Ripple Price Analysis: XRP/USD capitalizes on the global cryptocurrency bulls’ run – FXStreet

Ripple's XRP, now the 3d largest digital asset with the current market value of $10.1 billion has gained over 7% in recent 24 hours. The coin touched the highest level of 2020 at $0.244 on Tuesday and retreated to $0.2323 by the time of writing. The coin has been moving in sync with the global cryptocurrency market, driven by a strong wave of bullish sentiments.

The Chairman of the US Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) Heath Tarbert thinks that it is not clear whether XRP is a security. The Agency has been working with the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to figure out the status of Ripple's token. Notably, the head of CFTC has now doubts as to the status of Ethereum, which is regarded as a commodity.

Meanwhile, Ripple Labs is often accused of earning from XRP sales to retain investors: Ripple executives deny the claims saying that they sell token for negligible amounts compared to other sources of funding.

XRP/USD bottomed at $0.2259 during early Asian hours and recovered to the area above $0.2300 by the time of writing. While the coin is still below the recent highs, a sustainable move above $0.2200 the previous recovery high of $0.2250 has improved the short-term technical picture. The crucial support area is created by a combination of SMA50 1-hour and the lower line of 1-hour Bollinger Band on approach to the above-said psychological $0.2200. If it is broken, the sell-off may be extended towards $0.2130 (SMA200 1-hour).

From the longer-term point of view, strong support is created by SMA50 daily at $0.2080 followed by the middle line of the daily Bollinger Band at $0.2045.

On the upside, the key barrier is created by SMA100 daily currently at $0.2430. This resistance area has been validated twice, which means that the bulls will have a hard time with it. Once it is out of the way, the upside is likely to gain traction with the next focus on psychological $0.2500. The ultimate resistance comes at $0.2680 (SMA200 daily).

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Ripple Price Analysis: XRP/USD capitalizes on the global cryptocurrency bulls' run - FXStreet

Cryptocurrency Market Update: Two-day recovery on the rocks as Bitcoin, Ethereum and Ripple trim gains – FXStreet

The overwhelming surge across the cryptocurrency market has greatly revived interest in the major cryptocurrencies. For instance, Bitcoin SV has more than tripled in value since the lows traded last December. The cryptoasset is trading at $345 after adjusting from highs at $450. Other assets that have improved greatly, include Bitcoin Cash, Bitcoin Gold and Dash.

However, the surge appears to be on the rocks as the cryptocurrenciesstartto reverse. The majority of the major cryptos are in the red on Wednesday led by Bitcoin, which is down 6%, Litecoin follows at 3% and EOS at 4.21%.

On the other hand, the cryptoassets that are still in the green include, Dash with its 31% rise on a daily basis, Bitcoin Gold is trading 27.7% higher and Ethereum Classic is up 4.3%.

Bitcoin is down 2% on the day following a surge towards $9,000. An intraday high formed at $8,899 saw the bears start to swing into action. At the time of writing, BTC is valued at $8,627 amid a growing bearish momentum. If the support at $8,600 fails to hold, the zone at $8,400 could rescue the bulls. More support can also be expected to emanate from the former resistance at $8,200.

Ethereum, on the other hand, retreated from the new January 2020 high at $171.67. Support appears to be establishing at $160. Meanwhile, ETH/USD is valued at $162 (market value). Additional support is expected at $155, the 50 SMA on the 1-hour chart, and the 100 SMA.

Ripple blasted its way through the resistance at $0.22 as well as $0.24. An adjustment in the price has occurred with Ripple slide back to $0.2342. Immediate support could be found at $0.23. Besides, the leveling RSI suggests that Ripple could settle the dust above $0.24 while the upside capped at $0.24 in the near term.

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Cryptocurrency Market Update: Two-day recovery on the rocks as Bitcoin, Ethereum and Ripple trim gains - FXStreet

North Korea is Holding a Secretive Cryptocurrency Conference, and Experts Warn it’s a Very Bad Idea to Attend – Newsweek

North Korea is holding a blockchain and cryptocurrency conference in Pyongyang next monthand United Nation experts strongly advise against making the trip.

A confidential report soon to be submitted to the U.N. Security Council says anyone who travels to the event would likely be in violation of sanctions because it previously featured "discussions of cryptocurrency for sanctions evasion and money laundering," Reuters reported.

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The 2020 Pyongyang Blockchain and Cryptocurrency Conference is set to take place in the capital between February 22-29, according to its website.

Cybersecurity experts say North Korea has links to a hacking unit known as Lazarus, which is allegedly responsible for targeting banks, bitcoin exchanges, cash machines and ransomware outbreaks in an attempt to generate funds for the regime.

Despite U.N. sanctions against North Korea being in place since 2006, designed to curb its nuclear missile programs, the hermit kingdom reportedly brought in up to $2 billion for those programs with the use of cyberattacks in recent years, Reuters reported last August. The U.S. government refers to the North Korean government cyber activity under the name Hidden Cobra.

Ignoring the warnings could have serious consequences.

Two months ago, U.S. citizen Virgil Griffith, 36, was charged after going to the North Korea tech event last April to "deliver a presentation and technical advice on using cryptocurrency and blockchain technology to evade sanctions," the Department of Justice (DoJ) said.

He was charged with conspiring to violate the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, which carries a maximum sentence of up to 20 years in prison.

The U.S. state department said it previously denied Griffith permission to travel to the nation, which is officially titled the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, or DPRK.

"Griffith provided highly technical information to North Korea, knowing [it] could be used to help North Korea launder money and evade sanctions," said U.S. Attorney Geoffrey Berman. "In allegedly doing so, Griffith jeopardized the sanctions that both Congress and the president have enacted to place maximum pressure on North Korea's dangerous regime."

According to the conference website, organizers welcome U.S. passports, which it says will not be stamped "so there will be no evidence of your entry to the country." It also adds: "Your participation will never be disclosed from our side unless you publicize it on your own."

There is no full program schedule listed online. The itinerary shows multiple tourist trips before daily events, held inside the Pyongyang's Science and Technology Complex.

The main days are simply listed as: "Blockchain and Cryptocurrency conference."

Day five is described as containing a "general business presentation and private business meetings with interested counterparts." After a visit to the Masikryong Ski Resort on days six and seven, attendees will transfer to the airport and return to Beijing on day eight.

"The interest of participants to continue building bridges of friendship and collaboration with the DPR of Korea, as well as the exclusive environment of confidentiality and contacts with the highest government officials and engineers, demanded to organize a second conference with even more audience and wider scope," reads a blurb on the conference's website.

It remains unknown how many people are expected to attend. The conference website says the notoriously brutal country is safe for visitors, with some caveats.

"The DPRK can be considered the safest country in the world. As long as you have a basic common-sense and respect for the culture... you'll be always welcome," it notes.

Applicants have to send a scan of their passport and full address, phone numbers and a CV. It does not accept passports of citizens from South Korea, Japan and Israel. Journalists are not allowed to attend in order to "preserve the confidentiality of the participants."

While it can prove difficult to attribute digital attacks to an exact culprit, evidence of North Korea's cybercrime has mounted in recent years. Its fingerprints were found on a brazen attack on the Bangladesh Central Bank in 2016 which tried to siphon over 800 million.

"Lazarus is not just another APT actor. The scale of the Lazarus operations is shocking," analysts from Kaspersky noted in a report exploring the inner-workings of the group in 2017. APT, often used to describe state hacking units, stands for Advanced Persistent Threat.

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North Korea is Holding a Secretive Cryptocurrency Conference, and Experts Warn it's a Very Bad Idea to Attend - Newsweek

Bitcoin SV Blasts Ahead of Litecoin, Tether and Bitcoin Cash to Become Fourth-Largest Cryptocurrency – The Daily Hodl

Bitcoin SV (BSV) is now the fourth-largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization, after a turbulent day sent its value skyrocketing against the US dollar, up more than 100% at its peak on Tuesday. Its price, which hit an 24-hour high of $441.20 on Tuesday, subsequently plunged by nearly $100.

The massive surge in value comes amid new developments in the lawsuit against Craig Wright. The Australian computer scientist and self-proclaimed creator of Bitcoin is one of the biggest supporters of BSV, and he now says he can access a massive trove of Bitcoin holdings.

Wright is being sued by Ira Kleiman, brother of Wrights deceased business partner David Kleiman, for the alleged misappropriation of more than one million BTC that was once held jointly by the two business partners. Wright responded that the cryptographically locked Bitcoin, which requires a private key to unlock, was inaccessible.

US judge Beth Bloom gave Wright until February 3rd to access about $9.2 billion worth of Bitcoin which Wright said was locked in a Tulip Trust, an encrypted document that holds the keys to the BTC that Wright and Kleiman mined together.

Wright claimed a bonded courier who possessed the keys that could unlock the encrypted Tulip Trust would arrive this month, and on Tuesday, he filed a notice of compliance stating that the third party had indeed provided him with the information he needed to unlock the file. Wright also claims he has provided Kleimans side with a list of his Bitcoin holdings.

In a counter filing, the plaintiffs expressed their lack of satisfaction with Wrights list.

Say Kleimans lawyers,

The document produced by Craig is simply a list of 16,404 addresses. Craig, however, did not provide any information on the bounded [sic] courier, the company he/she worked for, when he/she came, or the message delivered.

Plaintiffs request they be provided with seven (7) interrogatories about the courier that Craig must respond to in ten (10) days. Plaintiffs will then use those responses to seek discovery from the bonded courier and his company. In the interim, Plaintiffs are having their experts review and analyze the list.

Plaintiffs expect that they will be ready to depose Craig after this discovery occurs, in early March.

Featured Image: Shutterstock/Smelov

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Bitcoin SV Blasts Ahead of Litecoin, Tether and Bitcoin Cash to Become Fourth-Largest Cryptocurrency - The Daily Hodl

RESEARCH: Cryptocurrency Staking Value Soars To A Record $7 Billion USD – Coingape

After a year of rocketing growth, 2020 looks set to push investors into staking platforms even further as latest reports show, According to Staking Rewards, a staking platform data aggregator, the total staked amount in dollars currently stands at $6.961 Billion USD, with seven of the top ten coins all registering over $100 million USD in staked coins. However, the research conducted by Crypto Differ excludes Tron (TRX), which stakes 22% of the total ~1 billion USD worth of TRX.

Staking allows cryptocurrency holders to earn passive income by storing their coins on protocols designed to payout interest.

The research from Crypto Differ places the total staked amount in dollars at $6.961 billion USD, excluding TRX, with the push to $7 billion USD set to happen sooner rather than later. Staking cryptocurrencies have gained traction in the past year as a number of exchanges introduced zero fee staking such as Binance Staking Protocol which launched a free staking platform for Tezos at the end of last year.

The market capitalization of staking cryptocurrencies currently stands at $11 billion dollars, which shows over 60% of the total cap is held in staking protocols. The top seven coins which hold at least $100 million USD including EOS, Tezos, Cosmos, Algorand, Dash, Synthetix and NEM, hold a combined $4.5 billion of the total ~$7 billion staked, representing approx. 64% of the total.

While the field is growing at an astronomical pace, four of the top staking projects seem to be controlling much of the market with ~$4 billion staked across the four crypto projects. Eos (EOS) leads the pack with $1.822 billion USD staked, representing a quarter of the total amount staked. Tezos (XTZ), Cosmos (ATOM) and Algorand (ALGO) complete the list of project with over $500 million USD staked with $832 million USD, $771 million and $515 million staked respectively.

We calculated the ratio of staked coins to the circulating supply as well. The leaders are Cosmos (98.6%), Livepeer (95.6%), Synthetix (88.3%), Kava(86%) and Tezos (85.8%). StakingRewards.com on the 2020 staking report.

However, there remains questions of the exclusion of Tron (TRX) from the list of staking projects as explained by enthusiast and community member, Mike McCarthy. The eleventh largest crypto has a total of $329 million USD staked, as at time of writing representing approx. 22% of its total market capitalization.

The field of staking is just taking off and this year looks to provide a larger market for staking products. Can the market breach $10 billion in 2020?

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RESEARCH: Cryptocurrency Staking Value Soars To A Record $7 Billion USD

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Total value in USD on staking platforms on the verge of breaching $7 billion USD.Eos, Tezos, Atom and Algo lead the standings with over $500 million USD staked in each platform

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Lujan Odera

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Coingape

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RESEARCH: Cryptocurrency Staking Value Soars To A Record $7 Billion USD - Coingape

Trading Technologies Launches Connectivity to Leading Futures and Options Cryptocurrency Exchange Deribit Via the TT Platform – Yahoo Finance

Trading Technologies International, Inc. (TT), a global provider of high-performance professional trading software, infrastructure and data solutions, and Deribit B.V., holding company of the leading Dutch cryptocurrency futures and options exchange Deribit, today announced TT has launched connectivity to Deribit.

Founded in 2016, Deribit is a cryptocurrency derivatives exchange, providing its services in Europe and Asia. Through the TT platform, users who are eligible to trade on Deribit will be able to access all listed productsBTC and ETH futures, perpetual and options contracts.

By connecting with Amsterdam-based Deribit, TT continues its emphasis on providing the professional trading community with diversified international market connectivity and multiple tools for cryptocurrency trading. Users will have access to TT's full suite of professional-grade tools, including advanced order types, Autospreader, ADL, charting and analytics, the MD Trader static price ladder, and the TT Mobile app for Android and iOS. Users also will have the ability to trade cryptocurrencies on the same screen as derivative products from nearly 50 futures markets around the world.

"Deribit is the market leader for crypto options, and we have seen strong demand for Deribit futures, perpetual and options from our users," said Michael Unetich, VP of Cryptocurrencies at Trading Technologies. "The exchange has strong volume, solid technology, and users throughout Europe and Asia. As we came to know the Deribit leadership team, we knew this would be an ideal fit for TT as we continue to enhance our product line by adding more high-quality crypto exchanges."

"We are excited to partner with derivatives specialist Trading Technologies and to welcome TTs professional traders to our exchange," said Deribit founder and CEO John Jansen. "We look forward to offering new trading opportunities to their traders in our unique options suite, regular futures and naturally our key volume contributor the BTC Perpetual."

With the addition of Deribit, TT now supports five crypto-only exchanges. TT has expanded from its traditional derivatives base to build out a cryptocurrency offering over the past two years, previously launching support for BitMEX, CoinFLEX, Coinbase and Bakkt.

About Deribit

Deribit (https://www.deribit.com) is a leading crypto futures and options trading platform based in Amsterdam, Netherlands. Deribit provides professional-grade trading solutions and a highly liquid marketplace. The framework of the platform was developed to assure the ability to handle large numbers of requests with ultra-low latency. The matching engine was developed from scratch and all of Deribit technology is proprietary. Deribit was the first to launch European style cash-settled options on BTC and ETH and pioneered functionalities like multi-instrument block trade for crypto derivatives. Furthermore, Deribit remains the market leader in crypto options and continues to set the standard for the rest of the industry.

About Trading Technologies

Trading Technologies (www.tradingtechnologies.com, @Trading_Tech) creates professional trading software, infrastructure and data solutions for a wide variety of users, including proprietary traders, brokers, money managers, CTAs, hedge funds, commercial hedgers and risk managers. In addition to providing access to the worlds major international exchanges and liquidity venues via its TT trading platform, TT offers domain-specific technology for cryptocurrency trading and machine-learning tools for trade surveillance.

View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200115005235/en/

Contacts

TT Media Contact Lorna Kiewert3Points Communications(312) 725-7950, Ext. 1Lorna@3ptscomm.com

Deribit Media Contact Andras CaronDeribit Exchange0031628493144andras@deribit.com

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Trading Technologies Launches Connectivity to Leading Futures and Options Cryptocurrency Exchange Deribit Via the TT Platform - Yahoo Finance

What does cryptocurrency have in store over the next decade? – 150sec

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In December 2019, Bitcoin was acknowledged as the asset class with the best return on investment. In recognition of Bitcoins rapid success, 150sec reflects on the predictions of Brian Armstrong the founder of Coinbase, one of the worlds leading cryptocurrency exchanges.

Headquartered in San Francisco, Coinbase has over 13 million users and revenues in excess of $1 billion. In a blog post, founder and CEO Brian Armstrong offered his thoughts on how the next decade will unfold for cryptocurrency:

Just like broadband replacing 56k modems led to many new applications on the internet (YouTube, Uber, and so on), I believe scalability is a prerequisite for the utility phase of crypto to really get going.

Armstrong claims that the scaling issue cryptocurrencies have previously experienced will be resolved. New layer 2 scaling solutions are being developed which will increase blockchain throughput considerably. Essentially, layer 2 solutions facilitate a blockchain on top of a blockchain. By taking activity off the mainnet, these solutions alleviate the throughput pressures on the primary blockchain.

In the case of Bitcoin, there is some weighty expectation that its layer 2 scaling solution Lightning Network will resolve the throughput issue for the cryptocurrency. Likewise, Ethereum the worlds second-ranking cryptocurrency by market capitalisation is in need of a solution. Developers behind the project are currently preoccupied with overhauling the decentralised cryptocurrency. A large part of their efforts centers around scaling improvement. The latest hard fork or change in the protocol implicated the addition of a layer 2 payment channel.

Only once this scaling issue is overcome, Armstrong believes we will see a tangible utility phase in cryptocurrency.

Cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin are only pseudo-anonymous. In comparison to cash, cryptocurrency is far easier to regulatefor law enforcement authorities. Although there can be difficulties establishing the identity of a user, once confirmed, the full extent oftransactional activity is far more transparent.

According to Armstrong, a privacy coin will be developed over the coming decade because it doesnt make sense in most cases to broadcast every payment you make on a transparent ledger.

While many cryptocurrency purists certainly want greater privacy features, the issue is likely to become a battleground over the course of the 2020s. In December, well-known crypto exchange Binance suspended users Bitcoin withdrawal ability. The reason was that clients had used Wasabi, a privacy-focused crypto wallet. Wasabi facilitates coin mixing which makes trailing cryptocurrency transactions very difficult for third parties. Its also believed that Binance suspended users withdrawal ability to appeasestate cryptocurrency regulators who dont want to see any privacy features enabled in cryptocurrency.

Elsewhere, Armstrong claims that consolidation will occur within the crypto world. This statement is unlikely to be met with disagreement considering that more than 1,600 cryptocurrencies currently exist. Over time, its likely that only a handful of these will survive.

One of the major criticisms crypto faces at the moment is the vast majority of activity is accounted through speculative trading. As a result, Armstrong predicts that startups established this decade will innovate and drive real, tangible utility in cryptocurrency.

If internet startups belong to the dotcom era, Armstrong asserts that this upcoming decade will be the era of crypto startups. New ventures will likely see a rise in seed capital via crypto, issue tokens to early adopters and expand exponentially on a global basis rather than country by country.

Armstrong continues by speculating that developing nations will find far greater uses for cryptocurrencies in the 2020s. He supports his theory by acknowledging how Venezuela, Iran, Turkey, Zimbabwe and Argentina have seen modest up-ticks in the use of crypto, despite runaway inflation.

Over the next ten years then, Armstrong believes that crypto adoption in emerging nations will scale to hundreds of millions. He goes so far as to say that one country could even have the majority of their transactions occurring in cryptocurrency.

The participation of large institutions has been long-awaited in crypto. There has been some involvement around the fringes but nothing substantial. Nonetheless, piece by piece, the infrastructure within the cryptocurrency ecosystem has steadily been improving over the past 18 months to facilitate institutions inclusion.

Armstrong notes that 90% of the worlds money is held by institutions. He predicts some level of involvement from every single institution with cryptocurrency over the next ten years.

Meanwhile, Armstrong declares that China now leads the charge in terms of CBDC development. He also believes that a currency based on Fiat currencies will emerge in the form of Facebooks Libra or an offering from the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

The world of cryptocurrency exchanges has represented some of cryptos most turbulent times. However, in Armstrongs opinion, exchange hacks, unstable platforms and questionable practices are set to lessen as the market matures over the next decade.

The emergence of decentralised exchanges which operate without the need for a central authority havestruggled to gain momentum. In contrast, though, Armstrong believes that such exchanges will begin to flourish in partnership with decentralised finance (DeFi), decentralised identity systems and decentralised applications (Dapps) generally.

The Coinbase CEO wraps up his predictions for the pending decade with the expectation that Bitcoin will acquire a $200,000 unit price. If this does happen, Armstrong states that an already tech-influenced crypto space will produce a number of high net-worth individuals, who in turn, invest in science and technology sectors.

Armstrongs predictions indicate bright opportunities ahead for cryptocurrency ones that defy any previous notions of it being short-lived. Armstrong demonstrates that crypto is making a sure transition away from being primarily about trading and speculation to being about real-world utility. The world waits then, for the next 10 years and an undoubtedly exciting future for cryptocurrency.

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What does cryptocurrency have in store over the next decade? - 150sec

ALYI Crypto Strategy Boosted by Facebook Cryptocurrency Initiative Awareness with 80% of Respondents Open to ALYI Led Offering – Yahoo Finance

Dallas, Texas--(Newsfile Corp. - January 14, 2020) - Alternet Systems, Inc. (OTC Pink: ALYI) today announced Goldman Small Cap Research has published the final results of a survey conducted to evaluate the company's cryptocurrency fund raising strategy. Goldman reports that the survey outcome "bodes extremely well for the Company, its stock, and the planned crypto offering." The survey results demonstrate the limited market awareness and understanding of cryptocurrency strategies in general with most respondents not knowing about Facebook's cryptocurrency offering. With the cryptocurrency awareness and education inherent within the survey itself, eighty percent (80%) of respondents expressed being open to investing in an ALYI led cryptocurrency offering:

"Dovetailing with the novice nature, over 70% of respondents don't plan to use/invest in crypto in the next twelve months. However, when presented with the (anonymous) ALYI concept and structure, around 20% replied that they would not be interested, with 80% open to the ALYI offering. Clearly, incorporating crypto to fund sustainable technology for use in helping emerging markets in need was well received and sends a powerful message to ALYI management and investors."

To view the full report following the link to Goldman's website:

Final Results Support ALYI's Crypto Initiatives; Broad Interest in Funding

ALYI African Crypto Strategy Highlights

The firm, IW Global (www.IW-Global.com) has proposed launching and managing an Initial Coin Offering (ICO) on ALYI's behalf specifically targeted at raising $100 million to fund infrastructure for electric vehicle production in Africa. ALYI has partnered with IW Global and ALYI's production and marketing partners in Kenya to form a new company (NewCo) with the specific focus of building a new, state of the art electric vehicle production plant. This NewCo will be a separate company apart from ALYI but exclusively contracted by ALYI for producing ALYI designed vehicles. The NewCo is the business entity that would initiate the proposed ICO. The funds would be dedicated to 1. Building the plant and 2. Funding the production of ALYI's vehicles. A successful ICO would permit ALYI to substantially accelerate and expand upon its existing $300 million in electric vehicle projects.

For more information, please visit: http://www.alternetsystemsinc.com

Disclaimer/Safe Harbor: This news release contains forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Securities Litigation Reform Act. The statements reflect the Company's current views with respect to future events that involve risks and uncertainties. Among others, these risks include the expectation that any of the companies mentioned herein will achieve significant sales, the failure to meet schedule or performance requirements of the companies' contracts, the companies' liquidity position, the companies' ability to obtain new contracts, the emergence of competitors with greater financial resources and the impact of competitive pricing. In the light of these uncertainties, the forward-looking events referred to in this release might not occur.

Alternet Systems, Inc. Contact:Randell Tornoinfo@lithiumip.com+1-800-713-0297

To view the source version of this press release, please visit https://www.newsfilecorp.com/release/51443

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ALYI Crypto Strategy Boosted by Facebook Cryptocurrency Initiative Awareness with 80% of Respondents Open to ALYI Led Offering - Yahoo Finance

How to minimize the cryptocurrency tax burden this tax season – Canadian Lawyer Magazine

What is more advantageous from a tax point of view is to have capital treatments, Rotfleisch explains. But you have a risk of the CRA saying, no, this is not capital, this is income, you've got twice the tax liability of what you reported, and we're going to hit you with gross negligence penalties.

As business income is fully taxable while only 50 per cent of capital gains are, he dives into clients cryptocurrency earnings and clarifies what looks like the former and what is defensible as the latter. He builds in a series of memos defending the capital gains claims in case the CRA comes calling.

Absent our analysis, the CRA would come in and take a look at the whole portfolio, Rotfleisch said. They would see some you bought some Bitcoin yesterday, you sold it today. One clear income account and they're going to [tax] everything as an income account. They're not going to go into detail.

Cryptocurrencies (or cryptos) are digital assets, designed to function as a decentralized medium of exchange protected by cryptography rather than a state guarantee. More than 2,000 different cryptos exist, including Bitcoin, Ethereum, Ripple and Litecoin. In late 2017 Bitcoin, which Rotfleisch says is a consistent indicator of overall cryptocurrency value, peaked at around US$20,000. It has since fallen to around US$10,000 but remains volatile.

The CRAs guidelines for cryptocurrency taxation emanate from a key premise: cryptos are a commodity, not money. Rotfleisch accepts this is fair. Cryptos like Bitcoin often behave more like gold, with wildly fluctuating values, and still arent widely acceptable as a medium of exchange. Though that is changing slowly, for the moment he thinks its not worth challenging the CRAs base premise, which leaves smart filing as the best means for a tax lawyer to protect their client.

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How to minimize the cryptocurrency tax burden this tax season - Canadian Lawyer Magazine

At the Crossroads of Art and Biotech, a Warning: Be Careful What You Wish For. – INDY Week

ARTS WORK IN THE AGE OF BIOTECHNOLOGY: SHAPING OUR GENETIC FUTURES

Through Sunday, March 15

The Gregg Museum of Art & Design, Raleigh

Where do we draw the lines dividing art from science, natural from unnatural, and boldness from hubris?

An exhibit at N.C. States Gregg Museum of Art & Design doesnt answer these questions. Instead, it offers head-spinning new ways to ask them at the nexus of art and biotechnology, sharpening our insight into the fields future and expanding our understanding of it into the past.

These hard-to-classify collaborations between artists and scientistsseethe with hot-button issues related to ethics, privacy, human nature, and more. But if they have one message in common, its to be careful what you wish for.

Arts Work in the Age of Biotechnology: Shaping Our Genetic Futures is the result of more than two years of planning led by Molly Renda, the exhibit program librarian at N.C. State University Libraries, and the universitys Genetic Engineering and Society Center. Guest-curated by Hannah Star Rogers, who studies the intersection of art and science, the main exhibit at the Gregg has annexes in Hill and Hunt libraries.

On a recent tour of the exhibit, Renda and Fred Gould, the co-director of the GESC, said that they wanted to bring artists into the welter of science-and-design innovation taking place at the university because their differing perspectives on fundamental human issues create balance, tension, and discovery.

In the course of this, Ive found that artists tend to be more dystopian and designers are more utopian, Renda says.

There are different ways of knowing things, Gould adds. Thats why Molly came up with the name: not artwork, but arts work. What is an artist supposed to do?

Some pieces take on the dangers of day-after-tomorrow DNA testing and engineering technology. Heather Dewey-Hagborg is best known for Probably Chelsea, a piece in which she collected DNA samples from Chelsea Manning and generated thirty-two possible portraits of the soldier and activist.

When we worry about biotechnology, we usually worry that our food is going to be dangerous. But sometimes you wish for something thats rare: What happens when biotechnology makes it available to you?

The Gregg is showing a similar piece in which Dewey-Hagborg harvested DNA from cigarette butts and gum she found on the street and created probablebut not definitereplicas of the litterers faces, which hang on the walls above the specimens. Dewey-Hagborg demonstrates not only the unnerving extent of whats currently possible with DNA testing, but also the limits, which create misidentification risks.

Other pieces probe how biotechnology might reshape life as we know it. In a film and a sculpture representing an ancient Greek rite for women, Charlotte Jarvis raises the possibility of creating female sperm, based on the idea that, because stem cells are undifferentiated, you could theoretically teach womens stem cells to develop into sperm.

Still other pieces pointedly poke holes in the boundary between science and art. Adam Zaretskys Errorarium (entitled "Bipolar Flowers")looks like a cross between an arcade cabinet and a terrarium. It houses a few genetically modified Arabidopsis specimens, which Gould calls the white mice of research plants. When you turn the knobs, it changes the sonic parameters of a synthesizer, notionally testing the effects of the sound on the mutant plants.

It doesnt really do anythingor does it? Zaretskys experiment with no hypothesis is a playful tweak on science with something a little dangerous in the background.

Joe Davis, a bio-art pioneer, touches on something similar in his piece, which consists of documentation of an experiment where mice roll dice to determine if luck can be bred. Renda says that Davis couldnt get permission to run the test (universities are wary of drawing attention for ridiculous-seeming experiments), so he did it as conceptual art at N.C. State, instead.

Its notable that two artists home in on luck, one of many human concepts that genetic engineering, which will allow us to take control of our bodies and environment in untested ways, will transform. In We Make Our Own Luck Here, Ciara Redmond has bred four-leaf clovers (without genetic modification), which ruins themtheyrelucks evidence, not its cause. This whimsical iteration of unconsidered consequences raises a serious question: What else are we not thinking of?

When we worry about biotechnology, we usually worry that our food is going to be dangerous, Gould says. But sometimes you wish for something thats rare: What happens when biotechnology makes it available to you?

The exhibit takes an expansive view of biotechnology. Maria McKinney uses semen-extraction straws to sculpt proteins from double-muscled breeding bulls, underscoring that weve been tampering with life since long before CRISPR. Biotech feels radically new, but its revealed as part of a centuries-long process.

Another part of the exhibit, which closed at the end of October but can still be experienced through virtual reality at the Gregg, was From Teosinte to Tomorrow, Rendas land-art project at the North Carolina Museum of Art. In what was essentially a walk back through agricultural history, a bed of teosinte, which is thought to be the ancestor of modern maize, waited at the center of a corn maze.

That teosinte was in some sense genetically enhanced by subsistence farmers in Mexico since the time of the Aztecs, Gould says. Now were doing it in the laboratory with the same genesso whats the difference? Arts work is to make us think and question.

Contact arts and culture editor Brian Howe at bhowe@indyweek.com

Support independent local journalism.Join the INDY Press Clubto help us keep fearless watchdog reporting and essential arts and culture coverage viable in the Triangle.

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At the Crossroads of Art and Biotech, a Warning: Be Careful What You Wish For. - INDY Week