Bitcoin’s lightning network might have a use case beyond faster and more scalable payments. Last week Lightning Labs developer Joost Jager revealed an experimental, new proof of concept: Whatsat, a version of lightning that can be used to send private messages. Like bitcoin, it’s censorship-resistant. But, unlike encrypted apps that morph messages into unreadable, garbled
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The MakerDAO loan system, administered by the Maker Foundation, hit its debt ceiling Wednesday with roughly $100 million worth of the stablecoin DAI issued and more than $339 million worth of ethereum locked up as collateral. On Thursday, the Maker Foundation proposed a new debt ceiling of 120 million DAI, which will now be voted on
Ethereum developers are using the Lightning payments network to build bridges into the bitcoin ecosystem. The venture-backed crypto startup Radar Relay, best known for its decentralized exchange (DEX) relayers for 0x, just launched a service called RedShift, which allows people to pay a lightning invoice from an ethereum wallet. Radar product lead Brandon Curtis told
Microsoft wants building blockchain tokens in the cloud to be as easy as plugging in a printer. So says Marley Gray, principal architect at Microsoft, following the announcement Monday of the Azure Blockchain Tokens platform. Just like printers were once a pain to set up – with a mishmash of printer types and their respective
China’s recent multi-front embrace of blockchain technology has divided the global cryptocurrency community. While some see it as helpful validation, others worry that crypto is diverging further from its anti-authoritarian roots. Authorities in China have long discouraged investment in grassroots cryptocurrencies like bitcoin. But the world’s most populous country is making significant progress with plans
Longtime bitcoin advocate Bruce Fenton has created a new broker-dealer for digital asset firms and financial advisors called Watchdog Capital. The firm is registered with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission and a member of the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority, public filings show. It’s a subsidiary of digital securities firm Chainstone Labs, also led by
Canadian investment fund manager 3iQ received initial approval on its long road to launch a closed-end bitcoin fund on the Ontario Stock Exchange later this quarter. The firm said on Wednesday that it received a favorable ruling before a panel of the Ontario Securities Commission (OSC) for the Bitcoin Fund, noting the commission moved to
Canadian startup Ledn, which offers bitcoin-backed fiat loans, now also offers dollar-pegged DAI loans, connecting bitcoin users with ethereum’s decentralized finance (DeFi) ecosystem. Ledn co-founder Mauricio Di Bartolomeo, a Venezuelan expat, told CoinDesk this new partnership with stablecoin promoter MakerDAO was driven by customer demand. Out of “thousands” of users, more than half of Ledn’s
Lebanon is far from a poster child for cryptocurrency adoption. News of Lebanese banks shuttering to prevent a bank run was met with predictable enthusiasm from the global bitcoin commentariat. People in Lebanon can no longer send foreign currencies, mainly dollars and euros, abroad. Further, due to heavily restricted banking access and limited liquidity provided
The Takeaway New analysis of the economic model behind ethereum 2.0 suggests validators can expect to earn 4.6–10.3 percent in annualized rewards at the start. The hardware cost for running ethereum 2.0 validator software may increase as a result of a new design proposal by founder Vitalik Buterin. Even so, the economic model of ethereum
When bitcoin advocates claim adoption is surging in developing countries, particularly during periods of political unrest or economic turmoil, their go-to source for evidence is often LocalBitcoins. The peer-to-peer exchange, which matches buyers and sellers of the largest cryptocurrency in nearly 250 countries, publishes weekly volume data for each nation and region where it has
Bitcoin IRA will soon allow customers to lend their retirement assets for interest. The firm, which provides digital asset individual retirement accounts (IRAs) is partnering with digital currency trader and lender Genesis Trading to offer interest on cryptocurrency and cash holdings that customers want to lend out, including bitcoin, ether, XRP, litecoin, and zcash. The
The bitcoin lightning network could be vulnerable to a simple and disruptive attack, according to a recent research paper. Written by Saar Tochner, Aviv Zohar, and Stefan Schmid, the paper describes a denial-of-service (DoS) attack that could be used to slow down or even stop a huge percentage of payments on the network and, although the behavior
The Oxford English Dictionary, published by the Oxford University Press, has added ‘satoshi’ to its compendium of the English language. First used less than seven years ago, satoshi is the newest word added to the dictionary. The addition was made as part of a quarterly update to the respected source’s database that also includes the words
Digital asset manager CoinShares is putting gold on the bitcoin blockchain. Working with wallet provider Blockchain and precious medal trader MKS (Switzerland) SA, the U.K.-based firm announced Tuesday a gold-backed network for trading tokens representing digitized physical gold, a project two years in the making. According to CoinShares, the network launches today with more than
When cryptocurrency fans gathered in Osaka, Japan, this week for the Devcon developer conference, the halls were filled with buzz about smaller projects seeking access to ethereum’s decentralized finance smorgasbord, especially loans and financial products, via interoperability. “Connecting to other chains doesn’t seem to be an ethereum developer’s priority,” Summa co-founder James Prestwich told CoinDesk.
Australia’s only bullion mint is backing a new digital token aimed to allow investors to trade the precious metal in real time. The Perth Mint Gold Token (PMGT) was launched by InfiniGold on Friday, and is backed 1:1 by GoldPass certificates issued by The Perth Mint. The digital certificates are 100% gold backed and guaranteed by the Government of
A startup building domains on blockchains has just launched a .crypto name registry on ethereum. Unstoppable Domains – a firm backed in May to the tune of $4 million by Draper Associates and Boost VC – said Friday that the new .crypto extension can be connected to users’ public cryptocurrency address, allowing third-parties to more easily send funds.