Coin News

Bitcoin wallet provider Airbitz has raised $450,000 from new industry-focused VC firm Block26.

In this episode I talk to the host of Bitcoins and Gravy, John Barrett, about many things, including being a performer working for Bitcoin. Later in the episode, after The Ode to Satoshi is played, Andrew Vegetabile from the Litcoin Association comes on board to talk about the recent rise of Litecoin, and things related to the major altcoin. If you have any requests for people you'd like to see featured on this podcast, just e-mail me at [email protected]. Thanks! Featured image from Shutterstock.  

The post Podcast Episode 12: Litecoins and Gravy appeared first on CCN: Financial Bitcoin News.

In this episode I talk to the host of Bitcoins and Gravy, John Barrett, about many things, including being a performer working for Bitcoin. Later in the episode, after The Ode to Satoshi is played, Andrew Vegetabile from the Litcoin Association comes on board to talk about the recent rise of Litecoin, and things related to the major altcoin. If you have any requests for people you'd like to see featured on this podcast, just e-mail me at [email protected]. Thanks! Featured image from Shutterstock.  

The post Podcast Episode 12: Litecoins and Gravy appeared first on CCN: Financial Bitcoin News.

Bitcoin in the Headlines is a weekly analysis of bitcoin media coverage and its impact. The fires of one of bitcoin's hottest recurring debates raged on this week, with the digital currency's potential use case as a safe haven asset during times of economic crisis taking the forefront amid continued struggles in the eurozone. The focal […]

The government of Jersey, the largest of the Channel Islands, has published a consultation paper on the risks and regulations for virtual currencies, including bitcoin. The report will be similar to that of Financial Action Task Force previously covered by Bitcoin Magazine. However, the government of Jersey is engaging in a public virtual currency consultation process from July 9 to August 7. With the participation of virtual currency and cryptography enthusiasts, the government of Jersey is set to publish the final consultation paper after all feedback and responses have been considered. The document will focus on money laundering risks and terrorist financing risks associated with digital currencies and the possibility of using the blockchain technology to create a standard ledger […]

The post Government of Jersey Publishes Consultation Paper on Risks and Regulation for Digital Currencies appeared first on Bitcoin Magazine.

American credit-card company Visa has once again showed its interests for bitcoin at WIRED Money held in London. Jonathan Vaux, executive director of new digital payments and strategy at Visa Europe, who attended the session on behalf of Visa announced: “The one thing I often get asked about is bitcoin. I do see … a separation between the currency and the technology that sits under it. From the point of view of currency, I think that’s interesting. As Visa, that’s what we do – we manage currencies.” Vaux said Visa is deeply interested in the blockchain technology which stands as a backbone of bitcoin as a currency, and suggested that Visa could implement the technology to ease the settlement and transfer […]

The post Jonathan Vaux at Wired Money: Visa Deeply Interested in Integrating Blockchain Technology appeared first on Bitcoin Magazine.

Plus: CitiGroup dips its toe in Bitcoin's pond and how Elon Musk's money is being used to protect AI from obliterating humanity

In May, Bitcoin Magazine reported that the leading stock exchange Nasdaq would begin experimenting with the blockchain technology that powers Bitcoin. In June, Nasdaq announced a partnership with San Francisco-based Bitcoin API startup Chain to implement the first blockchain technology pilot projects in Nasdaq Private Market, a recently launched marketplace that handles pre-IPO trading among private companies. In a recent analysis, the prestigious MIT Technology Review notes that, though it’s much too early to tell whether bitcoin is the future of money, the Nasdaq experiment will test whether it can be the future of financial record-keeping. In the Nasdaq Private Market pilot project, record-keeping via the blockchain will complement a cloud-based data management tool that tracks who owns shares of […]

The post Nasdaq Dives Deeper into Bitcoin Research and Blockchain Partnerships appeared first on Bitcoin Magazine.

In an announcement at the Inside Bitcoins Conference in Chicago, Matthew Roszak revealed the Chicago Bitcoin Center, an incubator that will act as the “center of gravity for blockchain-based technologies.” “Chicago has a rich history and DNA in financial technology, and the blockchain has the potential to provide a new, open-source rail for FinTech innovation. The Chicago Bitcoin Center is open to designers, developers, entrepreneurs, and all those dedicated to building tomorrow’s next chapter of financial technology,” said Roszak in a statement. The goal of the Chicago Bitcoin Center is to provide office space as well as mentorship by other bitcoin entrepreneurs, investors, and technologists. Further, the Center will also provide public relations and government affairs support. “The financial industry […]

The post Chicago Bitcoin Center Launches at 1871 To Support Blockchain Startups appeared first on Bitcoin Magazine.

A group of Chicago entrepreneurs and investors have launched the city's first bitcoin and blockchain hub. Opening today at Chicago's 1871 – an entrepreneurial centre home to 325 early-stage digital startups – Chicago's Bitcoin Center will provide a co-working space, mentorship, public relations and government affairs services to blockchain-focused startups. Matthew Roszak, CEO of the Chicago Bitcoin […]

In another sign that the Bitcoin and the Blockchain are becoming a platform for the long term, BitFury, the Bitcoin Blockchain infrastructure provider and transaction processing company, has secured $20 million in funding from investors including DRW Venture Capital, iTech Capital and the Georgian Co-Investment Fund. Among other things, Bitfury offers the HexFury, a USB mining rig with six… Read More

Dutch payment company Adyen ended 2014 with a bang.

In December, the payment processing platform, which counts Facebook, AirBnB, and Spotify as clients, raised $250 million (£161 million) at a $1.5 billion (£970 million) valuation.

Adyen CCO Roelant Prins sat down with us at Wired Money to explain why the company is worth so much. It all boils down to the fact that the payments industry is huge, but doesn't really work very well right now.

Adyen thinks it's found a way to do payments more efficiently and in the process make more money for clients.

The old system of payments involves lots of different parties doing lots of different things, each one handling things like risk, banks, and merchants. Because of the complexity and the fact that a lot of the systems are old, there's a lot of waste.

"A big problem for merchants is that about 15% of credit card payments are refused, but only about 25% of that is because of insufficient funds," Prins says. "A lot of it can be dealt with."

"Some is actually caused by the fact that the existing infrastructure in payments is old. Banks that issue credit cards have their own systems that were built a long time ago. Then the acquiring banks that have dominated this space for a long time have a very old systems, typically 30-40 years old. You have these older systems talking to one another to try and make payments work."

Adyen combines all the pieces of the payments puzzle — payment gateway, risk assessment, and acquiring technology— into one platform that lets companies take any number of payment methods worldwide: credit and debit cards, Apple Pay, and even bitcoin.

Prins says that merchants using Adyen's platform see another 2-4% of credit card payments go through. That might not seem like a lot but for companies like AirBnB that do huge amounts of business, it can make a big difference to their bottom line.

Adyen currently processes $35 billion (£22.5 billion) in payments annually for its merchants, and about 2-3 million payments a day. While that means the company is doing pretty well, it's still only dealing with a tiny part of the payments industry.

"But that’s the beauty of it," says Prins. "The massive opportunity we have. In terms of VC speak, the “addressable market” is massive. That also explains the big valuations you see in payments."

Adyen isn't the only fintech startup tackling this problem — companies like Currency Cloud, Klarna, and Stripe are all looking at payment processing. 

Adyen is now planning to add in-store payments to its repertoire. Like online payments, there's needless complexity here too.

"Let's take an international retailer like Louis Vuitton, for example," Prins says. "They will have local contracts and local solutions in every market in Europe to take point-of-sale payments. But we can do this on Adyen's single platform, the same platform the company uses to take payments online, so that all the data is combined."

All that data has multiple applications. It can let the store know that a customer has shopped at their online store before, or at another location, so they can build their loyalty schemes on the same platform and reduce the risk of fraud.

"More data — better risk — less fraud — more revenue," Prins points out.

Prins says that the company doesn't have any further funding plans right now — everything is centred on growth. Adyen has been doubling its revenues for the last few years, and expects to double those again to $300 million (£193 million) this year.

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NOW WATCH: Should we kill off one of the most dangerous creatures in the world?

Block26, a new venture capital firm with eyes on the “block chain market,” has made its first selection, leading an expected 1.25 million dollar seed funding round for the San Diego-based Airbitz mobile Bitcoin wallet. Readers may be familiar with the wallet, which won first place in the start up competition earlier this year in New York City at the Inside Bitcoins Conference. The primary novelty of Airbitz, besides ease of use, is its integration of a Bitcoin merchant directory, allowing the mobile user to locate a place to spend bitcoins within the same application. Aside from that, the company […]

The post Airbitz Gets $450,000 Cash Injection from Block26 appeared first on CCN: Financial Bitcoin News.

Another of America's major cities will now have its own Bitcoin Center, opening today in Chicago after an announcement at the Inside Bitcoins Conference happening there now. The effort is funded in part by Tally Capital, a local venture capital firm that sees the potential of block chain technology. The new center will be located at 1871, an office building packed with tech start-ups, currently housing more than 300. Aside from the usual mission of a Bitcoin information center, the Chicago Bitcoin Center will also focus on incubation of local Bitcoin start-ups, providing them with office space and opportunities to […]

The post New Bitcoin Center Opens in Chicago appeared first on CCN: Financial Bitcoin News.

As insecurity grows around the Greek banking crisis, is it a good idea for Greeks to turn to digital currency to secure their savings?

Via Dave Lutz at JonesTrading, here's a quick look at what traders are talking about this morning. 

Good Morning – US Futures are flying higher, with the E-Minis testing yesterday’s peaks, up 1.3% from the close. The optimism is being driven by China’s Market rebound, and positive rhetoric coming from Eurozone Ministers on Greece. The DAX is soaring, gaining 2% as the Financials across the continent scream higher by 3-4%+. Tech names are rebounding, with most Semis bid as Gartner PC slash has been priced in – and all eyes on AAPL pre-market, rebounding 2% after losing nearly 10% in the last 2 sessions. Spain trades +2.9% higher, Portugal +2.8% and Italy +2.6%. Over in Asia, Shanghai Composite finished up 4.5%, marking its biggest two-day gain — 10.6% — since 2008 - Only seven Chinese stocks fell while more than 1,000 companies hit their daily upward limit. Hang Seng has felt the ripple effects from China, gaining 2% - While Aussie squeaked out a minor gain. The red spot in Asia was in Japan, where the Nikkei lost 40bp as Fast Retailing collapsed 6%.

US and German Yields are ripping thru yesterday’s peaks as we await Greek Headlines and Janet’s speech today. Peripheral yields are all tighter, led by a very sharp bid in Greek Bonds – knocking their 10YY down nearly 4% this AM. With this Greek Sentiment, the Euro is flying thru 1.11 this AM, and the $ is losing ground across the board – causing a tailwind for commodities. Most metals have a bid to them, but a notable loser is Copper, dropping 50bp despite China. The Oil complex is higher as signs point to no Iranian deal – but off their best levels as the IEA warns on the market’s oversupply building. Softs are all marked higher into the Noon USDA report. Catalysts today include Treasury Sec. Lew speaking at 8am – at 10am we get Wholesale Inventories, followed by Boston Fed Pres. Rosengren’s speech at 11:30. USDA WASDE corn, cotton, soybean, wheat data at High Noon, but all eyes and ears will be focused on Cleveland for Yellen’s speech at 12:30 ahead of her Congressional Testimony next week. At 1pm the Oil complex will be eyeballing the Baker Hughes rig count.

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NOW WATCH: 6 scientifically proven features men find attractive in women

Bitcoin jumped more than 10 USD within a few minutes climbing above 290 USD while the Litecoin price plunged with more than 35%. Was it a big Litecoin "whale" or "bag holder" that sold off his/hers entire stack of litecoins just to go all in on Bitcoin? To whomever sold litecoins: enter your comments below and give us your thoughts on your executed sell orders. It would be interesting to see if this was a one man's job or a massive collective of neurons acting like a shoal of fish. View the current bitcoin price here.

The post WTF Just Happened to Litecoin and Bitcoin? appeared first on CCN: Financial Bitcoin News.

Bitcoin jumped more than 10 USD within a few minutes climbing above 290 USD while the Litecoin price plunged with more than 35%. Was it a big Litecoin "whale" or "bag holder" that sold off his/hers entire stack of litecoins just to go all in on Bitcoin? To whomever sold litecoins: enter your comments below and give us your thoughts on your executed sell orders. It would be interesting to see if this was a one man's job or a massive collective of neurons acting like a shoal of fish. View the current bitcoin price here.

The post WTF Just Happened to Litecoin and Bitcoin? appeared first on CCN: Financial Bitcoin News.

Litecoin just shed nearly 40% of its value in a matter of minutes. It's understandable, seeing as Litecoin gained more than 200% in a matter of days. "The original altcoin" is also experiencing tremendous turnover, overtaking bitcoin in 24h trading volume (USD) for a time this morning. While the currency seems to have stabilized around $6.50/LTC, volatility is still very high and it make take some time for the market correction to play out. Bitcoin has not experienced any action that appears to coincide with the Litecoin crash. It seems the crash is isolated to Litecoin, but with the Litecoin halving approaching, it's possible […]

The post Breaking: Litecoin has Crashed and Lost 35% appeared first on CCN: Financial Bitcoin News.

Litecoin just shed nearly 40% of its value in a matter of minutes. It's understandable, seeing as Litecoin gained more than 200% in a matter of days. "The original altcoin" is also experiencing tremendous turnover, overtaking bitcoin in 24h trading volume (USD) for a time this morning. While the currency seems to have stabilized around $6.50/LTC, volatility is still very high and it make take some time for the market correction to play out. Bitcoin has not experienced any action that appears to coincide with the Litecoin crash. It seems the crash is isolated to Litecoin, but with the Litecoin halving approaching, it's possible […]

The post Breaking: Litecoin has Crashed and Lost 35% appeared first on CCN: Financial Bitcoin News.

Bitcoin price has been is drawing into a narrowing range following the recent high near $280 / 1740 CNY, and the implication is that a directional move is pending. The possibility of a fake-out, to either direction, exists and analysis looks at the signals of caution to aid a buy entry. This analysis is provided by xbt.social with a 3 hour delay. Read the full analysis here. Not a member? Join now and receive a $29 discount using the code CCN29. Bitcoin Price Analysis Time of analysis: 04h51 UTC Bitstamp 1-Hour Chart From the analysis pages of xbt.social, earlier today: […]

The post Bitcoin Price Rearing To Go! appeared first on CCN: Financial Bitcoin News.

Litecoin, the original altcoin, was created in 2011 and is very similar to bitcoin in all but a few aspects. Intended to be "The silver to bitcoin's gold", Litecoin has surpassed bitcoin in daily trading volume (USD). A few takeaways from the chart: Litecoin's 24h trade volume is nearly $8m more than bitcoin Litecoin has surpassed Ripple, nearly overnight, to reclaim it's spot as the second largest coin Litecoin is experiencing rapid growth, more than doubling in the past few days Litecoin and bitcoin have both experienced rising prices amid the Greek debt crisis and other global uncertainty. However, while […]

The post Litecoin Overtakes Bitcoin in Trading Volume appeared first on CCN: Financial Bitcoin News.

Litecoin, the original altcoin, was created in 2011 and is very similar to bitcoin in all but a few aspects. Intended to be "The silver to bitcoin's gold", Litecoin has surpassed bitcoin in daily trading volume (USD). A few takeaways from the chart: Litecoin's 24h trade volume is nearly $8m more than bitcoin Litecoin has surpassed Ripple, nearly overnight, to reclaim it's spot as the second largest coin Litecoin is experiencing rapid growth, more than doubling in the past few days Litecoin and bitcoin have both experienced rising prices amid the Greek debt crisis and other global uncertainty. However, while […]

The post Litecoin Overtakes Bitcoin in Trading Volume appeared first on CCN: Financial Bitcoin News.

Litecoin, the original altcoin, was created in 2011 and is very similar to bitcoin in all but a few aspects. Intended to be "The silver to bitcoin's gold", Litecoin has surpassed bitcoin in daily trading volume (USD). A few takeaways from the chart: Litecoin's 24h trade volume is nearly $8m more than bitcoin Litecoin has surpassed Ripple, nearly overnight, to reclaim it's spot as the second largest coin Litecoin is experiencing rapid growth, more than doubling in the past few days Litecoin and bitcoin have both experienced rising prices amid the Greek debt crisis and other global uncertainty. However, while […]

The post Litecoin Overtakes Bitcoin in Trading Volume appeared first on CCN: Financial Bitcoin News.

Bitfinex, while still listed on its website as being in the "beta-phase," is the largest USD based bitcoin exchange. Bitfinex is currently experiencing an outage, as they have acknowledged on twitter. Beyond tweets acknowledging the existence of an issue, Bitfinex has not yet released any information concerning the current service interruption. This latest outage follows an outage just four days ago on July 6th. Few details have been released about that outage, though it was addressed quickly. In late may of this year, Bitfinex' hot wallet was hacked to the tune of $5,400,000. No customer funds were affected by that hack. […]

The post Bitcoin Exchange Bitfinex is Down appeared first on CCN: Financial Bitcoin News.

SHANGHAI (Reuters) - Chinese stocks rose strongly for a second day on Friday, buoyed by a barrage of government support measures, but worries persist about the long-term impact that four weeks of stock market turmoil may have on the world's second-largest economy.

Over the past two weeks Chinese authorities have cut interest rates, suspended initial public offerings, relaxed margin lending and collateral rules and enlisted brokerages to buy stocks, backed by cash from the central bank.

Some analysts predict further moves to come from the central bank, which often makes policy announcements over the weekend, such as another rate cut or relaxation of the amount of cash banks must hold as reserves.

The frantic efforts to stem the market slide finally began to gain traction on Thursday, when shares rose around 6 percent after the securities regulator banned shareholders with large stakes in listed firms from selling.

The CSI300 index of the largest listed companies in Shanghai and Shenzhen rose another 6 percent on Friday, while the Shanghai Composite Index gained 5.4 percent.

At the depths of their slump earlier this week Chinese shares had fallen more than 30 percent from their mid-June peak, and for some global investors China's market turmoil had become a greater concern than the crisis in Greece.

Analysts at Bank of America Merrill Lynch said in a research note they expected the ripple effect to eventually hit the real economy and corporate earnings.

"We expect this will likely hurt consumption down the road," the note said. "More critical is a potential distortion to credit flows due to the impairment to financial institutions' balance sheets."

While Beijing's efforts appear to have put a floor under the stock market for now - on Friday morning China's main indexes were just below the levels they opened at on Monday - it was still far from functioning normally.

Roughly half of China's listed companies were suspended from trading as they tried to sit out the market turmoil, and many of those still trading are propped up by state-directed buying.

On Friday Shanghai Securities News reported that insurers had brought 11.2 billion yuan ($1.8 billion) of equity since the rout began.

The plunge in China's previously booming stock markets, which had more than doubled in the year to mid-June, has created a major headache for President Xi Jinping and China's top leaders, who are already grappling with slowing growth.

Many investors say China's unprecedented attempts to arrest the slide have undermined its commitment to give markets a "decisive" role in pricing assets.

"They can probably stabilize the market, but it will be a political decision, as they will have to compel government, state agencies, banks, pension funds, insurance companies to buy," said Ashok Shah, investment director at London & Capital.

"Essentially the political decision is: to transfer the potential losses from private investors ... to the state in some manner."

(Reporting by Samuel Shen, Pete Sweeney, Brenda Goh and Kazunori Takada; Additional reporting by Pratima Desai in London; Writing by Alex Richardson; Editing by Will Waterman)

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The bitcoin payments network will power 10% of online payments and 20% of global remittances by 2025, according to a new report by Wedbush.

Users of the popular bitcoin tipping service ChangeTip can now top up their accounts with credit cards.

Due to the continued spam attack on the blockchain network that Bitcoin Magazine has previously reported on, multiple bitcoin wallets have implemented either increased fees or the ability for individuals to increase the fees paid for a given transaction. Based on the nature of the software, miners prioritize which transaction to process first based on the fees associated with it, among other factors. The standard bitcoin fee is 0.0001 BTC per kilobyte. However, with so many spam transactions occurring, the standard transaction fee is not sufficient to ensure quick confirmations. BitGo announced what it is calling its surge pricing —named after Uber’s surge pricing—which stipulates that the fees will vary depending on how congested the network is. In times of […]

The post Bitcoin Wallets Changing Fee Structures to Speed Transactions Though Network Delays appeared first on Bitcoin Magazine.