Crypto Guides, Knowledge & Insights

Japanese bank Sumitomo Mitsui launches the country's first 'a-1' rated security token

Japan-based bank Sumitomo Mitsui Trust Bank, or SMTB, has launched its first asset-backed securities token in partnership with Securitize on March 29.　　The instrument is the first security token compliant with the Financial Instruments and Exchange Act (FIEA) to launch in the Japanese Market. The token has received an “a-1 rating” from Japanese rating agency, Rating and Investment Information, Inc, suggesting the product is very likely to fulfill its short-term obligations.　　The token was created by tokenizing paper-based beneficiary certificates representing investor ownership to an underlying asset. SMTB has also created a trust company to manage its underlying securitized investments.　　SMTB issued the product using Securitize‘ security tokenization platform. Securitize was founded in the United States in 2017, before launching a Japanese division that secured investment backed from some of the country’s leading companies including Sony, SBI, and Softank.　　In March 2020, Securitize partnered with Tokyo-based LIFULL to create a tokenized real estate investment platform.　　In an announcement shared with Cointelegraph, SMBTs Hirohito Niji expressed pride in the bank embracing digital securities, stating:　　“We are committed to proactively develop and deliver innovative solutions to our customers with their changing needs by combining cutting-edge digital technologies and our conventional trust bank expertise.”　　SMBT is a member of the

2021-03-30Deep Dive

Why Coinbase Is Losing The Race To Become Top Dog

With a direct listing on the NASDAQ stock exchange coming very soon in April, Coinbase has a lot to do in order to make up ground on Binance, the number one centralised exchange on trading volume. A narrow choice of cryptocurrencies and a hostile US regulatory landscape are just two issues Coinbase will need to remedy if it wants to make up that ground.　　In an article this morning by Seeking Alpha, the case was laid out for a “bumpy path” facing Coinbase. This is in contrast to high expectations of a huge valuation as Coinbase lists on the NASDAQ this coming month.　　One of the main problems facing Coinbase is the far from friendly stance of the US regulatory authorities on what can be listed. This has led to Coinbase only managing to list a relatively small number of coins in comparison with its competitors. In fact, Coinbase with only 50 coin listings, is the second least in the top 10 ranking Cryptocurrency spot exchanges.　　Source: Table taken from Coin Gecko　　Traders like the opportunities that arise with new coin listings. With Binance providing almost 6 times as much variety, CZs exchange is certainly winning one of the races there.　　The regulations are even

2021-03-30Deep Dive

Payments firm Nuvei launches support for 40 cryptos including Reddcoin and DOGE

E-commerce merchants can now transact in nearly 40 cryptocurrencies through global payment platform Nuvei.　　According to the announcement, merchants partnered with the payment provider can use an array of cryptocurrencies to send and receive payments across 200 countries, including top assets Bitcoin (BTC) and Ether (ETH), lesser known cryptos such as Reddcoin and Bitcoin Gold, and even hyper-volatile coins like Dogecoin (DOGE).　　Nuvei‘s customers can even use Ripple (XRP), despite the asset’s recent legal woes and subsequent delistings from major exchanges.　　Commenting on the launch, Nuvei‘s CEO and chairman, Philip Fayer, described the firm’s support for crypto assets as “empower[ing] our clients, large and small, with frictionless payment experiences and a greater opportunity to partake in a global marketplace.”　　The announcement also asserts crypto asset transactions will provide “enhanced security, privacy, and integrity” to Nuveis users when compared to traditional fiat methods of payment. However, multiple crypto assets supported by Nuvei have previously been the subject of 51% attacks.　　In the final quarter of 2020, Nuvei processed almost $14 billion from merchants, with the company handling $43 billion over the entirety of 2020.　　Nuveis announcement comes as competition between traditional payment providers entering the crypto sector is heating.　　On March 29, Visa announced a pilot program allowing

2021-03-30Deep Dive

Central Banks Focus On Financial Inclusion As Cryptos Get Traction

Central banks are seemingly looking to steal the show from decentralized cryptocurrencies as they are also aiming to increase financial inclusion by issuing central bank digital currencies (CBDCs).　　China　　“We still have a lot of remote areas, or poor areas, and in those areas people are underbanked and they cannot enjoy mobile payment services. This is why we‘re promoting CBDCs to bring financial inclusion,” Changchun Mu, Director-General of the Digital Currency Institute of the People’s Bank of China (PBoC), said during a panel discussion at BIS Innovation Summit, an event hosted by the Bank for International Settlements (BIS), today.　　According to him, in China, cryptocurrencies have been largely perceived as a threat to the countrys monetary policy by local decision-makers, stimulating work on the roll-out of the digital yuan.　　Meanwhile, local payments giants such as Alipay and Tenpay dominate in Chinas mobile payment market which means that “if something bad happens to them, either financially or technically, this would definitely bring a negative impact on the financial stability of China,” Mu said.　　“To bring back-up, or redundancy … the central bank needs to step up and provide a CBDC to the retail payments market,” he added.　　The Bahamas　　Elsewhere, financial inclusion is also named as the main

2021-03-30Deep Dive

Visa to Settle USDC Transactions on Ethereum

Visa is to become the first large payments network to use a stablecoin as a settlement currency. By partnering with the popular cryptocurrency exchange Crypto.com, the San Francisco-headquartered giant will offer a crypto settlement system for fiat transactions based on the Ethereum blockchain.　　According to the announcement from earlier today, Visa has joined forces with Crypto.com to bring its first-ever non-fiat settlement program.　　The companys standard settlement process requires parties to settle in a traditional fiat currency. This can “add cost and complexity for businesses built with digital currencies.”　　As such, Visa will provide USDC settlements that can help cryptocurrency companies “evaluate fundamentally new business models without the need for traditional fiat in their treasury and settlement workflows.”　　Essentially, the pilot will enable Crypto.com (and other crypto companies in the future) to send USDC to Visa‘s Ethereum address to settle transactions under the exchange’s Visa card program. This will be possible by connecting Visas treasury with the crypto platform Anchorage.　　The statement also noted that the financial services giant will be able to “directly support new central bank digital currencies (CBDC) as they emerge in the future.”　　“The announcement today marks a major milestone in our ability to address the needs of fintechs managing their business

2021-03-30Deep Dive

The Effects Of Rampant Misinformation In The Crypto Ecosystem

Anthony Sassano, Product Marketing Manager at Set Protocol, Co-Founder of EthHub, and Founder of The Daily Gwei, tweeted a thread about how a cloud of noise and misinformation surrounds the crypto topic. He said,　　“Information asymmetry in the crypto ecosystem is your superpower if you know how to take advantage of it. What do I mean by this？ Well, because theres so much noise and misinformation, people are often misled for months or even years about different projects.”　　Issues That Misinformation Breeds　　Sassano states that due to this informations asymmetric distribution, most new fundamental developments in crypto fail to be “priced in.” It is hard to believe that even prevalent assets such as EIP-1559 and Ethereum PoS are not priced in yet.　　People tend to get stuck in echo chambers and not be aware of fundamental developments that different projects undergo. This is why token prices for specific projects stay flats for a long time (months or years) until the market notices it someday.　　Another issue is that people may be aware of a fundamental development but tend to think it is inconsequential due to not understanding its full potential. Sassano believes this applies perfectly to Ethereums monetary policy.　　How Can You Make The Best Of

2021-03-30Deep Dive

Bitgesell’s First Halving Just Happened: What You Need to Know About the Coin’s Bright Future

The Bitgesell halving just took place yesterday, March 28th, and will focus on putting a deflationary economic model in place just like Bitcoin did after its halving. Heres everything you need to know about the Bitgesell halving, the coin itself, and what lies ahead post-halving.　　WHAT TO EXPECT NOW THAT THE BITGESELL HALVING HAS HAPPENED　　Bitgesell, a young but novel blockchain project founded by Emma Wu, relies on a spinoff of the original Bitcoin codebase, with few key differences yet several similarities.　　One of the primary ways the two protocols behave the same is through a hard-coded halving event timed at appropriate intervals. Bitcoins halving was in May 2020 and paved the way for the monster uptrend that is still going strong even today.　　Bitgesells halving, only just happened on March 28th, and due to the similarity in design between the two, bullish momentum in Bitgesell is building. However, thanks to the differences between the two protocols, Bitgesell could even outperform Bitcoin due to its unique deflationary mechanism.　　Bitgesell coin has a four times faster halving frequency than Bitcoin, boosting the imbalance between supply and demand at an increasingly quicker pace. Also, unlike Bitcoin, although Bitgesell shares the same 21 million coin supply, 90% of

2021-03-30Deep Dive

The long-awaited “Interchain Era” begins on Cosmos (ATOM)

The highly anticipated inter-blockchain communication (IBC) protocol transfers have gone live on Cosmos (ATOM), allowing users to transfer their tokens between different decentralized networks, its developers announced today.　　“After 5 years of research and development, Inter Blockchain Communication is being rolled out onto the Cosmos Hub! This is the first step of enabling cross-chain communication, which activates IBC token transfers – allowing you to send fungible tokens from one chain to another,” said Cosmos developers.　　Starting today, IBC-compatible blockchains can send their tokens to the Cosmos Hub as well as its native ATOM tokens. The system supports both fungible and non-fungible (NFTs) digital assets.　　According to the developers, the launch of IBC opens up the doors for many new innovative applications such as token exchanges and NFT marketplaces. For example, the protocol can be used to create multi-chain smart contracts and split their logic between different blockchain. Thanks to this system, other blockchains can also solve their scaling issues by splitting popular decentralized applications (dapps) across multiple chains.　　Christopher Goes, lead developer of the IBC protocol noted:　　“IBC will have a transformative impact on the blockchain space by creating an ecosystem of politically independent chains that can interact via trade and information exchange. Knitting together

2021-03-30Deep Dive

3 crypto-market trends to look out for this year, according to PwC

Mergers and acquisitions will be a big theme in the cryptocurrency space, according to PwC, after the value of M&A deals in the sector doubled year over year in 2020.　　In a report published on Monday, the Big Four accounting firm revealed that the average M&A deal size jumped by 174% from $19.2 million to $52.7 million, with four deals valued at more than $100 million in 2020. The firm also revealed that transactions are shifting away from the Americas, with 60% occurring in Asia and Europe compared to 2019.　　Transactions, according to PwC, are also more spread out across categories.　　“With increasing interest in crypto from retail and institutional investors following the positive market momentum, it is not surprising to see increase M&A in the broader train sector,” the report said.　　The report comes amid a rapid rise of interest in the cryptocurrency space, with bitcoin, the most popular digital asset, rising 600% in the past year alone. While many bitcoin bears continue to criticize cryptocurrencies, many advocates are expecting the boom to continue amid rising interest from both retail buyers and institutions.　　The UK-based firm, in the report, then outlined the three trends to expect in the M&A activity in the crypto space

2021-03-30Deep Dive

The promise of smart contract adoption is held back by crypto silos

The internet is buzzing over recent developments in decentralized finance, or DeFi — smart contracts are hotter than ever. You might think you missed the coronation ceremony, but smart contracts are actually used in only a small corner of the crypto world, albeit a corner worth billions of dollars. Its a promising concept that has gone widely unused in the business world.　　Despite the headlines and in spite of crypto-cloistering, smart contracts are not overhyped. The ability to execute secure and complex business transactions is a barrier that keeps plenty of people out of business altogether. Moreover, every major company in the world would jump at a meaningful chance to reduce expenses, due to the endless legal fees involved with business transactions. Although tedious and expensive, unknown business partners must develop a sense of trust between each other to ensure the fulfillment of contracted work. Smart contracts can streamline this process and lower costs for everyone.　　While all of this is true and exciting, smart contracts are almost only used in the world of cryptocurrencies. Although there are billions of dollars flowing through smart contracts, they remain locked in this speculative world of crypto trading. What are smart contracts, and what will

2021-03-30Deep Dive

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