Updated: May 25, 2018:

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Is the IRS HODLing Out on Us? IRS Issues Additional Cryptocurrency Guidance Addressing Hard Forks, Soft Forks, and Airdrops - JD Supra

"At TRM, we are fueled by a fundamental belief that cryptocurrency and blockchain can democratize access to financial services and empower billions of people," said Esteban Castao, co-founder and CEO of TRM Labs. "By building solutions to prevent cryptocurrency fraud and financial crime, we enable this vision and build a safer financial system for billions of people."

The growth of cryptocurrencies is a global phenomenon and brings both opportunities and new risks to financial institutions. TRM is accelerating the safe adoption of crypto assets with its platform designed to help financial institutions monitor and mitigate these risks at scale. Compliance teams at financial institutions use TRM to risk-score their cryptocurrency-related transactions, customers, or partnerships, helping them to simplify customer due diligence and meet regulatory requirements.

TRM integrates with more than a dozen blockchains, and analyzes billions of virtual asset transactions to detect signs of fraud and financial crime like money laundering in real-time. TRM launched out of the startup accelerator Y Combinator this summer. Since then, it has delivered its cryptocurrency compliance and risk management solutions to global financial institutions including major banks, brokerages, and exchanges across US, Latin America, Asia, and Europe.

"PayPal has been trusted by consumers for over 20 years because of its emphasis on fraud prevention and risk management," said Rahul Raina, co-founder and CTO of TRM Labs. "Their strategic investment in TRM signals their continued commitment to ensuring safety and compliance as the digital payments landscape evolves and innovates."

Initialized Capital, early investors in Coinbase and Digit, also participated in this fundraise. "Illicit activity is an existential problem for crypto since it impacts the willingness of financial institutions, regulators, and consumers to embrace crypto," said Garry Tan, co-founder and managing partner of Initialized. "We can't imagine more mission-oriented founders who can bridge the worlds of traditional finance, compliance, and crypto to tackle this critical problem."

The new funding will be used to grow TRM's engineering and data science teams, expand into new markets, and accelerate product development.

Spencer Bogart, General Partner at Blockchain Capital, said that the company's solution is desperately needed by financial institutions. "TRM provides a solution that every financial institution needs today because they are either establishing plans to directly engage with crypto or because they inevitably have customers or partnerships that are in some way exposed to cryptocurrency transactions."

About TRM

Founded in 2018, TRM helps financial institutions to measure, monitor, and mitigate their cryptocurrency risk exposure so they can safely embrace cryptocurrency-related transactions, products, and partnerships. TRM's risk management platform includes solutions for cryptocurrency KYC/AML, entity risk scoring, transaction monitoring, threat intelligence, and wallet screening. Financial institutions use TRM to monitor and mitigate their direct and indirect risk exposure to cryptocurrencies. For instance, a global bank may use TRM to detect whether customers are depositing funds sourced from virtual currency linked to illicit activity. A payment company may use TRM to monitor the risk of its cryptocurrency-related partnerships. TRM is based in San Francisco, CA and hiring across engineering, product, sales, and data science.

Contact:contact@trmlabs.com

SOURCE TRM Labs

https://www.trmlabs.com

Continued here:
TRM Labs, the first cryptocurrency risk management platform, raises $4.2 million in funding from Initialized Capital, Blockchain Capital, PayPal...

DUBLIN--(BUSINESS WIRE)--The "Blockchain, Cryptocurrency and the Future of Monetary Policy - 2019 Report" report has been added to ResearchAndMarkets.com's offering.

The rise of cryptocurrencies offers an important perspective on the successes and the failures of monetary policy, as we detail in our report. Cryptocurrency seems to offer the promise of currency secure from compromise, safe from manipulation by financial institutions and increasing in value at a rapid pace. But, does it really?

Some have suggested that cryptocurrency and blockchain technology may signal the beginning of the fourth industrial revolution: "Speaking as part of the 18th collective study of the Political Bureau of the Central Committee on October 24, 2019 in Beijing, Xi Jinping, President of the People's Republic of China and General Secretary of the Communist Party of China, said blockchain technology has a wide array of applications within China, listing topics ranging from financing businesses to mass transit and poverty alleviation."

As indicated, we have updated the report to include information on the 10/18/19 session at the World Bank IMF Annual Meeting during which China outlined its plan for using digital currency in Africa and the Caribbean: "Central Bank Digital Currencies in the Caribbean: How Can Public and Private Sectors Work Together."

The report objectively outlines the pros and cons.

These developments have several potential impacts: first, the vast and as-of-yet untapped potential of blockchain technology to transform the social infrastructure and second, the force with which cryptocurrencies may influence the future of monetary policy. These are covered in this report.

The first section of the report describes these technologies. Next, it examines the ramifications for monetary policy. The author's forecast for LIBRA and review of new information from sessions they attended at the Annual Meeting of the IMF/World Bank on the promotion of China's digital currency to certain finance ministers give a unique, useful and objective take on what the future might bring. The author closes with an initial forecast of one possible path for cryptocurrencies and monetary policy.

The report helps:

Key Topics Covered

1. Blockchain Technology

1.1 Cryptocurrency

2. Regulatory Concerns

2.1 Criminal Implications and Risks

2.2 Cybersecurity Risks

2.3 Asset Classification Risks

2.4 Taxation Risks

2.5 Disintermediation

2.6 China's Appeal

2.7 US Takeover of the LIBRA Association

3. The Future of Monetary Policy

Companies Mentioned

For more information about this report visit https://www.researchandmarkets.com/r/h8lg5e

Read more:
Blockchain, Cryptocurrency, and the Future of Monetary Policy - 2019 Report - ResearchAndMarkets.com - Business Wire

At one point Paris Hilton and boxer Floyd Mayweather got on the bandwagon touting ICOs.

Maksim Zaslavskiy, a computer programmer from Sheepshead Bay with masters'degrees in finance and law, got into this wild-west of Wall Street two years ago when he launched an ICO forRecoin, which was intended to help him buy real estate. He issued a slew of false and misleading statements about the ICO, which he claimed was backed by property investments in the U.S. and overseas and led by a team of experienced real estate professionals.

Later, he switched to marketing a coin that he described as an exclusive and tokenized membership pool hedged by diamonds. That wasnt true, either.

Still, mania for all things crypto was so intense during the summer of 2017 that about 1,000 investors took the bait and invested at least $300,000 in Zaslavskiys ICOs.

His attorney, Mildred Whalen of the Federal Defenders of New York, argued that Zaslavskiy refunded as much money as he could before PayPal froze his customers accounts over concerns that payments for hisICOs were made with stolen or fraudulent credit cards.

Zaslavskiy became the first person charged criminally with ICO fraud when federal prosecutors brought a case against him in 2017 and he pleaded guilty last year to conspiracy to commit securities fraud. Zaslavkiy is a native of the USSR who immigrated to New York in 1991 with his family when he was 12.

He told federal Judge Raymond Dearie he was sorry for doing things he knew were wrong.

At no point am I a thief, he insisted in Brooklyn federal court Monday morning.

You are a thief, Dearie replied. You took something that didnt belong to you under false pretenses.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Julie Nestor observed that cases like Zaslavskiys are a dime a dozen, so a stiff sentence was necessary to send a message other fraudsters in the crypto-currency world.

Judge Dearie agreed.

This is a very unusual case for a lot of reasons. It involves new technologies and new currencies, he said. But there is nothing new about lying or flagrant fraud.

Read more:
Maksim Zaslavskiy of the cryptocurrency Recoin was sentenced to 18 months in prison for lying to investors - Crain's New York Business

The privacy-centric cryptocurrency ZClassic (ZCL), a fork of the Zcash coin, rose 60%, over the weekend, peaking at $0.45.

Bullish momentum is associated with the marketing move proposed by cryptocurrency creator Rhett Creighton. He gave out 1000 ZCLs to ten followers on Twitter, asking them to send 10 ZCLs to 50 other people.

That's what he posted on his Twitter account

I think we need to put more ZCL in the hands of people who understand Crypto. I'm going to send 1000 ZCL Each to 10 people below

1. Post a QR code2. Promise to send 10 ZCL to 50 OTHERS#800cc

ZClassic price jumps did not pass without a trace. According to the 2CryptoCalc calculator, the coin came out on top in terms of mining profitability, later dropping a line below.

At the same time, ZClassic demonstrated rather modest trading volumes of about $10,330. Now the cryptocurrency exchange rate has rolled back to $0.25.

Notably, at the end of September an error was discovered in all Zcash implementations, including the ZClassic fork. The error allowed to reveal the IP address of the full node that onwed the protected address (zaddr).

Read the original post:
ZClassic became the most profitable cryptocurrency for a fraction of time - FXStreet

US President Donald Trump has hosted an unscheduled meeting with Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell as of Monday. Despite claiming to have discussed everything, cryptocurrency appears to have been left entirely off the agenda.

President Trump tweeted about the impromptu meeting with Powell earlier today. He claims the pair talked about interest rates, negative interest, low inflation, easing, dollar strength and its effect on manufacturing, trade with China, EU, and others.

According to The Street, the Federal Reserve issued a statement following the meeting. In it, the institution claims that Powells comments to Trump were consistent with his remarks at his congressional hearings last week. The Federal Reserve wrote:

Chair Powell said that he and his colleagues on the Federal Open Market Committee will set monetary policy, as required by law, to support maximum employment and stable prices and will make those decisions based solely on careful, objective and non-political analysis.

Despite China being one of the topics of conversation during the meeting, and the nation having recently endorsed blockchain technology along with being known to be exploring the launch of its own digital asset, cryptocurrency appears to have been completely absent from todays conversation. This is somewhat more surprising given the growing numbers of US central bankers advocating for a state-backed digital currency for use in the nation. BeInCrypto reported on how Facebooks Libra has brought the issue back into the minds of Federal bankers last month.

Whereas China appears to be pushing hard for the formation of a fully digital economy, the USA risks being left behind if it continues to drag its feet in terms of both regulation and the adoption of cutting-edge technologies like blockchain.

That said, it does not come as much of a surprise to see Donald Trump not bringing up the impact digital currency could have on the US and global economy with Powell. After all, he famously dismissed all of cryptocurrency as inferior to the dollar and simply a means for orchestrating criminal activity. Earlier this year BeInCrypto reported on him tweeting the following:

Likewise, US Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, who was also present at todays meeting, called digital currencies a potential threat to national security. Both made their comments shortly after Facebook detailed its own digital asset, Libra earlier this year.

Although not expressly clamping down on blockchain innovation and digital currency use, the US government is nowhere near as proactive as China has been in recent weeks in promoting the use of the technology. At the end of last month, Chinese premier Xi Jinping publicly encouraged the nation to adopt distributed ledger technology and all manner of different Chinese blockchain initiatives are now coming to light.

Images are courtesy of Twitter, Shutterstock.

Did you know you can trade sign-up to trade Bitcoin and many leading altcoins with a multiplier of up to 100x on a safe and secure exchange with the lowest fees with only an email address? Well, now you do!Click here to get started on StormGain!

Read this article:
Everything Discussed in Trump and Fed Meeting (Except Cryptocurrency) - BeInCrypto

Several notable Dapps are also currently being built on the Metacoin platform such as:

Jay Baek, V.P. of INBLOCK said, "We're excited about the listing of Metacoin on Liquid. As one of the largest, most secure and reputable exchanges globally, Liquid will offer best-in-class security to anyone looking to trade and hold MTC. More importantly, being listed on a major exchange is aligned with our mission of creating new value through collaborations with other companies and business support."

Metacoin aims to solve two fundamental issues in blockchain technology -- scalability and security -- by implementing its node into LinuxONE. By doing so, Metacoin is not only able to further secure and protect users' data but handle millions of transactions per second in a safe and secure manner.

"We are delighted to be the first global cryptocurrency exchange to add Metacoin to our offering of digital assets on Liquid, and also be the first exchange to be able to support projects built on Hyperledger," said Mike Kayamori, CEO and co-founder of Liquid. "The ability to support Hyperledger-based projects is certainly an important step towards our mission of providing liquidity to the crypto economy."

Hyperledger is an open source collaborative effort created to advance cross-industry blockchain technologies. Hosted by the Linux Foundation, it is a global collaboration that includes leaders in finance, banking, Internet of Things, supply chains, manufacturing and Technology. Hyperledger Fabric currently supports distributed ledger solutions for a wide range of industries and maximises the confidentiality, resilience and flexibility of blockchain solutions through its modular architecture.

To celebrate the listing of Metacoin on Liquid, the Liquid and Metacoin teams have decided to provide a 1% bonus for anyone who deposits more than 1,000 MTC and a 3% bonus for anyone who deposits more than 30,000 MTC on Liquid. Liquid and Metacoin will also host a Trading Competition that rewards 1,000 MTC to the top 100 users in trading volume at the end of the campaign. More details will be shared soon. For the latest updates, follow Liquid on Twitter at @liquid_global

About Metacoin

Established in 2017, Metacoin, the first cryptocurrency based on Hyperledger, launched its mainnet in October 2018. Designed to be a permissioned network, Metacoin, with the use of Hyperledger's technology, is also a public blockchain that openly allows the sharing of transaction histories. Metacoin aims to expand the Metacoin Ecosystem through solving and improving problems that exists in traditional cryptocurrency.

Today, through the use of the open-source based Hyperledger fabric and by installing the Hyperledger nodes into LinuxONE, Metacoin ensures reliability and grow blockchain business models. Through the implementation of IBM's Secure Service Container (SSC) on LinuxONE, Metacoin aims to create a successful blockchain ecosystem and will offer secure management of digital assets and allow the development of chain-codes. More information is available at https://metacoin.network/.

About Liquid

Founded in 2014, we are a leading global fintech company that operates Liquid.com ("Liquid"), a global cryptocurrency platform that provides trading, exchange, and next generation financial services powered by blockchain technology. With offices in Japan, Singapore, Vietnam, and in the future, the USA, Liquid combines a strong network of local partners with extensive team experience in banking and financial products to deliver best in class financial services for its customers.

Today, Liquid is the world's largest crypto-fiat platform by transaction volume, regulated in Japan. Powered by the World Book, which provides customers enhanced price matching and deeper liquidity for various fiat and cryptocurrency pairs, Liquid offers trading services for major cryptocurrencies such as bitcoin and ethereum against fiat currency pairs in Japanese yen, US, Singapore and Australian dollars, and euro. More information is available at Liquid.com.

SOURCE Liquid.com

http://liquid.com

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Hyperledger-based token Metacoin to list on its first global cryptocurrency exchange, Liquid - PRNewswire

While the crypto market continues to stall, some analysts are betting on institutions to carry the next bull cycle, opposed to casual traders who snowballed the BTC price in 2017. Indeed, the Wild West days of crypto, accompanied by thousands of cash-grabbing, fraudulent ICOs seem to be coming to a close compliance is the general trend now. World-known corporations and banks like Facebook (NASDAQ: FB), Starbucks (NASDAQ: SBUX) and JPMorgan (NYSE: JPM) have entered the space, and, in order to save their reputation, they intend to play by the rules only those rules have to be established first.

Crypto Derivatives: A Traditional Tool to Help the Market Grow

Thats where traditional markets could inspire crypto actors. Thus, the industry has started to push towards financial mainstream, and first results are already in. One of them is crypto derivatives, a niche version of the time-tested trading tool. Indeed, derivatives have proven useful in terms of the stock market, even in the post-crisis conditions: for instance, they expanded U.S. real GDP by about $3.7 billion each quarter over the 2003-2012 period, according to the Milken Institute research.

Equity derivatives for example a class of derivatives whose value is based on the stock of a publicly traded firm is one of the most popular offerings, as it allows people to gamble on the value of publicly traded corporations like Starbucks (NASDAQ:SBUX) and Facebook (NASDAQ: FB), or even a basket of large-cap stocks like FANG, which combines shares of the four high-performing technology stocks in the market.

Coming back to the context of cryptocurrencies, derivatives are financial contracts between two or more parties that derives (hence derivatives) their value from the underlying cryptocurrency. In other words, it is an agreement to buy or sell a particular cryptocurrency at a fixed price and a specified time in the future. Its most popular form BTC futures was introduced on two of the U.S.'s leading and diverse derivatives marketplaces, CME and CBOE, in December 2017, largely de-stigmatizing bitcoin as some marginal asset on the Internet.

Notably, the demand for such products has not only stayed, but grown bigger, too: in fact, June 2019 was the best month for CMEs bitcoin futures volume since its launch. Nearly 300,000 contracts were traded in the 31-day period, marking a 27 percent increase in volume on the month prior and a 73.69 percent increase on March volumes.

Since then, the exchange has applied to the U.S. Commodities and Futures Trading Commission (CTFC) for permission to double its open position limit. Its also recently confirmed a January launch date for a new instrument: options on bitcoin futures.

Indeed, crypto derivatives are particularly important for institutions, since they represent a major risk managing technique: specifically, they offer protection from cryptos infamous volatility (a massive red flag for blue-chip investors and corporations). Additionally, they allow traders to offset their potential losses via put options and hedging another essential instrument in the arsenal of institutional traders.

Main Actors in the space: LedgerX, Bakkt, Deribit, BitMEX

Putting out fully-compliant products is a considerably difficult task in the crypto market, given the continued lack of proper regulations. Exchanges attempting to launch new products have met with varying degrees of success. For example, U.S.-regulated clearing platform LedgerX attempted to race ahead of the competition to release a physically-settled bitcoin futures contract over the summer.

Ultimately, it was thwarted by the CTFC, much to the chagrin of the companys CEO. Unlike conventional, cash-based BTC futures, the physically-delivered ones ensure that customers receive actual BTC tokens instead of fiat once the contracts expire.

In contrast to LedgerXs efforts, Bakkt, a major exchange operated by the Intercontinental Exchange (ICE) and supported by a plethora of major companies including Microsoft and Stabucks, has made progress. In September, the company successfully launched its physically-settled bitcoin futures contracts after obtaining the necessary CFTC-issued license required. Since then, it has also announced its planning to launch options on bitcoin futures, ahead of competitor exchange CME.

Story continues

Another leading exchange is Deribit, the Amsterdam-headquartered platform which is well-known for being the first true bitcoin options exchange. Currently, its the only exchange to offer the following three kinds of derivatives products at the same time: perpetual, futures and options. In fact, perpetuals derivative products which are similar to futures, but dont have an expiry date are the most popular trading option on the platform.

Deribit is continuously expanding its services: earlier this year, it allowed the public to trade European, vanilla-style ethereum options for the first time in history. Most recently, it has joined forces with Paradigm, the first institutional-grade OTC communication platform, to launch a service for institutional crypto-derivatives traders. Specifically, the new service offers yet another trading feature, the so-called block trades: privately negotiated, principal-to-principal transactions in futures or options that exceed certain minimum quantity thresholds.

Its a game-changer for institutional traders, as it safeguards them from another major crypto-problem, insufficient liquidity. Thus, block trades will allow them to trade in numerous transactions, avoiding slippage and minimizing impact on the market price (block trades are performed outside of the order book).

Deribit and Paradigm. First to offer crypto derivatives block trading for institutions.

Deribit and Paradigm. First to offer crypto derivatives block trading for institutions.

Most importantly, Deribits volume has been on a steady rise: in April 2019, even before the major uptrend on the market, its BTC options volume exceeded half a billion dollars in a month. In October, the company showed impressive growth in its Options market.

Analysts from @CryptoCompare released a very comprehensive Exchange Review for September and highlighted Deribit's impressive growth in Options, with volumes surpassing $1B. 🙌https://t.co/m4n9oH5IJ8 pic.twitter.com/MTr0xIuKsF

— Deribit (@DeribitExchange) October 22, 2019

In comparison, the volume of BitMEX another bitcoin derivatives platform and Deribits main competitor has recently slumped as much as 33%, likely due a probe from the CTFC. However, even that didnt stop them from reporting $1 trillion in annual trading volume earlier in July.

Crypto Derivatives Boom Could Arrive Any Moment Now

One thing is clear: crypto derivatives products are currently in large demand, and institutions seem to be the primary customer. Given the fact that institutions have historically had much more leverage compared to retail customers, the next crypto boom could be much more intense than the 2017 one. We're seeing $200-400M a week in new crypto deposits come in from institutional customers, Coinbase CEO has recently tweeted. The institutional money is coming, and it seems that the needed tools will be there ready.

Disclosure: None.

More here:
Is a Cryptocurrency Derivatives Boom On Its Way? - Yahoo Finance

BOSTON Twomen from Massachusetts were arrested and charged in Boston federal court Thursday in an elaboratescheme to steal hundreds of thousands of dollars fromcryptocurrency executives and others that included taking over their social media accounts and threats to their families.

Federal prosecutors say Eric Meiggs, 21, of Brockton,and Declan Harrington, 20, of Rockport,usedcell phone SIM-card swapping and computer hacking to targetonline accounts ofat least 10 individuals with large amounts of cryptocurrency. The victims included the heads of cryptocurrency companies.

The two defendants stole or attempted to steal more than $550,000 in cryptocurrency, according to prosecutors, and gainedaccess into two victims' "OG" (original gangster) accounts with social media companies. They were unsuccessful in stealing from some of the victims.

Trump on cryptocurrency and Bitcoin: 'I am not a fan'

Meiggs and Harrington, whose alleged actions spanned multiple years,were charged in an 11-count indictment and arraigned Thursday. Each face one count of conspiracy, eight counts of wire fraud, one count of computer fraud and abuse, and one count of aggravated identity theft.

Cryptocurrency refers to digital currency, includingBitcoin, that does not rely on a central bank but instead transactions from user to user.

Prosecutors allege the two men engaged in"SIM swapping," which occurs when cybercriminals convince a cell phoneservice provider to reassign the phone number of another individual's SIM card, located inside their phone, to a phone controlled by them.

Itallowed them to pose as thevictim torequest that social media providers send them password-rest links or an authentication code to their newly controlledphone numbers.

In one instance, according to the indictment, the defendants in March2018gained access to one victim's Facebook and Gmail accounts. They then sent messages to the victim's contacts, convincing one of them to send $100,000 in cryptocurrency.

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Weeks later, the defendants accessed another victim's LinkedIn, Twitter and Facebook accounts, as well as accounts at online cryptocurrency exchanges, allowing them to steal $10,000 in cryptocurrency, the indictment says. The defendants contacted the wife of the victim, prosecutors say, and sent a text message to his daughter saying, "TELL YOUR DAD TO GIVE US BITCOIN."

Bitcoin bandits: Hackers steal equivalent of $40M from Binance

In November and December of 2015, prosecutors say Meiggs sent a series of Twitter messages to another victim seeking control of the victim's Instagram account, which was an "OG" account name. Prosecutors say Meiggs indicated he knew where the victim lived and sent the address and name of the victim's mother with the message: "Just give up."

The indictment does not identify the victims or name their companies. Five are residents of California. Others live in New Jersey, Illinois, Nevada, Michigan and Arizona.

Reach Joey Garrison and on Twitter @joeygarrison.

How the scammers behind the biggest cryptocurrency hack in the world pulled it off Time

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2 men arrested in elaborate plot to steal $550K in cryptocurrency by hacking social media accounts - USA TODAY

Bear market-weary cryptocurrency traders often ask when moon/lambo or other representation of their fortunes turning around. In particular, though, Ive heard the concept of alt season often repeated recently by traders invested in projects other than Bitcoin, which has fared significantly better to date than most other cryptocurrencies since the 2018 crash. What are the signs that the markets will turn back towards the rest of the sector? I can give you one tried and true metric to watch: Bitcoin scaling.

Bitcoins absolute market dominance has slowly, and unsurprisingly, trended down over time

Since the inception of what has come to be known as the alt sector, Bitcoins percentage of the total value of all cryptocurrencies and related digital assets has slowly declined. This is no indictment of Bitcoin and should come as no surprise to anyone that the first of its kind and overwhelming industry leader would gradually lose its omnipresence as the space diversifies and grows. New projects enter to fill specific use cases improperly served by the one-size-fits-all model, and still more projects target purpose completely outside of Bitcoins scope. Rather than being attributable to any concept of alt season, this is simply the natural progression of the space.

When you look at the Bitcoin dominance percentage chart, youll see exactly that: a slow decline as more and more market share goes to the rest of the rapidly-growing field. This is the natural process of diversification and maturity in the industry, and is a great and expected sign that we should expect to continue consistently over the next several years.

The timing of 2017s alt season was no coincidence

Now, if you looked at the above chart, youll see something that doesnt look quite so natural: a giant tumble in the dominance percentage starting in early 2017, clearly breaking the gradual trend seen previously. Of course, economies are complex, and many different factors (such as Ethereums surge) may contribute to an event such as this, but the timing seems eerily coincidental to the time of the first serious Bitcoin scaling issues. Around that time, the demand by users seeking to access the network far exceeded the supply of available space in the blockchain. Naturally, one effect of this is to drive up the prices of transactions, but another was to cause consumers to seek other avenues for transacting in cryptocurrency. And, of course, in order to use a cryptocurrency you first have to buy some. Hence the great alt season of 2017.

This congestion issue paired with surging consumer demand caused the valuation of all other cryptocurrencies combined to spike versus Bitcoin, with Ethereum even coming close to dethroning it as the most valued cryptocurrency. Since then, the bear market has taken a lot of the demand out of the market, and many actors moved off of Bitcoin to other chains permanently, allowing the space to return to the previous trend line as Bitcoin became usable again. But this incident nonetheless shows exactly what can happen if such a situation were to be replicated.

All it takes is another run on the banks to kick off the flippening

Now, years into the ongoing bear market after the incredible surge of late 2017, were primed for another explosion in user demand. And just like last time, Bitcoin scaling has still not been solved. Just recently, we saw a massive spike in the mempool of unconfirmed Bitcoin transactions. While this very likely did not represent a sudden growth in consumer demand, it filled up the network regardless, with extreme ease. If something like this were to happen again at a time when the demand for cryptocurrency was rapidly growing, we could easily see another massive spillover to other chains, and a corresponding flip in valuations as alt season begins.

Dont ask when alt season? Watch for clear indicators. One of them may be the Bitcoin mempool.

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What Could Trigger the Next Cryptocurrency Alt Season? - Dash News