The LMAX Group has revealed figures on the growth of its crypto exchange, LMAX Digital. In a press release, LMAX states that the exchange has seen a 106% increase in the first half of 2020 for its trading volume with Bitcoin (BTC) and Ethereum (ETH). This translates into a record trading volume of $36 billion.

The LMAX Group reported total gains in trading volume of $2.3 trillion, with a 33% growth over the first half of 2019. The exchange is based in the UK and is regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA). For the past two years, the exchange has been offering institutions trade in the above-mentioned cryptocurrencies and in XRP, Bitcoin Cash and Litecoin.

The LMAX Group also reports a significant increase in the trading volume for the United States. Compared to the first half of 2019, the current trading volume registered an increase of 165%. In addition, the crypto exchange has a record number of new clients.

According to the press release, LMAX Digital is working with more than 200 large institutions globally that trade with Bitcoin, Ethereum and the other cryptocurrencies it offers in the United States, Europe and Asia. LMAX CEO, David Mercer, said the following

We have seen growth in new large institutional clients around the world trading on our execution venues and the deepening of existing relationships. This is attributed to the quality of the liquidity and execution we offer across exchanges ()In the two years since LMAX Digital launched, it has become the leading crypto currency exchange for institutional market participants and has secured its position as the primary price discovery venue.

In an earlier statement, the LMAX Group revealed that nearly $85 billion in cryptocurrencies have been traded since the service was launched. In addition, the last 10 months trading volume has increased 10-fold to $75 billion.

In the first quarter of this year, the crypto exchange experienced a 41% increase in quarterly trading volume and reached $20 billion, despite the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic on the global economy. David Mercer had the following to say about the growth in trade volume for cryptocurrencies:

We have been impressed by the resilience of crypto currencies, particularly Bitcoin, and note that they have been relatively stable compared to other asset classes which have enjoyed central bank intervention and still shown extreme levels of instability. We see this as an encouraging sign that investors are starting to place more value in digital currencies and have continued to trade through spikes in volatility.

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Interest from institutional investors for Bitcoin and Ethereum at record level - Crypto News Flash

Ethereum transactions are seeing transactional activity last seen in 2018when massive ICO activity dominated the network.

Much of the activity can be attributed to the rise of DeFi and Layer-2 applications. Furthermore, wallet data suggests investors may be accumulating ETH ahead of the networks upgrade to a staking mechanism.

Data shows Ethereum transactions are nearing 2018s levels. GAS prices have increased as a result, and are now at a record high.

As seen in the chart below, transactional activity has broken above last years 1 million/day levelnearing 1.3 million/day seen in January 2018. Current transaction activity is ranging between the 1.1-1.2 million/day level:

The charts coincide with the rise of DeFi applications this year. Projects like Balancer, Aave, Compound, and Synthetix have gained both a fan following and media interest in 2020and their rise in popularity is synchronous with the surge in Ethereum transactions.

DeFi tokens now account for 1.44 percent of the total cryptocurrency space, CryptoSlates proprietary analytics page shows. Sector volume has been $456 million over July 17-18.

The sector has returned 6.53 percent to investors in the past seven days. This is the most among any other sub-sectorssuch as smart contracts, general currencies, and privacy tokens.

Theres promise price-wise too. As CryptoSlate reported yesterday, one economic model has suggested Ethereums price will be boosted by DeFis growth. This was proposed by analyst Morgan Bennett earlier this week:

Meanwhile, mempool data on Ethereum is not helping its cause. Transaction fees have soared in the past week; costing over $10 on some smart contract transfers.

This can be traced back to DeFi token usage; the top-10 (DeFi) coins run on the Ethereum mainnet currently:

A relevant Reddit thread captures some of the community sentiment in this regard. The high gas prices make it really painful (and sometimes confusing) to interact with (a) smart contract, said one forum member.

But Ethereums broader ecosystem is working to solve some of these issues. ConsenSys-backed Starkware reached 9,000 transactions/second in testing in May, while Matic Network reported 7,200 tps in a testnet last week.

As Ethereums current tps is a small 12-15; block data shows. Layer-2 designs and rollup tech, once deployed, promise to power the network to over 1 million tps.

And thats required as well; if at all any decentralized cat meme games arrive on the scene again.

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Ethereum transactions are now near 2018s ICO boom levelsits the DeFi effect - CryptoSlate

Source: Adobe/bankrx

Chinas Blockchain Service Network (BSN) platform will integrate the Ethereum (ETH), Ios, Tezos (XTZ), Nervos (CKB), NEO and IRISnet blockchain networks as an international portal is unveiled in August.

Per a blog post, a version of the BSN a network that already has full coverage in all major Chinese cities, per official sources will roll out on August 10. Its operators said it will be called the BSN International Portal and will allow users around the world access to low-cost blockchain solutions.

BSN said it will offer three main services, namely permissioned services, permissionless services and inter-chain services.

The existing BSN-China portal has already begun offering permissioned services for Mainland Chinese locations. However, the operators added that due to regulations in China, permissionless services will only be available on the BSN International Portal and on international public city nodes.

Regardless, the operators appear keen to push ahead with interoperability drives, and claimed that they will add an additional three to five public chains to the BSN International Portal per month. They noted that they will focus on public chains that emphasize and encourage [decentralized app] development.

As previously reported, the BSN initiative is the brainchild of a number of Chinese government organs and state-owned firms, including government think tank the State Information Center of China, telecom giant China Mobile and financial services company China UnionPay.

In an official statement, BSN operators stated that the network has already deployed more than 120 public city nodes at locations around the world.

The operators also added that five BSN International nodes would be linked to the BSN-China network, but added that they would need to operate independently and comply with the laws and regulations of the areas in which they are active.

BSN has previously claimed that it has nodes activein Tokyo, Paris, Sydney, and So Paulo.

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Chinese Blockchain Network Integretes Ethereum, Tezos, NEO, and More - Cryptonews

Ever since it then-record $232 million ICO (initial coin offering) back in 2017, Tezos (XTZ) has earned a justifiable amount of buzz in the crypto world. But does the Swiss-US joint venture have legs?

First off, its important to understand what makes Tezos stand out among the thousands of cryptocurrencies on the market. XTZ utilizes a proof-of-stake based consensus model, which, unlike Bitcoin and Ethereums proof-of-work models, isnt dependent on mining for its blockchain protocol.

Instead, Tezos employs a more democratic model where all stakeholders have a hand in managing the protocol in what is known as a self-amending blockchain. One of the big takeaways from this model is that it avoids the issue of hard forking into two different blockchains. Hard forking is what caused bitcoin cash to break off from bitcoin and Ethereum to break off from Ethereum classic.

In comprehensive terms, Tezos uses a formal, on-chain mechanism for proposing, selecting, testing, and activating protocol upgrades. It results in a uniquely formalized process, in which users have control of what happens to updates, as long as its within the Tezos protocol.

It all adds up to some exciting potential for Tezos, which has generated some major public enthusiasm and investor interest. The Bank of France is testing out a Tezos node, and a tech investment firm called Silicon Valley Coin chose Tezos (noticeably over Ethereum) to tokenize its fund.

XTZ is also making a lot of noise on the STO (security token offering) market, with global investment banks like BTG Pactual, tZERO, and Alliance Investments contributing to a reported $2.6 billion-plus in STOs deployed on the Tezos blockchain.

So, will all this buzz and heightened interest result in Tezos being the next altcoin to go boom? Or is it all just hot air? Check out eToros video to find out more about Tezos and if it has what it takes to rival Ethereum as the no. 2 cryptocurrency on the market.

[VIDEO]

Disclaimer:

eToro is a multi-asset platform that offers both investing in stocks and crypto assets, as well as trading CFDs.

Please note that CFDs are complex instruments and come with a high risk of losing money rapidly due to leverage. 75% of retail investor accounts lose money when trading CFDs with this provider. You should consider whether you understand how CFDs work and whether you can afford to take the high risk of losing your money.

Past performance is not an indication of future results.

Cryptoassets are volatile instruments that can fluctuate widely in a very short timeframe and therefore are not appropriate for all investors. Other than via CFDs, trading crypto assets are unregulated and therefore is not supervised by any EU regulatory framework.

This is a paid post and should not be considered as news/advice.

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Will Tezos Be the Altcoin to Unseat Ethereum on the Crypto Market? - AMBCrypto English

Non fungible tokens (NFT) representing diamonds have made their way to the OpenSea marketplace.

In the past, there have been quite a few attempts to tokenize diamonds and other precious stones and metals. But Icecap founder and CEO Jacques Voorhees says the problem with previous attempts was they treated diamonds as fungible commodities, which they are not.

He told Cointelegraph that when he first heard about NFTs from his son Erik Voorhees (CEO of ShapeShift), it all came together. They're as different as a snowflake, he said. All the efforts to try to create fungibility with a non fungible item, have ended up failing. And even though they've thrown blockchain technology at it, they still have yet to meet with success.

I've seen this going back all the way to 1972 when the West Coast Commodities Exchange tried to create fungibility and diamond futures contracts. The thing lasted about three days and the market fell out because the contracts weren't actually similar.

NFT representing a diamond. Source: Icecap.

Before they are tokenized, all diamonds are certified by the Gemological Institute of America (GIA) and are then sent to the Gem Certification & Assurance Lab (GCal) , which audits the GIA certificate and provides a guarantee:

So if it's ever found that their grading was not accurate, they will pay the difference in price and then they back that up with an actual insurance policy that covers them in case they have to pay out on that.

The problem that Icecap solves is that it is currently almost impossible for retail investors to sell diamonds without a steep discount as there is no secondary market. According to Voorhees, this is an untapped $10 billion opportunity, even if initially it will be a small niche market, mostly inhabited by crypto millionaires and early adopters. Voorhees says that Erik, who invested in the company, also promised to buy a diamond on the OpenSea marketplace.

After thorough consultations with his attorneys, Voorhees does not believe that the NFTs representing diamonds present a regulatory challenge:

They've looked closely at what we're doing and exactly how we're handling the title transfer and how we're handling the collection of sales tax issues like this. They've asked a lot of questions. Their conclusion is that it seems that there's no regulatory issue right now.

He added the lawyers had advised to proactively reach out to all of the potential regulatory agencies in any case.

Erik Voorhees said recently that now is the time to invest in real assets. According to Jacques Voorhees, ShapeShift may enable trading of NFTs soon.

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Diamonds Are (Finally) Forever on the Ethereum Blockchain - Cointelegraph

EOS

EOS fell by 0.83% on Monday. Partially reversing a 3.17% rally from Sunday, EOS ended the day at $2.5685.

It was a choppy start to the day. EOS rose to a late morning intraday high $2.6196 before hitting reverse.

Falling well short of the first major resistance level at $2.6431, EOS fell back to sub-$2.57 levels before finding support.

EOS briefly revisited $2.60 levels again before sliding to a late intraday low $2.5402. Steering clear of the first major support level at $2.5013, EOS recovered to $2.56 levels to limit the downside.

At the time of writing, EOS was down by 0.26% to $2.5618. A bearish start to the day saw EOS fall from an early morning high $2.5675 to a low $2.5618.

EOS left the major support and resistance levels untested early on.

EOS would need to move through the $2.5761 pivot level to support a run at the first major resistance level at $2.6120.

Support from the broader market would be needed, however, for EOS to break back through to $2.61 levels.

Barring an extended crypto rally, the first major resistance level and Mondays high $2.6196 would likely cap any upside.

Failure to move through the $2.5761 pivot would bring the first major support level at $2.5326 into play.

Barring another extended sell-off, EOS should continue to steer clear of sub-$2.45 levels. The second major support level at $2.4967 should limit the downside.

First Major Support Level: $2.5326

Pivot Level: $2.5761

First Major Resistance Level: $2.6120

23.6% FIB Retracement Level: $6.62

38% FIB Retracement Level: $9.76

62% FIB Retracement Level: $14.82

Ethereum fell by 1.32% on Monday. Partially reversing a 1.44% decline from Sunday, Ethereum ended the day at $236.1.

It was also a choppy start to the day. Ethereum rose to an early morning intraday high $239.8 before hitting reverse.

Falling short of the first major resistance level at $241.69, Ethereum slid to a late intraday low $233.85.

Ethereum fell through the first major support level at $234.97 before moving back through to $236 levels.

At the time of writing, Ethereum was up by 0.11% to $236.35. A mixed start to the day saw Ethereum fall to an early morning low $235.77 before striking a high $236.46.

Ethereum left the major support and resistance levels untested early on.

Story continues

Ethereum would need to move through the $236.6 pivot to support a run at the first major resistance level at $239.32.

Support from the broader market would be needed, however, for Ethereum to break back through to $239 levels.

Barring an extended crypto rally, the first major resistance level and Mondays high $239.8 should cap any upside.

Failure to move through the $236.6 pivot would bring the first major support level at $233.37 into play.

Barring another extended sell-off, Ethereum should continue to steer clear of sub-$230 levels. The second major support level at $230.63 should limit any downside.

First Major Support Level: $233.37

Pivot Level: $236.60

First Major Resistance Level: $239.32

23.6% FIB Retracement Level: $257

38.2% FIB Retracement Level: $367

62% FIB Retracement Level: $543

Ripples XRP slid by 2.45% on Monday. Reversing a 0.20% decline from Sunday, Ripples XRP ended the day at $0.19502.

Tracking the broader market, Ripples XRP rose to an early morning intraday $0.20068 before hitting reverse.

Ripples XRP fell through the first major support level at $0.1965 and the second major support level at $0.1932.

Finding late support, Ripples XRP moved back through the second major support level to cut the deficit on the day.

At the time of writing, Ripples XRP was down by 0.04% to $0.19494. A relatively bearish start to the day saw Ripples XRP fall from an early morning high $0.19497 to a low $0.19429.

Ripples XRP left the major support and resistance levels untested early on.

Ripples XRP will need to move through the $0.1960 pivot to support a run at the first major resistance level at $0.1997.

Support from the broader market would be needed, however, for Ripples XRP to break back through to $0.199 levels.

Barring a broad-based crypto rally, the first major resistance level and Mondays high $0.20068 should cap any upside.

In the event of a breakout, Ripples XRP should test the second major resistance level at $0.2044 before any pullback.

Failure to move through the $0.1960 pivot would bring the first major support level at $0.1913 into play.

Barring another extended crypto sell-off, Ripples XRP should avoid the second major support level at $0.1875.

First Major Support Level: $0.1913

Pivot Level: $0.1960

First Major Resistance Level: $0.1997

23.6% FIB Retracement Level: $0.3638

38.2% FIB Retracement Level: $0.4800

62% FIB Retracement Level: $0.6678

Please let us know what you think in the comments below.

Thanks, Bob

This article was originally posted on FX Empire

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EOS, Ethereum and Ripples XRP Daily Tech Analysis July 21st, 2020 - Yahoo Finance

For the day ahead

Ethereum would need to move the $234.11 pivot to support a run at the first major resistance level at $238.46.

Support from the broader market would be needed, however, for Ethereum to break back through to $235 levels.

Barring an extended crypto rally, the first major resistance level and Thursdays high $239.16 should cap any upside.

Failure to move through the $234.11 pivot would bring the first major support level at $229.07 into play.

Barring another extended sell-off, Ethereum should continue to steer clear of sub-$220 levels. The second major support level at $224.72 should limit any downside.

Major Support Level: $229.07

Pivot Level: $234.11

Major Resistance Level: $238.46

23.6% FIB Retracement Level: $257

38.2% FIB Retracement Level: $367

62% FIB Retracement Level: $543

Ripples XRP fell by 1.58% on Thursday. Following on from a 0.92% drop on Wednesday, Ripples XRP ended the day at $0.19436.

A mixed start to the day saw Ripples XRP rise to an early morning intraday high $0.19772 before hitting reverse.

Falling short of the first major resistance level at $0.1978, Ripples XRP slid to a late morning intraday low $0.18857.

Ripples XRP fell through the days major support levels before finding support late in the day. A recovery to $0.1930 levels saw Ripples XRP break back through the third major support level at $0.1908. The second major support level at $0.1944 pinned Ripples XRP back.

At the time of writing, Ripples XRP was up by 0.01% to $0.19437. A mixed start to the day saw Ripples XRP rise to an early morning high $0.19478 before falling to a low $0.19437.

Ripples XRP left the major support and resistance levels untested early on.

Continued here:

EOS, Ethereum and Ripple's XRP Daily Tech Analysis July 17th, 2020 - FX Empire

The cryptocurrency giant Binance has released a new report on Tron from popular platforms today .

Butera Vitalikor by such established names I Etherea founded by Justin Sun has a longstanding rivalry between Tron. These two blockchain platforms, which compete especially in dApp (decentralized application), are also competing with each other about fixedcoins.

Binance, the largest cryptocurrency exchange in the world in terms of trade volume, has released a general evaluation report on the Tron network today. Binance examines the mobility in the Tron network in this report and makes some general comparisons between Tron and Ethereum.

In this study on Binance Tron, he also examined the fixedcoins in the Tron network, their number and usage areas. Tron, which started to support Tether s USDT fixed coin with the TRC-20 standard, started to challenge Ethereum with this move.

The production of USD 2.8 billion USDT in a short time in the Tron network has also angered this competition. But the Ethereum especially Tronan yet fully in USDT can not hold head also need to specify. Because the total value of ERC-20 based USDTs in the Ethereum network is over $ 6 billion. In addition, there are almost 1.5 million addresses in the Ethereum network with USDT, which puts Ethereum in front of Tron.

At this point, Binance takes the focus from USDT and converts it to USDC. Of the building; He pointed out that as of July 2, 5 million 483 thousand USDT transactions were made in the Tron network , emphasizing that this is two times more than USDC transactions in the Ethereum network . The company also has 377 thousand USDT in the Tron network ; In the Ethereum network, it does not neglect to state that there are 178 thousand addresses with USDC .

After making a comparison over the amount of USDT and USDC in the Binance Ethereum and Tron networks, it also examines the usage areas of these fixedcoins. Stating that fixedcoins such as USDT and USDC are generally used for arbitrage between exchanges, Binance team points out that Tron is faster and cheaper than Ethereum in this regard . However, it should be reminded that the number of exchanges that support the ERC-20 standard is higher than the number of exchanges that support the TRC-20 standard.

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Binance Compares Tron with Ethereum: Which Is Faster? - Somag News

Camila Russo is the founder of The Defiant and author of The Infinite Machine, the first book on the history of Ethereum, which launches today. Read an extract here.

Almost five years ago on July 30, 2015, part of the Ethereum team had gathered in Berlin to see the network they helped build go live. A big screen overhanging their worktables served as the countdown clock for when the test network reached block 1,028,201. Thats the palindrome and prime number they picked as the key which would launch the mainnet. Others were waiting for the launch in Ethereum hubs in Amsterdam, Toronto, New York and Zug, Switzerland.

It was the culmination of months of work, where core developers did the heavy lifting on the technical side, but which also included designers, marketers, and community managers.Ethereans knew a distributed network with no community would fail.

Ethereum turns five on July 30, 2020. CoinDesk is marking five years of Ethereum with a series of retrospective stories and live-streamed Twitter conversations. There are even some Easter eggs for eagle-eyed readers. Tune in to our CoinDesk Live sessions July 27-31 at 4 p.m. Eastern each day or call +1 (661) 4-UNICRN.

Early Ethereum team members had also spent endless hours with lawyers leading up to the ether sale, some co-founders had gone through bitter fights, while many others had ravaged their savings working with no salaries towards one goal: Making the vision Vitalik Buterin laid out on a white paper in November 2013, a reality.

Its happening

When the test network hit the predetermined block at 4:26 p.m. in Berlin, a meme of Ron Paul, jubilant, with his arms up and surrounded in green laser beams and white block letters that read ITS HAPPENING, popped up on the monitor. The Ethereum team opened a bottle of champagne while rocket emojis filled chat rooms.

The Ethereum network quickly left other blockchain upstarts behind and has since grown to become the second-largest cryptocurrency after bitcoin, with ethers market capitalization (as of writing) at just under $30 billion.

Minecraft of crypto-finance

But a better measure of success is to examine whether Ethereum builders achieved what they set out to do. Ethereum aims to be a fully-fledged, Turing-complete (but heavily fee-regulated) cryptographic ledger, which allows developers to build any application they can dream of on top, Vitalik wrote in the white paper, which inspired early team members to drop everything and join him in building it.

Rather than being limited to a specific set of transaction types, users will be able to use Ethereum as a sort of Minecraft of crypto-finance that is to say, one will be able to implement any feature that one desires simply by coding it in the protocols internal scripting language, he wrote. Minecraft is a sandbox-style video game, which gives players flexibility to explore and build whatever they want in the games virtual world.

Vitalik, who was 19 years old at the time, listed on the Ethereum white paper the applications he envisioned could be built on top of this generalized platform:

Sub-currencies representing assets such as USD or gold to company stocks and even currencies with only one unit issued to represent collectibles or smart property.

Financial derivatives, such as hedging contracts. He notes that financial contracts of any form do need to be fully collateralized; the Ethereum network controls no enforcement agency and cannot collect debt.

Identity and reputation systems where users can register their names in a public database alongside other data, for example, for domain-name systems.

Decentralized Autonomous Organizations, which replicate traditional companies but use blockchain technology for enforcement. The entity would have shareholders who collect dividends and decide how the corporation automatically allocates its funds, using either bounties, salaries or even more exotic mechanisms such as an internal currency to reward work.

Also listed were crop and generic insurance, decentralized data feeds, gambling and prediction markets, a full-scale on-chain stock market and an on-chain decentralized marketplace.

Five years later, all of the use cases envisioned by Vitalik have become a reality, though some with more success than others.

Sub-currencies success

What Vitalik called sub-currencies what we now know as tokens, stablecoins and NFTs have arguably been the most successful applications on Ethereum so far. Valued at over $33 billion, Ethereums ERC-20 tokens represent almost 13 percent of total cryptocurrency market capitalization, according to Etherscan. Together with ether, all of the Ethereum ecosystem is about one-fourth of crypto.

The innovation of entrepreneurs being able to issue their own coins and sell them to anyone in the world in fundraising rounds, which for the first time didnt need venture capitalists or banks, helped fuel one of the most spectacular speculative manias in 2017-2018. This past year, most growth has come from stablecoins, with tokens pegged to the value of the U.S. dollar trading at about $12 billion thats about three times stablecoin market cap a year ago, according to Messari data most of which is on Ethereum, due mainly to Tethers migration to the network.

Non-fungible tokens and their marketplaces had their biggest moment with CryptoKitties in late 2017, but the space is arguably one of the brightest spots for innovation within Ethereum, with use cases from in-game items to art and limited-edition fashion.

Dexs and derivatives

On-chain stock exchanges are todays decentralized exchanges. While they still represent a fraction of total volume traded on centralized crypto exchanges, growth has been staggering. Almost $5.7 billion have traded so far on DEXs this year, or more than twice the value trading hands in all of 2019, according to Dune Analytics. Beyond volume metrics, DEXs are delivering on the cypherpunk dream of seamless, global, non-custodial trading of cryptocurrencies.

Financial derivatives are also flourishing. Synthetic assets platforms such as Synthetix and UMA allow almost any assets to be represented on the Ethereum blockchain, while margin trading platforms such as dYdX have enabled futures trading, the most popular asset in centralized crypto finance.

Meanwhile, lending platforms including Compound and Aave allow users to gain interest on their crypto deposits, and tokenize those deposits so they can be simply bought on an exchange and held in users wallets.

DAOs started out early in Ethereum history as one of the strongest projects. The DAO attracted, at the time, the most capital ever for an Ethereum fundraiser, though we all know how that ended. After a traumatic experience, the Ethereum community steered clear of decentralized organizations for a couple of years, until 2019 ushered a DAO revival. Initially, these entities were focused on distributing donations, but that quickly evolved into for-profit DAOs, like The LAO and VentureDAO.

Ethereum has also given rise to applications in prediction markets, identity systems and insurance, but theyre lagging financial applications in terms of volume and adoption.

Internet of value

Financial applications have had the greatest success on Ethereum so far, arguably because it provides something that just cant be replicated by the current financial system, or by bitcoin, the biggest cryptocurrency. Its a global network thats built to transfer value, and it can also process computer programs to allow for more sophisticated financial transactions. Value held in these financial platforms has soared to more than $2 billion this year, a fivefold increase from a year ago.

Ethereum has successfully become the Minecraft of crypto finance, as Vitalik envisioned. But beyond becoming a platform that can support all these different kinds of applications, the biggest impact is its creating an actual internet of value. Its a network that enables fast, cheap, global value transfers and the ability to program that money to become anything from futures contracts to collectibles to derivatives pegged to stocks, forex and commodities. And its allowing users of this system to take charge of their own assets and data.

Almost any network metric will show there is demand for permissionless, trustless systems. Active addresses are near a record at just under 568,000, a stone throws away from bitcoins 745,000, according to CoinMetrics. Transaction fees paid to the networks miners have surpassed bitcoins, while daily transaction count is almost four times that of the biggest cryptocurrency at about 1 million, the data show.

A good problem to have

The question isnt whether theres demand for Ethereum, but whether the network will continue developing fast enough to meet that demand. The wait for ETH 2.0, which would allow Ethereum to scale, has been a constant in Ethereums history. A barebones proof-of-stake chain, which was slated to launch early this year, has been delayed and now its unclear whether it will launch this year at all.

But progress with Layer 2 solutions, which take transactions off-chain, has been encouraging. Teams working on Optimistic Roll-Ups are testing prototypes, while solutions using Plasma and Zero Knowledge technology are live right now and able to handle thousands of transactions per second. While the wait for ETH2.0 continues, the wait for Ethereum scaling is over.

The next five years will be about strengthening these scaling solutions and making these financial applications more robust and secure. It will also be necessary to create better crypto onramps and building apps in the less developed areas of Ethereum, like identity and insurance. The result will be this Minecraft of finance stops being an insiders secret and more players can join.

The leader in blockchain news, CoinDesk is a media outlet that strives for the highest journalistic standards and abides by a strict set of editorial policies. CoinDesk is an independent operating subsidiary of Digital Currency Group, which invests in cryptocurrencies and blockchain startups.

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Five Years On, Ethereum Is the Minecraft of Crypto-Finance - CoinDesk - CoinDesk

Crypto analyst Nicholas Merten thinks savvy crypto investors should pay attention to whether alternative blockchain protocols can overtake Ethereum or at least grab a higher percentage of the market share.

Merten dubs the market competition the protocol wars, noting that all of the best-performing assets recently have either been enterprise blockchain or decentralized finance (DeFi) projects.

The host of DataDash notes that Cardano, EOS, Neo, Tezos and Cosmos are displaying promising metrics and should continue to perform well in the next year. The question, he says, is whether they can actually chip away at Ethereums protocol supremacy.

I have no doubt all of these crypto plays that we just looked at are probably going to have higher levels [compared] to Bitcoin [BTC] a year from now than where they are right now. Lets just get that off the table. Probably the vast majority.

Keeping that in mind though whether or not we can actually get some fundamental development on these chains is going to be the question we need to get answered in order to see if this is going to do a 2 or 3x against Bitcoin or if a variety of protocol plays are going to do a 10, 20, 30, [or] 40x.

Because this time around, its not just speculation. There needs to be a bit of fundamentals with it. There really does. Quite frankly, a lot of blockchain protocols simply have one thing missing that Ethereum has hand-in-hand, and that is a developer ecosystem.

Merten notes that while he appreciates the academic nature of Cardano, not much has been built on it. And EOS, he says, is probably in the second-best position in blockchain for DeFi, but he still hasnt felt a need to use any of the protocols DeFi apps.

This is a problem here. If you dont have a way to have the leverage of building a network effect, you can have a great blockchain, you can be much more scalable than Ethereum, but youre not going to be a better blockchain protocol in the long run.

From an investment perspective, Merten says he believes NEO, Tezos, and Cosmos are all potentially worth a look.

Featured Image: Shutterstock/camilkuo

Excerpt from:

Analyst Says These Altcoins Could Gain Up to 40X on Bitcoin But Will They Challenge Ethereum? - The Daily Hodl

EOS

EOS rose by 0.55% on Tuesday. Following a 2.55% fall from Monday, EOS ended the day at $2.5609.

A bearish start to the day saw EOS fall to an early morning intraday low $2.5057 before making a move.

Steering clear of the first major support level at $2.4491, EOS rose to a late intraday high $2.5791 before easing back.

Falling well short of the first major resistance level at $2.6574, EOS slipped back to sub-$2.57 levels.

At the time of writing, EOS was up by 0.14% to $2.5645. A mixed start to the day saw EOS fall to an early morning low $2.5591 before rising to a high $2.5645.

EOS left the major support and resistance levels untested early on.

EOS would need to avoid a fall through the $2.5486 pivot level to support a run at the first major resistance level at $2.5914.

Support from the broader market would be needed, however, for EOS to break out from Tuesdays high $2.5791.

Barring an extended crypto rally, the first major resistance level and resistance at $2.60 would likely cap any upside.

Failure to avoid a fall through the $2.5486 pivot would bring the first major support level at $2.5180 into play.

Barring another extended sell-off, EOS should steer clear of the second major support level at $2.4752.

Major Support Level: $2.5180

Pivot Level: $2.5486

Major Resistance Level: $2.5914

23.6% FIB Retracement Level: $6.62

38% FIB Retracement Level: $9.76

62% FIB Retracement Level: $14.82

Ethereum rose by 0.49% on Tuesday. Following a 1.39% decline from Monday, Ethereum ended the day at $240.43.

Tracking the broader market, Ethereum fell to an early morning intraday low $236.66 before finding support.

Steering clear of the first major support level at $235.82, Ethereum struck a late intraday high $242.01.

Falling well short of the first major resistance level at $244.22, Ethereum fell back to $240 levels before ending the day at $240 levels.

At the time of writing, Ethereum was up by 0.28% to $241.10. A bullish start to the day saw Ethereum rise from an early morning low $240.4 to a high $241.18.

Ethereum left the major support and resistance levels untested early on.

Ethereum would need to avoid a fall through the $239.70 pivot to support a run at the first major resistance level at $242.74.

Support from the broader market would be needed, however, for Ethereum to break out from Tuesdays high $242.01.

Barring an extended crypto rally, the first major resistance level and resistance at $243 should cap any upside.

Failure to avoid a fall through the $239.70 pivot would bring the first major support level at $237.39 into play.

Barring another extended sell-off, Ethereum should continue to steer clear of sub-$230 levels. The second major support level at $234.35 should limit any downside.

Major Support Level: $237.39

Pivot Level: $239.70

Major Resistance Level: $242.74

23.6% FIB Retracement Level: $257

38.2% FIB Retracement Level: $367

62% FIB Retracement Level: $543

Ripples XRP rose by 0.10% on Tuesday. Following a 1.31% fall from Monday, Ripples XRP ended the day at $0.19924.

A bearish start to the day saw Ripples XRP fall to an early morning intraday low $0.19527. Steering clear of the first major support level at $0.1919, Ripples XRP rose to a mid-day intraday high $0.20024.

Falling short of the first major resistance level at $0.2064, Ripples XRP slipped back to end the day at sub-$0.20.

At the time of writing, Ripples XRP was up by 0.34% to $0.19991. A mixed start to the day saw Ripples XRP fall to an early morning low $0.19918 before striking a high $0.19992.

Ripples XRP left the major support and resistance levels untested early on.

Ripples XRP will need to avoid a fall through the $0.1983 pivot to support a run at the first major resistance level at $0.2012.

Support from the broader market would be needed, however, for Ripples XRP to break out from Tuesdays high $0.20024.

Barring a broad-based crypto rally, the first major resistance level and Tuesdays high $0.20024 should cap any upside.

In the event of a breakout, Ripples XRP should test resistance at $0.21 before any pullback. The third major resistance level sits at $0.2082.

Failure to avoid a fall through the $0.1983 pivot would bring the first major support level at $0.1963 into play.

Barring another extended crypto sell-off, Ripples XRP should avoid sub-$0.19 levels. The second major support level at $0.1933 should limit any downside.

Major Support Level: $0.1963

Pivot Level: $0.1983

Major Resistance Level: $0.2012

23.6% FIB Retracement Level: $0.3638

38.2% FIB Retracement Level: $0.4800

62% FIB Retracement Level: $0.6678

Please let us know what you think in the comments below.

Thanks, Bob

See more here:

EOS, Ethereum and Ripple's XRP Daily Tech Analysis July 15th, 2020 - FX Empire

Popular crypto researcher Lark Davis thinks a number of decentralized finance (DeFi) projects that are not built on Ethereum have significant growth potential.

He specifically highlights the upside of four little-known crypto assets that he believes could see big growth in the short term.

I believe that DeFi outside of Ethereum is likely to be a big growth area in the coming months even if we still have great DeFi projects launching on Ethereum.

Davis calls out Kava (KAVA), Band Protocol (BAND), Switcheo (SWTH) and Nash (NEX) as his top picks.

Kava is a cross-chain, DeFi lending platform. Its token is trading at about $1.97 at the time of writing, and it has seen 4x gains since mid-May.

Despite its already-skyrocketing value, Davis says the token still has massive potential for long-term price appreciation.

The team and the backers of Kava are very, very strong as well. In my opinion, this has all the makings to be as big as Ethereums MakerDao, which at its height had a market cap over $1 billion.

Band Protocol is a Cosmos blockchain native and cross-chain data oracle network that competes with Chainlink. Its token is currently trading at about $2.42 at time of writing and has increased about 120% in price since the beginning of July. Says Davis,

BAND already has a big, growing list of high-profile partners, people like Binance and Wanchain and Elrond and Fantom and Kava, of course.

SWTH and NEX are both decentralized exchange tokens. Davis says they have upside potential because Switcheo is launching a new derivatives exchange and upgrading their token model, and Nash just launched a zero-fee fiat on-ramp for users in the European Union.

Davis does warn, however, that both are competing with tons of other decentralized exchanges, which could impact their growth.

Featured Image: Shutterstock/camilkuo

See the original post:

Four Crypto Newcomers May Outrun Bitcoin and Ethereum to Become Best Investments of 2020, According to Lark Davis - The Daily Hodl

Key Takeaways

A highly popular crypto-economic theory, which states that base layers are more valuable than the applications built on top of them, may soon fall out of fashion due to the booming DeFi market.

In 2016, Joel Monegro, then a member of the blockchain investment team at Union Square Ventures (now a partner at Placeholder VC), introduced a crypto-economic theory called the fat protocol thesis.

This theory proposed that base layer blockchains, like Bitcoin or Ethereum, accrue more value than their corresponding application layers.

For example, this would mean that the total of all applications built on Bitcoin cannot have a market cap that exceeds that of Bitcoin.

Monegros rationalization of this theory in a public article looked at the top cryptoassets at the time.

Ethereum was just a couple of years old with no breakout use case in place, but it commanded a valuation of a billion dollars. This is eerily similar to current circumstances for nascent layer one networks like Cardano and Cosmos that are still in their active bootstrapping phase but are valued at $4 billion and $750 million, respectively.

Of the top 20 cryptocurrencies by market cap, only six are on the application layer. In the top 10, this reduces to two projects, Chainlink and Tether, both of which are blockchain agnostic.

However, the current market cap of all ERC-20 tokens has now overtaken Ethereums market capitalization.

According to a spreadsheet created by Cami Russo, the total market cap of ERC-20 tokens is $33.2 billion. This number is closer to $29 billion after excluding Binance Chain and VeChain, both of which have transitioned away from Ethereum to their native blockchains.

Still, the total amount of ERC-20 tokens exceeds Ethereums $26.8 billion market cap. This figure excludes other tokens on Ethereum, such as ERC-777 and ERC-721 tokens.

Does this mean that Monegros thesis is no longer valuable? Not quite.

Three possible outcomes control the fate of the fat protocol thesis.

First, if the market cap of ERC-20 tokens starts to fall while ETH stagnates or declines, the thesis would be confirmed as the total market cap of Ethereums tokens falls below that of Ethereum.

Analysts could attribute the brief period where the market cap of ERC-20s exceeded that of Ethereum to euphoria on the application layer that got out of hand and turned into a mini-bubble. Mean reversion would kick into action and bring the value of Ethereums application layer closer to its mean, which is below Ethereums total market cap.

Second, the price of ETH could pump, causing its market cap to catch up with the application layer.

This is the preferred scenario for every market participant, as it creates more value on the path to efficiency, rather than eroding it. It also confirms the fat protocol thesis.

If ETH follows its application layer, it sets a precedent that the Ethereums total value is not a ceiling for application growth. Instead, as applications continue to prosper, they drag ETH along with it.

For every $1 of value created by Ethereums application, x% of that trickles down to ETH.

Further, this would cement the idea that token economics and adoption is the winning formula for a successful base layer. If teams build strong incentives on the base layer to create working applications and allow those applications to drip value into the base blockchain by funneling in more users, everyone wins.

Finally, if ETH stays stagnant, and the value of ERC-20 tokens continues to soar, the fat protocol thesis will be disproven.

However, for real confirmation of this, ERC-20 tokens need to be worth more than Ethereum over a much more extended period.

In the end, this would mean that ETH is just the base currency that powers the application layer, but demand is not high enough for it to form a symbiotic relationship with the products built on top of Ethereum.

This sets a negative precedent that the real money is on top of Ethereum and not Ethereum itself.

Such an outcome places the number two blockchain project in jeopardy, too. It could lead investors away from funding base layer improvements like scalability and security, and towards mooning altcoins.

Ultimately, the legitimacy of the fat protocol thesis is key to Ethereums continued dominance.

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A Comparison of DeFi Protocol Token Valuations

Bitcoin May Be Down, but DeFi Is Pumping Like It's 2017

Aave Raises $3 Million From Framework Ventures and Three Arrows Capita...

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Death of Fat Protocol Thesis Is Bearish for Ethereum - Crypto Briefing

As the crypto community is anticipating Ethereum 2.0, a large number of Ether (ETH) holders already have enough ETH for staking on the network.

Nearly 80% of total Ether (ETH) supply is being held by non-crypto exchange wallets exceeding the amount required for staking on Ethereum 2.0, according to the latest Ethereum 2.0 Economic Review report. Published on July 16, the report is by executives at the Ethereum blockchain infrastructure developer ConsenSys.

According to the report, 77.7% of the current ETH supply, or about 86.6 million ETH, lives in wallets holding more than 32 ETH the minimum amount required to earn staking rewards on ETH 2.0.

While the majority of staking-ready ETH is held on non-exchange wallets, an additional 18.7 million ETH is managed by exchanges subject to staking services, the report says. According to ConsenSys, these scales make up a compelling serviceable addressable market, while a key objective of staking rewards should be to convert these wallets into active validators.

ConsenSys experts further outlined that 13.8% ETH staked will match the security levels of ETH1 at historical prices. We calculate that the target ETH stake rate for adequate security under historical price fluctuations is 13.8%, the report notes.

Ethereum staking is a major part of the Ethereum blockchains highlyanticipated upgrade, the so-called Ethereum 2.0. This upgrade moves Ethereums implementation consensus from miners-oriented Proof-of-Work, or PoW, to validator-oriented Proof-of-Stake, or PoS.

Crypto holders that own more than 32 ETH are eligible for ETH staking a practice that allows users to earn rewards in exchange for validating the blocks instead of miners.

Earlier in May, ConsenSys published a report revealing that 66% of ETH holders were planning to stake their coins as soon as the first phase of ETH 2.0s roll-out is completed.

While the Ethereum 2.0 implementation is expected to come later in 2020, the network has been in 2.0 testnet known as Beacon since May 2020.

See the original post:

About 80% of ETH Supply Is Qualified for Staking, Says ConsenSys - Cointelegraph

Industry experts say Tether and Decentralized Finance tokens will play large roles in the future of Ethereum as the blockchain approaches its five-year anniversary on July 30.

In a statement shared with Cointelegraph, Paolo Ardoino, Chief Technology Officer (CTO) of Bitfinex and Tether, said the Ethereum blockchain will play a central role in the digital asset ecosystem in the years ahead as Ethereum-based Tether can continue to support and empower growing ventures and innovation in the blockchain space.

We hope that the recent surge of DeFi can translate to more DeFi financing products and projects that will truly shape industry developments in a decentralized manner, Ardoino said. USDT is among the biggest and fastest-growing stablecoins in DeFi and we will ensure that Tether continues to play an important role in supporting this alternative financial system and remains the reserve currency of DeFi.

Tether (USDT) had a market share of 78% among Ethereum-based stablecoins, with most tokens being on the blockchain. USDT remains the biggest user of gas on Ethereum, a trend that may be exacerbated as other blockchains continue to migrate to the network, like the recent $300 million transfer of Tether from Tron.

The CTO cited the launch of the OMG Network Plasma sidechain as a measure to help relieve pressure and network load on the main Ethereum blockchain. Cointelegraph has reported the addition of the sidechain could lead to cheaper transactions as they reached two-year highs in June.

Despite the recent increase in transaction costs and reported network congestion, some industry officials are looking towards the next upgrade to the blockchain as a solution.

Kosala Hemachandra, Chief Executive Officer (CEO) and founder of MyEtherWallet, said the ETH 2.0 update would change the definition of blockchain technology by creating a secure and sustainable system capable of competing with centralized scaling solutions.

According to a Reddit Ask Me Anything (AMA) on July 10, Ethereum researcher Justin Drake said ETH 2.0 could launch by January 2021. However, Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin anticipates a November 2020 release date.

The rest is here:

Focus on USDT and DeFi as 5-Year Anniversary of Ethereum Approaches - Cointelegraph

EOS

EOS fell by 1.18% on Thursday. Following on from a 0.63% decline on Wednesday, EOS ended the day at $2.5045.

It was a mixed start to the day. EOS rose to an early morning intraday high $2.5573 before hitting reverse.

Coming up short of the first major resistance level at $2.5705, EOS slid to a late morning intraday low $2.4314.

EOS fell through the first major support level at $2.5125 and the second major support level at $2.4818.

Finding support late in the day, EOS moved back through the second major support level to limit the daily loss.

At the time of writing, EOS was down by 0.09% to $2.5022. A mixed start to the day saw EOS fall from an early morning high $2.5039 to a low $2.5006.

EOS left the major support and resistance levels untested early on.

EOS would need to avoid a fall through the $2.4977 pivot level to support a run at the first major resistance level at $2.5641.

Support from the broader market would be needed, however, for EOS to break out from Thursdays high $2.5573.

Barring an extended crypto rally, the first major resistance level would likely cap any upside.

Failure to avoid a fall through the $2.4977 pivot would bring the first major support level at $2.4382 into play.

Barring another extended sell-off, EOS should steer clear of sub-$2.40 levels. The second major support level sits at $2.3718.

Major Support Level: $2.4382

Pivot Level: $2.4977

Major Resistance Level: $2.5641

23.6% FIB Retracement Level: $6.62

38% FIB Retracement Level: $9.76

62% FIB Retracement Level: $14.82

Ethereum slid by 2.07% on Thursday. Following on from a 0.86% fall on Wednesday, Ethereum ended the day at $233.41.

It was a mixed start to the day. Ethereum rose to an early morning intraday high $239.16 before hitting reverse.

Falling short of the first major resistance level at $241.06, Ethereum slid to a late morning intraday low $229.77.

Ethereum fell through the first major support level at $235.98 and the second major support level at $233.63.

Finding support late in the day, Ethereum briefly revisited $234 levels before easing back.

At the time of writing, Ethereum was up by 0.03% to $233.48. A bullish start to the day saw Ethereum rise from an early morning low $233.46 to a high $233.87.

Ethereum left the major support and resistance levels untested early on.

Story continues

Ethereum would need to move the $234.11 pivot to support a run at the first major resistance level at $238.46.

Support from the broader market would be needed, however, for Ethereum to break back through to $235 levels.

Barring an extended crypto rally, the first major resistance level and Thursdays high $239.16 should cap any upside.

Failure to move through the $234.11 pivot would bring the first major support level at $229.07 into play.

Barring another extended sell-off, Ethereum should continue to steer clear of sub-$220 levels. The second major support level at $224.72 should limit any downside.

Major Support Level: $229.07

Pivot Level: $234.11

Major Resistance Level: $238.46

23.6% FIB Retracement Level: $257

38.2% FIB Retracement Level: $367

62% FIB Retracement Level: $543

Ripples XRP fell by 1.58% on Thursday. Following on from a 0.92% drop on Wednesday, Ripples XRP ended the day at $0.19436.

A mixed start to the day saw Ripples XRP rise to an early morning intraday high $0.19772 before hitting reverse.

Falling short of the first major resistance level at $0.1978, Ripples XRP slid to a late morning intraday low $0.18857.

Ripples XRP fell through the days major support levels before finding support late in the day. A recovery to $0.1930 levels saw Ripples XRP break back through the third major support level at $0.1908. The second major support level at $0.1944 pinned Ripples XRP back.

At the time of writing, Ripples XRP was up by 0.01% to $0.19437. A mixed start to the day saw Ripples XRP rise to an early morning high $0.19478 before falling to a low $0.19437.

Ripples XRP left the major support and resistance levels untested early on.

Ripples XRP will need to avoid a fall through the $0.1936 pivot to support a run at the first major resistance level at $0.1985.

Support from the broader market would be needed, however, for Ripples XRP to break out from Thursdays high $0.19772.

Barring a broad-based crypto rally, the first major resistance level and Thursdays high should cap any upside.

In the event of a breakout, Ripples XRP should test resistance at $0.20 before any pullback. The second major resistance level sits at $0.2027.

Failure to avoid a fall through the $0.1936 pivot would bring the first major support level at $0.1894 into play.

Barring another extended crypto sell-off, Ripples XRP should avoid sub-$0.18 levels. The second major support level at $0.1844 should limit any downside.

Major Support Level: $0.1894

Pivot Level: $0.1936

Major Resistance Level: $0.1985

23.6% FIB Retracement Level: $0.3638

38.2% FIB Retracement Level: $0.4800

62% FIB Retracement Level: $0.6678

Please let us know what you think in the comments below.

Thanks, Bob

This article was originally posted on FX Empire

Continued here:

EOS, Ethereum and Ripples XRP Daily Tech Analysis July 17th, 2020 - Yahoo Finance

This is a weird year for everyone and everything, but its a particularly weird year for Ethereum.

Why? The second-largest blockchain by market cap and the largest by contributing developers has always been known for having lots of events. COVID-19 has put the kibosh on that.

These folks are in a state of constant BUIDLing Amanda Cassatt, a ConsenSys alum who launched its Ethereal event series, told CoinDesk in an email. Ethereum is also, by design, a uniquely collaborative community. These factors contribute to the prevalence of and enthusiasm for in-person events.

Ethereum turns five on July 30, 2020. CoinDesk is marking five years of Ethereum with a series of retrospective stories and live-streamed Twitter conversations. There are even some Easter eggs for eagle-eyed readers. Tune in to our CoinDesk Live sessions July 27-31 at 4 p.m. Eastern each day or call +1 (661) 4-UNICRN.

In normal times, theres roughly one fairly big Ethereum conference somewhere in the world every month, but that has all come to a halt in 2020. The communitys tentpole event, Octobers Devcon, announced its next gathering will be in 2021. Similarly, the Community Ethereum Development Conference, or EDCON, has taken 2020 off.

I guess normally the number of international events feels a little excessive, but EDCON and Devcon are mainstays and it does feel like a loss not to be able to have them, Jinglan Wang, leader of the Optimism scaling project, told CoinDesk.

Ethereum during coronavirus

This reticence to meet up makes sense due to safety concerns around COVID-19.

After all, one of the last big Ethereum events, EthCC, turned out to be the source of a COVID-19 cluster. Still, it makes for a very different time in the community, particularly if this dearth of gatherings drags on into next year.

Lane Rettig, an Ethereum core contributor and former Ethereum Foundation employee (now at SpaceMesh), told CoinDesk this time at home has made him realize how much he wasnt getting done.

I think I had convinced myself I was operating at 60%-70% productivity. I was probably more at 20% productivity, Rettig said.

While hes enjoying this greater sense of accomplishment, Rettig also believes theres more to Ethereums tendency to gather than just having the largest community of devs.

The enjoyment of being together is part of the stickiness of Ethereums underlying technology.

I do think the in-person events are part of the DNA of the community and part of what binds us all together. And some of the affinity we share could hypothetically begin to dissipate, Rettig said of the current situation. If this was to go on some indefinite period, I would really be worried.

Remote-first

But token investor William Mougayar was eager to downplay any risk. The Ethereum community has been used to working virtually anyway, Mougayar told CoinDesk.

Rettig, however, cited a comment from a friend to express what hes worried about if folks go too long without hanging out and having spontaneous encounters at events. The reason Im here and the reason were all here is because we want to work on cool shit with people we like and do it in a sustainable way, Rettig said, paraphrasing the comment from his Ethereum colleague.

Its that with people we like part that gets harder and harder to replicate virtually.

No one knows quite when to look for the next big Ethereum gatherings to take place.

Given our communitys interest in events, I could see larger in-person gatherings resuming in 2021, Cassatt predicted, but she also expects hybrid on- and off-line gatherings will be the norm from here on out. The virtual experience will vastly improve during COVID-19, she added, even for events that go back to an in-person focus.

What's missing

Theres been a lot of snarky discussion around people saying were glad in-person conferences arent happening because now we are building more, which I think is a little shortsighted, ConsenSys developer relations staffer Coogan Brennan told CoinDesk.

Optimisms Wang agreed on the value of in-person events: Theyre great opportunities to meet projects that youve been chatting online with, or random crypto people whose tweets you enjoy.

Rettig shared a particularly concrete example of how events can be helpful for distributed teams. When he was working for the Ethereum Foundations eWASM team (which is porting the popular WebAssembly framework, in part, over to Ethereum), he said they tended to gather a few times each year, anchored to some Ethereum event, be it Devcon, ETHDenver or some hackathon. Theyd rent a whole-house Airbnb and live together and work side-by-side for a week. A physical hangout that was otherwise unheard of.

It would be very intense. Professionally as well as socially, Rettig said.

Jared Wasinger, still of the eWASM team at the Ethereum Foundation, confirmed that these side gatherings have been key.

I would say that the in-person events are definitely important from a morale point of view, he said.

Similarly, ConsenSyss Brennan said events served as a kind of punctuation in the year that Ethereum teams could organize their work around. A lot of product launches and debuts where driven by reveals at events. That was a way of driving excitement.

Ethereum conferences are very very known for dogfooding, the Ethereum Foundations Hudson Jameson said. It inspires a lot of confidence in the community. People are using the things they are building and that brings people a lot of joy.

The online events themselves have been more beta tests than real products as of yet, though, as Cassatt noted.

I havent seen any event completely crack the code on virtual networking, virtual sponsorships, or ticket sales, she said. Virtual events may be a tougher sell to sponsors, but Im looking forward to seeing creative solutions emerge for virtual events to offer sponsors value in new ways.

What's gained

Maybe there were too many events. This kind of break, if anything, its positive. Its a benefit because theres been more productivity, Mougayar said.

Most events felt like a distraction to me, if Im being honest, Spencer Noon, of DTC Capital, told CoinDesk. Im actually pretty bullish on people in the community organizing some awesome virtual events, though.

Noon may have been the only person CoinDesk spoke with that had real excitement about the potential of virtual gatherings. In fact, Rettig in particular noted how virtual events do a bad job of replicating the hallway (or lobby) conference, which is what people really go for. Still, many are looking forward to saving money on travel now and seeing more conference content delivered electronically.

For Jameson, there is an advantage in making the discussion around Ethereum more accessible.

It is a privilege to be able to travel the world, Jameson said. That intrinsically creates this different class system.

Moving these things online has a leveling effect that brings more people into discussions in real time, which is when people want to participate in them.

Brennan took this a step further, saying that with online events you really have to engage people in a way about tangible technologies.

He said his team has found a need to actually give people a way to work on their code rather than just wowing folks with a charismatic on-stage presentation. One of the things we have been trying to do with our ConsenSys Live series is to actually have code on screen, he said.

Mougayar also spoke about having done a long workshop with on-screen code and feeling that by doing it from home he could really focus in on it more.

The Ethereum Foundations Jameson concurred. I think this creates a whole new paradigm of having to keep peoples attention rather than waiting for the next big event to hear the next big announcement, he said.

Ethereum turns five on July 30, 2020. CoinDesk is marking five years of Ethereum with a series of retrospective stories and live-streamed Twitter conversations. There are even some Easter eggs for eagle-eyed readers. Tune in to our CoinDesk Live sessions July 27-31 at 4 p.m. Eastern each day or call +1 (661) 4-UNICRN.

The leader in blockchain news, CoinDesk is a media outlet that strives for the highest journalistic standards and abides by a strict set of editorial policies. CoinDesk is an independent operating subsidiary of Digital Currency Group, which invests in cryptocurrencies and blockchain startups.

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2020: The Year Ethereum Stayed Home - CoinDesk - CoinDesk

DeFi is having itself a moment. And while that may not be doing wonders for the price of Ethereum (ETH) itself, the tokens built atop the network are having a very big year.

Total market cap for all ERC20 tokens running on Ethereum has topped $33 billion, according to a data compiled and shared by The Defiants own Camila Russo. The source for the figures comes from EtherScan, Ethereums most popular block explorer.

And at $33 billion, the estimate exceeds the total market capitalization of ETH, the native token of the Ethereum blockchain, which today is worth roughly $27 billion.

What it all boils down to is that the total value of the economy built around Ethereum now exceeds that of ETH, the token that sustains the blockchain. And this doesnt even consider the value of the unique tokens based on the ERC721 standard (like those issued by CryptoKitties or Gods Unchained), which move several million dollars on their own. So the gap is likely even wider.

Of all the applications that are running on Ethereum, the most valuable ones are currently related to decentralized finance. As Decrypt previously reported, DeFi tokens are currently growing much faster than Bitcoin, or any other cryptocurrency in the market. At the moment, it appears that its DeFi, exchange tokens, and high-risk dapps that are attracting the most attention from investors.

Depending on how you look at it, this could be a sign of market maturity. Ethereum could be proving its value as a decentralized, global supercomputer upon which various applications are built.

In other words, the value of Ethereum as a technology likely cannot be simply measured in terms of ETHs market cap. ETH, after all, is but one part of a complex ecosystem that continues to evolve. (It may even be a sign that Ethereum cofounder Joe Lubin may yet win his bet against Bitcoin maximalist Jimmy Song, if the mass adoption of dapps actually becomes a thing.)

And with Ethereum 2.0 just around the corner (according to some ETH developers, at least), the great DeFi boom of 2020 may be a sign of things to come.

Then again, DeFi hype could also just as well fizzle out like the ICO craze of 2017. Market participants, in the end, will decide.

The views and opinions expressed by the author are for informational purposes only and do not constitute financial, investment, or other advice.

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Ethereum tokens are now more valuable than ETH itself - Decrypt

Quick take:

The amount of Ethereum locked up in DeFi platforms has hit a new milestone of 3.5 Million ETH. This marks a new all-time high in terms of the amount of ETH locked up in Decentralized Finance applications since DeFi hit the crypto scene. This fact was highlighted by the team at DeFi Pulse via the following Tweet.

Further checking the DeFi Pulse website, it can be concluded that the majority of the Ethereum is locked up in the two DeFi applications of Maker (MKR) and Compound Finance (COMP). Approximately 2 Million in ETH is locked up in Maker whereas 908,300 ETH is locked up in Compound Finance. Below is a list of the top 10 DeFi applications in terms of the amount of Ethereum locked up in them by investors.

To note is that the popularity of DeFi has exploded with the entry of Compound Finance less than a month ago. Furthermore, the COMP token experienced a meteoritic rise in the crypto markets upon listing. The digital asset rose in value from approximately $71 to its all-time high of $383 within a week of listing on Poloniex. COMP is currently valued at $171.

The Compound Finance project has ushered in a new era of Yield Farming with several DeFi projects following in its footsteps.Yield Farming is achieved when investors lock up their crypto on DeFi platforms and lend it out while earning interest on it.

Each of these DeFi platforms has several lending pools and the investor moves his funds in whichever pool is offering the best interest rates. In a sense, Yield Farming can be compared to crop rotation where the farmer picks to plant the most profitable crop. On top of the interest earned, investors are rewarded with tokens for providing liquidity on the platforms.

Disclaimer:This article is not meant to give financial advice. Any additional opinion herein is purely the authors and does not represent the opinion of EWN or any of its other writers. Please carry out your own research before investing in any of the numerous cryptocurrencies available. Thank you.

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Ethereum Locked in DeFi Hits New All-Time High of 3.5M ETH - Ethereum World News

For the day ahead

Ethereum would need to avoid a fall through the $241 pivot to support a run at the first major resistance level at $245.64.

Support from the broader market would be needed, however, for Ethereum to break out from Sundays high $243.9.

Barring another extended crypto rally, the first major resistance level and Sundays high $243.90 should cap any upside.

Failure to avoid a fall through the $241 pivot would bring the first major support level at $238.25 into play.

Barring another extended sell-off, Ethereum should continue to steer clear of sub-$230 levels. The second major support level at $233.68 should limit any downside.

Major Support Level: $238.25

Pivot Level: $241

Major Resistance Level: $245.64

23.6% FIB Retracement Level: $257

38.2% FIB Retracement Level: $367

62% FIB Retracement Level: $543

Ripples XRP rose by 0.18% on Sunday. Following on from a 0.86% gain from Saturday, Ripples XRP ended the week up by 13.79% to $0.20162.

A mixed start to the day saw Ripples XRP rise to an early morning high $0.20340 before falling to a mid-morning low $0.19987.

Steering clear of the major resistance and support levels, Ripples XRP rallied to an early afternoon intraday high $0.20447.

Falling short of the first major resistance level at $0.2048, Ripples XRP tumbled to an early afternoon low $0.19805.

Finding support at the first major support level at $0.1979, Ripples XRP moved back through to $0.199 levels.

Late in the day, however, Ripples XRP slipped back to an intraday low $0.19792. Finding support at the first major support level at $0.1979, Ripples XRP wrapped up the day at $0.20 levels.

At the time of writing, Ripples XRP was down by 0.12% to $0.20138. A mixed start to the day saw Ripples XRP rise to an early morning high $0.20210 before falling to a low $0.20103.

Ripples XRP left the major support and resistance levels untested early on.

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EOS, Ethereum and Ripple's XRP Daily Tech Analysis July 13th, 2020 - FX Empire