Global investment bank RBC Capital Markets believes that Facebook’s upcoming crypto project will be a major milestone in the firm’s history, CNBC reports June 14. In a note to investors, RBC Capital analysts Mark Mahaney and Zachary Schwartzman reportedly said that Facebook’s long-rumored stablecoin project “may prove to be one of the most important initiatives in the history of the company.” A part of the Royal Bank of Canada (RBC), RBC Capital predicted that the social media giant’s cryptocurrency project will “unlock new engagement and revenue streams.” According to the report, RBC Capital expects the project’s white paper to be …

A “next-generation” mobile payment protocol has unveiled new features — including “incentives” for users who own and run the nodes that perform vital roles on its network, including the verification of transactions. Crypto.com says the new program is a result of a partnership with Allnodes, which is offering its hosting services for the platform. Users who want to participate can either get involved through the Crypto.com Wallet app, or via Allnodes. The Hong Kong-headquartered company, which was founded in 2016, says the native blockchain powering its Crypto.com Pay service delivers “instant, seamless, secure and cost-efficient” transactions for merchants and crypto …

Former Wall Street executive and current blockchain researcher Tone Vays has expressed skepticism about the fact that crypto winter is over. Vays made his comments in an interview with Cointelegraph on June 10. Vays, a former financial analyst at United States’ banking giant JPMorgan, revealed that he does not trust the recent rally in the crypto markets, claiming that he has not observed “too much external money coming into the space.” The blockchain consultant argued that the recent reverse of a long-lasting bear market was supported by internal capital, stating that there is evidence of enough accumulation by those who …

Global retail giant Walmart is expanding its blockchain expertise by joining blockchain-powered pharmaceutical consortium MediLedger, industry media outlet CoinDesk reports on June 3. Walmart is reportedly planning to roll out a pilot project to track pharmaceutical products using MediLedger technology with the United States Food and Drug Administration in early June. By joining the consortium, Walmart has followed four major American pharmaceutical companies including Pfizer Inc., which joined MediLedger in early May, to collaborate on the development of a blockchain network for the health and pharmaceutical industry. Pfizer, along with McKesson Corporation, AmerisourceBergen Corporation and Premier Inc. officially announced that …

The co-founder at Hong Kong-based blockchain investment firm Kenetic has predicted that bitcoin (BTC) will rally as high as $30,000 by the end of 2019. Kenetic Capital’s Jehan Chu provided his stance on major issues around bitcoin in an interview with “Bloomberg Markets: Asia” published on May 28. According to Chu, bitcoin will continue its bullish direction along with the rest of crypto market in 2019 due to three main factors, including the drive of mass adoption by global giants such as Facebook, JPMorgan, Rakuten and Fidelity, who have recently turned their interest towards crypto. Chu added that his bullish …

The biggest cryptocurrency, bitcoin (BTC), has hit an all-time high versus the Argentine peso amid the ongoing decline of the currency, Financial Times (FT) reports on May 27. According to the report, the bitcoin price has soared to as high as 394,000 pesos ($8,762.95 at press time) per coin, exceeding prices versus the Argentine peso not seen since the bubble in late 2017. Bitcoin price against Argentine peso since 2017. Source: BitcoinAverage The new all-time high of bitcoin versus the peso takes place amid a crypto bull market this year, along with the ongoing depreciation of the Argentine peso against …

Blockchain browser Brave is testing a new tipping function for social media platform Twitter on its Nightly version, it announced in a tweet on May 23. The post reads that users of Brave Nightly — the testing and development version of blockchain-based browser that blocks ads and website trackers — will have access to the browser’s new feature for tipping tweets with the Brave Rewards program. The feature is designed to award content creators with Brave native digital tokens, basic attention tokens (BAT). A related announcement on the project’s website provides a detailed explanation of the tipping feature: “When you …

Emin Gun Sirer, a professor at Cornell University and a major global blockchain expert, will launch his own cryptocurrency and blockchain network, Bloomberg reported on May 16. Sirer, the creator of the first crypto based on proof-of-work (PoW) — Karma System — is now planning to launch a blockchain network that he touts as running as many transactions per second as payment giant Visa. Having raised $6 million from major investors such as Andreessen Horowitz, Polychain and MetaStable in February, Sirer’s Ava Labs has reportedly launched a private test version of the Ava network on May 16, while the public …

American digital asset manager Grayscale Investments reported a 42% growth in its product inflows in Q1 2019 over the previous quarter, the firm announced in a new financial report on May 13. Grayscale was specifically bullish on major cryptocurrency bitcoin (BTC), reporting that the vast majority of investments in Q1 2019 were in its Bitcoin Investment Trust (BIT). According to the report, Grayscale Bitcoin Trust secured $3.2 million in average weekly investment out of total average weekly investment of $3.3 million. As such, non-bitcoin investment products amounted to less than $0.1 million, the firm wrote. Non-bitcoin investments include such products …

Bakkt plans to roll out testing for bitcoin futures trading in early July 2019, Bakkt CEO Kelly Loeffler announced in a Medium post on May 13. First announced in August 2018, institutional crypto exchange Bakkt now announced that it will soon introduce bitcoin futures trading testing on a federally regulated futures exchange in collaboration with its parent company Intercontinental Exchange (ICE). Specifically, Bakkt is working with both ICE Futures U.S. exchange and ICE Clear U.S. clearinghouse to prepare the first testing of bitcoin futures trading and custody. Loeffler wrote: “In conjunction with our exchange and clearing partners at ICE, we’ll …

A British government-led jurisdiction team has launched a public consultation to determine the status of crypto assets under English private law, according to an official statement on May 9. In the document, the United Kingdom Jurisdiction Taskforce (UKJT) stated that the existing legal uncertainty around the crypto industry is a major reason for a lack of confidence by investors. The UKJT, one of the six taskforces of the LawTech Delivery Panel (LTDP), brings together the Judiciary and the Law Commission of England and Wales, as well as tech and legal experts. As the document notes, the U.K. Financial Conduct Authority …

A new blockchain trading platform says its secure, reliable infrastructure enables users “to stay ahead of market movements and manage risk and loss like never before.” As well as supporting a wide range of mainstream cryptocurrencies such as bitcoin, ether and litecoin, Bcnex says it is constantly expanding its offering to other quality tokens. In its white paper, the startup says that it wants to offer an antidote to the problems that currently blight crypto exchanges: weak technical architecture, a lack of liquidity, poor customer service and inadequate security. Bcnex says its platform is built upon an institutional-grade trading engine …