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A study of USDT turnover reveals just how crazy the demand for Tether’s stablecoin is. According to Coinmetric’s tweet on January 31, they reported that every single USDT token changes hands roughly 46 times every year. The trend of increasing activity shows that Tether is instrumental to liquidity flows between exchanges. It’s most likely that USDT changes hands most between multiple exchanges as opposed to individual traders.
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Always dreamed of owning a Ferrari but can’t afford it? Well, this may sound vaguely familiar: The blockchain has a solution for you. CurioInvest, an investment platform, and MERJ Exchange Ltd., a Seychelles-based digital asset exchange, are partnering to offer tokens backed by collectible cars. The companies say tokenizing the luxury assets as an investment could make them widely accessible to a bigger pool of people.tags: Blockchain Fintech
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This report examines both the benefits and risks big data and AI can bring to the insurance industry. In particular, this reports discusses how the OECD Recommendation on Artificial Intelligence, and the European Commission’s Independent High-Level Expert Group on Artificial Intelligence’s (HLAG AI) Ethics Guidelines for Trustworthy AI should be considered in the context of the insurance sector. The report concludes with policy areas in which policy makers may consider action in the insurance sector in relation to big data and AI going forward.
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If Walmart’s MoneyCard is any indication, many of America’s unbanked aren’t unbanked — they are differently banked. Instead of accessing banking services via traditional accounts, these people are connecting to it by prepaid credit cards, otherwise known as general purpose reloadable (GPR) prepaid cards. Walmart’s MoneyCard is one of the most well-known offerings. But even governments are sponsoring prepaid debit card programs, the Federal government’s DirectExpress card being the best example.
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The Hyperledger Foundation has released the second version of its open-source distributed ledger (DLT) platform, Hyperledger Fabric.
Month: January 2020
Kiffmeister’s Fintech Daily Digest 01/30/2020
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Last year, more than $4.3 billion in digital currencies was stolen in various crypto scams, according to Chainalysis. The majority of the scams were linked to Ponzi schemes including the PlusToken and OneCoin scams.
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For the 2019 calendar year, the Zelle Network processed $187 billion in payments on 743 million transactions. Year-over-year payment values increased by 57%, while transaction volume increased by 72%.
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Based on survey responses from around 30 jurisdictions, this paper provides a cross-country overview of policy responses to fintech developments. In addition, building on the work by global standard-setting bodies and other international organisations, the paper proposes a conceptual framework through which to analyse policy responses to fintech, referred to as the “fintech tree”. The fintech tree identifies three categories: fintech activities, enabling technologies and policy enablers.tags: Regulation Fintech
Kiffmeister’s Fintech Daily Digest 01/29/2020
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Trading volumes in bitcoin options listed on the Intercontinental Exchange’s Bakkt platform have completely dried up, even while CME’s options product is seeing strong interest. As per Bakkt’s data, not a single bitcoin options contract was traded last week on Bakkt, withactivity last registered on Jan. 17, when 20 lots had changed hands.
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The Financial Services Agency of Japan issued crypto-asset related regulations for public consultation. They would impose a 2x leverage limit, which is stricter than the 4x leverage limit imposed by the Japan Virtual Currency Exchange Association, the industry’s self-regulatory organization. It also includes a requirement for crypto-exchange to store more than 95 percent of its clients’ assets in cold wallet. The consultation period would end by mid-February to be implemented by June 2020.
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The National Bank of Cambodia (NBC) will launch a blockchain-based, P2P payment and money transfer platform in the next few months. Project Bakong (https://bakong.nbc.org.kh) was launched on a trial basis in July with the support of 11 banks, with many more expected to join.
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When cryptoasset exchanges get hacked and large monetary amounts get stolen, news tends to spread fairly quickly. However, articles tend to focus largely on the monetary amount stolen. Rarely do they explore the deeper consequences and fallout resulting from these shocks. In this feature, Coinmetrics use both on-chain and market data to analyze four of the largest Bitcoin exchange hacks and look at the deep consequences of each, both positive and negative.
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“It may be a little early to be hitting the panic buttons on blockchain not reaching its potential and then falling off the radar only to be a wasted opportunity, but cracks are showing. What needs to be achieved may not be a full level adoption and operational relevance of blockchain this year, but without a big breakthrough stride there could well be questions asked at the end of the year as to where next for the technology.”tags: Fintech Blockchain
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“The face of insurance is changing. Again. Led by data, digitalisation and a need to engage the customer, there are already many shifts underway. This current round of technology-driven change differs from those of the past, not least because of the speed and scale involved. Harnessed properly, these powerful forces offer new hope for the insurance industry to remain central to the lives of its customers. Swiss Re’s Sigma report Data-driven insurance, ready for the next frontier? explains what’s going on and presents a potential roadmap for progress.”
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Standard Chartered has invested an undisclosed sum into Contour, a Corda-based blockchain trade platform, to streamline transaction settlement processes.
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The white paper, Privacy 2020: 10 Privacy Risks and 10 Privacy Enhancing Technologies to Watch in the Next Decade, identifies ten technologies that are likely to create increasingly complex data protection challenges. Over the next decade, privacy considerations will be driven by innovations in tech linked to human bodies, health, and social networks; infrastructure; and computing power. The white paper also highlights ten developments that can enhance privacy – providing cause for optimism that organizations will be able to manage data responsibly. Some of these technologies are already in general use, some will soon be widely deployed, and others are nascent.
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In a new report, the R3 Team has outlined the key trends and predictions that business leaders, enterprise architects, and application builders should consider in 2020 as they evaluate or re-evaluate their blockchain strategies.tags: Fintech Blockchain
Kiffmeister’s Fintech Daily Digest 01/28/2020
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Libra is analogous to a currency-board regime. And yet, Libra’s proponents have so far overlooked the problems of monetary management that a currency board raises.
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Singapore introduced new payments legislation that offers global cryptocurrency firms a chance to expand their operations in the country by applying for operating licenses for the first time.
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The Israel Securities Authority intends to draft a regulation for DLT-based digital asset exchange platforms. It is now calling on the private sector to pitch the regulator with proof-of-concept DLT trading systems.
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Singapore’s Payment Services Act 2019 brings digital payment token services – effectively covering all crypto businesses and exchanges based in Singapore – under current AML/CFT rules.
Kiffmeister’s Fintech Daily Digest 01/27/2020
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To make investors feel comfortable again, we need more than ease and accessibility, that ICOs and IEOs offer. We also need to offer IPO-grade regulation and compliance. But most startups are not able to do that. So what’s the middle ground? Well, maybe the solution is STOs, tokenized securities that comply with regulations. But for now STOs are still a hard route, that lacks liquidity and regulatory clarity.
Kiffmeister’s Fintech Daily Digest 01/26/2020
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The two advocacy groups submitted amicus briefs to the court. One opposes the SEC’s lawsuit; the other asks the agency to do a better job defining digital assets.
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“If we are supposed to trust whatever is on a blockchain, then we are in trouble indeed. After all, the blockchain is only as good as the data we put on it.”tags: Fintech Blockchain
Kiffmeister’s Fintech Daily Digest 01/25/2020
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The Central Bank of the Bahamas announced that its Sand Dollar CBDC pilot project has ‘exceeded’ its expectation of 500 participants with enrollment currently at 1,200.
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The MIT Digital Currency Initiative “Redesigning Digital Money” paper considers three important features from crypto-asset design – decentralization, programmability and privacy – and assesses their applicability to a central bank digital currency. bility to a CBDC.
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As Stephen King said “sooner or later, everything old is new again!” In the 1990s Finland experimented with central bank digital currency in the form of its Avant stored-value card. It was never very popular and was discontinued in 2006.
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“When people discuss the future of payments they tend to predict the end of cash. Our view is different. Not only does Deutsche Bank think cash will be around for a long time, it sees the transition to digital payments as having the potential to do no less than rebalance global economic power.”
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Hedera Hashgraph appeared in 2019, and took the crypto world by a storm. Despite being a bit late to the game, Hedera Hashgraph quickly called itself a “Bitcoin Killer”, despite the failure of multiple projects to achieve that feat before it. But despite the fanfares at launch, all that the HBAR token managed to achieve was to go from $0.15 to $0.010 within a few months. The asset did not even have a relief rally, and its tokenomics and promises for smart contracts failed to appeal to the crypto community.
Kiffmeister’s Fintech Daily Digest 01/24/2020
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A group comprised of about 70 Liberal Democratic Party lawmakers are working on a proposal for Japan to issue its own digital currency. The digital currency could be a joint initiative between the government and private companies, Norihiro Nakayama, parliamentary vice minister for foreign affairs, told Reuters.
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The central bank of Bahrain is the first to pilot a new toolkit developed by the world economic forum. This toolkit will help Bahrain’s central bank determine if a Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDC) is the right fit for the gulf kingdom. Other nations considering CBDCs will also be using the toolkit in the future.
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The World Economic Forum launched the Global Consortium for Digital Currency Governance to focus on the development of interoperable, transparent and inclusive policy approaches to regulating the digital currency space and fostering public-private collaboration in both developed and emerging economies.
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This paper explores the assets and process necessary for creating a central bank digital currency on the Celo platform, as well as the potential impact on the financial system.
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New York City is joining San Francisco and Philadelphia in banning stores and restaurants from rejecting cash as a form of payment. The city council approved a bill by a vote of 43-3 Thursday that prohibits the practice and and prevents New York City retailers from charging customers who pay with cash more than those who don’t. Violators could face penalties of as much as $1,500.
Kiffmeister’s Fintech Daily Digest 01/23/2020
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The latest BIS survey shows that most central banks are researching CBDC and a small number looks likely to issue a CBDC very soon. Emerging market economies report stronger motivations and a higher likelihood to issue CBDC than advanced economies.
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The World Economic Forum and a community of over 40 central banks, international organizations, academic researchers and financial institutions have created a framework to help central banks evaluate, design and potentially deploy CBDC.
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ConsenSys white paper provides a concrete example of how a central bank digital currency might be implemented on the Ethereum blockchain.
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The CoinDesk Quarterly Review surfaces the key data, trends and events shaping crypto markets, in a 45-slide presentation format. It evaluates three different use cases for crypto across more than 25 different data sets. The results of this analysis suggest a dominant narrative for bitcoin and alternative cryptocurrencies has yet to emerge.tags: Fintech CryptoAssets
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The Deutsche Bundesbank and Deutsche Börse have presented the results of a concept study on the use of distributed ledger technology (DLT) in the area of collateral management. This study outlines that, in principle, DLT is capable of delivering further benefits in terms of the velocity and usability of collateral. The two institutions are thus continuing their successful cooperation in researching the capabilities offered by securities settlement based on DLT technology.
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Pornhub now supports Tether to allow instant and zero-fee payments via the TronLink crypto wallet and browser extension. TronLink is a native wallet for Tron (TRX). The USDT token became available on the Tron network in April 2019.
Kiffmeister’s Fintech Daily Digest 01/22/2020
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Vodafone is no longer part of the Libra consortium. Vodafone will dedicate resources previously intended for Libra to its well-established and successful digital payment service M-Pesa, which the company plans to expand beyond the six African nations currently served.
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Hong Kong and Thailand’s central banks have stepped closer to implementing a joint central bank digital currency for cross-border payments, officially announcing the outcomes of a joint CBDC research project called Project Inthanon-LionRock.
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Joseph Lubin presented the framework of regulated Ethereum-based stablecoins at the Davos Economic Forum.
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Blockchain service firm Chainstack recently published a report about developer activity on six major enterprise blockchains, showing that Fabric has overtaken Corda in regard to dev activity on its repository. A chart included in the report shows that Fabric developer activity exceeded Corda’s in Q4 2019.
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The Australian Prudential Regulation Authority (APRA) has published its submission to the Senate Select Committee on Financial Technology and Regulatory Technology. The submission outlines how APRA is evolving its regulatory framework and approach to support the developing FinTech and RegTech sector, while ensuring risks are appropriate managed in line with APRA’s mandate of financial soundness and stability.tags: Regulation Fintech
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This research aims to evaluate the suitability of cryptocurrency as money from the Islamic perspective. Money, in the Islamic perspective, has specific characteristics and requirements, such as stability and is based on assets. Cryptocurrency may not fulfil this as it has queries as money from the Islamic perspective. The research method applied data of 23 cryptocurrency prices and related information. The result shows that cryptocurrency is hugely volatile and has limits to being called ‘money,’ as it is limited and used for speculation, which is prohibited in Islam. The research implies that Muslims would be reluctant to use cryptocurrency as money, as a currency of transaction. This reason raise an expectation that the cryptocurrency will not develop rapidly in Muslim countries.