Cover image via 123rf.com

Disclaimer: The opinion expressed here is not investment advice it is provided for informational purposes only. It does not necessarily reflect the opinion of U.Today. Every investment and all trading involves risk, so you should always perform your own research prior to making decisions. We do not recommend investing money you cannot afford to lose.

Over the last two years, Ethereum seemed to be one of the most troubled platforms and cryptos with its congestion problems, Tron trying to lure its developer teams over to its blockchain, etc.

Now, that on Sunday, December 8, the long-expected Istanbul hard fork finally took place, some analysts are predicting Ether price to start growing and recover the $423 level soon after June next year.

The Twitter-famous analyst CryptoWolf (@IamCryptoWolf) has brought some good news to the Ethereum community, sharing his thoughts on the ETH price spike he expects as early as summer next year (right after the BTC halving, funny as it sounds).

The expert believes that after more than half-a-year of a correction due to the Falling Wedge and three months of MACD bullish divergence, ETH has already broken out of its resistance area and is going to start surging soon.

CryptoWolf believes that at some point after June next year, Ether price will reach the 61.8 Fib level which means 0.05661 BTC or $423 in traditional fiat.

Image via Twitter

Another trading expert in digital assets - @CryptoMichNL has shared a similar bullish forecast on ETH.

Speaking of the recent Ethereum FUD, he compares it with the FUD that hit the community when Binance announced theban for US citizens on the main platform as it was about to open its American branch.

I dont expect much more downside, he says about Ethereum price.

One of Ethereum developers, Nina Breznik, spreads the word, saying that next year the Ethereum Foundation intends to stop funding to internal dev teams, starting with young projects.

Ethereum has stopped finding her particular project PlayProject as of December 1.

In response to that, the Tron chief executive, Justin Sun, who views Ethereum as a major competitor and has been doing his best to let Tron surpass it since Trons migration from Ethereum to the mainnet, calls on Ethereum devs to migrate to Tron. Again - the first time he did it was a year ago.

In the fall last year, Justin Sun announced the creation of a special fund for financing those devs to decide to ditch Ethereum and start working on the Tron chain.

Original post:

Token Outperformed Bitcoin in 2019 According to Bloomberg News - U.Today

Bitcoin Association Founding President Jimmy Nguyen accepted a CHAINSIGHTS award in Beijing on behalf of the Bitcoin SV Node project, which was feted as one of the Blockchain Technology Breakthroughs of the year. The award recognizes blockchain applications that took the lead in combining blockchain technology with actual application scenarios in 2019. The Bitcoin SV Node is a project of the Bitcoin Association, the global industry organization which advances Bitcoin SV; its lead developer is Daniel Connolly and technical director is Steve Shadders, and they lead work by a strong development team at nChain.

The honor was presented at the red-carpet EDGE Awards hosted in conjunction with the T-EDGE technology conference. The event is one of biggest technology summits in China, organized by Chinese tech media outlet TMTPost and blockchain news and data provider ChainDD. It comes just one day after the Bitcoin Association successfully hosted its first BSV China conference in Beijing where Nguyen was a featured speaker along with Bitcoin creator Dr. Craig S. Wright.

The winners were chosen after a public poll, and then final selection by a special judging panel. The award focused on projects that create a big breakthrough in key technology, and applications that create easier and optimized solutions for blockchain use.

This year, the Bitcoin SV Node projects work has focused on technical improvements to achieve massive scaling of the Bitcoin networkwhich was Bitcoins original Satoshi Vision. The BSV network now regularly surpasses BTC for more daily transaction volume and bigger average block sizes. Last week, for the first time, the BSV network also surpassed Ethereum in 24 hour transaction volume on certain daysreaching over 850,000 transactions in 24 hours. BSV is the only blockchain project seeking to massively scale to support high transaction volume, keep fees super low to enable micropayments and microtransactions, and provide bigger data capacity for enterprise uses.

China is recognizing the power of BSVs technical achievements for blockchain scaling. This past week, Nguyen and Dr. Wright have taken a power-packed trip to Beijing, giving lectures to students at Asias #1 ranked Tsinghua University, as well as doing speaking appearances and meetings with business and technology representatives. Joining them are Bitcoin Associations China team China Manager Lise Li and China Ambassador Lin Zheming, CEO of Mempool.

Legal mind promotes a business friendly Bitcoin message

Theres no doubt Nguyen has been one of Bitcoins most prominent and energetic advocates. As Bitcoin Association president, he has spent much of the past year travelling the world and appearing on many stages to deliver Bitcoin SVs message of massive scaling, real business use, true economic benefits, protocol stability, and legal compliance.

A former digital technology lawyer since the 1990s, Nguyen worked with many businesses to navigate early growth of the Internet economy. With that experience, Nguyen highlights that Bitcoinlike the Internetwill only achieve global usage by winning business and government support with a legally responsible approach.

This message is making Bitcoin, as Satoshi Nakamoto originally intended it, far more appealing to large enterprises, institutional investors and world governments. After years of unfulfilled promises and uncertainty over how Bitcoin should actually function, many investors and potential enterprise users had backed away. This had a negative impact not only on Bitcoin adoption, but also its unit value.

Chinas leadership in blockchain

China has been a leader in the blockchain industry for years including for mining and mining hardware, and application development. Recently, Chinas President Xi Jinping gave a high-profile speech recognizing blockchain as one of the core innovative technology sectors that China should lead.

TMTPost was founded in 2012, and has become one of Chinas leading business and technology media sources. It publishes in both Chinese and English.

ChainDD spun off from TMTPost in 2018, and is a blockchain news and data provider. It is the number 1 blockchain-related news app in China, and has also launched US operations to expand its global presence.

Editors note: This article has been updated with new details.

To receive the latest CoinGeek.com news, special discounts on CoinGeek Conferences and other inside information direct to your inbox, please sign up for our mailing list.

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Bitcoin SV Node project receives Chainsights Award for Blockchain Technology Breakthrough of 2019 - CoinGeek

Cover image via 123rf.com

Disclaimer: The opinion expressed here is not investment advice it is provided for informational purposes only. It does not necessarily reflect the opinion of U.Today. Every investment and all trading involves risk, so you should always perform your own research prior to making decisions. We do not recommend investing money you cannot afford to lose.

Over the last two years, Ethereum seemed to be one of the most troubled platforms and cryptos with its congestion problems, Tron trying to lure its developer teams over to its blockchain, etc.

Now, that on Sunday, December 8, the long-expected Istanbul hard fork finally took place, some analysts are predicting Ether price to start growing and recover the $423 level soon after June next year.

The Twitter-famous analyst CryptoWolf (@IamCryptoWolf) has brought some good news to the Ethereum community, sharing his thoughts on the ETH price spike he expects as early as summer next year (right after the BTC halving, funny as it sounds).

The expert believes that after more than half-a-year of a correction due to the Falling Wedge and three months of MACD bullish divergence, ETH has already broken out of its resistance area and is going to start surging soon.

CryptoWolf believes that at some point after June next year, Ether price will reach the 61.8 Fib level which means 0.05661 BTC or $423 in traditional fiat.

Image via Twitter

Another trading expert in digital assets - @CryptoMichNL has shared a similar bullish forecast on ETH.

Speaking of the recent Ethereum FUD, he compares it with the FUD that hit the community when Binance announced theban for US citizens on the main platform as it was about to open its American branch.

I dont expect much more downside, he says about Ethereum price.

One of Ethereum developers, Nina Breznik, spreads the word, saying that next year the Ethereum Foundation intends to stop funding to internal dev teams, starting with young projects.

Ethereum has stopped finding her particular project PlayProject as of December 1.

In response to that, the Tron chief executive, Justin Sun, who views Ethereum as a major competitor and has been doing his best to let Tron surpass it since Trons migration from Ethereum to the mainnet, calls on Ethereum devs to migrate to Tron. Again - the first time he did it was a year ago.

In the fall last year, Justin Sun announced the creation of a special fund for financing those devs to decide to ditch Ethereum and start working on the Tron chain.

Read more here:

Crypto Market Update: Bitcoin (BTC), Ethereum (ETH) See Mild Green While Tezos (XTZ) Storms into Top - U.Today

Since Bitcoin (BTC) tapped $6,500 in late-November, analysts have been wondering if the bottom is really in. You see, the leading cryptocurrency bounced by 20% from $6,500, hitting $7,850 just a week after that.

Now, the crypto is trading for $7,400 a pop, seemingly trying to establish a market trend for the coming week. While some say that Bitcoins inability to move past the resistance in the high-$7,000s is decisively bearish, an analyst has said that the odds are leaning in the favor of bulls.

Popular trader Mr. Chief (or Halo Crypto) recently noted that the cryptocurrency ball is finally entering the court of the bulls.

He noted that the inverse chart of Bitcoin has shown that the cryptocurrency has broken below (meaning above) a key, some would say the penultimate,trend line that has been in place for over six weeks. The asset is also situated in a descending channel (actually an ascending channel) that implies a move to $8,500 is definitely on the table. A move to $8,500 would mark a 15% rally from current price levels.

It isnt only Halo that is starting to see bullish trends form on Bitcoins price charts.

Per previous reports from NewsBTC, Adaptive Capitals Willy Woo, a popular on-chain metrics analyst, noted on Dec. 7 that a proprietary indicator his fund uses is implying that the usage of the Bitcoin network is implying that bulls will soon gain the upper hand again:

On-chain momentum is crossing intobullish[territory] The bottom is most likely in, any [move] lower will be just a wick in the macro view.

Theres also Glassnode, a crypto-centric on-chain intelligence firm, which noted just recently that their metrics suggest that Bitcoin is bottoming andslated to revert higher in a strong fashion.

One such metric that Glassnode drew attention to was that the Market Value to Realized Value (MVRV), the ratio between market cap and realized cap, is consolidating towards one, which implies that gains are being realized by crypto asset investors. A reading of one for the ratio often marks a bottom for the cryptocurrency market.

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15% Jump to $8,500 on the Table for Bitcoin Price; Analyst Explains Why - newsBTC

Photographer: Andrey Rudakov/Bloomberg

Photographer: Andrey Rudakov/Bloomberg

A Denver-based company that installs data centers at shale drilling sites to take advantage of excess natural gas supplies says it now has eight operations across the U.S. and plans another 30 in the first half of next year.

The centers are being touted as a way to solve the growing problem of gas flaring, where energy companies burn off excess gas. Flaring has risen to a record in Texas this year amid a lack of pipeline capacity.

Closely held Crusoe Energy Systems Inc. is harnessing some of the surplus gas at source to turn it into electricity, powering the data centers that in turn generate revenue by mining Bitcoin. The company will install 70 units next year, each with a capacity of about 1 megawatt, which would keep about 10 million cubic feet a day of gas from being flared, Chief Executive Officer Chase Lochmiller said in an interview.

Its a very creative way to solve an environmental and economic problem for the oil and gas industry, said Alex Urdea, the chief investment officer of Upper90 Capital Management LLC, which has agreed to provide Crusoe with $40 million of project financing. The business model is attracting interest from large oil and gas producers, and it could eventually involve revenue sharing, he added. Crusoe also raised $30 million by selling equity to investors including Bain Capital Ventures.

Why Oil Producers Are Lighting the Skies With Flaring: QuickTake

Earlier this year, Crusoe raised $5 million of seed capital from investors including Winklevoss Capital Management LLC. Multiple units can be deployed at a single site to build scale. As the number of active units increases, Crusoe plans to start using some of that computing capability to develop a new artificial intelligence cloud-computing service.

With assistance by Catherine Ngai

Before it's here, it's on the Bloomberg Terminal.

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Why Bitcoin Mining Is Being Touted as a Solution to Gas Flaring - Bloomberg

Many bitcoin traders laugh at the idea of HODL (holding on for dear life). They think that it is not a sound trading or investing strategy. If you buy and hold on the way down, its very likely that youll use the same approach on the way up. The rigidity of this method makes it difficult for many investors to lock in gains.

Nevertheless, the strategy is so popular that it has become a meme.

HODLs acceptance appears to be bordering obsession. A new report reveals that millions of BTCs have not moved in a year.

The S&P 500 is up nearly 27% year-to-date. If the index closes the year with gains around that number, then many investors would consider 2019 as a good year.

Bitcoin holders are also having a great year. The top cryptocurrency is by over 95% year-to-date. The numbers align. According to The Block, 61% of bitcoin holders are sitting in profits.

Even with gains that are over 250% higher than the S&P 500, theres a sense that bitcoin investors are far from satisfied. Many expect mind-numbing and jaw-dropping performance from the dominant cryptocurrency.

I say this because BitInfoCharts show that 11.58 million BTCs have not moved in over a year.

In other words, 64% of the over 18.04 million bitcoin in circulation are not moving. This means that only 6.46 million BTCs are being used for speculation or payment settlement. At bitcoins current price of $7,260, only $48.99 billion worth of BTCs have been changing hands over the last year.

This has tremendous bullish implications for the number one cryptocurrency.

Haters like Peter Schiff always claim that bitcoin has no intrinsic value. They say that unlike gold which can be used for electronics, bitcoin doesnt have any utility. More importantly, it is not backed by anything that can prove its value.

Well, bitcoins value comes from its scarcity. There will only be 21 million BTCs in existence. On top of that, around 4 million BTCs are lost. The scarcity is real.

We spoke to Mati Greenspan, founder of Quantum Economics and asked whether 11.58 million being HODLed has long-term bull bullish implications. He told CCN,

Yes

The analyst then referred us to one of his recent tweets.

Trader Max echoes Mati Greenspans sentiments. The trader told CCN,

There are too many variables at play but scarcity is a good price driver.

The good news for HODLers is that bitcoin is about to get more scarce in the coming months.

If analysts believe that scarcity drives the price of bitcoin, then it would be fair to assume that the top cryptocurrencys value would soar in the coming months. In about six months, bitcoin block rewards will be reduced by half from 12.5 BTC down to 6.25 BTC. This means that there will only be around 900 BTCs issued to miners on a daily basis.

The dramatic drop in supply due to the halving would alleviate selling pressure at the very least. The reduction in selling is likely to drive prices higher. That might be more than enough to trigger a massive buying frenzy.

Therefore, HODL and halving are two of bitcoins strongest narratives.

Disclaimer: The above should not be considered trading advice from CCN. The writer owns bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies. He holds investment positions in the coins but does not engage in short-term or day-trading.

This article was edited by Sam Bourgi.

See the rest here:

Holders of Over 11 Million Bitcoin are Proving That Hodl Is Not Just a Meme - CCN.com

Bitcoin (BTC) fell to a daily low of $7,380 during the early trading hours of the Asian session on Sunday but didn't have a difficult time retracing its losses. As of writing, the BTC/USD pair was virtually unchanged on the day at $7,500. The lack of any significant developments that would attract the cryptocurrency market's attention causes major cryptocurrencies to remain stuck in their recent ranges. Even after the Istanbul network update, Ethereum continues to move sideways around $150.

The Relative Strength Index (RSI) on the daily chart stays directionless near the 50 mark, revealing the pair's indecisiveness in the short-term. Additionally,a symmetrical triangle seems to be forming on the same chart, further supporting the view that the pair will remain neutral. Meanwhile, the pair seems to be holding above the 20-day moving average (MA) for the second straight day but that by itself is not enough to suggest that buyers are looking to take control of the action.

The initial support for BTC could be seen at $7,380 (December 7 low)ahead of $7,080 (December low) and $6,500 (Nov. 25 low). Resistances, on the other hand, align at $8,000 (Fibonacci 38.2% retracement of October 25 - Novemberdrop), $8,500 (Fibonacci 50% retracement of October 25 - November 25 drop) and $8,720(100-day MA).

See original here:

Bitcoin pares early losses, turns flat on the day near $7,500 - FXStreet

The past month has been a pretty challenging time for bitcoin HODLers, and cryptocurrency in general. There has been precious little to celebrate, save for the fact that prices could easily have gone lower still.

So isnt it about time we had some positive news? Luckily, who should pop up at just the perfect juncture, but Master of On-Chain Analysis, Willy Woo. And according to him, BTCs on-chain momentum is crossing bullish.

Woo made the claim in a tweet posted earlier today, along with a chart featuring several unlabelled wiggly lines. Unfortunately, he wasnt even able to tell us what the indicator is. Apparently it is proprietary to Adaptive Capital, Woos analytics-led hedge fund project with Murad Mahmudov and David Puell.

All Woo did say was that it tracks investor momentum, presumably by considering a combination of bitcoin on-chain transaction volume, and perhaps UTXOs (unspent transaction outputs) to chart BTC HODLing. There appear to be at least two sets of indicators, one of which looks like a set of different timescale moving averages.

After November we had to cover our faces with our hands for, and sit and watch through slits in our fingers. Perhaps thats fair enough.

You might also be heartened by Woos assertion that the bitcoin bottom is most likely in, saying that, anything lower will be just a wick in the macro view.

From here on in we are front running in preparation for the halving, he says.

When questioned on his degree of confidence in this particular bitcoin prediction, Woo pointed out that:

I only tweet when Im at high confidence, else it erodes my rep.

During the summer, Woo introduced us to the Bitcoin Difficulty Ribbon, giving a simple metric to compare several moving averages of mining difficulty on different timescales. This is also currently starting to compress, indicating that now is a good time to buy bitcoin.

Does Willy Woos comments on on-chain bitcoin volume make sense? Let us know in the comments!

Images via Shutterstock, Willy Woo

The rest is here:

Bitcoin On-Chain Momentum Is Crossing Bullish: Willy Woo - Bitcoinist

The top analysts on Crypto Twitter (CT) are seeing a bloody Christmas for bitcoin. Many widely-followed accounts are predicting a price drop to between $6,000 and $5,000. If theyre right, then bitcoin is headed for another 30% plunge after already retracing by nearly 50% from this years high of $13,880.

These traders have amassed huge followings because they present scenarios that are likely to play out. But they dont always get it right. Its worthwhile to find gems or exceptional analysts who have a few hundred followers. They dont get a lot of attention because some of them present contrarian ideas. One of them is Riggs; the quant analyst boldly claims that the recent bitcoin dip is a gift to bitcoin holders.

What a time, thats how Riggs ended his tweet about bitcoin that has garnered close to 900 likes. Those concluding words indicate the analysts level of confidence. According to Riggs, the number one cryptocurrency is at a price level that looks extremely attractive. The trader emphasized that there were only two other instances in bitcoins history that offered the same buying opportunity.

To drive his claim, the trader points to the beginning of the 2013 and 2017 bull markets. In both periods, bitcoin had just risen from a crippling bear market.

The surge in price was then followed by a significant pullback. The three arrows on the chart point to the instances when the price touched the green indicator. Those moments appear to mark the end of the retracement.

These times offered the best chances to enter the market before the top cryptocurrency went into the stratosphere. They seem to have offered minimum risks and maximum growth opportunities.

The quant analyst is not only relying on charts to argue his ultra bullish case. The trader also mentioned upheavals around the world that might spark demand for the dominant cryptocurrency. In a tweet, Riggs wrote,

Millions already need BTC to survive, to send money to their families, to preserve their wealth.

Trader Riggs bolsters his assertions by plotting a chart of bitcoins supply and demand over time. Based on the chart, demand for bitcoin would plummet before we enter 2020. However, it will eventually pick up and then skyrocket towards the end of 2020.

On the other hand, supply would take a nosedive next year. This is somewhat accurate because the May 2020 halving would decrease block rewards by half.

Trader Riggs presents a compelling bullish narrative but its still wise to practice risk management strategies to protect your capital. Think about setting stops in accordance to your risk appetite. You can also consider buying other assets.

Mati Greenspan, founder of Quantum Economics, echoes these sentiments. When asked if bitcoins price is a godsend to long-term holders, the trader told CCN,

No, bitcoin is a risky asset.

The analyst added,

As it seems to me at the moment it could be undervalued. But Ive been wrong before. Any investment in emerging technology comes with a great deal of risk, which is why we continuously research and always diversify.

After a 50% bitcoin retracement, Riggs tells us that its time to buy despite the warnings of many big CT accounts. Only time will tell whos right.

Disclaimer: The above should not be considered trading advice from CCN. The writer owns bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies. He holds investment positions in the coins but does not engage in short-term or day-trading.

This article was edited by Sam Bourgi.

Continue reading here:

Now Is One of the Top 3 Greatest Buying Opportunities for Bitcoin: Analyst - CCN.com

Bitcoin has been on a roller-coaster over the last few weeks, with the price often yoyoing up to thousands of dollars in minutes.

The bitcoin price is down almost half from its year-to-date highs, with the bitcoin and crypto market stuck on a downward trend for last six months.

Now, researchers have recorded "unusual" moves in the bitcoin futures market, with premium rates rising even as bitcoin prices fallsuggesting the bitcoin price could be headed higher next year.

[Update: 8.53pm EST December 6 2019] As the bitcoin price has recovered some ground today, moving above $7,500 per bitcoin, the price has realigned with CME's March 2020 bitcoin futures.

The bitcoin price has struggled in the second half of this year but bitcoin bulls are upbeat about ... [+] next year's outlook.

Between November 29 and December 2, the premium on bitcoin futures increased over 30% while the bitcoin price dropped around 6%.

"The premium rates on bitcoin March 2020 contracts have been increasing, although the bitcoin price has decreased," analysts at Arcane Research found, adding, "this is not a common observation."

Researchers also reported that bitcoin's implied volatility is set to rise to over 70% by June 2020, up from 55% for the middle of December 2019.

"This clearly show that traders anticipate changes in the bitcoin price. To put this in perspective, gold options for June 2020 trade with an implied volatility of 11.5%."

There has been a sharp rise in the price of bitcoin futures contacts between now and March next ... [+] year, even as the bitcoin price falls.

Despite bitcoin's recent sell-off, many bitcoin and cryptocurrency market watchers are feeling good about next yearbitcoin and crypto heavyweights have been predicting a sudden price surge,technical data is looking positive, andrecent developments suggest 2020 could be a big year for bitcoin.

Meanwhile, the looming bitcoin halving event, set for May next year, will see the number of bitcoin rewarded to miners cut by half and some expect this to boost the bitcoin pricethough others disagree.

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Theres Something Very Strange Going On With Bitcoin Futures - Forbes