Crypto Guides, Knowledge & Insights

Anchor Begins Countdown to Launch of Bank-Beating DeFi Savings Account

Anchor, the much-anticipated cryptocurrency savings account from the team at Terraform Labs, appears to be finally nearing a go-live date, based on a countdown clock on its website.　　Under the plan announced last summer, Anchor would allow users to hold Terraforms UST stablecoin, pegged to the U.S. dollar, and earn returns that consistently outpace the annual percentage yield (APY) of savings accounts at U.S. banks.　　Anchor represents a significant new decentralized finance application independent of Ethereum (where most of the DeFi action takes place): a basic savings account that should be more than competitive with traditional banks.　　Based on its own implementation of the Tendermint consensus mechanism, UST has a market cap of just under $1 billion, making it the fifth-largest stablecoin, according to CoinGecko. The token has spread from its native blockchain to Ethereum and Solana.　　Anchor was originally slated for an October launch, but the team pushed that to late November. With the countdown showing on the site now, this could really be it.

2021-03-15Deep Dive

Van de Poppe: How To Take Advantage of the Altcoin Bull Cycle

Popular crypto trader and market strategist Michaël van de Poppe updated followers on how to get the most out of the ongoing crypto bull cycle.　　Speaking in a new YouTube video, Poppe outlined a method for altcoin investors to take advantage of the ongoing bull cycle. Poppe recommended following a dollar-cost averaging (DCA) method, whereby investors put small amounts of capital into chosen assets at regular intervals.　　He said:If you DCA into the markets then your horizon is multiple years from here… In that approach if something is running heavily you still want to start DCAing or buying a tiny portion every day… accumulating a position that you want to sustain for the coming years.　　Poppe recommended a swing trading method for investors interested in short-term gains. Under the program, investors look for good entry points on high-risk, high-reward crypto-assets that are limited to a daily time frame. The popular trader warned that shorter time frames increase the risk of investment, and therefore investors should adjust their allocation accordingly.　　Poppe said of short-term trades:　　“The approach is different than when you are swing trading as now you are looking at a smaller horizon. The stop loss and take profits areas also will be closer together.”　　The

2021-03-15Deep Dive

Blockchain funding bonanza

Bitcoin just keeps Bitcoin-ing.　　With President Biden signing the $1.9T COVID relief bill into law, expectations for rising inflation (and the $1.4k stimulus checks as a new source of demand) sent BTC over the $60k milestone.　　The cryptocurrency is now up ~12x in the last 12 months.　　Crypto companies are booming　　The biggest fish, Coinbase, is headed for a $100B+ public debut, while last week saw 2 big funding rounds in the space.　　First up: BlockFi, which raised $350m at a $3B valuation, per TechCrunch. Billed as a financial services startup for crypto, BlockFi offers products for:　　Retail investors: Users can buy and sell crypto on an app. But, crucially, BlockFi also offers interest on crypto savings (6%+) and lends money against crypto holdings so people looking for liquidity dont have to sell their assets (it has lent $10B+ so far).　　Institutional clients: BlockFi provides trade execution services to help organizations secure large blocks of crypto.　　Today, the startup has 265k+ retail and 200+ institutional clients, while monthly revenue has hit $50m (vs. $1.5m a year ago).　　Next up is FalconX…　　… another crypto trading platform that aims at institutions, and which raised $50m. As Bitcoin surged over the past year, the platform saw its revenue increase 46x.　　These funding moves

2021-03-15Deep Dive

Bitcoin Could Completely Replace $5 Trillion FX Market As Base Layer Currency, Says Max Keiser

Bitcoin evangelist Max Keiser says that BTC has the potential to become the new base layer currency and replace the entire $5 trillion foreign exchange (FX) market.　　In an episode of the Keiser Report, the Wall Street veteran takes note of Citibanks recent report that argues Bitcoin has an advantage in global payments due to its decentralized, deflationary, and secure nature, which are characteristics that put the flagship cryptocurrency in a position to go mainstream.　　Keiser highlights that Bitcoins advantages as a medium of exchange in global payments are already making banks, including Citibank, obsolete.　　“It‘s happening right now because the transaction is the settlement, so you don’t need Citibank. It obviates Citibank. It makes Citibank redundant, as are all banks, redundant with Bitcoin. I can trade with you as a currency and it doesn‘t require any bank. It doesn’t require a central bank.”　　While the Citibank report sees Bitcoin as having evolved from a form of payment to a store of value, Keiser believes it is the other way around.　　“And they got it a little bit reversed. They‘re saying it started off as a means of payment and people are looking at it as a store of value, but in fact, it started

2021-03-15Deep Dive

Social token platform Roll suffers exploit, token holdings transferred and sold

Roll, a platform for issuing social tokens on the Ethereum network, suffered an apparent exploit on Sunday, resulting in the theft and subsequent sale of tokens.　　Blockchain data shared across social media indicates that holdings of numerous social tokens issued on Roll were transferred and liquidated, with some of those funds subsequently moved to transaction mixer Tornado. An analysis by The Blocks Igor Igamberdiev indicates that some $5.7 million in ETH was netted during the attack. The market sale of the affected social tokens resulted in significant price declines.　　The creator of WHALE, one of the social tokens affected during the incident, shared additional details on Twitter, noting that “[t]he price dip was a result of our social token issuers hot wallets being compromised with the tokens immediately sold.... This represented 2.17% of total supply and it has been fully diluted into the market.”　　A representative for Roll confirmed that the projects hot wallet was the target of the attack, stating: “Were looking into a vulnerability in our hot wallet and will share more details as soon as possible.” No additional updates have been released as of press time.　　This is a developing story and will be updated as new details become available.

2021-03-15Deep Dive

Tesla’s Elon Musk Wants Coinbase to Become DOGE Friendly

A listing on Coinbase would expose dogecoin to a whole new breed of investor and unleash the cryptocurrencys potential.　　Electric car maker Teslas CEO and unabashed dogecoin fan Elon Musk wants the Coinbase exchange to end its “No DOGE Allowed” policy and list the meme-based cryptocurrency.　　Musk tweeted an exclamatory “Yes” on Saturday after a Twitter user asked the billionaire investor whether Coinbase should enable the Shiba Inu-represented cryptocurrency on its platform.　　A listing on Coinbase would expose dogecoin to a whole new breed of investor and thus unleash its potential. Thats because the U.S.-regulated exchange is considered synonymous with institutional investors and high net worth individuals. Tesla bought bitcoin worth $1.5 billion in February via Coinbase.　　At press time, dogecoin is changing hands near $0.059, representing a 6.7% gain on a 24-hour basis. Prices surged over 600% in January alone and have risen by nearly 1,130% so far this year. Bitcoin, meanwhile, is up more than 100% on a year-to-date basis, according to CoinDesk 20 data.　　DOGE adoption has increased over the past few weeks, with the likes of basketball team Dallas Mavericks accepting the cryptocurrency as payment for tickets and merchandise.　　Leading sports brand Wooter Apparel and medical supplier CovCare recently announced support for

2021-03-15Deep Dive

Ethereum Developers On Why They Don’t See Cardano & Binance Chain As Rivals

It has been an interesting few weeks for Ethereum (ETH). Having hit an all-time high of USD 2,043 on February 20, it has been outshone by a couple of rival platforms and cryptoassets, Binance Smart Chain(and BNB) and Cardano (and ADA).　　While neither BNB nor ADA currently enjoy a market capitalization in excess of 20% of ETH‘s, they’ve both risen proportionally more strongly over the short-term. At the time of writing, BNB has increased its price by around 95% in the past 30 days and ADA by 39%, while ETH is unchanged over the same period.　　Both smaller altcoins also outperform ETH over the past 12 months, raising the question a) of why exactly they‘re beginning to snap at Ethereum’s heels, and b) of whether they pose a genuine threat to the latters dominance as the smart contract platform of choice. Well, Ethereum developers speaking with Cryptonews.com provided two answers: a) high gas fees, and b) no, even if all three chains are likely to end up coexisting.　　Gas fees and the fiction of Ethereum issues　　High Ethereum transaction fees are the main reason why Binance Smart Chain and Cardano have done well recently, yet such fees have also been used to construct a

2021-03-15Deep Dive

Can a Digital Dollar Save the US? JPMorgan Says...It’s Complicated

“No country has more to lose” than the United States as central bank digital currencies (CBDCs) begin to roll out, claims US-based investment banking giant JPMorgan – which suggests that a “modest” digital fiat investment could potentially help safeguard dollar dominance for years to come.　　Per Bloomberg, JPMorgan claims that the United States is currently in a very advantageous position, with the world using the dollar as its global reserve currency. But as digital currency progress continues to intensify, particularly in China and Europe, but also in South Korea and other areas, the greenbacks dominance could be challenged.　　The media outlet says that Josh Younger, JPMorgans head of United States interest-rate derivatives strategy and Michael Feroli, its chief American economist, co-wrote a report claiming,　　“There is no country with more to lose from the disruptive potential of digital currency than the United States. Issuing the global reserve currency and the medium of exchange for international trade in commodities, goods, and services conveys immense advantages.”　　However, rather than delivering a fast knock-out blow, JPMorgan says that dollar dominance will likely be undermined in more nuanced ways if and when CBDCs do roll out elsewhere in the world.　　Particularly at threat, said the analysts, were “more fragile”

2021-03-15Deep Dive

What is an NFT? Why could this be a killer use case of Blockchain?

Does it seem like every venture capitalist is wondering about NFTs these days？ Today, an NFT from Beeple sold for $69m! Did we just see a music album by DJ Justin Blau get tokenized as an NFT and sold for $12m on Origin DShop, all on the blockchain？ Lebron James and other NBA players highlights producing over $230m in sales？　　Read about what is an NFT and why this could be a killer use case of Blockchain below!　　NFTs, or non-fungible tokens, are a type of cryptographic tool that can be used to tokenize unique digital items. NFTs are non-fungible, meaning that they cannot be replaced with an identical item, and are provably scarce, which gives them inherent value.　　In the physical world, individuals exchange things like art and collectibles through physical marketplaces, brokers, and more. The concept of “digital ownership” is significantly fuzzier than “physical ownership,” and thus the digital world lacks a comparable infrastructure for exchange.　　NFTs are a powerful approach for how individuals can “own” items, like digital art, on the Internet in a verifiable way and exchange them for value. By also standardizing what it means to be a “digital item,” NFTs also enable the exchange of digital creations on

2021-03-15Deep Dive

Will Joe Biden's Stimulus Plan Cause the US Economy to Overheat?

American GDP figures published on January 28 show that the country‘s economy continued to grow in Q4 2020 at an annualised rate of 4% compared to the previous quarter. This figure follows on from Q3 2020’s mechanically highly elevated growth figure of 33.4%, which was a result of the collapse in economic activity in Q2.　　This positive sequence has already led observers such UC San Diegos James Hamilton to announce that the Covid recession is over. A specialist in recessions, Hamilton asserts that the recovery in the second half of 2020 was strong enough that, if another recession occurs in 2021, it will be classified as a new phase (we describe this as a double-dip recession).　　In other words, if the Covid recession turns out to be over, it will have been short (two quarters) but extremely sharp. This would make it the most severe recession since World War II.　　Running slow long-term　　So can we say that the US economy has recovered？ Beyond knowing that recessions delimit phases of positive growth and phases of negative growth, given the unprecedented nature and size of this recession we also need to take into account its hysteresis effects.　　A useful concept for economists is the output gap,

2021-03-15Deep Dive

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