Coin News

 A new bit of ransomware is now attacking Linux-based machines, specifically the folders associated with serving web pages. Called Linux.Encoder.1 the ransomware will encrypt your MySQL, Apache, and home/root folders. The system then asks for a single bitcoin to decrypt the files. From Dr.Web Antivirus: Once launched with administrator privileges, the Trojan dubbed Linux.Encoder.1… Read More

ARK Investment Management LLC, which manages the first exchange-traded fund (EFT) with exposure to cryptocurrency, has almost doubled its money since September after investing in bitcoin, thanks to the virtual currency’s recent price surge, according to Bloomberg News. The overall fund has gained 15% this year, which represents more than 98% of the unleveraged ETFs in the U.S. Cathie Wood, who founded New York City-based ARK in January of 2014, said Greece, China’s devaluation and a U.S. interest rate increase drove price swings resulting in a capital exodus from emerging markets, elevating bitcoin. Also read: How the Bitcoin Investment Trust […]

The post Invested In Bitcoin, EFT Nearly Doubles Money Since September appeared first on CCN: Financial Bitcoin & Cryptocurrency News.

Bitcoin exchange trade volumes have soared over the past week as the bitcoin price hit its high for the year. Exchanges are reporting some of the highest volumes seen this year.

Over the counter (OTC) trading has also taken off with over three times normal trading volumes according to Genesis Trading.

ItBit’s OTC Manager Bobby Cho released the trading desk’s October 2015 report yesterday showing monthly trading volumes up 42 percent over September:

• itBit Bitcoin OTC Market Data Summary for October 2015: 41,328 XBT
• Total USD Amount Traded: $10.1 Million
• Average Daily Trading Volume: 1,878 XBT
• Month-over-Month Trading Volume Growth: 42%

itBit’s report also noted some “price tightening” despite the volatile price situation:

“October also saw OTC trade executions become more concentrated around the market’s spot prices (OTC Executions vs. Spot Price chart below). This price tightening in the OTC market occurred despite bitcoin prices hitting an annual high towards the end of the month, which is another positive sign for the health of the market.”

ItBit partners with TradeBlock to bring greater public visibility and accountability

ItBit’s October report also announced a new partnership with TradeBlock to provide a more streamlined OTC reporting service both to their clients and to the public:

“We are integrating Tradeblock’s order management system to enhance our OTC middle and back-office operations. TradeBlock’s system will allow us to streamline our back-end processes and provide clients with more powerful, customizable trading data analysis.

“In our ongoing effort to increase transparency of OTC markets across the bitcoin trading community, our team will be using these new tools to expand the OTC data we share publicly going forward.”

Genesis Trading CEO Brendan O’Connor told Bitcoin Magazine that they are watching their OTC market follow the public market in increasing trade volumes.

“Regarding trading in bitcoin, we’ve been seeing a three to four times increase in volume in our OTC trades," O'Connor said. "This may be caused by a number of factors including what’s happening in China, the Silk Road auction and a surge in institutional interest.

“As we typically trade over $10 million worth of BTC OTC per month, I expect we will see a record amount traded in November,” he said.

ItBit’s Cho is happy to see a steadily growing OTC market with a 6 percent increase in OTC institutional clients over the last month.

“The presence of active institutional traders is a promising sign for the future of the bitcoin OTC market,” he said.

Photo Lars Plougmann / Flickr (CC)

The post Wall Street OTC Bitcoin Trading Desks See Record Volumes as Price Hits 52-week Highs appeared first on Bitcoin Magazine.

Christine Lagarde, the managing director of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) addressed bankers to say that banks and financial institutions do not have to worry about bitcoin or the blockchain. It’s that time for global financial figures to be dismissive of Bitcoin and its underlying technology, the block chain. IMF Chief Christine Lagarde quelled bankers’ fears of the blockchain posing a threat to the current banking industry in banking conference at New York As reported by The Financial Times, Lagarde said: Many of you have heard about not only bitcoins but blockchains and that unbelievable technology that underlies the Bitcoins of […]

The post IMF Director Tells Banks:  Do Not Worry about Bitcoin & Blockchain appeared first on CCN: Financial Bitcoin & Cryptocurrency News.

Bitcoin's recent price surge caught the attention of mainstream journalists worldwide, with many noting bitcoin's comeback as it surged past $400.

Santander Innoventures, the $100 million fintech venture capital fund of multi-billion dollar Spanish banking group Santander, has partnered with startup agency OneVest to run a Distributed Ledger (DL) Challenge for early-stage startups.

Specifically, the bank will be actively searching for blockchain-based startups targeting mortgage processing, trade finance and asset leasing, and technologies which could help the bank bridge conventional payment systems with decentralized payment networks like the blockchain.

“Distributed ledger technologies will create huge value for customers, banks and entrepreneurs who create new businesses around it. The Challenge will spark and accelerate that process for fintech startups,” announced Santander InnoVentures managing partner Mariano Belinky.

The DL Challenge will be one of many financial technology initiatives the bank will direct, as announced during its participation in the tech industry WebSummit event in Dublin.

The winner will receive a US$15,000 grand prize and guaranteed investment from the bank’s venture capital fund. Other promising startups will also receive the opportunity to pitch for potential investment from its partnering venture capital funds and angel investors.

Prior to today’s announcement, Santander Group recently joined other global strategic investors to lead Ripple’s $32 million Series A funding round. The bank aims to maintain close relationships with Ripple Labs and its blockchain-based startups to explore potential use-cases of the blockchain technology in the traditional financial sector.

The blockchain technology could help banks cut between US$15-20 billion annually by 2022, the bank explains. The transparency and solid security protocols of the distributed ledger technology could reduce bank’s infrastructure costs in securities trading, asset settlement and regulatory compliance.

The post Santander Bank to Launch Blockchain Challenge appeared first on Bitcoin Magazine.

Santander Innoventures, the $100 million fintech venture capital fund of multi-billion dollar Spanish banking group Santander, has partnered with startup agency OneVest to run a Distributed Ledger (DL) Challenge for early-stage startups.

Specifically, the bank will be actively searching for blockchain-based startups targeting mortgage processing, trade finance and asset leasing, and technologies which could help the bank bridge conventional payment systems with decentralized payment networks like the blockchain.

“Distributed ledger technologies will create huge value for customers, banks and entrepreneurs who create new businesses around it. The Challenge will spark and accelerate that process for fintech startups,” announced Santander InnoVentures managing partner Mariano Belinky.

The DL Challenge will be one of many financial technology initiatives the bank will direct, as announced during its participation in the tech industry WebSummit event in Dublin.

The winner will receive a US$15,000 grand prize and guaranteed investment from the bank’s venture capital fund. Other promising startups will also receive the opportunity to pitch for potential investment from its partnering venture capital funds and angel investors.

Prior to today’s announcement, Santander Group recently joined other global strategic investors to lead Ripple’s $32 million Series A funding round. The bank aims to maintain close relationships with Ripple Labs and its blockchain-based startups to explore potential use-cases of the blockchain technology in the traditional financial sector.

The blockchain technology could help banks cut between US$15-20 billion annually by 2022, the bank explains. The transparency and solid security protocols of the distributed ledger technology could reduce bank’s infrastructure costs in securities trading, asset settlement and regulatory compliance.

The post Santander Bank to Launch Blockchain Challenge appeared first on Bitcoin Magazine.

Bitcoin trading achieved a decent rally during the past month and the overdue correction is still playing out. The large range of price movement has created a technical condition in the chart whereby price could drop to new lows, but just as easily resume advance without any technical hindrance. 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 Trading and Price Analysis Time of analysis: 14h23 UTC BTCC 15-Minute Chart From the analysis pages of xbt.social, earlier today: Overnight […]

The post Bitcoin Trading Indecisive appeared first on CCN: Financial Bitcoin & Cryptocurrency News.

Encrypted email service provider ProtonMail recently and grudgingly gave in to a ransom demand of 15 bitcoin (approx $6000) to attackers who targeted the service with destructive Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks. ProtonMail, an encrypted email service set up by CERN scientists in Geneva and researchers at MIT, has revealed crippling DDoS attacks to be the cause of a recent outage suffered by the crypto e-mail service provider. Two groups are believed to be behind the attacks, one of which began the cyber-strikes and put forth the ransom demand. The website remains down at the time of publishing due […]

The post ProtonMail Pays Bitcoin Ransom to Stop DDoS Attacks appeared first on CCN: Financial Bitcoin & Cryptocurrency News.

Bitcoin-powered social media platform ZapChain has raised $350,000 in seed funding and is launching new digital goods initiative with Coinbase.

Bitcoin skeptic Jamie Dimon, CEO of JPMorgan has once again spoken about the decentralized cryptocurrency, Bitcoin - by dismissing it. He sees potential in blockchain, however. “Separate currency from blockchain,” Dimon said. “My belief is that there’s not going to be virtual currencies. They may be small,” he added dismissively, stating that governments will not put up with it. “Government like to control (currencies). They have central banks, they like to control the supply. They also generally like to know where it (currency) is and where it goes.” Bitcoin, cryptocurrencies and virtual currencies are slowly being seen as innovations by […]

The post Video: JP Morgan CEO Sees Bitcoin as a Waste of Time appeared first on CCN: Financial Bitcoin & Cryptocurrency News.

Wirex Limited, the London, U.K.-based company that produces the bitcoin debit card E-Coin, has announced a successful fundraising effort at BnkToTheFuture, the online investment platform. The campaign raised $186,596 USD from 93 investors. E-Coin, a virtual debit card and multi-signature wallet, allows users to spend and transfer bitcoin in cards denominated in USD, EURO, and GBP currencies and will be adding additional currencies. The fundraising campaign raised $186,596 against a goal of $381,806 USD, meaning it surpassed the 10% minimum required equity of $152,722 on the offer. E-Coin, which Wirex claims has more than 50,000 users and is growing at […]

The post E-Coin Bitcoin Debit Card Raises $186,596 In Crowdfunding To Support Growth appeared first on CCN: Financial Bitcoin & Cryptocurrency News.

Bitcoin is back, thanks to its spiraling price, and The Wall Street Journal, the U.S. largest financial newspaper, took note today with a headline proclaiming: “Bitcoin Frenzy Back As Epic Bust Fades.”   The article notes that this week’s 50 percent price jump recreates scenes from 2013 and explores the question of history repeating itself. The publicity in 2013 pushed speculative buying which drove the price from $13 to $1,100 before crashing. The reporter, with a careful eye to recent news, notes early on that bitcoin’s price volatility is currently overshadowing a steadily growing interest in the block chain’s application […]

The post The Wall Street Journal Weighs In On Bitcoin’s Surge And What It Might Mean appeared first on CCN: Financial Bitcoin & Cryptocurrency News.