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Calvin Ayre Claims Bitcoin Is Going To Zero

There are many individuals around the world that have claimed that Bitcoin’s price is inflated. Especially during the cryptocurrency bull run of 2017, many claimed that Bitcoin was a “bubble” and being fueled by speculative interest rather than its intrinsic value. Since Bitcoin has fallen from its highs above $19,000 to its current price below $4,000 – these claims are less abundant, especially with more people than ever interested in blockchain technology. It appears as though Bitcoin Cash founder Calvin Ayre, however, isn’t so optimistic when it comes to the original Bitcoin.

Bitcoin Bashing

However, Calvin Ayre, the co-founder of Bitcoin Cash, has stated that he believes Bitcoin is essentially worthless. He states, “I am predicting it to go to zero value [in 2019], as it has no utility. It does not do anything, and they intentionally are anti-scaling.”

Ayre believes that Bitcoin Satoshi VIsion (Bitcoin SV) will take its place. He claimed, “Bitcoin — the technology and economic model — are alive and well with Bitcoin SV, and it’s going to have an amazing year.” Of course, it is easy to see that Ayre seems to be claiming that “his’ cryptocurrency will succeed, while the original Bitcoin will fail, and many in the cryptocurrency community were skeptical about the comments.

Previous Success

For those that are unaware, Calvin Ayre is a Canadian-Antiguan entrepreneur that made himself a billionaire after he created the online gambling company Bodog. He modeled his personal brand after billionaire Richard Branson from the Virgin Group.

His involvement with cryptocurrency actually led to Antigua and Barbuda appointing Calvin Ayre as a Special Economic Envoy in 2017. Ayre is to advise the government on new ways to utilize blockchain technology.

Many countries in the Caribbean appear to be interested in becoming a haven for blockchain startups, the same way that the region became a hub for online gambling previously during the 1990s, and continues to be a hub for offshore banking. He also maintains an online gambling news website that uses his own name at CalvinAyre.com.

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Weekly Cryptocurrency markets analysis: November 11 to November 18

This week was characterized by fundamental news of: The Bitcoin Cash Fork disagreement which brought the markets down and Ripple overtaking Ethereum to become the second top digital coin by market capitalization. Additionally, there were opposing views from the regulators stemming from the IMF’s advisory opinion to governments that they should set up their own cryptocurrencies. The European Central Bank (ECB) distanced itself from the calls for national cryptos to be set up, terming it an evil scheme.

Bitcoin Cash (BCH/USD)

In the technical analysis, prices of most cryptocurrencies took a sharp drop across most markets chiefly due to the BCH hard fork meant to upgrade and enhance Bitcoin Cash’s protocol. This project initially ‘hard forked’ or otherwise split from the Bitcoin blockchain in August 2017. On November 14, it additionally split in two; BCH ABC and BCH SV. The result is that BCH ABC now has more accumulated proof of work while BCH SV was trading higher on crypto-exchanges. The fork led to a break of the recent stability, with most cryptos taking a 10% drop. Despite taking the beating, some like Ripple (XRP) went through mild recovery after the fork.

Bitcoin (BTC/USD):

The strongest digital coin by market cap veered off from stability following the BCH fork meltdown which saw it lose 10%, breaking the $6000 support level. Throughout the week, the coin hit a high of $6434.21 and the low point of $5358.38. The coin’s performance is a total deviation of pundits’ prediction that the coin would gain in value towards the end of the year. Among them is crypto analyst Tom Lee who had said Bitcoin would hit $25,000 by the end of the year. He however lowered his prediction to $15,000.

Ripple (XRP/USD) overtook ETH in market capitalization

XRP moved to second place as Ethereum took a beating. On the top, this week the prices of XRP were at USD 0.525536 and towards the bottom, it quoted USD 0.430398. Ether prices took a beating and lost its long-standing second place to XRP. Ethereum on the top, this week was at USD 212.62 and were at lows of USD 170.19 breaching the USD 200 mark by distance. The fork downpour in the crypto market and subdued prices over past few months resulted in Ethereum (ETH) losing its second spot to Ripple (XRP). Ethereum’s value plummeted 38.6% in the past three months, dropping its market cap to $18.1 billion. XRP’s value rose 61.1 percent in that same period, pushing its market cap to $20.5 billion. CRYPTO IS COMING!

What Role Will Coinbase Play in The Crypto Space?

Coinbase has long been one of the most well-known cryptocurrency exchanges, providing a gateway for people to exchange fiat for Bitcoin which can then be held or moved to other exchanges with more trading pairs.

While Coinbase currently only offers Bitcoin, Ethereum, Litecoin, and Bitcoin Cash, most exchanges don’t allow customers to purchase with fiat directly due to regulatory complications associated with doing so, allowing Coinbase to establish itself as a fundamental piece of infrastructure in the crypto-space.

The exchange has an estimated 20 million users and just shy of 1 million followers on Twitter, about 100,000 more than Binance which is the largest exchange in the world by volume.

Founded in 2012, the company dominated the space early on with the Coinbase iPhone app becoming the most downloaded app of last year when the company generated $1 billion in revenue. The company was valued last year at $1.6 billion by a number of firms and raised $100 million in funding from outside investors. At that time Coinbase offered employees a share buyback, which almost none of them accepted due to the idea that the shares would increase in value – and they were right.

Verto Analytics cited over 4 million active monthly users on the exchange as the value and usage increased, and the company is likely now worth billions – in fact, the company recently placed a valuation of $8 billion on itself.  Forbes states that Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong is now a billionaire, or thereabouts with an estimated net worth of $900 million to $1 billion.

The exchange is a vital part of the ecosystem, although not without its own controversies and even rumors that the company will soon change hands.

Facebook Acquisition Incoming?

There have been persistent rumors that Facebook is closing in on Coinbase, seeking to absorb the highly profitable crypto-exchange with its tens of millions of users and connect both firms together, most likely integrating Facebook functions on the Coinbase interface.

The rumors are partly fuelled by the former head of Facebook messenger David Marcus joining the Coinbase board, which he announced over Twitter (probably Facebook too!).

Since 2005 Facebook have acquired 66 companies including Whatsapp for $19 billion, Occulus VR for $2 billion, and Instagram for $1 billion, meaning Coinbase is certainly within their grasp financially.

Director of Communications for DFinity supercomputer told CryptoNewsReview:

“Coinbase is a bargain at any price. If Facebook went ahead with the acquisition they could become the world’s biggest finance company, as well as benefiting from a once-in-a-generation event: the emergence of a new capital market. Coinbase is one of a handful of companies poised to capture uncountable billions of dollars.”

CEO Brian Armstrong on BTC/BCH

The soon-to-be-billionaire is a well-known figure in the cryptocurrency space, and unlike other CEOs of prominent companies, hasn’t been too shy about voicing his personal opinions on controversial issues within the community.

Armstrong has on occasion shown his support for Bitcoin Cash over Bitcoin Core, despite essentially BTC still being the most widely traded currency on the exchange. Coinbase staggered the release of BCH as an exchange asset between December and January.

https://twitter.com/Tom_Horvath/status/949207156338946048

In January 2016 Armstrong voiced his opinion that bigger block sizes was the solution to the scaling problem in a blog post, and Coinbase didn’t immediately adopt SegWit when it was released.

In 2016 r/Bitcoin mod Theymos removed Coinbase from the bitcoin.org’s list of suggested websites along with a number of other helpful and relevant resources as part of the ongoing BTC/BCH feud. Armstrong had previously suggested to the Reddit CEO that Theymos be removed as moderator from the sub due to the concerning amount of censorship taking place on site.

Regulatory Issues

The site reportedly had some trouble with the IRS over the requirement to disclose user information for the purposes of gathering data pertaining to the payment of capital gains tax in the US, to which Coinbase complied.

Coinbase is now on the way to becoming a federally regulated securities firm, to mixed reactions from within the community, many of whom are strongly opposed to regulation and government interference.

Coinbase COO Asiff Hirji recently published a blog stating that the company was obtaining a broker-dealer license, an alternative trading system license and a registered investment advisor license. At that point the company intends to seek approval from the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) to offer blockchain-based securities.

Competition

The company has some pretty stiff competition from emerging startup Robinhood which saw great success with its stock trading app before turning to cryptocurrency. The crypto app is also becoming very widely used and the company is now valued at $5.6 billion, rapidly gaining in valuation on Coinbases somewhat disputed $8 billion valuation.

The Robinhood CEO recently stated his intention to rival Coinbase with a recently acquired funding round of $363 million from investors. Unlike Coinbase, Robinhood is already a licensed broker with the SEC, giving the company a significant advantage in that area.

For many, the question isn’t whether Coinbase or Robinhood should end up on top, but whether such companies are good for the crypto space in general.

Undeniably the entry point Coinbase has provided people with over the last few years has been a fundamental piece of infrastructure that greatly aided adoption in a big way, with Robinhood offering similar ease of access to a world often viewed as overly complicated or technical for the lay investor.

However, the close ties to the SEC make others question the nature and motivations of the exchange – those seeking to escape the situation they are already in with fiat where they are beholden to government authorities to whom they must entrust their earnings do not view regulated exchanges as trustworthy or safe.

However, with the advent of decentralized exchanges like IDEX available, the crypto market arguably has the best of both worlds, with the dApp exchanges serving those wishing to go off-grid with their funds and engage in truly private and peer-to-peer exchange of assets, and giants like Coinbase and Robinhood catering to those who simply want to buy and trade some crypto.

Right now Coinbase is inarguably the crypto community’s biggest institutional evangelist….but is it the hero crypto needs?

Interested in other cool crypto posts….check out Mining Wars: Bitmain vs Dragonmint and The Price of Bitcoin vs Cost of Mining.

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EOS Tops Revised Chinese List Of Top Cryptocurrencies

Despite being omitted from the original list, published last month, EOS tops the most recent list, produced by the Chinese government, of the best cryptocurrencies. EOS and Nebulas were missed off the original list, but now make the revised edition. A spokesperson said that the ranking algorithms had been changed a little, which not only saw the introduction of the two coins, but also saw some minor changes in ranking for some major cryptocurrencies. Bitcoin slipped from 13th to 17th in the list while Bitcoin Cash fell from 25th to 28th in the list.

Cryptocurrencies Ranked

The launch of the initial list came as a shock, as the Chinese government administered a blanket ban on all cryptocurrency and coins. Despite the ban, China was the first country to launch an official ranking list of digital currencies. The list ranked crypto according to innovation, technology, and application. Ethereum was ranked at number 1 with Bitcoin in 13th spot. There were some raised eyebrows as Bitcoin Core didn’t make the top 10 and Bitcoin Cash barely made the list of 28 at all.

The latest publication is the second monthly updated list. EOS topped the list this time around, again raising eyebrows, as the technology has been blighted by downtime and bugs since its mainnet launch at the beginning of the month. EOS introduction means that Ethereum dropped to second place.

Algorithm Tweaks

Although there were some minor tweaks to the actual ranking algorithms used, the same basic premise of the ranking remained the same, and every cryptocurrency on the list was ranked according to its innovation, technology, and application.

EOS Leads The Pack

China’s Center for Information Industry Development (CCID) said that EOS, despite only being live for a couple of weeks, scored a combined total of 161.5 in its ranking. Second placed Ethereum only achieved 138.4. In contrast, Bitcoin, which only managed to rank 17th this time around, scored 91.5.

Interested in other cool crypto posts….check out A look at Historical Crypto Corrections and The Top Secret Hedge Fund That Everyone Knows About.

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$BCH losing hashrate relative to $BTC….predictions for 2018…what say you?

BCH (Bitcoin Cash) hashrate continues to decline this week. Down to 6% of BTC’s total hashrate.

looks like BTC hash rate is continuing to go up steadily while BCH hashrate growth has flattened over the past few months. Still early days for this project.

Predictions for end of 2018, what will this look like by end of the year…what say you redditors?