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What is going on with bitcoin now?
On the day of the Brexit vote alone, Coinbase saw an 86% increase of new clients from Great Britain.
The British are flocking to Bitcoin, that's what's happening. Coinbase, one of the largest bitcoin exchanges in the world, is reporting a surge of UK interest towards bitcoin in the days immediately before and after last week’s Brexit vote. Coinbase data reveals that in the week leading up to the vote (June 13-20) there was a 55% increase in new account sign-ups from the UK and the staggering 350% increase in bitcoin purchases from UK customers. According to a Coinbase spokesperson, quoted by Yahoo Finance, this was one of the largest spikes in activity the exchange has ever seen from one region in one week.
On the day of the Brexit vote alone, Coinbase saw an 86% increase of new clients from Great Britain.
People are looking for alternatives in the wake of the GBP crash, it's normal. I am assuming there were also a lot of people who turned to actual gold as well.
Bitcoin "miners" face fight for survival as new supply halves
Marco Streng is a miner, though he does not carry a pick around his base in south-western Iceland. Instead, he keeps tens of thousands of computers running 24 hours a day in fierce competition with others across the globe to earn bitcoins.
In the world of the web-based digital currency, it is not central banks that add new money to the system, but rather computers like Streng's which are awarded fresh bitcoins in return for processing blocks of the latest bitcoin transactions.
Bitcoin can be used to send money instantly around the world, using individual bitcoin addresses, free of charge with no need for third party checks, and is accepted by several major online retailers.
The work Streng's computers and others do serves two purposes: they record and verify the roughly 225,000 daily bitcoin transactions and - because they earn new bitcoins for the work they do - steadily increase the currency in circulation, currently worth around $10 billion.
The process has come to be known as "mining" because it is slow and intensive, reaping a gradual reward in the same way that minerals such as gold are mined from the ground.
But on Saturday, the reward for miners will be slashed in half. Written into bitcoin's code when it was invented in 2008 was a rule dictating that the prize would be halved every four years, in a step designed to keep a lid on bitcoin inflation.
From around 1700 GMT on Saturday, instead of 25 bitcoins up for grabs globally every 10 minutes, worth around $16,000 at the current rate, there will be just 12.5.
That means only the mining companies with the leanest operations will survive the ensuing profit hit.
"The most important thing is to be the most efficient miner," said Streng, the 26-year-old co-founder of German firm Genesis Mining, which has "mining farms" in Canada, the United States and eastern Europe, as well as in Iceland. "When the others drop out, that means that they leave the market and give you a bigger share of the pie."
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Bitcoin "miners" face fight for survival as new supply halves
Marco Streng is a miner, though he does not carry a pick around his base in south-western Iceland. Instead, he keeps tens of thousands of computers running 24 hours a day in fierce competition with others across the globe to earn bitcoins.
In the world of the web-based digital currency, it is not central banks that add new money to the system, but rather computers like Streng's which are awarded fresh bitcoins in return for processing blocks of the latest bitcoin transactions.
Bitcoin can be used to send money instantly around the world, using individual bitcoin addresses, free of charge with no need for third party checks, and is accepted by several major online retailers.
The work Streng's computers and others do serves two purposes: they record and verify the roughly 225,000 daily bitcoin transactions and - because they earn new bitcoins for the work they do - steadily increase the currency in circulation, currently worth around $10 billion.
The process has come to be known as "mining" because it is slow and intensive, reaping a gradual reward in the same way that minerals such as gold are mined from the ground.
But on Saturday, the reward for miners will be slashed in half. Written into bitcoin's code when it was invented in 2008 was a rule dictating that the prize would be halved every four years, in a step designed to keep a lid on bitcoin inflation.
From around 1700 GMT on Saturday, instead of 25 bitcoins up for grabs globally every 10 minutes, worth around $16,000 at the current rate, there will be just 12.5.
That means only the mining companies with the leanest operations will survive the ensuing profit hit.
"The most important thing is to be the most efficient miner," said Streng, the 26-year-old co-founder of German firm Genesis Mining, which has "mining farms" in Canada, the United States and eastern Europe, as well as in Iceland. "When the others drop out, that means that they leave the market and give you a bigger share of the pie."
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Bitcoin's Asymmetric Position
In short: no speculative positions.
The recent halving of Bitcoin rewards (BTC-eUSD) has proved to be a sort of non-volatility event. In an article on CoinDesk, we read:
We have already written about the relative lack of volatility around the halving date but this interpretation is actually pretty interesting. It might be the case that Bitcoin didn’t decline when it “should have” because of the fact that there is strength in the market and possibly more buying power than selling. This is pure speculation, but it could be the case that the lack of action in Bitcoin following the halving is fueled by buyers or potential buyers. At the same time, Bitcoin doesn’t really need much to get back to bearish in technical terms.
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Bitcoin Not Money, Miami Judge Rules in Dismissing Laundering Charges
In a case closely watched in financial and tech circles, the judge threw out the felony charges against website designer Michell Espinoza, who had been charged with illegally transmitting and laundering $1,500 worth of Bitcoins.
He sold them to undercover detectives who told him they wanted to use the money to buy stolen credit-card numbers. But Miami-Dade Circuit Judge Teresa Mary Pooler ruled that Bitcoin was not backed by any government or bank, and was not ... (full story)
Bitcoin Prices Steady after Volatile Start to the Month
The value of bitcoin traded within a narrow range Saturday, as the market stabilized after a high profile security breach triggered a large selloff of the digital currency at the start of August.
The BTC/USD was trading around $586.00 on Saturday, according to CoinDesk. The digital currency was trading in the middle of its daily range.
Prior the August price collapse, bitcoin was enjoyed a period of relative stability rarely seen during its tumultuous history. Prices spiked to a two-year high in June amid changes to its code and growing buying interest among Chinese investors looking to diversify away from yuan-denominated assets.
However, prices have yet to respond to the July 9 bitcoin halving event, which is expected to tighten supply of the cryptocurrency by creating less incentive to mine new coins.
Bitcoin was in the news this week after the World Economic Forum gave a highly bullish assessment of blockchains in a report that was published Friday. While the report failed to meniton bitcoin, it referred to “distributed ledger technologies” that underlie the cryptocurrency.
The report found that 80% of banks are expected to initiate distributed ledger technologies (DLT) projects by 2017 and that over $1.4 billion in investments have already been made over the past three years. Over 90 central banks are already engaged in DLT discussions, a figure expected to increase as more policymakers explore the potential of blockchains.
Response to the Forum’s report has so far been muted as traders continued to digest the fallout from the Bitfinex cyber security breach that resulted in the loss of around $70 million worth of bitcoins. Bitfinex, a Hong Kong-based exchange, recently announced that it would “socialize” the losses among its members, taking a little more than 36% from each trading account.
Lawyers familiar with the cryptocurrency have said that customers may have legal recourse against Bitfinex.