Users continue to withdraw Bitcoin from exchanges in record numbers, as the original king of crypto inches towards $10,000.

Liesl Eichhols, a growth strategist at blockchain research firm Glassnode, wrote about the trend in Glassnodes latest weekly report. The report noted that Bitcoins overall market health and the sentiment of its investors, based on data collected by Galssnode, is in a strong place.

And while not overly bullish, theres still a sense of optimism in the market. Its reflected in the price of Bitcoin, which continues to flirt with $10,000. But its also reflected in another data point: how much Bitcoin is being withdrawn from exchanges.

According to Glassnode, users are withdrawing their Bitcoin in droves. Bitcoin holders have been withdrawing from exchanges ever since the March 12 crash in a withdrawing spree that has become the largest and most prolonged BTC exchange balance downtrend in Bitcoin's history.

This activity, Glassnode postulates, may be attributed to bullish sentiment in light of Bitcoins halvingthat once-in-four-years event that caused quite a ruckus within the crypto industry last weekconsidering that the trend began in the weeks leading up to the halving and has continued after it.

A possible explanation for this decrease is that investors are withdrawing funds from exchanges to hold in cold storage, implying a longer-term outlook, the report stated.

Data that suggests small account holders are rising (alongside the balance in Bitcoin whales wallets, as well) corroborates this view, Glassnode wrote in its report.

But theres another factor that could explain why Bitcoin holders are moving their funds away from centralized exchanges.

During the Black Thursday market crash, the Seychelles-based BitMEX exchange suffered a technical snafu that may have contributed to Bitcoins historic plunge during the macro market selloff. Once the place to trade Bitcoin futures, BitMEX has since lost major market share to competitors, and exchange withdraws may play into a trend of distrust that exchanges like BitMEX have engendered in Bitcoin investors.

Instead, Bitcoin holders may be opting to trust themselves with their coins morewhich is how Bitcoin was intended to be used in the first place.

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Bitcoin is pouring out of exchanges as price flirts with $10K - Decrypt

During the last few years, the Google-owned Youtube platform has been accused of massive censorship and in the last three months, the video streaming business resembles the Ministry of Propaganda, more than an online video-sharing platform. This week Bitcoin.com was also censored for sharing a video about our bitcoin mining pool. Bitcoin.coms Youtube account was given one strike for allegedly violating community guidelines.

When the online video-sharing platform Youtube was first released in February 2005, it was a community of people sharing ideas with very little censorship and moderation. Nowadays, Youtube is under the ownership of Google, and the firms CEO Susan Wojcicki has been outspoken about removing videos. Weeks ago, Wojcicki told CNN that any videos that went against the WHO narrative in regards to the Covid-19 outbreak would be removed.

Last year, Youtube de-platformed a myriad of alt-right and so-called conspiracy groups and removed these channels from the video streaming site. Youtube also started harassing cryptocurrency content creators and Youtubers who operated channels that discussed bitcoin and other digital assets. During the holiday season in 2019, Youtube officials purged a massive number of cryptocurrency video channels for very little reasoning. The company typically just tells the person that the channel had violated community guidelines.

Prior to Bitcoin.coms recent video removal and strike, Wojcickis words came to fruition as her company banned many videos that spoke out against the WHOs narrative when it came to an oppositional narrative toward official coronavirus data. Youtube and Wojcicki took it upon themselves to shelter the public from an opposite narrative that claims herd immunity works and the fatality rate for Covid-19 was extremely over-exaggerated.

We now know that the proof is right in front of our faces and many respected scientific think tanks and epidemiologists have told the public that the lockdowns were very irrational. Despite the proof, Youtube has banned a number of videos that go against the ongoing fear-mongering narrative. When a video was posted on Youtube that featured Dr. Daniel W. Erickson and Dr. Artin Massihi from California, the video got 5 million views before it was removed. Youtubes excuse was:

We quickly remove flagged content that violate [sic] our Community Guidelines, including content that explicitly disputes the efficacy of local health authority recommended guidance on social distancing that may lead others to act against that guidance.

Youtube also banned a video called Plandemic, which featured Dr. Judy Mikovits soon after it was published on the online video sharing platform. Youtube, however, does allow videos that rebut Judy Mikovits, Daniel W. Erickson, and Dr. Artin Massihis narratives. The company has no issues allowing rebuttals that stay on course with the fear-mongering narrative.

But any dissenting views against the lockdowns, stay-at-home orders, and social distancing continued to be removed to this day. The former head of biostatistics, epidemiology, and research design at Rockefeller University, Dr. Knut M. Wittkowski, recently told the public that Youtube had banned his video that went against the lockdown, and over-reaction narrative after it gathered more than 1.3 million views. Dr. Andrew Kaufmans videos were also removed, when he spoke out against the stay-at-home narrative and the data spread by people like the epidemiologist Neil Ferguson.

Now Youtube has banned one of Bitcoin.coms videos for sharing information about our mining pool. The video removal was based on the companys sale of regulated goods policy and the video allegedly went against community guidelines. The Bitcoin.com account was given a single strike, which gives the account a one week probation period. Two to three strikes could lead to far worse restrictions against the Bitcoin.com account that merely shares information and resources about cryptocurrency solutions. Bitcoin.coms CEO Mate Tokay has spoken out against the Youtube censorship in a tweet letting the company and Wojcicki know they have been immoral.

History shows that censorship has produced some manipulated realities and it has furthered evil time and time again. Youtube is a private company and it can do whatever it wants, but the censorship still speaks volumes on the companys tethered relationship with the status quo. Theres a reason why cryptocurrency videos are removed and it is because it goes against Youtubes financial masters. The reason why Youtube bans certain groups is because those groups gain grass-roots attention and make people think critically.

Youtube has banned videos that go against the Covid-19 narrative as well, because people started realizing that a virus with a 99% survival rate isnt as horrible as we all thought. Concrete evidence shows that the lockdowns and stay-at-home orders did absolutely nothing, even though Youtube continues to scream the less-powerful Covid-19 mantras. Staying at home saves lives, Were all in this together, Flatten the curve, and other propaganda slogans are still aired on nearly every ad published on Youtube today.

Censorship and propaganda techniques paint a clear perspective of Youtubes true colors. Censoring Bitcoin.coms mining video bolsters the argument that Youtube does not have the best interests of global citizens in mind. If anything, people who understand Youtubes vile acts of censorship and misinformation, should vacate the platform in great numbers and leverage a more decentralized online video sharing application like Lbry, or Bitchute. As the economic think tank Fee.org has said: Youtubes censorship of dissenting doctors will backfire.

What do you think about Youtubes censorship and propaganda techniques these last few months? Let us know in the comments below.

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Disclaimer: This article is for informational purposes only. It is not a direct offer or solicitation of an offer to buy or sell, or a recommendation or endorsement of any products, services, or companies. Bitcoin.com does not provide investment, tax, legal, or accounting advice. 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 content, goods or services mentioned in this article.

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Bitcoin.com's Mining Video Censored: The Tale of Youtube's Blatant Censorship and Propaganda - Bitcoin News

In approximately 2,005 days, Bitcoin will achieve the holy grail of the four ninesthat is, 99.99% uptime for its global blockchain network. According to in-house calculations, we estimate Friday November 14, 2025 as the date when Bitcoin will reach the milestone, assuming nothing goes wrong in the meantime.

Bitcoin is estimated to have been functional for 99.985% of its existence thus far. In fact, that number would be as high as 100% if we measured only from 2013 onwards.

But Bitcoin has gone down twice. In 2010 a value overflow incident saw two Bitcoin addresses erroneously granted 92.2 billion coins each. In this instance, the blockchain was down for eight hours and twenty seven minutes before a softfork (minor update) effectively cancelled the bugged transactions.

In 2013, Bitcoin briefly went down after a block was rejected by certain miners running different versions of the Bitcoin client. This resulted in a short chain split which was resolved after six hours and twenty minutes when miners reorganized themselves onto the same client.

Dan Held, director of business development at crypto exchange Kraken, posted a video to the main cryptocurrency subreddit which claimed Bitcoin already had maintained a higher uptime than Amazon, Google and Facebook.

However, not everyone thinks comparing Bitcoins uptime to the worlds largest tech companies is a solid metric. As one commenter on Helds post suggested, perhaps Bitcoins uptime should be compared with that of other currencies:

Why compare a currency to tech companies? How much uptime did paying with usd have? 100%, they claimed.

Although some dispute thisclaiming the US dollar has indeed, had downtime. A Reddit post in 2017 pointed out that hyperinflation and other monetary policies stopped the first version of the dollar in its tracks. Four years later, it returned as the dollar we know today. Those four years put it at 98.36% uptime, arguably less than Bitcoin. But by this point, the discussion is too meta to really make any sense.

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Here's when Bitcoin will actually reach 99.99% uptime - Decrypt

During the last two months since the March 12 crypto market rout, otherwise known as Black Thursday, demand for cryptocurrencies seems to be on the rise in certain regions in Latin America. Various reports published this week have noted that countries like Colombia, Venezuela, Argentina, Chile, Brazil, and Mexico have seen significant bitcoin trade volumes. However, other reports show that even though the volumes are high in these specific countries, they are hard to measure due to inflation or hyperinflation.

A lot of bitcoin trade volume has been taking place in a variety of Latin American countries. Peer-to-peer marketplaces that sell cryptocurrencies are seeing strong volumes in these regions. According to Coin Dance volume statistics, Colombia, Brazil, and Chile have seen significant bitcoin trade volumes on Localbitcoins week after week. Venezuela and Argentina bitcoin trade volumes indicate new all-time highs and the trend can be seen on Paxful, Mycrypto, Local.Bitcoin.com, and other platforms as well. Because of this vast crypto trade volume in Latin America, it had prompted a number of financial news outlets to report that there is significant demand stemming from these areas. For instance, Nikkei Asian Review staff writer Naoyuki Toyama recently wrote that bitcoin shines in emerging markets plagued by falling currencies, and from Bueno Aires to Beirut, investors embrace cryptocurrency as a safe haven.

Despite the reports, a few media outlets like Decrypt, Crypto Globe, and a few others showed a different side of the story. For instance, it seems people are not taking into account that the fiat currencies in these countries are becoming less valuable every day. Yes, the volumes are at an all-time high in Argentina, but inflation is worse than it has ever been for Argentines in three decades. Well before the coronavirus, Argentinas inflation rate hit 53.8% at the end of 2019.

Venezuela is the same way, as the inflation rate for Venezuelans is massive. In February 2020 the inflation rate was 2,910%, but it did fall to 2,430% in March. However, the significantly larger inflation rate in Venezuela makes it the worst inflation rate in the world by a long shot. Despite the fact that Localbitcoins trade volumes in the country are touching an all-time high, it doesnt compare to the trade volumes in 2017 when the bolivar was worth more.

The Covid-19 pandemic has made things worse in these countries as the economies in Chile, Venezuela, Columbia, Mexico, and all the other regions with high BTC trade volumes have worsened. The troubles have gotten so bad in Venezuela, this week President Nicolas Maduro enacted a rent and wage freeze across the whole country. On many occasions, Localbitcoins data has had some discrepancies, particularly when it used to serve Iran. Not too long ago, many individuals and publications said that Iranians were paying $24,000 per BTC.

The problem with that price estimate was a common misconception about the exchange rate in Iran and how it works. At the time, people observed that one BTC was around a billion Iranian rials, but the exchange rate math is entirely different. An Iranian national named Mehran Jalali explained when these $24K per BTC headlines came out, how people can get the market rate using USD, and the Iranian rial. The going market rate for the U.S. dollar to the Iranian rial is one dollar to 136,500 rials, Jalali said this past January. Making things even more confusing, news.Bitcoin.coms Kevin Helms reported on how Iranian lawmakers recently discussed slashing four zeros from the rial. Localbitcoins, however, banned Iranian traders from swapping digital currencies on the platform and residents now have to leverage other options.

Its hard to measure how much demand is stemming from any country based on Localbitcoins volumes alone. Especially when there are huge discrepancies and massive inflation ruining these fiat currencies from various Latin American countries. The same could be said for the U.S. dollar someday, and economists have predicted the end of the USD after the petro-dollar collapse. Analysts forecast that BTC could reach 1 million dollars, at some point in time, and it very well could happen in the midst of hyperinflation in the U.S. if it was to occur. A number of economists think that the demise of USD very well could happen especially amid the Federal Reserve creating trillions of dollars out of thin air. So if you think about it logically and envision BTC touching a million USD per coin Would it be very meaningful if the USD was near worthless?

What do you think about the trade volumes in Latin America taking inflation into consideration? Let us know what you think about this topic in the comments below.

Image Credits: Shutterstock, Pixabay, Wiki Commons, Coin Dance, Local.Bitcoin.com

Disclaimer: This article is for informational purposes only. It is not a direct offer or solicitation of an offer to buy or sell, or a recommendation or endorsement of any products, services, or companies. Bitcoin.com does not provide investment, tax, legal, or accounting advice. 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 content, goods or services mentioned in this article.

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P2P Bitcoin Trade Volumes and Inflation in Latin America Are on the Rise - Bitcoin News

A handful of big names in crypto want in on the privacy features offered by Zcash.

It is humbling and inspiring that such a strong group of builders is leaning in to push that mission forward and help guide the future of Zcash, privacy coin co-founder Zooko Wilcox said in a press statement.

The Electric Coin Company (ECC) announced Monday the launch of the Zcash Developers Alliance (ZDA), an invite-only working group that includes the Lightning Network startup Bolt Labs, the cross-chain technology startup Thesis, the Ethereum conglomerate ConsenSys and two leading startups working on the Cosmos project, Agoric and Iqlusion, just to name a few.

The ZDA is an attempt to introduce a way to collaborate with the ECC, and the Zcash ecosystem, which focuses around other peoples priorities, Iqlusion founder Zaki Manian said. Product-market fit is other people [beyond fans and founders] actually caring about it.

Manian said the Zcash anonymity set is a valuable public good, describing how the privacy coin allows shielded transactions and the construct that allows individual transactions to get lost in the metaphorical crowd.

It feels like its time for a Zcash-Ethereum bridge, ConsenSys CEO Joseph Lubin said in a press statement.

Basically, other blockchains can connect to the Zcash ecosystem to enable, say, Cosmos users to enter and exit the staking system without revealing personally identifying information, just like Zcash users can shield their information while making payments. The more people tapping into this shared anonymity set, the more effective it is at anonymizing data.

Zcash Foundation researcher Henry de Valence said his team is helping bring the Zcash shielded pool to Cosmos, although the nonprofit hasnt been invited to the ZDA.

If you think privacy is important in order to have fungibility, then networks should have a privacy layer. So were going to add a privacy layer to Cosmos in such a way that the anonymity set from Cosmos users is joined up with the anonymity set of all the Zcash users, de Valence said.

The Ethereum Foundation is already researching ways to use these privacy options for Eth 2.0, the networks overhaul to Proof-of-Stake (PoS). Bolt Labs founder Ayo Akinyele has been working to enable some of Zcashs privacy features on Bitcoins Lightning Network since 2019. And yet, the alliance is about more than formalizing the work startups were already doing. Its about ECC shouldering the organizational burden, Akinyele said, so that other companies can focus on building tools related to the Zcash protocol.

Its not just about having the best anonymous crypto, Manian added. You have to have enough users of the anonymous crypto so that your anonymity set is sufficiently large that it can provide meaningful privacy.

Cypherpunk model

Agoric CEO Dean Tribble, an original member of cypherpunk mailing lists and community groups in decades past, said the ZDA is more like those hacker groups than it is like the Libra Association or JavaScript Foundation, or even Microsoft industry alliances.

The ZDA is invite-only, with the requirement being that members need to actively build privacy technology. This isnt a group for promoting token adoption or formalizing standards for specific products or services. Members are building wildly different tools, hoping to use the same privacy solution. As such, Akinyele said the ZDA has bi-annual meetings and private communication channels so projects can leverage resources across the group.

Were not building different solutions. We want to build one solution that can be adapted to multiple chains, Akinyele said. His startup launched a Zcash-inspired testnet for bitcoin in April called zkChannels. It works like the Lightning Network, in that it offers an additional layer for more complex features. While Lightning channels offer speed and reduced transaction fees, the Zcash-inspired channels offer privacy.

Its a way for a customer to establish a zkChannel with a merchant or a service and the merchant wont be able to link transactions on that channel to the identity of the customer, Akinyele said. In the case of [wallets], the provider just knows that two users paid each other.

He aims to have a beta version live this year, but it wont be connected to the Lightning Network quite yet. That will come in 2021, Akinyele said, when additional work enables both layers to be used at the same time. For now, imagine that people must choose between chocolate or vanilla frozen yogurt, privacy or speed. In the future, bitcoiners will be able to choose a chocolate-vanilla swirl swirl without diluting either feature.

The anonymity set is going to be tied to the number of channels the provider youve communicated with already has, Akinyele said, offering an example of a merchant with 10,000 channels. A customer using zkChannels is anonymized because the merchant cant see which of the 10,000 customer channels is the buyer.

Akinyeles startup is working on a Lightning-inspired scaling layer for Zcash as well. But tokens require different techniques than bitcoin, especially when it comes to privacy. This is why such different crypto companies joined ZDA.

We all have independent reasons to start that interoperability, said Tribble, whose team is focused more on smart contracts than payments. Agoric also plans to eventually launch its own token.

We dont believe theres going to be one winning chain, so getting the mainstream world online with added privacy requires the cooperation of a lot of chains, Tribble said.

Privacy perks

Despite the ZDAs cypherpunk roots, this is still an industry alliance focused on business, not rebels.

Theres often an inaccurate conflation of such privacy features with criminal intent. But a Rand Corporation survey commissioned by the ECC found only 1% of illicit darknet operations accepted zcash (the publicly auditable bitcoin is still the dominant cryptocurrency on the darkweb). Someday, consumers may choose ZDA member services to shop online at regular websites, without being constantly tracked for affiliate marketing profiles they have no control over.

We have to look at technology as a neutral, that it could be used for a wide variety of applications, Rand Europe analyst Erik Silfversten told Forbes.

Likewise, the ZDA aims to identify business needs and shift resources to making the Zcash protocol useful for companies that may not transact directly with the namesake privacy coin.

Other organizations may join the alliance in the future, like the Zcash Foundation or Interchain Foundation, if they get involved in industry projects, not research.

For me, the future state is in a year or two to be able to use zcash, or wrapped zcash, on Cosmos or Ethereum, said ECC CTO Nathan Wilcox. Were certainly thinking about folks that didnt make it in the first batch.

Over at the foundation, de Valence said the nonprofits goal is less token-centric and more focused on infrastructure, a privacy layer for the entire cross-chain ecosystem.

Our goal is to leverage the unique properties of Zcash particularly the strong network effects of its anonymity set to provide privacy to all of these projects, de Valence said.

One goal the nonprofit shares with the new alliance, ZDA, is both of them see diversifying Zcash stakeholders and developers as the top priority.

The focus for this year is interoperability, Nathan Wilcox said.

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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Zcash Alliance Aims to Bring Privacy Tech to Bitcoin, Cosmos and Ethereum - CoinDesk

Founded in 2013, the Beijing-based Bitmain Technology remains at the center of the crypto economy. With its flagship AntMiner bitcoin mining equipment still dominating the hardware market and its mining pools accounting for about a quarter of the Bitcoin networks computing power, it retains a uniquely powerful place in the ecosystem of by far the largest cryptocurrency and blockchain project.

Thats not to say it isnt also controversial. Its vocal support for a Bitcoin hard fork (Bitcoin Cash) in 2017, following contentious community disagreement, won the company, and its masterminds, many enemies.

This post is part of the CoinDesk 50, an annual selection of the most innovative and consequential projects in the blockchain industry. See thefull list here.

Over the years, Bitmain has been involved in many controversial developments to the point that the Chinese crypto community refers to its foes as the mining avengers. In 2017, Bitmain filed a lawsuit against Yang Zuoxing, the former design chief behind Bitmains AntMiner S9 who started a rival miner manufacturer MicroBT, over patent infringement. But Bitmain lost the case eventually.

Then in 2018, it brought another lawsuit over non-compete violation against the former creators of Bitmans mining pool BTC.com, who left the company to start a rival service PoolIn, which has become the worlds top two bitcoin mining pool by total hash rate.

Bitmains story started with Wu Jihan, one of the earliest bitcoin evangelists in China, translating Satoshi Nakamotos white paper to Chinese in 2011.

He invested in probably the worlds first known bitcoin-denominated initial public offering in 2012. It was a project started by Jiang Xinyu, a.k.a Friedcat., who was crowdfunding bitcoin to roll out an application-specific integrated circuit just for bitcoin mining.

The hardware sold well initially and sensational success followed. In 2013, Wu, with a finance and psychology degree from Chinas prestigious Peking University, decided to start his own company to manufacture mining hardware. He was joined by Zhan Ketuan, his partner on the technology side, who, in six years, would find himself ousted from the company in a coup started by Wu.

Bitcoins last halving event in the summer 2016 marked the beginning of two years of extraordinary growth at Bitmain.

In 2017 alone, still only four years old, it made $1 billion in profits. It made another $1 billion for the first six months in 2018 and then went on a high-profile fundraise in the summer, netting $700 million from external shareholders with a bet. The deal is this: if Bitmain cant go public within five years since the fundraise at an agreed term, external investors could require the company to redeem all of their investment with an interest.

At that time, Bitmain was boasting a hardware market share of nearly 80 percent. So the agreed term for the IPO was nothing but ambitious: raising at least $500 million at a valuation of no less than $18 billion.

So much has changed in 2019, since its first IPO attempt failed in March in Hong Kong.

Its rising rival, MicroBT, whose founder won over Bitmains patent infringement lawsuit, is seriously undermining Bitmains market dominance.

In 2019, Bitmains mining pools BTC.com and Antpool lost the top two spots to F2Pool and Poolin, the latter of which still has an ongoing case with Bitmain over alleged non-compete violation.

When Wu Jihan returned in a coup in November 2019 to kick out his founding partner Zhan, he told his people hes back to save the sinking ship. Whether his tough comeback will work as he expected is yet to be proven, although it appears prepared to roll out more powerful equipment to weather the upcoming halving.

It remains to be seen if Bitmain can replicate the sensational success it once had following the 2016 bitcoin halving.

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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The CoinDesk 50: Bitmain, the Behemoth of Bitcoin Mining - CoinDesk

The Chief Executive Officer of Chapel Hill Denham, Bolaji Balogun, said that though the Coronavirus pandemic has caused numerous health and economic challenges Nigerians should always remember that crises also create opportunities.

He disclosed this during a Q&A session at the Workshift online conference organised by Liberty Church, London, as he laid emphasis on available opportunities for Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) amid the pandemic.

According to him, this is the right time for business owners to reflect inwards, carry out some critical analysis of their businesses, and answer some important questions. Some of these questions include the following:

He then focused on the last question by giving numerous examples of how businesses can reinvent in order to adapt during this period. For instance, companies that primarily make clothes may consider switching over to sowing clothe masks which are in serious demands right now. Such companies can also consider producing bedsheets for hospitals because almost certainly, at a time like this, hospitals arent going to be using and re-using bedsheets. They will be using bedsheets and disposing of them because if the highly-infectious nature of the virus.

I think the first thing is to recognise that every Crisis must not be wasted and in every crisis, there is an opportunity. I dont necessarily subscribe to the people who have turned themselves to opportunists who started off n95 masks at N2000 and are now selling those same n95 masks at N5000 to N6000. I think that is a bit of opportunism at the wrong time. And that is not something which, in itself, brings sustainable prosperity, he said.

He also spoke more on cutting down on costs, stressing that it is absolutely essential at this point. He did, however, note that for SMEs (which are a large source of employment in Nigeria), this may be a difficult time to manage costs. This is because there are really no existing support systems for these SMEs. Even the palliatives announced by the government are not enough.

What this means, therefore, is that businesses must watch their costs. He warned against spending money on things that are not necessary. He said:

It should also be recognised that this is a time when everybody should watch their costs. So, absolutely dont spend money on things that are unnecessary. This is also not a time to be investing, unless you are investing in technology that allows you to do your business, or investing in data. This is absolutely not a time to be investing. Slow down on investment. Keep cash as much as possible.

Its also a time when you have to look at your people and make some honest decisions. And those honest decisions require a lot of open communication with your people. There will be many scenarios where people will tell you that you know what hat, it may be easier for all of us to take 50% pay cut rather than firing 30% to 40% of the workforce.

You may watch the rest of the CEOs comments by clicking here.

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Bitcoin could hit above $100000 by August 2021 - Nairametrics

The unprecedented reaction from governments around the world to do whatever it takes to keep their economics afloat in response to the coronavirus pandemic could drive a flight to Bitcoin.

Thats the principal takeaway from the latest report by Bitcoin research firm Delphi Digital. The exhaustive documentcovering everything from the macro financial climate to Bitcoins on-chain datalooks at a mixture of historical precedent and Bitcoins current data trends to presage what the rest of the year may look like for the cryptocurrency.

The report began with a rosy reminder that the worlds economy is basically on debt-based life support. The amount of monetary and fiscal relief thats been pledged [by central banks in 2020] equates to more than $10 trillion globally, it stated.

But as governments print more money, Bitcoin (as evidenced by yesterdays successful halving) is going to tick on with a decreased inflation rate.

This activity will benefit Bitcoin in the long run, according to Delphi Digital. But it will take some time. Using the limited data they have for Bitcoins 11 year existence, the team asserted that, historically, it is notable that prior BTC cycles tended to peak when major central bank asset growth began to decelerate.

Continuing to evaluate the risk currency debasement poses for poorer populations, Delphi noted that Bitcoin is already performing well against the monies of troubled states. For instance, its up 44% against the Russian ruble, 74% against the Brazilian real, and 52% against the Mexican peso among others.

We expect the demand for non-sovereign safe haven assets to rise considerably as the risk of broad-based currency debasement increases, Deplhi reported, adding that gold has a place here among Bitcoin, which it expects to grow in market cap.

Perhaps this growth isnt so far-fetched when we crunch some on-chain numbers. The number of addresses holding fewer than 1 Bitcoin trends upwards over the last five years, while addresses holding larger amounts of Bitcoin has trended downwards. This is typically considered to be an indication that Bitcoins investor base is growing among retail (though, its important to note that multiple addresses could belong to a single, privacy-minded user).

Moreover, this recent rally following Marchs precipitous price drop was led by the spot market, typically made up of low-capitalized retail investors. But the January rally preceding the Black Thursday crash was largely institution-driven.

This level of spot volume hasn't really been seen since last summer; it's tough to know who exactly to attribute it to (holder size wise), but I definitely agree that it's bullish, Yan Liberman, co-founder of Delphi Digital, told Decrypt.

As retail volume booms, the amount of Bitcoin held on exchanges is dwindling, experiencing previously unseen outflows, according to the report.

Delphi ended its report with a nod to the previous halving, and compared how the current holder base stacks up to Bitcoins second halving four years ago.

The current composition of the underlying holder base looks nearly identical to the one leading into the second halving, the report noted. It added that, at the moment, the percentage of holders who havent moved coins for at least one year or three years is only a single digit percentage point off the figures from 2016.

22% of the network hasnt moved in 5 years, and 7.7% hasnt moved in a decade, Delphi said in its report. Adding to these findings, Liberman told Decrypt that these holders basically represent the portion of the base that's in it for the long haul, and don't care as much about short-term moves.

In other words, hardcore Bitcoiners are creating a bedrock of support as the networks so-called holders of last resort. At the very least, as Delphi said in a tweet when it released its report, the data makes one thing clear: Dismissing Bitcoin is no longer an option.

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Bitcoin poised to shine as governments print more money: report - Decrypt

Dr. Craig Wright has continued to vent at some of the digital asset industrys bad actors. In his latest blog post, he trained his sights on those peddling misinformationabout Bitcoins structure and incentives, digital asset investments, and those who use their media platforms to damage his own reputation. Combating fake news, he said is one of the reasons I invented Bitcoin.

Dr. Wright named several well-known identities in the Bitcoin and digital asset space, including John McAfee, Ira Kleiman, Peter McCormack, and Greg Maxwell. These people, he said (some of whom are engaged in ongoing disputes with Wright) have used online media and their own platforms to spread false information by citing each others words and creating a self-feeding cycle of confusion for the public.

Forbes and YouTube Flim-Flam

The post begins with a look at Forbes and other famous-name online media outlets that publish unpaid contributor articles. These articles, Dr. Wright said, are not properly vetted for accuracy and exist only to drive eyeballs and clicks to site ads. Destroying the internets ad-based model, he added, is one of the reasons he invented Bitcoin.

The fact is, such burnishing of the truth does nothing to create integrity in journalism. It is merely adding a gloss to a turd that is fake news.

Access to brand-name media through contributions (sometimes unpaid) has allowed both unqualified and outright deceptive individuals to publish investment advice with a veneer of legitimacy. YouTube, he said, has also been an open platform for those promoting digital asset pump and dumpsincluding BTC. He called technical analysis trading YouTube channels unscientific flimflam that forever promise big price gains, while their hosts often make the opposite moves they advise their viewers to make.

Wright noted that, even though Google has recently taken stricter action against content it regards as misinformation, Forbes and other contributors continue their free run with digital currency investment promotion.

(We should note that Googles censorship dragnet has also ensnared several legitimately informative content producers, such as the BSV Channel.)

Some examples: misinformation about Bitcoin

Price isnt the only topic the fake news media promotes. The nature of Bitcoin itself is often misrepresented, which either demonizes truth-tellers or deflects criticism away from guilty parties.

Dr. Wright gave the example of Bitcoin transaction malleability being responsible for the loss of 850,000 BTC from the Mt. Gox exchange in the years leading up to its 2014 collapse. Even though that myth was debunked at its outset, the phrase continues to appear. Most serious investigators believe the Mt. Gox debacle was caused by embezzlement and theft by those with inside knowledge, not a technical issue with Bitcoin.

The structure of Bitcoins own network is misunderstood (accidentally or deliberately) due to phrases like mesh network and relay nodesneither of which are relevant to the way Bitcoin should function, he added. Believing they are true, or somehow important, creates incorrect impressions about what Bitcoin is for and makes networks like BTC less secure.

Misinformation about Dr. Craig Wright

Given Dr. Wrights outspoken nature, knowledge of Bitcoin and willingness to challenge some of BTCs biggest proponents, its natural they see him as a threat to their interests. Efforts to smear his character began from the instant he was outed as Satoshi Nakamoto in late 2015, but have ramped up since he took back control of the Bitcoin project with BSV.

Wright gave a few examples: Ira Kleiman and his lawsuit claiming ownership of early Bitcoins; Peter McCormacks claims that Wright is not Satoshi Nakamoto, and Greg Maxwells more technical takes against Wright and on Bitcoin history.

Easily debunked

Though Kleimans lawsuit purportedly concerns ownership of Dr. Wrights (and/or Satoshi Nakamotos) early Bitcoins and company IP, it serves also as a means to generate plenty of headlines and misleading news articles that attack Wrights reputation. Thats something Kleiman, who works in the area of search engine optimisation (SEO), would understand, he wrote.

Misleading reports about Dr. Wrights past actions resulting from the case have suggested he fled Australia for the United Kingdom, has plagiarized research, and is under investigation by the Australian Tax Offices criminal investigations unit (which does not exist).

Like the ATO claim, such myths are easily debunked, but lazy reporters dont bother to check them and neither do gullible readers. Wright said his U.K. visa showed clear intent to travel there in late 2015. Moreover, the U.K. is hardly a useful destination for anyone trying to escape the law in Australia.

Falsifying documents, he added, has been the domain of his attackers rather than himself. He claimed his own signature was forged multiple times either to make accusations and even to launch the infamous 2015 raid on his property (which coincided with his outing as Satoshi). He called the latter example a case of swatting; where bad actors make a false report with the intent to prompt law enforcement action on another individual.

Dr. Wright said Ira Kleiman was perhaps being used by other forces, and was not smart enough to know when he is being played.

Plagiarism claims show lack of academic understanding

In another example, Dr. Wright referred to BTC developer and former Blockstream employee Greg Maxwell, who he said publishes articles under his own name and several pseudonyms. Maxwell has long been a Wright adversary with antagonism between the two preceding Bitcoin by years.

Maxwell has in the past accused Wright of plagiarizing research, particularly in a recent hit piece article that referenced Wrights legal cases against both Kleiman and McCormack.

The article concerned mathematical concepts like random forests and decisions, which the article suggested Wright had plagiarized a medical paper whose data was incorporated into a training and example package that researcher John Maindonald created. Maindonald used the original paper to create a CRAN R statistical package, while Wright did not use the original paper and instead took his graph from the courseware. Wright said Maxwells lack of academic experience and training had caused him to misunderstand the nature of references in his patent applications, he said. Speaking to CoinGeek, Dr. Wright said:

John is one of the authors of the original R package and incorporated much of the original statistical work into common packages people have now. This included the particular piece of data that that image came from. Ironically, Ill probably not terribly ironically I dont think Greg Maxwell has a clue when it comes to academic work, it is referenced. When youre referencing academically, you dont actually put different papers if its not from a different paper. This particular diagram comes from statistical notes and processes and courseware developed by John Maindonald.

You see they dont care about investigating truth. The fact that Ive actually referenced a document by saying its notes from the forthcoming publication does not mean its not referenced, it is referenced as part of a statistical software package and it is the image derived from that. Then, if Mr Greg Maxwell had done any statistical training using the CRAN R package before going into calling himself paintedfrog, he would have probably recognised the source, it is a very common one that is used in many statistical programming training courses around the world. Dr Maindonald was one of the original authors of the CRAN R statistical package and I learnt from him before this was popular or well-known.

All these accusations, and misinformation about Bitcoin, echo through online media and causes both accidental confusion and deliberate damage. Dr. Wright said reporters hadnt bothered to investigate their own stories thoroughly, and his own critics chose to attack the man rather than address them as technical debates.

What they and other detractors failed to understand, he said, is that he personally has plenty of patience to wait for real facts to emergesomething he attributed to his Aspergers spectrum condition.

Other people may stop, I dig in deeper. I bide my time.

It sounds like it is going to be a rocky road on the horizon for Wrights distractors.

New to Bitcoin? Check out CoinGeeksBitcoin for Beginnerssection, the ultimate resource guide to learn more about Bitcoinas originally envisioned by Satoshi Nakamotoand blockchain.

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Craig Wright: Bitcoin truth versus the 'turd that is fake news' - CoinGeek

The most recent quarter has been turbulent to say the least across all global economies but while Bitcoins performance naturally fell, according to CoinMarketCaps most recent analysis, it still outperformed global benchmarks for equities.

In its Q1 assessment of crypto market and user trends, CoinMarketCap argued that, amid the Covid-19 pandemic, crypto markets have regained a good portion of their March losses, but warns there was still some way to go before they fully recover.

Bitcoin reached a high of $10,500 and total market cap of $305 billion in February, before touching a low of $3,900 on March 12, dropping 43%. Its year-to-date performance based on January 2 to March 31 saw a drop in price of 10.52%. This was better than the MSCI World Index, which fell 20.65% over the quarter, and the S&P 500 Index (-19.42%).

Since March 31, where Bitcoins price was at $6,445, there has been a gradual revival, with many seeing it as a comparative safe haven amid the crisis. The currency touched $10,000 again, in line with positive comments hedge fund manager Paul Tudor Jones made, saying it was a great speculation.

Alongside that, this week has seen the latest Bitcoin halving, whereby the reward for unlocking a new block has been cut from 12.5 new coins to 6.25. The event, approximately once every four years, has its supporters and detractors within the industry. Supporters of Bitcoin see it as a protection part of ensuring only 21 million Bitcoins will ever exist while others see it as a potential disincentive for miners. Stephen Innes, from AXI Corp, told the BBC that miners will probably switch to more profitable cryptocurrencies.

Within the cryptomarket itself, according to CoinMarketCap, some cryptoassets most notably Ethereum (+3.29%), Bitcoin Cash (BCH, +10.48%) and Bitcoin SV (BSV, +76%) saw a solid quarter, with market caps of $14.74bn, $4.11bn and $3.08bn at the end of the quarter respectively. As a result of these gains, BSV and BCH both reside in the top 10 most viewed cryptoassets on CoinMarketCap. Bitcoin naturally remains on top, with Ethereum nudging XRP into second place. Litecoin also moved into the top 10 this quarter.

Among the reports other interesting findings was that the number of female Bitcoin users had increased significantly. Led by countries such as Greece, Romania, Colombia and Venezuela, there was a 42.34% quarterly growth worldwide. CoinCorner, a UK-based Bitcoin exchange, said in a note that it had seen a similar rise, with women accounting for more than one in five (22.8%) of all sign-ups in Q1.

CoinMarketCap concluded its report with the most cautious of optimism, noting that while the strongest hype around concepts like ICOs has almost certainly died off, the solid figures elsewhere show opportunities for growth do not rest solely on Bitcoin.

From the 2017 boom of initial coin offerings to exchange-led fundraising in initial exchange offerings, the viability of raising capital via the issuance of tokens is now at a trough, the company noted. That said, there is much untapped potential in the blockchain revolution.

You can read the full analysis here.

Photo byClifford PhotographyonUnsplash

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Analysing Bitcoin's revival: CoinMarketCap notes cautious optimism amid Covid-19 - as halving arrives - The Block - The Block