Ethereum (ETH) Price Analysis – Was That A Bullish Breakout?

Ethereum appears to be breaking above its channel top to signal a reversal.

Ethereum had been trending lower inside a descending channel on its 4-hour time frame, but a breakout appears to have taken place. This signals that a reversal is imminent, but price might need to clear a few more hurdles to confirm this.

The 100 SMA is still below the longer-term 200 SMA to signal that the path of least resistance is to the downside. In other words, the downtrend is still more likely to resume than to reverse.

The gap between the moving averages is widening to reflect strengthening bearish pressure. However, price has also broken past the 100 SMA dynamic resistance to signal a pickup in bullish momentum. Ethereum might still need to move past the 200 SMA dynamic inflection point to confirm that an uptrend is underway.

However, RSI is already indicating overbought conditions to show that sellers could still return and push price back inside the channel. Stochastic is also in the overbought zone to reflect exhaustion among buyers, and turning lower could bring sellers back in.

The rebound in cryptocurrencies late last week contributed to a strong rise in ethereum price, but it remains to be seen if the rallies can be sustained. Month-end flows were also pinpointed as a factor leading to the climb, although it’s still worth noting that the market capitalization increased from $304 billion from the end of May to $350 billion over just three days.

In an OmiseGO AMA session, Ethereum founder Vitalik Buterin explained how the network will be able to process 1,000,000 transactions with the solutions of Plasma and Sharding.

It also helped that the dollar was unable to draw much support from stronger than expected NFP data as trade war concerns appeared to dominate its price action. There are no major reports due from the US economy so trade-related headlines could influence dollar behavior and draw enough risk flows back to alternative assets like altcoins.

Author : Rachel Lee On Jun 4, 2018

Posted by David Ogden Entrepreneur

David https://markethive.com/david-ogden

Vitalik Wants You to Pay to Slow Ethereums Growth

Could adding a new fee help preserve ethereum in the long term?

It's a contentious statement in light of the debates ongoing across blockchains over how and when users should pay to support what amount to global computing networks. However, the concept is now gaining notable momentum on ethereum, most recently from the creator of the world's second-largest blockchain himself, Vitalik Buterin.

Buterin's concept, described in a recent blog post, revolves around so-called "rent fees," whereby users would be asked to pay to use the network based on how long they'd like their data to remain accessible on the blockchain.

The idea has recently seen interest generally, as ethereum developers have sought to cope with the platform's increased adoption, and, in turn, the increased amount of data being added that all network nodes need to store.

In short, it's a tragedy of the commons issue – if too many people use the resource for free, the network starts taking on the costs itself. And there's plenty of evidence to suggest that there is already reason to worry.

With rising use spurred by popular apps and ICOs, notable developers, including ethereum researchers Vlad Zamfir and Phil Daian, believe the problem needs to be addressed now.

"No one likes talking about rent, but we need to have this conversation," ethereum developer and Thiel fellow Raul Johnson recently tweeted.

"Core developers need to relay this information to the smart contract developer community ASAP to get their opinions on the matter," he continued, adding:

"The current system as it stands is unsustainable."

Fees, explored

Still, Buterin's backing could be a sign that momentum might build around the idea.

So far, he has broached the idea with a pair of proposals on the subject, including a succinct possible solution he calls "a simple and principled way to compute rent fees." And Buterin's first proposal is as simple as its title suggests.

The idea is to compute fees based on a long-term limit on the "state," a slice of special ethereum data that node operators need to store, which tracks who owns the current information about all apps (including user balances, who has posted so much data in, say, a Twitter replacement app and so on).

Under the proposal, state data stored in a node computer's RAM – now about 5GB – will never be allowed to exceed 500 GB. To ensure this, users will have to pay fees based on how long their data is stored. In this way, data is kept in check, since fees will grow if storage creeps toward that limit.

One notable part of Buterin's proposal is that he tries to incorporate a scaling change that ethereum developers have long wanted to add to the platform.

Although the most recent roadmap claims deployment is still years away, "sharding," as it's known, could potentially boost the amount of resources a database can handle by splitting up the data. In ethereum, the idea is, each node wouldn't have to store all of ethereum's historical data – just a slice of it.

"With sharding, the maximum acceptable state size would be per-shard, so the above fees would be decreased by a factor of 100," Buterin said.

Buterin also tries to address another key problem with rent: its bad user-experience. Most rent proposals today would require users to know how long their data will need to live ahead of time, which would be prone to error.

His second proposal explores a way of quashing this annoying guessing game by letting users use their state even after it has expired. Essentially, they would prove that their state existed at a previous point in time, with the help of a cryptographic technique called a "Merkle proof."

Deep-rooted problem

One problem with all this, though, is that fees, kind of like taxes, are never popular.

Bitcoin's years-long debate, for example, mostly centered on fees and the trade-offs associated with them. If fees are increased, less data will be stored, making full nodes easier to run. The downside, of course, is it would make the cryptocurrency more expensive to use.

One question is whether ethereum users and developers will react the same way, arguing "the rent is too damn high." In this way, Johnson worries that suddenly adding extra fees would alarm developers who have already deployed apps on ethereum.

Johnson argues for changes that aren't so knee-jerk and should be phased in slowly to give developers time to adjust.

Not to mention, some believe a similar rent needs to be applied to all cryptocurrencies. Indeed, scaling problems – and the associated fees – are a problem across blockchains.

Daian went as far as to argue that bitcoin needs to apply the same model. Like ethereum, bitcoin currently doesn't charge for the lifetime of a coin.

"Bitcoin is not free of these issues," he said, arguing that its simpler model incentivizes state bloat in a variety of ways, "exposing users to a variety of other consequences of mispriced storage."

Pricing resources to the right degree is such an important area of research, that Daian, a smart contract researcher at IC3, and others at the institute have set up an initiative called Project Chicago dedicated to the effort.

Even if this is a lesser-explored area and researchers haven't yet found a concrete solution, he's optimistic.

Daian concluded:

"No cryptocurrency has figured out good models for pricing these resources thus far, and ethereum's storage rent represents a step in the right direction towards these goals.

Author: Alyssa Hertig Updated Mar 28, 2018 at 03:07 UTC

Posted by David Ogden Entrepreneur
David ogden Cryptocurrency Entrepreneur

David https://markethive.com/david-ogden

Doge Is Helping Ethereum Solve Its Biggest Issue

A cryptocurrency modeled after a dog meme is proving yet again it's not just a joke.

Created on a whim in 2013, dogecoin isn't simply still around, it's playing a crucial role in the ongoing testing of at least one "serious" technology. In fact, on February 5, it notably factored into an experiment that successfully showcased one of ethereum's more enterprising projects.

On that date, the much-anticipated technology truebit successfully sent dogecoin to ethereum's Rinkeby testnet, where it became a distinct asset on that blockchain. A historic first, the transaction marked the completion of a years-long project developers see as a stepping stone toward the interoperability of crypto assets more broadly.

Nicknamed the "dogethereum bridge," the test also marks the first real release for truebit, which aims to solve one of ethereum's biggest problems: scalability.

In short, the smart contract platform can't support many users right now. Indeed, because of all the data ethereum needs to store in its globally distributed database, it requires more than three times as much data as bitcoin, and that's making it more difficult for users to run.

Though truebit is lesser-known than scaling solutions like raiden and sharding, the technology is perhaps more ambitious because it's designed to scale any type of ethereum computation, rather than just transactions. This is key, since ethereum bills itself as more than "just" a financial cryptocurrency.

In the long run, truebit wants to scale video, machine learning or just about any computation you can think of, and dogethereum is the first use case, so far.

Truebit co-founder Jason Teutsch:

"We built a first version of that, which we're calling 'truebit lite.' It demonstrates that all the core pieces of truebit work. It's a big milestone for us."

$1 million on the line

Backing up, the history of dogethereum is an interesting one.

In the heyday of dogecoin (back when its thriving community could pool together $30,000 in donations to fund a bobsled team), Ethereum Foundation UX designer Alex Van de Sande got together with other developers and set a bounty to incentivize someone to come up with a way to move coins from dogecoin to ethereum and back.

The group locked up the funds in a DAO, a kind of application that runs on ethereum, enabling money to be spent only once specific rules are met. In this instance, the funds were set to only be released if five of the DAO leaders vote to do so by signing approval with their ethereum private keys.

Since the price of ethereum ballooned over the years, the smart contract holds ether worth about $1.2 million today. But no one's received the bounty so far, primarily because running dogethereum in an efficient way has proven to be a much more difficult problem to solve than expected, as Van de Sande pointed out in a string of tweets describing the project's origins.

The heart of the issue is it's too computationally expensive to validate a coin going from one chain to another – and back again – costing millions of dollars in ether. In order to solve this problem, it needs to be less expensive to run computations on the ethereum blockchain.

"This [bounty] kicked off a two- or three-year discussion about how best to implement it," said truebit developer Sina Habibian, adding:

"Dogethereum is representative of a larger problem of how to run big computations."

And dogethereum is how truebit was born – the seemingly silly bridge sparking Ethereum Foundation developer and truebit co-author Christian Reitwiessner's interest in designing a scalability layer on top of ethereum.

The big test

Truebit developers might be getting close to snatching the dogethereum bounty, though, since some successful tests on the Rinkeby copy of the ethereum blockchain have been executed.

The only other step is doing it live.

Truebit built a dogecoin light client, a smaller version of the blockchain that slashes most of the historical data, embedding it in the doge relay so it can securely move coins from chain to chain.

Yet, Truebit's developers stressed the challenging aspect of what they've accomplished, arguing that the dogethereum bridge is different than decentralized exchange via atomic swaps, an idea that's been gaining ground of late. Rather, it's more like sidechains, a long-stalled bitcoin technology.

"We want to actually pull coins off of the dogecoin blockchain and put them onto ethereum in the form of ERC-20 tokens," Teutsch explained. "And be able to move them back."

"You don't need a counterparty. You're doing this completely on your own," Habibian added.

To accomplish this, there has to be some way of locking coins on dogecoin so that they cannot be spent until they are sent back from ethereum. But that's not the most difficult part. What remains computationally expensive is proving that the owner of the dogecoin owns the ether coins on the other side.

They then executed a transaction on the Rinkeby testnet, sending the dogecoin to ethereum – and back again – using truebit under the hood, so the normally expensive proof is executed off-chain, in a much cheaper way.

No estimates

Despite the public debut for the scaling project, though, the team behind truebit still has their work cut out for them.

In this first version of the technology, the incentives are "greatly simplified," Habibian said.

In the technology they have ready today, some of the participants are behaving "altruistically." That is, the system's verifiers are performing expensive computations just to be nice.

And while that probably wouldn't work in practice, truebit's goal is to one day create a marketplace where participants are paid for doing computational work on their computers and contributing correct results.

"People will come out of their own self-interest to run these computations and make money in return," Habibian said.

So, when will all that be ready exactly? Habibian wouldn't give an estimate for how long it will take to launch for real on ethereum.

"It's always hard to make estimates like that because one of the rules of software engineering is, 'However long you think something's going to take, it'll take three times as long,'" he said.

Still, he revealed truebit plans to release new software programs iterating on this milestone in the coming months now that the startup has teamed up with decentralization startup Aragon and ethereum-based video service LivePeer.

That's how they think the technology will spread at first, beyond dogethereum, marking a big step for truebit – and potentially ethereum too.

As Habibian told CoinDesk

"When it's done and it's fully built, you'll be able to run any computation on ethereum."

Author Alyssa Hertig Updated Feb 19, 2018 at 03:41 UTC

Posted by Daviid Ogden Entrepreneur
David Ogden Cryptocurrency Entrepreneur

David https://markethive.com/david-ogden

CFTC Warns Against Cryptocurrency Pump-and-dump Schemes

The rising popularity of cryptocurrencies is of great concern. Especially when it comes to pump-and-dump schemes, there’s reason to be concerned. As such, the CFTC issued an official warning against this type of market manipulation. They advise customers to avoid such schemes, especially when it comes to small and new altcoin markets. It is evident doing one’s research is always the best course of action.

In the world of cryptocurrency, pump-and-dump schemes are nothing new. In fact, they are a lot more common than some people might think. The CFTC has issued an official warning on this topic earlier this week. This is quite a surprise, even though it is evident consumers need to be aware of these manipulative efforts. Especially smaller cap coins and new alternative cryptocurrencies pose a significant risk in this regard. Moreover, it is always best to avoid any promotion on social media altogether.

Avoiding Cryptocurrency Pump-and-dump Schemes

This seems to stem forth from the recent BitConnect issues. That pump-and-dump scheme caused hundreds of millions in financial losses. It was mainly promoted on social media and YouTube. The CFTC doesn’t want history to repeat itself in this regard. They now want consumers to blow the whistle on any suspicious currencies first and foremost. It’s always better to submit tips than ignore pump-and-dump schemes altogether. Whether or not the general public will follow this guideline, remains to be seen.

According to the CFTC, pump-and-dump schemes in the cryptocurrency world take place on social media first and foremost. Online chat rooms, such as the ones on Telegram, are also problematic in this regard. Ignoring these buy signals will prove to be rather difficult for a lot of novice users. It is these people the marketers and scammers prey on first and foremost. A lot of people never do any research for specific coins or projects, even though they really should.

For now, the CFTC will not undertake further action against pump-and-dump schemes. They are not in a position to do so either, unfortunately. It is evident users need to conduct their due diligence first and foremost. Those who purposefully defraud other investors will face legal issues sooner or later, though. Anyone participating in market manipulation also violates the law. It is evident this new financial industry needs some boundaries first and foremost. Cracking down on pump-and-dumps is the right way to go in this regard.

Author JP BUNTINX • FEB 18, 2018 • 03:02

Posted by David Ogden Entrepreneur
David Ogden Cryptocurrency Entrepreneur

David https://markethive.com/david-ogden

Prices Aside, Crypto’s Tech Stack Is Steadily Improving

Prices Aside, Crypto's Tech Stack Is Steadily Improving

Rachel Rose O'Leary and Alyssa Hertig

Feb 11, 2018 at 14:45 UTC

A look at the headlines of late may leave you with a familiar conclusion – with all the ups and downs in the market, it's just too early to take crypto seriously.

And it's true, despite the best efforts of even the industry's most notable developers, the world's largest cryptocurrencies remain not just volatile, but difficult (and risky) to use, at least in a way that their creators' intended.

Still, heading into 2018, enthusiasts the world over are hard at work on improvements.

As such, there's optimism advances could start to compound, creating a user experience that finally starts to transcend the issues – namely, the high fees and long wait times – users of most blockchains have become all too accustomed to.

In fact, in the year ahead, blockchain users could see exciting new features and scientific firsts that just might help push the industry closer to that vision:

1. Off-chain channels

What if it was possible for blockchain-based transactions to avoid using the blockchain at all?

That's the big idea behind off-blockchain payment channels, an idea that harkens back to 2015, but whose time may have finally come this year. Most associated with Bitcoin's Lightning Network, the idea is actually more general than this specific instance.

Essentially, off-blockchain payment channels would allow two people using any one cryptocurrency to send small payments back and forth, settling to the blockchain (and dealing with its high fees and slow transaction times) only when absolutely necessary.

Due to the potential impact, the idea is catching on – ethereum developers, while they often don't see eye-to-eye with their bitcoin peers, are at work on the same type of solution.

But there's more than just a rivalry at play, there's also reason to believe 2018 might be different in that actual live transactions could be sent in significant numbers.

The developers behind bitcoin's Lightning Network have declared the technology almost ready based on successful tests. Meanwhile, ethereum's developers have also unveiled successful tests for their versions of the concept, Raiden Network, with a more ambitious version, Plasma, potentially around the corner.

2. Real-live staking

As their popularity grows, attention is also being paid to the electricity required to sustain cryptocurrencies.

While the relevant data is difficult to pin down, proof-of-work, the consensus protocol that underlies bitcoin mining, is best defined as an energy-intensive process. As such, there are concerns about its electricity use could have large-scale environmental effects.

This is leading to new research on an idea from 2011. Called proof-of-stake, or "consensus by vote," the idea has been implemented, however, not at the scale intended by ethereum.

As such, it's long-awaited project Casper is likely to be under significant scrutiny this coming year, and early versions are beginning to see the light.

In a testnet released on New Year's Eve, one variation of Casper, was claimed to be functional. Karl Floersch, a leading developer behind the technology, told CoinDesk at the time that the code is working with "no hiccups."

Work remains to adapt this early version of Casper across the different ethereum clients, but ethereum creator Vitalik Buterin has said he expects the technology will be tested alongside proof-of-work sometime in the future.

3. Privacy advances

Privacy has been a somewhat neglected promise in the majority of blockchains, but it's nonetheless an issue that could see improvement this year.

Most notable is the advances in zero-knowledge proofs, what Buterin has called "the single most under-hyped thing in cryptography right now," are getting cheaper and easier to deploy.

A form of cryptography that hides information without risking validity, it's already been adapted to a small degree into ethereum, which could lead to a wave of startups experimenting with private smart contracts in novel and unexpected ways.

Plus, in a white paper published earlier this month, a system for achieving zero-knowledge without compromising trust – a point of contention in some earlier iterations of the tech – was released, an update which could have exciting consequences.

And as existing tech matures, privacy-centric cryptocurrencies such as monero and zcash are also set to improve.

In preparation for an upgrade, zcash has been steadily reinforcing its security, while monero is stepping up to implement "bulletproofs," a feature that could cut fees by 80 percent.

4. Decentralized exchanges

No, this isn't just a new version of Coinbase or Kraken.

As the industry's largest exchanges struggle to cope with the influx of new adopters, an increasing number of projects are at work developing something called a decentralized exchange. The term denotes not just a new browser-based exchange, but rather a type of software users can use to swap one cryptocurrency with another without a central entity.

2017 saw a flood of new decentralized exchange projects, such as ShapeShift's Prism, 0x, OmiseGo, Kyber Network, and many others.

Expect those efforts to accelerate this year.

So far, hardware wallet Ledger has already integrated with decentralized exchange Radar Relay, allowing users to trustlessly exchange tokens based on ethereum.

While functionality is limited (it's only supported by a single wallet and only ethereum-based tokens can be sent), many in the industry see it as a glimpse into the future of not just cryptocurrency exchanges, but the technology itself.

Posted By David Ogden Entrepreneur
David ogden Cryptocurrency entrepreneur

David https://markethive.com/david-ogden

Top Cryptocurrencies Price Weekly Prediction â Next Days Will Be Rough For The Crypto Market

Top Cryptocurrencies Price Weekly Prediction – Next Days Will Be Rough For The Crypto Market

Not much has changed for most cryptocurrencies over the past few hours. Bitcoin is, together with Monero, the only currency in the top 10 noting a small loss, whereas most other coins have stabilized or regained some losses. Considering how the weekend is often a dreadful period for cryptocurrency trading this overall trend is rather positive. The total cryptocurrency market cap is heading toward US$90bn as well, which is a positive sign for the future.

CRYPTOCURRENCIES PREPARE FOR A STRONG WEEK

It seems evident most of the top 10 cryptocurrencies are in a good position for some notable gains over the next seven days. Even though we will see one Bitcoin hard fork materialize on August 1st, it is doubtful this will harm the price in a negative manner. Do not be mistaken in thinking Bitcoin Cash tokens come free of charge, though, as they may effectively subtract value from the actual Bitcoin price until the market stabilize.

That being said, we do see the Bitcoin price has dipped a whopping 0.19% over the past 24 hours. That in itself means very little as far as the world’s leading cryptocurrency is concerned. In fact, as long as Bitcoin doesn’t move by 5% or more over the course of 24 hours, there is absolutely nothing to be concerned about. A minuscule change such as this one means absolutely nothing.

lastest prices july

Despite the Bitcoin price “dip”, most altcoins are doing quite well. Ethereum is finally showing some life signs after weeks of declines. The 5.67% gain in the past 24 hours is quite substantial, as the price seems to be heading toward US$200 once again. It is still a far cry from US$400, though, and the currency is not out of the woods just yet. Future declines in value may still be a big part of Ethereum as there is still some funds in circulation which may be dumped across exchanges in the near future.

Other top currencies are showing small gains as well. Litecoin is up by 189%, whereas NEM, Dash, and IOTA all report gains below 1%. The big winners are XRP – up by 3.47% – as well as Stratis – up by 2.99% – and Ethereum Classic, which increased by 1.45%. The bigger question is when people will realize Ethereum Classic is the true, immutable Ethereum chain without SEC scrutiny, highly controversial ICOs, and a blockchain which can be rolled back when founders’ money is stake. Only time will tell if the ETH/ETC correlation will ever see proper momentum, as for now, all the hype and focus is still in Ethereum’s camp.

What is rather surprising is how Monero is the only top 10 currencies to note any losses, other than Bitcoin Monero lost6.41% of its value overnight, which is quite substantial. There is no real reason for this sudden downturn other than people speculating on the other currencies and trying to make a profit. Monero is still a very powerful cryptocurrency with honest developers who aim to provide anonymity to all users. Then again, a price of US$40.65 per XMR is still more than fair, all things considered.

Looking at the individual cryptocurrency market caps, it is pretty obvious Bitcoin remains the undisputed leader for some time to come. This also results in the Bitcoin Dominance Index going back above 50%, as it currently sits at 50.5%. Not too long ago, that percentage was heading toward 40% and lower, but it seems the market has finally come to its senses once again. There is no other currency capable of rivaling Bitcoin right now, that much is evident.

David Ogden
Entrepreneur

David Ogden Cryptocurrency Entrepreneur

Author: Oliver Wood

David https://markethive.com/david-ogden

Are Cryptocurrencies Recovering or is This a Dead cat Bounce?

No one can say there is such a thing as a boring day in the world of Bitcoin and cryptocurrency. After the onslaught of price declines throughout the weekend, we kick off this Monday on a positive note. All currencies are seemingly recovering their losses. The Bitcoin price surpassed US$2,000 again, but it looks like Ethereum is the winner of the day so far. Other currencies all doing quite well too, for now.

CRYPTOCURRENCY MARKET SEES A DEAD CAT BOUNCE

Even though we are not a big fan of the term “dead cat bounce“, it accurately describes what is going on in the cryptocurrency world right now, by the look of things. The markets are showing signs of positive momentum, but there is no reason to get overly excited just yet. After all, the gains made today can easily be wiped out in an hour or two of bearish trading. This is especially true for the currencies showing large gains compared to yesterday.

Taking a closer look at the charts, we can see there is only one coin in the top 50 without a green number next to it right now. Overall, that is a positive sign for cryptocurrency as a whole. At the same time, people have to keep in mind these positive changes are a direct result of the Bitcoin price going up slowly. Should Bitcoin drop in value again, these short-term gains for all altcoins will be wiped out pretty quickly.

While it is good to see the Bitcoin price bounce back to above US$2,000, maintaining that position will be quite challenging. There is a lot of negative pressure on the market, which may push the price back to to the US$1,900 range in the coming hours. Such a retrace will effectively prove to be a tough time for any altcoin struggling as of late, including the likes of Ethereum and Dash.

Speaking of those two particular altcoins, Dash has seen its value climb by 13.52% over the past 24 hours. This is despite a trading volume of under US$50m, mind you. Ethereum, on the other hand, notes an 18.02% gain over the past 24 hours, thanks to a trading volume which even surpasses Bitcoin’s. Many people still hope to see ETH return to US$400, but for now, it is a struggle to remain above US$160.

Seeing the Ethereum trading volume surpass Bitcoin’s is not entirely surprising. Korea and China are trying to push the ETH price back up, yet their efforts are not wildly successful so far. In fact, the price on Bithumb – denominated in US Dollars- is below the ETH/BTC price on Poloniex when converting it to USD. That is somewhat surprising, considering Korean exchanges often depict higher values for cryptocurrencies compared to Western markets.

It is still too early to tell if the cryptocurrency markets are effectively recovering. For all we know, this is just a temporary blip on the radar, which will be nullified before the day is over. It seems plausible to assume Bitcoin will have a tough time remaining above US$2,000 for an extended period of time. The markets remain volatile for quite some time to come, but there is always sunshine beyond the dip. No one needs to panic right now, as things will be alright in the end.

David Ogden
Entrepreneur

Author: JP Buntinx

David https://markethive.com/david-ogden

Cryptocurrency Investors Must ‘Be Prepared to Lose Everything’

Cryptocurrency Investors Must 'Be Prepared to Lose Everything'

Potential investors in cryptocurrencies should focus on finding a great new concept rather than rushing to buy volatile Bitcoins, Dr. Campbell Harvey told Radio Sputnik.

The market in Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies has been subject to remarkable growth but also volatility in recent months.

On June 11, the price of Bitcoin peaked at $3,019, an increase of more than 300 percent since the beginning of the year. However, the price has dropped since then and the cryptocurrency was trading at $2,207 on Friday.

The value of the Ethereum cryptocurrency has also decreased by almost half in recent weeks from a high of $392 on June 13 to $211 on Friday, according to Coindesk.com.

According to BlackRock's global chief investment strategist, cryptocurrency volatility may be a sign of a bubble in the market.

"I look at the charts, and to me that looks pretty scary," Richard Turnill told a media briefing in New York on Tuesday.

Dr. Campbell Harvey, Professor of Finance at the Fuqua School of Business, Duke University, told Radio Sputnik that the sharp rises in the value of cryptocurrencies this year is a cause for caution.

"Any time you see something go up in value by a factor of 20 over a few months, you need to be very cautious," Harvey said.

"I think part of it is just the nature of the actual game, that this is a new technology, it is extremely volatile. For instance, if you look at Bitcoin it is six times the volatility of the S&P 500. It is very volatile and it's very difficult to figure out what the actual value is. If you are speculating in cryptocurrency, you need to be prepared to lose everything," Harvey said.

"In the 'dotcom bubble,' people were basically buying lottery tickets. They saw firms go from one cent a share to $100 a share, it was like a lottery and you didn't want to be left behind. You wanted to have some kind of investment and that drove up the prices very dramatically and I think it's the same thing today with the cryptocurrencies."

'Digital Gold': Cryptocurrencies Soar as Investors Swap Dollars for Bitcoins

Harvey recommended that potential investors do their research before taking the plunge and focus on finding an attractive concept.

"You really need a good story behind a new crypto that you're offering. There will be a lot of people coming in with bad ideas that will get funding. The best way to do it is to invest directly in some of the start-ups in this space rather than just going out and buying some coins."

"When the prices go up so dramatically, a smart investor will basically take some profit and indeed this is what I recommend to your listeners. If you've doubled your money, sell half. What that means is that you've recovered your initial investment and everything that's left is just pure profit and if you lose it, you lose it.

"Given there's uncertainty in the US right now, people are looking elsewhere. Gold is an alternative but gold is real pain because you have to vault it, basically protect the gold. But cryptocurrency is basically extra-national, you need a wallet and backup. You don't need a vault or security guards."

In the future, cryptocurrencies will develop in several different ways. These include collateralized cryptocurrencies and the expansion of the blockchain technology behind them.

"One of the things we'll see is collateralized cryptocurrencies. There's an initiative with the Chicago mercantile exchange and the royal mint group in which they'll put some gold in a vault and issue a crypto based upon that gold.

"As soon as you do that, then the crypto is linked to the price of gold and its volatility is linked to the price of gold. You can do this with anything – with equity, bonds, commodities in general, that you can issue cryptos based on a vault or a storage facility with the actual collateral. I think we are just beginning to see the collateralized versions."

"In a broader context, most of the action in terms of blockchain is not with cryptocurrencies, it's with businesses using blockchain technology to solve things like supply chain problems and other property transfer problems where you don't even need a cryptocurrency. So, as I see it from a business point of view, most of the action won't come from the initial coin offerings, but the application usually of Ethereum-based blockchain technology in business."

"It's not as sexy as looking at the price of Ethereum or Bitcoin doubling or tripling or going up by a factor of 20. In the media, people focus on the cryptocurrencies but in the practice of business the action is blockchain applications to solve business problems, not as much the currency aspect."

David Ogden
Entrepreneur

David https://markethive.com/david-ogden

Ethereum’s share of the cryptocurrency market has exploded

Ethereum's share of the cryptocurrency market has exploded

Ethereum is gobbling up share in the cryptocurrency market.

A new report by Autonomous NEXT, a financial technology analytics service, shows that Ethereum's percentage of the total cryptocurrency market has sharply risen since the beginning of the year.

In January it stood at approximately 5%. As of June 22, its marketcap as a percentage of the entire market rose to 30%.

Ethereum's impressive rise has led to a dramatic fall in bitcoin's marketcap as a percentage of the market. It has declined from about 85% at the beginning of the year to just under 40% as of late June. Up until mid June, Ethereum was on track to surpass bitcoin as the world's largest cryptocurrency by market cap, according to Coindesk, but its share of the market has since pulled back.

Still, the shift from bitcoin to Ethereum reflects a change in what the cryptocurrency industry wants from blockchain tech, according to the report.

"Early phase of cryptocurrency market development focused on who will be the “digital gold” – and Bitcoin won through the largest developer and adoption ecosystem," the report said. "However, current battle is for other functionalities, such as global decentralized computing or smart contracts infrastructure."

Ethereum, unlike bitcoin, wasn't built to simply function as a "digital gold." According to Paul McNeal, a bitcoin evangelist, the Ethereum blockchain was built as a platform on which two parties could enter into a so-called smart contract without a third party. As a result, it can be used as a currency and it can "represent virtual shares, assets, proof of membership, and more."

The multifaceted functionality of Ethereum has many folks in financial services bullish on its future. Mike McGovern, the new head of Investor Services Fintech Offerings at Brown Brothers Harriman & Co, is one such person.

"Ethereum is not only cheaper than bitcoin, it is also more robust and has more applications outside of simply financial transactions," he said in a recent interview with Business Insider.

A survey recently cited by Nathaniel Popper in The New York Times indicates that a lot of businesses are singing a similar tune. Almost 94% of surveyed firms said they feel positive about the state of ether tokens. Only 49% of firms surveyed had a positive feeling about bitcoin.

David Ogden
Entrepreneur

Author: Frank Chaparro

David https://markethive.com/david-ogden

Ethereum Price Drops Below $300 Amid Technical Issues and Cryptocurrency ICO Hype

Things are not looking all that great for Ethereum right now. The popular cryptocurrency suffered a major crash not too long ago and it remains the market is still recovering. The past two days have heralded another downturn for Ether, making it highly doubtful Ethereum will pass Bitcoin in market cap anytime soon. It seems safe to say more volatility is on the horizon for Ethereum holders.

WHAT IS GOING ON WITH THE ETHEREUM PRICE?

Looking over the Ethereum price charts leaves traders and investors disappointed, as their hopes for challenging Bitcoin’s crown subside. More specifically, the ETH price has taken another beating, as it declined by 7.65% over the past 24 hours. This puts the value of one Ether well below the US$300 mark and it is possible this value will keep heading toward US$270 or lower over the coming days. This momentum is not entirely surprising given Ethereum’s bullish trend throughout the first half of 2017.

It is not hard to forget once ETH was worth under US$11 back in early January of this year. Things have certainly picked up over the past few months, culminating in an Ether price peak of nearly US$400, according to Coinmarketcap. Such a spectacular price increase can only be met with future price volatility, which is what we are seeing on a daily basis right now. Even so, the Ether value increase has been nothing short of impressive this year.

Ethereum enthusiasts have referred to a phenomenon known as the flippening all year. This trend would occur once Ethereum’s market cap surpasses that of Bitcoin. Although both currencies were only separated by “just” US$8bn, the gap has widened once again. More specifically, Bitcoin’s market cap is close to US$41bn right now, whereas Ethereum’s is only US$26.32bn. The flippening will not be happening anytime soon at this rate.

The bigger question is why Ethereum is facing such a setback right now. Shifting market conditions are likely the culprit. Moreover, the Ethereum blockchain and its technology are weighed down by the influx of cryptocurrency ICOs. Transactions are confirmed far slower when a big ICO happens, and smart contracts used by these projects often contain issues which need to be fixed later on. The technology is still premature, yet investors also see this can become a much bigger problem if things aren’t resolved quickly.

Speaking of cryptocurrency ICOs, they have quickly become the main use case of the Ether currency. That is not necessarily a positive development either. With so many projects raising funds in Ether, the chances of a market “dump” will increase as well. When teams need funding, they will convert ETH to fiat currency, creating negative pressure across the exchanges. When more projects sell off their raised funds, the price per ETH will undoubtedly continue to go down quite quickly. It is unclear if that is part of the ongoing price drop right now, but it is something to keep in mind.

It is unclear what the future will hold for Ethereum right now. The Ethereum price is very volatile, which is only to be expected at this point. However, Ethereum is not a store-of-value by any means. With so many “dumb money” flowing into Ethereum to participate in cryptocurrency ICOs, it is virtually impossible to determine the real value of the existing coin supply. Technical issues are becoming a major problem as well. If this trend keeps up, the flippening may never happen at all. These are interesting times for Ethereum to prove its value, but so far, the project leaves quite a bit to be desired.

David Ogden
Entrepreneur

Author: JP Buntinx

David https://markethive.com/david-ogden