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Bitcoin has struggled to break back over the psychological $10,000 mark in recent weeks but not all cryptocurrencies are treading water, with top 15 token tezos soaringthough some think bitcoin could be about to "explode."

While bitcoin, the world's original and most valuable cryptocurrency, has risen almost three-fold over the last 12 months, tezos has rallied some 400%climbing from under $0.40 per tezos token in February 2019 to just over $2 today.

Bitcoin has failed to move much above its recent highs, falling back after surging higher over the ... [+] weekend. Tezos has, meanwhile, continued to climb.

Tezos, trading as XTZ, has risen by 10% over the last 24-hour trading period, taking its year-to-date gains to almost 50% and giving it a market capitalization of around $1.4 billion.

At the beginning of the year, tezos was the 15th most valuable cryptocurrency by market capitalization, according to CoinMarketCap data, but has now climbed to 11thand is in touching distance of the top ten.

Tezos, which styles itself as a "self-amending cryptographic ledger" and uses the so-called proof of stake consensus model, has emerged as a favourite blockchain and cryptocurrency for tokenized real-estate and security tokens.

Tezos holders, if their funds are stored in certain wallets, can "stake" their XTZ and receive additional tokens as a reward for creating and verifying new blocks in the chain.

The tezos rally, which began in November last year, has been pushed on by major partnerships with the financial world and the so-called Tezos Foundations Faucet, that awards users up to 0.01 XTZ every 12 hours.

Last year, Brazil's BTG Pactual bank and Dalma Capital, a Dubai-based asset manager, announced they would use the tezos blockchain for security tokens. Meanwhile, Elevated Returns said it would use tezos to tokenize its real estate in Aspen.

The tezos price has outperformed bitcoin and most other cryptocurrencies over the last 12-months.

Tezos XTZ tokens began trading in late 2017 at the height of global bitcoin and crypto mania after the Switzerland-based non-profit Tezos Foundation raised $232 million in an initial coin offering.

At its peak, tezos was worth a little over $10 per XTZ token but lost over 95% of its value throughout the dire so-called crypto winter of 2018-2019.

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As Bitcoin Fails To Break Out, This Minor Cryptocurrency Has Surged By 400% - Forbes

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Elon Musk has raised concerns about the "dire problem" of cryptocurrency scams on Twitter.

The Tesla CEO has been consistently targeted by scammers in recent years, who use fake accounts toimpersonate him and trick people into sending them cryptocurrencies like bitcoin and ethereum.

Scams typically involve fake accounts holding "giveaways", which require people to send cryptocurrency to a digital address in order to receive a greater amount in return.

Sharing the full story, not just the headlines

Analysis byThe Independentin 2018 found that more than 400 people sent thousands of dollars worth of cryptocurrency to scammers, however Musk claims the problem is even worse now.

"The crypto scam level on Twitter is reaching new levels. This is not cool," he tweeted to his 31 million followers. "Troll/ bot networks on Twitter are a dire problem for adversely affecting public discourse and ripping people off."

On 3 January, 2009, the genesis block of bitcoin appeared. It came less than a year after the pseudonymous creator Satoshi Nakamoto detailed the cryptocurrency in a paper titled 'Bitcoin: A peer-to-Peer Electronic Cash System'

Reuters

On 22 May, 2010, the first ever real-world bitcoin transaction took place. Lazlo Hanyecz bought two pizzas for 10,000 bitcoins the equivalent of $90 million at today's prices

Lazlo Hanyecz

Bitcoin soon gained notoriety for its use on the dark web. The Silk Road marketplace, established in 2011, was the first of hundreds of sites to offer illegal drugs and services in exchange for bitcoin

On 29 October, 2013, the first ever bitcoin ATM was installed in a coffee shop in Vancouver, Canada. The machine allowed people to exchange bitcoins for cash

REUTERS/Dimitris Michalakis

The world's biggest bitcoin exchange, MtGox, filed for bankruptcy in February 2014 after losing almost 750,000 of its customers bitcoins. At the time, this was around 7 per cent of all bitcoins and the market inevitably crashed

Getty Images

In 2015, Australian police raided the home of Craig Wright after the entrepreneur claimed he was Satoshi Nakamoto. He later rescinded the claim

Getty Images

On 1 August, 2017, an unresolvable dispute within the bitcoin community saw the network split. The fork of bitcoin's underlying blockchain technology spawned a new cryptocurrency: Bitcoin cash

REUTERS

Towards the end of 2017, the price of bitcoin surged to almost $20,000. This represented a 1,300 per cent increase from its price at the start of the year

Reuters

On 3 January, 2009, the genesis block of bitcoin appeared. It came less than a year after the pseudonymous creator Satoshi Nakamoto detailed the cryptocurrency in a paper titled 'Bitcoin: A peer-to-Peer Electronic Cash System'

Reuters

On 22 May, 2010, the first ever real-world bitcoin transaction took place. Lazlo Hanyecz bought two pizzas for 10,000 bitcoins the equivalent of $90 million at today's prices

Lazlo Hanyecz

Bitcoin soon gained notoriety for its use on the dark web. The Silk Road marketplace, established in 2011, was the first of hundreds of sites to offer illegal drugs and services in exchange for bitcoin

On 29 October, 2013, the first ever bitcoin ATM was installed in a coffee shop in Vancouver, Canada. The machine allowed people to exchange bitcoins for cash

REUTERS/Dimitris Michalakis

The world's biggest bitcoin exchange, MtGox, filed for bankruptcy in February 2014 after losing almost 750,000 of its customers bitcoins. At the time, this was around 7 per cent of all bitcoins and the market inevitably crashed

Getty Images

In 2015, Australian police raided the home of Craig Wright after the entrepreneur claimed he was Satoshi Nakamoto. He later rescinded the claim

Getty Images

On 1 August, 2017, an unresolvable dispute within the bitcoin community saw the network split. The fork of bitcoin's underlying blockchain technology spawned a new cryptocurrency: Bitcoin cash

REUTERS

Towards the end of 2017, the price of bitcoin surged to almost $20,000. This represented a 1,300 per cent increase from its price at the start of the year

Reuters

He urged followers to report any suspicious activity as soon as they see it in order to prevent people from falling for the scams.

Twitter could also take lessons from Google, he suggested, by dropping the prominence of malicious accounts.

"Trolls/ bots just need to be deemphasized relative to probably real people who aren't being paid to push an agenda or scam," he wrote. "Google still shows bs/ scam pages, they're just several clicks away."

The issue was raised at a recent employee conference at Twitter, when Elon Musk appeared via video link to respond to Jack Dorsey'squestion about how to improve the platform.

Musk said it would be helpful to differentiate between real and fake users in order to protect the integrity of Twitter and restore trust in its users.

"Basically, how do you tell if the feedback is real or someone trying to manipulate the system, or probably real, or probably trying to manipulate the system," he said.

"What do people actually want, what are people actually upset about versus manipulation of the system by various interest groups."

Musk is not the only high-profile Twitter user to be targeted by such scams, with many figures within the cryptocurrency community also impersonated.

The founder of ethereum, VitalikButerin, has consistently called on Twitter to come up with a solution, as well as cryptocurrency advocate John McAfee.

Twitter has rules in place to prevent its users from being impersonated and claims to have cracked down on scams by implementing various tools.

"We're constantly adapting to bad actors evolving methods, and have made improvements in combating cryptocurrency scams on the platform," a spokesperson toldThe Independent.

"If we see content that is violative of our Financial Scams Policy we take action. We will continue to iterate and improve upon this policy and the industry evolves."

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This is not cool: Elon Musk attacks Twitter over impersonators scamming bitcoin from followers - The Independent

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Up almost 30% for the year already, Bitcoin is on track for its best Q1 performance in seven years.

With a surging price for the month, Bitcoin is eyeing its strongest start to a calendar year since 2013.

It was trading for under $7,200 on Jan. 1st, with a market cap of just over $130 billion. It is now trading at around $9,250, according to CoinMarketCap. Its market cap has surged to $170 billion.

Its first quarter performances have been historically poor, with many pointing to pre-Lunar New Year selling pressure as the cause for its traditionally sluggish starts.

According to data from analytics firm Skew, BTCs best first quarter in the past seven years was in 2017, when it rose by around 11%. That was followed by its worst, with the original crypto plunging by over 50% in only three months at the beginning of 2018.

Currently trending almost 30% higher since the start of January, it is on target to substantially outperform its Q1 average.

With its third block reward halving event set for May, many pundits have suggested that a pre-halving price surge is long overdue. That assertion has been controversial, however, with others arguing that BTC halving events have no impact on price.

Institutional demand could be another reason behind Bitcoins January price surge. Grayscale recently reported 2019 inflows of over $600 million, with a third of that coming in the last quarter of the year. 2019 saw inflows into the fund manager surpass cumulative inflows from the previous six years combined.

There are still two months to play out in Q1 2020. But Lunar New Year has already passed, a supply shock is a little over three months away, and institutional demand continues to rise.

Bitcoins roaring start to 2020 could foreshadow a bullish cycle ahead.

Originally posted here:
Bitcoin on Track for Best Q1 in Seven Years | Cryptocurrency News - Crypto Briefing

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When it comes to politicians it seems that the only common thing about them is that they cannot agree on anything. However, recently another thing emerged that all the worlds governments are uniformly opposed to. Sadly, its not nuclear weapons or acts against human rights. Its a cryptocurrency.

Every expert in the finance industry agrees that the potential of cryptocurrency is incredible. Simply by making remittances cheap, it can trigger a huge change for third-world economies. And yet, this power isnt realized and mostly its because of the blockages from governments.

Why is that so? Dont the governments want whats best for their countries?

To understand why those in power are so wary of crypto and all it entails you need to understand the impact that its already had.

There can be no arguing the fact that the rapid rise of crypto is one of the most important things that happened in the last decade. However, aside from its stellar rise to prominence we also witnessed its sudden fall.

Bitcoin, the foremost cryptocurrency in the world even today, shows this change most prominently. Its value went from about $1,000 to $20,000 to $3,000 and then $10,000 all in the span of two years. That rate of volatility is concerning, but studying the latest bitcoin value trends one can see its more or less stabilized.

The same goes for the cryptocurrency market as a whole. Its not insanely booming as it did in 2018 but its also not rapidly declining. But the most important thing to ask here is why did that decline appear in the first place?

Any matter of global finances is complex and therefore influenced by a gazillion of factors. However, its a fact that one of the main reasons for the sudden downturn in cryptocurrency is multiple anti-crypto policies. Multiple governments of the world panicked as they saw the rapid rate of crypto growth and took steps to slow down or stop this process completely. Some even went as far as to ban bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies.

But of course, such a global power cannot be stopped. Therefore, while the rise of crypto was hindered, the trend for using blockchain technology and digital currencies remained. Today its evolving to fit within the legal regulations or work around them. This proves that despite the best efforts of politicians, the future of crypto is bright.

First and foremost, cryptocurrency has the power of making global trade both fast and more affordable. This alone grants it the power to revolutionize the world economy completely. Its because, despite all the progress in this area, the mechanics of currency transfers are complex and unsafe. Online currency transfer platforms made great improvements in some parts of the world and cut the costs of transfers to under 1%. However, cryptocurrency can make them virtually free.

Moreover, blockchain transactions are instantaneous and extremely secure. This means that global trade can speed up and reduce the level of risk for multiple businesses.

The result is that should cryptocurrency become universally accepted, the global trade will change beyond all recognition. Millions of businesses will receive limitless opportunities for growth and collaboration as cross-border payments will no longer eat up their profit margins.

Cryptocurrency is also untaxable, which means even more savings for businesses and investors. Therefore, they will have more funds to use for growth, boosting the global trade further.

But that lack of taxes is one of the biggest issues that governments have with cryptocurrency. Unlike fiat money, blockchain cannot be controlled and manipulated for political and economic machinations. So, is it really any wonder that governments are so uniformly against it?

Another important thing to consider when discussing cryptocurrency and its impact on global trade is that crypto itself has become a hedge. In fact, its currently growing in popularity as a hedge protecting people from bad governments, in particular.

Yes, volatility does pose some risk, but this risk seems huge to those who live in the US or top EU countries. For people of Venezuela, for example, that volatility isnt such a big issue as compared to the dramatic weakening of their fiat currency that resulted from the governments dreadful policies.

In response to similar situations, people are now considering investing in cryptocurrency the same as investing in gold. Many of them choose this as an alternative to converting their funds to USD, which has long been considered a hedge currency. This only adds to the list of reasons why governments, and the US government in particular, are using different means to hinder the progress of crypto.

The governments need to control the population and money flow is hindering the development of cryptocurrency. However, even unfavorable policies cannot stop the decline of fiat money. Leading financial institutions understand this, so they are trying to jump on the cryptocurrency bandwagon right now.

Bank of England is showing the way by announcing it considers adopting cryptocurrency. Its currently investigating the risks and benefits of using electronic money. In the world thats rapidly becoming cash-free, this is an example of forward-thinking that might make the difference for this particular financial institution.

As banks are rapidly becoming obsolete even for regular money transfers, they are searching for solutions. Money transfer platforms, which offer lower rates and better terms than banks, have a huge competitive advantage. These companies have already pushed banks and traditional money transfer providers to look for any way to improve their own offers. Otherwise, they will be completely ousted from the market.

Adopting blockchain and cryptocurrency is one of the solutions that banks are using to survive today. Over 200 of them are already accepting Ripple and other similar experiments with crypto are running in all major banks.

Money transfer companies also dont want to be left behind. Some of them, like Abra and BitPesa, accept cryptocurrency payments.

All these developments show that crypto definitely has a future. As the decline of cash is definite, blockchain can be the solution that will revolutionize the world economy. However, for this to happen, a change must start at the government level. Until digital currencies are, at least somewhat, legitimized, they wont be able to realize their potential.

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Why Are Governments Really Opposed to Cryptocurrencies?

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Why Are Governments Really Opposed to Cryptocurrencies?

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Coingape

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Why Are Governments Really Opposed to Cryptocurrencies? - Coingape

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