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The post A Los Angeles Community College Paid $28,000 in Bitcoin to Ransomware Extortionists appeared first on CryptoCoinsNews.

Needham: Winklevoss Bitcoin ETF Would Have Profound Impact on Price, but Unlikely to Get Approved Needham & Company has put together a...

The post Needham: Winklevoss Bitcoin ETF Would Have Profound Impact on Price, but Approval Unlikely appeared first on Bitcoin Magazine.

Data shows that American consumers aren't filing many complaints with the US government's consumer watchdog.

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Bitcoin experienced a sharp rally at the end of 2016 that continued into the New Year with the price of bitcoin peaking at $1,153.86 on...

The post Bitcoin Volatility Reminds Investors About the Reality of Investing in Digital Currencies appeared first on Bitcoin Magazine.

For the past two years, the main topic of conversation in the Bitcoin community has been the scalability debate. While the peer-to-peer...

The post Op Ed: Here’s Why the Bitcoin Price Skyrocketed in 2016 Despite Scalability Concerns appeared first on Bitcoin Magazine.

A few weeks ago, the relatively new India-based bitcoin mining pool GBMiners decided to switch their software from Bitcoin Core to Bitcoin...

The post Here’s Why India’s GBMiners Mining Pool Switched to Bitcoin Unlimited appeared first on Bitcoin Magazine.

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The post OKCoin Disputes Bitcoin Use in Capital Flight as PBOC Mulls Regulations appeared first on CryptoCoinsNews.

The decentralized bitcoin and altcoin exchange Bitsquare has decided that it must rebrand or face a costly legal battle. Launched last year,...

The post As User Base Grows, Decentralized Bitcoin Exchange Bitsquare to Rebrand appeared first on Bitcoin Magazine.

The decentralized bitcoin and altcoin exchange Bitsquare has decided that it must rebrand or face a costly legal battle. Launched last year,...

The post As User Base Grows, Decentralized Bitcoin Exchange Bitsquare to Rebrand appeared first on Bitcoin Magazine.

 The digital currency bitcoin began 2017 with a bang, soaring to its highest level in more than three years to reach $1,150 – a record high. Since then, its price has more fallen more the 30 percent as nervous Chinese authorities put local bitcoin exchanges on notice that more regulations may be coming. To Dan Morehead — a former head of macro trading at Tiger Global who today runs… Read More

A long-running bitcoin investment platform is shifting gears in light of regulatory scrutiny in China.

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The post Bitcoin Scaling Solution Lightning Network Releases Milestone Implementation appeared first on CryptoCoinsNews.

This story was delivered to BI Intelligence "Payments Briefing" subscribers. To learn more and subscribe, please click here.

Amazon and JPMorgan Chase have partnered to introduce a new Amazon Prime Rewards Visa Signature Card, which will be the first card to target members of Amazon Prime, the e-commerce company's prized loyalty program.

It will do so primarily with a lucrative 5% cashback offer on all Amazon.com purchases, but also includes restaurant, gas station, and drugstore rewards, boasts no foreign transaction fees, and offers a 24/7 concierge service. By partnering with an e-commerce giant, Chase will likely boost adoption of its credit cards. 

Amazon Prime's large user base and strong engagement could boost Chase. 

• Amazon Prime has a massive user base. Amazon Prime had 49.5 million members in the US alone as of Q3 2016, according to Cowen & Co. estimates. This is roughly a 23% increase year-over-year (YoY). That's a large addressable base for Chase to target, especially because it's likely to continue to rise as Amazon pushes more offerings through Prime. 
• And these users spend more often than nonmembers. Amazon Prime members accounted for 57% of all Amazon purchases in October 2016, compared with 49% last year. Moreover, 83% of Prime members made a purchase in that period, compared with just 49% of non-Prime members. That strong engagement could make the card popular among these consumers, as frequent spending would allow customers to rack up rewards quickly. And that benefits Chase — if adoption and spend on the card is high, it has the potential to capitalize on the resulting interchange fees. 

The announcement comes on the heels of Chase reducing the sign-on reward on its extremely popular Sapphire Reserve card. The bank's partnership with Amazon will afford reward-seeking consumers a new credit card option that is unlikely to lead to astronomical costs for Chase — the firm's Sapphire Reserve credit card could end up reducing the bank’s profit by $200 million to $300 million in Q4 2016, according to Bloomberg.

Meanwhile, with the popularity of the Sapphire Reserve card likely to decline — this card was in part responsible for the 35% increase in new Chase card accounts in Q3 2016 — Chase is probably looking for a way to replicate its early success. Amazon Prime's audience size, spend, and engagement could be the perfect audience to help do that.

Time will tell how this card will affect the broader payments ecosystem, if at all. 

John Heggestuen, director of research at BI Intelligence, Business Insider’s premium research service, has compiled a detailed report on the payments ecosystem that drills into the industry to explain how a broad range of transactions are processed, including prepaid and store cards, as well as revealing which types of companies are in the best and worst position to capitalize on the latest industry trends.

Here are some key takeaways from the report:

• 2016 will be a watershed year for the payments industry. Payments companies are improving security, expanding their mobile offerings, and building commerce capabilities that will give consumers a more compelling reason to make purchases using digital devices.
• Payments is an extremely complex industry. To understand the next big digital opportunity lies, it's critical to understand how the traditional credit- and debit-processing chain works and what roles acquirers, processors, issuing banks, card networks, independent sales organizations, gateways, and software and hardware providers play.
• Alternative technologies could disrupt the processing ecosystem. Devices ranging from refrigerators to smartwatches now feature payment capabilities, which will spur changes in consumer payment behaviors. Likewise, blockchain technology, the protocol that underlies Bitcoin, could one day change how consumer card payments are verified.

In full, the report:

• Uncovers the key themes and trends affecting the payments industry in 2016 and beyond.
• Gives a detailed description of the stakeholders involved in a payment transaction, along with hardware and software providers.
• Offers diagrams and infographics explaining how card transactions are processed and which players are involved in each step.
• Provides charts on our latest forecasts, key company growth, survey results, and more.
• Analyzes the alternative technologies, including blockchain, which could further disrupt the ecosystem.

To get your copy of this invaluable guide, choose one of these options:

1. Subscribe to an ALL-ACCESS Membership with BI Intelligence and gain immediate access to this report AND over 100 other expertly researched deep-dive reports, subscriptions to all of our daily newsletters, and much more. >> START A MEMBERSHIP
2. Purchase the report and download it immediately from our research store. >> BUY THE REPORT

The choice is yours. But however you decide to acquire this report, you’ve given yourself a powerful advantage in your understanding of the payments ecosystem.

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Print section Print Rubric:  The technology underlying bitcoin may be in for a patent war Print Headline:  Blockchain of command Print Fly Title:  Intellectual property UK Only Article:  standard article Issue:  Equipping people to stay ahead of technological change Fly Title:  Who owns the blockchain? FOR fans of bitcoin, a digital currency, the year got off to a volatile start. On January 5th one bitcoin changed hands for nearly $1,150—almost as much as the record set three years ago. It has since dropped by 33%. Elsewhere in the land of monetary bits, things move more slowly but trouble is brewing: a potential patent war looms over the blockchain, a distributed ledger that authenticates and records every bitcoin transaction. Heated fights over intellectual property are nothing new in promising technology markets. But given that the blockchain is expected to shake up everything from the way precious diamonds are safeguarded to the ...

Print section Print Rubric:  The technology underlying bitcoin may be in for a patent war Print Headline:  Blockchain of command Print Fly Title:  Intellectual property UK Only Article:  standard article Issue:  Equipping people to stay ahead of technological change Fly Title:  Who owns the blockchain? FOR fans of bitcoin, a digital currency, the year got off to a volatile start. On January 5th one bitcoin changed hands for nearly $1,150—almost as much as the record set three years ago. It has since dropped by 33%. Elsewhere in the land of monetary bits, things move more slowly but trouble is brewing: a potential patent war looms over the blockchain, a distributed ledger that authenticates and records every bitcoin transaction. Heated fights over intellectual property are nothing new in promising technology markets. But given that the blockchain is expected to shake up everything from the way precious diamonds are safeguarded to the ...

The Bitcoin Core development team released Bitcoin Core 0.13.2 on January 3. As a minor release, the latest version of the Bitcoin Core...

The post Bitcoin Core 0.13.2 Release: Graceful Recovery appeared first on Bitcoin Magazine.

Despite recent reports suggesting China's central bank is casting a critical eye on domestic bitcoin exchanges, local traders remain largely unfazed.

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Early selling  pushed bitcoin down nearly 5% to a low of $752.46 per coin. The cryptocurrency has recovered a portion of its losses and is lower by more than 2% at $772 per coin as of 7:48 a.m. ET. Thursday's weakness has the cryptocurrency trading at its lowest level in about a month.

Bitcoin has had a wild start to 2017. It rallied more than 20% in the first four trading days of 2017, putting in a high of $1161.88 per coin amid massive interest from China. However, speculation began to mount last Friday that China was going to crackdown on the cryptocurrency after the People's Bank of China warned investors to exercise caution when investing in virtual currencies. Then on Wednesday

Then on Wednesday, China announced it had begun investigating bitcoin exchanges in Beijing and Shanghai on suspicion of market manipulation, money laundering, unauthorized financing, and other issues. Selling in response to that announcement pushed bitcoin down more than 13%.

SEE ALSO: We bought and sold bitcoin — here's how it works

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NOW WATCH: Watch Yellen explain why the Federal Reserve decided to raise rates

One lawyer is fighting back against what he sees as a government overreach that affects bitcoin users. Here's his story.

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A group of individuals has been accused of smashing dozens of bitcoin ATMs in a bid to gain a competitive edge.

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The post Bitcoin Accepting Shops in Japan Increase Drastically, by 4.5x appeared first on CryptoCoinsNews.

Good morning! Here's what you need to know.

Bitcoin got demolished. It traded down 15.1% at $768 a coin, a drop of $136 a coin. The fall came after China announced it had begun investigating bitcoin exchanges in Beijing and Shanghai on suspicion of market manipulation, money laundering, unauthorized financing, and other issues, Reuters reports.

Whatever happens, Brexit won't be as good as EU membership. Britain's divorce terms with the European Union must be fair, but not as good as those for full EU members, the Prime Minister of Malta, which holds the rotating EU presidency, told a news conference.

A binary options platform is shutting down. Banc De Binary, one of the biggest and best-known providers of online trading in binary options, which allow investors to bet on short-term moves in financial assets, said it is winding down its business, citing regulatory pressures.

Brussels and London will co-ordinate on fintechs. A delegation from Belgium's financial technology sector came to London with its finance minister this week to set up a "fintech bridge" with the British capital that will enable cooperation on the burgeoning sector.

Northern Ireland will have a Brexit say. Prime minister Theresa May said that Northern Ireland would continue to have a say in Britain's preparations for leaving the European Union, despite the likelihood of fresh elections in the province.

Ride-hailing service Uber signed an agreement with Dubai's transport authorities. The deal makes Uber fully regulated after a series of clashes over pricing and availability.

Fewer migrants arrived in Germany last year. Some 280,000 migrants seeking refuge entered Germany in 2016, down from 890,000 the previous year, the Interior Ministry said.

Italy won't get a vote on work reforms. The country's constitutional court rejected a petition calling for a referendum on a key plank of labour market legislation that was a flagship reform of ousted premier Matteo Renzi.

The banking door is open for Silicon Valley. Roughly one in three banking and insurance customers globally would consider switching their accounts to Google, Amazon or Facebook if the Silicon Valley giants offered financial services, according to a survey of 32,715 people polled in 18 countries.

The Italian Prime Minister's heart surgery was a success. Paolo Gentiloni, who took office last month, had an emergency angioplasty to unblock an obstructed blood vessel of the heart late on Tuesday.

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NOW WATCH: This is what will happen when the Fed raises rates

China's central bank says it is investigating market manipulation, money laundering and unauthorised financing.

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The post Bitcoin Price Correction Nearing It’s End appeared first on CryptoCoinsNews.

Developers can now test an early version of bitcoin's much-hyped Lightning Network. Released by one of the most prominent startups working on the open-source micropayments protocol (San Francisco-based Lightning Labs), the daemon runs on the bitcoin testnet, so it's not exactly for average users yet. Rather, the aim is for developers to get their feet wet testing […]

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