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Ripple Launches Crypto Liquidity Hub To Assist Customers In Buying, Selling, And Holding Cryptocurrencies.

Ripple harnesses the power of cryptocurrency and blockchain to pay for everyone, anywhere, anyway. Financial institutions can join the growing Ripple global network (RippleNet) to instantly, reliably, and cost-effectively process customer payments from anywhere in the world. Banks and payment processors can use XRP digital assets to cut costs and expand their market presence.

Ripple, a leading provider of enterprise blockchain and encryption solutions, has announced Ripple Liquidity Hub, a new solution for enterprise customers that will be available in 2022. Customers can access crypto assets on a variety of global platforms, including market makers. , a decentralized platform via exchanges, OTC tables, and future Ripple Liquidity Hub. Customers can easily buy, sell and store crypto assets thanks to turnkey product integration and smart order routing, allowing them to receive digital assets at the best price.

With plans to scale to more tokenized assets, the GA launch supports BTC, ETH, LTC, ETC, BCH, and XRP (availability varies by geographic location). Ripple plans to add new features like bidding support and monetization capabilities in the future.

Ripple has used Liquidity Hub for internal liquidity management for nearly two years as part of its On-Demand Liquidity (ODL) product, generating multi-million dollar transactions. Ripple will now serve hundreds of customers around the world, not just financial institutions, banks, fintech, or businesses that need help preparing for the imminent cryptocurrency world.

“We understand firsthand the need for simple and effective liquidity management, so we’ve been asked by clients looking for a solution that could be a one-stop shop for buying, selling, and storing crypto assets,” said Ashish Birla. RippleNet CEO.

Ripple’s cryptographic DNA and long history of partnerships with financial institutions provide a unique opportunity to help clients address this challenge as they prepare for a tokenized future.

Unlike other solutions on the market today, Liquidity Hub is tailored to the needs of enterprise customers.

Easy Onboarding: Provides an optimized API to access digital assets from diverse liquidity pools, enabling businesses to quickly integrate with liquidity hubs and provide trading services to clients, creating new revenue streams.
Optimized Pricing: Businesses can offer optimized aggregate prices for a wide range of digital assets, enabling them to offer their clients the best possible prices from a variety of liquidity sources.
Access to Capital: Businesses do not need to pre-fund their Liquidity Hub account and can access working capital through Ripple to finance their business operations.

Coinme is the largest network of licensed cryptocurrency exchanges in the United States, with thousands of locations across the country, and is Ripple’s first alpha product partner. Initially, Coinme plans to use its underlying technology platform, Liquidity Hub, and add additional features available.

“Coinme provides an easy and convenient way to exchange cash for cryptocurrencies. To provide our clients with optimal prices for a wide range of assets, we need 24/7 access to the liquidity to manage this vast network. “We are excited to work with Ripple to bring these benefits to our customers and businesses,” said Coinme CEO Neil Bergqvist.

Ripple was the first corporate company to use cryptocurrency to solve a multi-billion dollar cross-border payment problem. Since then, Ripple has evolved from a cross-border payment network to a platform that provides tokenized services, providing businesses with crypto opportunities and preparing for a future where cryptocurrencies are in the spotlight. Liquidity is critical to and supports any cryptocurrency experience.

Going forward, all clients will sign up for RippleNet with the same basic service and wallet that supports both crypto and fiat currencies. Customers can adopt this technology to stay on the cutting edge with the latest blockchain-based solutions. The platform is designed to seamlessly upgrade and add new services as customers wish. Customers can store anything tokenized in a Rippleenable-enabled wallet.

RippleNet closed its best quarter so far, announcing more than 20 new ODL markets, including new deployments in Japan and the Middle East and a 25x increase in the international flow of the network.

Ripple announced the creation of a liquidity hub as the company continues to seek legal action with the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) accused Ripple Labs CEO Brad Garlinghouse and co-founder Chris Larsen of raising more than $1.3 billion through XRP. sued with The Commission is considering an offer of unregistered securities.

Team YTS

Bitcoin Price continues to fall as Chinese officials exclusively target Crypto Mining.

Digital currencies have gained a lot of popularity and demand in a very short span of time. Unfortunately, the world’s largest and most popular cryptocurrency which hit an all-time high under $65,000 during mid-April has fallen to 45% of its valuation. Many people, especially the younger generation, invest and trade using digital currencies. But, China has recently imposed stricter regulations and speculative measures so that the financial risks are minimized on mining and trading of the world’s largest cryptocurrency.

The Financial Stability and Development Committee of China which is chaired by Vice Premier Liu He, said that Bitcoin needs more regulation. So, last Friday, the valuation of Bitcoin fell more than 11% after doubling the monitoring efforts. For most of the London and Asian session, the value of Bitcoin was $40,000 which dropped to $35,928.

Imposing Strict Speculation on Cryptocurrency

The Chinese Government and other officials of the country are now determined to rule out any possible loophole that will increase the chances of fraud in Cryptocurrency. Before the Chinese officials made any public statement, three Chinese industries already imposed a ban on banks and payment companies which carried out crypto-related services. This escalated the situation and finally Liu He released the order of crackdown on Bitcoin publicly. It is for the first time that crypto mining is targeted by the government.

After the statement by China, John Wu, President of Ava Labs commented that the statements made by China were not very specific. So, it might be difficult to understand the course of action or the real impact of the situation that will take place in the following days. He further added that the statement by Liu He makes it clear that Bitcoin mining is very risky in China as it relies on the will of the government.

The New Rules

With China imposing double measures on digital currencies, there are new rules proposed by the Chinese government. According to the government proposal, every cryptocurrency exchange that is operating in Hong Kong is bound to be licensed by the city’s market regulators. From now onwards, they can only provide services to professional investors. In response to this new announcement by the Chinese government, Ruud Feltkamp, chief executive officer at crypto trading bot Cryptohopper, said that, China is trying to tackle Bitcoin, its mining and trading since 2013 so again doubling down efforts to stop fraud in digital currencies is not a surprise anymore. But, he further said it will be a surprise if this has substantial long-term effect on Bitcoin.

Last Friday, China’s state broadcaster CCTV warned its audience against the systemic risks of cryptocurrency trading during a commentary on its website. The exact words that CCTV said were, “Bitcoin is no longer an investment tool to avoid risks. Rather, it’s a speculative instrument.” It further mentioned that cryptocurrency is a very lightly regulated asset which makes it a good option for trading in the black market, money laundering, drug dealing, and every other kind of illegal business. While the Chinese government is trying to enforce strict rules on Bitcoin, the rival cryptocurrency Ether is also losing its valuation.

Sudden Awareness of the Chinese government

Before China decided to declare a crackdown on Bitcoin, the U.S.Treasury Department just a day before China’s declaration announced some new rules. According to these new rules, the large cryptocurrency transfer should be reported to the Internal Revenue Service and the Federal Reserve flagged the risks cryptocurrencies posed to financial stability (Gadgets 360). The Bitcoin market operates around the clock so the traders have to be vigilant as any time unpredictable price swings might occur.

For many people, the concept of Bitcoin is not very clear. One should know that Bitcoin is a form of digital currency that does not have any relationship with the bank or government and the user can spend it in any possible way. The users also have the option to buy or sell Bitcoins in exchange for U.S. dollars and other currencies. But, seeing that digital currencies especially Bitcoin are becoming a very dominating source of monetary trading in illegal activities, the Chinese government is enforcing strict rules and regulations.

Annasha

Annasha Dey is an NIT student, who apart from studying engineering is also a content writer. She has a great interest in photography, writing, reading novels, and travelling as well. She is a foodie who loves socializing and hanging out with her friends. She is also a trained Kathak dancer and a big fashion enthusiast. Dey also loves watching TV series, which includes F.R.I.E.N.D.S. and Big Bang Theory. To be a better writer she prefers to read more

Nakamoto Mystery Worth Billions of Dollars: How Bitcoin founder Nakamoto left with no trace.

Leave a Comment / Founder, Tech Story / By Athulya

Bitcoin has emerged as a game-changer in world-economics attracting millions of users and buyers. An international digital currency that took the world by a storm at the start of the decade still continues its run. Rewarding investors handsomely, and turning them into millionaires has made this commodity very valuable. However, one of the most fascinating aspects of Bitcoin is its founder, Satoshi Nakamoto. This mystery remains unsolved as people know little about him. After releasing this commodity which forever changed the dynamics of international economics, he disappeared. Here’s a look behind the scenes at the mystery and the success of the Bitcoin.

What is Bitcoin?

Bitcoin is a type of decentralized digital currency or cryptocurrency, having no banks or administrators. This currency goes from one person to another, without relying on middle-men, via a network. The system works on the principle of block-chain technology through which transactions are verified and recorded in a public ledger. The idea started taking shape in 2008 by a person or group who used the pseudonym Satoshi Nakamoto. The platform went open source in 2009 and quickly gained popularity. People started trying to learn more about, and ‘mine’ these bitcoins to exchange them for other currencies and products. By 2017, over 4.8 million unique users had their own cryptocurrency wallets.

Nakamoto Creation of the Bitcoin

In August 2008 the domain name “bitcoin.org” was registered and within a couple of months, Satoshi Nakamoto authored a paper titled “Bitcoin: A Electronic Cash System”. It came out as open-source software in January 2009 with Nakamoto’s identity remaining unknown. The author himself mined the first block, called the genesis block two days after launching. Hal Finney became the first receiver when Nakamoto sent him 10 bitcoins, and soon enough other people joined the chain. The first commercial exchange occurred in 2010 when 10,000 coins gave Laszlo Hanyecz two Papa John’s pizzas. Since then, the coin has become an international phenomenon and currently, one single Bitcoin costs around 5.5 lakhs!

Disappearance and Mystery

Nakamoto mined around a million bitcoins and disappeared in 2010, leaving everyone in shock. Before leaving, he handed over the network key to Gavin Andresen, who became the lead developer at the Bitcoin Foundation. Silk Road was a major investor early on, carrying out transactions worth more than $214 million. The coin started 2011 at $0.30 and grew to $5.27 by the end of the year, having hit $31.50 in June. Alternate coins soon came out with the first one being Litecoin, which came out in 2011. A year later, Bitcoin rose to $13.30 and in the same year, investors and developers found the Bitcoin Foundation.

Explosion and Growth

In 2013, the industry really exploded and the Bitcoin grew exponentially, starting the year at $13.30 and ending it at $770. The same year, FinCEN built some regulatory guidelines for the bitcoin, making it a legal entity. A huge hit came in late 2013 when the People’s Bank of China banned Chinese institutions from utilizing bitcoins. After two years of constantly rising and falling prices, in 2016, the prices steadily rose to $998. In 2017, the prices sky-rocketed, hitting their highest value of $19,783.06 on 17th December 2017. In 2018, the prices fluctuated, mostly staying above $5000, being negatively affected by hacks and thefts. Also read

Who is Nakamoto?

As the Bitcoin grew, Nakamoto’s importance grew with it, with him being a figurehead to the entire institution of digital currency. Most discussions regarding the future development of the bitcoin constantly feature his name. Also, the founder also holds cryptocurrency worth around $5.8 billion, making him an important investor. While people made numerous efforts over the years, the search for Nakamoto’s identity has proved difficult and elusive. Here’s a look at the three most probable candidates.

In 2014, Newsweek stated that Dorian Nakamoto is Satoshi Nakamoto via an article, creating a storm within the crypto-environment. The article claimed several similarities between the two, including a Japanese connection and similar philosophies. However, Dorian denied these claims, but still profited from it as people gifted him 67 bitcoins worth $273,000.

Australian scientist, Craig Wright announced in 2015 that he had been involved with bitcoin for a while. This led to large-scale investigations with people claiming he was Nakamoto. However, over time, the proof came out which unraveled Wright’s claim to being Nakamoto. Even Ethereum cofounder Vitalik Buterin, who is in most cases silent came out against him. Conspiracy theorists have even stated that the founder could be a group of companies. For example, Samsung + Toshiba= Satoshi and Nakamichi +Motorola=Nakamoto! Like “Finding Nemo”, the quest for finding Satoshi Nakamoto is on, and let us hope we get a name soon enough! However, in spite of this mystery, the industry continues to grow, being already worth billions of dollars.

Athulya

Being a cinephile with a love for all things outdoorsy, Athulya never misses a chance to chase inspiring stories or poke fun at things, even when the subject is herself. Currently pursuing a degree in mechanical engineering, she is someone innately interested in technical and scientific research. Music reviews and op-eds define her as they allow her to explore different perspectives. Though sometimes she thinks she makes more sense playing the guitar than she does while writing.

How NEO Became China’s Answer to Ethereum?

Leave a Comment / Story, Tech Story / By Athulya

The cryptocurrency industry is one that is growing at an unprecedented rate. The environment has grown tremendously in the last five years and is now a billion-dollar sector. Several entrepreneurs owe their millionaire status to this industry. This time around we will be looking at two such millionaires. But all this success has led to a saturation in the industry, and it is now highly competitive. With new currencies propping up every year, it is difficult to stay ahead and stay relevant. One such new cryptocurrency that is gaining momentum is NEO. Here’s a look at how this currency came up and the story behind its success.

NEO Vs Ethereum

Ethereum is the second most popular cryptocurrency, second only to the Bitcoin. However, NEO has been creeping up behind Ethereum and is very close to catching up to it. The competition between the two is so fierce that is has earned NEO the nickname “Chinese Ethereum”. The currencies are going head to head against each other because they are very similar in many aspects. For instance, both currencies are multi-purpose, unlike the Bitcoin.

However, NEO gets a lot of support from the developer community as it supports C++, C#, Java and even Go. Therefore, developers skilled at one of these languages can build projects on NEO. Furthermore, the system has the power to handle over 10,000 transactions/second. In comparison, Ethereum supports only 15 transactions/second.

Growth in China

One of the biggest support that NEO receives is from China. China creates alternatives for most services provided around the world. For instance, Alibaba goes head to head with Amazon, while WeChat battles WhatsApp, and Baidu takes on Google. In the field of cryptocurrency, NEO is China’s answer to Ethereum. So much so that has become China’s largest cryptocurrency due to support from the Chinese government.

About the Founder

Da Hongfei, who co-founded NEO, also founded AntShares in 2014 for a decentralized app building. This company later became NEO in 2017 via a re-branding scheme. Hongfei and Antshare’s CTO Erik Zhang founded Onchain in 2014. This company served as a blockchain research and development company.

Onchain levied partnerships with Microsoft China and Fadada throughout 2016 to build this company. These three companies together became Legal China later on. Hongfei also serves as a communication link between his company and the Chinese government and works as their consultant on matters regarding cryptocurrency.

Growth and Success

Onchain was also the first Chinese blockchain development company. In 2016, NEO released China’s first consensus protocol called dBFT. It is this protocol that allows NEO to carry out lightning-quick transactions. NEO started 2017 priced at $0.16 and then grew a miraculous 111,400% to end the year at $162! The company’s current market share stands at a whopping $4.96 billion.

The company opened with 100 million NEOs, out of which, 50 million went to early investors, and the rest went into a smart contract. Every year, 15 million tokens get released to fund development and research. In 2018, Da Hongfei announced that the company would split into NEO Foundation, under Hongfei and Erik Zhang, and two units named NEO Global Development and Global Capital.

NGD will work on research and development, while the Foundation would handle everything to do with operations and marketing. NGD opened its first office in Shanghai in 2018 and the second one in Seattle.

The word “Neo”, in Greek, means new, modern and young. With their fresh ideas and young team of professionals, it does look like NEO is the newest kid on the block with the power to disrupt the cryptocurrency industry.

Athulya

Applications Of Cryptoassets Led Coinbase To The Unicorn Club

Leave a Comment / start-up, Tech Story / By Annasha

We talk about a new era of technology where the Internet has made our lives pretty easier. The modern technologies and types of equipment have been beneficial to our medical, educational and industrial systems as well. But, it is high time we put a little attention to our financial system.

The world is changing but the subject, that is, mankind is constant. Since time immemorial humans have improvised the world. Speaking of the modernization in our financial system, the major population is not familiar with the concept of cryptoassets.

Defining cryptoassets is similar to introducing one to a whole new financial world. They are nothing but digital assets with the implementation of cryptographic techniques. There are no central parties to monitor any transaction. Coinbase is a company based on such digital assets which made billions over the span of seven years.

Coinbase

Currently, Coinbase is the United Nation’s largest crypto assets exchange. In June 2012, Brian Armstrong and Fred Ehrsam founded the company. Within five years the company hit annual revenue of $ 1 billion. The company’s headquarters is based in San Francisco California.

The main products of Coinbase are Bitcoin, Bitcoin Cash, Litecoin, Ethereum and exchange of digital assets. The bitcoin transaction of Coinbase takes place in more than 190 countries worldwide.

Brian Armstrong

Brian Armstrong completed both his Bachelor’s and Masters from Rice University. While he was an undergraduate student in Computer Science he worked as an intern for IBM. He also worked at Deloitte & Touch for five months.

In August 2003, Brian co-founded UniversityTutor.com and in 2011 he joined Airbnb.com as a software engineer. He resigned when he decided to build Coinbase.

Fred Ehrsam

Fred went to Duke University and has a B.S degree in both Computer Science and Economics. He also carried research on Self-assembling DNA Nanostructures from Duke University.

He started off his career as a Trader on GoldmanSachs and worked there for a couple of years. In 2012, he co-founded Coinbase with Brian Armstrong and now serves as the Board of Directors. Fred also co-founded Paradigm in June 2018. He also appeared in Forbes 30 Under 30.

Early History

Back in June 2012, Ben Reeves, co-founder of Blockchain.info was also a part of the founding team of Coinbase. But, due to mismatching of future plans, he left shortly. The company wasn’t in its full form back then. After it participated in the Y Combinator startup incubator program it finally started providing services from October 2012.

Initially, the company launched the service buying and selling bitcoin but who knew it would be a scope of investment in the near future. Once the company sees through it never really had to turn back.

Investments, Growth, and Expansion

The company’s Series A round took place in May 2013. Coinbase raised a funding of $5 million from venture capital firm Union Square Ventures. After a few months, the company again received a funding of $25 million from Andreessen Horowitz, Union Square Ventures and Ribbit Capital.

The next year Coinbase hit a million users. It also implemented a lot of new things in their systems. Some of them were a vault system for secure bitcoin storage and secured insurance for the bitcoin stored in the company’s server.

In 2015, the company received a funding of $75 million from Draper Fisher Jurvetson, New York Stock Exchange, etc. 2017 was a big year for Coinbase as it received the BitLicense. The company was given legal permission to trade in Ethereum and Litecoin. On 5^th April 2018, the company formed Coinbase Ventures to invest in companies with similar grounds of interest.

Coinbase Ventures made its first investment on May 20 on Compound Labs.

Acquisitions and Partnerships

Coinbase made its first acquisitions in 2014. It acquired Blockr, blockchain explorer service and Kippt, a web bookmarking company. In the same year, the company came into joint ventures with Overstock, Dell, Expedia, etc. The company also made a deal with PayPal, Braintree and, Stripe which allowed users bitcoin payment.

Recently, Coinbase has acquired a company called Neutrino. The company was acquired for an undisclosed amount. A lot of questions have been coming up since then. Some information came up regarding Neutrino’s founders having a connection with the Hacking Team. Hacking Team is a Milan based company that sells information to the government and clearly has a poor human rights record.

In August 2019, the company announced a hacking attack. A questionable acquisition followed by a hacking attack has clearly put the users in a dilemma. But, Coinbase declared that nothing was compromised and everything is secure.

Annasha

Samsung is Launching a Blockchain Smartphone Named KlaytnPhone

Leave a Comment / News, Product, Tech News / By Yashica Vashishtha

Samsung is releasing its foldable smartphone today in its home country, and along with that, the company has come with another announcement that includes a new blockchain-based smartphone. Yes, a post from Wall Streat Journal has revealed that Samsung is working on a new flagship smartphone that will support cryptocurrency and will be called as “KlaytnPhone.”

The company has already got about ten smartphones’ release this year, including the Samsung Galaxy Fold, Galaxy S10s, Galaxy Note 10s, and now, it looks like the company is not stopping on them only. Samsung has chosen the name KlaytnPhone for its blockchain smartphone, which is inspired by a South Korean cryptocurrency built by the subsidiary company, Ground X Corp, of Korean internet company Kakao.

The smartphone actually belongs to the Galaxy Note 10 series and has got most of the features similar to the smartphones in this series. But there will be an inbuilt crypto wallet and support for blockchain included in it. Like the foldable smartphone from Samsung, for the time being, KlaytnPhone will also be available only in South Korea. According to the WSJ, the early buyers will also get a specified amount of cryptocurrency coins, i.e., Klay from Ground X Corp.

Klay is a newly launched cryptocurrency that Kakao released last year in October through its spin-off arm Klaytn. Cryptocurrencies and blockchain have been a topic of discussion for all. And, even being around for the past decade, there have been many questions about the authenticity of these technologies. But most of the big tech companies have always stood in favour of it. So the main purpose of Samsung to develop such a smartphone may be to get people familiar with this very technology and make it more user-friendly.

According to the reports, the prices for the new KlaytnPhone will start at $1000. There have been no comments from the company as yet, and if believed, according to Cointelegraph’s reports, Samsung has already launched a blockchain supporting smartphone in March this year, which is Galaxy S10. The company was also planning to build its own cryptocurrency and has invested $2.9 million into the French cryptocurrency company Ledger.

Yashica Vashishtha

Yashica is a Software Engineer turned Content Writer, who loves to write on social causes and expertise in writing technical stuff. She loves to watch movies and explore new places. She believes that you need to live once before you die. So experimenting with her life and career choices, she is trying to live her life to the fullest.

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