></iframe></div>

And in a statement, three state-backed industry associations said "cryptocurrency prices have skyrocketed and plummeted, and cryptocurrency trading speculation activities have rebounded".

The price fluctuations "seriously violate people's asset safety and disrupt normal economic and financial order", said the statement, which was posted to social media by the People's Bank of China.

The notice warned consumers against wild speculation, adding that the "losses caused by investment transactions are borne by the consumers themselves" since Chinese law offers no protection to them.&nbsp;

It reiterated that providing cryptocurrency services to customers and crypto-based financial products was illegal for Chinese financial institutions and payment providers.

China is in the midst of a wide-ranging regulatory crackdown on its fintech sector, whose biggest players, including Alibaba and Tencent,&nbsp;have been hit with big fines after being found guilty of monopolistic practices.

The central bank has also sought to promote its own heavily regulated digital yuan, which it is testing across the country in pilot schemes.

Bitcoin, the biggest and best-known cryptocurrency, had already been under pressure from a series of tweets from Tesla boss Elon Musk, but the news from China sent it as low as $36,250, a 15 per cent&nbsp;drop in the trading session.

Bitcoin's decline whacked other crypto assets, with Ether, the coin linked to the ethereum blockchain network, shedding as much as 28% on Wednesday to $2,426. It brings losses in the week since it hit a record high on May 12 to 40 per cent.

Meme-based dogecoin also tumbled,&nbsp;losing nearly 30&nbsp;per cent&nbsp;at one point, according to market tracker Coingecko.

Shares in the crypto exchange Coinbase dropped 5&nbsp;per cent&nbsp;in pre-market trading. Coinbase's share price has nearly halved from the peak hit on the day of its direct listing in April.

Cryptocurrency price declines last week were sparked by Musk's reversal on Tesla accepting bitcoin as payment. His subsequent tweets caused further confusion over whether the carmaker had shed its holdings of the coin.

The crypto asset selloff at a time when inflation fears are rising hurts the idea of the asset class as an inflation hedge.

Instead, more traditional hedges have been gaining ground, with gold up almost 6&nbsp;per cent&nbsp;this month.

The recent selloff in bitcoin and other digital currencies has sent market capitalisation of all cryptocurrencies to $1.7 trillion, down from the $2.5 trillion record hit earlier this month.

Bitcoin tumbled below the $40,000 mark on Wednesday for the first time in more than three months after China banned financial and payment institutions from providing cryptocurrency services.

Bitcoin tumbled below the $40,000 mark on Wednesday for the first time in more than three months after China banned financial and payment institutions from providing cryptocurrency services. Trading in cryptocurrencies has been banned in China since 2019 to prevent money laundering as leaders try to stop people from shifting cash overseas. The country had been home to around 90 percent of the global trade in the sector. And in a statement, three state-backed industry associations said "cryptocurrency prices have skyrocketed and plummeted, and cryptocurrency trading speculation activities have rebounded". The price fluctuations "seriously violate people's asset safety and disrupt normal economic and financial order", said the statement, which was posted to social media by the People's Bank of China. The notice warned consumers against wild speculation, adding that the "losses caused by investment transactions are borne by the consumers themselves" since Chinese law offers no protection to them. It reiterated that providing cryptocurrency services to customers and crypto-based financial products was illegal for Chinese financial institutions and payment providers. China is in the midst of a wide-ranging regulatory crackdown on its fintech sector, whose biggest players, including Alibaba and Tencent, have been hit with big fines after being found guilty of monopolistic practices. The central bank has also sought to promote its own heavily regulated digital yuan, which it is testing across the country in pilot schemes. Bitcoin, the biggest and best-known cryptocurrency, had already been under pressure from a series of tweets from Tesla boss Elon Musk, but the news from China sent it as low as $36,250, a 15 per cent drop in the trading session. Bitcoin's decline whacked other crypto assets, with Ether, the coin linked to the ethereum blockchain network, shedding as much as 28% on Wednesday to $2,426. It brings losses in the week since it hit a record high on May 12 to 40 per cent. Meme-based dogecoin also tumbled, losing nearly 30 per cent at one point, according to market tracker Coingecko. Shares in the crypto exchange Coinbase dropped 5 per cent in pre-market trading. Coinbase's share price has nearly halved from the peak hit on the day of its direct listing in April. Cryptocurrency price declines last week were sparked by Musk's reversal on Tesla accepting bitcoin as payment. His subsequent tweets caused further confusion over whether the carmaker had shed its holdings of the coin. The crypto asset selloff at a time when inflation fears are rising hurts the idea of the asset class as an inflation hedge. Instead, more traditional hedges have been gaining ground, with gold up almost 6 per cent this month. The recent selloff in bitcoin and other digital currencies has sent market capitalisation of all cryptocurrencies to $1.7 trillion, down from the $2.5 trillion record hit earlier this month.

Bitcoin tumbles below $40,000 after China's new crypto ban

Ether, the world's second-largest&nbsp;cryptocurrency&nbsp;after Bitcoin, on Thursday rose to a&nbsp;record&nbsp;high&nbsp;of $3,591.65 on the Bitstamp Exchange.

Also read |&nbsp;<a href="https://www.wionews.com/business-economy/bitcoin-other-cryptocurrencies-tumble-over-biden-tax-plan-fears-379752">Bitcoin, other cryptocurrencies tumble over Biden tax plan fears</a>

Ether&nbsp;was last up about 3.0 per cent&nbsp;at $3,568.92. Bitcoin was down 0.7 per cent&nbsp;at $57,109.40 and about 12 per cent&nbsp;below its&nbsp;record&nbsp;intraday&nbsp;high&nbsp;at $64,895.22 set on April 14.

Ether, the world's second-largest cryptocurrency after Bitcoin, on Thursday rose to a record high of $3,591.65 on the Bitstamp Exchange. Also read | Bitcoin, other cryptocurrencies tumble over Biden tax plan fears Ether was last up about 3.

Ether, the world's second-largest cryptocurrency after Bitcoin, on Thursday rose to a record high of $3,591.65 on the Bitstamp Exchange. Also read | Bitcoin, other cryptocurrencies tumble over Biden tax plan fears Ether was last up about 3.0 per cent at $3,568.92. Bitcoin was down 0.7 per cent at $57,109.40 and about 12 per cent below its record intraday high at $64,895.22 set on April 14.

Cryptocurrency 'Ether' rises to new record high

Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies tumbled on Friday due to concern that US President Joe Biden's plan to raise tax for the rich would curb investments in digital assets. Bitcoin, the most popular currency fell below USD 50,000 mark for the first time since March and slumped to USD 47,555.

News reports on Thursday said the Biden administration is planning a raft of proposed changes to the U.S. tax code, including a plan to nearly double taxes on capital gains to 39.6% for people earning more than $1 million.

Other cryptocurrencies felt the heat of the negative sentiment too. Ether and XRP fell 3.5 per cent and 6.7 per cent respectively. while dogecoin, created as a joke for early crypto adopters and which had surged about 8,000% this year prior to this latest setback, was down 20% at $0.21, according to price and data tracker CoinGecko.&nbsp;

"With a high growth rate in the bitcoin price, crypto holders that have accrued gains will be subjected to this tax increment," said Nick Spanos, founder at Bitcoin Center NYC. He sees bitcoin dropping further in the coming days.

Bitcoin is on track for an 11.3% loss on the week, its worst weekly showing since late February. On the year, however, it was still up 72%.

But while social media lit up with posts about the plan hurting cryptocurrencies, and individual investors complaining about losses, some traders and analysts said declines are likely to be temporary.

"I don't think Biden's taxes plans will have a big impact on bitcoin," said Ruud Feltkamp, CEO at automated crypto trading bot Cryptohopper. "Bitcoin has only gone up for a long time, it is only natural to see a consolidation. Traders are simply cashing in on winnings."

Others also remained bullish on bitcoin's long term prospects, but noted it might take time before prices start increasing again.

"Investors will see the price drop across the crypto market as an opportunity to widen their portfolio by averaging up their investment outlay and buying new altcoins," said Don Guo, chief executive officer at Broctagon Fintech Group. He added that for bitcoin, investors will see it as an opportunity to buy bitcoin at a lower price.

(With inputs from agencies)

Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies tumbled on Friday due to concern that US President Joe Biden's plan to raise tax for the rich would curb investments in digital assets.

Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies tumbled on Friday due to concern that US President Joe Biden's plan to raise tax for the rich would curb investments in digital assets. Bitcoin, the most popular currency fell below USD 50,000 mark for the first time since March and slumped to USD 47,555. News reports on Thursday said the Biden administration is planning a raft of proposed changes to the U.S. tax code, including a plan to nearly double taxes on capital gains to 39.6% for people earning more than $1 million. Other cryptocurrencies felt the heat of the negative sentiment too. Ether and XRP fell 3.5 per cent and 6.7 per cent respectively. while dogecoin, created as a joke for early crypto adopters and which had surged about 8,000% this year prior to this latest setback, was down 20% at $0.21, according to price and data tracker CoinGecko. "With a high growth rate in the bitcoin price, crypto holders that have accrued gains will be subjected to this tax increment," said Nick Spanos, founder at Bitcoin Center NYC. He sees bitcoin dropping further in the coming days. Bitcoin is on track for an 11.3% loss on the week, its worst weekly showing since late February. On the year, however, it was still up 72%. But while social media lit up with posts about the plan hurting cryptocurrencies, and individual investors complaining about losses, some traders and analysts said declines are likely to be temporary. "I don't think Biden's taxes plans will have a big impact on bitcoin," said Ruud Feltkamp, CEO at automated crypto trading bot Cryptohopper. "Bitcoin has only gone up for a long time, it is only natural to see a consolidation. Traders are simply cashing in on winnings." Others also remained bullish on bitcoin's long term prospects, but noted it might take time before prices start increasing again. "Investors will see the price drop across the crypto market as an opportunity to widen their portfolio by averaging up their investment outlay and buying new altcoins," said Don Guo, chief executive officer at Broctagon Fintech Group. He added that for bitcoin, investors will see it as an opportunity to buy bitcoin at a lower price. (With inputs from agencies)

Bitcoin, other cryptocurrencies tumble over Biden tax plan fears

Peter Thiel, a Conservative political donor and a venture capitalist, has urged the Joe Biden government to tighten regulations on crypto currencies, warning them against a possible attack from China.

A pro-Bitcoin maximalist himself, Thiel believes the cryptocurrency has the potential to undermine the US.

The warning from Thiel came at a virtual event held for members of the Richard Nixon Foundation.

“I do wonder whether at this point, Bitcoin should also be thought [of] in part as a Chinese financial weapon against the US," Thiel said.

“It threatens fiat money, but it especially threatens the U.S. dollar,” he added. “[If] China’s long Bitcoin, perhaps from a geopolitical perspective, the U.S. should be asking some tougher questions about exactly how that works.”

Interestingly, former US secretary Mike Pompeo and former National Security Advisor Robert O’Brien were also present at the event. The conversation was largely focused on the sour relationships between the US and China.

The conversation was moderated by Hugh Hewitt, a talk show radio host and chief executive of Nixon Foundation.

Thiel also accused the tech giant Google of working against the American spirit and asked employees in the company’s artificial intelligence (AI) department whether or not their technologies were being used by China to suppress minority communities in Xinjiang region’s Uighur camps.

“Well, we don’t really know—and don’t ask any questions,” Thiel said. “You have this almost magical thinking that by pretending that everything is fine, that’s how you engage and have a conversation.”

It is not simply Google, Thiel also attacked Apple Inc, describing it as a problem for the US interests. “Apple is probably the one [tech company] that’s structurally a real problem,” he said. “Apple is the one that has real synergies with China.”

Peter Thiel, a Conservative political donor and a venture capitalist, has urged the Joe Biden government to tighten regulations on crypto currencies, warning them against a possible attack from China.

Peter Thiel, a Conservative political donor and a venture capitalist, has urged the Joe Biden government to tighten regulations on crypto currencies, warning them against a possible attack from China. A pro-Bitcoin maximalist himself, Thiel believes the cryptocurrency has the potential to undermine the US. The warning from Thiel came at a virtual event held for members of the Richard Nixon Foundation. “I do wonder whether at this point, Bitcoin should also be thought [of] in part as a Chinese financial weapon against the US," Thiel said. “It threatens fiat money, but it especially threatens the U.S. dollar,” he added. “[If] China’s long Bitcoin, perhaps from a geopolitical perspective, the U.S. should be asking some tougher questions about exactly how that works.” Interestingly, former US secretary Mike Pompeo and former National Security Advisor Robert O’Brien were also present at the event. The conversation was largely focused on the sour relationships between the US and China. The conversation was moderated by Hugh Hewitt, a talk show radio host and chief executive of Nixon Foundation. Thiel also accused the tech giant Google of working against the American spirit and asked employees in the company’s artificial intelligence (AI) department whether or not their technologies were being used by China to suppress minority communities in Xinjiang region’s Uighur camps. “Well, we don’t really know—and don’t ask any questions,” Thiel said. “You have this almost magical thinking that by pretending that everything is fine, that’s how you engage and have a conversation.” It is not simply Google, Thiel also attacked Apple Inc, describing it as a problem for the US interests. “Apple is probably the one [tech company] that’s structurally a real problem,” he said. “Apple is the one that has real synergies with China.”

Bitcoin can be 'Chinese financial weapon' against US, warns cryptocurrency investor Peter Thiel

Michael Pierre was sitting in his Brooklyn, New York, apartment last summer when he received a text on his iPhone from an unknown number, then immediately lost service. Worried his phone was being hacked, he quickly checked his most valued app: Coinbase, a cryptocurrency company where he had stored digital coins worth $100,000.

Pierre could not log in. Panicked, he emailed Coinbase for help. The company later told him that an “attacker” had reset his password and drained his account. Pierre said he was shocked because he had expected Coinbase’s security to detect suspicious activity and stop the theft.

“I was thinking about retirement, family, having money for those rainy days,” he said. “And within a couple of minutes, it was all taken away from me.”

Pierre, 47, a lawyer and onetime Coinbase employee, began urging his former colleagues to investigate the episode and to compensate him for the missing cryptocurrencies, which would be worth more than $400,000 today. He received little assistance, he said. So in January, he sued Coinbase, accusing the company of negligent security measures and failing to protect his money.

His cautionary tale is one of dozens from Coinbase customers around the world who say that their accounts were plundered by attackers or that they were locked out of their life savings without warning or reason — and that the company failed to detect the issues and did little to help. As Coinbase prepares to go public in the next few weeks, cementing its status as one of the world’s biggest cryptocurrency enterprises, its users’ experiences show how the company sometimes still struggles to address basic customer service complaints.

That raises questions for Coinbase at a crucial moment. No major cryptocurrency company has gone public before, and some investors have speculated that Coinbase could be valued at as much as $100 billion. Its listing would also underline how cryptocurrencies have surged in popularity in the pandemic. The price of Bitcoin, the best-known digital currency, has broken records since November.

Coinbase’s going public is “seminal” for the cryptocurrency industry, said David Silver, a lawyer who represents digital currency investors. But he added that if the company wanted to be “the Goldman Sachs of crypto,” it “needs to maintain quality customer support.”

In a statement, Casper Sorensen, Coinbase’s vice president for customer experience, said the company was grappling with a “24/7 crypto economy, which, combined with a substantial increase in demand, has created a unique set of customer experience challenges.” To address those, the company said it had added 2,000 customer support employees in recent months and decreased wait times for help.

Coinbase added that it had never been hacked. It said 0.004% of its users had experienced “account takeovers” in the past year, where someone breached their devices and then gained access to their Coinbase accounts. The company said it educated its users on how to keep their accounts secure.

Coinbase declined to comment on any individual cases or litigation.

Compared with banks and regular money, digital currencies and financial exchanges carry an extra degree of risk. Unlike money transferred through a bank, Bitcoin can be traded instantly, and transactions cannot be reversed or, often, traced to an individual, making it easier to steal. Many laws that protect people’s money and require banks to maintain tight security do not apply to digital currencies.

Coinbase was founded in 2012 by Brian Armstrong, who is the chief executive, and others. At the time, Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies had just started emerging as a way to decentralize finance by allowing people to send money to each other across the globe without the need for a bank.

But trading Bitcoin without help from an institution proved tricky. So Armstrong created Coinbase as a “currency exchange” — essentially, a place where people could buy, sell and transfer cryptocurrencies through what is known as a digital wallet. The company would take a fee each time a customer placed an order.

Today, Coinbase has 43 million customers, according to its offering prospectus. It turned a $322 million profit last year, while its revenue more than doubled to $1.27 billion. In December, it filed to go public. It plans a direct listing, in which no new shares are issued.

As Coinbase has grown, it has fielded customer complaints. The concerns have centered on two main issues, according to legal documents and interviews with more than a dozen Coinbase users, as well as social media posts and surveys of customers: that the company’s security was fooled by attackers who infiltrated their accounts and then stole their money, or that they were suddenly barred from their accounts, either because of a technical glitch or seemingly for no reason at all.

Coinbase rarely bars users from their accounts, it said, but it may do so if it is investigating a violation of its terms of service or suspicious activity.

Losing account access can be crippling because some people use Coinbase as a de facto bank where they deposit their paychecks. The frustrations have been compounded because the company is often unresponsive to entreaties for assistance, users said.

The issues have become so prevalent that a forum about Coinbase on Reddit has been flooded with requests from people seeking help for unlocking their accounts. One Reddit user, who posted that he lives in Vietnam, has left dozens of comments asking for help getting back into his account, which he said has been frozen for more than a year.

“I need to unlock my account,” wrote the Reddit user, whose handle is kuromodzz. “Please reply my emails and give me solutions. I can’t lose my money!”

Gonçalo Maia, 24, a web developer from Lisbon, Portugal, said he was blocked from his Coinbase account, which has about 27,000 euros, or $32,000, in January. In response, he set up a Coinbase-related group on the messaging platform Discord. It has since attracted more than 300 people, many of whom bemoan how they cannot get into their accounts. Some said they had since been unable to afford food and pay their rent.

“They are hurting people,” said Maia, adding that many feel “hopeless.”

After The New York Times asked Coinbase about Maia’s account, he received an email from the company saying he had violated its terms of service and would not be allowed to use its platform. Maia said he did not know what he did wrong. He added that he was happy that Coinbase was letting him withdraw his frozen funds first.

Christine Duhaime, a financial crimes expert, said that Coinbase and other cryptocurrency exchanges should have to act the same as large banks, which need legal reasons to freeze assets and are obligated to quickly investigate missing or stolen funds. Coinbase’s listing, she said, could be a step toward aligning the crypto world with laws governing traditional financial institutions.

“Coinbase, by going public and being subject to greater regulatory oversight, is moving more into the light, where there is, or will be, greater visibility and comfort,” she said.

One of Coinbase’s most frustrating aspects, some users said, is that a real person does not appear to be reading their complaints.

“There’s nobody on the other side,” said Cheryl Hung, a marketing consultant in Los Angeles.

Hung said she and her fiance, Paul Hwang, started investing in cryptocurrencies in 2019 and picked Coinbase because it was a “big, reputable company” with security. But in January, someone stole $26,000 of cryptocurrencies from their account. They said they did not have any idea of how that happened.

“We just lost all the money we could have been using to work on a house or move our life forward,” Hwang said.

The couple asked Coinbase for help, but they said they received perfunctory email responses. Trying Coinbase’s phone line got an automated response. After the Times inquired about their case, Hung said they got another email from the company with more information about their account.

Coinbase said real customer support agents respond to inquiries.

For most Coinbase users, legal recourse is also limited. Under the company’s terms of service, users agree to settle disputes through private arbitration or small claims court, rather than pursuing a class-action lawsuit.

That did not deter Pierre from suing. Pierre, who worked for Coinbase between 2017 and 2018, said he initially found the decentralized format of digital currencies “exciting.” But after he lost his Coinbase savings, he said he saw the value in traditional, regulated institutions like banks to fall back on “for times like this.”

“I’m less excited now,” he said.

Michael Pierre was sitting in his Brooklyn, New York, apartment last summer when he received a text on his iPhone from an unknown number, then immediately lost service.

Michael Pierre was sitting in his Brooklyn, New York, apartment last summer when he received a text on his iPhone from an unknown number, then immediately lost service. Worried his phone was being hacked, he quickly checked his most valued app: Coinbase, a cryptocurrency company where he had stored digital coins worth $100,000. Pierre could not log in. Panicked, he emailed Coinbase for help. The company later told him that an “attacker” had reset his password and drained his account. Pierre said he was shocked because he had expected Coinbase’s security to detect suspicious activity and stop the theft. “I was thinking about retirement, family, having money for those rainy days,” he said. “And within a couple of minutes, it was all taken away from me.” Pierre, 47, a lawyer and onetime Coinbase employee, began urging his former colleagues to investigate the episode and to compensate him for the missing cryptocurrencies, which would be worth more than $400,000 today. He received little assistance, he said. So in January, he sued Coinbase, accusing the company of negligent security measures and failing to protect his money. His cautionary tale is one of dozens from Coinbase customers around the world who say that their accounts were plundered by attackers or that they were locked out of their life savings without warning or reason — and that the company failed to detect the issues and did little to help. As Coinbase prepares to go public in the next few weeks, cementing its status as one of the world’s biggest cryptocurrency enterprises, its users’ experiences show how the company sometimes still struggles to address basic customer service complaints. That raises questions for Coinbase at a crucial moment. No major cryptocurrency company has gone public before, and some investors have speculated that Coinbase could be valued at as much as $100 billion. Its listing would also underline how cryptocurrencies have surged in popularity in the pandemic. The price of Bitcoin, the best-known digital currency, has broken records since November. Coinbase’s going public is “seminal” for the cryptocurrency industry, said David Silver, a lawyer who represents digital currency investors. But he added that if the company wanted to be “the Goldman Sachs of crypto,” it “needs to maintain quality customer support.” In a statement, Casper Sorensen, Coinbase’s vice president for customer experience, said the company was grappling with a “24/7 crypto economy, which, combined with a substantial increase in demand, has created a unique set of customer experience challenges.” To address those, the company said it had added 2,000 customer support employees in recent months and decreased wait times for help. Coinbase added that it had never been hacked. It said 0.004% of its users had experienced “account takeovers” in the past year, where someone breached their devices and then gained access to their Coinbase accounts. The company said it educated its users on how to keep their accounts secure. Coinbase declined to comment on any individual cases or litigation. Compared with banks and regular money, digital currencies and financial exchanges carry an extra degree of risk. Unlike money transferred through a bank, Bitcoin can be traded instantly, and transactions cannot be reversed or, often, traced to an individual, making it easier to steal. Many laws that protect people’s money and require banks to maintain tight security do not apply to digital currencies. Coinbase was founded in 2012 by Brian Armstrong, who is the chief executive, and others. At the time, Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies had just started emerging as a way to decentralize finance by allowing people to send money to each other across the globe without the need for a bank. But trading Bitcoin without help from an institution proved tricky. So Armstrong created Coinbase as a “currency exchange” — essentially, a place where people could buy, sell and transfer cryptocurrencies through what is known as a digital wallet. The company would take a fee each time a customer placed an order. Today, Coinbase has 43 million customers, according to its offering prospectus. It turned a $322 million profit last year, while its revenue more than doubled to $1.27 billion. In December, it filed to go public. It plans a direct listing, in which no new shares are issued. As Coinbase has grown, it has fielded customer complaints. The concerns have centered on two main issues, according to legal documents and interviews with more than a dozen Coinbase users, as well as social media posts and surveys of customers: that the company’s security was fooled by attackers who infiltrated their accounts and then stole their money, or that they were suddenly barred from their accounts, either because of a technical glitch or seemingly for no reason at all. Coinbase rarely bars users from their accounts, it said, but it may do so if it is investigating a violation of its terms of service or suspicious activity. Losing account access can be crippling because some people use Coinbase as a de facto bank where they deposit their paychecks. The frustrations have been compounded because the company is often unresponsive to entreaties for assistance, users said. The issues have become so prevalent that a forum about Coinbase on Reddit has been flooded with requests from people seeking help for unlocking their accounts. One Reddit user, who posted that he lives in Vietnam, has left dozens of comments asking for help getting back into his account, which he said has been frozen for more than a year. “I need to unlock my account,” wrote the Reddit user, whose handle is kuromodzz. “Please reply my emails and give me solutions. I can’t lose my money!” Gonçalo Maia, 24, a web developer from Lisbon, Portugal, said he was blocked from his Coinbase account, which has about 27,000 euros, or $32,000, in January. In response, he set up a Coinbase-related group on the messaging platform Discord. It has since attracted more than 300 people, many of whom bemoan how they cannot get into their accounts. Some said they had since been unable to afford food and pay their rent. “They are hurting people,” said Maia, adding that many feel “hopeless.” After The New York Times asked Coinbase about Maia’s account, he received an email from the company saying he had violated its terms of service and would not be allowed to use its platform. Maia said he did not know what he did wrong. He added that he was happy that Coinbase was letting him withdraw his frozen funds first. Christine Duhaime, a financial crimes expert, said that Coinbase and other cryptocurrency exchanges should have to act the same as large banks, which need legal reasons to freeze assets and are obligated to quickly investigate missing or stolen funds. Coinbase’s listing, she said, could be a step toward aligning the crypto world with laws governing traditional financial institutions. “Coinbase, by going public and being subject to greater regulatory oversight, is moving more into the light, where there is, or will be, greater visibility and comfort,” she said. One of Coinbase’s most frustrating aspects, some users said, is that a real person does not appear to be reading their complaints. “There’s nobody on the other side,” said Cheryl Hung, a marketing consultant in Los Angeles. Hung said she and her fiance, Paul Hwang, started investing in cryptocurrencies in 2019 and picked Coinbase because it was a “big, reputable company” with security. But in January, someone stole $26,000 of cryptocurrencies from their account. They said they did not have any idea of how that happened. “We just lost all the money we could have been using to work on a house or move our life forward,” Hwang said. The couple asked Coinbase for help, but they said they received perfunctory email responses. Trying Coinbase’s phone line got an automated response. After the Times inquired about their case, Hung said they got another email from the company with more information about their account. Coinbase said real customer support agents respond to inquiries. For most Coinbase users, legal recourse is also limited. Under the company’s terms of service, users agree to settle disputes through private arbitration or small claims court, rather than pursuing a class-action lawsuit. That did not deter Pierre from suing. Pierre, who worked for Coinbase between 2017 and 2018, said he initially found the decentralized format of digital currencies “exciting.” But after he lost his Coinbase savings, he said he saw the value in traditional, regulated institutions like banks to fall back on “for times like this.” “I’m less excited now,” he said.

Coinbase users say crypto startup ignored their pleas for help

Elon Musk said on Wednesday that&nbsp;Tesla Inc customers can now buy its electric vehicles with bitcoin,&nbsp;marking a significant step forward for the cryptocurrency's use in commerce.

"You can now buy a Tesla with bitcoin," Musk said on Twitter, adding that the option would be available outside the United States later this year.

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You can now buy a Tesla with Bitcoin
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) <a href="https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1374617643446063105?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">March 24, 2021</a></blockquote>
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The electric-car maker said last month it bought $1.5 billion worth of bitcoin and would soon accept it as a form of payment for cars, in a large stride toward mainstream acceptance that sent bitcoin soaring to a record high of nearly $62,000.

Bitcoin, the world's biggest digital currency, rose more than 4 per cent&nbsp;after Musk's tweet and was last trading at $56,429.

Also read|&nbsp;<a href="https://www.wionews.com/world/tesla-ceo-elon-musk-calls-himself-bitcoin-supporter-prices-soar-360630">Tesla CEO Elon Musk calls himself Bitcoin 'supporter'; prices soar</a>

Musk said bitcoin paid to Tesla would not be converted into traditional currency, but he gave few other details on how the bitcoin payments would be processed. The company was using "internal and&nbsp;open source software", he said.

Most mainstream companies such as AT&amp;T Inc and Microsoft Corp that allow customers to pay with bitcoin typically use specialist payment processors that convert the cryptocurrency into, say, dollars and send the sum to the company.

Like other cryptocurrencies, bitcoin is still little used for commerce in major economies, hampered by its volatility and relatively costly and slow processing times.

Musk, who regularly posts comments on Twitter about cryptocurrencies, last month criticised conventional cash, saying when it "has negative real interest, only a fool wouldn't look elsewhere".

He had said that the difference with cash made it "adventurous enough" for the S&amp;P 500 company to hold the cryptocurrency.

Following Tesla's investment in bitcoin, companies including Mastercard Inc and Bank of New York Mellon Corp have embraced the emerging asset, sparking predictions that bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies will become a regular part of investment portfolios.

Uber Chief Executive Dara Khosrowshahi said the ride-hailing company discussed and "quickly dismissed" the idea of investing in bitcoin. However, he said Uber could potentially accept the cryptocurrency as payment.

General Motors Co said it would evaluate whether bitcoin could be accepted as payment for its vehicles.

Tesla recently added "Technoking of Tesla" to Musk's list of official titles.

Elon Musk said on Wednesday that Tesla Inc customers can now buy its electric vehicles with bitcoin, marking a significant step forward for the cryptocurrency's use in commerce.

Elon Musk said on Wednesday that Tesla Inc customers can now buy its electric vehicles with bitcoin, marking a significant step forward for the cryptocurrency's use in commerce. "You can now buy a Tesla with bitcoin," Musk said on Twitter, adding that the option would be available outside the United States later this year. You can now buy a Tesla with Bitcoin — Elon Musk (@elonmusk) March 24, 2021 × The electric-car maker said last month it bought $1.5 billion worth of bitcoin and would soon accept it as a form of payment for cars, in a large stride toward mainstream acceptance that sent bitcoin soaring to a record high of nearly $62,000. Bitcoin, the world's biggest digital currency, rose more than 4 per cent after Musk's tweet and was last trading at $56,429. Also read| Tesla CEO Elon Musk calls himself Bitcoin 'supporter'; prices soar Musk said bitcoin paid to Tesla would not be converted into traditional currency, but he gave few other details on how the bitcoin payments would be processed. The company was using "internal and open source software", he said. Most mainstream companies such as AT&T Inc and Microsoft Corp that allow customers to pay with bitcoin typically use specialist payment processors that convert the cryptocurrency into, say, dollars and send the sum to the company. Like other cryptocurrencies, bitcoin is still little used for commerce in major economies, hampered by its volatility and relatively costly and slow processing times. Musk, who regularly posts comments on Twitter about cryptocurrencies, last month criticised conventional cash, saying when it "has negative real interest, only a fool wouldn't look elsewhere". He had said that the difference with cash made it "adventurous enough" for the S&P 500 company to hold the cryptocurrency. Following Tesla's investment in bitcoin, companies including Mastercard Inc and Bank of New York Mellon Corp have embraced the emerging asset, sparking predictions that bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies will become a regular part of investment portfolios. Uber Chief Executive Dara Khosrowshahi said the ride-hailing company discussed and "quickly dismissed" the idea of investing in bitcoin. However, he said Uber could potentially accept the cryptocurrency as payment. General Motors Co said it would evaluate whether bitcoin could be accepted as payment for its vehicles. Tesla recently added "Technoking of Tesla" to Musk's list of official titles.

Elon Musk says Tesla customers can buy its electric vehicles with bitcoin

The world's most popular cryptocurrency touched $29,300 before pulling back, most recently down 0.67% at $28,774.36. It has surged by nearly half since breaking $20,000 for the first time on December 16.

The price of Bitcoin topped $29,000 on Thursday for the first time, with the digital currency almost quadrupling in value this year amid heightened interest from investors big and small alike.

The world's most popular cryptocurrency touched $29,300 before pulling back, most recently down 0.67% at $28,774.36. It has surged by nearly half since breaking $20,000 for the first time on December 16.

Bitcoin's potential for quick gains, as well as expectations it could become a mainstream payment method, has attracted demand from larger U.S. investors, as well as from traders who normally stick to equities.

"You can buy a stock like Amazon, you can buy a stock like Apple, and you know what you got," said Dennis Dick, a proprietary trader at Bright Trading LLC. "Bitcoin you really just have digits on a screen and you're really hoping that the guy behind you sees it as being worth more than what you just paid for it, so it's a purely speculative view," he said.

Still, intrigued by the story behind bitcoin and the traction it was getting with institutional investors, he put 1% of his net worth into a bitcoin fund around five weeks ago, which has doubled in value since then, and he sold half on Thursday.

"When you double your money within five weeks, if you sell half of it, I figure now you’re playing with the house's money," he said.

Recent gains have taken bitcoin's market capitalization past $536 billion, according to industry website CoinMarketCap.

The world's most popular cryptocurrency touched $29,300 before pulling back, most recently down 0.67% at $28,774.36. It has surged by nearly half since breaking $20,000 for the first time on December 16.

The world's most popular cryptocurrency touched $29,300 before pulling back, most recently down 0.67% at $28,774.36. It has surged by nearly half since breaking $20,000 for the first time on December 16. The price of Bitcoin topped $29,000 on Thursday for the first time, with the digital currency almost quadrupling in value this year amid heightened interest from investors big and small alike. The world's most popular cryptocurrency touched $29,300 before pulling back, most recently down 0.67% at $28,774.36. It has surged by nearly half since breaking $20,000 for the first time on December 16. Bitcoin's potential for quick gains, as well as expectations it could become a mainstream payment method, has attracted demand from larger U.S. investors, as well as from traders who normally stick to equities. "You can buy a stock like Amazon, you can buy a stock like Apple, and you know what you got," said Dennis Dick, a proprietary trader at Bright Trading LLC. "Bitcoin you really just have digits on a screen and you're really hoping that the guy behind you sees it as being worth more than what you just paid for it, so it's a purely speculative view," he said. Still, intrigued by the story behind bitcoin and the traction it was getting with institutional investors, he put 1% of his net worth into a bitcoin fund around five weeks ago, which has doubled in value since then, and he sold half on Thursday. "When you double your money within five weeks, if you sell half of it, I figure now you’re playing with the house's money," he said. Recent gains have taken bitcoin's market capitalization past $536 billion, according to industry website CoinMarketCap.

Bitcoin touches record above $29,000, extending 2020 rally

PayPal will allow customers to hold bitcoin and other virtual coins in its online wallet and shop using cryptocurrencies at the 26 million merchants on its network.

World Business Watch: PayPal to open up network to cryptocurrencies

The idea of currency and money is being disrupted by cutting-edge technologies that promise to change how money exchanges hands in the 21st century. The race for developing national digital currencies is gaining momentum, fueled by the birth cryptocurrencies that challenges the monopoly and autonomy of central banks on the economy altogether. The Republic of China is leading the race to develop the first major digital currency in a bid to reshape its economy by modernising the national currency,&nbsp;Renminbi, one of the world’s major reserve currencies to curb the vices of money-laundering, counterfeiting that plagues its society and to dominate the world both strategically and financially in the coming years by overhauling its foundations. 
 
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China is not alone in this race, a survey by the Bank of International Settlements indicates that the majority of the central banks are exploring a national digital currency and the Reserve Bank of India has made clear that it has plans to launch Digital Rupee currently under the research stage. The question is whether India is lagging, and do we need to win this race in the first place or learn from the mistake of others? The answer to this is two-fold and is based on examining the technology underlining it and considering the endless possibilities that impact the society and the Indian economy itself.

The debate proposes that the creation of Digital Rupee solves a lot of problem India is currently facing. A digital rupee solves the problem of counterfeiting banknotes; a colossal complication that is fueled by the political interests of nations such as Pakistan and its backed terrorist organisations. A digital rupee dismantles the ploy and ambition of Pakistan as an electronic rupee by ensuring the immutability and authenticity of money without the apprehension of alteration, tampering or counterfeiting.

Further, Digital Rupee would curb money laundering and tax evasion as blockchain technology enables secure monitoring and reporting. On-chain analysis of transactions is going to ensure better fraud and money laundering detection and prevention, as authorities would be able to monitor the transactions in real-time and report any anomalies as they find. Digital Rupee will make it difficult for people to park money away from the eyes of income tax authorities and would enable better analysis and reporting of financial transactions that cross jurisdictions.

Thus, the advantages of a national digital currency are endless because it disrupts illegal activities and removes problems that plague our “economic reality.” The current coronavirus pandemic has only accelerated and made this race more critical as governments fear that the being behind the curve is going to harm its economic and political interests. Therefore, the Reserve Bank of India needs to move with confidence and caution in mind. The belief that the technology offers solutions to various illegal economic activities that hurts the Indian economy but with the warning that a haphazard implementation of a digital currency would only lead to severe financial consequences. That may devalue the national currency, increase inflation, or hurt foreign exchange reserves held by the Reserve Bank of India.

The Race for Digital Yuan – Tale from China&nbsp;

Internationally, the People’s Bank of China is winning this race as the central bank recently announced that the prototype of the digital currency is almost ready. The bank is adopting a mix of blockchain architecture and centralized databases to provide for high throughput and scalability of transactions to cater to its large population and network of retailers. The digital currency launched by PBoC will have a two-layer system where the central bank will be the sole creator of the currency with mixed levels of centralization and decentralization to distribute the digital currency among all the citizens, banks, corporations, and other channels as it deems fit. This is going to change the course of the economy for China in the coming years as the country would be able to modernize all aspects of its digital economy and fight with problems such as tax evasion, money laundering and counterfeiting of currency notes which still affects millions of Chinese every day.

Libra a stablecoin that made the US Senate standstill

The corporate giant Facebook also came with its plan of launching Libra a stablecoin backed by a basket of fiat currencies to be used by its users to send money seamlessly across borders without the hassle of getting through a money exchange, forex exchange, etc. Even though the Senate tried to derail its plan when they realized that Libra could potentially disrupt the payment markets worldwide, thereby remove its monopoly over the economy. Still, the dream of Libra is not dead but currently navigating the regulatory challenges thrown before it. Nevertheless, US lawmakers recently introduced the concept of Digital Dollar to provide US citizens stimulus payments to tackle the impact of the economic the recession of COVID-19 even though the idea got scrapped after some time. Two new bills introduced by lawmakers cover the concept of creation of the digital dollar and challenges regarding the regulatory framework for adopting blockchain technology.

A lot to gain for India

Digital Rupee can solve a lot of problems faced by India, such as tax evasion, counterfeiting of notes, and money-laundering. Regulators and government authorities can track the full history of transactions executed through the digital currency. Advanced machine learning and big data analysis to detect better, deter and limit frauds and other malicious activities that run the shadow economy. The creation of digital rupees will put a long-term hold on the efforts of Pakistan to counterfeit Indian national currency to finance drug smuggling and terrorism activities in India. Only the Reserve Bank of India would have the authority and ability to create and distribute the digital currency as it deems fit.

A blockchain-based architecture will ensure immutability, authenticity, and verifiability of transactions made through the digital currency. It will ensure that adversaries would not be able to magically replicate or counterfeit rupee as the digital currency developed by the RBI would work on a distributed-cum-centralised-blockchain that would be encrypted cryptographically and verified by a network of nodes participating as validators. The mechanism of authenticating transactions through a distributed network of nodes before adding the transactions to the block, thereby forming a chain of transactions, would ensure that any type of malicious transaction will not be able to penetrate the network as the decentralized network would ensure that no single point of failure exists. Thus, the opportunities and benefits of digital currencies for India are endless; the only question is, should the Reserve bank of India proceed with caution?

The Burning Economy: Lessons from Venezuela

It is not the first time the government and regulators worldwide are pushing for the idea of incorporating digital currencies. In fact, Venezuela was one of the first countries that launched Petro a digital cryptocurrency backed by Oil, to save its economy amidst the political and economic crisis destroying the country. The purpose of the currency was to circumvent the sanctions imposed by the USA back in 2017 and to act a currency with less inflation as compared to the Bolivar. The government viewed oil-backed digital currency as a liberator that could stop the hyperinflation and end poverty in the country. President Maduro offered Petro to Vladimir Putin. The Russian government refused to accept Petro as a unit of exchange. The actions of Maduro, as reported by Wired, received criticisms as Venezuelan Crypto exchanges reported very little trading activity and some indicated that Petro does not exist at all, as the company backing its Oil reserve, PDVSA was in $45 billion debts.

Further, Maduro’s actions to delegitimise international laws, treaties, and sanctions put by the security council only further destabilized the economy of Venezuela. The digital currency backed by barrels of Oil and reserved by PSDVA was a sham as the company embroiled itself in a debt cycle, unable to repay its debt. Thus no physical asset or commodity was backing the digital currency, which proved to be a recipe for economic disaster.

Conclusion

Digital rupee can be a blessing for the government only when it is implemented through research, sandboxing, and pilot programs to test the currency within a small range of controlled environment. The advantages of a national digital currency simply outweigh the risks associated with it. The authorities can develop a thorough digital currency with the right mix of decentralization and centralization, product development, and research that questions and answers every aspect of blockchain technology, cryptography, and principles of economics. Deep-down research and testing will ensure that a technical or economic disaster does not happen in the future. The central bank would have to address challenges related to how the currency would be governed, distributed, who will validate the transactions, who will report and monitor such transactions?

Would the data be available to the public, or would it be a closed network? The questions are many and only a time-based cautious approach of learning, collaborating, and researching with regulators and authorities worldwide can solve the concerns regarding digital currencies. Only then the dream of an Indian digital economy would become a success. Thus, even though the Reserve bank of India is already working and researching on the concept of digital currencies, it should move slowly doing all its calculations and due-diligence on the aspects of technology, economics and the societal impact.&nbsp;

(Disclaimer: The opinions expressed above are the personal views of the author and do not reflect the views of ZMCL)&nbsp; 
&nbsp;

The idea of currency and money is being disrupted by cutting-edge technologies that promise to change how money exchanges hands in the 21st century. The race for developing national digital currencies is gaining momentum, fueled by the birth cryptocurrencies that challenges the monopoly and autonomy of central banks on the economy altogether.

The idea of currency and money is being disrupted by cutting-edge technologies that promise to change how money exchanges hands in the 21st century. The race for developing national digital currencies is gaining momentum, fueled by the birth cryptocurrencies that challenges the monopoly and autonomy of central banks on the economy altogether. The Republic of China is leading the race to develop the first major digital currency in a bid to reshape its economy by modernising the national currency, Renminbi, one of the world’s major reserve currencies to curb the vices of money-laundering, counterfeiting that plagues its society and to dominate the world both strategically and financially in the coming years by overhauling its foundations. China is not alone in this race, a survey by the Bank of International Settlements indicates that the majority of the central banks are exploring a national digital currency and the Reserve Bank of India has made clear that it has plans to launch Digital Rupee currently under the research stage. The question is whether India is lagging, and do we need to win this race in the first place or learn from the mistake of others? The answer to this is two-fold and is based on examining the technology underlining it and considering the endless possibilities that impact the society and the Indian economy itself. The debate proposes that the creation of Digital Rupee solves a lot of problem India is currently facing. A digital rupee solves the problem of counterfeiting banknotes; a colossal complication that is fueled by the political interests of nations such as Pakistan and its backed terrorist organisations. A digital rupee dismantles the ploy and ambition of Pakistan as an electronic rupee by ensuring the immutability and authenticity of money without the apprehension of alteration, tampering or counterfeiting. Further, Digital Rupee would curb money laundering and tax evasion as blockchain technology enables secure monitoring and reporting. On-chain analysis of transactions is going to ensure better fraud and money laundering detection and prevention, as authorities would be able to monitor the transactions in real-time and report any anomalies as they find. Digital Rupee will make it difficult for people to park money away from the eyes of income tax authorities and would enable better analysis and reporting of financial transactions that cross jurisdictions. Thus, the advantages of a national digital currency are endless because it disrupts illegal activities and removes problems that plague our “economic reality.” The current coronavirus pandemic has only accelerated and made this race more critical as governments fear that the being behind the curve is going to harm its economic and political interests. Therefore, the Reserve Bank of India needs to move with confidence and caution in mind. The belief that the technology offers solutions to various illegal economic activities that hurts the Indian economy but with the warning that a haphazard implementation of a digital currency would only lead to severe financial consequences. That may devalue the national currency, increase inflation, or hurt foreign exchange reserves held by the Reserve Bank of India. The Race for Digital Yuan – Tale from China Internationally, the People’s Bank of China is winning this race as the central bank recently announced that the prototype of the digital currency is almost ready. The bank is adopting a mix of blockchain architecture and centralized databases to provide for high throughput and scalability of transactions to cater to its large population and network of retailers. The digital currency launched by PBoC will have a two-layer system where the central bank will be the sole creator of the currency with mixed levels of centralization and decentralization to distribute the digital currency among all the citizens, banks, corporations, and other channels as it deems fit. This is going to change the course of the economy for China in the coming years as the country would be able to modernize all aspects of its digital economy and fight with problems such as tax evasion, money laundering and counterfeiting of currency notes which still affects millions of Chinese every day. Libra a stablecoin that made the US Senate standstill The corporate giant Facebook also came with its plan of launching Libra a stablecoin backed by a basket of fiat currencies to be used by its users to send money seamlessly across borders without the hassle of getting through a money exchange, forex exchange, etc. Even though the Senate tried to derail its plan when they realized that Libra could potentially disrupt the payment markets worldwide, thereby remove its monopoly over the economy. Still, the dream of Libra is not dead but currently navigating the regulatory challenges thrown before it. Nevertheless, US lawmakers recently introduced the concept of Digital Dollar to provide US citizens stimulus payments to tackle the impact of the economic the recession of COVID-19 even though the idea got scrapped after some time. Two new bills introduced by lawmakers cover the concept of creation of the digital dollar and challenges regarding the regulatory framework for adopting blockchain technology. A lot to gain for India Digital Rupee can solve a lot of problems faced by India, such as tax evasion, counterfeiting of notes, and money-laundering. Regulators and government authorities can track the full history of transactions executed through the digital currency. Advanced machine learning and big data analysis to detect better, deter and limit frauds and other malicious activities that run the shadow economy. The creation of digital rupees will put a long-term hold on the efforts of Pakistan to counterfeit Indian national currency to finance drug smuggling and terrorism activities in India. Only the Reserve Bank of India would have the authority and ability to create and distribute the digital currency as it deems fit. A blockchain-based architecture will ensure immutability, authenticity, and verifiability of transactions made through the digital currency. It will ensure that adversaries would not be able to magically replicate or counterfeit rupee as the digital currency developed by the RBI would work on a distributed-cum-centralised-blockchain that would be encrypted cryptographically and verified by a network of nodes participating as validators. The mechanism of authenticating transactions through a distributed network of nodes before adding the transactions to the block, thereby forming a chain of transactions, would ensure that any type of malicious transaction will not be able to penetrate the network as the decentralized network would ensure that no single point of failure exists. Thus, the opportunities and benefits of digital currencies for India are endless; the only question is, should the Reserve bank of India proceed with caution? The Burning Economy: Lessons from Venezuela It is not the first time the government and regulators worldwide are pushing for the idea of incorporating digital currencies. In fact, Venezuela was one of the first countries that launched Petro a digital cryptocurrency backed by Oil, to save its economy amidst the political and economic crisis destroying the country. The purpose of the currency was to circumvent the sanctions imposed by the USA back in 2017 and to act a currency with less inflation as compared to the Bolivar. The government viewed oil-backed digital currency as a liberator that could stop the hyperinflation and end poverty in the country. President Maduro offered Petro to Vladimir Putin. The Russian government refused to accept Petro as a unit of exchange. The actions of Maduro, as reported by Wired, received criticisms as Venezuelan Crypto exchanges reported very little trading activity and some indicated that Petro does not exist at all, as the company backing its Oil reserve, PDVSA was in $45 billion debts. Further, Maduro’s actions to delegitimise international laws, treaties, and sanctions put by the security council only further destabilized the economy of Venezuela. The digital currency backed by barrels of Oil and reserved by PSDVA was a sham as the company embroiled itself in a debt cycle, unable to repay its debt. Thus no physical asset or commodity was backing the digital currency, which proved to be a recipe for economic disaster. Conclusion Digital rupee can be a blessing for the government only when it is implemented through research, sandboxing, and pilot programs to test the currency within a small range of controlled environment. The advantages of a national digital currency simply outweigh the risks associated with it. The authorities can develop a thorough digital currency with the right mix of decentralization and centralization, product development, and research that questions and answers every aspect of blockchain technology, cryptography, and principles of economics. Deep-down research and testing will ensure that a technical or economic disaster does not happen in the future. The central bank would have to address challenges related to how the currency would be governed, distributed, who will validate the transactions, who will report and monitor such transactions? Would the data be available to the public, or would it be a closed network? The questions are many and only a time-based cautious approach of learning, collaborating, and researching with regulators and authorities worldwide can solve the concerns regarding digital currencies. Only then the dream of an Indian digital economy would become a success. Thus, even though the Reserve bank of India is already working and researching on the concept of digital currencies, it should move slowly doing all its calculations and due-diligence on the aspects of technology, economics and the societal impact. (Disclaimer: The opinions expressed above are the personal views of the author and do not reflect the views of ZMCL)

The race for national digital currency is gaining momentum, is India lagging behind?

Digital assets and cryptocurrencies like bitcoin, ethereum and XRP have often been called highly volatile and risky assets used by either speculators or dubious characters for dark web anonymous transactions facilitating illegal activities. Bitcoin has been around for over ten years at this point and it has proven to be useful for more than just speculation, and when it comes to using it for illegal transactions, it is not a clever solution to use a payment where the payment history is ending up on a permanent blockchain freely accessible.

The industries and companies that are developing technology using blockchain are now numbering in the thousands, and with more and more incentive to solve problems with fiat currencies, the industry is set to expand exponentially in the coming years. A fundamental difference between regular fiat currencies like the dollar, and bitcoin, is that the dollar is an inflationary currency that loses value over time due to money printing. Bitcoin, on the other hand, is a deflationary currency with a fixed, limited total supply.

Another characteristic of bitcoin besides the limited supply is the periodic halving of the reward handed out to miners processing transactions on the network and in turn increase the security of it. Currently, miners are rewarded with 12.5 bitcoins per block of transactions confirmed on the network, after the halving the reward will be reduced to 6.25 bitcoins per block. The next bitcoin halving is scheduled to happen on May 12, and investors are expecting that the digital asset will see new all-time highs as there will be a smaller supply of newly created Bitcoins.

When bitcoin halvings have happened historically, it has lead to a bull-market pushing the price of Bitcoin up dramatically in the months following the halving, which takes place roughly every four years.

Twitter handle PlanB @100trillionUSD has created a useful data model to explain these periodic cycles of price fluctuations in relation to the halving events: 
 
<img alt="Data Model" data-entity-type="file" data-entity-uuid="62d444e9-f7c6-4a9f-aae1-65abf35197fb" src="//cdn.wionews.com/sites/default/files/inline-images/medium_Com_PlanB_S2F_model%20%281%29.png" />

This model predicts that following the halving event on May 12, the price of bitcoin will rise into a new phase around $100,000 after the flow of new bitcoins into the market gets factored in and reflected into the price. The different phases of this model also take into consideration how the use case for bitcoin develops over time. In the early days, the most popular bitcoin narrative was “proof of concept”, in the next phase that changed to “payments”, followed by “E-gold” where the price of one bitcoin was close to the price of one ounce of gold. This model has proven its value over the previous halvings on the network, but it is worth noting that some of the scaling issues that appeared during the bull-market of 2017 are yet to be resolved.

Twitter user @C3_Nik states: “The Scalability issues surrounding #Bitcoin $BTC haven't been improved over the last few years. Nothing in terms of the technology has changed since the BTC network slowed down to a crawl and the average fee rose to 60$ in late 2017. It can kill the next bull run for BTC, easily.”

During all-time high bull-market of 2017, the network slowed down significantly, while the transaction fees rose to levels above what most people are comfortable with for smaller transactions, leading to a lot of investments flowing into altcoins where transactions were faster and cheaper.

@C3_Nik goes on to state “And this isn't some 'maybe', it is a proven fact. The data is there. Next time it will happen again. #Bitcoin $BTC will become unusable right in the middle of the next bull run. What will happen then? I hope that the market realises that there are better solutions that work.”

In the years following the launch of bitcoin, several other cryptocurrencies have been launched. One notable example is Ripple's XRP that focuses on international remittances and on-demand liquidity. While some people in the digital assets community think of Ripple as the banker's coin that does not follow the ethos of Bitcoin, Ripple labs went to meet with regulators as soon as possible in order to work with regulators and speed up the process of adoption and implementation. XRP is today the third biggest digital asset by market cap and has partnerships with more than 300 banks around the world. With all the developments in the recent months with the coronavirus pandemic and the economic fall out of that, there is now an added incentive for people to use digital payments instead of using cash due to the risk of getting infected. When the governments around the world are printing money on a large scale leading to inflation and the devaluing of their population's savings and retirements accounts, digital assets can, like gold and silver be used as a safe haven investment for protecting their wealth.

Whether or not the stock to flow model holds true and bitcoin reaches $100,000, the cryptocurrency industry is here to stay, and there are many other solutions than Bitcoin for secure digital payments. During these testing times, the future looks bright for digital assets.

(Disclaimer: The opinions expressed above are the personal views of the author and do not reflect the views of ZMCL) 
&nbsp;&nbsp;

&nbsp;

Digital assets and cryptocurrencies like bitcoin, ethereum and XRP have often been called highly volatile and risky assets used by either speculators or dubious characters for dark web anonymous transactions facilitating illegal activities.

Digital assets and cryptocurrencies like bitcoin, ethereum and XRP have often been called highly volatile and risky assets used by either speculators or dubious characters for dark web anonymous transactions facilitating illegal activities. Bitcoin has been around for over ten years at this point and it has proven to be useful for more than just speculation, and when it comes to using it for illegal transactions, it is not a clever solution to use a payment where the payment history is ending up on a permanent blockchain freely accessible. The industries and companies that are developing technology using blockchain are now numbering in the thousands, and with more and more incentive to solve problems with fiat currencies, the industry is set to expand exponentially in the coming years. A fundamental difference between regular fiat currencies like the dollar, and bitcoin, is that the dollar is an inflationary currency that loses value over time due to money printing. Bitcoin, on the other hand, is a deflationary currency with a fixed, limited total supply. Another characteristic of bitcoin besides the limited supply is the periodic halving of the reward handed out to miners processing transactions on the network and in turn increase the security of it. Currently, miners are rewarded with 12.5 bitcoins per block of transactions confirmed on the network, after the halving the reward will be reduced to 6.25 bitcoins per block. The next bitcoin halving is scheduled to happen on May 12, and investors are expecting that the digital asset will see new all-time highs as there will be a smaller supply of newly created Bitcoins. When bitcoin halvings have happened historically, it has lead to a bull-market pushing the price of Bitcoin up dramatically in the months following the halving, which takes place roughly every four years. Twitter handle PlanB @100trillionUSD has created a useful data model to explain these periodic cycles of price fluctuations in relation to the halving events: This model predicts that following the halving event on May 12, the price of bitcoin will rise into a new phase around $100,000 after the flow of new bitcoins into the market gets factored in and reflected into the price. The different phases of this model also take into consideration how the use case for bitcoin develops over time. In the early days, the most popular bitcoin narrative was “proof of concept”, in the next phase that changed to “payments”, followed by “E-gold” where the price of one bitcoin was close to the price of one ounce of gold. This model has proven its value over the previous halvings on the network, but it is worth noting that some of the scaling issues that appeared during the bull-market of 2017 are yet to be resolved. Twitter user @C3_Nik states: “The Scalability issues surrounding #Bitcoin $BTC haven't been improved over the last few years. Nothing in terms of the technology has changed since the BTC network slowed down to a crawl and the average fee rose to 60$ in late 2017. It can kill the next bull run for BTC, easily.” During all-time high bull-market of 2017, the network slowed down significantly, while the transaction fees rose to levels above what most people are comfortable with for smaller transactions, leading to a lot of investments flowing into altcoins where transactions were faster and cheaper. @C3_Nik goes on to state “And this isn't some 'maybe', it is a proven fact. The data is there. Next time it will happen again. #Bitcoin $BTC will become unusable right in the middle of the next bull run. What will happen then? I hope that the market realises that there are better solutions that work.” In the years following the launch of bitcoin, several other cryptocurrencies have been launched. One notable example is Ripple's XRP that focuses on international remittances and on-demand liquidity. While some people in the digital assets community think of Ripple as the banker's coin that does not follow the ethos of Bitcoin, Ripple labs went to meet with regulators as soon as possible in order to work with regulators and speed up the process of adoption and implementation. XRP is today the third biggest digital asset by market cap and has partnerships with more than 300 banks around the world. With all the developments in the recent months with the coronavirus pandemic and the economic fall out of that, there is now an added incentive for people to use digital payments instead of using cash due to the risk of getting infected. When the governments around the world are printing money on a large scale leading to inflation and the devaluing of their population's savings and retirements accounts, digital assets can, like gold and silver be used as a safe haven investment for protecting their wealth. Whether or not the stock to flow model holds true and bitcoin reaches $100,000, the cryptocurrency industry is here to stay, and there are many other solutions than Bitcoin for secure digital payments. During these testing times, the future looks bright for digital assets. (Disclaimer: The opinions expressed above are the personal views of the author and do not reflect the views of ZMCL)

Explained: Bitcoin halving and the expected bull-market for digital assets

The Supreme Court on Wednesday struck down the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) 2018 circular that barred banks from giving access to companies in trading in cryptocurrencies.

Also read: <a href="https://www.wionews.com/india-news/supreme-court-reserves-order-on-plea-challenging-rbis-ban-on-cryptocurrency-277161">Supreme Court reserves order on plea challenging RBI's ban on cryptocurrency</a>

A three-judge Bench of Justices Rohinton Fali Nariman, S Ravindra Bhat, and V Ramasubramanian allowed the plea of the Internet and Mobile Association of India (IAMAI) challenging RBI's 2018 circular that directed regulated entities to not deal with cryptocurrencies.

The IAMAI, whose members include cryptocurrency exchanges, and others had approached the top court objecting to a 2018 RBI circular directing regulated entities to not deal with cryptocurrencies.

Also read: <a href="https://www.wionews.com/world/g7-worried-over-facebooks-libra-cryptocurrency-french-official-236753">G7 worried over Facebook's Libra cryptocurrency: French official</a>

The petitioners had argued that the RBI's circular taking cryptocurrencies out of the banking channels would deplete the ability of law enforcement agencies to regulate illegal activities in the industry.

IAMAI had claimed the move of RBI had effectively banned legitimate business activity via the virtual currencies (VCs).

The RBI on April 6, 2018, had issued the circular that barred RBI-regulated entities from "providing any service in relation to virtual currencies, including those of transfer or receipt of money in accounts relating to the purchase or sale of virtual currencies".

&nbsp;

The Supreme Court on Wednesday struck down the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) 2018 circular that barred banks from giving access to companies in trading in cryptocurrencies.

The Supreme Court on Wednesday struck down the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) 2018 circular that barred banks from giving access to companies in trading in cryptocurrencies. Also read: Supreme Court reserves order on plea challenging RBI's ban on cryptocurrency A three-judge Bench of Justices Rohinton Fali Nariman, S Ravindra Bhat, and V Ramasubramanian allowed the plea of the Internet and Mobile Association of India (IAMAI) challenging RBI's 2018 circular that directed regulated entities to not deal with cryptocurrencies. The IAMAI, whose members include cryptocurrency exchanges, and others had approached the top court objecting to a 2018 RBI circular directing regulated entities to not deal with cryptocurrencies. Also read: G7 worried over Facebook's Libra cryptocurrency: French official The petitioners had argued that the RBI's circular taking cryptocurrencies out of the banking channels would deplete the ability of law enforcement agencies to regulate illegal activities in the industry. IAMAI had claimed the move of RBI had effectively banned legitimate business activity via the virtual currencies (VCs). The RBI on April 6, 2018, had issued the circular that barred RBI-regulated entities from "providing any service in relation to virtual currencies, including those of transfer or receipt of money in accounts relating to the purchase or sale of virtual currencies".

Supreme Court allows trade in cryptocurrencies, quashes RBI curb

Last year Facebook announced its digital currency - Libra - which seen as a savvy business move, but American lawmakers raised red flags over the entire project.

However, the Bank of England has different ideas - they might end up embracing cryptocurrency.

From being hailed as the future of money to being snubbed and barred, the cryptocurrency has faced the entire spectrum.

But now it could find more legitimacy than ever before because of some of the world's largest central banks. &nbsp;

Right after Facebook revealed its plans, the European central bank expressed an interest. China too has been busy readying plans for a state-backed cryptocurrency. 
 
WATCH:&nbsp;&nbsp;

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And now the Bank of England has created an international group for it. The central banks of Japan, Sweden, Switzerland and the Eurozone have joined the initiative along with the bank of international settlements.

This new group will be co-chaired by ECB board member Benoit course and Bank of England Deputy Governor Jon Cunliffe. The cryptocurrency industry has given the move a double thumbs-up expectedly. They are glad that the potential of the bitcoin is finally being recognised.

But they are also aware that this is just the beginning of what could be an extremely long-winding process. In the meantime, the facebook-led project libra itself has faced intense regulatory pushback.

Central bankers from the US to Europe have warned about potential risks of Libra to global financial stability. Vodafone is the latest company to leave Facebook's digital currency project which has seen an exodus of backers including PayPal, e-bay and Mastercard amid regulatory scrutiny.

China has been racing to issue its own central bank digital currency, but its efforts in the space have so far been sketchy in terms of details. 
&nbsp;

Last year Facebook announced its digital currency - Libra - which seen as a savvy business move, but American lawmakers raised red flags over the entire project.

Last year Facebook announced its digital currency - Libra - which seen as a savvy business move, but American lawmakers raised red flags over the entire project. However, the Bank of England has different ideas - they might end up embracing cryptocurrency. From being hailed as the future of money to being snubbed and barred, the cryptocurrency has faced the entire spectrum. But now it could find more legitimacy than ever before because of some of the world's largest central banks. Right after Facebook revealed its plans, the European central bank expressed an interest. China too has been busy readying plans for a state-backed cryptocurrency. WATCH: × And now the Bank of England has created an international group for it. The central banks of Japan, Sweden, Switzerland and the Eurozone have joined the initiative along with the bank of international settlements. This new group will be co-chaired by ECB board member Benoit course and Bank of England Deputy Governor Jon Cunliffe. The cryptocurrency industry has given the move a double thumbs-up expectedly. They are glad that the potential of the bitcoin is finally being recognised. But they are also aware that this is just the beginning of what could be an extremely long-winding process. In the meantime, the facebook-led project libra itself has faced intense regulatory pushback. Central bankers from the US to Europe have warned about potential risks of Libra to global financial stability. Vodafone is the latest company to leave Facebook's digital currency project which has seen an exodus of backers including PayPal, e-bay and Mastercard amid regulatory scrutiny. China has been racing to issue its own central bank digital currency, but its efforts in the space have so far been sketchy in terms of details.

Global central banks could adopt cryptocurrencies

Seven global central banks, led by the Bank of England will consider adopting cryptocurrencies. This report from Gravitas tells you how leading countries are looking at ways to adopt cryptos into their financial systems.

Gravitas: 7 Global Central Banks could adopt Cryptocurrencies

The G7 group of the world's most developed economies are worried about Facebook's planned <a href="https://www.wionews.com/world/us-lawmakers-question-facebook-over-plans-on-libra-cryptocurrency-236514">Libra cryptocurrency</a> and have a shared consensus about the need to act quickly, a French official said Wednesday.

Facebook last month unveiled <a href="https://www.wionews.com/world/facebook-needs-very-high-standard-for-libra-coin-us-treasury-steven-mnuchin-236268">its plans for Libra</a> in an announcement greeted with concern by governments and critics of the social network behemoth around the world.

The issue was at the forefront of the minds of ministers and central bankers from the G7 group of most developed economies as they kicked off a two-day meeting in Chantilly outside Paris on Wednesday.

"On Libra, we had a very constructive and detailed discussion with a very large and shared consensus on the need for action," said the official, who asked not to be named.

"Concerns (were) expressed by all the participants about the current situation and the need to act quickly."

The finance ministers of France and Germany had earlier expressed serious reservations about Facebook's plans because of Libra's possible impact on global financial stability.

"The G7 finance ministers and central bankers who are here have serious concerns," said German Finance Minister Olaf Scholz.

"They want to be sure that all existing regulations are adhered to, and if they should be changed in the future, so that we can guarantee the stability of the international financial system," he added.

"We are talking about currency stability, security, data protection and democratic control," he added.

French Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire, who has warned about Libra repeatedly since the launch announcement, said "the conditions are not yet in place today for Libra to be introduced."

He said he hoped the G7 would consider the necessity of a "framework or a regulation" and also "what would be the conditions that would make such an instrument feasible."

"Today, we cannot accept that an exchange instrument comes into being when it does not respect any of the precautionary rules that all sovereign currencies are required to abide by."

Their comments echoed warnings issued on Monday by US Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, who was also present at the meeting.

Mnuchin said Facebook must meet "a very high standard" before it moves ahead with Libra, adding that US regulators have already expressed concerns to the company.

He said that these kinds of virtual currencies have in the past been associated with money laundering and illicit activities.

"Whether they're banks or non-banks, they're under the same regulatory environment," Mnuchin told reporters at the White House.

Libra is widely regarded as a challenger to dominant global player bitcoin. Expected to launch in the first half of 2020, Libra is designed to be backed by a basket of currency assets to avoid the wild swings of bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies. 
&nbsp;

The G7 group of the world's most developed economies are worried about Facebook's planned Libra cryptocurrency and have a shared consensus about the need to act quickly, a French official said Wednesday.

The G7 group of the world's most developed economies are worried about Facebook's planned Libra cryptocurrency and have a shared consensus about the need to act quickly, a French official said Wednesday. Facebook last month unveiled its plans for Libra in an announcement greeted with concern by governments and critics of the social network behemoth around the world. The issue was at the forefront of the minds of ministers and central bankers from the G7 group of most developed economies as they kicked off a two-day meeting in Chantilly outside Paris on Wednesday. "On Libra, we had a very constructive and detailed discussion with a very large and shared consensus on the need for action," said the official, who asked not to be named. "Concerns (were) expressed by all the participants about the current situation and the need to act quickly." The finance ministers of France and Germany had earlier expressed serious reservations about Facebook's plans because of Libra's possible impact on global financial stability. "The G7 finance ministers and central bankers who are here have serious concerns," said German Finance Minister Olaf Scholz. "They want to be sure that all existing regulations are adhered to, and if they should be changed in the future, so that we can guarantee the stability of the international financial system," he added. "We are talking about currency stability, security, data protection and democratic control," he added. French Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire, who has warned about Libra repeatedly since the launch announcement, said "the conditions are not yet in place today for Libra to be introduced." He said he hoped the G7 would consider the necessity of a "framework or a regulation" and also "what would be the conditions that would make such an instrument feasible." "Today, we cannot accept that an exchange instrument comes into being when it does not respect any of the precautionary rules that all sovereign currencies are required to abide by." Their comments echoed warnings issued on Monday by US Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, who was also present at the meeting. Mnuchin said Facebook must meet "a very high standard" before it moves ahead with Libra, adding that US regulators have already expressed concerns to the company. He said that these kinds of virtual currencies have in the past been associated with money laundering and illicit activities. "Whether they're banks or non-banks, they're under the same regulatory environment," Mnuchin told reporters at the White House. Libra is widely regarded as a challenger to dominant global player bitcoin. Expected to launch in the first half of 2020, Libra is designed to be backed by a basket of currency assets to avoid the wild swings of bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies.

G7 worried over Facebook's Libra cryptocurrency: French official

A proposal to prevent big technology companies from functioning as financial institutions or <a href="https://www.wionews.com/world/facebooks-libra-currency-under-fire-235697">issuing digital currencies </a>has been circulated for discussion by the Democratic majority that leads the House Financial Services Committee, according to a copy of the draft legislation.

In a sign of widening scrutiny after<a href="https://www.wionews.com/world/if-facebooks-libra-wants-to-become-a-bank-it-must-must-seek-new-banking-charter-trump-235162"> Facebook Inc's proposed Libra digital </a>coin aroused widespread objection, the bill proposes a fine of $1 million per day for violation of such rules.

Such a sweeping proposal would likely spark opposition from Republican members of the house who are keen on innovation, and would likely struggle to gather enough votes to pass the lower chamber.

Even if it were to pass the full house, it would still have to pass the Senate which would also likely be an uphill struggle.

Nevertheless, the draft proposal sends a strong message to large tech firms increasingly eyeing the financial services space.

The draft legislation, "Keep Big Tech Out Of Finance Act", describes a large technology firm as a company mainly offering an online platform service with at least $25 billion in annual revenue.

"A large platform utility may not establish, maintain, or operate a digital asset that is intended to be widely used as a medium of exchange, unit of account, store of value, or any other similar function, as defined by the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System," it proposes.

Facebook, which would qualify to be such an entity, said last month it would launch its global cryptocurrency in 2020.

Facebook and 28 partners, including Mastercard Inc, PayPal Holdings Inc and Uber Technologies Inc, would form the Libra Association to govern the new coin. No banks are currently part of the group.

Last week, US President Trump criticised Libra and other cryptocurrencies and demanded that companies seek a banking charter and make themselves subject to US and global regulations if they wanted to "become a bank."

His comments came after Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell told lawmakers that Facebook's plan to build a digital currency called Libra could not move forward unless it addressed concerns over privacy, money laundering, consumer protection and financial stability.

A proposal to prevent big technology companies from functioning as financial institutions or issuing digital currencies has been circulated for discussion by the Democratic majority that leads the House Financial Services Committee, according to a copy of the draft legislation.

A proposal to prevent big technology companies from functioning as financial institutions or issuing digital currencies has been circulated for discussion by the Democratic majority that leads the House Financial Services Committee, according to a copy of the draft legislation. In a sign of widening scrutiny after Facebook Inc's proposed Libra digital coin aroused widespread objection, the bill proposes a fine of $1 million per day for violation of such rules. Such a sweeping proposal would likely spark opposition from Republican members of the house who are keen on innovation, and would likely struggle to gather enough votes to pass the lower chamber. Even if it were to pass the full house, it would still have to pass the Senate which would also likely be an uphill struggle. Nevertheless, the draft proposal sends a strong message to large tech firms increasingly eyeing the financial services space. The draft legislation, "Keep Big Tech Out Of Finance Act", describes a large technology firm as a company mainly offering an online platform service with at least $25 billion in annual revenue. "A large platform utility may not establish, maintain, or operate a digital asset that is intended to be widely used as a medium of exchange, unit of account, store of value, or any other similar function, as defined by the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System," it proposes. Facebook, which would qualify to be such an entity, said last month it would launch its global cryptocurrency in 2020. Facebook and 28 partners, including Mastercard Inc, PayPal Holdings Inc and Uber Technologies Inc, would form the Libra Association to govern the new coin. No banks are currently part of the group. Last week, US President Trump criticised Libra and other cryptocurrencies and demanded that companies seek a banking charter and make themselves subject to US and global regulations if they wanted to "become a bank." His comments came after Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell told lawmakers that Facebook's plan to build a digital currency called Libra could not move forward unless it addressed concerns over privacy, money laundering, consumer protection and financial stability.

US lawmakers propose barring big tech companies from offering financial services, digital currencies

US President Donald Trump on Thursday criticised <a href="https://www.wionews.com/india-news/india-us-trade-talks-to-restart-friday-amid-few-signs-of-compromise-234949">Bitcoin, Facebook's proposed</a> Libra digital coin and other cryptocurrencies and demanded that companies seek a banking charter and make themselves subject to US and global regulations if they wanted to "become a bank."

"I am not a fan of Bitcoin and other Cryptocurrencies, which are not money, and whose value is highly volatile and based on thin air," Trump wrote on Twitter.

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I am not a fan of Bitcoin and other Cryptocurrencies, which are not money, and whose value is highly volatile and based on thin air. Unregulated Crypto Assets can facilitate unlawful behavior, including drug trade and other illegal activity....
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) <a href="https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1149472282584072192?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">July 12, 2019</a></blockquote>
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"If Facebook and other companies want to become a bank, they must seek a new Banking Charter and become subject to all Banking Regulations, just like other Banks, both National and International," he added.

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....Similarly, Facebook Libra’s “virtual currency” will have little standing or dependability. If Facebook and other companies want to become a bank, they must seek a new Banking Charter and become subject to all Banking Regulations, just like other Banks, both National...
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) <a href="https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1149472284702208000?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">July 12, 2019</a></blockquote>
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Trump's comments come one day after Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell told lawmakers that Facebook's plan to build a digital currency called Libra cannot move forward unless it addresses concerns over privacy, money laundering, consumer protection and financial stability.

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...and International. We have only one real currency in the USA, and it is stronger than ever, both dependable and reliable. It is by far the most dominant currency anywhere in the World, and it will always stay that way. It is called the United States Dollar!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) <a href="https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1149472285905940480?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">July 12, 2019</a></blockquote>
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Powell said the Fed has established a working group to follow the project and is coordinating with other government's central banks. The US Financial Stability Oversight Council, a panel of regulators that identifies risks to the financial system, is also expected to make a review.

Hours earlier on Thursday, Trump criticised large technology companies at an event at the White House, who he said treated conservative voices unfairly.

The Internet Association, a trade group representing major tech firms like Facebook, Twitter and Google, said, "Internet companies are not biased against any political ideology, and conservative voices in particular have used social media to great effect." 
&nbsp;

US President Donald Trump on Thursday criticised Bitcoin, Facebook's proposed Libra digital coin and other cryptocurrencies and demanded that companies seek a banking charter and make themselves subject to US and global regulations if they wanted to "become a bank.

US President Donald Trump on Thursday criticised Bitcoin, Facebook's proposed Libra digital coin and other cryptocurrencies and demanded that companies seek a banking charter and make themselves subject to US and global regulations if they wanted to "become a bank." "I am not a fan of Bitcoin and other Cryptocurrencies, which are not money, and whose value is highly volatile and based on thin air," Trump wrote on Twitter. I am not a fan of Bitcoin and other Cryptocurrencies, which are not money, and whose value is highly volatile and based on thin air. Unregulated Crypto Assets can facilitate unlawful behavior, including drug trade and other illegal activity.... — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 12, 2019 × "If Facebook and other companies want to become a bank, they must seek a new Banking Charter and become subject to all Banking Regulations, just like other Banks, both National and International," he added. ....Similarly, Facebook Libra’s “virtual currency” will have little standing or dependability. If Facebook and other companies want to become a bank, they must seek a new Banking Charter and become subject to all Banking Regulations, just like other Banks, both National... — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 12, 2019 × Trump's comments come one day after Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell told lawmakers that Facebook's plan to build a digital currency called Libra cannot move forward unless it addresses concerns over privacy, money laundering, consumer protection and financial stability. ...and International. We have only one real currency in the USA, and it is stronger than ever, both dependable and reliable. It is by far the most dominant currency anywhere in the World, and it will always stay that way. It is called the United States Dollar! — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 12, 2019 × Powell said the Fed has established a working group to follow the project and is coordinating with other government's central banks. The US Financial Stability Oversight Council, a panel of regulators that identifies risks to the financial system, is also expected to make a review. Hours earlier on Thursday, Trump criticised large technology companies at an event at the White House, who he said treated conservative voices unfairly. The Internet Association, a trade group representing major tech firms like Facebook, Twitter and Google, said, "Internet companies are not biased against any political ideology, and conservative voices in particular have used social media to great effect."

If Facebook's Libra wants to become a bank, it must seek new banking charter: Trump

Cryptocurrencies live in a volatile, roller-coaster world, which Facebook is seeking to change with its new Libra digital money.

The new digital currency will be overseen by a nonprofit association and backed with real assets to serve as a reliable, stable form of globally accepted money that lives essentially on smartphones.

How do cryptocurrencies work?

To use <a href="https://www.wionews.com/world/libra-facebook-unveils-cryptocurrency-meant-to-be-new-global-currency-228282">currencies like Libra</a>, people will need to install software referred to as a digital wallet.

Several digital wallets are available, but one called Calibra is being built by a Facebook subsidiary for Apple- and Android-powered smartphones and integrated with the social network's Messenger and WhatsApp mobile services.

This system "lets everyone store their money securely in their phone," Calibra vice president of product Kevin Weil told AFP.

A digital wallet chosen by the user is linked to bank accounts or credit cards for transfers or online transactions.

"The same way you can pick any browser to go on the internet, you can pick any digital wallet," Weil said.

What are the advantages?

Libra was released as an open ecosystem, so any business or service may accept it for payments. Financial institutions could also offer credit or loans in Libra.

"Imagine storing your life savings in your house; it is safer to take it with you on the go on your phone," Weil said.

Calibra, for example, could be used to send money to friends or family members in another country, or shop at stores online or in the real world the same way they might use Apple Pay or Google Pay.

More than a billion people already use WhatsApp and Messenger to communicate, so providing a way to send money makes sense.

"Over time, as the Libra ecosystem grows and Libra is built into products and services, there will be more things you can just do with Libra," Weil said.

How is cash converted to crypto?&nbsp;

People without access to banks could go to currency exchange or merchant to convert cash into Libra.

Once on a smartphone, Libra could be sent text-message style, with recipients having the option to save it in their own wallets for future use or convert it to their local currency.

"We make it easy to go back and forth to local currency," Weil said.

"If you are unbanked, you will have locations like money exchanges that operate with Libra."

Currency exchange fees would be market-driven, but likely less than remittance fees charged by businesses that wire funds.

Calibra has built-in fraud and password recovery protections, and there is a "know-your-customer" process that requires people to initially provide some form of government identification.

"This is people's money; we feel a huge responsibility to keep it safe," Weil said.

Cryptocurrencies live in a volatile, roller-coaster world, which Facebook is seeking to change with its new Libra digital money. The new digital currency will be overseen by a nonprofit association and backed with real assets to serve as a reliable, stable form of globally accepted money that lives essentially on smartphones.

Cryptocurrencies live in a volatile, roller-coaster world, which Facebook is seeking to change with its new Libra digital money. The new digital currency will be overseen by a nonprofit association and backed with real assets to serve as a reliable, stable form of globally accepted money that lives essentially on smartphones. How do cryptocurrencies work? To use currencies like Libra, people will need to install software referred to as a digital wallet. Several digital wallets are available, but one called Calibra is being built by a Facebook subsidiary for Apple- and Android-powered smartphones and integrated with the social network's Messenger and WhatsApp mobile services. This system "lets everyone store their money securely in their phone," Calibra vice president of product Kevin Weil told AFP. A digital wallet chosen by the user is linked to bank accounts or credit cards for transfers or online transactions. "The same way you can pick any browser to go on the internet, you can pick any digital wallet," Weil said. What are the advantages? Libra was released as an open ecosystem, so any business or service may accept it for payments. Financial institutions could also offer credit or loans in Libra. "Imagine storing your life savings in your house; it is safer to take it with you on the go on your phone," Weil said. Calibra, for example, could be used to send money to friends or family members in another country, or shop at stores online or in the real world the same way they might use Apple Pay or Google Pay. More than a billion people already use WhatsApp and Messenger to communicate, so providing a way to send money makes sense. "Over time, as the Libra ecosystem grows and Libra is built into products and services, there will be more things you can just do with Libra," Weil said. How is cash converted to crypto? People without access to banks could go to currency exchange or merchant to convert cash into Libra. Once on a smartphone, Libra could be sent text-message style, with recipients having the option to save it in their own wallets for future use or convert it to their local currency. "We make it easy to go back and forth to local currency," Weil said. "If you are unbanked, you will have locations like money exchanges that operate with Libra." Currency exchange fees would be market-driven, but likely less than remittance fees charged by businesses that wire funds. Calibra has built-in fraud and password recovery protections, and there is a "know-your-customer" process that requires people to initially provide some form of government identification. "This is people's money; we feel a huge responsibility to keep it safe," Weil said.

How cryptocurrencies can replace other pay options

Over the past decade, cryptocurrencies like EOS and bitcoin have become popular among investors looking to make large profits from a new and anonymous form of storing wealth. But a handful of charities are also now using digital currencies to send relief directly to those in need, circumventing banks and companies that handle remittances.

Charities use cryptocurrency to send aid to Venezuela

India's 1st Cryptocurrency ATM seized

Alphabet Inc`s Google said on Wednesday it will ban advertisements for cryptocurrencies and related content starting in June.

Under the new policy, the company will ban ads for unregulated or speculative financial products like binary options, cryptocurrency and financial spread betting among others.&nbsp;

In a separate blog post, Google said it took down 3.2 billion ads that violated its advertising policies in 2017, nearly double the number of ads it removed in 2016.

&quot;Improving the ads experience across the web, whether that`s removing harmful ads or intrusive ads, will continue to be a top priority for us,&quot; Scott Spencer, director of sustainable ads, said.&nbsp;

In January, Facebook Inc said it will ban ads promoting financial products and services tied to cryptocurrencies and initial coin offerings.

The policy will be implemented across its platforms, including Facebook, Audience Network and Instagram, the company said.

Google said it took down 3.2 billion ads that violated its advertising policies in 2017

Alphabet Inc`s Google said on Wednesday it will ban advertisements for cryptocurrencies and related content starting in June. Under the new policy, the company will ban ads for unregulated or speculative financial products like binary options, cryptocurrency and financial spread betting among others. In a separate blog post, Google said it took down 3.2 billion ads that violated its advertising policies in 2017, nearly double the number of ads it removed in 2016. "Improving the ads experience across the web, whether that`s removing harmful ads or intrusive ads, will continue to be a top priority for us," Scott Spencer, director of sustainable ads, said. In January, Facebook Inc said it will ban ads promoting financial products and services tied to cryptocurrencies and initial coin offerings. The policy will be implemented across its platforms, including Facebook, Audience Network and Instagram, the company said.

Google to ban ads on cryptocurrencies, related products

Cryptocurrencies fell Friday after Japan-based digital exchange Coincheck suspended client deposits and withdrawals for virtual currencies except for bitcoin, saying it had been hacked.

Also read:&nbsp;<a href="http://www.wionews.com/world/hackers-steal-530-million-from-cryptocurrency-exchange-in-japan-30891" target="_blank">Hackers steal $530 million from cryptocurrency exchange in Japan</a>

Coincheck said it was investigating &quot;unauthorised access&quot; of the exchange that appeared to result in a loss worth half a billion US dollars of NEM, the 10th biggest cryptocurrency by market capitalisation.

&quot;At 3 am (1800 GMT) today, 523 million NEMs were sent from the NEM address of Coincheck. It&#39;s worth 58 billion yen based on the calculation at the rate when detected,&quot; said Coincheck&#39;s chief operating officer Yusuke Otsuka late Friday.

&quot;We&#39;re still examining how many of our customers are affected,&quot; he said, adding that the exchange was trying to find out whether the breach was from Japan or another country.

After the exchange suspended deposits and withdrawals, NEM plunged more than 16 percent in a 24-hour period, according to CoinMarketCap.com.

Major virtual currencies had rebounded slightly by late Friday but were still down, with Bitcoin dropping 2.13 percent to $10,987.70, ripple sliding more than six percent and ethereum flat.

Coincheck said it had discovered the breach at 11.25 am and announced it had suspended trading for all cryptocurrencies apart from bitcoin in a series of tweets.

According to its website, which proclaims it is &quot;the leading bitcoin and cryptocurrency exchange in Asia&quot;, Tokyo-based Coincheck was founded in 2012 and had 71 employees as of July last year.

In 2014 major Tokyo-based bitcoin exchange MtGox collapsed after admitting that 850,000 coins -- worth around $480 million at the time -- had disappeared from its vaults.

Bitcoin is recognised as legal tender in Japan and nearly one third of global bitcoin transactions in December were denominated in yen, according to specialist website jpbitcoin.com.

The virtual currency is well down from record highs approaching $20,000 in late December, having rocketed 25-fold last year, before being hit by concerns about a bubble and worries about crackdowns on trading it.

Billionaire investor George Soros, known for his legendarily successful currency trading, has dismissed bitcoin as a &quot;typical bubble&quot;.

But speaking Thursday at the Davos summit, he said the cryptocurrency would likely avoid a full crash because authoritarians would still use it to make secret investments abroad.

Major virtual currencies had rebounded slightly by late Friday but were still down, with Bitcoin dropping 2.13 percent to $10,987.70, ripple sliding more than six percent and ethereum flat.

Cryptocurrencies fell Friday after Japan-based digital exchange Coincheck suspended client deposits and withdrawals for virtual currencies except for bitcoin, saying it had been hacked. Also read: Hackers steal $530 million from cryptocurrency exchange in Japan Coincheck said it was investigating "unauthorised access" of the exchange that appeared to result in a loss worth half a billion US dollars of NEM, the 10th biggest cryptocurrency by market capitalisation. "At 3 am (1800 GMT) today, 523 million NEMs were sent from the NEM address of Coincheck. It's worth 58 billion yen based on the calculation at the rate when detected," said Coincheck's chief operating officer Yusuke Otsuka late Friday. "We're still examining how many of our customers are affected," he said, adding that the exchange was trying to find out whether the breach was from Japan or another country. After the exchange suspended deposits and withdrawals, NEM plunged more than 16 percent in a 24-hour period, according to CoinMarketCap.com. Major virtual currencies had rebounded slightly by late Friday but were still down, with Bitcoin dropping 2.13 percent to $10,987.70, ripple sliding more than six percent and ethereum flat. Coincheck said it had discovered the breach at 11.25 am and announced it had suspended trading for all cryptocurrencies apart from bitcoin in a series of tweets. According to its website, which proclaims it is "the leading bitcoin and cryptocurrency exchange in Asia", Tokyo-based Coincheck was founded in 2012 and had 71 employees as of July last year. In 2014 major Tokyo-based bitcoin exchange MtGox collapsed after admitting that 850,000 coins -- worth around $480 million at the time -- had disappeared from its vaults. Bitcoin is recognised as legal tender in Japan and nearly one third of global bitcoin transactions in December were denominated in yen, according to specialist website jpbitcoin.com. The virtual currency is well down from record highs approaching $20,000 in late December, having rocketed 25-fold last year, before being hit by concerns about a bubble and worries about crackdowns on trading it. Billionaire investor George Soros, known for his legendarily successful currency trading, has dismissed bitcoin as a "typical bubble". But speaking Thursday at the Davos summit, he said the cryptocurrency would likely avoid a full crash because authoritarians would still use it to make secret investments abroad.

Cryptocurrencies fall after hack hits Japan's Coincheck

Digital currency bitcoin fell more than 15 percent on Monday to a nearly three-month low amid a slew of concerns ranging from a global regulatory clampdown to a ban on using credit cards to buy bitcoin by British and US&nbsp;banks.

On the Luxembourg-based Bitstamp exchange, bitcoin fell as low as $6,853.53 in early afternoon trading in New York. That marked a fall of more than half from a peak of almost $20,000 hit in December.

Bitcoin has fallen in six of the last eight trading session.

The currency, which surged more than 1,300 percent last year, has lost about half its value so far in 2018, as more governments and banks signal their intention for a regulatory crackdown. Last week bitcoin suffered its worst weekly performance since 2013.

&quot;We envisage this decline will continue, setting the next technical level at $5,000 a coin,&quot; said Miles Eakers, chief market analyst at Centtrip, which specializes in foreign exchange, worldwide payments and treasury management.

Other cryptocurrencies also suffered double-digit declines on Monday, according to industry tracker Coinmarketcap.com.

Ethereum, the second largest virtual currency, was last down nearly 19 percent at $703.40, while Ripple, the third largest, last traded at 71 cents, down 14.1 percent.

British bank Lloyds Banking Group said on Sunday it was banning customers from using credit cards to buy bitcoin. It joined U.S. banking giants JPMorgan Chase &amp; Co and Citigroup, which announced similar bans on concerns the lenders could be held liable when the volatile currencies plunge in value. [nL8N1PU10Y]

On Monday, India said it was planning steps to make virtual currencies illegal within its payments system and to regulate the trading of crypto assets.

&quot;Cryptocurrencies have seriously fallen out of favour since the middle of December, and constant negative news flow and speculation of increased regulation has exacerbated the move lower,&quot; Craig Erlam, an analyst at currency broker Oanda, said.

The cryptocurrency sector has also attracted the spotlight after news of hacks and scams, including the roughly 58 billion yen ($532.9 million) stolen in digital money from Tokyo-based cryptocurrency exchange Coincheck two weeks ago.&nbsp;

But some investors were unfazed.

&quot;Bitcoin has bounced back from similar collapses before during its short but volatile history, and it would hardly be a shock if those claiming the bubble has burst are surprised by yet another change in fortunes,&quot; said Dennis de Jong, managing director at online FX brokerage firm UFX.com in Limassol, Cyprus.

Luxembourg-based Bitstamp exchange, bitcoin fell as low as $6,853.53 in early afternoon trading in New York.

Digital currency bitcoin fell more than 15 percent on Monday to a nearly three-month low amid a slew of concerns ranging from a global regulatory clampdown to a ban on using credit cards to buy bitcoin by British and US banks. On the Luxembourg-based Bitstamp exchange, bitcoin fell as low as $6,853.53 in early afternoon trading in New York. That marked a fall of more than half from a peak of almost $20,000 hit in December. Bitcoin has fallen in six of the last eight trading session. The currency, which surged more than 1,300 percent last year, has lost about half its value so far in 2018, as more governments and banks signal their intention for a regulatory crackdown. Last week bitcoin suffered its worst weekly performance since 2013. "We envisage this decline will continue, setting the next technical level at $5,000 a coin," said Miles Eakers, chief market analyst at Centtrip, which specializes in foreign exchange, worldwide payments and treasury management. Other cryptocurrencies also suffered double-digit declines on Monday, according to industry tracker Coinmarketcap.com. Ethereum, the second largest virtual currency, was last down nearly 19 percent at $703.40, while Ripple, the third largest, last traded at 71 cents, down 14.1 percent. British bank Lloyds Banking Group said on Sunday it was banning customers from using credit cards to buy bitcoin. It joined U.S. banking giants JPMorgan Chase & Co and Citigroup, which announced similar bans on concerns the lenders could be held liable when the volatile currencies plunge in value. [nL8N1PU10Y] On Monday, India said it was planning steps to make virtual currencies illegal within its payments system and to regulate the trading of crypto assets. "Cryptocurrencies have seriously fallen out of favour since the middle of December, and constant negative news flow and speculation of increased regulation has exacerbated the move lower," Craig Erlam, an analyst at currency broker Oanda, said. The cryptocurrency sector has also attracted the spotlight after news of hacks and scams, including the roughly 58 billion yen ($532.9 million) stolen in digital money from Tokyo-based cryptocurrency exchange Coincheck two weeks ago. But some investors were unfazed. "Bitcoin has bounced back from similar collapses before during its short but volatile history, and it would hardly be a shock if those claiming the bubble has burst are surprised by yet another change in fortunes," said Dennis de Jong, managing director at online FX brokerage firm UFX.com in Limassol, Cyprus.

Bitcoin continues to slide, loses half its value in 2018

Authors: Larisa Yarovaya and Brian Lucey*

In the last year, the price of Bitcoin has increased from less than US$800 to more than US$12,000. This huge spike in value has many asking if it is a bubble or if the high price today is here to stay.

Finance defines a bubble as a situation where the price of an asset diverges systematically from its fundamentals. Investment mogul Jack Bogle says there is nothing to support Bitcoin, and the head of JP MorganChase, Jamie Dimon has called it a fraud &ldquo;worse than tulip bulbs&rdquo;.

Like any asset, Bitcoin has some fundamental value, even if only a hope value, or a value arising from scarcity. So there are reasons to hold it. But our research does show that it is experiencing a bubble right now.

Together with Shaen Corbet at Dublin City University, we took as the fundamentals of Bitcoin elements of the technology that underpins it (and other cryptocurrencies). We looked at measures, which represent the key theoretical and computational components of how cyrptocurrencies are priced.

New Bitcoin is created by a process of mining units called blocks. Bitcoin is built on blockchain technology &ndash; a digital ledger of transactions &ndash; which enables the currency to be traded independently from any central banking system, without risk of fake or duplicate Bitcoins being used. Instead of having a bank verify pending transactions (a &ldquo;block&rdquo;), miners check them and, if approved, the block is cryptographically added to the ever-expanding ledger.

So the first measure we examined relates to mining difficulty. It calculates how difficult it is to find a new block relative to the past. As per the Bitcoin Protocol, the number of Bitcoin is capped at 21m (there are currently 16.7m in circulation). This means that as more people mine for Bitcoin and more blocks are created, each block is, all things being equal, worth less than the previous block.

The second measure we looked at relates to the &ldquo;hash rate&rdquo;. This is the speed at which a computer operates when mining. To successfully mine Bitcoin, you must come up with a 64-digit hexadecimal number (called a &ldquo;hash&rdquo;), which is less than or equal to the target hash. The faster you can do this, the better chance you have of finding the next block and receiving payment. 
The third measurement was &ldquo;block size&rdquo;. This relates to how large the chain is at any given time, with larger chains taking longer to mine than shorter ones.

And lastly we looked at the volume of transactions conducted. Any asset, in particular any currency, which is more widely used will be more valuable than one which is used less frequently.

In our study, we examined data from Bitcoin&rsquo;s early days &ndash; from July 2010 to November 2017. The price of one Bitcoin did not rise above US$1 until April 16, 2011, then to US$10 on June 3, 2011 and US$100 on April 2, 2013. Since then the price rise has clearly been exceptional.

<iframe allowfullscreen="allowfullscreen" allowtransparency="true" frameborder="0" height="450" mozallowfullscreen="mozallowfullscreen" msallowfullscreen="msallowfullscreen" oallowfullscreen="oallowfullscreen" scrolling="no" src="https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/mygLM/1/" webkitallowfullscreen="webkitallowfullscreen" width="100%"></iframe>

<figure class="align-center zoomable">
We then applied an accepted method that is used to detect and date stamp bubbles after they burst. In essence, this involves identifying the existence of an explosive component in a series. As the series, here the price of bitcoin, &ldquo;explodes&rdquo;, it runs the risk, like any explosion, of flying apart.

A possibly counter-intuitive result of this approach is that if a fundamental driver and the price of an asset both show an explosive component, we might not conclude a bubble is present. A bubble is when something deviates from its fundamental value. If the fundamental value is itself growing explosively then the price would also.

Think of dividends on a stock. If, somehow, these were to grow at an explosive rate we might expect to see the price do the same. While unsustainable, this is not technically a bubble. To overcome this, we then date stamp a bubble as being present when the price shows an explosive component and the underlying fundamentals do not.

Here are the results of the analysis:

<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/197566/original/file-20171204-4062-195jztn.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&amp;q=45&amp;auto=format&amp;w=1000&amp;fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/197566/original/file-20171204-4062-195jztn.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&amp;q=45&amp;auto=format&amp;w=754&amp;fit=clip" /></a>

<figcaption>The Bitcoin Bubbles.Authors own calculations</figcaption>
</figure>

&nbsp;

The orange lines denote when the price is showing explosive behaviour. We also see a period where the hash rate was growing explosively &ndash; the blue columns in late 2013 and early 2014. This is also an indication of a price bubble, which went on to burst.

So there are clear points where bubbles are visible &ndash; including now. The price of Bitcoin at present shows explosive behaviour in the absence of anything similar in its fundamentals. We see the price moving upwards in a manner that is not related to the technical underpinnings. It is a clear bubble.

A weakness of these tests and indeed all bubble identification tests is that they take place after the bubble has burst. Even this test, which can be redone as swiftly as new data arrives, is such. Bubbles by their nature grow in a compound manner &ndash; so even a day or two delay in addressing the situation can make a bubble significantly worse.

What is not yet available is an accurate advanced warning bubble indicator. In its absence, this approach may be the best. Unfortunately, we cannot use this approach to determine the extent of the bubble. There is no well-accepted model that suggests a &ldquo;fair&rdquo; value for Bitcoin. But whatever that level is, it is almost certain that, at present, it is well below where we are now.

This article was originally published on <a href="http://theconversation.com" rel="nofollow" target="blank">The Conversation</a>. Read the <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-bitcoin-bubble-how-we-know-it-will-burst-88511" rel="nofollow" target="blank">original article</a>.

*Brian Lucey:&nbsp;Professor of International Finance and Commodities, Trinity College Dublin

(Disclaimer: Both authors write here in a personal capacity).

An analysis of Bitcoin's fundamentals shows how much of a bubble its price has inflated to

Authors: Larisa Yarovaya and Brian Lucey* In the last year, the price of Bitcoin has increased from less than US$800 to more than US$12,000. This huge spike in value has many asking if it is a bubble or if the high price today is here to stay. Finance defines a bubble as a situation where the price of an asset diverges systematically from its fundamentals. Investment mogul Jack Bogle says there is nothing to support Bitcoin, and the head of JP MorganChase, Jamie Dimon has called it a fraud “worse than tulip bulbs”. Like any asset, Bitcoin has some fundamental value, even if only a hope value, or a value arising from scarcity. So there are reasons to hold it. But our research does show that it is experiencing a bubble right now. Together with Shaen Corbet at Dublin City University, we took as the fundamentals of Bitcoin elements of the technology that underpins it (and other cryptocurrencies). We looked at measures, which represent the key theoretical and computational components of how cyrptocurrencies are priced. New Bitcoin is created by a process of mining units called blocks. Bitcoin is built on blockchain technology – a digital ledger of transactions – which enables the currency to be traded independently from any central banking system, without risk of fake or duplicate Bitcoins being used. Instead of having a bank verify pending transactions (a “block”), miners check them and, if approved, the block is cryptographically added to the ever-expanding ledger. So the first measure we examined relates to mining difficulty. It calculates how difficult it is to find a new block relative to the past. As per the Bitcoin Protocol, the number of Bitcoin is capped at 21m (there are currently 16.7m in circulation). This means that as more people mine for Bitcoin and more blocks are created, each block is, all things being equal, worth less than the previous block. The second measure we looked at relates to the “hash rate”. This is the speed at which a computer operates when mining. To successfully mine Bitcoin, you must come up with a 64-digit hexadecimal number (called a “hash”), which is less than or equal to the target hash. The faster you can do this, the better chance you have of finding the next block and receiving payment. The third measurement was “block size”. This relates to how large the chain is at any given time, with larger chains taking longer to mine than shorter ones. And lastly we looked at the volume of transactions conducted. Any asset, in particular any currency, which is more widely used will be more valuable than one which is used less frequently. In our study, we examined data from Bitcoin’s early days – from July 2010 to November 2017. The price of one Bitcoin did not rise above US$1 until April 16, 2011, then to US$10 on June 3, 2011 and US$100 on April 2, 2013. Since then the price rise has clearly been exceptional. We then applied an accepted method that is used to detect and date stamp bubbles after they burst. In essence, this involves identifying the existence of an explosive component in a series. As the series, here the price of bitcoin, “explodes”, it runs the risk, like any explosion, of flying apart. A possibly counter-intuitive result of this approach is that if a fundamental driver and the price of an asset both show an explosive component, we might not conclude a bubble is present. A bubble is when something deviates from its fundamental value. If the fundamental value is itself growing explosively then the price would also. Think of dividends on a stock. If, somehow, these were to grow at an explosive rate we might expect to see the price do the same. While unsustainable, this is not technically a bubble. To overcome this, we then date stamp a bubble as being present when the price shows an explosive component and the underlying fundamentals do not. Here are the results of the analysis: The Bitcoin Bubbles.Authors own calculations The orange lines denote when the price is showing explosive behaviour. We also see a period where the hash rate was growing explosively – the blue columns in late 2013 and early 2014. This is also an indication of a price bubble, which went on to burst. So there are clear points where bubbles are visible – including now. The price of Bitcoin at present shows explosive behaviour in the absence of anything similar in its fundamentals. We see the price moving upwards in a manner that is not related to the technical underpinnings. It is a clear bubble. A weakness of these tests and indeed all bubble identification tests is that they take place after the bubble has burst. Even this test, which can be redone as swiftly as new data arrives, is such. Bubbles by their nature grow in a compound manner – so even a day or two delay in addressing the situation can make a bubble significantly worse. What is not yet available is an accurate advanced warning bubble indicator. In its absence, this approach may be the best. Unfortunately, we cannot use this approach to determine the extent of the bubble. There is no well-accepted model that suggests a “fair” value for Bitcoin. But whatever that level is, it is almost certain that, at present, it is well below where we are now. This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article. *Brian Lucey: Professor of International Finance and Commodities, Trinity College Dublin (Disclaimer: Both authors write here in a personal capacity).

Opinion: The Bitcoin bubble ? how we know it will burst

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