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US Judge Appoints Receiver To Oversee Butte Bitcoin Plant – MTPR

A U.S. judge has appointed a receiver to oversee a Bitcoin plant in Montana after the majority owner was indicted on federal charges alleging he was running a Ponzi scheme involving cryptocurrency investments.

U.S. District Judge Brian Morris on Friday appointed retired U.S. Magistrate Judge Jeremiah Lynch as the receiver for CryptoWatt in Butte, The Montana Standard reported. Lynch will oversee the company's finances and assets.

Minority owner Kevin Washington and operator Rick Tabish requested the court appoint a receiver. They argued the owner, Matthew Goettsche of Lafayette, Colorado, wasn't paying the bills, which threatened the entire operation, including 32 jobs.

CryptoWatt is behind in paying its power bill to NorthWestern Energy, threatening the viability of the plant, Washington said. Maintaining that transmission contract is key to the operation.

Bitcoin mining requires significant power usage to run specialized computers that process and record transactions in exchange for virtual currency. A Bitcoin was worth $8,748 on Tuesday. Its value peaked at $19,783 in late 2017.

Morris' order directs Lynch to enter into a loan agreement between CryptoWatt and Washington to provide funding for at least three months, to secure all Bitcoin mined by CryptoWatt and negotiate any contracts necessary to keep operating the plant.

The order allows Lynch to collect $22,500 a month for his services.

Goettsche, 37, is charged in New Jersey with conspiracy to engage in wire fraud in connection with his role in BitClub Network. The network solicited money from investors in exchange for purported shares of cryptocurrency mining pools, prosecutors said. He was arrested in Colorado.

Four attorneys listed for Goettsche in court records did not immediately return an email from The Associated Press seeking comment Tuesday.

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Cryptocurrency Market Update: Bitcoin and major altcoins start the trip to the moon – FXStreet

The cryptocurrency market has been growing strongly following the successful launch of options on Bitcoin futures on CME. Positive momentum has been increased by technical factors as Bitcoin and may altcoins broke crucial resistance levels and thus attracted new speculative buyers to the market. The cryptocurrency market capitalization increased to $228 billion, while an average daily trading volume reached $99 billion. Bitcoin's market dominance is registered at 68.1%.

The largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization hit the intraday high at $8,587 during early Asian hours and retreated to $8,517 by. press time, The coin has gained over 5% both on a day-to-day basis and since the beginning of the day. Despite the retreat, BTC/USD is still trading above critical $8,500, reinforced by 50% Fibo retracement for the upside move from December 2018 low to July 2019 high. While the short-term trend remains bullish, the intraday volatility has been decreasing gradually.

Ethereums price action took it above $151.00 to an intraday high of $151.61. The strong bullish move was triggered by a decisive breakthrough above $148.00. The prevailing short-term trend is bearish as the coin has been in retreat from the recent high, though the longer-term perspectives look good as long as it stays above $150.00.

Ripple came close to the highest level of $0.2255 and retreated to $0.2200 by press time. The third-largest digital asset has been growing steadily after the resistance of $0.2100 gave way. XRRP/USD has gained 4.5% since the beginning of Monday, moving in sync with the market. The short-term trend is bullish.

Bitcoin SV (+25%) - $204.93

Dash (+23%) - $81.00

Litecoin (+7.6%) - $53.96

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Adam Back: $10 Million Bitcoin Prediction Is Closer Than It Sounds – CCN.com

According to Blockstream founder and cypherpunk, Adam Back, Hal Finneys $10 million price point for bitcoin isnt so far fetched, though, the reasons behind these levels may not be as apparent as you may think.

When it comes to price predictions, crypto analysts often tout the most hyperbolic and over-inflated projections imaginable. From the more modest end of the spectrum at around $10,000, toward the virtually inconceivable heights of $10 million, valuations within this space can vary wildly.

Regardless, some augers of these seemingly aggrandized price points do sometimes offer a reasonable explanation to support them.

Currently circulating its way around the ecosystem are some of the earliest price predictions ever made, and per Back, they may well come to fruition.

Hal Finney is frequently praised as one of the most respected cypherpunks of all time. The late programmer is also among the list of presumed identities for Satoshi Nakamoto. Finney was involved in BTC from the get-go. He was the first known recipient of bitcoinand a fervent contributor to its algorithmic foundations.

Moreover, Finney was also responsible for the first-ever price predictions.

Merely a week after the mining of bitcoins genesis block, Finney opined that BTC could grasp a value of $10 million per coin. This hypothesis was basedas many BTC predictions are these dayson bitcoin becoming a de facto global payments system.

Finney wrote:

As an amusing thought experiment, imagine that Bitcoin is successful and becomes the dominant payment system in use throughout the world. Then the total value of all the currency should be equal to the total value of all the wealth in the world.

Finney went on to suggest that throwing a few cents of compute time was actually quite a good bet. As we all know, he wasnt wrong. In 2010, mining one BTC block would have netted a cool 50 BTC for virtual pennies. Today, 50 BTC fetches a princely sum of around $400,000.

But as for bitcoin becoming a quasi global standard of exchange, the jury is still very much out.

In defense of his fellow cypherpunk, Adam Beck vindicated Finneys prediction. Rather than place too much emphasis on a monetary revolution, the Blockstream CEO instead focused on inflation of the dollar. According to Back, as the greenback steadily depreciates due to inflation, bitcoin willby contrastcontinue to grow, thus increasing its price point against USD.

Back continued to rationalize the prediction by remarking how a few years ago $10k looked insurmountable:

$100k Bitcoin doesnt seem so far given we already crossed $10k threshold a few times when few expected even $1k some years back and $10k seemed crazy.

So, while bitcoins climb atop the financial system may take a few years to materialize, in the meantime, we can look forward to steady fiat devaluation providing a better ROI.

This article was edited by Sam Bourgi.

Last modified: January 13, 2020 2:09 PM UTC

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Whale Alert: $1 Billion (0.7% Of Total Bitcoins) Just Transferred For $80 Fees – CryptoPotato

Bitcoin set the stage for an impressive price increase throughout the whole market with a positive run to over $8,800 at one point. Amid all this, the popular transaction monitoring resource, Whale Alert, detected a $1 billion transaction carried out with BTC.

The last 24 hours have been nothing short than impressing in the market. The largest crypto was trading at around $8,100 before it skyrocketed to $8,850 on Bitstamp in just several hours. Even though it has slightly retraced since then and its currently trading at about $8,700, its still a 7.5% increase in a day.

Moreover, a specific user has found a massive transaction of 124946.622 BTC, which represents 0.7% of all bitcoins that have been mined so far. To put things into a fiat perspective, with Bitcoins price of $8,700 at the moment, this means that the total value of the transaction exceeds $1.08 billion. The user also says that it originated from a Bitfinex cold storage address, but the recipient is still unknown.

Interestingly enough, the large amount was transferred from one address to another for a fee of just 0.00964, which is $84 at the time of this writing. This may showcase Bitcoins full potential as a peer-to-peer electronic cash system, as no central authority had to be involved in any way.

As it generally happens, Bitcoins price surge didnt stay unnoticed by the rest of the market. Most altcoins recorded staggering increases during the day, as well. Arguably the most significant gainer is Bitcoin SV, which at one point was over 100% up and reached a new all-time high of $413.

Other coins that followed the move include EOS (20%), which was above $4 for the first time since September 2019. Litecoin (15%) was trading north of $60 for a while. Thats a level that LTC hadnt reached since November last year.

Bitcoin Cash and most privacy coins also noted similar impressive gains. As a result, the whole market capitalization increased by almost 10% today from $216 B to upwards of $237.

Its still unclear if this transaction of $1 billion worth of bitcoin is the real reason behind todays price surge. However, its a serious possibility and more importantly, it outlines Bitcoins true power, serving as a decentralized means of payment.

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Teslas Elon Musk Teases Bitcoin Community With Tongue-In-Cheek Tweet – Forbes

Elon Musk, the busy chief executive of both electric car maker Tesla and space exploration group SpaceX, still finds time to troll on Twitterwith the bitcoin and cryptocurrency community a regular target.

Musk, who often generates headlines with his Twitter account by posting both memes and serious news about his businesses, has previously praised joke bitcoin-rival dogecoin and discussed the second most valuable cryptocurrency, ethereum, on the site.

Now, the bitcoin and cryptocurrency community, many of whom are still pondering bitcoin's latest roller-coaster, have been left scratching their heads after Musk tweeted "bitcoin is not my safe word," early on Friday morning.

Elon Musk made his fortune from payments company PayPal before setting up Tesla and SpaceX. Musk has ... [+] previously used micro-blogging platform Twitter to praise bitcoin and other major cryptocurrencies.

Bitcoin and cryptocurrency watchers follow the likes of Elon Musk and Twitter's Jack Dorsey closely, with many hopeful the next wave of bitcoin and crypto adoption will come on the back of uptake from Silicon Valley's biggest technology companies.

In December, Dorsey, who like Musk heads up two U.S.-listed companies, revealed he plans to spend time in Africa this year and wants to help develop bitcoin and crypto businesses there.

Musk has, however, indicated he won't be getting into cryptocurrency directly. Musk has calledbitcoins structure "quite brilliant," though at the same time poured cold water on suggestions Tesla could get into the bitcoin businesses.

Last year, Musksurprised the bitcoin and cryptocurrency community by saying that the meme-based dogecoin is his "fav" cryptocurrency, even ahead of original cryptocurrency bitcoin.

When Musk tweeted the word "ethereum" last year he quickly followed it up by tweeting "jk"thought to be an attempt at preventing Twitter from suspending his account, which has previously been locked after tweeting about cryptocurrencies due to bitcoin and cryptocurrency give-away scammers using his name and likeness.

The bitcoin price has struggled since hitting highs of around $14,000 in early July last year.

Meanwhile, shares in Tesla have soared this week, with its market value now topping the combined value of U.S. rivals Ford and General Motors and landing it the title of the highest-valued automaker of all time.

The sharp rise in Tesla's valuation, which has doubled since October, comes after it revealed a surprise third-quarter profit and delivered a record 367,500 cars in 2019.

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Former Coinbase VP: we moved billions of dollars into Bitcoin in large part because of Plaid – CryptoSlate

Dan Romero, former vice president at leading crypto exchange Coinbase, confirms that the US-headquartered trading platform has been able to move billions of dollars into Bitcoin (BTC) through the US automated clearinghouse (ACH) system, which is a large electronic fund transfer system that handles payments in the country.

Romero pointed out that while using the ACH system for Bitcoin transactions may be convenient, its reversible and thus fraud-prone. He notes that Coinbase has been able to use ACH in large part because of what Plaid provides. He adds that this is the underrated part of the crypto adoption story in the US.

Zach Peret, co-founder and CEO at Plaid, revealed on January 13 that the company had been acquired by giant payment firm Visa. Plaid provides firms the tools and access needed to build a digitally-enabled financial system.

Based in San Francisco, California, Plaid is a technology platform designed to make it easier and safer for startups and large financial institutions to develop innovative financial services and applications.

Perret remarked:

Today marks an important milestone for our company and for Fintech. What started with two founders building in a cramped conference room has become an incredible network that enables millions of consumers to interact with over 2,500 digital finance products.

He adds that when Plaid was first launched, nobody had heard of Fintech, or financial technology. Today, the Fintech ecosystem has become significantly larger than what it was just a few years ago, Peret reveals. This has significantly improved the way that consumers live their financial lives, he argues.

He goes on to mention that consumers now depend on convenient Fintech services to pay utility bills, send funds to their friends, help them save, manage educational loans, and create budgets to achieve their financial goals.

Perret said:

Joining forces with Visa, a brand that is trusted by billions of consumers, and financial institutions in over 200 countries and territories, represents an incredible opportunity to continue to scale our products.

Plaid aims to leverage the Visa brand, company resources, and international presence to better serve its clients and business partners, Perret adds.

He also notes that Plaids management was quite impressed by the Visa team because both companies share the same vision when it comes to developing the future of financial services. Perret confirms that Visa wants Plaid to function as an independent business so they can continue to focus on what theyre already doing so well.

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These Factors Suggest Bitcoin Cashs Recent Rally is Just Getting Started – newsBTC

The past week has proven to be highly bullish for the controversial Bitcoin hard fork Bitcoin Cash (BCH). This cryptocurrency was able to post a meteoric surge just a few days ago in tandem with the upswing incurred by the altcoin markets, and it appears to be on the cusp of forming another massive leg up.

Analysts are now noting that BCHs recent uptrend could soon turn parabolic as its technical and fundamental confluence continues to grow increasingly bullish.

At the time of writing, Bitcoin Cash is trading up nominally at its current price of $267, which marks a notable climb from its daily lows of $262 and only a slight decline from its daily highs of $269.

Earlier this past week, BCH was able to post a massive surge that allowed it to climb from lows of $230 to highs of just over $270. This massive rally came about concurrently with upswings seen by most major altcoins, with the two most prominent Bitcoin hard forks Bitcoin Cash and Bitcoin SV both leading the markets.

BCHs ability to maintain stability around its recent rallys peak points to underlying strength amongst the cryptos buyers and may suggest that it will soon see significantly further upside.

Technical analysis seems to further support this notion, as Big Cheds, a popular cryptocurrency analyst on Twitter, explained in a recent tweet that the crypto is currently caught within a bull flag consolidation pattern, signaling that it could be on the verge of another breakout.

$BCH #BitcoinCash Daily chart Bull flag consolidation while testing MA 200, he explained while pointing to the charts seen below.

Bagsy, another popular crypto analyst on Twitter, explained in a recent tweet that he is bullish on Bitcoin Cash due to a plethora of different fundamental and technical reasons, pointing to BCHs upcoming mining rewards halving among other factors as one reason why hes bullish on it.

$BCH: To expand my bullish thought process: 1) Halving coming up (May 24th) 2) 4th tap of horizontal resistance 3) Massive bullish divergences on HTF 4) Volume growing. Im prepared for a pullback into 0.031 with additional bids, he explained.

The convergence of all the aforementioned factors does paint a highly bullish picture for Bitcoin Cash and they all seem to point to the possibility that its recent rally is currently in its early phases.

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2019 Bitcoin Transaction Volume Moved Away From US in First Since 2013 – Cointelegraph

For the first time since 2013, the U.S. is no longer the top recipient of Bitcoin (BTC) as valued in USD, as Singapore took the lead over the course of 2019.

As of Dec. 5, 2019, global users sent BTC valued at $8.58 billion to Singapore in 2019, according to analytics site Crystal Blockchain. Users in Singapore received more dollars via Bitcoin last year than anywhere else in the globe.

The U.S. held the top spot from 2014 to 2018 but slipped to 2nd place, receiving $7.46 billion in BTC, per Crystal Blockchains data.

Singapore, however, did not send the most money via Bitcoin last year. Island country and BitMEX host site the Seychelles sent the greatest USD amount of Bitcoin in 2019, valued at $10.07 billion and holding the second spot on the list for overall transaction volume, according to Crystal Blockchains data.

The U.S. came in third overall on the list of Bitcoin transaction volume a tumble for the country considering it previously held the top spot for five consecutive years. In 2013, the United Kingdom saw the most money flowing in and out via Bitcoin.

Many top exchanges in the crypto space have found homes in countries outside the U.S. and the European Union, which host notoriously stringent regulations.

Crypto derivatives giant BitMEX operates its headquarters out of the Seychelles, the site of the most Bitcoin value outflow in 2019. Binance is also located in Malta.

Still, several large exchanges have retained their position on U.S. soil, including Coinbase, Kraken and Gemini, with Binance also setting up a regulation-sensitive branch in the country.

Earlier this month, Singapore-based crypto exchange Bibox announced plans to delist crypto asset XRP from its platform, according to Cointelegraphs reporting.

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Top 3 Price Prediction Bitcoin, Ripple, Ethereum: Higher levels to watch after the bullish run – FXStreet

Blood on the streets? Not so fast 0 but cryptocurrencies resume their rises and hit higher levels. Investors flocked to Bitcoin, Ethereum, Ripple, and others after the US killing of top Iranian general Qassem Suleimani and as prospects of war were rising. When the world's superpower and the regional leader defused tensions, digital coins dropped.

But now, cryptos are climbing once again. Reports of significant adoption, new money entering exchanges and other explanations have been given to the rise. What are the next levels to watch?

This is what theCrypto Confluence Detector shows in its latest update:

Bitcoinhas been leading the charge forward, but the granddaddy of cryptocurrencies is now the worst-positioned coin among the majors. It needs to convincingly overcome the dense cluster of lines awaiting around $8,490. This includes the Bollinger Band 4h-Upper, the Pivot Point one-month Resistance 2, the previous week's high, the SMA 50-15m, and more.

If it runs higher, the next target is $9,155, which is the meeting point of the PP one-week R2 and the PP one-month R3.

BTC/USDhas significant support at around $8,220, which is the convergence of the PP one-day R1, the Fibonacci 23.% one-week, the previous daily high, the SMA 50-1h, the SMA 200-15m, and more.

The next cushion is at $8,050, where we note the confluence of the SMA 200-1h, the SMA 50-4h, the Fibonacci 38.2% one-week, the PP one-day S1, and the previous daily low.

Ethereumis well-positioned to continue higher. Vitalik Buterin's brainchild enjoys massive support of around $149.60, which is a juncture including the previous 4h-low, the PP one-day R2, the PP one-month R1, the BB one-day Upper, the BB 4h-Upper, and the SMA 10-1h.

It enjoys another considerable cushion at $139.50, which is the confluence of the Fibonacci 61.8% one-month, the SMA 50-one-day, the PP one-day S2, and the Fibonacci 61.8%.

Looking up, initial weak resistance awaits ETH/USD at $153, where the previous monthly high and the BB 1h-Upper meet.

The upside target is $170, where the PP one-month R2 hits the price.

Ripple, similar to Ethereum, enjoys substnail support and may target higher levels. It is trading just above $0.2186, which is the convergence of the PP one-day R2, the Fibonacci 23.6% one-week, and the SMA 50-15m.

A dense support cluster awaits it at $0.2117, which includes the SMA 5-one-day, the Fibonacci 23.6% one-day, the Fibonacci 61.8% one-month, the SMA 200-1h, and the SMA 50-4h.

XRP/USD's first target is $0.2330, which is last month's peak, and then $0.2437,where we see the confluence of the Pivot Point one-week Resistance 2 and the 100-day Simple Moving Average.

See all the cryptocurrency technical levels.

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Bitcoin Equivalent of $4.7 Trillion Added to US Debt is $260k per BTC – Bitcoinist

Bitcoin equivalent of the $4.7 trillion US debt that was signed into federal law by President Trump would put the price of a single BTC at $260,000.

In a drive for expansion, US President Donald Trump has signed $4.7 trillion into law, since his inauguration in 2017. Those debt levels have been prepared to serve the US economy until 2029, with matching tax and spending policy changes.

The US President was faced with several debt ceiling situations, leading to eventual new agreements to borrow more. The US debt to GDP ratio has kept growing, with more borrowing scheduled in the coming years.

The $4.7 trillion of debt signed into law by President Trump is on top of the current $17.2 trillion debt held by the public and the $9.2 trillion we were already expected to borrow over the next decade absent these proposals. Debt is projected to be about 97 percent of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in 2029, compared to 82 percent if none of this debt-increasing legislation had been passed, showed analysis from the US Committee for a responsible budget.

The growth in US debt has sparked a discussion on what would happen in an event of hyperbitcoinization. Bitcoin (BTC) could hypothetically map any economy, and at current prices, its valuation matches the size of a small countrys money supply.

But if all BTC in circulation, which is a bit above 18 million, were mapped to the current US debt figure which was added to the next budget, the fair price for BTC would be above $200,000. To be more exact, the price could reach well above $260,000 if debt reached all its targets. This level is relatively small in comparison to prices that could match the global economy, and are far from the $1 million valuations.

The $200,000 hypothetical price range is rather close to the predictions of BTC reaching $100,000 within the coming few years. BTC has no way to predict prices exactly, but may have the potential to spike to higher levels.

BTC is moving around 00, finding new powers to expand from Decembers lows, and move into the new year. But for now, institutions are more cautious, with hedge funds shedding crypto assets for now, due to periods of extremely bad performance. Still, BTC adoption has grown over the last decade, sparking expectations the leading coin will be much more than a fad.

What do you think about the chances of bitcoin jumping to higher valuations? Share your thoughts in the comments section below!

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