This Is How Cryptocurrencies & Blockchain Could Solve Asia's Financial Inclusion Issue

Experts see remittances as an area that could be ripe for VC disruption. The Philippines is not the only country with a high population of overseas workers whose families depend on their remittances. High transaction fees and slow or inconvenient transfer services create extreme hardships on people who can’t afford to spend hours claiming one payment, or who live far from banks or shops that manage remittance payments.

“The costs of these transactions 

which can average as high as 12% in Sub-Saharan Africa — hit the poor the hardest. Technological advances like cryptocurrency and distributed ledgers may offer a solution,” Dr. Garrick Hileman, a cryptocurrency researcher at the Cambridge Centre for Alternative Finance, told Phys.org. "It would be surprising to me if in 30 years from now we aren't looking back and saying yes this was a watershed moment for financial inclusion, and that cryptocurrency and distributed ledgers played a significant role in opening up access to the financial system in developing economies."

A 2016 KPMG article indicated that more than 70 percent of the population in Southeast Asia is unbanked, leaving hundreds of millions at steep disadvantages for achieving financial security. Not having a bank account excludes people from a range of financial products, but fintech companies see mobile technology as a means of closing that gap. Startups like Coins, which use cryptocurrencies behind the scenes to offer fast, low-cost services to their customers, may be on the front lines of improving financial inclusion in Southeast Asia and the rest of the world. Thanks to growing mobile phone penetration, even low-income consumers can take advantage of their services.

“One of the important ways to increase financial inclusion is facilitating the transition from people being purely cash-based to be able to access and use [their] money online. In this regard, cryptocurrencies work very well as railways for seamless fund transfers and being able to pay for services,” Leow said. “The advantage that cryptocurrencies provide relative to other closed-loop systems is that anyone can be connected to the payment network very easily and services can be made available to anyone else on the network.” Remittances and mobile payments aren’t the only ways blockchain technology facilitates inclusion.

“I think payments will continue to be a key functionality for blockchain technologies with adoption continuing to increase as more businesses recognize its advantages,” Leow said. “At the same time, I think that there are also a lot of application-specific solutions using the blockchain for purposes such as digital identity management and smart contracts that are actively being explored that are causing us to rethink how many (typically expensive) business processes are being done.”

For instance, Acudeen, a Filipino fintech startup that helps small businesses by streamlining the invoicing process, uses blockchain technology to ensure that its clients’ contracts are secure. If cryptocurrency does become mainstream, it will likely do so quietly, at least as far as the average consumer is concerned. Luis Buenaventura,  chief technology officer of Bloom Solutions and author of Reinventing Remittances With Bitcoin, told me for a previous article that Bitcoin is “probably best off as a backend technology." Similar to the protocols behind email systems, blockchain technology may drive common services, but users won’t ever interact with it.

Leow shared a sentiment similar to Buenaventura’s. “The challenge from a financial inclusion standpoint is how to facilitate access to these technologies in such a way that easily transitions people from using purely cash,” he said. “We should remember that at the end of the day, people want to get things done and generally care less about the actual implementation of how that happens.”

Chuck Reynolds
Contributor

Alan Zibluk Markethive Founding Member

Meet Bitcoin Plus –
The Next Great Cryptocurrency

  

Chuck Reynolds
Contributor

Alan Zibluk Markethive Founding Member

   The first quarter of 2017 saw dramatic price gains

for the top cryptocurrencies, as the total market added nearly $7bn in value. The so-called 'blue chip' cryptocurrencies – those with a market cap greater than $30m — saw aggressive growth in the first quarter, as bitcoin's waning dominance set the stage for new players to assert themselves. Others, too, saw impressive gains that occurred relatively quickly in recent weeks. All told, the cryptocurrencies posted a median price increase (in USD terms) of 180.56% over the course of the quarter.

Top performers

The two top performers from Q1 2017 were Decred (DCR) and Golem (GNT), which gained 2,410.6% and 835.5%, respectively. Decred is a cryptocurrency that uses a hybridized consensus system instead of relying on either solely proof-of-work (POS) or proof-of-stake (POW). Similar to bitcoin, the DCR protocol sets a 21 million cap to the number of coins generated on the network.

Currently, the largest trading pair for DCR is DCR/BTC. Poloniex serves as the largest marketplace for DCR trading. The majority of DCR’s gains came toward the end of the quarter, and the highest daily volume was achieved on 27 March with $14.03m. As for Golem, most of its gains came during the latter half of Q1. Cryptocurrency exchange announced markets for the token on 17th February, and following the announcement, the price rose approximately 100% with 48 hours, from $.02 to $.04 on 19th February, with a volume of $6.67m.

Prior to the Poloniex announcement, average daily volume was between $20k and $100k per day. A second spike in price occurred on 21st March, following the release of news that GNT would be integrated into Shapeshift.io, an altcoin exchange platform. That particular day, the price increased approximately 22% from $0.045 to $0.055 on $5.28m in 24-hour volume. The final day of Q1, Golem developer Grzegorz Borowik published a blog post announcing Golem for macOS. The news buoyed the market, which boosted GNT to an all-time-high of $0.094 on volume of $11.4m.

Bitcoin struggles

Bitcoin's performance in the first quarter was more muted. The CoinMarketCap's Bitcoin Dominance Index – which measures bitcoin's market share relative to other cryptocurrencies — shed nearly 20%, ending the quarter at 68%. A weakening Bitcoin Dominance Index points to investor preference for alternative cryptocurrencies. Bitcoin (BTC) gained just 7.8% over the course of the quarter. This was a noticeable decrease from its 35.4% gain in Q4 2016.

General fear, uncertainty, and doubt has permeated the bitcoin community and can arguably be blamed for the anemic performance of the cryptocurrency in comparison to alternatives. Furthermore, bitcoin's volatility has tapered off as a result of its maturation, coupled with the evolving narrative that the cryptocurrency is a safe-haven asset.

Chuck Reynolds
Contributor

Alan Zibluk Markethive Founding Member

OneCoin Claims To Have Largest Cryptocurrency Market Cap After Doubling Event

  

Yesterday was quite an interesting day in the world of Bitcoin scams and Ponzi Schemes. OneCoin, the world’s biggest pyramid scheme to date, doubled all user coins last night. This brings the total supply of “coins” to 2 billion, which is ridiculous. In fact, this means that OneCoin is now a bigger cryptocurrency than Bitcoin, according to OneCoin CEO, Ruja Whatsherface. The allure presented by this global pyramid scheme should not be underestimated. People from all over the world are falling for what OneCoin promises, even though they have no blockchain or coins in existence to speak of. The scheme entails the distribution of incoming funds to early investors, whereas new members have to recruit hard to make money.

Now that all of the non-existent Onecoin balances have been doubled, the Ponzi Scheme camp is over the moon regarding its success. Creating a 100% value increase out of thin air is ludicrous, yet millions of people seem to fall for it anyway. In fact, the team claims that their market cap is now bigger than Bitcoin’s. To put this into perspective, OneCoin’s new “blockchain” will allow for 50,000 new coins to be generated every minute. The team is also planning to “go public” with the coin come 2018. How this will be achieved is anybody’s guess, as there is no OneCoin blockchain or coins to speak of in the first place.

What is rather worrisome is how every OneCoin is valued at nearly 7 euros per piece. Keeping in mind how this is all vaporware, one can see that the team is making big money off the backs of gullible people. In this day and age, fooling people with financial promises has become very easy, especially when it’s related to “virtual currencies”.

Anyone who still believes OneCoin is a legitimate scheme will be in for a rude awakening very soon. Governments and law enforcement agencies all over the world are looking to investigate what this cult is offering its members, and it will be shut down sooner or later. Everyone who has funds in OneCoin should pull them out as soon as possible and see if they can pay out. In most cases that will not be possible.

Chuck Reynolds
Contributor

Alan Zibluk Markethive Founding Member

US Government Hacks Global Bank System, Necessity of Bitcoin

  

The US government’s ongoing extensive surveillance

on the global banking system and payment, transfers are demonstrating an urgent necessity of a decentralized financial network such as bitcoin. Over the past few months, various organizations including Wikileaks and Shadow Brokers have exploited most of the malpractices of the National Security Agency of the US. One of the recent tools of the NSA that was leaked and exploited on the dark web was the NSA’s surveillance tool on the Swift global banking system.

Motive of the US Government

Government agencies and law enforcement are required to undergo a lengthy process of filing a complaint and request to the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunications (Swift) in order to gain necessary financial information of certain bank accounts of businesses and individuals.

With a surveillance and hacking tool, however, the NSA can surpass the above-mentioned process by simply gaining access to the actual Swift network without alarming its system and infrastructure. According to representatives of Shadow Brokers, a hacking group that has leaked many pieces of malware in the past, the hacking tool of the NSA allows the US government to surveil financial transactions settled within the Swift network with full transparency. Matt Suiche, founder of the United Arab Emirates-based cyber security firm Comae Technologies, said in an interview with Reuters:

“If you hack the service bureau, it means that you also have access to all of their clients, all of the banks.”

While some security analysts and firms including EastNets denied the claims of Shadow Brokers, prominent whistleblowers and security experts including Edward Snowden explained that if the exploitation of the NSA hacking tool by the security firm Shadow Brokers is in fact, true, it could be described as the “Mother of All Exploits.” In the meantime, Swift announced that its cyber security and research team were not able to find any evidence to conclusively determine the surveillance allegation against the US government.

“We have no evidence to suggest that there has ever been any unauthorized access to our network or messaging services,” said the representatives of Swift.

Necessity of Bitcoin

Whether the US government actually utilized the NSA’s hacking tool to surveil the Swift network without permission from Swift and its clients is not the major issue. The main problem is that such hacking tools exist and they are capable of unraveling transactions settled across the world. Any centralized financial networks such as Swift impose such vulnerability, as any network, server or database connected to the Internet is vulnerable to hacking attacks, surveillance and data breaches if it is not designed to be immutable or decentralized, unlike bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies.

Each transaction on the bitcoin blockchain is identified with cryptographic proof and it can be accessed on the bitcoin blockchain. Most importantly, because the bitcoin blockchain is public, it cannot be manipulated by a government agency like the NSA with sophisticated hacking tools. Although there exists strict Anti-Money Laundering (AML) and Know Your Customer systems in place on the majority of the world’s bitcoin and cryptocurrency exchanges, government agencies and law enforcement agents must go through proper channels to obtain the data.

Chuck Reynolds
Contributor

Alan Zibluk Markethive Founding Member

What Is a Bitcoin Worth?

The virtual currency has seen its value soar in recent years.

  

Bitcoin has existed for less than a decade,

but it has achieved amazing popularity across the globe, and its value has risen along with its use. Shortly after its creation in 2009, one could buy the virtual currency for less than a penny per bitcoin. Now, a bitcoin is worth about $1,250, and many believe that the upward trend for bitcoin could continue indefinitely. Despite there being plenty of skepticism about the inherent value of bitcoin, the currency has survived dramatic volatility without losing favor among its core users.

The history of bitcoin's value

During the first couple of years of its existence, bitcoin saw dramatic gains in price. From its penny valuation in 2009, bitcoin rose to $0.10 by 2010 and first hit the $1 mark in early 2011. That ignited a huge wave of new demand for bitcoin, sending the currency up to more than $10 by mid-2011. Yet at that point, bitcoin showed its propensity for big ups and downs. Within just a few months, bitcoin prices dropped 80%, punishing those who had gotten in at the top and were looking for quick gains. Still, those who stuck with bitcoin earned back their losses, with the currency reaching the $10 mark again in late 2012.

From there, the next wave of interest in bitcoin took the currency to the $100 mark and beyond, climbing to nearly $200 by early 2013. The bankruptcy of the Mt. Gox bitcoin exchange briefly took a big toll on prices, cutting bitcoin's value in half, but before the year was out, the digital currency climbed above $1,000 as market participants increasingly believed that bitcoin would achieve global currency status and prove to be a better alternative to traditional government-issued currency. The frequency of financial crises across the globe during the first several years of bitcoin's history certainly helped feed that theory and added to bitcoin's appeal.

Since then, bitcoin has remained volatile, but not to the same extent as it was earlier in its existence. Prices sank to around $200 in 2015, but the currency picked up steam again more recently. This year, bitcoin regained the $1,000 level and has climbed as high as nearly $1,300.

The true measure of bitcoin's worth

One concern that some have expressed about bitcoin is that the currency has no intrinsic value. Gold coins, by contrast, represent a given weight of an actual commodity with practical applications, and gold investors take comfort in the fact that their bullion is worth something beyond monetary terms. That's not true of bitcoin, which one receives as a reward for solving complex mathematical problems.

Yet bitcoin advocates note that the same is true of paper currency. It used to be that Federal Reserve notes were tied to the value of gold or silver, but those days are long gone. Just as a dollar bill only has whatever value a buyer and seller assign to it, so too does bitcoin have practical value to the extent that those who make exchanges of the digital currency agree on what it's worth.

One reason why bitcoin has become more valuable likely has to do with the fact that one can use it more widely now than early in its history. Many major technologies and retail companies accept bitcoin in the same way they would older currencies, and small businesses have jumped on the bitcoin bandwagon as well. Moreover, with relatively low transaction fees for transfers, bitcoin has become a popular way to move money while avoiding the costly charges that banks and other financial institutions often impose.

Keep an eye on bitcoin

Bitcoin has seen dramatic price increases recently, but the one thing investors in the currency can be certain of is that volatility in both directions will continue. With some calling for continued exponential growth in the value of bitcoin while others believe it's a bubble waiting to burst, the market for bitcoin is sure to be exciting for the foreseeable future.

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Chuck Reynolds
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Alan Zibluk Markethive Founding Member

Imperial College London’s Centre for Cryptocurrency Research and Engineering

Cathy Mulligan, co-director of Imperial College London’s Centre for Cryptocurrency Research and Engineering, believes a dearth of regulation is undermining new financial technologies. Although this might not come as welcome news to libertarian-minded bitcoiners, she believes uncertainty over regulations has stifled growth. “We have the situation in the UK where many startups are chasing the regulator to say, ‘How are we going to be regulated?’ rather than the other way round. Bitcoin in the UK is really treated as private money,” she recently opened. London Bitcoin industry insiders told CCN for this interview that they, and others, are anticipating further Bitcoin regulations in the UK in the coming months.

Ms. Mulligan cites confusing oversight, such as when one exchanges Bitcoin for pound sterling, in the UK,  there is no VAT on the value of the Bitcoin, but, rather, the commission. “From the UK perspective, we haven’t seen huge amounts of regulation,” she says. “They aren’t being forced to have AML [anti-money laundering regulations] or ‘know your customer’ regulation just yet. I think what will happen in Japan is, there will be an influx in startups because the business environment is stable and you’ll know how you’re going to regulate it.”

Indeed, regulators are worried about Bitcoin’s potential anonymity. “At Europol [the EU’s law enforcement agency] they don’t like the anonymity of Bitcoin, which I think perhaps is a bit of a misunderstanding because it is not truly anonymous,” said Eitan Jankelewitz, a lawyer at the law firm Sheridans who specializes in blockchain and e-commerce. She believes regulators should have fewer concerns. “You can trace every transaction and follow it all the way through,” she noted. “You can see the life of a penny and see exactly where it’s been. The problem is that you don’t know exactly who controls those wallets.” Much of the confusion circle around determining what, exactly, bitcoin constitutes.

Dr. Mulligan says: “Some countries are taking it as a commodity like we are, other places are treating it like money and others are treating it as unknown, which changes the way you tax things.” The Imperial College London’s Centre for Cryptocurrency Research and Engineering started early in January.

“Blockchain technology is poised to re-engineer the world as we know it,” said Blockchain at the time. “In fact, there is a general consensus that the technology will revolutionize industries as varied as finance, fashion, government, and healthcare, among others. While the technology offers a great deal of promise, it is in its nascent stages and there is still much to explore in understanding the future we’re helping build. It’s that perspective that keeps us committed to research and development. “

Many lawyers advise Bitcoin and blockchain startups to initiate strict AML and KYC policies, generally speaking, to ensure a smooth business process. To be sure, many Bitcoiners believe no new regulations are needed, and any pre-existing regulation can be applied to the digital currency. Oh, and then there’s those who believe there should be no regulations at all.

Chuck Reynolds
Contributor

Alan Zibluk Markethive Founding Member

A recent debate about Bitcoin as a safehaven

against geopolitics is supported by consistent buying demand for the digital currency. Furthermore, at key junctures in the War on Terror, Bitcoin has increased precipitously, with its best-known price rises coming during heightened geopolitical conflict. For instance, Bitcoin’s first memorable price increase took place as a military conflict in Libya picked up. Recent events have been no different as, despite consistent discussion about concerns over the bitcoin technology itself, the price has increased. Geopolitical tension is on the rise worldwide, and Bitcoin has consistently reached all-time highs. Russia stopped a Security Council statement brought forth by the U.S. on Wednesday to express disapproval of North Korea’s missile tests. China signed off on the measure.

“Russia is slowing this down, and it is not clear why”. The diplomat told CBS News. “The U.S. wanted to get the message out.” North Korea’s failed missile test launch on Sunday mushroomed geopolitical tensions between President Donald Trump and Pyongyang. U.S. Vice President Mike Pence said Wednesday that the U.S. remained committed to its allies but that it would overwhelmingly respond to any attack. The U.S. military intercepted two Russian bombers in international airspace off Alaska’s coast earlier this week, as two F-22 Raptor aircraft intercepted the Russian TU-95 Bear bombers. Navy Commander Gary Ross, a Pentagon spokesman, called the intercept “safe and professional.” Further, U.S. economic data did little to encourage and confidence in the Trump administration on tax cuts have waned in recent weeks.

All this should be considered bullish for Bitcoin. Two months after U.S. military action in Libya, Bitcoin begins to increase from approx 90 cents to $32. The United Nations called for “an immediate ceasefire in Libya, including an end to the current attacks against civilians, which it said might constitute crimes against humanity … imposing a ban on all flights in the country’s airspace — a no-fly zone — and tightened sanctions on the Qadhafi regime and its supporters.” The price of Bitcoin fell to $4 by the end of 2011, as the U.S. military withdrew from Iraq thus ending the Iraq War on December 18. By the November 2015 Paris Attacks in France, which killed 139 and injured 352, the Bitcoin price had reached the 300 handle.

There’s been little to inspire confidence in global relations and economy. Since November 2015, the bitcoin price has increased beyond $1,000 and the gold price, further inspiring confidence in its possibilities as a safehaven medium. Gold and silver have long been considered safehavens by investors, who purchase such assets to protect their investment portfolio from global geopolitical uncertainty. Digital currencies like Bitcoin offer borderless and secure payments. While legacy currencies and payment system are susceptible to capital controls and currency manipulation, many believe Bitcoin is not. This leads to confidence in the digital currency as a potential safe-haven to stave off economic uncertainty.

Chuck Reynolds
Contributor

Alan Zibluk Markethive Founding Member

What is the Willy Bitcoin Trading bot?

  

Trading Bot Pushes Bitcoin Price Higher and Higher

When the infamous Mt. Gox exchange was on the verge of collapsing, there was a lot of discussion regarding the so-called Willy trading bot. Although there have been many trading bots ever since now would be a good time to look wat why the Willy Bot made such an impact on this particular exchange before it went bankrupt.

It has to be said, the years 2013 and 2014 were — for some part — quite enjoyable for bitcoin holders. After the price per BTC started to skyrocket, a lot of people suddenly took notice of this cryptocurrency. Mt. Gox was the center of trading activity, as it was one of the very few exchanges dealing with bitcoin at that time. Unfortunately, this price trend could not be sustained, eventually leading to the Mt. Gox collapse, customer funds being stolen, and the bitcoin price crashing to a low triple-digit value once again.

While most people have been focused on Mark Karpeles since Mt. Gox disappeared,  it is important to remember why the bitcoin price was skyrocketing, to begin with. As it turns out, bitcoin security firm WizSec successfully found the culprit behind this massive bitcoin price pump. The culprit goes by the name of Willy, and it is a bitcoin trading bot that only made an appearance on the Mt. Gox exchange. Willy first started its trading spree in September of 2013, eventually leading to the bitcoin price bubble and crash months after.

It is not hard to see how the Willy trading bot affected the Mt. Gox exchange and all of its users. To be more specific, the Willy bot is responsible for buying large amounts of bitcoin on the exchange over a six-week span. Given the low bitcoin price at that time, it appears the bot had access to enough funds to purchase about 250,000 bitcoin. Up until that point, there had never been such a high demand for bitcoin, which sent the price rocketing to its all-time high with relative ease.

In fact, on some trading ways, Willy accounted for 30-50% of Mt Gox’s entire trading volume. That is a significant amount, to say the least, indicating someone was carefully manipulating the bitcoin price in the process. No one will be surprised to learn there was some manual intervention by the person responsible for using the trading bot on the Mt. Gox exchange. Most people still believe Mark Karpeles is the person responsible for manually driving up the bitcoin price, although it is doubtful we’ll ever know the truth.

To this very day, there are still a lot of questions surrounding the infamous Willy bot. No one knows for sure who developed or used it, which is of particular concern given the current fiat currency issues affecting so many bitcoin exchanges. While it is doubtful anyone is using a similar trading bot to carefully drive up the price across multiple exchanges, the current bitcoin price trend shows some correlations with how things unfolded at Mt. Gox. We can only hope Bitfinex and other platforms are not being manipulated in the same manner, although there is no real reason to think that is the case right now.

It is also worth mentioning WizSec released an official Willy Report back in  May of 2014. Although the security firm was unable to provide answers to every question may have, they did a good job at creating a timeline of operations. Trading boats pose somewhat of a risk to bitcoin price stability, although it appears most creations have become a lot smarter over the past few years.

Chuck Reynolds
Contributor

Alan Zibluk Markethive Founding Member