United Kingdom car manufacturer Jaguar Land Rover will use blockchain network Iota to reward drivers with cryptocurrency for data reporting, the companies confirmed in a press release on April 29. Part of a plan to gather better information on road conditions and vehicle performance, Jaguar will distribute Iota’s Iota tokens to Smart Wallets tied to participating drivers. The drivers will then be able to redeem them for various products including road tolls and even coffee, Jaguar says. “In the future an autonomous car could drive itself to a charging station, recharge and pay, while its owner could choose to participate …

This article has been updated to include Liverpool’s denial of the Tron partnership. Tron CEO Justin Sun said in a tweet on April 24 that the Tron Foundation, the firm behind the 11th biggest cryptocurrency Tron (TRON), will reportedly partner with British professional football club Liverpool. However, a Liverpool spokesperson reportedly told Decrypt Media that “Liverpool Football Club has confirmed that it does not have a partnership with Tron.” While Sun did not include any specific details about the nature of the upcoming partnership — which has since been denied — the tweet features a short video invitation from Liverpool …

Corporate Traveller, the largest travel management firm in the United Kingdom, is now accepting Bitcoin (BTC) for payments, according to a press release on April 15. A newly announced partnership with crypto payments company BitPay will allow Corporate Traveller — which provides business travel management services to SME companies — to accept bitcoins. Andy Hegley, U.K. General Manager at Corporate Traveller said: “We identified an increasing demand from our clients for the option to pay in bitcoin for business travel bookings made by our travel consultants. We chose BitPay to manage our merchant processing because they make it easy and …

This article has been corrected to reflect that the money raised was in collaboration with the Turquoise platform in a test environment, and not on the LSE’s Turquoise platform itself. United Kingdom-based blockchain startup 2030.io has raised $3.9 million in collaboration with a platform owned by the London Stock Exchange (LSE), according to a press release shared with Cointelegraph on April 15. Known as Twenty Thirty or 20|30, the startup has reportedly secured 3 million British pounds (GBP) by selling tokenized shares and settling them in a test environment on LSE-owned equity trading platform Turquoise. In July 2018, 20|30 became …

94% of endowments have been allocating to crypto-related investments throughout 2018, a new survey published on April 12 reveals. The study was conducted in Q4 2018 by trade publications Global Custodian and The Trade Crypto, in partnership with blockchain security firm BitGo. Out of 150 surveyed endowments, 89% of the respondents were reportedly based in the United States, with the rest either in the United Kingdom or Canada. The survey indicated that despite widely-reported concerns around regulation, custody and liquidity, endowments will continue to allocate investments to the new asset class — with only 7% of respondents saying they anticipated …

Major American cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase has launched Coinbase Card, that enables its United Kingdom-based customers to pay in-store and online with cryptocurrency. The development was announced in a blog post published on April 10. The Coinbase Card is a Visa debit card powered by customers’ Coinbase account crypto balances, which allows them to make purchases with digital currencies worldwide. Coinbase instantly converts customers' cryptocurrency funds into fiat currency in order to complete the purchase. Coinbase also released the Coinbase Card app for iOS and Android, which links customers’ Coinbase accounts with the app and allows them to choose a particular …

Princess Eugenie of the United Kingdom and United States anti-human trafficking Ambassador John Richmond recently spoke in favor of using new technology like phone apps and blockchain to address human trafficking, Reuters reports on April 8. At a conference in Vienna, Austria hosted by the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE), experts noted that increased internet usage has expanded the ability of traffickers to exploit potential targets. However, Princess Eugenie — the granddaughter of Queen Elizabeth — reportedly noted that technology could also help fight trafficking. Eugenie, who founded the Anti-Slavery Collective in Britain in 2017, said: “I …

Two major United Kingdom banks — Barclays and Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) — have joined a trial using blockchain to streamline real estate purchasing after rethinking the technology’s potential, Bloomberg reported on April 4. The trial, which involved a total of 40 participants, used a tool from Instant Property Network (IPN), a startup using enterprise blockchain group R3’s Corda platform. Introducing blockchain into the real estate exchange arena worldwide could result in savings of $160 billion, IPN told Bloomberg, with the previously skeptical banks appearing to warm to this specific use case for blockchain. “We are near the end …

Major American cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase has revealed details of its insurance coverage for its hot wallet crypto holdings, reportedly covering a $255 million limit via a Lloyd’s of London-registered broker. The details were disclosed in an official blog post from Coinbase’s Chief Information Security Officer (CISO) Philip Martin on April 2. According to Martin, Coinbase has held an insurance policy covering its hot wallet crypto holdings since mid-November 2013, in particular to protect against what the exchange identifies as being the highest-risk consumer loss scenario in the crypto space — theft by hacking. Martin’s post outlines that Coinbase currently holds: …

Only 14 percent of 216 global crypto exchanges were confirmed as being licensed by regulators, regulatory technology (regtech) startup Coinfirm found in its crypto exchange risk report released on March 27. Coinfirm, а London-based regulatory tech firm for digital currencies and blockchain, studied 216 global cryptocurrency exchanges to outline the key risks that can be associated with each platform, as well as to assist monitors in developing necessary regulatory frameworks. The analyzed exchanges reportedly represent more than 90 percent of global crypto market activity. In the study, Coinfirm evaluated the exchanges into seven categories of risk, including license and authorization, …

United Kingdom-based global metals trading mecca the London Metals Exchange (LME) is reportedly backing an effort to disrupt industry supply chains with blockchain, but would not confirm its involvement, the Financial Times (FT) reported on March 27. Citing unnamed sources familiar with the alleged plan, FT reported that LME is supportive of an international plan to use blockchain in order for the metals industry to increase transparency around its operations. The participants include Swiss metals giant Mercuria in the role of leader, with banks ING and Macquarie also on board. Dubbed “Forcefield,” the reported blockchain-based solution would also allow the …

Monday, March 25 — crypto markets have continued trading sideways, with Bitcoin (BTC) holding the $4,000 threshold at press time, according to data from CoinMarketCap. Most of the top 20 cryptocurrencies by market cap are in the red today, with Cardano (ADA) dropping by more than 4 percent to press time, while Tezos (XTZ) is up almost 5.7 percent over the past 24 hours to press time. Bitcoin has been stable over the day, seeing a slight decline of around 0.2 percent at press time. The biggest cryptocurrency is trading at $4,020, which is a 0.1 decline over the past …