Coin News

Stripe's lead bitcoin engineer Christian Anderson provides an inside look at the online payments company's bitcoin plans.

Representatives from bitcoin's retail sector discuss how the high price of bitcoin could impact business at CoinSummit.

I went to the Texas Bitcoin Conference. It was a great event overall but one part really stuck with me: the concert, or “Bitcoincert” held at the end of the conference. This “Bitcoincert” was the first ever “Bitcoin-exclusive” concert, where tickets could only be purchased using Bitcoin. One performer at the Bitcoincert specifically caught my full attention: a Jazz and R&B singer, songwriter, and recording artist by the name of Carolyn Malachi. She and her band brought a new groove to the conference; she even had the crowd participate with her in performing some funky tunes. I found myself head-bobbing without thinking twice about it. I had to know more about her. And luckily, I did. After speaking with her, […]

The post Carolyn Malachi: The Grammy-nominated Bitcoiner appeared first on Bitcoin Magazine.

Today, Canada took a huge step forward in carving the path towards global bitcoin adoption. Vault of Satoshi - a Canadian-based bitcoin and alt-currency exchange – made huge news yesterday, March 25th, by announcing their approval as a Money Transmitting Business (MTB) with FINTRAC. What is FINTRAC and why should I care? FINTRAC (Financial Transactions and Reports Analysis Centre of Canada) is Canada’s anti-money laundering and anti-terrorist financing group. They are an independent agency that cooperates with Canada’s government through the Minister of Finance to show Canada’s leaders that businesses are operating in a legitimate way. Their overall goal as an organization is to “be recognized as a world-class financial intelligence unit in the global fight against money laundering and […]

The post Vault of Satoshi Approved by FINTRAC appeared first on Bitcoin Magazine.

Earlier this year, we saw a civil war emerging between Bitcoin's earliest, most anarchist, and most libertarian advocates; and those willing to accept a greater level of regulation. in the name of mainstream adoption.

Thursday afternoon brought more evidence of this conflict.

In new comments on Quora, reddit CEO Yishan Wong heavily criticized Bitcoin evangelists on the very site he runs, calling out the hysteria that can fill Bitcoin forums there. 

Without being too inflammatory, the userbase for bitcoin is basically crazy libertarians who are increasingly poorly-informed about currency systems and macroeconomics.  I say "increasingly" because at one time it was fairly well-informed libertarians but as the currency has become mainstream, it's attracted more poorly-informed individuals and the conversation have become more polarized and less knowledge-based, driving the well-informed and balanced people away, or at least prompting them to recede into the background.

He sees nothing wrong with the currency itself, but says these types of individuals are giving the currency a bad name:

I think that the obsession in the bitcoin community with bringing down central banks, fiat currencies, and governements is misguided and generally misses the point of bitcoin, which I think is that for the first time in history, we have the technology for enabling extremely low-friction electronic payments and certain trust-delegation mechanisms.  That in and of itself is incredibly valuable.  (There are also programmability features in the codebase that potentially open the door for zero-trust contracts and other intriguing possibilities, but they haven't been activated or tested yet)

And he argues it actually makes tracking transactions for illicit good easier.  

I would not be surprised if the NSA is actually heavily in favor of bitcoin, because by combining their other data streams, they can cross-correlate activity on the blockchain and essentially know exactly who is doing what.  

SEE ALSO: The Emerging Bitcoin Civil War

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Former Legg Mason Chairman and Chief Investment Officer Bill Miller has an extraordinary returns record, at one point beating the market for 15-straight years.

And on CNBC Thursday afternoon, he said he personally owns Bitcoins. 

"Bitcoin is like a venture investment. It could go to zero, but what's interesting is the addressable market," he said.

Bill Miller owns #Bitcoins. #Wow @CNBCClosingBell @Kelly_Evans

— Bill Griffeth (@BillGriffeth) March 27, 2014

That of course flies in the face of fellow investment guru Warren Buffett, who called the longterm potential of Bitcoin "a mirage." 

It would also seem to fly in the face of Marc Andreessen's thoughts this week on older white males' appreciation of new technologies.

As we reported earlier today, Bitcoin prices are down about 11% on unconfirmed rumors out of China that the country is banning Bitcoin.

Miller currently serves as portfolio manager of the Legg Mason Opportunity Trust.

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Outspoken Reddit boss Yishan Wong issued some frank views on bitcoin, libertarians and altcoins this week.

Outspoken Reddit boss Yishan Wong issued some frank views on bitcoin, libertarians and altcoins this week.

Outspoken Reddit boss Yishan Wong issued some frank views on bitcoin, libertarians and altcoins this week.

In the long, kabuki saga that is the fall of Mt. Gox, one point seemed always clear: the company lost loads of bitcoin to hackers using a bug called transaction malleability. It seems, however that this is wrong. According to a team at the ETH Zurich University, the company allegedly lost only 386 BTC or $200,000, nowhere close to the 744,408 bitcoins rumored to have been lost in the attack. Read More

The recent decision by the IRS to deem Bitcoin as property and tax it in the mode of stocks, rather than treating it as currency, is going to create a lot more uncertainty for Bitcoin in the short-term. The drumbeat for more clarity and regulation is getting louder in the face of the decision.

At BI Intelligence, we believe Bitcoin's real value is as a payments network. Bitcoin offers merchants and individuals an extremely low-cost, virtually frictionless payments system. Value can easily be transferred around the world without transmitting sensitive information that could be used for fraud, and without forcing merchants to pay exorbitant transaction fees.

But as the IRS decision makes clear, the digital currency still faces stiff hurdles, not least of which are regulatory. 

In  a recent report from BI Intelligence, we explain how Bitcoin works, from the moment when local currency is exchanged for bitcoins, to the moment when it reaches the electronic wallet of a receiving party. We look at the key advantages of Bitcoin compared to the legacy players in the payments industry and examine the challenges that Bitcoin faces as a payment network. 

Access the Full Report By Signing Up For A Free Trial Today >>

Here are some of the key elements from the report: 

• Unlike government-backed currencies, Bitcoin's elegant design places a strict limit on how many units can be created — 21 million. But each coin can be divided into 100 million pieces, which will allow it to scale as a payments technology.
• Bitcoin's daily average transaction volume stands at just $89 million compared to $16.5 billion for Visa and $9.8 billion for MasterCard. 
• In a nutshell, Bitcoin allows for the simple and secure transfer of value online, without intermediaries. There are many players in the Bitcoin ecosystem that help to make this happen, including Bitcoin exchanges, Bitcoin wallets, and miners.
• Third-party bitcoin payments processors already are stepping in to address flaws such as price volatility and the length of time that it takes the Bitcoin network to clear transactions, allowing merchants to instantly process bitcoin transactions and avoid exchange risk.
• Bitcoin faces other significant threats, though, including fraud and regulation. And right now, too much power is concentrated among a small group of miners, which opens Bitcoin up to further vulnerabilities.
• Despite the barriers, we believe the efficiency and low cost of Bitcoin in comparison to legacy payments tools — including credit cards, money transfer services, and letters of credit — will ultimately prove too tempting for merchants, individuals, and business-to-business applications to resist.

In full, the report:

• Examines the problems Bitcoin was created to solve and the elegant solutions it provides which have clear advantages over the current payments system. 
• Gives an insider's view of Bitcoin with exclusive interviews from Bitcoin Investment Trust Founder Barry Silbert and BitPay's Vice President of Marketing Stephanie Wargo.
• Explores the open questions surrounding Bitcoin pertaining to security, volatility, and regulation and provides potential answers to these questions. 
• Analyzes the players in the legacy payments system which Bitcoin has the potential to eliminate if it catches on as a transaction network. 

For full access to all BI Intelligence's charts and data on the Payments Industry, sign up for a free trial.

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With great business relations, many public appearances at conferences and elsewhere, Bitcoin Bigfoot has received the sponsorship of CheapAir, one of the world’s first travel agencies to accept Bitcoin, allowing them to add to their goal of distributing over 100 thousand Plan ฿ brochures meant to promote Bitcoin awareness and adoption. CheapAir joins a growing list of […]

The post Bitcoin Bigfoot Prepares for Plan ฿ Distribution with Big Sponsorships appeared first on CryptoCoinsNews.

In another validation of the Bitcoin space, YC’s biggest payments company Stripe said it has started to test Bitcoin and ACH payments with a select number of users. They didn’t disclose who they’re partnering with, so it appears that they might be going their own way on this. Two of their better-known and funded competitors for processing merchant payments using Bitcoin are… Read More

Stripe is now testing bitcoin payment support with one merchant, but has opened enrollment to more.

Coinfloor is now accepting registrations from users looking to conduct GBP-to-BTC trading.

ANT, a Belgium-based event, is to be the first scientific conference to accept digital currency for registration.

Hive, the creators of an open-source wallet for Mac OS X, are looking for developers to contribute to the company’s expansion. Earlier this year, Hive announced that Hive for Android will be available in late spring, 2014. iOS support is out of the question due to their decision to remove Bitcoin wallets from the app store. With the release of their original OS X wallet, many have asked about a possible Windows or Linux wallet. Wendell Davis, the self-proclaimed “pseudo-CEO” of Hive, has stated that a Windows or Linux wallet will never come to existence “unless an exceptional developer steps up.” Now for a little background on the wallet. On the website, it is described as thus: “Hive was designed […]

The post Hive Wallet is Looking for New Developers appeared first on Bitcoin Magazine.

Bitcoin is crashing on rumors China has banned Bitcoin, CoinDesk's Jon Southurst reports.

This follows an erroneous report that that had occurred last week. 

But this time the reporter writing up the news is sticking by his story, Southurst says, although the PBOC has not released any information:

News that the Chinese government would penalize any bank transacting with bitcoin exchanges after 15th April started to break around mid-morning China time on Thursday 27th March. This time, it was reported as fact by a number of news services.

Here's the price action:

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Since the introduction of Bitcoin the crypto-community has achieved exponential growth strongly driven by monthly meetups, yearly conferences, and exciting events. With a focus on the global Bitcoin economy, organizations like the Bitcoin Foundation and Bitcoin Embassies in the US and around the world have continued to provide education and support to the Bitcoin ecosystem. Now more than ever there is an increased number of conferences and expos scheduled in regions that would have been nearly impossible years ago. With a strong focus on the future of Bitcoin and virtual currencies, upcoming conferences like the upcoming Central Europe Bitcoin Expo (CEBE) in Vienna and Bitcoin Expo 2014 in Shanghai prove the point that Bitcoin is here to stay. This summer, […]

The post Want More Bitcoin? A Look at CEBE and Bitcoin Expo 2014 appeared first on Bitcoin Magazine.

The Bitcoin Foundation, an organization focused on growing the Bitcoin economy, has welcomed another Gold Member to its ever-expanding community of Bitcoin innovators and supporters. BitPay, the newest Bitcoin Foundation member, has shown continuous support since the dawn of virtual currency. As a popular Bitcoin payment processor, BitPay has given businesses across the globe the ability to accept Bitcoin as payment. Additionally, the company’s key spokespeople have also played a large role in the future of Bitcoin in the United States and abroad, speaking out and spreading knowledge of the benefits of virtual currency. As a Gold Member of the Bitcoin Foundation, BitPay will join other key contributors and innovators within the Bitcoin space. In a recent press release, Bitcoin […]

The post The Bitcoin Foundation Welcomes BitPay as Gold Member appeared first on Bitcoin Magazine.

Researchers at ETH Zurich University question whether transaction malleability played an extensive role in Mt. Gox's bitcoin losses.

OneName's developers discuss their open-source approach to simplifying bitcoin payments, and what this means for users.

A new service by credentials management company Jumio hopes to streamline ID verification for bitcoin businesses.

News of a Chinese government bank ban has hit bitcoin markets, though exchanges say there's no official announcement.

Two data nerds went to town on a big leak from the Bitcoin exchange Mt. Gox. What they came up with is not only beautiful, but historically fascinating.

Mark Karpeles must be one of the most talked about people in the world of Bitcoin. Normally, one would be happy to be a trending topic but in Karpeles’ case, I highly doubt that’s the case. The Mt. Gox CEO is held responsible for all the bankruptcy of his exchange and has several lawsuits waiting. […]

The post Mt. Gox CEO Karpeles refuses travel to U.S. for questioning appeared first on CryptoCoinsNews.

There are hundreds if not thousands of cryptocurrency exchanges out there – BTC-e, Kraken, Bitcurex, etc. The choices are endless. As a result, it can be difficult for newer exchanges to stand out unless they provide truly unique features. Fortunately, a new exchange platform called Comkort successfully accomplishes this task. Simplicity The first thing I […]

The post Comkort: A Modern Cryptocurrency Exchange Platform appeared first on CryptoCoinsNews.

Solid research has proven what many bitcoiners have long suspected; transaction malleability did not play a significant, if any, role in the disappearance of 850,000 BTC from Japanese exchange Mt. Gox. Christian Decker and Roger Wattenhofer of ETH in Zurich, Switzerland, combed through the blockchain to tally each instance of a potential transaction malleability attack […]

The post BREAKING: Evidence That Transaction Malleability Did Not Bankrupt Mt. Gox appeared first on CryptoCoinsNews.

Chinese article here. According to reporters, The Peoples’ Bank of China released a separate report to branches around the country in mid March.  The title of the report was this: 关于进一步加强比特币风险防范工作的通知, or the Notice on Further Strengthening Bitcoin Risk Prevention Measures. This document requires all Chinese banks and third party payment processors to shut down all […]

The post PBOC Orders All Chinese Banks And Third Party Payment Processors To Close Accounts Of Chinese Bitcoin Exchanges by 4/15 appeared first on CryptoCoinsNews.

A panel of economists and an entrepreneur discussed bitcoin's troubles, from power usage to distribution and too much regulation.

Robocoin has announced an ambitious new incentive plan for operators that will run through April.

There has been an absolute explosion in the number of companies entering the ATM part of the space. With all this entrepreneurial activity we’ve even seen innovation around the very idea of what an ATM should be. In these last few days alone Diamond Circle has sought to distinguish itself from the pack: announcing its ‘cashless ATM’ concept. The unit will allow users to buy bitcoin with a credit card, and sell bitcoin with their bank account. Singapore based producer Tembusu announced its seed funding round of close to USD 300,000 on the back of its machine debut. Interest in the space is high. While the regulators struggle to comprehend Bitcoin and its implications, an ever-increasing number of ATM manufacturers […]

The post Costa Rica’s MBTC Announces its Bitcoin ATM appeared first on Bitcoin Magazine.

After famed dealmaker Warren Buffett warned investors to stay away from Bitcoin, calling it "a mirage," venture capitalist (and Bitcoin investor) Marc Andreessen called him an "old white man crapping on new technology he doesn't understand."

Bitcoin ATMs, storefronts and slang can grow mainstream adoption. And dogecoin's unlikely success will help build the bitcoin economy.

It was exactly one month ago that Senator Joe Manchin of West Virginia decided to send a letter to regulators demanding a complete ban of Bitcoin. It was rather easy to point out all of the different flaws in the Senator’s argument, but it seems that he’s already changing his tune. While he was very […]

The post Senator Manchin Already Backing Off Bitcoin Ban appeared first on CryptoCoinsNews.

Look out for the new CNY index in the upper right-hand corner of the CoinDesk homepage.