Coin News

• Blockfolio, an app crypto investors can use to view their investments, has raised $3 million in funding.
• The money is going towards a new service that'll connect investors with the teams behind certain tokens. 
• The company, which boosts 4 million users, is gunning to be the Bloomberg for crypto.          

Blockfolio, a popular platform crypto investors use to check their holdings, is aiming to be the Bloomberg for crypto. 

The firm, which announced Thursday the close of a $3 million in venture funding round, has taken its first big step towards its lofty vision with the launch of Signal, a new service that will allow cryptocurrency development teams to send information directly to investors on the Blockfolio app. 

Cryptocurrencies have development teams behind them that are working on software updates, expanding into new markets and listing on new exchanges. Signal will allow those development teams to send information, such as protocol updates or new hires, directly to investors on the Blockfolio platform. Blockfolio will then vet developers and the information they send to ensure their veracity.

Typically, crypto investors rely on Telegram or Twitter for such information, but sometimes those platforms can be unreliable or false, says Blockfolio chief executive Ed Moncada. 

In an exclusive interview with Business Insider, Moncada said the new Signal feature will cut out misinformation, PR-hype, and bias. 

"With Signal, we mainline important team information directly to users. Signals come straight from the token team leadership, free of the noise and toxicity that we so often see in the current communication channels used by the global crypto community," Moncada said.

"Just like how the feed is so valuable on Facebook and LinkedIn, the feed will become the center point of Blockfolio," Moncada added. 

In the long-run, Moncada sees the firm becoming a central hub of data and information for the crypto world just as  Bloomberg serves such a function in the broader financial markets. 

"We want to be the de facto communication network," Moncada said. "The hub of breaking information."

20 development teams are participating, including Dash, aelf, and Digibyte. Moncada said other teams have expressed interest.

Participants in Blockfolio's funding round include include DCM, which previously has invested in companies such as SigFig, the fintech company. Other participants include Playground Ventures and L2 Ventures.

SEE ALSO: One of the largest bitcoin hedge funds killed it in April - but it still got showed up by passive funds

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Ripple's xRapid pilot program results found that customers saved both money and time when compared to traditional cross-border transactions.

Brian Kelly, a prominent cryptocurrency trader, contributor to CNBC’s Fast Money, and founder of BKCM, stated on the May 9 Fast Money show that the adoption of bitcoin by Wall Street’s biggest financial institutions such as the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) and Goldman Sachs will lead the cryptocurrency market to surge in the short-

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The bitcoin price took a $250 nosedive on Thursday, putting an end to what had previously been a day of relative stability. The world’s largest cryptocurrency had spent the majority of the day trading near $9,325 on Bitfinex, though it peaked as high as $9,390 during the early morning hours. At approximately 16:45, the bitcoin … Continued

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Developers have proposed testing the Dandelion privacy mechanism on large number of active nodes.

Ignore Bitcoin for the moment: Distributed-ledger technology is most useful for assuring quality within supply chains. Here's how to incorporate it

This promoted article originally appeared on Bitcoin Magazine.

South Korean cryptocurrency exchange Coinone is turning to Ripple for international remittances. Coinone Transfer, the retail remittance subsidiary of the namesake crypto exchange, will begin using Ripple’s enterprise blockchain network to power its soon-to-launch international remittance service for retail customers in the country. The remittance firm will use xCurrent, an enterprise blockchain software from the

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•  Pantera Capital made a big comeback in April, thanks to a boom in the crypto markets. 
•  Still, a number of small passive index fund beat the $1 billion fund manager. 

Pantera Capital, one of the largest cryptocurrency hedge funds, made a big comeback in April, according to documents reviewed by Business Insider. 

The firm's Digital Asset Fund gained 46.2% in April, riding a bullish surge across the market for digital currencies. That's a big turn around for the fund, which was down 45.7% in March, according to documents. 

In March, the crypto market shed almost 50% of its value. It started to picked up steam near mid-April around Tax Day in the US.

Pantera Capital, which manages about $1 billion, said in an investor letter dated April 11 that the deadline for filing taxes in the US was behind's March's recent selling pressure. 

"I could imagine that a portion of the selling pressure on the market in general has been unintended tax positions," the letter said.

Notably, Fundstrat's Tom Lee predicted in a note to clients at the beginning of April that selling pressure would alleviate after Tax Day. Since April 17, bitcoin has picked up approximately $1,500 per coin. 

Still, Pantera was outshined by at least two passive index funds. Bitwise HOLD 10 Private Index Fund was up 52.9% in April, after fees, according to person familiar with the matter. And Hehmeyer Trading's Cryptocurrency Index Fund ended April up 51.7%, according to the company.

As for Pantera's Digital Asset Fund, it is down 34% since the beginning of the year, which is slightly worse than bitcoin's performance. The cryptocurrency is down 30% year-to-date, according to Market Insider data. 

Elsewhere at Pantera, its ICO fund was up a whopping 60% in April. And its Long-Term ICO fund gained 5% in April. 

SEE ALSO: Bitcoin exchanges are stepping up their game to lure high-speed traders like Virtu and Citadel

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The bitcoin price could reach $64,000 by the end of 2019, according to a new analysis of cryptocurrency mining economics. The study, conducted by Wall Street strategy firm Fundstrat Global Advisors, argues that that the ratio between the bitcoin price and miners’ breakeven cost (P/BE) has proven to be a “reliable long-term support level” for

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This promoted article originally appeared on Bitcoin Magazine.

Tech investor Chamath Palihapitiya considers himself a “disciple” of Warren Buffett, but even he does not think the investing icon is a reliable source on the subject of bitcoin. Palihapitiya, who served in various management roles during a four-year tenure at Facebook, told CNBC that technology is outside of Buffett’s “circle of competence,” so he

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• Robinhood, the zero-fee stock trading app that's popular among millennials, confirmed its Series D funding round of $363 million.
• The round places the company's worth at $5.6 billion.
• Robinhood says it will use the money to snag new talent, offer more financial service options (among them, its rollout of the company's cryptocurrency trading platform), and spearhead product growth. 

In March, the Wall Street Journal reported that commission-free stock trading company Robinhood could be valued in excess of $5 billion. The Journal's unnamed sources said the company was currently raising an estimated $350 million funding round, led by Robinhood's longtime investor, the Russian investment firm DST. 

Now, Robinhood is confirming both the size of the Series D funding round at $363 million and the company's current valuation at $5.6 billion, making the five-year-old startup a formidable contender in the fintech stock-trading market.

It's a remarkable growth for the young company, which, in its first attempt to secure funding, was rejected 75 times.

The round brought in new investors like Kleiner Perkins, Sequoia, Iconiq, and Capital G as well, Robinhood co-founder Vlad Tenev told Business Insider. Tenev said Robinhood will use the money to launch new products, scale the product's growth, and snag new talent. Most recently, Robinhood brought on Greylock investor Josh Elman as its VP of product.

"We're expanding our product suite so that we can offer many financial services at the lowest possible price," said Tenev.

Robinhood's primary offering is a zero-fees trading app that's taken off among millennials. Currently, the company is rolling out a cryptocurrency trading platform, where users in 10 US states can currently trade in fiat currencies commission-free for digital currencies like bitcoin, ethereum, and litecoin. 

Tenev declined to share the number of users who are trading in cryptocurrencies through Robinhood's app, but said that there was a "huge demand" for the service. 

"We're working as fast as we can," said Tenev.

Like its stock-trading options, Robinhood's cryptocurrency trading platform is also commission-free. Tenev said Robinhood will be buckling down on its cryptocurrency offerings in the forthcoming months.

"Cryptocurrency platforms have exorbitant fees and they're hard to use," said Tenev. "I think it's fair to say that our goal is to build the best product on the market, where users can have all of their investments in one place."

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• Robinhood, the zero-fee stock trading app that's popular among millennials, confirmed its Series D funding round of $363 million.
• The round places the company's worth at $5.6 billion.
• Robinhood says it will use the money to snag new talent, offer more financial service options (among them, its rollout of the company's cryptocurrency trading platform), and spearhead product growth. 

In March, the Wall Street Journal reported that commission-free stock trading company Robinhood could be valued in excess of $5 billion. The Journal's unnamed sources said the company was currently raising an estimated $350 million funding round, led by Robinhood's longtime investor, the Russian investment firm DST. 

Now, Robinhood is confirming both the size of the Series D funding round at $363 million and the company's current valuation at $5.6 billion, making the five-year-old startup a formidable contender in the fintech stock-trading market.

It's a remarkable growth for the young company, which, in its first attempt to secure funding, was rejected 75 times.

The round brought in new investors like Kleiner Perkins, Sequoia, Iconiq, and Capital G as well, Robinhood co-founder Vlad Tenev told Business Insider. Tenev said Robinhood will use the money to launch new products, scale the product's growth, and snag new talent. Most recently, Robinhood brought on Greylock investor Josh Elman as its VP of product.

"We're expanding our product suite so that we can offer many financial services at the lowest possible price," said Tenev.

Robinhood's primary offering is a zero-fees trading app that's taken off among millennials. Currently, the company is rolling out a cryptocurrency trading platform, where users in 10 US states can currently trade in fiat currencies commission-free for digital currencies like bitcoin, ethereum, and litecoin. 

Tenev declined to share the number of users who are trading in cryptocurrencies through Robinhood's app, but said that there was a "huge demand" for the service. 

"We're working as fast as we can," said Tenev.

Like its stock-trading options, Robinhood's cryptocurrency trading platform is also commission-free. Tenev said Robinhood will be buckling down on its cryptocurrency offerings in the forthcoming months.

"Cryptocurrency platforms have exorbitant fees and they're hard to use," said Tenev. "I think it's fair to say that our goal is to build the best product on the market, where users can have all of their investments in one place."

Join the conversation about this story »

NOW WATCH: Jeff Bezos on breaking up and regulating Amazon

• The cryptocurrency market is known for a profusion of cryptocurrency exchange venues. 
• To compete for business from large trading firms, some crypto exchanges are building out their infrastructures to look like traditional equities exchanges.
• Exchanges such as Gemini and Coinbase have begun supporting block trading. 
• Some crypto exchanges are rolling out new liquidity programs and considering co-location and other market structure developments, according to executives. 

Crypto exchanges are trying to step up their game to lure the fastest traders on Wall Street. 

These exchanges, which helped shepherd the nascent market for digital currencies through 2017's boom, have been adding customers and making money hand-over-fist. Bloomberg estimates crypto exchanges bring in $3 million a day in fees. Still, many have failed to attract large institutional investors to the platform, relying for now on small time traders for liquidity.

In order to draw in big traders, exchanges across the space are beefing up their capabilities and rolling out new products to attract liquidity. 

"How do we get Virtu, Citadel Securities, DRW, Susquehanna to make markets?" said Larry Tabb, founder of consultancy Tabb Group, said in an email to Business Insider. "Those are the things they're thinking about. It's going to be a combination of incentives, order types, connectivity, co-location, and pricing." 

Block Trades

The exchange business is a volumes game with more volumes equaling more profit. Attracting large traders or investors is one way to boost volumes. But most customers of this profile have opted to trade in over-the-counter markets, rather than on retail exchanges.

That's because big trades on a crypto exchange can impact the broader price in the market, said Michael Moro, chief executive of Genesis Trading, an OTC trader and market making firm in the crypto space. Moro told Business Insider that most of his accounts would never trade on an exchange. 

"As better as these exchanges have kind of gotten, 95% of what I do is OTC," Moro said. "I don't touch the exchanges for liquidity at all, but that's because OTC markets are far more efficient, especially for size."

To compete for larger orders in the crypto markets, a number of exchanges have started to offer block trades, which are executed off an exchange main order book as to not move the market in a direction against the trader. 

Gemini, the cryptocurrency exchange founded by the Winklevoss twins, started allowing customers to buy and sell large quantities of crypto in April. Coinbase has also started supporting block trades as well. That could lure large traders to their venues, according to CoinRoutes chief executive Dave Weisberger. 

"I think that there is a clear need for more tools available for block trading in Bitcoin and other crypto assets, so companies that fill that need will be rewarded," Weisberger said in an interview. 

Liquidity programs

Crypto exchanges have also been flirting with different incentive programs, which provide discounts to certain market makers for adding liquidity to a venue. 

The idea of providing incentive to liquidity providers is not new to trading. IEX, the upstart stock exchange, recently unveiled such a program that offers discounts on trading fees across a number of securities trading on its venue. The New York Stock Exchange and Nasdaq offer rebates to brokers to incentivize them to send their order to their exchange.

The point of a market maker is to ensure immediacy of execution, even if there isn't natural interest in the market.  With incentives, you are more likely to attract traditional market makers to the fold, executives from market making firms told Business Insider.

"It could draw in those who have only been involved in a lower capacity," one trading executive said. 

The lack of liquidity in crypto is one reason behind its neck-breaking volatility. 

"There's less liquidity in the marketplace than people might think," the executive added. "This last run-down can show you. People selling because of Tax Day drove this market to the ground."

In the US, dollar to crypto transactions are in the couple hundred millions of dollars a day, according to research by crypto firm MithrilX. 

Currently GDAX, Coinbase's cryptocurrency exchange, does not charge liquidity providers for placing orders on the exchange. And it is currently looking into adding new liquidity incentive programs, according to a job advertisement for a head of market structure. Gemini provides incentive for some market makers trading in its auctions. 

Circle, the fintech firm that recently acquired crypto exchange Poloniex, is also looking into new incentive programs for market makers, the company's chief executive office Jeremy Allaire told Business Insider in an interview. 

"We inherited a fee structure and are obviously looking closely at that to make sure it is in line with what participants expect," Allaire said. "I think there will be multiple models and experiments tried across venues."

What else can be done?

Outside liquidity incentive programs, cryptocurrency exchanges are also looking into supporting co-location capabilities, which would allow high-frequency traders to house their servers in the same building as exchange matching engines.

The practice, which was highlighted in the hit Michael Lewis book "Flash Boys," has been controversial on Wall Street, since it provides traders with faster access to information. 

"I would imagine in the upcoming year that we will see exchanges develop co-location capabilities, and it will be something of a common occurrence," Miha Gcrar, head of business development at Bitstamp, said. 

Coinbase is considering co-location as well, a source told Business Insider. 

To be sure, at this time, co-location isn't a "core necessity" for trading firms, Gcrar said. 

What they want to see in the crypto exchange market, for the most part, according to market insiders, is outside of their control or will require years to come to fruition. 

For instance, the lack of a proper prime broker is keeping Virtu Financial, the high-speed trading firm from entering the market. Here's chief executive Douglas Cifu: 

We are a market maker in the Cboe and the CME futures products around [cryptocurrency], I guess they're bitcoin futures right now. We do not currently make markets in any of the [cryptocurrency] markets primarily because of our concerns round risk management. In other words our MO has always been to trade in transparent and regulated exchanges with centralized clearing or clearing though a prime broker in cash, if you will, bitcoin and other [cryptocurrencies] that is currently not available.

A prime broker would allow traders to trade across venues simultaneously without maintaining a balance on a single exchange. A prime broker would put their own funds into a crypto exchange and then extend their customers credit to trade in and out. 

There also isn't a major clearing firm in crypto to act as an intermediary between banks. As a result, small banks such as Silvergate and Signature act as quasi clearing houses. 

"You can only have instant clearing if your counterparty is using the same banks, " Jonathan Benassaya, CEO of MithrilX, said. "The bank is becoming the clearing house."

Still, even if these things were to come to fruition, it may not be enough for some large traders. As Genesis' Moro put it: "You could poke holes in everything the exchanges are doing for not being of institutional quality."

SEE ALSO: The former tech chief at secretive trading firm Jump has jumped to a crypto exchange

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Despite a brief rally yesterday, bitcoin risks falling back below $9,000 amid bearish short-term moving averages.

The cryptocurrency market has rebounded over the past 24 hours, as the bitcoin price rose by around 3 percent and other major cryptocurrencies such as Ethereum and Bitcoin Cash recorded gains in the 3 to 8 percent range. Bitcoin and Ethereum Since bitcoin’s failed test of the $10,000 support level and the scheduled SEC hearing

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Venture capitalist Chamath Palihapitiya says billionaire Warren Buffett is wrong about bitcoin, though he calls himself Buffett's "disciple."

Yuzo Kano, chief executive of major Japanese exchange bitFlyer is trying to build a global cryptocurrency powerhouse, one former financier at a time. The Goldman Sachs Group alumnus who made bitFlyer Japan’s largest bitcoin exchange has doubled his staff in the past six months in a bid for global expansion. His team, which is expected

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Popular bitcoin wallet service Electrum has released evidence demonstrating that copycat client “Electrum Pro” is “bitcoin-stealing malware.” First launched in 2011, Electrum has long been one of bitcoin’s most popular wallet clients, and many users trust the wallet for its proven security, ease-of-use, and its support for advanced features like multisig authentication and compatibility with

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