The timing for a project like this couldn't be better.  Headlines about out of control data gathering operations have dominated the news cycle over the last few weeks. Along with this, the general public has become aware just how in-demand and valuable their data is, and how many people are out to get it.

Unfortunately, the harsh lesson learned is - your data is already being shared.  Whether though companies we've agreed to allow to do so though terms-of-service agreements nobody actually reads, or private companies scouring social networks in rogue data mining operations.

So if it's going to be shared and sold anyway - why can't YOU be the one doing the selling?

This is the concept behind Opiria's PDATA token (personal data token), a decentralized marketplace to earn income by selling your personal data yourself. Creating a digital economy for exchanging data between consumers and companies.

"Opiria-Platform enables consumers to create a passive income stream by monetizing their personal data. Companies can buy personal data directly from consumers and compensate them with PDATA Tokens. PDATA Token is the currency that expresses the value of personal data and enables its trading by using smart contracts on the blockchain. Opiria platform will connect consumers and companies globally and become the world´s largest decentralized personal data marketplace" explains the company.

Consumers will be given additional layers of control and maintain power over what is and isn't shared, by selecting what specific data to put on the market, and given an extra layer of protection by removing the middle man - data flows directly from consumer, to the company purchasing it.

As I've mentioned in previous articles, when evaluating new blockchain projects the one thing I like hearing the most is that an existing company, already successful in their field, is now implementing blockchain to do things a better way.  Opiria, the company behind the PDATA token already has a working product - and has worked with Fortune 500 companies such as Audi, BMW, Intel, PG&E and many more.

The PDATA token is an ERC20 token.  Data sharing is tied to a smart contract, where a consumer consents to providing their data to a buyer, triggering the release of the PDATA tokens.

The Opiria PDATA public sale ICO starts in just 8 days, and more info can be found at https://opiria.io

KIN is the cryptocurrency launched last year by the makers of the popular messaging app Kik.  Lots of excitement surrounded it's ICO - which raised $98 Million dollars.

Since the ICO's end in Sept 2017 there has been a bit of rocky road.  Initially, investors felt in the dark on what the company was up to, and to the KIN teams credit they stepped up their communications with the community and managed to keep interest in the project up - promising big developments and partnerships to come.

Following through on those promises, yesterday they announced a partnership with Unity Technologies, a huge player in the gaming world.  Over a million developers use their 3d gaming engine for producing games on multiple platforms, and implementing KIN as the ecosystem of choice for these games could lead to large-scale use and adoption of the KIN cryptocurrency.

"Our initial partners need to work hand-in-hand with us to create the tools and services that will serve as the foundation of the Kin Ecosystem. With Unity, we get a partner committed to democratizing development, solving hard problems and enabling success, which aligns perfectly with our goal of creating a thriving ecosystem that maximizes the value of Kin for developers." says Dany Fishel, executive vice president of partnerships at Kin.

Unity boasts games and experiences made with Unity were installed more than 24 billion times in the last 12 months - and has partnerships with everyone from Google, to Facebook and Microsoft.

Customer rewards programs are insanely popular, and it's almost standard for big brands.  But what you may be surprised to hear, is while initially that may draw a customer in, they tend to get bored with the incentives shortly after joining.  So much so in fact, an estimated $100 Billion worth of reward incentives earned have gone to waste and never been used.

You may think that's how the business model works - reward customers for spending, but hope they never 'cash in' their reward points.  But what's way more profitable is a rewards program people actually use that keeps the customer coming back for years.

So, what if the excitement behind cryptocurrencies, was leveraged and blended with the world of customer rewards? That's the idea behind Momentum Token.

They've identified why the old way of doing it has failed - people who sign up for these loyalty programs end up feeling spammed, that they lack in personalization, and the end result doesn't make them feel like they received something of value.

Using Momentum Token's platform however, companies are opened to a variety of new options to revitalize their reward programs, by allowing a company, though them, to launch their own cryptocurrency based reward system and even their own cyptocurrency, or even give new life to their existing rewards program by allowing people to convert what they've already earned into a cryptocurrency.

"By using the Momentum Token or launching their own branded crypto tokens on the Momentum Platform, companies can not only reward their customers in exchange for their purchases and loyalty, but also reward attention, brand advocacy and data insights, whilst giving the consumer full control of their data. Consumers will be able to easily use and enjoy their cryptocurrency reward tokens, but can also exchange their reward tokens into other branded reward tokens. For example; tokens collected while flying can be exchanged and used to enjoy a Burger meal or upgrading a rental car. Any unused tokens can be saved, traded or even gifted or donated." explains the company.

In addition to this, new ways to earn rewards can be enabled.  Don't just think 'spend some money recieve some points' - that's an old business model.

Momentum Token can facilitate rewarding users for a variety of actions beyond purchases as well - posting reviews, sharing links on social channels, helping other shoppers - how the company wishes to distribute rewards is completely in their hands.

It's a model that has another huge plus - for cryptocurrency lovers who may not be ready to purchase expensive mining hardware, participating and earning tokens will be like mining with their online activity - a new way to earn tokens by simply promoting the companies they like.

The Momentum Token will be an ERC20 token, while the platform will allow companies to issue their own tokens within the platform think of this as the master token of the platform which all others can be exchanged for.

Their ICO will begin April 26th, and more information can be found at https://momentumtoken.io

Jed McCaleb has been a pioneer on many fronts in the cryptocurrency and blockchain world, he founded the first major bitcoin exchange Mt.Gox, and sold it in 2011 (long before the new owners mismanaged it), he then went on to be a co-founder of Ripple, but left the company in 2014.

Speaking to CNBC Fast Money, McCaleb expressed his belief that cryptocurrencies must be decentralized;

"The real vision is that you have a network, much like the internet, that anyone can participate in. There's not one central entity that can decide that it's going to start charging. This is the way this thing can actually grow and reach ubiquity. That's the key thing to make these things successful" says McCaleb.

The discussion then went into his current project, Stellar, which he founded after disagreements with how Ripple should function, and at one point, blasted Ripple a bit for what he sees as lacking vital decentralization.

"It's very hard to run nodes outside of Ripple Labs (The Ripple team is) running the majority of the nodes, which should be concerning for people." he expressed.

Speaking on his current project, Stellar, McCaleb emphasized why he felt it's important that the company behind a cryptocurrency should maintain a non profit status, which Stellar Development Foundation does, comparing it to the non-profit birth of the internet " Imagine an internet created by a for-profit company, it would just be a very different world."

Ripple currently ranks the #3 cryptocurrency globally, and Stellar has been catching up - currently sitting at #8. 

The IoT revolution is in full swing, and it's estimated 50 billion devices will be connected to the internet by 2020.

Happening silently in the background, these devices are loaded with a variety of sensors that are constantly gathering data on how the devices are being used and even the conditions they're being used in.

Data is gold these days, existing companies use it to improve their products, and new companies use it to identify problems and engineer products to address them.  Companies, researchers, and governments are spending billions each year maintaining the sensors to gathering this information.

Now here's the surprising part - once it's gathered, evaluated and used by the original group or groups seeking it, it's locked away.  Even though other IoT companies or researchers want it and are willing to pay big to have that data shared - the marketplace to do so just doesn't exist.

Databroker DOA is a company hoping to be the ones to address this problem, with a blockchain powered solution.

"Today companies make use of sensor data to optimize and monitor their operations. The result is a single purpose data landscape. DataBroker DAO drives the evolution towards truly ‘smart living’ by making this data easily accessible to cities, organizations and entrepreneurs at an affordable price." explains the company.

The primary market for these sensors is estimated to reach 1.2 trillion USD in 2019, and when an industry starts hitting numbers like this, building a secondary market becomes vital.

Databroker DAO will be the first marketplace to connect IoT sensor data owners with companies seeking to purchase the data directly, it's been compared to the equivalent of an eBay or Amazon for IoT sensor data. A dedicated marketplace where sensor owners, network ops, sensor manufactures, smart city initiatives, academics and the agricultural sector can all exchange the information they rely on.

While both IoT and blockchain are the hot emerging tech buzzwords of the decade, there hasn't been much cross over between the two industries.  So as a blockchain expert, you may be wondering what exactly is this "IoT sensor data" that's so valuable?

Frank Van Geertruyden from Databroker DAO explains "Sensor data can be explained as the output of a device that detects and responds to some type of input from the physical environment. The output may be used to provide information or input to another system or to guide a process. Not all data is meaningful but at the same time, all data is destined to have some value, even if not known at the immediate time of collection. It is in fact a complete ecosystem."

The project has an impressive team behind it as well. Their CEO Matthew van Niekerk also founded Belgium based SettleMint, and their advisors include Overstock.com CEO Patrick Bryne.

The Databroker DAO token 'DTX' is an ERC20 token and will serve as the credits to buy and sell sensor data within the platform.

Their ICO presale is live now, with the public sale beginning April 26th

For more information visit https://databrokerdao.com

When you think ICO, you think Ethereum.  Odds are it's an ERC20 token, and odds are they accepted most of their ICO funds in Ethereum as well.

Because of this, speculation on further ICO regulation damages Ethereum's market more than others. In a report last week put out by the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) they stated:

"Fintech products in payments; lending; wealth management; and distributed ledger technology can provide consumers and the broader financial system with various benefits but may also pose risks similar to those of traditional products. While existing laws apply to fintech products and services in most cases, some products pose additional risks that may not be sufficiently covered by existing laws."

Generally, the market over-reacts to the unknown.  However, I feel regulators have been fairly clear on their intentions - targeting only scammers, and pump-and-dump's is their only goal.  (Read about that here and here)

Another factor that could be in play - as stated above, ICO's often receive the majority of their funding in Ethereum.  At some point, they need to use those funds.

Now, combine the two issues I've listed above to understand what's happening now.

These two things happening at the same time - old ICO's are selling their coins to fund their project, while new ICO's are delaying their launch dates until regulators clarify the rules.

This throws off the balance. There's more Ethereum being cashed out, than being spent on new ICO investments.

The good news is, as I stated above, I believe the new ICO's delaying their launches are simply 'playing it safe' - if they are legitimate, I do not expect regulators to be giving them any bad news soon.

Once these fears die down - a massive recovery is likely coming for Ethereum.  Especially with some of massive developments in solving the scaling issues (read about that here).

Currently, for these reasons I believe Ethereum is the most undervalued coin on the market.

International banking giant Santander is developing what they're calling an 'international money transfer app' - which will utilize blockchain-based xCurrent, and RippleNet products.

“We will be the first large retail bank to carry out cross-border payments at scale with blockchain technology.” said Santander CEO Nathan Bostock.

No firm release date set, yet, "This spring, if not one beats us to it" says Bostock.

Santander bank has taken part in two rounds of Ripple investing, in both 2015 and 2016 - believed to total over $4 million.

The findings come from polling data provided by The Student Loan Report, a site for general student loan info.

After polling 1000 students who have recently received student loan money, a surprising amount - a little over 20% said they've spent some of that money on cryptocurrencies.

"Living on a tight budget, one would think students would spend that money on groceries, rent or school supplies rather than bitcoin and ethereum." says Drew Cloud the orginizations founder.

U.S. Department of Education weighed in with a statement saying; "Federal student aid funds are to be used only to help meet the costs of attending an eligible institution of higher education. Investing is not considered an appropriate use of federal student aid funds."

The study from The Student Loan Report can be read here.

Currently, there's two interesting stats at odds with each other.  Charitable donations are at a high of $500 billion per year. While at the same time, polls suggest trust in how charitable organizations use their funds is at an all time low.

What better way to address this than with blockchain technology?  Accountability, and the lack of the ability to 'fudge the numbers' are among the most widely discussed advantages of the tech, and applying it to a sector suffering from public mistrust presents a win/win opportunity for both those donating, and the legitimate organizations seeking donations.

So today we're taking a look at a company addressing these issues with a cryptocurrency based platform that takes these issues head on.  The company involved is called "GiftCoin" and they propose a better way to do things.

The platform works like this:  First, provides a place for charities to list their projects, individuals as well (think GoFundMe) these will be browseable online for anyone to see.

Then, they facilitate the donation process, in cryptocurrency or USD.

Lastly, Giftcoin promises to "show you exactly when and where your money is spent."

"By giving absolute trust and confidence, we believe donors will choose to give more money to the causes they care about. At a time in history of seemingly endless natural disasters, the refugee crises in the Middle East, and a greater divide between rich and poor than ever before, the need has never been greater for such a platform." explains the company.

They're kicking off with some impressive partnerships as well, with charties already signing on to use the platform when it goes live in October including English Heritage, Optimum Health Clinic, Enhance The UK, Grief Encounter and more.

Giftcoin's token sale is live now at https://www.giftcoin.org

The basis of the lawsuit dates back to Ripple's former CEO and co-founder Chris Larsen.  Back in 2016 he signed an agreement with a company called "R3", a banking consortium.

In that deal, R3 claims there was a clear "option contract" - which gave the company the right to buy up to 5 billion XRP coins, at a locked in price of less than a penny.

Ripple's defense revolves around the contract being invalid, stating R3 grossly misrepresented their abilities as a company.  Claiming R3's CEO hyped up partnerships with Morgan Stanley, Goldman Sachs, and J.P. Morgan - when in reality, those companies were in the process of actually ending their relationships with R3.

"R3 had misrepresented its resources and current ability to perform solely to induce Ripple into executing the Agreements. For example, although R3 represented to Ripple that it would have access to its large consortium of leading banks, R3 knew and had reason to know that several key banks that would be instrumental to Ripple’s success would soon be departing from its consortium." Ripple said in their counter-claim against R3.

R3 says it's much more simple - Ripple just wanted to cut them out now that they weren't needed, stating Ripple wanted out of the agreement once they were “in the money.”

Giving more worry to Ripple's hopes of winning - a San Francisco court just denied Ripple's appeal.  Because of this, the case heads to R3's home of New York next.

Currently, R3 is pushing a competing product, also aimed at banks - blockchain software called "Corda".

Speaking to The Times in the UK, CEO of Twitter and Square Jack Dorsey said “The world ultimately will have a single currency, the internet will have a single currency. I personally believe that it will be bitcoin.” Dorsey continued “probably over ten years, but it could go faster".

His Bitcoin-believer mindset has shown in his products lately too - with the Square Cash app rollout to buy Bitcoin many people are wondering, what's next?

Square provides point-of-purchase services to literally millions of retail outlets nation-wide.  Given Dorsey's beliefs on Bitcoin, it's not too far fetched to think at one point these merchant services will see the ability to accept Bitcoin in their stores through Square.

That would be a move where overnight, Bitcoin would be an accepted form of payment at millions of stores. I discussed this possibility in depth a couple months ago in a YouTube video (link) after I was lucky enough to be one of the early Square Cash app users with the ability to purchase Bitcoin.

Point is - not only can Jack Dorsey make this happen, it sounds likely he actually will.

The blockchain can store more than a record of Bitcoin transactions - it can also store files.

The idea has been called "radical" and far fetched - as most innovative ones have been.  They call it "governance 2.0" - a virtual nation, ruled entirely via the blockchain.

Meet "Bit Nation" a group out to offer services most of us think as being government-provided, though their own blockchain enabled democracy.

So how will this work? For now, it all functions through their app 'Pangea' - the first version is actually already live.  Here users (or 'citizens') are given an easy way anyone can write smart contracts to the blockchain. As they explain:

"The first service offered on Pangea lets you create and join a Decentralized Borderless Voluntary Nation (DBVN) with a constitution and code of law of your choice. Soon new functions will be added to allow group and personal chat, write P2P smart contracts from chat, resolve disputes and access governance service DApps. Our automated and human reputation and arbitration systems as well as arbitrator and code of law registries will provide positive incentives for contract compliance, strengthened through a network effect as Pangea attracts more users"

Now if all of this is sounding nuts - this next part may blow your mind.  BitNation is working with an actual government.

The nation of Estonia has some pretty lax rules on duel citzienship, almost anyone can apply and be granted it. They then expanded it and launched what they call the 'e-Residency program' where now this process can be done online, without ever having to set foot into the country.

The program offers anyone, anywhere, a digital identity issued by the Estonian government and the possibility to start and operate a business online under Estonian regulations. BitNation is helping to facilitiate these services being provided.

“I personally think it’s global apartheid that people are restricted of their lifestyle choices or freedom of movement just because of where they were arbitrarily born, because of a piece of paper, a passport that gives them permission or not to move somewhere” said founder When Susanne Tarkowski Tempelhof, speaking at the first ever BitNation sanctioned wedding.

Their token, PAT (an ERC20 token) goes on sale next week. The PAT token functions as proof-of-reputation for Citizens, issued when Citizens create a contract, successfully complete a contract or resolve a dispute attached to a contract.

Full info at: https://tse.bitnation.co

Hardly a surprise - when Venezuela launched their official national cryptocurrency the 'petro' last month, they openly admitted their goal was to use it to bypass international sanctions.

In response today, the Trump administration has released an executive order to make sure the cryptocurrency is included in the sanction as well. Stating;

"All transactions related to, provision of financing for, and other dealings in, by a United States person or within the United States, any digital currency, digital coin, or digital token, that was issued by, for, or on behalf of the Government of Venezuela on or after January 9, 2018, are prohibited as of the effective date of this order."

Thankfully, the cryptocurrency world never embraced the Petro, which is going through problems internally within Venezuela as well, as it's congress has labeled it 'illegal' and 'unconstitutional'.

Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro however is claiming the project has been a massive success - and has claimed various amounts were raised, anywhere between $735 million and $5 billion - the actual amount is still unknown and expected to be much lower. 

Billionaire investor Peter Thiel discusses his view on the cryptocurrency bitcoin...

Loom Network is releasing a developer toolkit today that seemingly outperforms both Raiden Network, and Plasma. The company describes themselves as "The next-generation blockchain platform for large-scale online games and social apps."

Boasting the ability for massive multiplayer games such as World Of Warcraft to run smoothly on Ethereum's blockchain.

“With Bitcoin came the world’s first blockchain, a decentralized ledger of financial transactions that cannot be counterfeited, forged, or modified, Ethereum took it a step further by allowing developers to upload indelible pieces of code into the Blockchain, called ‘smart contracts.’ Loom Network is the next logical step in this evolution — it allows developers to run these unstoppable applications on a massive scale.” says James Duffy, the co-founder.

The technology provides it's scalibility benefits by running each DApp on it's own blockchain, called a "DAppChain" - that runs parallel to an Ethereum smart contract.

Remember when Cryptokitties bogged down the entire Ethereum network? Well, imagine running a million, at once, and not noticing any difference in network congestion.

This very well could be the limitless scaling solution we've been waiting for.  But worth noting, these dedicated sidechains will be less secure and centralized ( and at least now during beta phase, only hosted with Loom Network) - giving less security.

China’s most popular cryptocurrency platform, today announced the launch of its own token, which is named MT.

Established in August 2017, MyToken has quickly become the most popular cryptocurrency platform in China in terms of market share and number of active users. The platform has more than 400,000 users, including 150,000+ daily active users across its iOS, Android, Mac, and web-based apps. The platform was established to offer a range of market services to cryptocurrency investors in China, including:

● Transaction data for almost 300 exchanges with real-time price and trading volume details across 70+ major exchanges.

● Real-time pricing data for more than 2,000 cryptocurrencies.

● Candlestick, trading volume and in-depth data across all major exchanges.

● Details on nearly 1,000 popular cryptocurrencies and their sub-markets, ICO price and projects.

● Real-time total asset feedback.

● Announcements and updates from major exchanges

● Useful industry insights and informations

“For any investor, access to quality information is key to success and that is particularly true in the cryptocurrency industry where investors need to be able to tell the signal from the noise. MyToken was established to provide investors with the most objective data, information and tools so that they can make the most informed investment decisions. By combining this access to data with user generated content, a vibrant investor community, and a range of useful services we can help investors reduce cost and invest with maximum efficiency,” says Larry, CEO of MyToken.

First Market-based App to Issue Its Own Token

With the launch of MT, an ERC20 token on Ethereum. MyToken aims to mleverage its expertise and resources in cryptocurrency management to provide an even better service to users of its platform. “There are many potential applications for MT, and we hope that it will add value to all users of our platform. For example, advertisers can use it as a means of paying for advertising, or users can use it to pay their transaction fees.  We see this as an ideal way to make transacting on our platform as seamless as possible for all users of our system.”

According to MyToken’s white paper, MT's overall market value is about $47 million (300 million RMB). When first listed on the exchange, the value of MT circulated in the market will be equivalent to 17,000 ETH. The remaining amount, equivalent to 7,000 ETH, will be unlocked on a daily basis over the next 6 months - a plan that is designed to stabilize the price of MT in current volatile market conditions.

MyToken has already generating significant volumes in trade which creates an immediate opportunity for trade in MT. Monthly advertising on the platform, for example, is between $900,000 to $1.8 million, while the company takes a service fee of 4% to 8% of every ICO on the platform. There is also a significant potential application for MT in DApp.

With this in mind, Aaron Chen, Partner of MyToken’s consulting agency Spectra Ventures & Advisory, believes MT will quickly become an important player in the international cryptocurrency market.

“MyToken is the first market app to issue its own cryptocurrency, and it’s starting from a position of significant advantage. MyToken has already been the China’s most popular cryptocurrency platform, and a vital entry point for Chinese investors. China currently sees the largest cryptocurrency trading volumes globally, so with MyToken’s industry leading position we see an immediate opportunity for MT to become a popular and widely circulated currency,” Aaron Chen continues, “We believe the blockchain industry is set for continued rapid growth over the next 3 to 5 years and that, building on its industry leading position, MyToken can quickly become a highly profitable platform with tens of thousands of RMB in monthly revenue. This gives MT a significant potential advantage, and this is underpinned by our repurchase commitment. It is highly likely that we will soon complete our repurchase goal for MT to reduce the volume in circulation to just 3 billion.”

Add our Telegram admin to get updated info and 200 FREE MTs
Telegram: spectraofficial
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ICO page: https://tokensale.mytoken.io

Bitcoin is under $8000 (at $7963 at time of writing) and Ethereum below $600 (at $588 at time of writing) - the lowest since the Feb 11th dip.

So, what does this mean? 

Well, it means we're waiting to find out the re-entry point of large investors  (aka "whales") - the point where they decide it probably won't go much lower, so it's time to re-buy at low prices.

We've evaluated two data sources - past indicators, and monitoring some private telegram channels for large accredited investors only - where our sources have been combing to look for the discussion of automated buy-orders.

Based on this data we believe the worst case scenario before an upward trend is triggered would be around $6500 for Bitcoin, and $450 for Ethereum.

Of course, relief could still come before then, and a stagnant market will soon be revitalized either way, as a multitude of new index funds prepare to launch bringing in large amounts of institutional investors.

There's light at the end of the tunnel, what's uncertain is how fast we're traveling.

------- 

Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse is taking heat from Bitcoin belivers for compairing it to the early, and now forgotten music P2P sharing program "Napster". 

Speaking to Bloomberg in Singapore, Garlinghouse said:

"Some may look back at Bitcoin and say that it is the Napster of digital assets. What I mean by that is that Napster was the first to digitize music and demonstrate that you can do a lot of cool things with that.

But ultimately they were circumventing trademark laws, they were circumventing royalty payments and then government stepped in and Napster wasn’t successful. But Spotify, iTunes, and Pandora were successful.

I think what you will find is that maybe the next generation of digital assets will end up solving some of the problems that Bitcoin set out to solve."

It's an interesting battle as Bitcoin faces criticism around issues of scaling - leaving some questioning Bitcoin's long-term usefulness as a currency, and Ripple faces criticism for lack of decentralization, one of Bitcoin's main components.

First off let me say - nobody here is angry at John Oliver.  We get it - it's a comedy show. I'd say at best 'a bit disappointed' is the general response when the topic came up in our morning meeting and we played it for those who missed it last night.

But since it's what the cryptocurrency world is buzzing about today, let's take a deeper look just for fun.

As I journalist, this did indeed have the signs of a bit of hit piece. While I can’t say John Oliver was technically wrong about anything, or lying - there are a couple red flags. Some strange and deliberate choices his producers and writers made.

Look at the only people they chose to show on the pro-cryptocurrency side. Some dumb sounding guy bragging about making millions, Carlos from Bitconnect, and Brock from EOS sounding insane at the end babbling about his wedding at Burning Man on stage.

They chose those people - in an industry literally full of genius engineers, scientists, coders. Honest and good people too - but they chose the most ridiculous ones they could.

What I wish they didn't leave out is - the people they showed are mocked inside the cryptocurrency world as well! We make fun of these people too!  I feel like someone unfamiliar with cryptocurrency would watch this and think these people are embraced as our leaders or at least accepted here - they definitely are not.

To top it off,  the one person they cut to and say gave an ‘accurate explanation’ - they made sure still looked stupid in some ridiculous bitcoin costume.

I talk to and interview people in the cryptocurrency world for a living - I do not come accross people like the ones John Oliver showed very often.  It took a deliberate effort to select this batch of of idiots to feature.  Sure, maybe just because they’re the funniest.

But still - could have shown a few of the idiots in crypto, then maybe a couple of the many sane and frankly brilliant people in this space.  Once again, not angry - just would have been nice, and a more accurate overview for his viewers.

The bulls are back! For the first time in 3 days - all coins in the top 100 are in the green.

Financial analysts were watching for one key factor that could have sent things falling further - the market dipping below their previous recent lows hit on Feb 6th, which would have put Bitcoin in the $7400's.

But thankfully, that never happened - the market found bottom around $8500, giving the green light to the bulls, Bitcoin has risen to $9,402 at time of publishing this article and altcoins are joining in the recovery as well.

$36 billion has been added to the overall market cap in the last 24hrs, a sign that unless any unexpected bad news pops up, recovery is now in full swing!

About 3 weeks ago we covered the "Bitcoiin" ICO that actor Steven Seagal was promoting (read that article here).

Now, the New Jersey Bureau of Securities has issued them a cease and desist order.

The celebrity endorsement itself may have also been illegal, citing a previous SEC directive that any celebrity endorsement of an ICO should disclose the nature, scope, and amount of compensation paid to the celebrity. 

The statement from the NJ Bureau of Securities reads:

“The Bitcoiin Websites do not disclose what expertise, if any, Steven Seagal has to ensure that the Bitcoiin investments are appropriate and in compliance with federal and state securities laws. Additionally, there are no disclosures as to the nature, scope, and amount of compensation paid by Bitcoiin in exchange for Steven Seagal’s promotion of the Bitcoiin investments.”

While there are no new announcements posted in direct response to the cease and desist, an older post from when Bitcoiin first started receiving criticism titled 'PRESS RELEASE: TO CLARIFY SOME FACTS AND RESPONSE ON ALLEGATIONS' says:

"...we are not an MLM company or any Pyramid Scheme or Scamming people, all of these allegations are false and just an attempt to discourage people from becoming a part of the Bitcoiin2Gen, Crypto-Currencies, and Crypto-economies."

Unfortunately, even if everything they say is true - that leaves plenty of red flags.  The site owners are remaining anonymous (remember Bitconnect?) and they're promoting an Ethereum based ERC20 token but named it after a misspelling of Bitcoin - which appears to be a bold attempt to confuse people new to cryptocurrency.

It's been a rough day in cryptocurrency. There's nothing here worthy of panic, but still, you're probably wondering the reasons behind today's dip, so let's dive in.

First - U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission is asking exchanges to register with them, as exchanges.

“If a platform offers trading of digital assets that are securities and operates as an ‘exchange,’ as defined by the federal securities laws, then the platform must register with the SEC as a national securities exchange or be exempt from registration.” the SEC said in a statement today.

Their concern is that when people hear the word "exchange" they associate it with the stock exchange, and all the rules and regulations that come with it. Not even the big ones currently are registered as such.  For example, Coinbase operates by getting money transmission licenses state by state, and Gemini is licensed where it resides, with the New York State Department.

Secondly - fears of a Binance hack. There's two options being debated at time of publishing.  Some saying Binance's API was exploited (this allows for people using other programs, or trading bots, to interact with Binance to facilitate the trades).

Binance however points to a phishing site with a URL that looks very close to the real thing - meaning nothing was hacked, some people were just tricked.

According to Binance founder CZ, the crooks won't get away with it either way, tweeting;

"We have localized the irregular trades, they will be reversed.  All funds are safe, thanks to the fast alarm.  Please learn to secure your accounts against phishing."

Third - Mt Gox comes to haunt us again. For those new to crypto, it was an exchange site that ended up a huge mess with a lot of stolen bitcoin (the full story is much longer, that's the basics).

The bankruptcy trustee for Mt Gox came out today and put some fear into the market, that a lot of the Bitcoin they're sitting on will be sold soon in order to begin paying off their creditors. They're still holding $1.9 Billion worth, and says they plan to offload them soon.

So, it's just one of those days.  While any 1 of these probably wouldn't have a huge effect on the market, all 3 at once has made today a rough ride.

Bitcoin mining costs by country. Image: EliteFixtures

EliteFixtures has released a study (link) using the average electricity costs in each country to show the total power costs to earn 1 bitcoin via mining. 

Their parent company Crescent Electric Supply previously did a study breaking down the costs by US state, which can be seen here.

We think of the internet as vital to anything blockchain related, and it is - but what if that same blockchain technology could also interact with another kind of network?

XYO Network is building that - and to an impressive extent, already has.  They're now operating the largest network of GPS and Bluetooth devices in the world, with over 1 million acting as location beacon devices.

"The need for a difficult-to-disrupt system to complement GPS has been well known for years. GPS is exceptionally accurate and dependable, yet jamming, spoofing, cyber attacks and other forms of interference appear to be growing in frequency and severity. This has the potential for devastating effects on our lives and economic activity." -  says Dana Goward, Executive Director of the Resilient Navigation & Timing Foundation.

That's what the XYO Network will function as, with the intent of using blockchain technology to create a totally trustless method of tracking anything, anywhere. Creating a network that developers can interact with the real world as if it were an API.

So here's how it would be used in the real world.  An online shopping site could build in a smart contract the location (XY coordinates) of the home or business they're shipping something to, with the agreement that funds are not released until the item reaches those coordinates.

They would then track the item every step of the way.  From wearhouse, to shipment and all locations inbetween. Holding the funds within the smart contract, they would be released when the package hits it's destination.  Allowing the shipper to gurantee delivery, and the buyer to never pay for something until it's recieved.

"The XYO Network is the world’s first XY-coordinate bridge between blockchain and the real world” says company founder Arie Trouw.

The XYO Network has a consumer-friendly Web App Interface called "XY Gamma" with developer APIs, and software libraries for a range of popular smart contract languages.

Whitelisting for the ICO is live now at https://xyo.network

PayPal has filed their first patent related to cryptocurrency and blockchain tech. The concept behind it revolves around a system that transfers private keys off-chain to speed up transaction times.  An excerpt from the patent reads:

"The systems and methods of the present disclosure practically eliminate the amount of time the payee must wait to be sure they will receive a virtual currency payment in a virtual currency transaction by transferring to the payee private keys that are included in virtual currency wallets that are associated with predefined amounts of virtual currency that equal a payment amount identified in the virtual currency transaction."

It echos some of the concepts outlined by Microsoft last month (link).  It's becoming a widely accepted idea, that transactions must be confirmed off of the blockchain, then recorded to the blockchain afterwards - otherwise there's no way Bitcoin which is currently processing a maximum of about 7 transactions per second, will ever rival credit cards as a payment system which can do about 50,000 per second.  Lightening Network is a similar off-chain solution.

But also worth noting - a patent filing doesn't necessary mean a company is about to dive into cryptocurrencies head first. PayPal has not announced any specific product or service related to cryptocurrency coming soon.

You can read PayPal's full patent application here.

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File this under 'odd stories in crypto' - a hacker who stole Ethereum valued at over $37 million has given back some of it - twice now.   (Worth noting - $37 million is the value of the Ethereum today, at the time it was closer to $7.5 million).

The story behind how he obtained it goes back to July 2017 and the Coindash ICO.  The hacker broke into their website, and simply replaced the address for investors to send their ethereum to, to one he controled. People who thought they were participating in the ICO we're actually just sending funds to the hackers wallet.

Then, in September - the hacker returned 10,000 ETH back to CoinCash. Then on Friday he popped up again - returning another 20,000 ETH to CoinDash.

"We have notified the Counter Cyber Terrorist Unit in Israel. The hacker’s Ethereum address will continue to be tracked and monitored for any suspicious activity." CoinDash's CEO Alon Muroch said in a company blog post.

As for the rest of the funds, nothing's been spent - the remaining 13,000 Ethereum is still just sitting in the hackers wallet.

For the younger generations raised online, a "travel agent" sounds like something only our grandparents talk about.  We browse online, we compare prices online, and we book online - all without having to speak to another human.

That's great and all, but we also know the problems that have come with it.  If you've ever ended up eating somewhere Yelp users swore was fantastic...and wasn't.  Or worse, booked a few nights at a hotel that had decent reviews and photos - but when you got there, figured out they showed the 1 newly renovated room online... and you're not staying in it.

Well, they've figured us out - it's as easy as creating an appealing image online to bring in customers.  In some of the darker corners of the internet, you can find people who can make it happen. Businesses can buy fake reviews and ratings and make a flop look like a hit.

Don't believe me? Check out this Vice News reporter, who just a couple months ago managed to become London's #1 restaurant on TripAdvisor - except he didn't even have a restaurant.  He showed how the system can be manipulated with fake reviews and hype (check that out here).

Now, think about your traveling experience if you're visiting a friend or family member.  Before you book that room or make dinner reservations somewhere, you may shoot them a text message and ask 'how is it?'.

Okay, now imagine if you were able to do this in every city! Connect with a local who has the inside scoop - but unlike those questionable reviews - this person is rewarded for giving you the straight truth.

This is the concept behind Cool Cousin.  Giving you a 'cool cousin' to hit up in every city.

"Using our friendly app, travelers get on-demand city guidance that matches their style and needs, directly from like-minded locals. Once they’ve connected with a Cousin, travelers can directly reach out to them for personalized city guidance. Every month, thousands of travelers contact our Cousins for advice on timing their visit, where they should stay, tickets for special occasions, current events, customized itineraries and more." explains the company.

The idea is to bridge the gap between a generation that does it all online, and the generation that calls a travel guide for help.  Now, you have that real human guide - but in an app, on your phone!

Another plus - while powering the app with blockchain tech and their CUZ (ERC20) token will be new - the app isn't. It's already gotton some big media attention as well, and mentions in The New York Times, Guardian, USA Today, National Geographic and TechCrunch.

Their ICO is live now, and ends on March 15th.  Full info https://www.coolcousin.com/ico/

Valued at over $2 million USD, the 600 Bitcoin miners disappeared from a data center in Iceland, and police are suspecting an inside job.

Local media has dubbed it the "Big Bitcoin Heist" - which has already seen 11 arrests of those suspected to be involved.  Among those suspects - the security guard in charge of protecting them.

But even stranger - all those arrests, and still no miners recovered.

"This is a grand theft on a scale unseen before, everything points to this being a highly organized crime." says Icelandic police chief Olafur Helgi Kjartansson.

Mining hardware has become a target of thefts worldwide, since those who steal it don't need to resell it to make a profit - they can just use them to mine Bitcoin themselves.

Over the last couple years Iceland's inexpensive electricity has drawn in Bitcoin mining operations from around the world.

Today - data is king.  Businesses both large and small are out to generate more, buy more, and find better ways to utilize it once they have it. They call it "big data" but that doesn't even accurately describe what has become a truly massive global industry.

But just because the data exists doesn't mean it's being put to good use - if used at all.  When someone thinks about "big data" they picture the search engines, social networks, apps, cloud services, etc. 

While small and medium size businesses may be gathering data too - understanding how to analyze it, learn from it, and apply the knowledge gained from it to make smarter business decisions can be an overwhelming task for a company with a couple dozen employees.

Well, imagine a marketplace where big data and small/medium businesses can get together, to help eachother - and actually want to because there's incentive for both.  That's what a company called Repux has built.

Companies are gathering this valuable data but they don't know how to monetize it, in the Repux marketplace, they can now find a buyer.  Businesses can upload anonymized data sets, and through agreements secured via smart contracts, sell those data sets to the developers who need it. The developers can then even choose to sell their work back to small business for them to utilize, completing the circle that never would have been done without this partnership: gathering, analyzing, using. A process the best businesses do continually.

“The RepuX Protocol has the potential to eliminate the ‘digital divide’ between those who have easy access to machine learning datasets and those who don't” explains the company.

Also something we like to hear - Repux is already in motion! The platform is live, and being tested with 4 companies on the pilot program - WorkHQ, FungyuCPA, and Dascom which collectively represent a reach of millions of small/medium businesses.

“Data has always been something that SMEs have struggled to utilize to improve their business. So, in June of 2017 we developed this concept to create a decentralized storage system for SMEs and developers to collaborate together. We then started working on a platform, which is now live.” says Tomasz Tybon, co-founder and chief growth officer for RepuX.

The Repux token is an ERC20 token, and is the only method that will be allowed for all payment exchanges on the platform.

Their ICO is live now until March 9th - full information at https://repux.io