The Winklevoss Twins' Bitcoin ETF Was Just Rejected ...
The Winklevoss Twins' Bitcoin ETF Was Just Rejected ...
The Winklevoss twins' bitcoin ETF was rejected
Bitcoin ETFs: What They Are and How to Invest (in 2020 ...
Winklevoss twins on crypto’s allure for the ETF world ...
Winklevoss Twins Committed to Launching Bitcoin ETF ...
Crypto Investment Up 300% in Third Quarter, Grayscale Reports
Grayscale Investments, which offers investors access to Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies in the form of shares, on Tuesday reported a record third-quarter inflow of over a quarter of a billion dollars. In a report, the New York-based investment firm said Q3 inflows amounted to $254.9 million, which is triple the $85 million it posted the previous quarter, and that 84% of the new funds came from hedge funds and other institutional investors. Grayscale’s third quarter investment figure is striking in part because the crypto market has been in a slump during this time. While a rally earlier this year saw the price of Bitcoin hit $12,000 in July, its value has fallen by around a third since then. According to Grayscale’s managing director, Michael Sonnenshein, the record inflows are the result of a growing number of professional investors deciding to make cryptocurrencies a part of their portfolio mix. He also credited the company’s recent “Drop Gold” advertising blitz, which encourages investors to buy crypto rather than precious metal—a choice Grayscale says is appealing to younger people. “When the world gets to be the way it is at the moment, these institutions want a new source of alpha,” said Sonnenshein, referring to investments that can out-perform the market. “There’s also a growing acceptance that younger generations want a part of this asset class.” But while Grayscale touts the appeal of various digital assets, its report shows that 67% of third quarter investments went into the company’s Bitcoin Trust shares, while virtually all the rest went to shares of other cryptocurrencies, Ethereum and Ethereum Classic. Other Grayscale offerings such as XRP and Zen attracted virtually no interest. Sonnenshein explains the disproportionate interest in the company’s products as a function of liquidity. Specifically, Grayscale customers—who must be accredited investors—can sell their shares a year later in the public market, but only in the case of Bitcoin, Ethereum, and Ethereum Classic. Grayscale is asking regulators to allow this liquidity option for its other products, says Sonnenshein, adding he expects interest to spike if they receive approval. Meanwhile, the company received approval this week from regulator FINRA to sell shares of its Digital Large Cap Fund—an ETF-like investment made up different cryptocurrencies—to the general public. The Grayscale report also notes that the majority of investors in the third quarter bought shares using cryptocurrency rather cash—in most cases, trading actual Bitcoin for shares in a Bitcoin trust. Sonnenshein says such decisions are likely the result of institutional investors lacking the legal and security infrastructure to hold actual cryptocurrency, which is vulnerable to being hacked. Shares in a crypto trust provide an easier option, he suggests. The service, however, comes at a cost: Grayscale clients pay a management fee of between 2% and 3% for owning the company’s products. Grayscale expects to make a new advertising push in coming months. Citing the success of the “Drop Gold” ads, Sonnenshein says a similar campaign will launch in the near future.
Hi Bitcoiners! I’m back with the 21st monthly Bitcoin news recap. For those unfamiliar, each day I pick out the most popularelevant/interesting stories in Bitcoin and save them. At the end of the month I release them in one batch, to give you a quick (but not necessarily the best) overview of what happened in bitcoin over the past month. You can see recaps of the previous months on Bitcoinsnippets.com A recap of Bitcoin in September 2018
Crashing through the support lines like a Boss If you are reading this, then your awesome! ICO DOG started off as a simple twitter channel in January 2018. People started to follow the dog, because we provided useful insights into ICO investing and whitelist links. Back then people still had to race everyone else to get into these things, before they would dump hard. In February we then had the first guys asking us to make a telegram chat room for the community and use primablock to pool funds together to send to such projects. It was a very exciting time to see ICO DOG brand grow so organic. After that, the market crashed 20% every single day. That was a rough period. To be honest, the whole year was a stony road. Several people came together, that were very active in the telegram channel and formed a team. It was like a mini DAO. We had review & marketing guys, tech guys, lawyer team and all that happened by itself on Telegram. We build the first Presale Platform, created a cool UI for users introduced a level system to build the community and later even added master nodes. However, things just became more and bleaker. As Bitcoin fell closer to $3000 more people left and the group became silent. Sounds like a sad story right? Well, every good storyline has a downturn, followed by a boost of motivation to get through all the shit. A few months ago, we decided that the ICO space became a bit too scammy in 2018. We started to become more selective with the investment choices and eventually stopped pooling altogether. Pooling was about winning together, and it’s not fun if everybody loses. We started to look into other forms of revenue that we can build up to keep us over water until the bear market is over. What we love to do the most is community building, and community is the MOST important aspect of a decentralized network. The idea of blockchain was it to move from a centralized system to a decentralized one. This word decentralized is being thrown around on a daily basis although most people still do not understand what it means to change the architecture from centralized to decentralized. Most if not all big projects still have a very centralized structure going on with a few exceptions like Bitcoin, Ethereum & Steem. Understanding decentralized Architecture A decentralized architecture is fundamentally different to anything we know as of know. That’s also why it’s so hard to understand. Think of bitcoin as the first decentralized company. Let’s call it Bitcoin Crop. To help understand the Bitcoin Company metaphor, let’s say bitcoins properties are the products that this new decentralized company is producing. Common things said about Bitcoin is its decentralized, censorship resistance peer to peer money. These are often the terms used when people tell you why you should buy bitcoin. Bitcoin is the fastest growing asset of all time. Therefore Bitcoin as the first decentralized company is the fastest growing Company in the world, reaching an evaluation of over 300 Billion USD in less than 10 years. Although the Bitcoin Company is producing high-quality stuff, the products themselves are only as good as the sales, distribution, marketing and that where decentralized architecture kicks centralized companies ass. To make things even more complicated we now have to rethink what it means to be paid and to receive a salary. In a centralized company, build on the centralized architecture model, you work for your boss, who has a boss and that boss gets told what to do by some CEO who then has to take his others from shareholders. The money “trickles down” the food chain and by the time it reaches the bottom almost all of it is gone. Let’s compare this with the first decentralized company Bitcoin. In the Bitcoin company its a bit more complicated than that. In the early days of the company, if you want to work there, you actually have to pay the company first! Crazy I know! Think of it as some tribute to show your loyalty to the Network. The earlier you join, the less you have to pay, and the more of the company network you own. In the early days of Bitcoin Corp. most of the employees there were just engineers and a few crazy marketing guys. Things became a lot more interesting in 2013, when some important people started to work at Bitcoin Corp. People like the Winklevoss twins, Roger ver, Chamath Palihapitiya and many others bought a big share in Bitcoin Corp. and thereby earned the right to work for the Bitcoin. After that, Bitcoin Corp started to grow exponentially, because those new high-class employees had a lot of leverage and even more incentive to grow Bitcoin. The harder they would work the bigger the company would become and the more valuable there coins would be. This was the birth of the first decentralized payroll. Most of the mentioned people earned millions working for Bitcoin and are still working hard getting ETFs approved and spreading the word about it. Every person that owns Bitcoin becomes an employee at Bitcoin Corp. Everybody is rewarded for the work that anybody does, and everybody is incentivized to help grow the Bitcoin company. Introducing a New Way of Doing Everything A few months ago, we decided to build software to help ICOs build their own decentralized Networks. We called the system Proof of Engagement and called the Software the DAO Maker. Pun intended. Proof of Engagement is a concept that helps onboard new users and uses token bondage curves and community incentive to create an organic community of long-term token holders. We took our functions that we build to detect contributors in an ICO pool and combined it with our Point system to great a smart community program. The idea is that users can join the ICO before it starts and do community work, quizzes, and other services before the public sale ends. Once the tokens are unlocked, those users that joined the ICO will get their investment tokens + engagement reward tokens. Users can then continue to earn community bonus tokens monthly, but ONLY if they keep their ICO token in the wallet which they used for investing into the ICO. The monthly rewards increase with: Time user holds the initially invested coins. Time users hold their earned engagement tokens. The total amount of tokens held by registered users. The total amount of tokens user is currently holding. Current users community level. Monthly earned points. All of these factors are added together, to give the exact value that a user will receive monthly. Put simply its a micro staking system, that rewards engaged users in tokens. The result is a dynamic token bonded community. People have incentives to build and help the network, the more experience that have the more tokens they will own, the more tokens they will earn. The system incentives loyalty and hodlers, while also makes it possible for new users to join the system and help the network to grow. For a deeper understanding on Dynamic Token Bonding Curves you can check out some publications on Token Economy here  The best KYC & AML & CTF in Crypto For the past months, we were talking to A LOT of KYC providers. We quickly came to the conclusion that most of them are scams. The state of Anti Money laundry in crypto is pretty scary. I lots of people will end up in court for violating the AML directives. Currently, most ICOs do not comply with KYC & AML laws. The EU currently requires to be compliant until the 4th EU AML directive, which will change in 2019. We are already compliant with EU AMLD5, which is not in force yet but already includes cryptocurrencies, we are a step ahead of the curve in the EU. Starting this week, we will introduce the new KYC & AML features on our Platform. We are using the newest system of machine learning to scan a users face and password as well as detecting an applicants voice, to generate a complete biometric signature of his application. We will be able to onboard KYC & AML application in real time and will be one of the first fully compliant with the new regulations of 2019.  Updates to ICODOG Reviews We changed the homepage for ICO DOG to show more crypto stories, reviews and post analysis. We are working on a more in-depth redesign for ICODOG.IO in 2019. We added a few new Blog sections namely, ICO Analysis and Post ICO Reviews and Crypto Stories. We want to take more time in 2019 to evaluate ICOs that concluded their Sale in 2017 & 2018. We are planning to make this a decentralized work effort with the help of Token Curated Lists (TCL). We will make a few posts about TCL in the next few weeks. ICODOG.IO is focusing on providing value-adding content, not the same stuff that the mainstream crypto outlets write about. This will be a really cool project that we are very excited to start next year and finish by end of Q1 2019. We welcomed 3 new writers to the ICODOG team and are trying to produce useful content every day. New Partnerships & Business Development Last month we Partnered up with several high-quality service providers as well as high potential ICOs. We will add all of the new partners on the Partners on the Partners tap of the updated website. Looking forward to building the new world with likeminded people. ICO DOG Platform Upgrade 2.0 We been very busy and added a lot new feature on ICO DOG Investment platform. We are still in bug hunting so if you use the bug bounty tap on the platform to help us. We added some cool features that will make the life of many a lot easier. Automated twitter confirmation Users once a user connects their Twitter account in the profile section and starts generating tweets and retweets, these actions will be detected at midnight automatically. That means users do not need to click claim every day, but instead can earn points directly on Twitter. Reddit Automated Integration Users can now also join the Reddit campaign and generate threads and comments to spread the word about ICO DOG. We increased the team to help with the distribution of content among all the social media accounts. This should help you guys earn points quicker and easier as well as build a community on Reddit. For launching this new system we are increasing the points for reddit registrations by 3x. Ambassador Program We added an Ambassador Program for the ICO DOG community. We added Ambassador status to several people already that have been part of the community for almost a year and been working together through this bear Market. Ambassadors have special rights and access to social media accounts, discord reddit and will be informed about the latest updates. ICO DOG COIN We plan to introduce the ICO DOG Coin next year. This coin will be the fuel that powers all of the ICO DOG utility. Ambassadors will get monthly airdrops in the ICODOG coin depending on their contribution. Part of the revenue that ICO DOG will make goes into the coin via buybacks and token burns. As we are not raising any funds from nobody, the coin is cannot be considered a security. All new Features Summarized Following a few of the new features: + Upgraded pool system: – new wallet management – my pools is now a list (click the red sync button to update your pools) – record and track all the transaction you have sent, even from different address – improved overall working flow + Add reddit integration with auto check (it runs every day) + Weekly competition + Global real-time notifications + Two factor authentication support (Google authenticator) + Twitter with auto claim (it runs every day, no need to click Claim anymore) + Many other new features and bug fixes  Summary This year was rough, but we did not give up. The harder Bitcoin Dumps, the harder we work! Things could be better in terms of the market, but fundamentally ICO DOG is doing pretty good. We want to thank all those that have been with us on this amazing journey since the beginning. Crypto will change the world and we will help make that happen. If you like what we do please register on the icodogpool platform and shill this and other-other content! As always like, share and join discord & telegram. https://icodog.io/crypto-stories/the-story-of-icodog-november-progress-report/
Hello! Some of you may know me from the Daily Discussion thread here. I am an enthusiastic supporter of Bitcoin and also the author of Hopium Time (formerly Daily Hopium). Hopium Time is my effort to improve morale of the Bitcoin community during the dark times of current bear market we've been enduring. In my posts I make an effort to post good news and show parallels to previous Bitcoin bear markets to provide perspective when things look bleak.
I also like to make predictions. My core prediction is as follows:
The price of ONE BITCOIN will surpass $100,000 USD before May 1, 2021.
To illustrate my conviction on this prediction and to help my favorite charity, The Independence Fund, I have made it into a Bet. I’m calling it my Bitcoin Bet for the Vets (BBV). Please take a look at my post on this. I would really like this to grow into a nice donation to the charity which is very helpful to Veterans and their families. Hopefully some of you guys will pledge to match my Bet.
7/21/18 Revision to bet matching:
I will allow someone who pledges to match my bet to decide what percentage of my donation they will match (minimum of 5%). Please reply directly to the bet thread to make your honor bound irrevocable commitment to donate with me on May 1, 2021. I will include you on my public list of donors. Also, while I have pledged to donate enough to buy one track chair for the Vets even if I win the bet, you as a bet matcher, will be encouraged to do the same, but it is not required.
I will attempt to contact some of the leading Bitcoin bulls in the media (John McAfee, Tom Lee, Tim Draper etc.) and let you know in this thread if they plan to participate in my Bet or not. So you may want to check back on this thread from time to time for a status update.
Imagine the good we could do together if more people got involved. We can show the world how generous the crypto community can be. Good for the Vets and good for bitcoin. Everybody wins!
I will maintain an archive of all my Hopium Time posts here, in case you are feeling a little down and need a quick reality check or pick-me-up. See below.
https://preview.redd.it/swms7ved3ak21.jpg?width=1050&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=1036a5bf4fb325aa1e007fc9530167dbf9fff601 Simon says, no minimum investment or additional paperwork, and children go “weeee”. Seriously, are ETFs that great? Let’s knock it off before someone else earns a pile of money on it. There is a lot of buzz in the crypto world about Bitcoin ETFs. Winklevoss twins are trying to get it approved. And the SEC has been very energetic in the department of cryptocurrencies lately, now reviewing two Bitcoin ETF proposals. So, what is an ETF? How does it differ from mutual funds and individual shares? Let’s take a closer look! Just like there are a variety of different mutual funds, there are many different ETFs, each with different objectives. But before we move forward, let’s define an ETF in the most classic manner.
An exchange-traded fund (ETF)is an investment fund traded on stock exchanges, much like stocks.
OK, if you’re an ultimate beginner, you probably have left the page in the middle of the previous sentence. Not yet? As a thank you for this miracle, let’s connect some dots. An exchange-traded fund (ETF) means that there is some fund you can trade on an exchange. Moreover, they call this fund an investment fund, so let’s look into that, too.
An investment fundis a supply of capital belonging to numerous investors used to collectively purchase securities while each investor retains ownership and control of his own shares. Types of investment funds include mutual funds, exchange-traded funds (ETFs) and hedge funds.
Bingo! An ETF share is a fraction of a capital or a fund numerous investors trade on the exchange. But the fund itself consists of stocks, bonds, real estate and other types of investment assets that are selected and managed by an experienced manager. Those investments are then sliced up into millions of pieces and sold to individual investors on exchanges in the form of ETFs. Hedge funds sound familiar to this concept and are an interesting topic in the context of competition with ETFs, but we will not talk it here for one simple reason. The typical minimum hedge fund investment is between $500,000 and $1 million. Meaning, only sophisticated investors can take part in such a fund! As for ETFs and mutual funds… let us put it this way, do you have $100? Then, read on! Read more: https://blogs.airdropalert.com/what-is-etf/
ELI5 Request: Difference between pending CME announcement, and the Winklevoss twins' failed ETF?
So, I don't think futures trading and exchange traded funds are the same thing. Are futures contracts easier to gain approval? Are the Winklevoss twins still working on their ETF? I understand their ETF failed because there wasn't enough regulation with Bitcoin. Would this be a roadblock to the CME futures trading? Finally, CME says they will start trading on December 11th pending regulatory review. What percentage likelihood would you say this will happen?
Over the past few months, there has been plenty of talk around the status of submitted Bitcoin ETF’s. For those that are unaware, an ETF stands for exchange traded fund and is a way to trade an asset or security on a regulated exchange. At press time, there are currently two submitted ETF proposals. One is the Cboe VanEck proposal that has been around for months now. The other was published last week by Bitwise for the New York Stock Exchange. As of February 20th, the SEC will have 45 days to make a ruling on the pending ETFs. In the past, we’ve seen several other attempts in setting up Bitcoin ETF’s fail. Most notably was the Winklevoss Twins attempt that was rejected in 2017 and again in 2018. Matt Hougan, who’s involved with the Bitwise proposal went on to say to Coindesk, “A year ago there was maybe one qualified crypto custodian… and now there are half a dozen, and that number will go up from here.” Why do Bitcoin ETF’s keep getting rejected? There are a few reasons why Bitcoin ETF’s repeatedly get rejected. The largest one is the fear that Bitcoin markets are manipulated heavily. The SEC has even commented on Tether (USDT), and how it appears to prop the Bitcoin price up. Another reason Bitcoin ETF’s have been rejected is due to it being unclear where the official Bitcoin price at any given time is determined. The VanEck proposal is attempting to form this from price action on large over the counter (OTC) trades, while Bitwise plans to use the average of high volume exchanges. Depending on the SEC’s preferences, it’s possible one gets rejected while the other gets accepted. Why do Bitcoin ETF’s matter? In Bitcoin’s case, an ETF would allow users to own Bitcoin without having to deal with storage. Too often we see uneducated cryptocurrency holders lose their funds on centralized exchanges from hacks and other careless mistakes. By simplifying the process, the door is opened for thousands of new cryptocurrency holders. Conclusion Regardless of which cryptocurrencies you support, the introduction of a Bitcoin ETF would bring an enormous amount of mainstream adoption. The SEC has until April 5th to decide, so keep an eye out for the ruling. Do you think a Bitcoin ETF will finally be accepted? Let us know in the comments below.
Post ETF effect on price of ETH (my predictions for evaluation after March)
First we must consider why the ETF is being pushed: The Winklevoss Twins own 108,000 Bitcoin. People expect the price of BTC to move by 3x if the ETF is passed. That would mean that the Winklevoss would have over 300 million USD in Bitcoin that they would want to sell. This is the reason they want to make the ETF so that they have enough volume to offload their BTC (Keep this in mind) Possible outcomes of Post ETF decision. ETF does not pass (I think this is most likely outcome) Likely: BTC drops 30% ETH/BTC ratio spikes 50% (Bitcoin ratio of crypto market below 70%) ETH/USD drops below 11 for first month ETH recovers above 11 from momentum for implementation of Metropolis which appears to be at most 8 months and at least 2 months away. (I think about 4 months away according to Vitalik's sentiments) During this time the price will rise from 10 to new highs (above 22) over the period of time to Metropolis as sentiment of market is discovered. (if setbacks this will not happen, I think security setbacks are unlikely as that is what the last 6 months have been about establishing) The ETF Passes (I think this will not happen but it may) Bitcoin rises 2.5x and then precedes a long downward trend for 2 years before stabilization. If a fork is implemented to save transaction problems BTC will drop below 1800. Short term ETH/BTC drops 50% as Bitcoin outpaces ETH ETH/USD continues upward with a 15% boost from incoming BTC funds In long term ETH will be similar to if ETF does not pass TLDR: Short Term: 2 months ETF pass: ETH rises quickly (not relative to BTC as BTC will outpace ETH) ETF no pass: ETH drops 25% from entire market squeeze of USD but ETH/BTC ratio will rocket Long term: >3 months ETF will not affect long term USD price, only the rate that ETH arrives at that price. This is my personal guess that I wanted to make as part of my post history to review later so I understand how I approach making personal decisions in crypto.
Hello! Some of you may know me from the Daily Discussion thread here. I am an enthusiastic supporter of Bitcoin and also the author of Hopium Time (formerly Daily Hopium). Hopium Time is my effort to improve morale of the Bitcoin community during the dark times of current bear market we've been enduring. In my posts I make an effort to post good news and show parallels to previous Bitcoin bear markets to provide perspective when things look bleak (Edit 5/11/19: Not looking bleak anymore. Time for a bull market! ).
I also like to make predictions. My core prediction is as follows:
The price of ONE BITCOIN will surpass $100,000 USD before May 1, 2021.
To illustrate my conviction on this prediction and to help my favorite charity, The Independence Fund, on July 16, 2018, I made it into a Bet. I call it my Bitcoin Bet for the Vets (BBV). Please take a look at my post (Now archived) on this. I would really like this to grow into a nice donation to the charity which is very helpful to Veterans and their families. Hopefully some of you guys will pledge to match my Bet. You can respond with your official bet pledge right in this thread (since my old thread has been archived).
7/21/18 Revision to bet matching:
I will allow someone who pledges to match my bet to decide what percentage of my donation they will match (minimum of 5%). Please reply directly to the bet thread to make your honor bound irrevocable commitment to donate with me on May 1, 2021. I will include you on my public list of donors. Also, while I have pledged to donate enough to buy one track chair for the Vets even if I win the bet, you as a bet matcher, will be encouraged to do the same, but it is not required.
Unfortunately, so far my efforts to contact some of the leading Bitcoin bulls in the media (John McAfee, Tom Lee, Tim Draper etc.) have mostly failed. Only Tom Lee responded that “If this is for the Vets, I’m in”.
Imagine the good we could do together if more people got involved. We can show the world how generous the crypto community can be. Good for the Vets and good for bitcoin. Everybody wins! Thanks for reading this.
I will maintain an archive of all my Hopium Time posts here, in case you are feeling a little down and need a quick reality check or pick-me-up. See below.
What is an ETF? ETF stands for exchange traded fund, which is basically a security that tracks some underlying assets (for example equities, bonds or commodities). The issuer of the ETF takes custody of the underlying assets it tracks and then issues a number of shares that represent ownership. These shares can be easily traded (like stocks) and therefore remove a lot of barriers for investors who are willing to invest in this particular asset. If an ETF-issuer wants to create new shares, they turn to an authorized participant (AP). An AP is someone who is responsible for purchasing the underlying assets an ETF wants to hold. APs require a license from the ETF provider and then buys the underlying asset on behalf of the ETF-issuer. Subsequently, the AP sends these freshly purchased assets to the ETF-issuer and then ETF provider sends shares of the fund back to the AP. The value of these shares is equal to the assets the ETF provider just received. The redeeming process works in the opposite direction: AP sends ETF shares it wants to redeem to the ETF provider, which then returns the underlying assets back to the AP. There are times when the price of the ETC can become higher than the price of its underlying assets, or net asset value (NAV). Then the ETF is said to be trading at a premium. If the ETF is trading below NAV it is called trading at a discount. The AP arbitrages premiums and discounts to keep the market price tightly coupled to the NAV. What is the benefit of an BTC ETF? The shares of an ETF can easily be obtained and traded and lowers the barrier of entry for investors. With Bitcoin, these barriers are buying the asset and, most of all, safe storage of the asset. A BTC ETF enables technologically inexperienced investors to profit from BTC price movement without going through the hassle of securing their private keys. Hedge funds, pension funds, and 401ks can easily invest in this ETF, so we expect a lot of new capital to flow in Bitcoin. Increased capital inflow decreases volatility and therefore making BTC more stable. What types of Bitcoin ETFs are proposed? There are two types of Bitcoin ETF proposals: ETFs that Physically Hold Bitcoin (VanEck & SolidX ETF) ETFs that Purchase Bitcoin Derivatives (ProShares, GraniteShares, Direxion) ETFs that physically hold Bitcoin This type of ETF owns the underlying asset it tracks. Every share is backed by the real deal. Pros: low transaction costs tracks the performance of the underlying asset directly high liquidity Contras: counterparty risk (custody of the asset) ETFs can only be traded through specific daytimes where the BTC market is open 24 hours ETFs that purchase Bitcoin derivatives The second kind of ETF does not actually hold any Bitcoin. Instead, the ETF tries to mimic the performance of Bitcoin by trading Bitcoin futures, options, swaps, money market instruments. Pros: no worrying of custody of BTC, since these types of ETF don't hold BTC directly Contras: approximating the performance of Bitcoin active management risk active management cost margin call risk leveraged trading risk rollover risk ETFs that are holding physically Bitcoin are far superior to the derivatives-based one. And I expect the first type to havesignificant higher chances of approval. BTC-futures are only a few months old and I cannot imagine that the SEC will approve an ETF that tracks these highly speculative and brand new derivatives as underlying. Requirements of the SEC The U.S.- Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has certain requirements for an ETF to be approved: Custody solutions immune to manipulation sufficient liquidity coorect valuation of the NAV Current situation All derivatives-backed ETFs were rejected by the SEC on August 23. These ETFs were filed by ProShares and Direxion. The decision came down to the risk of market manipulation & fraud. The SEC can only approve an ETF that is designed to prevent fraudulent and manipulative acts and practices. The Winklevoss ETF (backed by the underlying asset) was rejected earlier this month. The main argument for rejection was the fact that the price determination of the NAV would only happen on the Gemini exchange (which is owned by the Winklevoss twins). The only remaining big proposal is the ETF from VanEck & SolidX which backed by the CBOE (Chicago Board of Options). The VanEck & SolidEck ETF proposal backed by the CBOE This proposal is vastly superior to prior ETF proposals and addresses most of the concerns the SEC has expressed when rejecting prior ETF applications. Reasons are: holds physical BTC backed by the CBOE, which is a very serious institution shares are big (25 BTC = 1 share), this excludes retail investors Involved parties: Fund: SolidX Bitcoin Shares. FileExchange: CBOE BZX Exchange. Trust/Fund IssueBTC Custodian: VanEck SolidX Bitcoin Trust. Trust’s SponsoManager: SolidX Management. Trust’s Administrator & Cash Custodian: BNY Mellon. Marketing Agent: Foreside Fund Services. Marketing: Van Eck Securities Corp. Comparison with a Gold ETF The SEC approved the streetTRACKS Gold Shares ETP even though the spot gold market were largely unregulated. On March 28, 2003, the first gold-backed ETF, developed by ETF Securities, was launched. It trades on the Australian stock exchange as the ETFS Physical GoldGOLD, +0.06% with assets under management at about $602 million. “We can certainly track the growth of gold ETFs since their invention, and see how investor interest in gold has growth significantly,” said Will Rhind, managing director of U.S. operations for ETF Securities. Globally, there are now 143 gold ETFs available, with the latest data showing assets under management at roughly $132 billion, he said. In the first few years after the first Gold ETF was introduced, the Gold price rose by over 600%. The ETF lowered the barrier of entry for many investors. Final deadline The Sec can postpone the final decision until 21. February 2019 and we expect them to do so. The developement of Bitcoin markets made big leaps forward since the filing for the Winklevoss ETF, for example we have now very advanced custody solutions (from Coinbase for example) and with increasing liquidtiy volatility decrease.
Cryptocurrencies plunge for the week with Bitcoin still below USD$6,550, forecasters project 54% per annum growth in the Cryptocurrency ATM industry over 5 years and Coinbase explores launching a Bitcoin ETF with BlackRock
Developments in Financial Services
Apex Clearing, a digital financial clearing and execution company, announced Wednesday of plans to launch a new cryptocurrency brokerage subsidiary. As a result, Apex’s clients, who are primarily wealth management and financial advisory firms, will have access to investment opportunities in cryptocurrencies. Initially in its brokerage service, Apex will include Bitcoin, Bitcoin Cash, Litecoin, and Ethereum before expanding to other coins.
The Australian Securities Exchange (ASX) has announced a six-month delay in the rollout of a specialized blockchain to facilitate equity transactions. ASX has been working to implement the blockchain since December 2017 and had plans to launch in late 2020. However, with the six-month setback, ASX will not launch the blockchain until March or April of 2021. ASX cited plans to devote more time to user development and testing in explaining its decision to delay the blockchain’s launch.
Abra, the cryptocurrency wallet startup, is now permitting deposits to come from European bank accounts. Users in Single Euro Payments Area (SEPA) can now transfer Euros (or other national currencies) directly into Abra.
The ASX is delaying the roll-out of a blockchain settlement system until 2021. After receiving 41 written submissions form various stakeholders in the process (clearing & settlement, payment providers, market operators, etc), ASX management decided it makes sense to delay implementation and extend the development testing period.
Bittrex announced it is partnering with Cryptrofacil to launch a cryptocurrency trading exchange for Latin America. The new exchange will be based out of Uruguay.
Coinbase announced Thursday of plans to roll out new crypto trading pairs for the British pound. David Farmer, general manager of Coinbase Pro, said in a blog that Coinbase Pro will begin offering trading services for the pound against Ethereum, Bitcoin Cash, Ethereum Classic, and Litecoin. Coinbase Pro already offers trading services for the pound against bitcoin.
Crypto.com is launching its first cryptocurrency debit card in Singapore. The company raised USD$25mm this past June in its an ICO. Crypto.com will be partnering with payment provider Visa to deliver its debit card.
Industrial & Commercial Bank of China, the largest bank in China, has announced it will focus on investing in “intelligent banking” and the deployment of new financial technologies. The goal of the bank is to introduce “smart banking” to the financial ecosystem in China.
ResearchandMarkets.com forecasts that the crypto ATM industry will grow to USD$114.5mm by CY2023 and implies a per annum growth rate of ~54.7%. The company suggests the majority of the growth will come from two-way ATMs which let customer change digital currency into fiat and vice-versa. Furthermore, the reported by ResearchandMarkets.com posits that that the majority of the crypto ATMs will be based in North America. At the moment, crypto ATM industry is forecasted to be ~USD$16.3mm.
Robinhood, the mobile zero-fee investment app, revealed Thursday that the firm is actively looking for a CFO while citing ‘definite’ plans for the firm to go public. Robinhood CEO Baiju Bhatt expanded, saying, “it’s definitely on the horizon, not in the immediate term, but that’s something we are thinking about.”
Regulatory Environment
After making a controversial move to hold themselves to know-your-customer (KYC) regulations, ShapeShift exchange is facing criticism from users across the crypto industry. In explaining their decision, CEO Erik Voorhees explained that the idea of requiring customers to hand over private information is something the exchange has struggled with for a long time, but they believe this is the best decision to help the firm navigate the regulatory environment.
Breugel, a Belgium-based think tank, argues that the EU should create a single standard for regulating cryptocurrencies for the Euro-bloc. The group believes there should be common regulations for crypto exchanges and ICOs.
Global crypto wallet Abra will begin enabling the direct purchase and sale of cryptocurrencies with European bank accounts, the company announced Tuesday in a press release. Users will now be able to transfer euros and other national currencies into their wallet, which can then be used to purchase any of 28 cryptocurrencies offered by the crypto wallet.
The Iranian government has accepted the mining of cryptocurrencies as a formal industry. The Supreme Cyberspace Council is now focusing on developing a framework for regulation of the crypto mining industry.
Members of the European Parliament met Tuesday to review a proposal of regulatory framework that would surround initial coin offerings (ICO). If passed, the proposal would cap token sales of an ICO at EUR 8 million and hold offerings to know-your-customeanti-money-laundering regulations. The framework would allow projects to raise funds in any of the 28 EU member nations.
The Philippines Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) said Tuesday that it plans to release trading rules for cryptocurrency exchanges to follow, according to local news outlets. The Philippines has been an early mover in crypto regulation, having already published regulatory framework for initial coin offerings and requiring actual registration of crypto exchanges.
A high-ranking official of Ukraine's Finance Ministry, Sergey Verlanov, explained in an interview that Ukrainians are expected to pay the regular 19.5% income tax on profits from crypto related activities. Verlanov went on to add that while cryptocurrencies have no official legal status in Ukraine, they are common items deemed intangible assets.
An order issued by Uzbekistan President Shavkat Mirziyoev on Sunday states that Uzbekistan will no longer charge tax on cryptocurrency related income and that licensed cryptocurrency exchanges will not be held to the country’s securities and exchanges regulations. This announcement comes as Uzbekistan is attempting to attract cryptocurrency related businesses to the country.
General News
Andreas Antonopoulos, Bitcoin evangelist, believes Bitcoin ETFs will be negative for Bitcoin long-term as it will let investor speculate about its price more easily. Antonopoulos believes a Bitcoin ETF will permit market makers to manipulate Bitcoin markets and that individual investors would move away from playing an important part in the decision-making process of the cryptocurrency ecosystem (since they would inevitably shy away from the responsibilities of owning Bitcoin key).
Bill Barhydt, CEIO of cryptocurrency payment startup Abra, during an interview on CNBC’s Coin Rush, suggests the SEC is rejecting Bitcoin ETFs because the applicants don’t “fit the mold of who the SEC is used to approving.” Barhydty suggests a trusted financial organization has better probability of getting a Bitcoin ETF approved than a startup.
Bitcoin Depot has launched 20 crypto ATMS in California to bring its total global installed base to 160. The company expects to reach 200 installed ATMs globally by year-end. With an install rate of 7 ATM/months, Bitcoin Depot may not reach its management goal of 1,000 installed Bitcoin ATMs by CY2020.
Bitcoin’s market capitalization is back to 55% of total digital currency market capitalization, the highest level since December 2017.
Bitmain’s AntPool has activated AsicBoost, a controversial method of mining Bitcoin more efficiently. AsicBoost exploits a previously known weakness in Bitcoin’s proof-of-work algorithm that allows for faster mining. Bitmain notably holds a patent in China for a system that exploits the Bitcoin network’s weakness in order to increase mining productivity.
Bitfi, previously advertised as an unhackable Bitcoin wallet, has withdrawn its claim that it is not hackable after cybersecurity researchers were able to discover serious security flaws in Bitfi’s technology.
Bittrex has decided to delist Bitcoin Gold following failure by the cryptocurrency to pay Bittrex the monthly listing fee of USD$262,907.
Blockchain identity startup Civic has decided to use 333 million of its 1 billion supply of CVC token (~USD$43mm) to pay for the costs of identity checks of users on its platform as well as stress-testing the protocol.
Blockstream VP Warren Togami warned investors on Tuesday of a possible ‘51 percent’ attack on Bitcoin Cash’s blockchain. With a hashrate below 8% of Bitcoin’s , Togami warned that a ‘51 percent attack’ could render the cryptocurrency useless. In his rantings on Twitter, Togami cited Bitcoin Cash’s similarity to Feathercoin, a cryptocurrency who’s ‘51 percent’ attack left the coin obsolete.
Cannabis publication, High Times, reported Wednesday that they would be accepting cryptocurrency for its ongoing initial public offering (IPO). High Times initially announced that it would accept bitcoin and Ethereum in the beginning of August; however, it rolled back on its announcement citing regulation issues. Despite the rollback, it appears that bitcoin has remained a payment option in the publication’s IPO.
Cryptocurrencies underwent a harsh selloff Wednesday morning with the top 100 coins losing $12 billion of market cap in just one hour. Most notably, Bitcoin’s price dipped below the $7,000 level and Ethereum lost more than 11% in the last 24 hours. CNBC crypto analyst Ran NeuNer cited that a possible reasoning for this price move could be a large sell-off of digital assets from a crypto wallet that may be associated with the infamous Silk Road.
Google is rolling out an update to its Big Data service that will help investors “visualize” the Ethereum blockchain. The platform, BigQuery, will permit users to visualize behavior and clustering on the Ethereum blockchain.
IBM announced today of a partnership with Hu-manity.co to develop a ‘health data application that utilizes blockchain technology. This is not the first time the tech giant has partnered on a blockchain related projects, announcing partnerships earlier in the year with SecureKey and Sovrin.
According to iPR Daily, Alibaba and IBM have filed the largest number of blockchain-related patents to date. Alibaba has filed for 90 different blockchain-related patents while IBM has filed 89. Mastercard is 3rd on the list at 80.
Japanese city Tsukuba has officially become the first Japanese city to test a voting system that leverages blockchain technology. The blockchain voting system allows citizens to vote on different social contribution project proposals, such as the construction of a cheap sporting facility and the creation of a new cancer diagnostics center.
A malware that targets Bitcoin ATMs is on sale in underground markets for approximately US$25,000 according to Trend Micro. The malware exploits a service vulnerability and utilizes Near-Field Communication or pre-written cards that are provided to the buyers of the malware.
The Mega Chrome extension for the Chrome internet browser has been compromised. Hackers can now steal a user’s Monero as well as sensitive information according to chatrooms on Reddit and posts on Twitter.
The People’s Bank of China announced Tuesday that it has officially launched the testing phase of its blockchain trade finance platform, according to the Shanghai Securities News. The new blockchain aims to provide an “open financial and trade ecosystem based on the Guangdong, Hong Kong, and Macau Bay are.” The new blockchain should help banks conduct business authenticity audits, slash business costs, and improve efficiencies while helping regulators monitor various financial activities and improve interdepartmental information sharing.
Ripio, an Argentinian startup that ICO’d last year, has launched its full service, offering microloans to some 200,000 bitcoin wallet users in Argentina. Ripio’s blockchain connects lenders with borrowers from across the globe by leveraging Ethereum smart contracts. Ripio said its microloans can be issued for as much as US$730 and its average loan size is around $146.
Rising RAM costs are making the costs of EOS dapps cost prohibitive for developers. RAM, according to analysis by CoinDesk.com, has to be bought at market prices using EOS, with trades taking place on the Bancor algorithm. Each EOS dapp user takes 4 kilobytes of RAM to onboard for developers. According to the current RAM price, that's around $3.12 per user.
The South Korean government continues to make a push to invest and trial blockchain technologies in the public sector. According to CoinDesk.com, The Korea Internet & Security Agency (KISA) is looking to increasing the number of blockchain starter projects in the public sector from 6 to 12 by CY2019.
Southeast Asia’s largest cryptocurrency exchange, Coins, reported that it tripled its user count over the last fiscal year, going from 1.5 million users to over 5 million users. Coins is located in the Philippines and has grown by aggressively targeting foreign markets, specifically Malaysia and Thailand.
A survey by YouGov Omnibus finds that half of American Millennials are interested in using cryptocurrencies. The survey covered 1,202 persons and according to the results, 79% of the respondents knew of at least one cryptocurrency and 71% knew of Bitcoin.
Wal-Mart plans to begin testing the effectiveness of automated delivery drones based on blockchain protocol. The blockchain technology is meant to replace the elements of the delivery process that is dependent on “trust”.
While testifying in front of a US Congressional committee Wednesday, Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey said the social media giant believes blockchain may be a potential solution to the lack of trust between social media companies and their users. Dorsey cited that a decentralized blockchain would help to establish digital trust between the company and users, and that a blockchain may help to solve problems introduced in social media within the last two years.
The Winklevoss twins have won a patent for a cold storage method of protecting crypto keys that involves air-gapped computers, geographically remote vaults, plastic cards, and papyrus. The patent, awarded on Tuesday, was awarded to the brothers’ firm, Winklevoss IP, LLC by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.
Wyre, a crypto payments startup, has acquired Hedgy, a venture capitalist backed bitcoin smart contract development firm. Wyre hopes to leverage the acquisition of Hedgy in order to wider their crypt financial ecosystem, specifically by offering more financial instruments, such as forwards, swaps, and more.
→ Crypto ETF Rejection Sends Bitcoin Price Below $8,000 The bitcoin price fell below the psychologically-significant $8,000 mark afte the SEC rejected a cryptocurrency ETF application. → Uber Co-Founder, E*Trade Vet Launch Zero-Fee Cryptocurrency Trading Platform Uber's first chief technology officer and a former executive at stock brokerage E*Trade have teamed up to launch a zero-fee cryptocurrency trading platform. → Binance Prepares to Enter the South Korean Market - Bitcoin News Binance is preparing to expand into South Korea, having already hired Koreans for some local positions. However, the exchange is reportedly waiting for the country’s crypto regulatory framework to be fine-tuned before actually launching SwissBorg Referendum Join us VOTE & get rewarded !! Daily Performances BTC was holding steady above 8000 until today. SEC rejected the proposed BTC EFT by the Winklevoss Twins for the second time. At the time of writing BTC dropped below 8000, dragging the entire market down. The next day or two will be a test to see the market shakes the news off in expectation of more positive news, or return to summer doldrums. Weekly Top 5 Price comparison - BTC. - ETH - XRP - BCH . - EOS https://preview.redd.it/tbzy37hmwic11.png?width=1045&format=png&auto=webp&s=d84ac53f0a6f2c4f02bd0ee634d885d82c7b09c5 Technical Analysis -BTC BTCUSD has broken the descending triangle on the upside on heavy volume. This is a very positive development and indicative of a strong uptrend over the next weeks and months. While it might have a consolidation or even a minor correction in the near term as it is short term extended we don't see any major resistance until $10,000 https://preview.redd.it/taxtu6uowic11.png?width=1313&format=png&auto=webp&s=6f8121ef25551d0e19cac17b5bf4433a1470a1dc ----------------------------------------------------------------------
Daily PerformancesBTC dominance by market capitalization in the total crypto market posted its highest level yesterday, passing 47.10% for the first time. The move comes as sentiment surrounding Bitcoin in particular continues to improve after BTC/USD jumped in excess of 15% over the last five days. At the same time, the other cryptocurrencies have struggled to achieve similar gains, posting losses against Bitcoin. Weekly Top 5 Price comparison - BTC. - ETH - XRP - BCH . - EOS https://preview.redd.it/axdkbd6ey2c11.png?width=1064&format=png&auto=webp&s=c613a48f15c04b443cf15dcd633f3b8535ff7489 Technical Analysis -BTC BTCUSD has busted through the 100 SMA dynamic resistance, so there’s some bullish momentum building up. BTC is ready to test the 200 SMA dynamic resistance around $8,500 next. This is near a former support turned resistance level at the $9,000 barrier.A move past this level could lead to a test of the $10,000 major psychological level. Stronger bullish pressure could take BTCUSD to the next ceiling close to $12,000. However, RSI is indicating overbought conditions already, which means that seller's wave is taking over. https://preview.redd.it/envy8vfsy2c11.png?width=1332&format=png&auto=webp&s=6703efe0e2aa16be704f9b799885bd28ec4ba5f7 ----------------------------------------------------------------
Tuesday, 24. July 2018
→ Someone Tried to Hack Etherscan [Using the Comment Section]Ethereum block explorer Etherscan has thwarted a hacking attempt in which the attacker attempted to use the comment section to serve up malicious code. → China’s ‘Dream City’ Taps Ethereum Dev. Studio ConsenSys for Blockchain PushGovernment officials in Xiongan New Area have announced a partnership with Ethereum development studio ConsenSys to develop blockchain initiatives for China’s “dream city.” → UK Central Bank Says New Payments System Will Be Blockchain FriendlyThe Bank of England confirmed it is going to update its Real-Time Gross Settlement system to potentially interact with blockchain-based forms. → A New Bitcoin Wallet Fulfills an Old Privacy PromiseThese cypherpunk crypto wallet projects want to bring fungibility to bitcoin. SwissBorg Referendum II Partial Results Referendum data done by a community member (Draazzzz) #WeAreSwissBorg Source: https://www.cryptalloc.com/rsb2 VOTE NOW! https://vote.swissborg.com Daily Performances BTC dominance by market capitalization in the total crypto market posted its highest level yesterday, passing 46% for the first time. The move comes as sentiment surrounding Bitcoin in particular continues to improve after BTC/USD jumped in excess of 15% over the last five days. At the same time, the other cryptocurrencies have struggled to achieve similar gains, posting losses against Bitcoin. Weekly Top 5 Price comparison - BTC. - ETH - XRP - BCH . - EOS https://preview.redd.it/8rvz3sr24vb11.png?width=1058&format=png&auto=webp&s=903e46fe354b3851b5ea69851777b3139d8073ce Technical Analysis -BTC BTC has now broken the Head & Shoulders neckline at $6,750 and has rapidly moved past beyond it. The target of the formation is around $7,900 so we expect to reach that level in the next days/weeks. This is very positive overall on a medium to longer term perspective, the next major hurdle is the $8,000 level, where BTCUSD will meet a downtrend that has proven difficult to surpass last time. https://preview.redd.it/08g9qmz54vb11.png?width=1326&format=png&auto=webp&s=4ee7c329ea9a151fb7b66afd1945149a9c0b3a68 -------------------------------------------------------------------
ETF Approval Is Unlikely To Happen Any Time Soon, Says Godfather of ETFs
https://preview.redd.it/bbcl9rx6eyv11.jpg?width=960&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=855f200ae334a09ad0e5f3451763a6ce4ea12ee0 According to Reggie Brownie, better known as ‘Godfather of ETSs,’ Cryptocurrency Exchange-Traded Funds (ETFs) may be approved “no time soon,” as reported by Business Insider Thursday. Brownie said a reliable and robust regulatory framework must be established first before regulators approve a cryptocurrency ETF. He said these while speaking at the Financial Markets Quality Conference. The event was sponsored by Georgetown University in Washington D.C. Giving his two cents on the current state of bitcoin ETFs, Brownie said:“It’s very difficult for the [Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC)] to wrap their heads around a positive approval because there’s no data yet … the markets just aren’t here.” Brownie’s statement echoes those made by Larry Fink when discussing BTC ETFs. Though Mr. Fink seems to be unsure about the future of ETFs, he did not rule them out. “I wouldn’t ever say – when it’s legitimate, yes,” said Fink, speaking at the New York Times DealBook Conference. “It will ultimately have to be backed by a government. I do not see sense that any government will allow that unless they have a sense of where that money is going,”Fink said. Fink clearly expressed concerned regarding the potential for money laundering, tax evasion and other scams as the cryptocurrency is not only anonymous but also largely unregulated. The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has been reluctant to approve applications for cryptocurrency ETFs due to similar reasons. Early this year, SEC said in an official letter that ‘investor protection issues need to be examined’ before these funds are approved. In August this year, the regulatory body turned down applications by three different institutions seeking to launch 9 ETFs. SEC gave the same reason it delivered earlier this year when it rejected Winklevoss twins’ BTC ETF proposal, Forbes reported. SEC expressed concerns about fraud and manipulation of cryptocurrency markets.
Image Source: Cointelegraph In the past few days, we have seen a couple of internet news outlets and cryptocurrency websites recycling reports about the refusal of the US Securities and Exchange Commission to grant a regulatory approval for the launching of the Bitcoin Exchange-Traded Fund or Bitcoin ETF by the Winklevoss twins. This particular news was initially released in March of 2017. How come are we seeing the same news again after more than a year of its original release? The cryptocurrency market is characterized by high volatility. Prices of bitcoin and altcoins can rise and drop according to existing market demand and supply. Investor speculations which are brought about by current news and regulatory updates also affect the movement of prices. The recycling of the SEC-Winklevoss news can be considered as an attempt to bring down the price of Bitcoin after slowly recovering in the past weeks. We could easily remember that the same news in March 2017 has caused a significant drop in Bitcoin’s price from $1295 to $1000, which was a negative 22% change. There was much confusion as to which ETF has been denied when the story came out again last week. Recycling of negative news concerning the regulatory status of Bitcoin in world governments has the potential to gravely affect the Bitcoin and cryptocurrency prices. As years of market history has already proved, investor speculations and random news are among the primary movers of cryptocurrency values. When a story comes out, be sure to pay attention to the details. Market manipulators use real stories out of context or with intentional facts omitted to control the market to their liking. Original story from: https://roguecrypto.com/2018/07/30/the-sec-winklevoss-news-recycling-fake-fud/
SEC’s Meeting with of SolidX, VanEck, and CBOE Paves the Way for a Bitcoin ETF
The race to launch the first Bitcoin exchange-traded fund (ETF) seems close to a happy ending. Although it is difficult to determine a date, many analysts have expressed an optimistic view of the situation after analyzing the latest developments in this area. The SEC has acquired a bad image within the ecosystem of users and traders of cryptocurrencies after denying all the Bitcoin ETFs that had been presented. The most famous case was that of Gemini -the Exchange owned by the Winklevoss twins – while the last denied Bitcoin ETF was that of VanEck. https://ethereumworldnews.com/sec-meeting-solidx-vaneck-cboe-bitcoin-etf/
The Winklevoss ETF is a joke, 4 years waiting for 20mio$ - 0.1% of the actual market cap, yes or no it doesn't change anything ! I don't even understand why would people get exited about it sick. http://www.nasdaq.com/markets/ipos/company/winklevoss-bitcoin-trust-909930-72927 And twins surely already have the necessary fund in btc since 2011 so their 20mio$ initial as become 200mio$ and etf is just a way for them to dump coin, cashout gain while making price skyrocket out of religious belives of hodlers. The amount distributed by the ETF will be 20 million $. Which is ridiculous compared to power of bitcoin at the moment. I don't even understand how people can use this as speculative info... 20kcoins is 1 or 2 day volume on kraken shouldn't have any impact on the btc price if people were not guided by 'stupid and religious like hodler believes'.
When the ETF goes online will it's shares permanently be tied to the number of Bitcoins the Winklevoss twins start the fund off with or will this ETF purchase additional BTC as needed? I would imagine that the price of bitcoin would behave differently depending on whether existing or additional BTC is used within the fund over time? Does someone here have a better understanding of how this will work?
Approval of the Winklevoss Bitcoin ETF is expected before the end of the year, according to this article on Gemini....
Get your moon suits ready! From the paywalled mondaymorning article:
The Gemini Bitcoin exchange, one of several Bitcoin-related projects that the Winklevoss twins have in the pipeline, has obtained two key approvals from New York regulators. The New York State Department of Financial Services (NYDFS) has granted the Gemini Trust Co. approval for its Articles of Organization. The NYDFS also granted Gemini an exemption from the FDIC deposit insurance requirements of New York's banking laws. It's all been part of an arduous process to gain the solid regulatory backing needed to make Gemini the top choice for institutional investors. The Winklevoss twinsThe Winklevoss twins, Tyler and Cameron, set up the Gemini exchange as a trust company under New York regulations. It gives the Bitcoin exchange many of the same privileges as a bank, including the ability to take deposits. But as a banking trust, Gemini can't lend money. Lending isn't necessary for Gemini to function as a Bitcoin exchange, and it would have lengthened the approval process even more. The new approvals make the Gemini Trust Co. an "established entity," which means it can now pursue the formal relationships with banks and vendors that will allow it to actually launch the exchange. The approvals have Gemini on the "one-yard line," Cameron Winklevoss told CoinDesk, although it still needs a few more approvals from the NYDFS. The Winklevoss twins have pursued the banking charter path rather than apply to the NYDFS for a BitLicense specifically because they wanted to serve institutional investors. "I don't know if anyone has made this distinction enough. If you want to service institutional customers in New York, the BitLicense is not sufficient," Cameron Winklevoss told CoinDesk. "There's a good chance that when you get one you'll have to curtail or stop actually servicing NY institutions." The charter also means the Winklevoss Bitcoin exchange will have the option to offer derivatives, swaps, and futures, although that will require further approval from the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC). The CFTC ruled last month that Bitcoin is a commodity, and so such trading falls under its jurisdiction. Gemini will not be the first U.S.-based Bitcoin exchange – Coinbase and ItBit went live earlier this year. ItBit, like Gemini, operates as a trust company with NYDFS approval. But here's why institutional investors are likely to prefer the Gemini Bitcoin exchange What Sets the Gemini Bitcoin Exchange Apart Part of the appeal of the Gemini Bitcoin exchange is the painstaking effort the Winklevoss twins have made to ensure it's fully compliant with all regulations. That goes a long way to building confidence in an institution – particularly a new one based on a digital currency that itself is only six years old. But the Winklevoss twins also believe Gemini has features that will make it more appealing to institutional traders. "We describe Gemini as an E-Trade, because we'll have a web interface, like Nasdaq, because we have a matching engine order book, and like DTC [Depository Trust Company] because we are also a clearing and settlement house. We are basically all three functions collapsed into one," Tyler Winklevoss told Modern Trader. "When we discuss what we're doing with the institutional crowd, they get really excited about the clearing and settlement aspects of what we're doing, and the reduction in costs. Bringing that friction down is a massive opportunity." The Gemini Bitcoin exchange also fits into a larger trend of rapidly increasing Wall Street interest in the digital currency. Last month, for instance, nine major world banks announced they had formed a partnership to study ways to incorporate Bitcoin into the global financial markets, an alliance that since has grown to 22. The Gemini exchange is just one Bitcoin investing initiative the Winklevoss twins have undertaken. They also are awaiting U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission approval of the Winklevoss Bitcoin Trust, a Bitcoin exchange-traded fund (ETF) that will trade under the ticker Nasdaq: COIN. Approval of the Winklevoss Bitcoin ETF is expected before the end of the year. The Winklevoss twins also created their own Bitcoin price index, the Winkdex, which uses a weighted formula based on trading at the top three Bitcoin exchanges. But for now, they're very much focused on launching the Gemini Bitcoin exchange. "Our days are focused on building what we consider a pure-play Bitcoin exchange," Tyler Winklevoss told Modern Trader. "We need to make sure it's an active, healthy market with the right participants, so that when people show up, there's liquidity, a full order book and everything works as expected and advertised. We're trying to do this one thing really right, in a way that the community hasn't seen yet."
Bitcoin ETF Could Actually Be on Horizon Says Prominent Investing Firm
Bitcoin users had lost hope of having an Bitcoin ETF when the Winklevoss twins' application was rejected. However, the CEO of ARK Investment Management feels that a Bitcoin ETF may only be a year or two away. ETFs matter Some may debate the utility of having a Bitcoin ETF when it would be more profitable to hold Bitcoins instead. By holding Bitcoins directly, you get the benefit of price appreciation without having to pay any management fees. However, financial institutions usually have a mandate for investment and direct ownership of Bitcoin wouldn't fit into their investment plan. A Bitcoin ETF, however, would grant exposure to Bitcoin’s prices and also be highly liquid. ETFs would also help unsophisticated investors to invest in Bitcoins indirectly. These investors would be willing to pay the fund management fee to avoid the hassle of buying Bitcoins from an exchange and taking precautions to store them securely. Ark Invest - Indirect Exposure As a registered investment company, ARK Invest is not allowed to directly purchase and hold Bitcoins. So it has invested in the Bitcoin Investment Trust, giving its end investors exposure to cryptocurrency. Cathie Wood, the CEO of ARK Investment Management told Bloomberg: “I wouldn’t be surprised if we saw a closed-end fund before a Bitcoin ETF. I don’t think we’ll see an ETF within a year, but maybe within two years and with a lot of education.” Bitcoin ETFs could provide an avenue for financial institutions to invest in Bitcoin fuel a new rally in the cryptocurrency. SEC Action The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has so far been unwilling to approve any of the several Bitcoin ETF proposals. After four years of delay and inaction, the SEC rejected the application of the Winklevoss twins, saying that it could not approve an ETF where the underlying asset is unregulated. The SEC asked other Bitcoin ETF applicants to withdraw their applications. Given that the primary objective of the SEC is to protect investors, the decision did not come as a surprise. The SEC has also started clamping down on ICOs, stating that ICOs with equity-like features would be subject to federal securities laws. Regulatory Tussle The existing financial regulators have clear boundaries on the assets they regulate. While the SEC regulates securities, the Commodities Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) regulates commodities trading. However, as a totally new asset class, Bitcoin doesn't neatly fall into either of these categories. The SEC's opposition to Bitcoin ETFs may become meaningless once CFTC-approved trading of Bitcoin futures begins. If an ETF application bases its application on a CFTC-regulated futures market rather than unregulated Bitcoin exchanges, the SEC's entire reason for denying an ETF will become moot. It does seem like a Bitcoin ETF might eventually get approved.
This is an automatic summary, original reduced by 85%.
ANSWER: D. Tyler and Cameron Winklevoss won a large settlement from Facebook in 2010 and sunk a large amount of their winnings into bitcoin and bitcoin projects. The twin brothers filed for SEC approval of their fund in 2014 and submitted multiple drafts of a prospectus that promised to open up investment in bitcoin to the masses-since an ETF would allow bitcoin investment by mutual funds, pension funds and hedge funds. ANSWER: B. A funny thing happened on the way to the SEC's rejection of a bitcoin ETF: The longstanding Bitcoin Investment Trust started acting more like the de facto ETF that some people had predicted it would be all along. ANSWER: B. Michael Moro, chief executive of bitcoin market maker Genesis Trading, says that everyone in the bitcoin network would like to tweak the underlying software to speed up transactions, which were once instant but have slowed because of high demand. Miners-the independent programmers who solve the mathematical riddles embedded in bitcoin transactions and so verify them-want to update the bitcoin software unilaterally so they can process more transactions simultaneously. To prevent the bitcoin miners from eroding the value of the currency, the reward for "Solving a block" of bitcoin would be halved every four years or so.
Summary Source | FAQ | Theory | Feedback | Topfivekeywords: bitcoin#1ETF#2fund#3D.#4trade#5 Post found in /Bitcoin, /BitcoinAll and /btchub. NOTICE: This thread is for discussing the submission topic. Please do not discuss the concept of the autotldr bot here.
A Bitcoin ETF, such as the one proposed by the Winklevoss twins, would have the digital currency bitcoin as an underlying asset. That means that by purchasing a bitcoin ETF, an investor would be indirectly purchasing bitcoin, as he or she would be holding the bitcoin ETF in a portfolio as opposed to the actual digital currency itself. Bitcoin (BTC), Cryptocurrency, Exchange-Traded Funds–The Winklevoss twins, who first emerged in popularity following their association with Mark Zuckerberg and the creation of Facebook, have become a set of established figures in the cryptocurrency industry. Since merging into the industry in 2013 with an investment into Charlie Shrem’s BitInstant payment processor, the Winklevoss twins ... Founders of digital currency exchange are confident about bitcoin ETF despite two SEC rebuffs. ... Winklevoss twins on crypto’s allure for the ETF world. ... Exchange traded funds Add to myFT. The Securities and Exchange Commission rejected a second attempt by Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss, founders of crypto exchange Gemini, to list shares of what would be the first-ever bitcoin ETF. After having their Bitcoin ETF proposal rejected by the SEC in January, the Winklevoss twins submitted an updated proposal with a few tweaks. That updated proposal was rejected by the SEC on July 26th. However, there are a number of other ETF proposals on the table.
Bitcoin ETF approval and Tether to be wiped out? 2019 predictions ... the Winklevoss twins have recently spoken out on The Ledger to offer some interesting predictions for the markets in 2019. We ... This News will be the best news if the US SEC will approve this ETF Bitcoin Hearing on 11th March then the Price will be for 1 BTC = $1645 Speculation about the Winklevoss twins’ Bitcoin ETF ... Bitcoin ETF News - Winklevoss Twins & Japan [Bitcoin Technical Analysis] Bitcoin James. Loading... Unsubscribe from Bitcoin James? Cancel Unsubscribe. Working... Mar.10 -- Bloomberg’s Cory Johnson discusses the Securities and Exchange Commission’s rejection of a filing for a Bitcoin ETF by Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss. He speaks with Caroline Hyde on ... Winklevoss Twins Look to Create Bitcoin ETF - Duration: 2:36. Bloomberg 2,035 views. 2:36. Language: English Location: United States Restricted Mode: Off History Help
