Is the ROI of Conventional Cryptocurrency Mining Farms making them obsolete?

Friends, any commercial entity – large or small – needs to have a long-term positive Return on Investment to succeed. The Cryptocurrency mining ROI comes down to the cost of energy consumption (and hardware) vs. the market value of the currency. With more and more energy required to generate Bitcoin, Litecoin, and Dash we have seen the rise of mining farms and pools such as Ghash.io and Slush. Meanwhile, some crypto theorists have proposed newer and most cost-efficient algorithms like DigiByte and DigiShield. Many believe all roads point to China’s Bitmain yet are weary of the increasing centralized control of Jihan Wu. A new model for Cryptocurrency creation is needed as we look toward second and third generation currencies. But what is the bona fide solution? Share your thoughts today! Lawrence, CryptocurrencyAcademy (https://cryptocurrencyacademy.blogspot.com)

Will the Centralized Blockchain Model Proposed by the PBoC Be Applicable Outside of China?

Friends, to no one’s surprise the Peoples Bank of China (PBoC) has strongly advocated a highly centralized approach to BlockChain implementation. The PBoC digital currency research institute leader Yao Qian believes that is impossible to exercise decentralized, informal Blockchain governance on a scale befitting the world’s 2^nd largest economy and the world’s most populous nation. His solution is for the Blockchain to have a central governor. Yao seeks the benefits of distributed ledger technology (DLT) while maintaining a centralized governance structure. In addition, Wang Pengjie, from the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), suggests that the PBOC and the China Securities Regulatory Commission (CSRC) should create a Blockchain and digital asset management “approval system,” as well as raised the possibility of establishing a digital asset trading platform at a national level. Bottom line: Given the vast advantages Blockchain offers will a heavily centralized and controlled ecosystem for this technology thwart or facilitate its growth and benefits for the PRC? A secondary question concerns whether such a model is viable outside the PRC’s centrally planned economy and financial system. Send us your comments today. Lawrence, CryptocurrencyAcademy (https://cryptocurrencyacademy.blogspot.com)

Can the Aramco Coin Concept be applied to Other Global Commodities?

Friends, the Aramco coin has its origins from the idea of having a strong currency that has a backing on raw materials … namely crude oil. Aramco has dual headquarters in Saudi Arabia and the UK. The ARM digital coin ICO will begin with 3 phases 1) Phase I - Pre-sale on April 24th, 2018. The pre-sale will run until May 8th, 2018. The incentive for investors during this time is a 15% bonus on all purchases. 2) Phase II - -1 sale on May 9th 2018. The Stage-1 sale will run until May 23th 2018. The incentive for investors during this time is a 10% bonus on all purchases, and 3) Phase 3 -2 sale on May 24th 2018. The Stage-2 sale will run until June 7th 2018. The central question is whether other ARM-like Cryptocurrencies backed by specific commodities or raw materials such as natural gas, copper or platinum are viable – even as niche markets and applications – in the global economy? Let us know your comments. Lawrence, CryptocurrencyAcademy (https://cryptocurrencyacademy.blogspot.com)

Is the Basic Attention Token the solution for Blockchain Digital Advertising?

Friends, digital advertising is one of the next frontiers for Blockchain technology adoption and transformation as we look beyond the Cryptocurrency arena. The Basic Attention Token (BAT) employs the Ethereum Blockchain to issue and distribute its tokens. Some interesting changes will be coming to Basic Attention Token including improved anti-fraud measures and dashboard analytics are coming to publishers and users shortly along with scaling real ad revenue. The BAT team wants to integrate Basic Attention Token into even more applications based on open-source projects with ad buying leverage. Publishers are penalized by who Google and Facebook take 73% of all ad dollars and 99% of all growth. And upwards of 50% of the average user’s mobile data is for ads and trackers carrying a hidden cost of north of $20 USD per month. Bottom line: While there may be no solver bullet solution, can BAT materially help reduce costs and make digital advertising more cost-efficient and relevant for publishers and users alike? Send us know your comments. Lawrence, Cryptocurrency Academy

How Will the Use of Sidechains Benefit Blockchain Implementation?

Friends, sidechains are separate Blockchains which are attached to its parent Blockchain using a two-way peg. The two-way peg enables interchangeability of assets at a predetermined rate between the parent Blockchain and the sidechain. The parent Blockchain is commonly referred to as the ‘main chain’ and all additional Blockchains are referred to as ‘sidechains’. Any transactions occurring on a sidechain can be picked up by nodes on the main chain to record it. Every sidechain will trust the main chain for cross-chain transactions of any kind. Mounting transaction fees and growing confirmation delays have been problems for quite some time now. The developers of Ethereum Classic wish to avoid these issues with the help of a sidechain protocol, rather than an on-chain block size increase a la Bitcoin Cash. Bottom line: Will the continued use of sidechains benefit Blockchain integrity and adoption?  Our belief is yes they will until such time as a new mechanism is developed to test new functionality without putting the parent Blockchain at risk. Let us know your comments. Lawrence, Cryptocurrency Academy (https://cryptocurrencyacademy.blogspot.com)

Energy Consumption and Carbon Emissions Remain the Achilles Heel of Mass Cryptocurrency Adoption.

Friends, although total Bitcoin (or Cryptocurrency) energy consumption is unlikely to usurp global energy availability anytime in the foreseeable future, technologists and entrepreneurs alike who are staking their futures on second and third gen Cryptocurrencies must address this issue if the crypto sector is to grow and flourish. What is the root cause? Many experts point to trust-minimizing consensus has been enabled by the proof-of-work algorithm. Users in a network send each other digital tokens. The decentralized ledger gathers all the transactions into blocks. However, care should be taken to confirm the transactions and arrange blocks. While one could write a dissertation on the PoW algorithm, the preeminent challenge is to either reconstruct or replace the current algorithm with a mechanism which both mitigates trust minimizing censuses building and greatly reduces the computing energy requirements for performing a viable PoW alternative algorithm. And yes, a future Nobel Prize in Economics or Physics likely awaits the savant who solves this dilemma. How close are we to resolving this matter? Our estimate is 6-10+ years. Let us know your comments! Lawrence, Cryptocurrency Academy (https://cryptocurrencyacademy.blogspot.com)

Can Basis Provide the Price Stability with a Viable Peg and an Algorithmic Central Bank Needed to Succeed?

Friends, lack of price stability, a legitimate peg and an algorithmic central bank with fixed currency supply have been major shortcoming of first gen cryptocurrency leaders Bitcoin, Ethereum and Litecoin. Enter Basis … a second generation cryptocurrency purpose-built to overcome these limitations and offer greater accountability to the economies of developing nations. Basis addresses currency expansion and contraction via a three-token system including Base Shares, Basecoin and Base Bonds. Initially Basis will be pegged to the US dollar using simple supply and demand to manage the price of its currency. When too many people want Basis, the protocol increases the supply of the currency. It does the opposite when demand is weak. Basis is backed by an impressive list of investors and advisors such as Lightspeed Venture Partners, former Federal Reserve governor Kevin Warsh, hedge fund manager Stan Druckenmiller, Bain Capital Ventures and respected VC Andreessen Horowitz. Only time will tell if Basis will succeed. Our key takeaway is that Basis does represent a highly credible move beyond the “wild west” of first gen cryptocurrencies and deserves a serious look as a viable payment method. Let us know your comments! Lawrence, Cryptocurrency Academy (https://cryptocurrencyacademy.blogspot.com)

Taking a Fresh Look at Cryptocurrency Wallets

Friends, many newcomers to Cryptocurrency trading ask the fundamental question of which Wallet is best for me? There are a myriad of Wallets on the market today including Jaxx, TLDR, Trezor, KeepKey, Nano Ledger S, MyEtherWallet, Coinbase, and Electrum to name a few. Whether software, hardware or paper Wallets the central issue is what are your needs and goals for a Crypto Wallet? And yes, as second and third generation Cryptocurrencies come to market we are likely to see new Wallet genres emerge. Key factors here include are your trading one (or more Cryptocurrencies), how many transactions do you plan to make over the next month, year or beyond, and what are your security requirements. Your answers to these questions will generally guide you to the Wallet category and even brand that will fulfill your needs. TechWorm offers up three guidelines that will help you make the best choice: First, Hot Wallets – Web Wallets and Self-Hosted Wallets – are connected to the Internet and are considered less secure. Second, always create a seed phrase or private key back-up (electronic, paper, etc.) And third, use Cold Storage Wallets which are not Internet-connected for storing large numbers of keys … and in turn larger values of Cryptocurrencies. Hope this helps. Let us know your comments! Lawrence, Cryptocurrency Academy (https://cryptocurrencyacademy.blogspot.com)

Assessing the Impact of Hard and Soft Forks in Blockchain Adoption

Friends, hard and soft forks create significant uncertainty, as they have the potential to fragment the power of the Blockchain network into lots of variants. They are also likely to be necessary, as without the capacity to update the Software, the Blockchain is unlikely to be future proof. Hard forks create a fork in the Blockchain: one path follows the new, upgraded Blockchain, and the other path continues along the old path. Generally, after a short period of time, those on the old chain will realize that their version of the Blockchain is outdated or irrelevant and quickly upgrade to the latest version. Hard fork can be implemented to reverse transactions (e.g. the DAO decentralized autonomous organization for Bitcoin or Ethereum), add new functionality, correct important security risks found in older versions of the software, to add new functionality, or to reverse transactions. Thus, should Blockchain hard forks be viewed with skepticism or as a tool for enhancing the integrity and quality of the given Blockchain? Share your comments with us today! Lawrence, Cryptocurrency Academy (https://cryptocurrencyacademy.blogspot.com)

The US and China are on the move to establish Blockchain standards

Friends, on March 12, 2018 China announced the establishment of a national Technical Standardization Committee for Blockchain. Such cryptographic ledgers operate in an ecosystem consisting of the following actors. A ledger node modifies an instance of a cryptographic ledger based on the current configuration of the ledger. The ledger node tracks a set of pending ledger events that are candidates for being written to the ledger and writes them to the ledger when it believes consensus has been reached. A ledger agent may be used by any system that communicates over HTTP to instruct a ledger node to perform a specified action on the ledger. China’s initiative comes in the wake of the US NIST Blockchain Technology Overview published in January 2018. With the world’s two largest economies ‘generally’ moving in the same direction how does this bode for Blockchain adoption – growth or endless bureaucracy? And which other sovereign states such as the UK and Australia are prepping standards of their own? And finally, which international entity – e.g. IEEE or ISO – will serve to harmonize these standards I the months and years to come? Share your comments with us today! Lawrence, Cryptocurrency Academy (https://cryptocurrencyacademy.blogspot.com)

Do Mining Pools Enable Individual Miners to Effectively Compete Against Institution Cryptocurrency Miners?

Friends, mining pools allows cryptocurrency investors to pooling of resources by miners, who share their processing power over a network, to split the reward equally, according to the amount of work they contributed to the probability of finding a block.  In the context of cryptocurrency mining, a mining pool is the pooling of resources by miners, who share their processing power over a network, to split the reward equally, according to the amount of work they contributed to the probability of finding a block. Mining pools are groups of miners who pool their resources together in order to generate blocks more quickly. Miners then receive more regular rewards than they would mining solo, as rewards are shared among members. Eligius, Kank CKPool, F2Pool, Slush Pool and AntPool are some of the most common mining pools … each with their own pros and cons. Membership fees can range from 0.00% to 3.00% and the reward or incentive categories include Pay-per-Share (PPS), Proportional, Score based and Pay per Last N Shares (PPLNS). Are mining pools a good fit for your circumstances? Share your comments with us today! Lawrence, Cryptocurrency Academy (https://cryptocurrencyacademy.blogspot.com)

Can ModulTrade’s Value Ecosystem Level the Playing Field for SMEs to Participate in the Blockchcain Arena?

Friends, ModulTrade is a marketplace where SMEs can efficiently trade globally and directly without banks intermediation. Their ecosystem is based on the MSP (multi-platform-side), which aims to create value through network effects five: Marketplaces or Two Sided Networks, Channel partners  aka Three Sided Networks, Communications networks, Content networks and Local networks. (Note: See MIT’s paper on Network Effects). Opportunities for SMEs in global markets and value chains are very large: it exposes them to the buyer/customer base is great, as well as the opportunity to learn from large companies and of involved and persist in the up and coming sectors of the global market. ModulTrade will continue with its pre-sale offering MTR, the ModulTrade token architected on Ethereum, with up to 10mln MTR available during this period. Followed by a further 40mln during the main sale, and a soft cap of 15,000 ETH. Bottom line: Will the MVE truly enable SMEs to successfully trade directly and globally without back intermediation? Share your comments with the Cryptocurrency Academy today. Lawrence (https://cryptocurrencyacademy.blogspot.com)

Interconnectivity and Interoperability Present a Monumental Challenge for Mass Blockchain Adoption

Friends, despite the unmatched opportunity and appetite for mass Blockchain adoption, the relative absence of standards negatively impact – for now – the positive business case and ROI for multiple Blockchains within and between private sector organizations. A simple analogy: Assume Global 500 companies each needed to design, develop and test an Accounts Receivables process rather than using (and customizing) a standardized AR system from Oracle, SAP or Salesforce. The cost would be prohibitive, moreover, such applications must have bullet proof integrations with other inter-dependent enterprise apps including Financial Management, Accounts Payable, DSO, ERP, HRM, etc. This, this quandary equally applies to implementing multiple application-specific Blockchains which have not only “internal” integrity but also must interfacing with a myriad of external industry systems and applications. This dilemma not only keeps CIOs up at night but also can easily be a budget-buster. And while the Cryptocurrency Academy do not advocate “over regulation” of this transformative technology this issue clearly points to the need for a modicum of standards (aka regulation) which appears to be the lynch-pin form mass Blockchain adoption. Let’s hear your comments today! Lawrence, Cryptocurrency Academy (https://cryptocurrencyacademy.blogspot.com)

Will the GBX Grid Allow the Gibraltar Stock Exchange to Ensure Token Transparency, Credibility and Security?

Friends, the GBX Grid, a token sale platform, has the lofty mission of delivering Transparency, Credibility and Security along with institutional recognition and respectability. Impressive, nonetheless there can be a big difference aspirations and reality.  A stable and regulated environment has benefits for Fintech startups like Lendo, which is why it intends to apply to be licensed under Gibraltar’s new DLT regulatory framework and seek listing on the Gibraltar Blockchain Exchange (GBX) which is a subsidiary of its Stock Exchange. GBX aspires to be a world-leading institutional-grade token sale platform and Cryptocurrency exchange. Built upon principles of decentralization and community consensus, we seek to create a new era of trust, openness and global acceptance for the Cryptocurrency industry by listing one quality token at a time. Moreover, the unique selling feature of Gibraltar Blockchain Exchange is that it will analyze new coins before adding them to the platform. A group called the GBX Alliance must form a consensus about each token before having it listed on the platform. What is your assessment? Share your comments today! Lawrence, Cryptocurrency Academy (https://cryptocurrencyacademy.blogspot.com)

Can Ethen Fulfill its Mission of ERC20 Tokens and Wallets Integrated with Ethereum’s Network?

Friends, Ethen, a new decentralized platform for trading digital forms of money for proficient brokers, dealers and financial specialists, will launch with a one of a kind calculation for getting and exchanging ERC20 tokens, is set to launch on the Ethereum network. Far beyond professional traders, Ethen’s mission is to make decentralized exchanges more accessible to a wide range of users and thus grow the user base for Cryptocurrencies. Bottom line: Ethen’s purpose built platform is designed to ensure Confidentiality, Double Security along with Fixed and Fair Commissions. Can Ethen live up to these high expectations given the rapid pace of Cryptocurrency innovations? Share your comments with us today! Lawrence, Cryptocurrency Academy (https://cryptocurrencyacademy.blogspot.com)

Coinbase to Launch Index Fund for Institutional Investors

Friends, this week we saw the announcement of the Coinbase Index Ventures Fund. There are two key elements of this funds which would appear to set it apart from most other Cryptocurrency and Blockchain vehicles. First – and consistent with our thesis here at the Cryptocurrency Academy – this fund will be geared toward medium-long term “investors” rather than shorter-term “traders”. And second, rather than offering a weighted baskets of Cryptocurrencies, this funds will invest in the ever-expanding number of technology and ecosystem firms which augment the buying and selling of individual currencies. The new fund will specifically invest in digital assets listed on Coinbase’s exchange, GDAX. Using our 1849 Gold Rush analogy this fund will focus on the picks, axes and equipment needs of the masses of prospectors rather than trying to isolate and invest in the small percentage of gold miners who actually struck in rich high in the Sierra Nevada Mountains. We like this approach and recommend taking a closer look. Share your assessment with us today! Lawrence, Cryptocurrency Academy (https://cryptocurrencyacademy.blogspot.com)