The final release of the Ethereum 2.0 spec version 0.1 has been announced by Danny Ryan, the Ethereum 2.0 coordinator. He said:

Major release centered on the integration of the IETF BLS standards into the eth2 spec. This release also contains a deep and much needed reorganization of files/directories

The rest of the changes are some minor optimizations and cleanups. Most of these are generally backward compatible, and all should be very straight forward to integrate.

v0.10.0 marks a stable target for Phase 0 for multi-client testnets and security reviews. We expect some revisions in February/March pending the results from each.

One of the Ethereum 2.0 clients, Ben Edgington of PegaSys, says that this version release is intended to be another frozen release, as the basis for both testnets and an audit. In addition to the audits related to the Beacon chain code, an audit of the deposit contract is currently happening. The ETH 2.0 clients are waiting for this version release before planning any multi-client testnet launch.

Though most of the stated changes are in regards to the signature standards, there are some changes proposed to the Beacon chain design itself. This release is an essential step towards the main full launch, with users and coders waiting for the audit reports, which might need a few further changes.

Edgington says:

Theres a 13,000 long queue of validators waiting to enter the Prysm testnet. New validators are onboarded at a maximum rate of 4 per epoch at the start, so thats two weeks of backlog by my calculations!

Few of these testnets have now upgraded to mainnet configuration, with some prospective stakers seemingly testing it all out. An ETH researcher at the Ethereum Foundation, Justin Drake, has announced the unofficial non-deadline of 30th July for the launch of the genesis block.

More:

Ethereum 2.0 spec version 0.1 release announced - FXStreet

Nick Bertke, owner of the YouTube channel, Pogo, reported that it was hacked on January 14 this year. The artist, known for his musical collaborations with Disney, made the denunciation through his Twitter account. The hackers took control of his channel with more than 800,000 subscribers and are passing it off as an official channel of the Ethereum Foundation.

Currently, the channel continues to broadcast under the name of Ethereum 2.0 Foundation. The perpetrators have announced their involvement in a false release of an Ethereum update. Under that premise they have begun offering a bogus giveaway that provides YouTube users with 10,000 Bitcoin (BTC) and 10,000 Ethereum (ETH).

The bogus promotion celebrates the alleged listing of new fiat currencies in the cryptoexchange Binance and a release of Ethereum 2.0. The scam scheme not only has the above-mentioned fake rewards, but a set of rules that attempt to capture victims on Youtube. Giveaway participants must submit 5 ETH or 0.1 BTC to be part of the contest. In return, the scammers offer false rewards.

The owner of the channel, Nick Bertke, stated the following:

My YouTube channel is hacked. 13 years of content just got deleted. Hackers have transferred the channel to their account.

The YouTube support team contacted the YouTuber. However, the broadcast continues and displays the face of Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin.

After communicating with the Youtube team, Bertke was more optimistic and expects a positive result. Unfortunately, the YouTuber joins the long list of victims of attacks motivated by the theft or cryptocurrencies scams.

The list of exchanges, institutions and users that have fallen victim to hackers is long. Among the most recent is the PlusToken scam. The attackers managed to move the Bitcoin and Ethereum funds of the PlusToken wallet users. The assets are estimated at around $3 billion and are still moving in the market. A study by Chainalysis even speculated on the funds participation in the 2019 bear market.

Another major hack affected the cryptoexchange Mt. Gox. At its peak, the exchange handled over 70% of all Bitcoin transactions. The attackers managed to steal 850,000 BTCs in 2014, causing the shutdown of Mt. Gox. The victims of the attack are still waiting for compensation for their losses.

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Last Updated on 15 January, 2020

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Hackers offer Bitcoin and Ethereum in scam to YouTube users - Crypto News Flash

Over the last couple of years the former lead maintainer of the Bitcoin Core (BTC) repository Gavin Andresen has been quiet in regards to the crypto ecosystem. Andresen hasnt been developing any projects and once in a while makes a comment or two about the digital currency industry. On Monday, January 13, Andresen shared the first blog post hes written since November 2018, as he decided to review the zero-knowledge protocol for Ethereum called Tornado.cash.

Also read: Privacy-Enhancing BCH Tool Cashfusion Begins Working Behind the Scenes

Gavin Andresen was once the lead developer for the Bitcoin Core codebase after Satoshi Nakamoto handed Andresen the repository keys when the inventor left. Since then a lot has changed and Andresen hasnt worked on the BTC project or any crypto concept in four years. Some crypto observers believe Andresen was ousted in 2016, when the Core development team removed his Bitcoin commit access. Once in a while, Andresen has made comments about the cryptocurrency industry and once tweeted that bitcoin cash (BCH) reminded him of the Bitcoin he worked on back in 2010.

On January 1, 2020, Andresen tweeted that, in his opinion, the most interesting cryptocurrency project in 2018 was Ethereums Crypto Kitties and Pooltogether in 2019. Then 13 days later, Andresen wrote a blog post about the project Tornado.cash, an Ethereum-based project that claims to break the onchain link between ETH recipient and destination addresses. Andresen said hes been playing around with Tornado, the smart contract running on the Ethereum blockchain.

When I say smart, I mean really wicked-smart, Andresen stressed in his blog post. [Tornado.cash] uses Zero-Knowledge Succinct Non-Interactive Argument of Knowledge cryptography (ZkSNARK) so the ether (or tokens) deposited into the contract cant be linked to those that are withdrawn.

Andresen also noted that he wouldnt be surprised if a paper is released in 2023 that shows 85% of tornado usage was not private. Not because the cryptography is broken, but because it is really hard for mere mortals to use something like Tornado (or Coinjoin or other similar technologies) in a way that doesnt leak information about their wallet, Andresen insisted. But Andresens post leads to the conclusion that most people will leak information about their mixed coins when consolidating them into one account he dubs the Super Secret wallet. You have almost certainly accomplished nothing Unless somebody else just happened to use tornado to move 117 ETH from one address to another in the same timeframe, it is easy to see that 0xabc and 0xdef are both owned by you Your Super Secret wallet isnt, Andresen emphasized.

The former Bitcoin developer does think Tornado is a step in the right direction and called the project a fantastic building block. Following the blog post on Tornado, Andresen published another post on the same subject the following day. On Tuesday the developer explained his description of the type of wallet hed like to leverage. Andresen explained the perfect setup for receiving Andresens dream wallet would give individuals a normal ETH address where they could receive some ether. But after funds were received to that address, the wallet would automatically forward them into Tornado, Andresen wrote. To the engineer, sending would be a three-step process, which includes one or more withdrawals from Tornado to a never-before-used address, sending the ETH to the destination address, and then re-deposit any leftover funds back into Tornado.

However, Andresen doesnt seem to think theres a simple solution and he also addressed the change problem, which can lead to transaction data leakage. Andresen said that a future version of Tornado could support depositing and withdrawing arbitrary amounts. Which is the best solution to the problem, the developer stressed. This issue is being tackled today, as Bitcoin Cash developers have been making strides with Coinjoin transactions that can be done in arbitrary amounts.

Bitcoin Magazines technical writer Aaron van Wirdum wrote an editorial about the subject on January 13 in a post titled: Do CoinJoins Really Require Equal Transaction Amounts for Privacy? Part One: Cashfusion. The writer explained that BCH developers claim Cashfusion can provide Coinjoin transactions without the equal amount requirement. If true, this might drastically change how we think about privacy in Bitcoin as well, van Wirdum detailed.

Andresens post explains the problems with Coinjoin transactions and seems to hint that things could be improved. Id also be happy with an opinionated wallet that rounds down balances for privacy and automatically sent the change to the wallet developers favorite charity (or maybe goes to fund wallet development, or a little bit of both), Andresens blog post on Tuesday notes. Not a huge price to pay for privacy, especially if it goes to a good cause, the developer concluded.

What do you think about Andresens blog posts about Tornado.cash and wallet privacy? What do you think about the possibility of Cashfusion being the answer to some of the problems mentioned with Coinjoin-based transactions? Let us know what you think about this topic in the comments section below.

Disclaimer: This article is for informational purposes only. Readers should do their own due diligence before taking any actions related to the subject matter written above. Neither the company nor the author is responsible, directly or indirectly, for any damage or loss caused or alleged to be caused by or in connection with the use of or reliance on any ideas, software, concepts, content, goods or services mentioned in this article.

Image credits: Shutterstock, Wiki Commons, Fair Use, Twitter, Tornado.cash, and Pixabay.

Did you know you can buy and sell BCH privately using our noncustodial, peer-to-peer Local Bitcoin Cash trading platform? The local.Bitcoin.com marketplace has thousands of participants from all around the world trading BCH right now. And if you need a bitcoin wallet to securely store your coins, you can download one from us here.

Jamie Redman is a financial tech journalist living in Florida. Redman has been an active member of the cryptocurrency community since 2011. He has a passion for Bitcoin, open source code, and decentralized applications. Redman has written thousands of articles for news.Bitcoin.com about the disruptive protocols emerging today.

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Gavin Andresen Speaks About Ethereum's Tornado and Wallet Privacy - Bitcoin News

Ethereum (ETH), the second-largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization, has just recorded a further 10% gains to achieve a value of $165.60its highest value since late November 2019. This recent price action continues a week of bullish momentum for the cryptocurrency, which has now gained over 19% in the last week.

Beyond this, Ethereum has witnessed strong gains against Bitcoin (BTC), climbing six percent against the number one cryptocurrency today to achieve its highest value since mid-December last year. Ethereum has also seen its trade volume more than double in the last monthreaching as high as $17.9 million in ether changing hands daily.

Although these things are never certain, it appears that Ethereum's recent gains can be attributed to recent developments in the Craig Wright vs Kleiman court case, in addition to growing economic uncertainty in Venezuela. These two events, in addition to massively increasing trade volume for most crypto assets, has led some to speculate that a new bull market is about to begin. Moreover, Coinbase appears to be struggling under the recent pressurefurther evidence that interest has massively increased as of late.

Although Ethereum's recent gains are certainly significant, practically every major cryptocurrency is also seeing similar gains, with an average gain of five percent seen across the board. Can the momentum continue?

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Ethereum price spikes 10%, continues gaining on Bitcoin - Yahoo Finance

Ethereum has had a couple of miserable years in terms of price but development on the worlds largest smart contract and dApp platform has continued. Speed and scalability are the keys for mass adoption and a solution is already being developed.

Ethereums infighting in 2016 and 2017 has been replaced by co-operation and alliance-building, according to an article shared by Barry Silbert, the founder and CEO of Digital Currency Group.

Last month, Matter Labs published an in-depth report titled the missing link to mass adoption of Ethereum. It was shared by Circle CEO Jeremy Allaire who stated that it was a big win for Ethereum based stablecoins.

ZK Rollups now possible and will allow Layer 2 scaling on Ethereum supporting upwards of 3000tps (larger than Visa), while maintaining decentralization and privacy.

The report introduced the concept stating that a successful scaling solution must include the systems ability to meet the demands of millions of users without sacrificing decentralization. None of them can actually achieve this yet as most public blockchains are still largely experimental and virtually unused.

As Ethereum co-founder, Vitalik Buterin, pointed out in the past, its impossible for a blockchain to boast scalability, security and decentralization all at once. He argues that, at most, a blockchain will possess 2 of these traits.

Recent advances in zero knowledge proofs however have opened up new possibilities in this arena. ZK is a cryptographic protocol by which one party can prove to another party that they know a value of something without revealing any information apart from the fact that they know the value.

According to the researchers, a solution called ZK Sync is designed to bring a VISA-scale throughput of thousands of transactions per second to the Ethereum network.

ZK Sync is built on ZK Rollup architecture which is a Layer 2 scaling solution that holds all funds on a smart contract on the main chain, while computation and storage are performed off-chain.

Additionally funds remain as secure as in the underlying Layer 1 accounts and maintaining a high degree of censorship-resistance.

Another important aspect of the protocol is its ultra-low latency: transactions in ZK Sync will provide instant economic finality.

The devnet for ZK Sync v0.1 is live and 2020 is likely to see more scaling solutions for Ethereum, as the migration to proof of stake consensus gets underway.

At the moment Ethereum is the same as most crypto assets in that it is primarily used for speculation in markets largely driven by day traders seeking a quick profit.

Scaling solutions such as these, which tackle the blockchain trilemma, are the next step toward Web 3.0, decentralized finance and mass adoption for Ethereum.

Will Ethereum be able to massively scale this year? Add your comments below.

Images via Shutterstock

Continued here:

How This Solution Could Drive Massive Adoption For Ethereum - Bitcoinist

Although the broad cryptocurrency market ended 2019 in a fundamentally better state than it did 2018, the overall trend in the transition into 2020 has not been an overwhelmingly positive one. Bitcoin spent the back-half of last year trending down from recent highs by as much as 50% while other major coins like litecoin and ripple approached new 52-week lows.

In spite of these facts, the dimmest outlook in the crypto market circa 2020 is for Ethereum. ETH is down roughly 60% from the 2019 high it set in June and the coin has gotten dangerously close to hitting a key $100 support level.

In addition to the price pressure, ETH has been hit by a series of hurdles and bad news that threaten to challenge the support for the currency through the initial months of the new year.

Is ETH Forked?

One of the most persistent troubles hanging over ETH through 2019 has been the continued delay of Ethereum 2.0, which is planned to switch mining of new currency from a proof-of-work protocol to the more common proof-of-stake. To facilitate this transition, Ethererums programmers added a difficulty bomb to the PoW framework that would gradually make mining new blocks in this way more difficult, encouraging greater PoS mining.

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However, while the transition to PoS has been delayed, the difficulty bomb has continued ticking within Ethereums programming chain. To avoid a total price explosion, Ethereums developers have implemented a series of hard forks to offset the eventual switch, including two that happened at the start and end of 2019Constantinople and Istanbul.

Februarys Constantinople and Decembers Istanbul hard forks pushed the timeline for the PoS transition all the way to 2022, but they also resulted in depressing ETHs price below $130 that month as well.

A Test Of ETH

Although these hard forks were necessary to keep the supply of new ether constant, they have disrupted mining operations and introduced greater uncertainty to the stability of Ethereums framework. ETH mining has fallen to a daily value below 12,000 coins and a longtime ETH HODLer with more than 300,000 ETH has started migrating his or her coins onto exchanges.

Source: cointelegraph

Another wrench has been thrown into ETH just this month. Coinfloor, the U.K.s longest-running cryptocurrency exchange, announced it would be ending its support for the currency to focus on BTC.

All of this comes as ETH is experiencing a sustained downtrend. Even barring the massive hit the broader cryptocurrency market took in July, ETH has lost $100 in value since August, half of which has been shed off since mid-November.

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All of which leads to the question of where the bottom might be for ETH. Its current trajectory below $130 puts the coins nearest support at $120, below which is the critical $100 floor that helped to support the coin during last years low.

Should miners and investors continue to migrate away from the worlds second-largest cryptocurrency, 2020 may see ETH hit the floor once again.

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Is Ethereum Destined To Fall Below $100? - Yahoo Finance

Ethereums Serenity will launch by the end of this year, according to ConsenSys Co-founder Andrew Keys. Given the current state of development though, few share his excitement.

In a Jan. 7 post published on the ConsenSys site, Andrew Keys shared his predictions for 2020. Keys was one of the co-founders of ConsenSys, having since become a managing partner at DARMA Capital.

While Keys predictions touched diverse themes ranging from the world economy to human rights, two are especially notable for their optimism.

According to the executive, 2020 will see Ethereum move stridently beyond Phase 0 of Ethereum 2.0, onto Phase 1 and the launch of shard chains.

In addition, while Serenity continues development, Keys believes that layer two solutions will turbocharge Ethereum and bring it towards 2.0 levels of scalability at layer one.

The recent Istanbul hard fork was the last stage in Ethereum 1.0, introducing several improvements and adjustments. Some of the core Ethereum Improvement Proposals (EIPs) that went into the upgrade were closely related to Zcash (ZEC). EIP-152 improved interoperability with the actual Zcash blockchain, while EIP-1108 made optimizations for cryptography routines leveraged by projects such as Aztec and ZEther.

Aztec Protocol aims to introduce confidential transactions within the Ethereum (ETH) blockchain by using SNARK zero-knowledge technology the same powering Zcash shielded transactions.

On the other hand, Matter Labs is attempting to leverage SNARKs for scalability. On a basic level, its Zk Sync technology would allow offloading of the majority of transactional computations off-chain using a zero-knowledge proof to guarantee their correct execution.

Finally, Plasma focuses on creating sidechains for specific use cases. In a 2019 interview with Cointelegraph, CEO of ConsenSys Joseph Lubin explained:

Plasma is this class of technologies that enable you to have less decentralized platforms sitting at layer two in the Ethereum ecosystem. They can benefit from the full trust in some cases sometimes they benefit from partial trust but if they're linked in really rigorously, they can benefit from the full trust of the base trust layer, and you can get the best of both worlds.

However, these technologies are not yet live. Only Aztec looks poised to launch its cryptography engine this month, after conducting its trusted setup ceremony on Jan. 9.

Matter Labs revealed in a blog post that it would launch a smart contract framework this month but not the full scaling technology. Representatives from Matter Labs failed to reply to Cointelegraphs inquiries on detailed time tables.

Plasma Group, a non-profit research group, recently declared that their theoretical work on the technology is complete, but failed to indicate specific implementations underway.

Cointelegraph approached Afri Schoeden, a former Parity Technologies developer, for additional insight. When asked whether 2020 will feature working sidechain solutions, Schoeden replied:

No. We will see COSMOS maturing, Polkadot launching maybe, and Ethereum 2.0 finally taking shape. But we are still far away from viable solutions that would work in production.

Though Istanbul was the last step before the introduction of Ethereum 2.0 technology, it is unclear when the next stages will be implemented.

According to a mid-2019 roadmap by ConsenSys, phase zero of Serenity was supposed to be implemented by years end. This will introduce the Beacon Chain, the first to be powered by Proof-of-Stake validators.

Though Keys noted that a block explorer for the beacon chain was released, it merely tracks a testnet version. He then continued:

Ethereum developers have already proven their ability to work wonders, and that this decentralized team is now in the stride of hitting ambitious roadmap targets is the best indicator in all of blockchain for future success.

Schoeden, however, was far less optimistic:

From what I observe, maybe we can expect Q4/2020 launch window for phase 0.

Cointelegraph sought out comments on the roadmap from the Ethereum Foundations press team, but did not receive a response at publication.

Read more here:

Ethereum 2.0 Will Come in 2020, According to ConsenSys Co-Founder - Cointelegraph

The Ethereum price was at $130 at the start of the year on January 1st across major crypto exchanges. With 12 days left on the calendar, ETH is now net negative in 2019, which comes in stark contrast to the 70% performance that Bitcoin has seen in 2019.

In the last 48 hours, the Ethereum price has declined from $142 to $123, marking a more than 10 percent decline against the U.S. dollar.

Whats worse, the cryptocurrency remains down 91% from its all-time high of $1,450, which was reached at the peak of 2017 and 2018s initial coin offering mania.

Why has Ethereum been hit so hard by bears compared to Bitcoin? And, also importantly, is there any hope for the second-largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization?

First off, altcoins havent done too hot this year, with Bitcoin dominance the percentage of the cryptocurrency market made up by BTC pressing higher from 33% to 72% at its peak this year. Ethereum, being the largest altcoin, has understandably suffered in this Bitcoin-centric trend.

Secondly, Ethereum has been subject to a large amount of selling pressure induced by the PlusToken Wallet cryptocurrency scam. A report from Chainalysis, a blockchain analytics firm, recently this week indicates that the scammers, most of which have been apprehended by authorities, have been liquidating dozens of millions worth of Bitcoin and ETH over recent months, presumably pushing prices lower.

With ETH being a more illiquid market than Bitcoin, theres a high likelihood that the PlusToken liquidations have resulted in a strong downtrend forming.

Despite the harrowing price trends, some assert that the cryptocurrencys fundamental trend remains decidedly positive.

Perprevious reports from NewsBTC,RealT, a U.S.-based global real estate platform working with Ethereum and blockchains, just sold the first property ever to be tokenized on Ethereum.In related news, decentralized finance as an industryhas been absolutely exploding, with users being attracted by derivatives and the chance to access financial services in a decentralized manner.

Also, Fidelity Investments a Wall Street mainstay with over $2 trillion worth of assets under management recently revealed that it has plans to add support for ETH services through its cryptocurrency branch, the fittingly-named Fidelity Digital Assets.

Speaking to industry outlet The Block, Fidelity Digital Assets president Tom Jessop said that his firm has done a lot of work on Ethereum, and thus intends to support the asset sometime in 2020.

The catch: clients of the firm need to show that they demand Ethereum, for Bitcoin, the digital currency with the longest track record, has long been the star of the institutional crypto show due to risk factors. Jessop elaborated:

How do I know that if I buy this thing, its gonna be around tomorrow? Like what indication of durability or longevity do I have based on the fact that the history of this asset is 10 years old?

Read more:

Ethereum Is Now Officially Net Negative in 2019, Down 91% From ATH - newsBTC

Ethereum has just slumped to a nine month low, wiping out virtually all gains it has made this year. The move has been part of a market wide decline catalyzed by Bitcoins drop below $7k. Many are not convinced that ETH prices will recover at any time soon, and here is why.

There has been a lot of negativity about Ethereum lately which may have added to its bearish performance. Research firm Messari has made their contributions in the latest Crypto Thesis for 2020 paper which does not paint the network in a very positive light.

The paper has been penned by founder Ryan Selkis, and is not to be taken as gospel for, in his own words;

I compiled 120 nuggets of my clearest thoughts into one 70 page report. This is NOT an objective analysis, but a collection of my/our strong convictions for the decade ahead.

There is a lot covered in the 70 page report but we will focus on the Ethereum parts to provide a balance for yesterdays Ethereum by numbers article based on ConsenSys research.

The report claims that there will be no ETH 2.0 until 2022 at earliest because the Serenity rollout consists of seven phases. The first of which, Phase 0 or Beacon Chain, is likely to be launched sometime in 2020 according to Selkis.

It details the Ethereum 2.0 roadmap which has already been covered in depth elsewhere. Beacon chain will essentially manage network validators, ultimately assigning them to individual shards.

The new chain will be proof of stake with rewards for those that lock up 32 ETH 1.0 tokens on the chain. There is a caveat however according to the paper;

That one way bridge into the new system is also contentious, but it means ETH1 supply will start getting effectively burned once token holder begin claiming beacon chain validator slots.

Phase 1 which will introduce 64 shard chains is not expected until 2021 according to Messari. This parallel processing upgrade will be the key to scaling but the report continues to add that no network the size of Ethereum has successfully sharded its blockchain.

Phase 2 is the full launch which includes a new eWASM virtual machine and massive dApp migration through smart contracts. Naturally this will not be rushed out and the research suggests late 2021 being optimistic.

ETH 2.0 is a brand new blockchain. Its going to be a chaotic and high-risk transition.

The report continues to elaborate on ETH 1.0 governance adding that there are three goals to boost performance and reduce blockchain bloat.

On the topic of Ethereum killers Selkis says that EOS has no chance due to its cartel-like system but Cosmos and Polkadot could be a threat. Most others have tiny communities and few developers.

The only positive sentiments from the Ethereum section of the report is the DeFi developments and the fact that ETH has a robust aggregate economy and sufficient liquidity to function in this financial market of the future.

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Why Prominent Crypto Researcher Thinks Ethereum Will Struggle in 2020 - newsBTC

Supply chain fintech startup Tradeshift, which boasts two million firms on its platform, says it's slashed the cost of cross-border transactions between buyers and suppliers using the public ethereum blockchain.

Tradeshift Frontiers, the innovation division of the Goldman Sachs-backed unicorn, represents invoice values as tokenized IOUs between buyers and sellers and then settles them in a novel form of on-chain fiat currency.

FlowTokens, as the tokenized IOUs are called, has implications for banks and financial institutions that typically make money on cross-border payments. It could do for supply chain management and trade finance what Libra has been attempting to do at a consumer level with wallets and stablecoins.

Tradeshift, which partnered with Consensys-backed e-money license holder Monerium, completed a domestic transaction earlier this year. This involved retailer Nordic Store and IKEA Iceland, which were issued an e-invoice through Tradeshift; a day later, the transaction was settled through a smart contract.

This next phase of piloting has seen cross-border transactions involving euro-denominated e-money inside the smart contract. Tradeshift and Monerium settled first 1024 (US$1,141.78) and then 512, at a fixed fee cost of 17 cents and 16 cents, respectively, the companies said. (For comparison, using Automated Clearing House in the United States typically costs somewhere between 20 cents and $1.50 in fixed fee, or 0.5 percent to 1.5 percent in variable fee.)

Tradeshift said its preliminary research of the payments space shows that fees vary wildly. To settle a cross-border transaction in the 1000 range can cost between 0 when, for example, using the SEPA payment system in Europe, to 30 or more for doing regional transfers between continents.

Monerium co-founder and CEO Sveinn Valfells said e-money is the oldest and most proven framework for digital cash in any major jurisdiction. We are deliberately going slow and trying not to break things, which is how it should be in finance, he added.

Valfells said Moneriums e-money on ethereum has now been approved for use in Iceland, Denmark, Germany, U.K., Lithuania, France and Sweden.

We issue e-money on ethereum to an ERC-20 compliant smart contract that works as a programmable passbook. Subject to KYC/AML, we issue the e-money as a balance to a person's public key into our ERC-20 contract. They are then at liberty to use that e-money as they would if it were issued in some other digital format, he said.

As for cross-border payments, Gert Sylvest, co-founder of Tradeshift and GM of Tradeshift Frontiers, said, We have taken an accepted invoice and tokenized it on ethereum. On the due day, a smart contract automatically swaps the tokenized invoice for the e-money that is on-chain.

Obviously a blockchain really doesn't care about whether or not that is [a] cross-border or domestic transfer, so the settlement cost is going to be the same, he added.

In terms of timeline, Sylvest said he could not set a date for going into production, but the first quarter of next year would be used to validate interest on the back end among users of the platform.

Crippling costs and a general lack of transparency when it comes to paying suppliers overseas were among the complaints voiced by Hafsteinn Gubjartsson, CEO, Nordic Store, which is testing the new blockchain system.

Much of Nordic Stores inventory comes from abroad and involves multiple currencies routed through its Icelandic bank to the banks of suppliers and manufacturers, a long and opaque process that is also prone to error, said Gubjartsson.

We send a lot of money to China, which is pretty opaque. Thailand is probably the most problematic; I guess they have some kind of financial constraints on their currency or something, and we cannot buy Thai baht, he said.

So we send them dollars, and in the process of sending them dollars they never receive the same amount as they invoiced for. Our bank charges, but their bank seems to take a lot of money. We always have to send another small payment. It's just extra work for nothing, really.

There are also implications when it comes to trade finance, since Tradeshift opens financing options beyond banks to a wide range of potential investors on the platform, which can reach right across the supply chain.

If you turn invoices into real programmable assets you open up a whole new generation of financial services, said Sylvest.

Small companies are the cash cows of large corporates everywhere in the world, he added. The smaller the company, the harder to get access to finance, which can come at an outrageous price.

It all reflects the fact that banks and financiers typically don't have any kind of insight into what is happening inside small companies, who are they trading with and what are the promises being exchanged between parties, said Sylvest.

Update (Dec. 18, 16:35 UTC): An earlier version of this story used the wrong name for Tradeshift's tokenized IOUs. They are called FlowTokens, not Tradeshift Cash.

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.

Original post:

Tradeshift Says It's Slashed Cross-Border Transaction Costs Using Ethereum - Coindesk

EOS

EOS slid by 7.10% on Tuesday. Following on from a 7.48% tumble on Monday, EOS ended the day at $2.2110.

Bearish through the day, EOS fell from an early morning intraday high $2.3804 to a late morning low $2.3289 before finding support.

Steering clear of the major support and resistance levels, EOS recovered to $2.36 levels before hitting reverse.

The reversal saw EOS slide through the first major support level at $2.2487 to a late intraday low $2.1624.

Finding late support, EOS moved back to $2.2 levels to cut the deficit on the day.

At the time of writing, EOS was up by 1.45% to $2.2430. A bullish start to the day saw EOS rise from an early morning low $2.2028 to a high $2.2547.

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

EOS would need to move back through to $2.25 levels to support a run at the first major resistance level at $2.3402.

Support from the broader market would be needed, however, for EOS to break out from $2.20 levels.

Barring a broad-based crypto rally, resistance at $2.3 levels would likely pin EOS back on the day.

Failure to move through to $2.25 levels could see EOS hit reverse. A fall through the morning low $2.2028 would bring the first major support level at $2.1222 into play.

Barring a crypto meltdown, however, EOS should steer clear of sub-$2.00 levels. The second major support level at $2.0333 should limit any downside on the day.

Major Support Level: $2.1222

Major Resistance Level: $2.3402

23.6% FIB Retracement Level: $6.62

38% FIB Retracement Level: $9.76

62% FIB Retracement Level: $14.82

Ethereum tumbled by 7.96% on Tuesday. Following on from a 7.04% slide on Monday, Ethereum ended the day at $121.83

Tracking the broader market, Ethereum slid from an early morning intraday high $132.66 to a late intraday low $119.5.

Steering clear of the major resistance levels, Ethereum fell through the first major support level at $126.75 and second major resistance level at $121.14.

Ethereums first visit to sub-$120 levels since February was brief, however, with Ethereum closing out the day at $121 levels.

The late move saw Ethereum break back through the second major support level before the day end.

At the time of writing, Ethereum was up by 2.74% to $125.17. A bullish start to the day saw Ethereum rise from an early morning low $121.20 to a high $125.45.

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

Story continues

Ethereum would need to steer clear of sub-$125 levels to support a run at the first major resistance level at $129.83.

Support from the broader market would be needed for Ethereum to break out from the morning high $125.45.

In the event of an extended rally on the day, Ethereum could revisit Tuesdays high $132.66 before any pullback.

Failure to steer clear of sub-$125 levels could see Ethereum slide for a 3rd consecutive day.

A fall through to sub-$124.70 levels would bring the first major support level at $116.67 into play.

Barring another crypto meltdown, however, Ethereum should steer clear of the second major support level at $111.50.

Major Support Level: $116.67

Major Resistance Level: $129.83

23.6% FIB Retracement Level: $257

38.2% FIB Retracement Level: $367

62% FIB Retracement Level: $543

Ripples XRP slumped by 10.76% on Tuesday. Following on from a 5.33% decline on Monday, Ripples XRP ended the day at $0.18426.

Another bearish start to the day saw Ripples XRP fall from an early intraday high $0.20675 to a mid-morning low $0.19020.

Steering clear of the major resistance levels, Ripples XRP fell through the first major support level at $0.2006 and second major support level at $0.1945.

Finding support in the late morning, Ripples XRP recovered to $0.20 levels before a getting hit by a late sell-off.

The late sell-off saw Ripples XRP slide through the major support levels to an intraday low and new swing lo $0.17854.

A partial recovery late on saw Ripples XRP break back through the third major support level at $0.1796.

At the time of writing, Ripples XRP was up by 1.54% to $0.18709. A bullish start to the day saw Ripples XRP rise from an early morning low $0.18253 to a high $0.18796.

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

A move through to $0.1900 levels would support a run at the first major resistance level at $0.2012.

Support from the broader market would be needed for Ripples XRP to break out from the mornings high $0.18796.

Barring a broad-based crypto rebound, however, Ripples XRP would likely come up short of $0.20 levels on the day.

Failure to move back through to $0.1900 levels could see Ripples XRP hit reverse once more.

A fall through the morning low $0.18253 would bring the first major support level at $0.1730 into play.

Barring another crypto meltdown, however, Ripples XRP should steer clear of the second major support level at $0.1616.

Major Support Level: $0.1730

Major Resistance Level: $0.2012

23.6% FIB Retracement Level: $0.3701

38.2% FIB Retracement Level: $0.4851

62% FIB Retracement Level: $0.6710

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 18/12/19 - Yahoo Finance

Ethereum price is diving below key supports versus the US Dollar and bitcoin. ETH price could continue to move down towards $125 if it fails to stay above $130.

In the past few analyses and the weekly forecast, we discussed the chances of Ethereum declining to the $132 support against the US Dollar. ETH price did start a nasty declining in the past few sessions and broke many supports near $140.

Moreover, there was a close below the $140 level and the 100 hourly simple moving average. It opened the doors for more losses and the price tumbled below the $135 level. Finally, it spiked below the $132 support and tested the $130 area.

A new monthly low was formed near $130 and the price is currently consolidating losses. An initial resistance is near the 23.6% Fib retracement level of the recent decline from the $142 high to $130 low.

Besides, there is a short term contracting triangle forming with resistance near $133 on the hourly chart of ETH/USD. Therefore, Ethereum price could either recover above $133 or extend its decline.

On the upside, the next major resistance is near the $136 level. Additionally, the 50% Fib retracement level of the recent decline from the $142 high to $130 low is also near the $136 level.

Having said that, the price must climb above the $138 and $140 resistance levels to move back into a positive zone. If not, there is a risk of more downsides below the $130 support area.

A clear break below the $130 level will most likely open the doors for a nasty decline towards the $125 support or the $122 area in the near term.

Ethereum Price

Looking at the chart, Ethereum price is down more than 6% and it clearly dropped heavily after it broke the $140 support. Similarly, there could be another slide if the price fails to stay above the $130 support area.

Hourly MACD The MACD for ETH/USD is slowly reducing its bearish slope.

Hourly RSI The RSI for ETH/USD is currently in the oversold region, with no signs of a major recovery.

Major Support Level $130

Major Resistance Level $136

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Ethereum (ETH) Nosedives To Final Bearish Target, Can It Recover? - newsBTC

American mathematician and economistEric Weinstein recently interviewed Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin on his popular YouTube show The Portal.

While I personally think Weinstein did not fully understand what Ethereum is about and how it works,Vitalik was smart enough to shift the conversation to more interesting topics.

In this article, Ill take a look at the good and the bad of the interview, available below, and discuss how I see Ethereum evolving.

Even though some people might think Im a Bitcoin maximalist due to my harsh stance on some of Ethereums promises and the foundations inability to keep them, my core belief is that Ethereum is a sleeping giant waiting to be woken up.

Ethereum is an incredible network. Not only because of its Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) and Solidity compiler or its easy-to-use developer interfaces (Mist, MyEtherWallet, and MetaMask), but also because of the quantity of projects being developed on top of its protocol.

That is Ethereums killer application.

Still, I am a firm believer that for Ethereum to become a fully decentralised world computer, its main focus should be on decentralisation.

Im personally looking forward to both of the platforms upcoming Proof-of-Stake (PoS) implementations, Casper FFG and Casper CBC, in the hope that one of them increases scalability and decentralisation even though the trade-off is less long-term security.

Nevertheless, I argue Bitcoins purpose is to be a store of value (perhaps one day P2P cash), meaning Ethereum shouldnt be worrying about that (even though ETH could potentially overtake BTC one day if its network upgrades are strong enough).

With the development of a scalable PoS system and the implementation of sharding and ZK-snarks, we could really see Ethereum making an attempt to rule decentralised computing.

Not only that, but the Ethereum Foundation is forming new partnerships with major players like Microsoft and Google in order to increase corporate adoption. The truth is that corporations are the ones capable of financing large-scale developments and training large quantities of people.

The Ethereum ecosystem is also making strides to enhance Ethereums censorship resistance and privacy. Two examples of projects getting traction in these areas are ChainLink and Enigma.

My stance is that Ethereum ticks all of the boxes to win most of the smart contract market share. Bitcoin is clearly not interested in that (a pity in my opinion), since the only altcoins being built over Bitcoin apparently exist solely on Liquid a centralised Bitcoin sidechain.

Because Ethereum promotes open-source development and is capable of funding and assisting ERC projects, I see a great deal of developers looking to build DeFi dApps on the platform.

One of the most interesting and controversial points of the interview above is the fact Vitalik openly admits to selling ETH tokens to cover the cost of operations during the platforms early days.

During the bull run of late 2017, Vitalik was apparently able to convince the Ethereum Foundation to sell a lump sum of about 70,000 ETH, over $80,000,000 at the time.

Even though some people might not see a problem with that I know I dont the truth is open-source projects like Ethereum should be straightforward with investors, especially when the message from the founding team at the time was well decentralise everything.

I believe the correct approach to be Litecoin founder Charlie Lees one of openly stating how much LTC he sold during that time. If projects want to captivate investors, they should maintain high standards of openness.

To conclude, I dont think dumping coins on investors at the top to finance the project long term was a bad move, especially since the market was seriously overbought. However, since the project is open source, the amounts should have been disclosed much sooner.

The post Vitalik Buterin discusses Ethereum on The Portal with Eric Weinstein appeared first on Coin Rivet.

See more here:

Vitalik Buterin discusses Ethereum on The Portal with Eric Weinstein - Yahoo Finance

EOS

EOS slid by 7.48% on Monday. Following on from a 6.59% slide from last week, EOS ended the day at $2.3809.

Tracking the broader market, EOS fell from an early morning intraday high $2.5773 to a mid-morning low $2.5257.

Steering clear of the major resistance levels, EOS fell through the first major support level at $2.5456.

Finding support through the late morning, EOS recovered to $2.57 levels before hitting reverse.

The reversal saw EOS fall through the major support levels to a late intraday low $2.2816.

While finding late support, EOS failed to break back through the third major support level at $2.4609.

At the time of writing, EOS was down by 1.22% to $2.3519. A bearish start to the day saw EOS fall from an early morning high $2.3804 to a low $2.3412.

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

EOS would need to move through to $2.4150 levels to support a run at the first major resistance level at $2.5444.

Support from the broader market would be needed, however, for EOS to break out from $2.40 levels.

Barring a broad-based crypto rally, resistance at $2.5000 would likely pin EOS back on the day.

Failure to move through to $2.4150 levels could see EOS slide deeper into the red. A fall through the morning low $2.3412 would bring the first major support level at $2.2487 into play.

Barring a crypto meltdown, however, EOS should steer clear of the second major support level at S2.1173.

Major Support Level: $2.2487

Major Resistance Level: $2.5444

23.6% FIB Retracement Level: $6.62

38% FIB Retracement Level: $9.76

62% FIB Retracement Level: $14.82

Ethereum tumbled by 7.04% on Monday. Following on from last weeks 5.51% fall, Ethereum ended the day at $132.36

A bearish start to the day saw Ethereum fall from an early intraday high $142.53 to a mid-morning low $140.11.

Finding support at the first major support level at $140.12, Ethereum recovered to $141.9 levels before the meltdown.

The meltdown saw Ethereum slide through the major support levels to a late intraday low $129.03.

While finding support late on, Ethereum failed to break back through the third major support level at $133.68.

At the time of writing, Ethereum was down by 0.65% to $131.50. A mixed start to the day saw Ethereum rise to an early morning high $132.66 before falling to a low $130.67.

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

Story continues

Ethereum would need to move back through to $135 levels to support a run at the first major resistance level at $140.25.

Support from the broader market would be needed for Ethereum to break back through to $140 levels.

Barring a broad-based crypto rebound, however, the first major resistance level at $140.25 would likely limit any upside.

Failure to move back through to $135 levels could see Ethereum struggle throughout the day.

A fall back through the morning low $130.67 would bring the first major support level at $126.75 into play.

Barring another crypto meltdown, however, Ethereum should steer clear of the second major support level at $121.14.

Major Support Level: $126.75

Major Resistance Level: $140.25

23.6% FIB Retracement Level: $257

38.2% FIB Retracement Level: $367

62% FIB Retracement Level: $543

Ripples XRP fell by 5.33% on Monday. Following on from last weeks 5.48% decline, Ripples XRP ended the day at $0.20670.

A bearish start to the day saw Ripples XRP fall through the first major support level at $0.2158 to a late morning low $0.2117.

Finding support in the late morning, Ripples XRP recovered to $0.2150 levels before succumbing to market forces.

Ripples XRP tumbled through the days major support levels to an intraday low $0.20336 before steadying.

At the time of writing, Ripples XRP was down by 3.24% to $0.20001. A particularly bearish morning saw Ripples XRP fall from an early morning high $0.20675 to a new swing lo $0.19020.

Steering clear of the major resistance levels, Ripples XRP fell through the first major support level at $0.2006 and the second major support level at $0.1945.

A move back through to $0.2095 levels would support a run at the first major resistance level at $0.2156.

Support from the broader market would be needed for Ripples XRP to break out from the first major support level at $0.2006.

Barring a broad-based crypto rebound, however, Ripples XRP would likely come up short of $0.21 levels on the day.

Failure to move back through to $0.2095 levels could see Ripples XRP lose more ground on the day.

A fall through the second major support level at $0.1945 could bring sub-$0.19 levels into play before any recovery.

Barring a crypto meltdown, however, Ripples XRP should steer clear of the third major support level at $0.1795.

Major Support Level: $0.2006

Major Resistance Level: $0.2156

23.6% FIB Retracement Level: $0.3841

38.2% FIB Retracement Level: $0.4964

62% FIB Retracement Level: $0.6780

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 17/12/19 - Yahoo Finance

Ethereum (ETH) has fallen by 8.5% in the past 24 hours amid a massive sell-off across the entire cryptocurrency market.

A total of $1.2 billion has been wiped from Ethereums total market cap, which now resides at around $14.25 billion.

The dramatic move to the downside was undoubtedly led by Bitcoin, which slumped below the $7,000 level of support before experiencing a small bounce at $6,700.

Ethereum is now 65% down from its yearly high of $365, with the next meaningful level of support coming in at $124.

Failing that, it remains likely that Ethereum could dwindle all the way down to $95 and even $80, with both levels acting as support following the capitulation low in December 2018.

Potential upside targets remain at $133 and $146, although a bullish reversal would only come into play if Ethereum can surge to above $217, which was the confluence of Augusts death cross.

Regardless of the recent descent to the downside, Ethereum has witnessed impressive volume over the past 24 hours, with more than $9.6 billion being traded across all major exchanges.

Vitalik Buterins project underwent a hard fork last week, although it has so far presented a number of issues with uncertainty spreading to both users and miners.

For example, developers reportedly forgot to update the difficulty bomb, which has been reflected by the lack of confidence across Ethereums trading pairs.

For more news, guides, and cryptocurrency analysis, click here.

The post Ethereum slumps to nine-month low of $128 appeared first on Coin Rivet.

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Ethereum slumps to nine-month low of $128 - Yahoo Finance

ETH/USD lost nearly 15% of its value in just two days. At the time of writing, the second-largest digital asset is changing hands at $121.50. During early Asian hours, ETH/USD tested $120.80, which is the lowest level since December 2018. Ethereum is one of the worst-performing altcoins out of top-10 as the breakthrough in the vital support area increased the bearish pressure. On a day-to-day basis, ETH/USD is down nearly 7%.

While the current sell-off has been driven mostly by technical factors and overall bearish sentiments on the cryptocurrency markets, the cryptocurrency expert and crypto data scientist Alex Svanevik noted some strange activity in the Ethereum network. As it turns out, an investor that participated in ETH ICO has been selling significant amounts of ETH recently.

Curious who this ETH ICO participant is: https://etherscan.io/address/0x51f9c432a4e59ac86282d6adab4c2eb8919160eb/ They've dumped (?) almost 300k ETH in the last few months - after hodling 530k ETH since the ICO in 2015. 3 days ago they transferred 60k ETH out of their wallet.

The first large-scale transaction was processed in September and the last one happened on December 12. In the previous three months, ETH/USD l=has lost over 42% of its value, with the most violent sell-offs taking place in November and December.

From the long-term perspective, a sustainable move below $132.00-$130.00 area may result in a deep decline towards December 2018 low reached at $80.00. The downward-looking RSI (Relative Strength Index) confirms this bearish view. The weekly chart is no less pessimistic at this stage as the RSI also points downwards with no signs of an upcoming reversal.

Meanwhile, it should be noted that ETH/USD broke below the lower line of the weekly Bollinger Band (currently at $131.50). It may signal that the market is ready to ender a consolidation phase or rebound as the price tends to return inside the Bollinger Band.

Now the critical support waits for us on approach to $120.00. Once it is out of the way, the sell-off may continue towards $100.00 and $80.00 (2018 low).

On the upside, a sustainable move above $131.50 ( the lower line of the weekly Bollinger Band) will allow for an extended recovery towards $140.00 and $144.00 ( the middle line of the daily Bollinger Band and the previous support).

More here:

Ethereum Price Analysis: ETH/USD stares in the abyss with the bottom at $80.00 - FXStreet

Ethereums price action has been closely mirroring that of Bitcoins in recent times, which led ETH to drop as low as $120 this morning before posting a massive surge back up to the $130 region.

ETHs strong reaction to the $120 level confirms that this is a strong support region for the cryptocurrency and may even signal that these lows will mark a long-term bottom for Ethereum a possibility that appears to be confirmed by history.

At the time of writing, Ethereum is trading up over 4% at its current price of $130, which marks a massive climb from its daily lows of $120 that were set earlier this morning concurrently with the capitulatory drop incurred by Bitcoin and most other major altcoins.

This mornings rapid downturn marked a significant extension of the downwards momentum that the markets had been facing over the past few days, which was sparked by Bitcoins drop below its key support level at $7,000 earlier this week.

One factor that should be closely considered in the near-term is the fact that Ethereums bounce from its 24-hour lows came about concurrently with incredibly low RSI levels, with levels this low historically marking long-term bottoms for the crypto.

Josh Olszewicz, a popular cryptocurrency analyst on Twitter, spoke about this possibility in a recent tweet, saying:

Daily $ETH RSI = 21 has only ever been this low five other times, two of which were local bottoms, the others leading to a bullish divergence.

In addition to boasting technical strength while looking at ETHs technical indicators, its weekly chart may also signal that it will soon see significantly further upside in the near-term.

Scott Melker another popular crypto analyst on Twitter who goes by the pseudonym The Wolf of All Streets explained in a recent tweet that Ethereums reaction to its key support levels on its weekly chart points to the possibility that it could soon see some decent upside.

$ETH (USD) Weekly has sparked my interest, to be honest, he explained while pointing to Ethereums weekly candle chart.

It is highly probable that Ethereum will closely track Bitcoins price action in the coming hours and days, which means that all eyes will be closely watching to see how BTC responds to its recent break above $7,000.

More:

History Signals That Ethereum May Have Just Posted a Long-Term Bottom - Ethereum World News

EOS

EOS fell by 0.06% on Sunday. Following on from a 2.04% slide on Saturday, EOS ended the week down by 6.59% to $2.5765.

Tracking the broader market, EOS fell to an early morning intraday low $2.5464 before finding support.

Steering clear of the major support levels, EOS rallied to a mid-morning intraday high $2.6031.

Falling short of the first major resistance level at $2.6256, EOS fell back to $2.55 levels before closing out at $2.57 levels.

At the time of writing, EOS was down by 0.49% to $2.5638. A bearish start to the day saw EOS fall from an early morning high $2.5773 to a low $2.5601.

EOS left the major support and resistance levels untested early on

EOS would need to move through to $2.5740 levels to support a run at the first major resistance level at $2.6023.

Support from the broader market would be needed, however, for EOS to break through to $2.60 levels.

Barring a broad-based crypto rally, the first major resistance level and Sundays high $2.6031 would likely cap any upside.

Failure to move through to $2.5740 levels could see EOS slide deeper into the red. A fall through the morning low $2.5601 would bring the first major support level at $2.5456 into play.

Barring a crypto meltdown, however, EOS should steer clear of sub-$2.50 levels. The second major support level at $2.5176 should limit any downside.

Major Support Level: $2.5456

Major Resistance Level: $2.6023

23.6% FIB Retracement Level: $6.62

38% FIB Retracement Level: $9.76

62% FIB Retracement Level: $14.82

Ethereum rose by 0.47% on Sunday. Partially reversing a 2.05% slide from Saturday, Ethereum ended the week down by 5.51% to $142.38.

A choppy start to the day saw Ethereum fall to an early morning intraday low $139.8.

Ethereum fell through the first major support level at $140.22 before rebounding to a mid-morning intraday high $143.99.

Falling short of the first major resistance level at $144.14, Ethereum fell back to $141 levels before closing out at $142 levels.

At the time of writing, Ethereum was down by 0.98% to $140.98. A bearish start to the day saw Ethereum fall from an early morning high $142.53 to a low $140.58.

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

Story continues

Ethereum would need to move back through to $142 levels to support a run at the first major resistance level at $144.31.

Support from the broader market would be needed for Ethereum to break out from the morning high $142.53.

Barring a broad-based crypto rebound, however, resistance at $144 would likely pin Ethereum back on the day.

Failure to move back through to $142 levels could see Ethereum struggle throughout the day.

A fall back through the morning low $140.58 would bring the first major support level at $140.12 and sub-$140 into play.

Barring a crypto meltdown, however, Ethereum should steer clear of the second major support level at $137.87.

Major Support Level: $140.12

Major Resistance Level: $144.11

23.6% FIB Retracement Level: $257

38.2% FIB Retracement Level: $367

62% FIB Retracement Level: $543

Ripples XRP rose by 0.48% on Sunday. Partially reversing a 1.96% slide from Saturday, Ripples XRP ended the week down by 5.48% to $0.21834.

A mixed start to the day saw Ripples XRP rise from an early morning intraday low $0.21554 to a mid-morning intraday high $0.22039.

Steering clear of the major support levels, Ripples XRP broke through the first major resistance level at $0.2208.

Through the late morning, Ripples XRP fell back to sub-$0.21 levels and into the red before finding late support.

While closing out in the green, Ripples XRP failed to recover to $0.22 levels for a 2nd consecutive day.

At the time of writing, Ripples XRP was down by 1.61% to $0.21482. A particularly bearish morning saw Ripples XRP fall from an early morning high $0.21835 to a low $0.21330.

Steering clear of the major resistance levels, Ripples XRP fell through the first major support level at $0.2158.

The second major support level at $0.21320 limited the downside early on.

A move back through to $0.2180 levels would support a run at the first major resistance level at $0.2206.

Support from the broader market would be needed for Ripples XRP to break out from Sundays high $0.22039.

Barring a broad-based crypto rebound, however, Ripples XRP would likely come up short of $0.22 levels on the day.

Failure to move back through to $0.2180 levels could see Ripples XRP lose more ground on the day.

A fall through the second major support level at $0.2132 could bring sub-$0.21 levels into play before any recovery.

Barring a crypto meltdown, however, Ripples XRP should steer clear of the third major support level at $0.2084.

Major Support Level: $0.2158

Major Resistance Level: $0.2206

23.6% FIB Retracement Level: $0.3841

38.2% FIB Retracement Level: $0.4964

62% FIB Retracement Level: $0.6780

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

Thanks, Bob

This article was originally posted on FX Empire

View original post here:

EOS, Ethereum and Ripples XRP Daily Tech Analysis 16/12/19 - Yahoo Finance

With the Istanbul Hard Fork behind us, numerous innovations are already being implemented into the post-hard fork Ethereum (ETH) network. One of these innovations may rapidly facilitate the throughput of Ethereum and increase the quantity of transactions per second (TPS) sixtyfold.

Iden3, a startup that is partnering with the Ethereum Foundation, published a report on how the ZK-Rollup feature can increase the speed of the Ethereum network.

ZK-Rollup (ZK refers to Zero Knowledge) is a feature that allows one to unload the main blockchain by transferring some of the data about the transaction off-chain (out of smart contracts of the initial Ethereum). This will result in a limited load on the main network and will start to operate much faster.

This technology is endorsed by the "Father of Ethereum" Vitalik Buterin as his favorite scalability solution. In accordance with Iden3, the ZK-Rollup feature will allow more transactions to be validated in every Ethereum block. Therefore, its capacity may skyrocket.

Image by:https://iden3.io/post/istanbul-zkrollup-ethereum-throughput-limits-analysis

This upgrade is now possible because oftwo Ethereum Improvement Proposals (EIPs) that were included with the Istanbul Hard Fork - EIP-1108 and EIP-2028. Both of these EIPs will reconsider the gas pricing calculation, making the introduction of ZK-Rollup much cheaper.

To put this in context,2000 TPS is what the Visa network currently averages. Ethereum currently supports around30 TPS, but with the implementation of ZK-Rollup, this figure may surge 6300%. Therefore, the breakthrough doesn't seem impossible at all.

Furthermore, the calculations by Iden3 are a rough estimation. The true throughput of blockchain alwaysdepends on the performance of mining gear used by validators as well as based on the demand for its native token.

Should we get ready for the Visa-like speed of Ethereum? Let's discuss it on Twitter!

See the article here:

Expert: Ethereum Can Easily Surpass Visa with This Feature - U.Today

Bitcoin Cash ABC

Bitcoin Cash ABC slid by 2.22% on Saturday. Reversing a 1.88% gain from Friday, Bitcoin Cash ABC ended the day at $205.92.

A bullish start to the day saw Bitcoin Cash ABC rally to an early morning intraday high $212.75 before hitting reverse.

Falling short of the first major resistance level at $213.94, Bitcoin Cash ABC slid to a late intraday low $205.09.

The sell-off saw Bitcoin Cash ABC fall through the first major support level at $207.01.

At the time of writing, Bitcoin Cash ABC was down by 0.40% to $205.09. Bitcoin Cash ABC eased back from Saturdays end of the day $205.92.

Bitcoin Cash ABC left the major support and resistance levels untested early on.

A move through to $208 levels would support a run at the first major resistance level at $210.75.

Support from the broader market would be needed, however, for Bitcoin to break back through to $210 levels.

Barring a broad-based crypto rally, the first major resistance level would likely pin Bitcoin Cash ABC back on the day.

Failure to move through to $208 levels could see Bitcoin Cash ABC struggle through the day.

A fall back through to $204 levels would bring the first major support level at $203.09 into play.

Barring a crypto meltdown, however, Bitcoin Cash ABC should steer clear of sub-$200 levels. The second major support level at $200.26 should limit any downside.

Major Support Level: $203.09

Major Resistance Level: $210.75

23.6% FIB Retracement Level: $269

38% FIB Retracement Level: $316

62% FIB Retracement Level: $393

EOS slid by 2.04% on Saturday. Reversing a 1.4% gain from Friday, EOS ended the day at $2.5783.

A bullish start to the day saw EOS rise to an early morning intraday high $2.6389 before hitting reverse.

Falling short of the first major resistance level at $2.6628, EOS slid to a late afternoon intraday low $2.5570.

The reversal saw EOS fall through the first major support level at $2.5908 before finding support.

In spite of a partial recovery late on, however, EOS failed to break back through the first major support level.

Story continues

At the time of writing, EOS was down by 0.43% to $2.5672. A bearish start to the day saw EOS slide from an early morning high $2.5791 to an early morning low $2.5464.

In spite of the early moves, however, EOS left the major support and resistance levels untested.

EOS would need to move through to $2.59 levels to support a run at the first major resistance level at $2.6256.

The broader market would need to provide support, however, for EOS to break back through to $2.60 levels.

Barring a broad-based crypto rebound, resistance at $2.60 would likely pin EOS back on the day.

Failure to move through to $2.59 levels could see EOS take another slide on the day.

A fall back through the early morning low $2.5464 would bring the first major support level at $2.5437 into play.

Barring a crypto meltdown, however, EOS should steer well clear of the second major support level at $2.5094.

Major Support Level: $2.5437

Major Resistance Level: $2.6256

23.6% FIB Retracement Level: $6.62

38% FIB Retracement Level: $9.76

62% FIB Retracement Level: $14.82

Ethereum fell by 2.05% on Saturday. Following a flat Friday, Ethereum ended the day at $141.73.

Tracking the broader market, Ethereum rose to an early morning intraday high $145.03 before hitting reverse.

Falling short of the first major resistance level at $145.63, Ethereum slid to a late afternoon intraday low $141.11.

Ethereum fell through the first major support level at $143.26 and the second major support level at $141.83.

A recovery to $142 levels was brief, with Ethereum falling back through the second major support level in the final hour.

At the time of writing, Ethereum was down by 0.54% to $140.97. A bearish start to the day saw Ethereum slide from an early morning high $141.90 to a low $139.80.

Steering clear of the major resistance levels, Ethereum fell through the first major support level at $140.22 before finding support.

Ethereum would need to move through to $142.60 level to support a run at the first major resistance level at $144.14.

Support from the broader market will be needed, however, for Ethereum to break back through to $143 levels.

Barring a broad-based crypto rally on the day, the first major resistance level would likely pin Ethereum back from $145 levels.

Failure to move through to $142.60 levels could see Ethereum take another hit on the day.

A fall back through the first major support level at $140.22 would bring the second major support level at $138.70 into play.

Barring an extended sell-off, however, Ethereum should steer clear of sub-$139 levels on the day.

Major Support Level: $140.22

Major Resistance Level: $144.14

23.6% FIB Retracement Level: $257

38.2% FIB Retracement Level: $367

62% FIB Retracement Level: $543

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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Bitcoin Cash ABC, EOS and Ethereum Daily Tech Analysis 15/12/19 - Yahoo Finance