Category Archives: Cryptocurrency

If you use TurboTax to file taxes, you now have the option to deposit your refund directly to a Coinbase account. The money can either be deposited in USD or be sent to your account already converted to any of the 100 types of cryptocurrency available. Coinbase says the choices include stablecoins that are pegged to a real currency and fluctuate much less than typical crypto coins. You won't be charged with any trading fees if you choose to get your refund in crypto, but you'll still be able to immediately convert your money into the cryptocurrency of your choice if you opt to get it in USD first.

To be able to take advantage of the companies' partnership, you'd have to file from the Coinbase section of the TurboTax website. All TurboTax customers can file from the page, even those using the free option for simple tax returns that only need a W-2. It does have a maximum deposit amount of $25,000 per day, but that probably won't be a problem for most people.

TurboTax will help you set up a Coinbase account if you don't have one yet, and you'll have to follow the steps you see afterwards to be able to deposit your refund to the exchange's "MetaBank." The exchange said in its blog post:

"Coinbase is committed to giving everyone instant and easy access to the cryptoeconomy... We'll continue to enable new use cases that allow customers to transition more of their financial lives to the cryptoeconomy."

Coinbase has launched quite a few ways to make cryptocurrency more available over the past year, including opening up a feature that lets you deposit paychecks to its system and another that lets you link it to your PayPal account.

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Coinbase partners with TurboTax to let you receive tax refunds in cryptocurrency - Engadget

(KLAS) Young adults on social media are increasingly becoming the targets of hackers and federal data shows crypto-currency scams have skyrocketed. But there are some simple things to do to protect yourself.

Mary Peplin said she thought she was messaging a friend from high school on Instagram. She shared her phone number and clicked on a link but it turned out to be a scam. I started getting messages and phone calls from friends and family asking me, hey mary, are you on your on your instagram right now asking me for money?' Peplin said. I think I had a panic attack. I was mortified. I was crying. I was upset. I did not know what to do.

Crypto-currency scams have skyrocketed during the pandemic. The federal trade commission estimates that since october 2020, people ages 20-49 were five times more likely to lose money in these online investment scams. You want to trust your gut, Consumer Reports technology writer Thomas Germain said. If you have a bad feeling about someone youre talking to on the internet, you want to listen to those instincts.

Germain says other steps you can take include: not responding if its someone you dont know, check before you click on a link, and limit Venmo or cash app payments to friends only.

Peplin said she wants Instagram to do more to protect users like her. Instagram provided a statement that reads in part, We have sophisticated measures in place to stop bad actors in their tracks before they gain access to accounts, as well as measures to help people recover their accounts we know we can do more here, and were working hard in both these areas to stop bad actors before they cause harm.

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Cyber attacks on young adults on the rise due to cryptocurrency - KLAS - 8 News Now

No one knows how long cryptocurrency's current slump will last. But the industry's long-term prospects look promising, with geopolitical uncertainty on the rise and inflation eroding the value of fiat currencies. Investors looking to get into crypto should bet on those tokens with the best chance of outperforming when the market recovers.

Metaverse tokenThe Sandbox(CRYPTO:SAND) fits the bill -- and it's my top cryptocurrency to buy in February.

While the concept is far from fully developed, the metaverse could be defined as a vast array of interconnected virtual worlds that continue existing and operating regardless of who is or is not accessing them. Some will likely be best experienced via virtual- or augmented-reality gear, but that won't necessarily be required.

Analysts at Emergen Research expect that as more companies invest in this exciting new medium, the metaverse market opportunity will expand at a compound annual rate of 43.3% through 2028 to $829 billion.

Image source: Getty Images

There are two main reasons blockchain platforms are well-suited to metaverse development. First, their native tokens (the units used to pay fees and make transactions on specific networks) can double as in-application virtual currencies. Second, non-fungible-tokens (NFTs), which are unique assets that can't be replicated, serve as digital proofs of ownership. Together, these technologies can form the backbone of a decentralized virtual economy.

The Sandbox is fully committed to this opportunity. According to its white paper, it aims to create interconnected virtual worlds where users can "build, own and monetize gaming experiences" -- a similar business model to that of publicly traded video game platform operator Roblox.

The Sandbox's content ecosystem is made up of three synergistic products. First is the Voxel Editor, a 3D-modeling program that allows users to create in-game objects. The second is the online marketplace where users can buy and sell such objects. And third is the Game Maker, a game creation engine that allows users to locate and use their objects within a specific piece of in-game virtual real estate.

According to its official roadmap, the Sandbox began public sales of virtual real estate in 2020. And it boasted 30,000 monthly active users in its beta, according to a Nov. 2 tweet. This quarter, developers plan to open their segment of the metaverse to owners who have built high-quality experiences on their digital real estate.

The Sandbox has also partnered with Warner Music Group to launch a metaverse concert hall designed to host virtual performances.

The Sandbox is not the only blockchain platform getting serious about metaverse development. The developers behind popular meme coin Shiba Inu are working on a project called Shiberse that's expected to launch in 2022 -- although details about it have been scarce.

The Sandbox stands out from the competition because of the impressive progress it has made toward making its metaverse a reality. Its developers also have solid experience in game creation: The Sandbox Franchise of mobile games boasts 50 million installs on iOS and Android devices, so this isn't a fly-by-night operation. Trust and a track record of success are important in the largely unregulated cryptocurrency industry.

With a market cap of $3.4 billion, The Sandbox's valuation has soared roughly 7,000% since its inception in late 2020. And while the platform is not immune from the current cryptocurrency bear market, its experienced development team and unique value proposition (as a decentralize user-generated metaverse game) can help it outperform peers when the industry recovers.

This article represents the opinion of the writer, who may disagree with the official recommendation position of a Motley Fool premium advisory service. Were motley! Questioning an investing thesis -- even one of our own -- helps us all think critically about investing and make decisions that help us become smarter, happier, and richer.

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Here's My Top Cryptocurrency to Buy in February - Motley Fool

DOVER, Del., Feb. 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ --METABLAZE, a new DeFi gaming utility token, has announced today that its presale offering will get underway on February 14. METABLAZE plans to disrupt the crypto industry by combining passive rewards, NFTs, and an immersive play-to-earn Role Playing Game (RPG) to emulate the success stories of accomplished crypto projects such as Axie Infinity (AXS), The Sandbox (SAND), Decentraland (MANA), and SafeMoon.

The Ecosystem

Imagine Sandbox and Safemoon combined. METABLAZE: The Newest Metaverse Project with Meta Massive Potential Opens Public Presale February 14th, 2022.

As a deflationary utility token, METABLAZE offers a unique rewards system that looks to deliver continuous and sustainable growth through an innovative Decentralized Application (dApp) called BLAZEdApp. Unlike most reward-based tokens that only offer a single rewards system, METABLAZE offers users two streams of passive income for users. In addition to its native $MBLZ token, the thoughtfully designed BLAZERWARDS mechanism provides a continuous passive income in any BEP20 token. Gamers can also maximize rewards by playing in the BLAZIVERSE, an NFT-based strategy game.

The Next Big NameLike Axie Infinity, The Sandbox, and Decentraland, METABLAZE is entering the multi-billion-dollar blockchain gaming metaverse. METABLAZE gamers andnon-gamersmaintain complete control over their digital identities, accounts, and digital assets. Aside from earning through its robust ecosystem, holders can embrace the lucrative opportunities monetizing through virtual real estate within its gaming metaverse. While exciting users with its immersive play-to-earn game, METABLAZE will take it a step further by developing its metaverse-specific blockchain, called BLAZECHAIN.

SafeMoon is another successful crypto project that resists volatility by rewarding passive users that do nothing more than hold on to their tokens. Built with a unique vision and framework that combines multiple ways to hold-and-earn or play-and-earn, METABLAZE is ready to be unleashed into the crypto market with immense potential to replicate, and even surpass, the success of these ventures.

Looking AheadMETABLAZE started its journey in the last quarter of 2021 and has set an ambitious future roadmap to evolve its ecosystem in a way that will maximize the token value for the benefit of the entire METABLAZE community.

"Big business has been taking over and running the show for way too long, so METABLAZE has turned to the very nature of cryptocurrency to reduce reliance on traditional financial institutions and put more power into the hands of 'the people'. We are truly honored to be sharing the benefits of a fast-growing company with our community," said Michelle German, Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder of METABLAZE.

To find out more about the METABLAZE presale offering, please visit https://metablazetoken.com

METABLAZE is a US-based cryptocurrency company designed for the metaverse with a dual rewards system, play-to-earn gaming, and NFTs. METABLAZE has been thoughtfully designed with long-term, continuous growth and sustainability in mind.

Contact:Mobeen Malik, Media ContactEmail: [emailprotected]

SOURCE METABLAZE

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METABLAZE Aims to Recreate the Success of Top Cryptocurrency Metaverse Projects - PRNewswire

US rapper Gunna has been hit by a furious fan backlash after launching a cryptocurrency that collapsed hours later.

The hip hop star, 29, promoted PushinPETH in a Twitter post urging followers to help send its value "to the moon".

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Furious fans said they had lost their money and blasted the rapper for going silent on the crash.

He deleted his tweet promoting it, and the official @pushinpeth Twitter account was closed down.

Gunna, from Atlanta, launched the cryptocurrency after his "Pushin P" catchphrase went viral last month thanks to a single by he released with Future and Young Thug.

One Monday, Gunna tweeted: "Ay @pushinpeth making a crypto metaverse for us!"

"I know this is gonna fly. IM TAKING THIS TO THE MOON JOIN THE TELEGRAM HERE."

He also tweeted: "I Wunna C Everybody Win !!"

It was unclear who was actually running the scheme, but Gunna himself said it was backed by a mysterious Twitter user called @shanemooncharts.

Shane's account promoted it heavily, and retweeted comments from fans who said they were investing.

One user said: "Putting all my money in P coin pray for me."

It launched on Tuesday night US East Coast time, and briefly spiked in value.

But it had crashed to near zero by Wednesday morning.

It was quickly called out by crypto "sleuth" @zachxbt, who tweeted: "Nice scam @1GunnaGunna didnt even last 8 hrs."

He included a screenshot of the token's performance on TradingView, which showed how it had received an early influx of liquidity how easily crypto can be converted into cash.

But it then quickly plunged in value, which he claimed was potential evidence of a "rug pull" when those behind a scheme suddenly pull out funds and let it collapse.

Gunna's fans slammed him online after the collapse.

Many echoed his own catchphrase, saying: "That ain't P."

P is said to mean positivity, "keeping it real" and generally acceptable behavior.

Gunna deleted his earlier tweets about the crypto, and has not commented on the collapse or the fan backlash.

But last night he tweeted: "They tryna taking to take my kindness for weakness."

The Pushin Peth website is still live, and boasts: "Gunna started a revolution!"

It claims it is "a decentralized movement that offers something unique and never before seen on the blockchain."

A separate Pushin' P twitter account says it will soon be selling NFTs, or non-fungible tokens.

It is not clear if that account is linked to Gunna, but it carries the same branding as the website.

Many other artists and musicians have started offering fans NFTs, unique digital renditions of artworks that cannot be copied.

The NFT market has boomed in recent years, and even Walmart is said to be getting in on the act.

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Five risks of crypto investments

THE Sun's consumer team round up the five major risks of investing in cryptocurrencies:

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Rapper Gunnas new cryptocurrency PushinPETH collapses within HOURS sparking fury from fans... - The Sun

Quick take

Cryptocurrencies are a volatile asset, arguably more so than many other asset classes. Due to the sentiment driven nature of crypto, they are prone to large price adjustments and consequent spikes on volumes through the exchanges.

As an exchange operator, LMAX Group has built both its institutional FX and cryptocurrency execution venues on the same low latency, high throughput institutional grade infrastructure to manage this kind of intense volatility. LMAX Digital, the Groups spot cryptocurrency exchange, frequently experiences and manages high-order rate spikes. Additionally, in the equally fast-moving FX market, it is not uncommon to see several hundred price updates per millisecond in major currency pairs, meaning its technology has to size accordingly for these peaks.

Due to these order rate spikes, crypto exchanges, including those catering to retail investors, tend to suffer during these. One problem is that whilst their infrastructure is effective on human time scales of seconds to minutes, dealing with an order spike of 10-100 millisecond duration is often too short for the scaling systems to react.

Challenging perceptions

With these drawbacks and exchange outages an all-too-common occurrence, the solution may lie in learning a thing or two from traditional market infrastructure.

Cryptocurrency evangelists point to outages as being a fundamental limitation of centralised exchanges, although LMAX Group would argue strongly against this. There are plenty of central financial exchanges quietly powering the global economy with latencies a thousand times better than the crypto household names and with throughputs far more efficient.

LMAX Group has long been providing institutional grade infrastructure to its clients, with 100% uptime and zero outages. Critically, it also displays real time operational service status (including the uptime) for all its exchanges in the public domain.

During the most recent spike in volatility, whereby many exchanges crashed, LMAX Digital continued to operate. Its order latency did not change from a reliable base line of just less than 200s, even while processing 6,000 orders/second, whilst the Groups institutional FX exchange was also processing 60,000 orders/second on what was an unexceptional trading day.

Traditional infrastructure is the foundation to understanding the next iteration of exchanges

As each generation invents the world anew, sometimes the same hard lessons must be relearnt. There is often an assumption touted from the cryptocurrency evangelists that there is nothing to learn from traditional finance infrastructure and blockchain technology will sweep away all that came before.

As large institutions enter and increasingly explore the crypto market, their expectations for robustness shouldnt change from what they expect in trading matured asset classes, such as FX.

The problem also is not centralised exchanges, it is that many nascent crypto exchanges have not learnt the hard lessons of scalability, performance and reliability, central to other asset classes.

LMAX Group therefore believes in cultivating understanding within the institutional community that robust, reliable institutional grade exchange technology exists for trading this nascent asset class.

There are more mainframes now in the world than there were in the 1970s. In truth, new technologies often co-exist and depend on pre-existing technologies. Crypto will supplement and enhance traditional finance, and maybe, learn from it too.

Keep up to date with LMAX Digital, sign-up for the LMAX Digital News Bulletin

2022 The Block Crypto, Inc. All Rights Reserved. This article is provided for informational purposes only. It is not offered or intended to be used as legal, tax, investment, financial, or other advice.

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The Significance of Institutional Grade Infrastructure in Shaping the Future of Cryptocurrency Trading - The Block Crypto

The Washington Legislature took a step closer this week to creating a blockchain work group. Blockchain is an emergent database technology primarily used in cryptocurrency.

Senate Bill 5544 sponsored by state Sen. Sharon Brown, R-Kennewick, and co-sponsored by state Sen. Lynda Wilson, R-Vancouver, was passed Tuesday by the Senate Environment, Energy & Technology Committee. The bill now heads to the Senate Rules Committee before going to the Senate floor for a vote.

The bill would establish the Washington Blockchain Work Group with the purpose of exploring potential applications for the technology, such as utilities, banking, real estate transactions, health care, supply chain management, higher education and public records.

Under the bill, the work group would be comprised of lawmakers, representatives from the departments of commerce and financial institutions and the states Consolidated Technology Services agency, along with private-sector experts and stakeholders.

Brown has said she wants to establish the work group to position Washington as a leader on the technology.

This is such a vibrant economy for the state of Washington. There are so many wonderful blockchain developers here that are doing really great work, and to be clear, its not just cryptocurrency, Brown said during a Jan. 12 hearing before the same committee.

Brown said the work group will examine other industries where blockchain technology can be developed to help advance the industry.

Blockchains are a type of database shared across computer networks. What is different between a typical database and a blockchain is the structure of the data.

A blockchain collects information in groups, or blocks, where a typical database usually structures its data into tables. The blocks have a set limit for storage capacity so when a block is filled, it is closed and linked to the previously filled block. This forms a chain of data known as a blockchain. Any new information that follows the most recent block is compiled into a new block, which will ultimately be added to the chain once filled.

The decentralized and fixed structure of blockchains has played a key role in the development of cryptocurrencies, such as Bitcoin and decentralized finance applications.

Molly Jones, vice president of public policy at the nonprofit Washington Technology Industries Association, was one of several people testifying in support of the bill.

This is a foundational and important step toward growing the blockchain sector in our state, Jones said.

A similar bill from Brown, introduced during the 2020 session, was passed by both the House and Senate but ultimately vetoed by Gov. Jay Inslee at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic.

One area of concern noted by the committee was the energy consumption blockchain technology requires. For example, the process of creating Bitcoin in 2019 had an annual consumption rate of 91 terawatt hours of electricity. Thats nearly the same amount of electricity used by the Philippines that year, which had a population of 108 million.

We use as much energy to do a Google search as we do to fry an egg. We have been increasing our usage of energy dramatically, said state Sen. Lisa Wellman, D-Mercer Island. I believe this is the first time Ive seen energy associated with a specific activity. Perhaps, we should be considering it more with every digital activity we set out there.

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Sen. Wilson co-sponsors measure to boost cryptocurrency technology - The Columbian

Bitcoin (BTC) returned at over $38,000 on the last day of January as selling pressure is apparently wearing off after a rocky start to 2022.

Historically, bitcoin has positive returns in February, which could give traders some hope as technical indicators suggest short-term buyers could stay active around the $35,000-$37,000 support area, but upside looks to be limited toward $45,000. Despite the recent spike in price, some analysts are still skeptical of BTC due to the Biden administration preparing to release an executive order in February to regulate bitcoin as a matter of national security.

It's hard to predict if the new regulations will have a positive or negative impact on the digital coin, so the crypto market remains highly volatile. Even though history points to positive returns in February, bitcoin could end up falling for a third consecutive month.

Bitcoin produced an average return of 12% in February throughout the past nine years. The second month of the calendar finishes with a gain over 85% of the time.

As the crypto market stabilized to end January, investors poured 22.1 million into bitcoin-focused funds last week, the second consecutive week of money inflow into BTC. Despite one of its worst-ever starts to a year, crypto funds saw inflows of $19 million during the seven days through January 28.

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Bitcoin price: Can the cryptocurrency recover in February? - Marca English

One month into 2022 and the debate on cryptocurrency is already heating up, with calls for regulation causing a rift between jurisdictions that are crypto friendly and those that arent. Which will determine the future of the market?

Russian Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Chernyshenko has reportedly signed a roadmap to regulate crypto operations in Russia. The news comes after Russias central bank published a consultation paper that proposed a blanket ban on crypto-related activity in the country.

The paper, titled Cryptocurrencies: Trends, Risks, and Regulation, states a wider adoption of cryptocurrencies creates significant risks for the Russian financial market. It says non-state-based currencies pose a threat to citizens well-being, through loss of investments as a result of market volatility, scams and cyber attacks.

Jurisdictions have grappled with the idea decentralised digital currencies provide an alternative to sovereign currency and thus pose a threat to central banks power over monetary policy.

Although Russia has stopped short of completely stifling operations inside its borders, the latest events follow a broader trend of nations struggling to embrace cryptocurrency. Future bans or regulations will determine the future of the industry.

China has banned cryptocurrency trading multiple times. An outright ban on crypto mining last year was a massive loss to the industry, as most crypto mining happened in China.

Mining involves running software on computer servers to solve cryptographic algorithms. This process validates transactions and maintains a shared record of transactions across the blockchain network. People who participate, the miners are automatically rewarded in cryptocurrency.

Mining is an international industry, and large capital outlay goes towards the land, power and infrastructure needed to set up mining warehouses.

Read more: Why is Bitcoin's price at an all-time high? And how is its value determined?

The mining ban in China drove miners to sell or ship their equipment overseas and invest capital in friendlier jurisdictions, particularly the United States. One consequence was the strengthening of the network, as mining operations were diversified. As such, future bans may have less of an effect on the market.

Currently, most Bitcoin mining occurs in the US, Kazakhstan, Russia, Canada, Malaysia and Iran. Some networks face great challenges. In Kazakhstan, for instance, power has reportedly been rationed away from miners to conserve energy during electricity shortages, forcing miners to leave the country.

Reports estimate this will cost Kazakhstans economy US$1.5 billion (or A$2.14 billion) over the next five years, including US$300 million in tax revenue.

Crypto has come a long way since Bitcoins anonymous launch in 2009. There are now thousands of cryptocurrencies, with an estimated total market cap of US$1.66 trillion (about A$2.36 trillion).

Its often stated, including in the recent report from Russias central bank, that the anonymity of cryptocurrencies enables illegal activity such as money laundering, terrorism financing and drug trade.

This isnt entirely true. In fact transaction history on public blockchains, such as Bitcoin and Ethereum (the largest by market capitalisation), is public.

Many governments (including those of Australia and the US) collaborate with large private blockchain analytics firms to monitor citizens crypto wallet addresses and transactions. They do this to mitigate risks of money laundering and tax evasion.

Read more: Around the world, regulators are realising Bitcoin is money

Contrary to popular belief, most cryptocurrencies arent anonymous; they are pseudonymous. If a persons identity is linked to their wallet address via a central touch point, such as a cryptocurrency exchange or an email, that wallet is traceable to the individual.

Research (commissioned by Zcash but carried out by the Rand corporation) found there isnt widespread illicit use of privacy coins preserving users anonymity.

Cryptocurrency continues to become increasingly mainstream as an investment asset class, technological infrastructure and a social experiment in non-state-based infrastructure.

With this, crypto communities hold growing influence in public policy debates. For example, crypto advocates were able to slow down a major federal government infrastructure bill in the US last year.

Yet jurisdictions are choosing different pathways regarding policy and regulation. Some such as China and Russia view it as a fiscal and ideological challenge to sovereign monies. Others view it as an opportunity for innovation, investment and economic growth.

As different approaches emerge, 2022 may be a defining year for both the crypto industry and those competing to either ban or welcome it.

Past examples suggest countries that welcome crypto networks reap economic benefits through innovation, investment, jobs and taxes. Business benefits of adopting crypto as a digital asset include access to new demographics and technological efficiencies in treasury management.

At the same time, the effects of policy and regulation on the industry demonstrates cryptocurrency isnt a completely decentralised thing that exists only on the blockchain.

In the competition to limit but benefit from cryptocurrency, Australia has emerged as a potential destination of crypto friendliness. A report published in October by the Senate Select Committee on Australia as a Technology and Financial Centre looks favourably on cryptocurrencies.

It proposes market licensing for crypto exchanges, streamlined taxation arrangements and a regulatory structure for decentralised autonomous organisations, or DAOs. These function using the same philosophy of self-governance as decentralised cryptocurrency networks, using blockchain technology and cryptocurrency tokens to manage participation and enforce rules.

Australias choice is to capture the enormous economic potential of decentralised digital assets. How this will impact the national economy remains to be seen. But if history is a lesson to be learned from, we can expect policy to shape outcomes.

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Cryptocurrency has an impact on economies. That's why some are afraid of it and some welcome it - The Conversation AU

Bitcoin exchange rate graphic illustration

President Joe Biden told United States federal agencies to regulate cryptocurrencies and other digital assets, like NFTs. Biden maintains that regulating this fast-growing industry is so important that it's become a matter of national security. It's an interesting point of time for this action, as the crypto market is going through a tumultuous time, losing large amounts of value for its investors.

Regulatory bodies, such as theSecurities and Exchange Commission,the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, Internal Revenue Service and FINRA, will likely coordinate their investigations, audits and examinations. Theyll also review whether or not tokens should be considered and registered as securities.

So far, the likelihood of regulation and the recent crash in the value of bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies has not yet affected the rich total compensation packages offered by cryptocurrency firms, according to an analysis by the professional social network Blind.

The compensation is highly competitive at cryptocurrency exchanges. They also tend to offer remote work options and other great benefits. Typical total compensation packages at bitcoin and cryptocurrency exchanges usually offer employees equity, stock options and restricted stock unitswhich could result in future windfalls, if the firm does well.

According to self-reported salary data listed on Blind, here is what people say they earn working in the cryptocurrency space at a top exchange. These numbers are for engineers. The compensation for other professionals, managers and executives may escalate even higher:

The demand for talent for bitcon, digital assets, NFTs and related platforms is blazing hot. A search on LinkedIns job site for crypto yields 15,433 results in the U.S. There were 4,656 listings for bitcoin jobs and 6,381 for NFTs. The site, unfortunately, doesnt disclose the compensation on most of the job listings.

Companies, in an effort to attract and recruit talent, are offering higher wages, sign-on bonuses, remote, hybrid and flexible workstyles, one-on-one mentoring and free college tuition. There is another sweetener that some businesses are considering to attract people to join their firmspaying in bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies.

In 2021, we saw digital assets go parabolic. The number of new crypto projects and the incredible rise in value of the asset class caught America and the worlds attention. To some people, purchasing digital assets was viewed as a hedge against the U.S. dollar thats being devalued, due to rising inflation and questionable policies from the federal government and Federal Reserve bank. Other folks, especially young people, saw cryptocurrencies as a YOLO (you-only-live-once) trade that could make them rich quickly.

Burdened with heavy college tuition debt payments, exorbitant apartment and home prices, coupled with an alarming inflation rate raising the price of everything, digital assets seemed like the only way to get ahead financially.

If you get paid in U.S. dollars, as inflation increases, the value of your paycheck decreases. Recent data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics highlights rising costs. The consumer price index in September spiked 5.4% higher in 2021. The growth was so fast and furious that the U.S. government called for a nearly 6% cost-of-living increase for people on Social Security. This was the largest hike in four decades. Inflation has surged by 7%.

We are seeing signs of change in payments. Miami Mayor Francis Suarez said he would take a paycheck 100% in Bitcoin and will also offer cryptocurrencies to public employees too.Eric Adams, the new Mayor of New York City, similarly announced that hes looking into paying people in bitcoin and other digital assets, and will accept his first three paychecks in bitcoin. Sports stars Russell Okung, Odell Beckham Jr. and Aaron Rodgers have all said they will be paid, at least in part, in crypto, according to Bloomberg.

If you accept a salary in crypto, you have to have a strong stomach and be comfortable with seeing strong gains, along with scary plunges in value. Payment in cryptocurrency is not without risk. There is a lot of volatility in this space.

In 2021, the price of bitcoin hit $67,000 and subsequently plunged to under $30,000, and then bounced back again. Ethereum saw record highs of around$4,800 on December 1, only to see it trade lower at around $3,600 to $3,900. If you were paid in bitcoin, ethereum or other coins at a high point and then the price cratered,you will owe taxes based on the higher value you were paid.

For people who ardently believe in the future of crypto, are open to volatility and risk and have a long-term time horizon, payment in Bitcoin may be an exciting new way to enhance your wealth.

Beckham signed a one-year deal with a base salary of $750,000 and bonuses that could bump it up to $4.25 million. The NFL wide receiver said was taking his entire salary in bitcoin. He reportedly converted a $750,000 paycheck into bitcoin, and may have lost the equivalent of almost $350,000, according to an analysis from MarketWatch. While the price of bitcoin has since somewhat rebounded, it hasn't fully recovered and remains extremely unpredictable.

It could turn out that bitcoin surges and his next check will be substantially higher. Beckham most likely could afford the wild swings. For others, it's a cautionary tale to be careful about the vicissitudes of cryptocurrencies and converting your cash salary into highly volatile and largely unregulated digital tokens.

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People Working At Bitcoin And Cryptocurrency Exchanges Can Earn More Than $1 Million A Year - Forbes