Circle Internet Financial Ltd. is launching a USD-backed digital token dubbed the “USD Coin,” Circle’s blog reports Wednesday, September 26. A consortium called Centre — which includes Bitmain Technologies Ltd. among its members — will act as a platform for deposits and fiat conversions for the stablecoin. Bloomberg notes that although Centre is a “wholly owned subsidiary of Circle,” there are plans in plan to turn it into an independent organization. The USD Coin (USDC) will reportedly be available on Circle’s Poloniex exchange, as well as Huobi, OKCoin, KuCoin, and digital wallet and exchange Coinbase. As per Circle’s release, over …

As Cointelegraph reported on Sept. 10, with the approval of the New York Department of Financial Services (NYDFS), Paxos and Gemini officially announced the introduction of two stablecoins called the “Gemini dollar (GUSD)” and the “Paxos Standard (PAX).” Both stablecoins are backed by the U.S. dollar on a 1:1 basis, with every unit of GUSD and PAX representing the value of one U.S. dollar. Experts believe that the emergence of fully audited, legitimate and licensed stablecoins will have a profound impact on the crypto market, especially in the long-term, as it provides investors a way to retain value without being …

A University of Berkeley professor has claimed stablecoins are a “myth” in a new critique published Tuesday, September 11. Taking the emerging market sector, which includes well-known assets such as Tether (USDT), to task, Professor of Economics Barry Eichengreen argues that stablecoins are not automatically “viable” just because they are pegged to reserves of, for example, fiat currency. Eichengreen writes that “conventional cryptocurrencies, such as Bitcoin, trade at wildly fluctuating prices, which means that their purchasing power – their command over goods and services – is highly unstable,” adding: “Stable coins purport to solve these problems. Because their value is …

Chinese traders are using virtual private networks (VPNs) as a major tool to circumvent the ongoing government crackdown on cryptocurrency trading, local media outlet South China Morning Post (SCMP) reported September 8. According to SCMP, referencing reports from Beijing-affiliated Shanghai Securities Times, traders have begun leveraging stablecoin Tether (USDT) as a means of entering and exiting cryptocurrency markets. Combined with a VPN, two traders can use an exchange platform notionally registered outside China as an intermediary to swap cryptocurrency for fiat currency and vice versa. “[T]wo individuals who have both completed a ‘know-your-customer’ procedure with an exchange would swap ‘fiat’ …

Ethereum cofounder Joseph Lubin said on Yahoo Finance’s Final Round August 28, that he doubts manipulation accusations against stablecoin Tether (USDT). Founded in 2014, Tether was “the first” blockchain-powered platform that allows for the tokenization of fiat-backed cryptocurrencies. In June, after the publication of a study conducted by analysts from the University of Texas, USDT fell under suspicion of Bitcoin (BTC) price manipulation in 2017, when the BTC price surged to an all-time high of $20,000. The paper claims that “purchases with Tether are timed following market downturns and result in sizable increases in Bitcoin prices.” While many cryptocurrency enthusiasts …

Monday, August 27: crypto markets have seen another recovery attempt, with all of the top 20 coins by market cap in the green, according to data from CoinMarketCap. After suffering a slump yesterday, crypto markets are back to green, with IOTA (MIOTA), Cardano (ADA), and EOS (EOS) seeing the biggest gains among the top 10 coins, while Bitcoin (BTC) has broken back above the $6,700 point. Most of the top ten coins are seeing only slight gains between 1 and 2 percent on the day. Market visualization from Coin360 The top cryptocurrency Bitcoin is trading at $6,744 at press time, …

New issuances of stablecoin Tether (USDT) are not currently affecting the prices of either major cryptocurrencies or smaller altcoins, Bloomberg reports August 24. In the article, Bloomberg noted that the allegations that Tether has been used to manipulate or stabilize the price of Bitcoin (BTC) — previously put forward in a paper from the University of Texas — are not holding true for the crypto markets this August. The paper, published in mid-June, had claimed that Bitcoin reached its all-time high of $20,000 due to price manipulation involving both Tether and sixth largest crypto exchange Bitfinex, which is reportedly “the …

Tether (USDT) has issued new tokens worth $50 million on August 11, according to block explorer OmniExplorer. In late March, Tether had released 300 mln USDT tokens priced at $1 per token. Over the past 30 days, Tether’s market capitalization lost around $300 million, down from $2.7 billion in mid-July to the current $2.4 billion, according CoinMarketCap. Tether market cap 1 month chart. Source: Coinmarketcap Tether is now in second place after Bitcoin (BTC) in terms of highest daily trading volumes, seeing $4.2 billion in trades a day or 28.16 percent of all crypto trades, while Bitcoin’s average 24-hour trading …

Huobi, currently the world’s third largest crypto exchange by daily trading volumes, is set to support Indian rupee (INR) transactions on its proprietary peer-to-peer trading platform, according to an email cited by Crypto News India July 26. Huobi, whose over-the-counter (OTC) service will reportedly offer Indian users zero-fee trading on Bitcoin (BTC), Ethereum (ETH), and Tether (USDT) using rupees, noted in the email that: “We do think it’s time that we provide a solution of buying/selling digital assets with INR for all Indian users...every registered Indian user of Huobi can log in to https://otc.huobi.com to trade digital assets with INR.” …

Bitcoin’s (BTC) price continued to hold above $8,000 on Monday, July 30, as the rest of market saw slight losses across the board. Market visualization from Coin360 Data from Cointelegraph’s price tracker and Coin360 reveals a modest comedown for Bitcoin through the day, falling almost 1 percent over a 24 hour period to trade at around $8,110 by press time. The top cryptocurrency reports around 28 percent growth over the last month. Bitcoin weekly price chart. Source: Cointelegraph Bitcoin Price Index Bitcoin’s price had remained relatively steady over the weekend, after briefly dipping below $8,000 after the news that the …

Sunday, July 29: crypto markets have seen diverging trends over a 24 hour period, with nine out of the ten top cryptocurrencies by market cap slightly in the green, according to Coinmarketcap. Market visualization from Coin360 Bitcoin (BTC) is slightly up by less than one percent over the past 24 hours and is trading at around $8,206 at press time, with an intraday high of $8,285. The major cryptocurrency reached as high as $8,431 this week, following the crypto market rebound that started in mid-July. Holding the some of the biggest gains among the top ten coins over the past …

Cryptocurrency startup Tether Limited has appointed a former AML Quality Control Manager at the Bank of Montreal (BMO) to lead the company’s regulatory compliance efforts, according to an announcement published July 12. The company behind cryptocurrency Tether (USDT) has hired Leonardo Real as Chief Compliance Officer. Real was previously responsible for establishing practices, policies, and procedures in accordance with regulatory requirements to improve the quality of Canadian BMO’s anti-money laundering (AML) investigations. Additionally, Real has experience dealing in stocks and futures trading. Real commented on the new appointment: “I look forward to helping showcase Tether’s commitment to transparency and regulatory …