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Rwandan Central Bank Studying Ways of Issuing Digital Currency
The Rwandan central bank is looking into ways it could potentially issue its own digital currency to make the processing of transactions more efficient and to boost economic growth.
tags: Fintech CryptoAssets AltCoins CBDC
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Ripple Partnership Provides New Payment Rail for UK Remittance Firm
UK-based remittance firm Xendpay is partnering with Ripple to use its RippleNet global settlements platform to allow it to enter new markets like the Philippines, Bangladesh, Malaysia, Vietnam, Indonesia, and Thailand.
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Chainalysis launches real-time alerts for ‘suspicious transactions’ across 15 cryptocurrencies
Chainalysis’s real-time crypto transaction AML monitoring/ compliance product began providing suspicious crypto-asset transaction alerts across 15 crypto-assets.
tags: Fintech CryptoAssets AMLCFT
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NYDFS Grants Charter For Bakkt To Custody Bitcoin
The New York State Department of Financial Services authorized Bakkt Trust Company LLC to offer custody services for Bitcoin following the introduction of trading physically delivered Bitcoin futures contracts on the Intercontinental Exchange Futures U.S. Under its charter, Bakkt will provide services to institutional customers.
tags: Fintech CryptoAssets Bitcoin Custody Bakkt Regulation Futures
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10 Million ETH: Big Mysteries Revealed About PlusToken
PlusToken’s intake of BTC, EOS, and XRP since the beginning of the scam in mid 2018 is still being calculated by our team. Once this data is finalized, we expect that PlusToken will easily emerge as the largest crypto Ponzi scheme in history, surpassing both BitConnect and OneCoin by a handsome margin.
tags: Fintech CryptoAssets Ponzi
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Understanding the crypto-asset phenomenon, its risks and measurement issues
This ECB article discusses the crypto-asset phenomenon with a view to understanding its potential risks and enhancing its monitoring.
tags: Fintech CryptoAssets
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The European Banking Association and the European Securities and Markets Authority have written to the European Commission to say they will review the legal frameworks used by European Union member states for monitoring stablecoins such as Libra.
tags: Fintech CryptoAssets PaymentSystems AltCoins Stablecoins Facebook
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The State of Stablecoins, 2019
2019 has proven a huge year for the development of stablecoins and decentralized finance, particularly in regards to projects built on the Ethereum blockchain.
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The New York Attorney General is investigating Bitfinex, Tether and various associated iFinex companies — on the basis, amongst other reasons, that there’s been funny business with the Tether “reserve”.
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Starbucks, monetary superpower
Starbucks has around $1.6 billion in stored value card liabilities outstanding. This represents the sum of all physical gift cards held in customer’s wallets as well as the digital value of electronic balances held in the Starbucks Mobile App.* It amounts to ~6% of all of the company’s liabilities.
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How China’s Virtual Banks Are Offering Loans to Micro-Businesses Within Minutes
In China, online lenders are filling the credit gap, leveraging cutting edge technology including artificial intelligence (AI) to make lending decision in just a second. Alibaba’s MyBank and Tencent’s WeBank make their lending decisions using AI, processing vast amounts of user data and information gathered from the mobile payment services they operate.
tags: Fintech MachineLearning AI
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More trouble in blockchain-land
Engineer sources told The Block that R3 is finding it hard to manage or support its growing client base, insinuating the company is flogging software that isn’t fully baked yet.
tags: Fintech Corda Blockchain
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New Flexa Tech Will Let You Spend Bitcoin From Other Apps Too
The merchant payments startup Flexa will soon allow any other app to run payments in crypto just like its own SPEDN app has since May. For now, Flexa delivers final payment to most merchants in fiat, working with exchange partners to provide liquidity to trade tokens used in payment for the final currency. But the Flexa system defaults to paying merchants in the cryptocurrency used by the customer, and it hopes to nudge more to do so.
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Binance Venus Aims to Outshine Libra and Chinese National Crypto?
Although both of the stablecoin projects may appear to be international in scope, Binance’s will likely only work with specific countries and regions in developing their own digital currencies to help establish financial autonomy and security.
tags: Fintech CryptoAssets AltCoins Stablecoins Binance Facebook
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Tether to Issue Stablecoin Backed by Yuan in Belgian Bank: Insider
Tether is planning to issue a stablecoin pegged to the Chinese renminbi, according to a trader with ties to the company.
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SEC Approves Blockchain Based Digital Securities Platform Securitize As A Registered Transfer Agent
A new blockchain startup called Securitize has been recently approved as a transfer agent by the U. S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). This means that the company will now be able to act as an official keeper for records involving ownership changes in securities.
tags: Fintech Blockchain Regulation
Month: August 2019
Kiffmeister’s Fintech Daily Digest 08/21/2019
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Cointelegraph has picked out the five most crypto-friendly American states for different crypto actors, be it casual consumers or large businesses. Most cases involve having fair regulations in place (like allowing corporations to tokenize their shares) or, for instance, local authorities’ willingness to provide special electricity discounts for mining facilities. However, sometimes less is more: California is the most popular location for crypto firms, and unlike New York, it doesn’t oblige them to get any specific licenses.
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Crypto forefather David Chaum issues new digital currency, intended as a paradigm shift from bitcoinCrypto pioneer David Chaum is issuing a new digital currency, Praxxis that has the security, speed, and scalability to grow into a replacement of physical cash. The digital asset is built on the so-called Elixxir blockchain, launched early last year.
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Antitrust regulators at the European Commission, the executive branch of the European Union, have sent out a questionnaire to determine whether Facebook’s proposed stablecoin Libra is an anticompetitive project.
Kiffmeister’s Fintech Daily Digest 08/20/2019
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Transfer volumes across stablecoin platforms have risen considerably in 2019. While the number of on-chain transactions across tracked stablecoins still trail that of Venmo, the aggregate total on-chain transfer volume across the largest stablecoins has now surpassed Venmo’s total payment volume .
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WhatsApp is in advanced talks with several digital payments firms including ride hailer Go-Jek, mobile payments firm DANA, backed by China’s Ant Financial, and fintech startup OVO, which is owned by Indonesian conglomerate Lippo Group and is also backed by ride hailing company Grab, sources said.
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‘Satoshi’ confirmed himself to be Bilal Khalid – as was previously discovered in a check of the domain name registrar for the ‘Satoshi Reveal’ website. We also find out the reason why he can’t access his $19 billion fortune (he lost his private keys).
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Smart contracts could soon get a boost in bitcoin as prominent programmer Pieter Wuille has unveiled a new coding language designed specifically for their use. The ‘Miniscript’ language aims to make it easier for programmers to write up “smart contracts” or conditions for spending bitcoins.
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The number of projects utilizing a proof-of-stake governance mechanism has increased recently, as new projects hope to increase scalability and reduce the high energy consumption often associated with proof-of-work networks.
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“Undoubtedly, technological innovation can bring important improvements in productivity and convenience to the financial services industry. It serves as a catalyst for structural change and thus requires careful monitoring of market dynamics and implications for risk. Going forward, I see four main priorities for regulators and supervisors…”tags: Fintech
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Fnality is pleased to announce key additions to the senior management and advisory team. Gary Chu joins as General Counsel and Adam Clarke as Chief Technology Officer (CTO), with Daniel Heller joining as Head of Regulatory Affairs.
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Speaking at the Digital Banking Summit Innovation and Excellence Awards 2019 in Accra yesterday, Dr Opoku-Afari said adopting digital technology by players in the banking and financial space could help promote transactional efficiency in the delivery of financial services as well as scale up and broaden financial access to all segments of the society.tags: Fintech
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A rag-tag team of Israeli entrepreneurs is looking to leverage Facebook’s cryptocurrency project for profits, even without the $10 million required to join the Libra Association. So far the newly established startup, Libracamp, has received more than 80 applications to participate in a virtual bootcamp for Libra developers starting in November.
Kiffmeister’s Fintech Daily Digest 08/19/2019
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“The World Bank has raised an additional AUD 50m for its Kangaroo bond due August 2020 – the first bond created, allocated, transferred and managed through its life-cycle using distributed ledger technology.”tags: Fintech Blockchain
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“Binance today announced its plans to initiate an open blockchain project, Venus, an initiative to develop localized stablecoins and digital assets pegged to fiat currencies across the globe. Binance is looking to create new alliances and partnerships with governments, corporations, technology companies, and other cryptocurrency companies and projects involved in the larger blockchain ecosystem, to empower developed and developing countries to spur new currencies.”
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“The appropriate response to Libra or the larger crypto phenomenon is not a binary yes or no. Rather, it’s to engage in a wide and deep debate on how to create technology-enabled monetary solutions that better serve humanity. So far at least, the traditional banking sector has not been up to the challenge, preferring instead to use compliance requirements as a fig leaf to protect what is an all but entrenched oligopoly.”
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“There are really quite stark differences between what Libra’s proposing and what we see as a central bank digital currency. On our side it is important to be regulated. You can with a central bank digital currency tell clients that it’s legal tender—meaning it has to be accepted and is regulated and backed by assets on a central bank balance sheet. This is really key.”
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Santander is expanding its use of Ripple’s technology. The Spanish bank is building a “payment corridor” that would let customers in Latin America send money to the U.S. instantly for free via One Pay FX, a mobile app that uses Ripple’s xCurrent software.
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Telegram’s long-awaited blockchain, Telegram Open Network, is said to be scheduled to launch Oct. 31, but the yet-to-be-issued gram tokens are already trading in an unauthorized secondary market.
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The latest self-proclaimed Satoshi Nakamoto overpromised and underdelivered in Part 1 of his “big reveal” — probably to the surprise of no one in crypto. In a meandering blog post, the self-proclaimed bitcoin inventor did not reveal his real name, nor did he produce a photo of himself. So we’re still no closer to learning his true identity than we were before the “reveal.”
Kiffmeister’s Fintech Daily Digest 08/18/2019
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ITU and Stanford University have agreed to launch a new partnership to support pilot implementations of Digital Fiat Currency (DFC), digital currency authorized and issued by a Central Bank.
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Approximately $2.9 billion deposits have been lost in an alleged scam with a crypto wallet provider and exchange PlusToken. Six suspects affiliated with PlusToken have been arrested, although main operators of the alleged scam are still on the run. PlusToken allowed users to earn profits on their crypto deposits and incentivized members to bring in new users by providing monetary rewards.
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The group of six US legislators will hold a meeting with the Swiss Federal Data Protection and Information Commissioner Adrian Lobsiger. It will be led by Maxine Waters, Chair of the House Banking Committee.
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There are many reasons why the Philippines is becoming increasingly crypto-friendly. Not only has its central bank registered more crypto exchanges recently, but the Securities and Exchange Commission has also been actively finalizing crypto guidelines. The country has an active crypto community, and one of its largest banks has engaged in multiple crypto projects.tags: Fintech CryptoAssets
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A data-driven look at global financial technology investment trends, top deals, active investors, and corporate activity in Q2 2019.tags: Fintech
Kiffmeister’s Fintech Daily Digest 08/17/2019
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Satoshi Nakamoto will reveal his true identity in three installments, starting on August 18 at 4 pm Eastern time, including his plans for a bitcoin renaissance and an explanation of the critical role that Chaldean numerology cyphers and encryption played in his creation of bitcoin.
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So as a dystopian cat-and-mouse game emerges in Hong Kong, with a technologically sophisticated police chasing protesters for their faces, a refusal to use centralized digital cash, and arrests of protesters for their participations in virtual forums and state-mounted attacks on communications apps — cryptocurrency has quite a role to play in what may be the opening act of the dystopian, cyberpunk protests of the future.tags: Fintech CryptoAssets
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Research by PARSIQ details the massive accumulation of wealth in the hands of a minuscule few, resulting in inequality greater than what can be found in the established “old money” institutions. Just 0.023% of the top Bitcoin addresses hold 50% of the total funds. 50% of XRP outstanding is held just 14 addresses.tags: Fintech CryptoAssets
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Digital assets and cryptocurrencies make estate planning complex. You need to track where assets exist online and how to access them. If you fail to do proper planning, your digital footprint and assets will likely be stuck in the cloud forever.tags: Fintech CryptoAssets
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There’s an arms race afoot over who can store cryptocurrency safest.
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In just over one year since launch, Coinbase Custody has grown to over $7 billion in Assets Under Custody stored on behalf of more than 120 clients in 14 different countries, making it the largest institutional custodian in the world.
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Most crypto funds are backed by traditional venture capital, so even though they are supporting the emergence of the new crypto economy, it will be one that will have strong, foundational links with the financial system.
Kiffmeister’s Fintech Daily Digest 08/16/2019
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ICE subsidiary Bakkt has acquired a New York state trust charter through the New York State Department of Financial Services, and claimed that the CFTC has green lighted it to begin offering its physically-settled bitcoin futures contracts on September 23.
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Our contracts have already received the green light from the CFTC through the self-certification process and user acceptance testing has begun. With approval by the New York State Department of Financial Services to create Bakkt Trust Company, a qualified custodian, the Bakkt Warehouse will custody bitcoin for physically delivered futures.
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A review of over 50 patent applications submitted by the People’s Bank of China shows the design of its central bank digital currency will only resemble a cryptocurrency in limited ways, and it probably won’t use a blockchain.
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Regulators have made clear that the old way of transacting, where you have pseudonymous transfers—that’s not going to scale. Some users may leave compliant exchanges for others that choose not to share personal information, or seek out more decentralized methods of exchange that are harder to police. Such a community will have to remain niche.
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Coin Metrics says the unique identifiers known as addresses show that only about 300 entities control around 80% of Tether, the token that serves as a conduit for trading on many of the world’s largest crypto exchanges.
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But the battle is far from over. Fintechs have failed to take significant share of core banking activities despite a decade of a benign credit environment with banks hampered by their recovery efforts after the 2008 crisis. Many of the newcomers are plagued by poor customer service and attract the attention of regulators for weak controls. As the cycle finally turns, there will be more serious casualties and perhaps an opportunity for traditional banks to eat up some of the new companies at more appetising prices.tags: Fintech
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While Facebook was talking about their proposed cryptocurrency and blockchain linked to a basket of fiat currencies, Monerium was issuing fully licensed fiat-denominated e-money on an established blockchain, Ethereum.
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Ethereum-based banking alternative platform Monolith, is issuing a new Visa debit card, which allows users to spend Dai stablecoin anywhere in the world at stores that accept Visa payments.
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St. Louis Fed President Bullard: “Cryptocurrencies are creating drift toward a non-uniform currency in the U.S., a state of affairs that has existed historically but was disliked and eventually replaced… Consumers and businesses may not like a system in which many types of currency trade simultaneously at a variety of prices in a local market.”tags: Fintech CryptoAssets
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The Australian Securities Exchange’s work on a DLT-based platform aimed at replacing its ageing CHESS settlement system is “on track” to likely 2021 completion. It will “will deliver upgraded security, resilience and performance” for equity post trade services. It will also offer new functionality over and above what is currently enabled by CHESS.
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Digital transformation is powering China’s economy and also new growth opportunities for the insurance sector. [PDF]
Kiffmeister’s Fintech Daily Digest 08/15/2019
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Amid a downturn in the cryptocurrency markets, the apparent swathe of Bitcoin sell-offs from a $3 billion Chinese Ponzi scheme could be to blame.
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“I think practical transactions allow you to see the potential benefits [of blockchain], such as the reduction in settlement time,” says Paul Snaith, the multilateral lender’s head of operations for capital markets. He was speaking to WatersTechnology ahead of the one-year anniversary of the bank’s issuance of the first blockchain bond, Bond-i.tags: Fintech Blockchain
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Central banks worldwide are examining the possibility of issuing a central bank digital currency (CBDC), with some already testing theirs for different uses. Countries that have advanced their digital currency projects include China, Singapore, Canada, the Bahamas, Thailand, Uruguay, and Sweden. India has also included the digital rupee in the country’s draft cryptocurrency bill.
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Chart analysis aside, market metrics are rarely useful in isolation, and to get a feel for what the bitcoin dominance rate is telling us, we need a deeper understanding of what it represents – and why a rising number is not necessarily good news.
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Graychain released its first report on the collateralized crypto lending industry, estimating that $4.7b has been lent out over the history of the sector, but only $86 million has been earned back in interest. That’s a 1.8% return, despite the fact that loans typically cost borrowers 6 to 10% on an annual basis.
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The Fed has defied lobbying and the insistence of some Republicans that banks should control faster payments to prod the US into the 21st century. Even so, its promised FedNow service is a distant prospect: it may only launch in 2024.tags: Fintech FastPayments
Kiffmeister’s Fintech Daily Digest 08/14/2019
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The creation of a vibrant market in SDR linked to commodity prices could create a powerful new monetary anchor, argues former IMF SDR chief Warren Coats.
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Blockchain technology and digital currencies — seen today as a risk by the establishment, the authorities and others — could be an opportunity to relaunch the migration of the SDR’s monetary architecture similar to the supranational currency “bancor,” conceptualized by the economist John Maynard Keynes.
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Previous posts discussed what the IMF’s Special Drawing Rights (SDRs) are and how they are used. This post discusses what a hypothetical crypto-SDR, or Crypto Drawing Rights (CDR), would look like and how it could benefit the IMF and its member organizations.
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The BIS is seeking to fill the top spot in its new Innovation Hub to manage the selection and execution of projects across multiple Hub Centers with the aim of increasing knowledge in areas of critical interest to central banks and with a view towards the production of potential global public goods.tags: CentralBanking Fintech
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Marco Polo, the trade finance blockchain network launched in 2017 by R3 and TradeIX, is moving slowly but surely toward production. The latest milestone in the 22-bank blockchain consortium’s methodical piloting process allows a third party to a trade (in this case a logistics provider) to trigger a payment to a supplier in real-time at the moment the goods are on their way to their destination.
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Bantotal, a core banking service provider based in Uruguay that services over 60 different financial institutions across 14 different countries, is partnering with crypto exchange Bitex to facilitate bitcoin-based cross-border payments.
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On May 13, 2019, Flexa payments launched in the United States and released the iOS SPEDN app, which processes regular purchases in cryptocurrencies. Now SPEDN is now open to Canadians on both iOS and Android.
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PayPal is ramping up its presence in India, looking to capitalise on surging digital payments demand as the country’s 450m mobile users leap online and as growth slows in the US and Europe.tags: Fintech PaymentSystems
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CIMB announced that its virtual bank that was launched earlier this year have secured 500,000 customers, approximately six months after opening its doors for business in the Philippines. The all-digital, mobile first bank is part of CIMB’s strategy in penetrating new markets.tags: Fintech MobileMoney
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Barclays is no longer working with cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase, which, however, has found a replacement in U.K. upstart ClearBank
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A recent run-up in the price of bitcoin has been attributed to many factors: aggressive monetary easing by central banks, plans by Facebook to develop its own digital tokens, and market manipulation via Tether, another crypto asset. But another force may be giving bitcoin a lift: demand from Chinese investors.
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As an electronic money institution (EMI), Monerium is issuing asset-backed e-money on blockchains. A regulated EMI provides customers with legal protections while gaining all of the advantages afforded by blockchains: sending, receiving, and storing digital money without going through a financial institution. In contrast, virtual currencies that transact on blockchains do not offer such protections, they are not subject to the same requirements of being asset-backed, redeemable, fully audited and supervised.
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The Financial Supervisory Authority of Iceland approved Reykjavik-based Monerium as its first electronic money institution in June. The designation means that Monerium has regulatory approval to provide fiat payment services on a blockchain and use it throughout the European Economic Area. Electronic money is a well-established regulatory framework in Europe that’s been in use for years.
Kiffmeister’s Fintech Daily Digest 08/13/2019
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The IMF’s Dong He and Yan Liu talk about central bank digital currency: the current level of interest among central banks in issuing them, what concerns they need to address when designing them, and how commercial banks might be affected, depending on the design of the CBDC. We discuss how privacy could be built into such a currency while also fulfilling anti-money laundering and counter terrorist financial regulations and how a CBDC could affect the IMF’s ability to achieve its goal of financial inclusion. Plus, we also cover how crypto assets being widely adopted could influence economies, as well as Facebook’s Libra.
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PayPal -owned payments app Venmo announced support for instant transfers to U.S. bank accounts. The feature is an optional alternative to Venmo’s standard bank transfer service, which typically takes one to three business days to process transactions. With Instant Transfer, however, funds from your Venmo account can hit your bank account within minutes.
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The RTP network has a single price for all participants with no volume discounts, no volume commitments and no monthly minimums to ensure that financial institutions of all sizes participate on the same terms. Financial institutions pay only for the transactions they originate.
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The Clearing House, owned by 24 large U.S. banks, is currently operating a real-time payments system. An independent assessment found that the RTP network met all 36 criteria set by the FRB-sponsored Faster Payments Task Force. Those 24 banks have individually or collectively paid hundreds of millions of dollars to build that system.
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According to CipherTrace, outright thefts, scams and other kinds of misappropriation of funds from digital currency holders and trading platforms resulted in around $4.3 billion in losses throughout 2019.
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The U.S. SEC has again delayed making a decision on three bitcoin exchange-traded fund proposals. The ETFs were proposed earlier this year by asset managers Bitwise Asset Management, VanEck/SolidX and Wilshire Phoenix, and filed with exchanges NYSE Arca and Cboe BZX.
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Seed SEF has launched user acceptance testing of its physically-settled bitcoin derivatives which will carry on through early August. Seed SEF, which has been licenced as a Swap Execution Facility by the CFTC since 2016, has opened its UAT environment, allowing customers to start trading on Seed SEF’s matching platform.
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Hedera is a public ledger that uses hashgraph consensus, touted by the company as a faster, more secure alternative to blockchain consensus mechanisms. Hashgraph claims to achieve high-throughput with 10,000-plus cryptocurrency transactions per second, and low-latency finality in seconds from its “innovative gossip about gossip protocol” and virtual voting. Once consensus is reached, the data is added to the public ledger for everyone to see.