Stories by Jimmy Aki
BitMEX CEO Arthur Hayes to debate Nouriel Roubini
It looks like the debate has already begun. BitMEX CEO Arthur Hayes and well-known economist and crypto skeptic Nouriel Roubini—known affectionately as Dr. Doom—are all set for a showdown on stage at the 2019 Asia Blockchain Summit on Wednesday. But, for both men, the date can’t come soon enough–as they’ve been verbally sparring over the internet. The opening salvo was fired by Hayes, after it tweeted a promotional poster dubbing the event, “The Tangle in Taipei.” The tweet also stated that tra...
Singapore exchange Bitrue breached in a $4.7 million heist
Another exchange has fallen foul to hackers. Singapore-based Bitrue has lost nearly $5 million of cryptocurrency, in both XRP and Cardano (ADA), as it becomes the latest exchange to suffer a security breach. This comes shortly after GateHub was hacked for almost twice the amount. Bitrue disclosed that the attackers had exploited a vulnerability in one of its internal review processes, and the information gleaned from it was used to breach the accounts of about 90 Bitrue users. Once in, the atta...
China’s state-run media agency reports bitcoin is a safe haven in a rocky world
China may be warming to bitcoin. Yesterday, Xinhua News Agency, a Chinese state-run media outfit, published an analysis over Bitcoin’s latest price surge. The analysis touched on the price of Bitcoin and speculated on the reason for its bullish run, touching on Facebook’s Libra as a possible cause. But more tellingly, it said that bitcoin has proven it’s a safe haven, attracting the attention of many investors. It put this into context, pointing out that global markets have become more volatile...
TRON Foundation Gears Up for the Largest TRX Buyback
The TRON Foundation has announced a buyback of TRON (TRX) tokens as a vote of confidence for the fledgling ecosystem–and also, a died-in-the-wool technique to regulate price fluctuations. According to the announcement, the buyback commemorates TRON’s Independence Day, aka the moment TRON broke free from Ethereum's blockchain in 2018. Per the announcement, the TRON Foundation will conduct the buyback in batches from secondary markets, with a minimum spending limit pegged at $20 million. “At thi...
New York businessman pleads guilty to crypto fraud
Patrick McDonnell, 46-year old ‘businessman’ from New York has pleaded guilty to charges of defrauding investors under the guise of using their funds to invest in cryptocurrencies. The long arm of the law caught up with McDonnell in March, as part of a larger scheme to round up shady traders by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC). Per a release by the U.S Attorney’s Office, McDonnell, who is also known as “Jason Flack”, pleaded guilty before United States District Judge Nicholas G....
ChangeNow catches 500,000 stolen XRP from the GateHub hack
Some of the XRP funds stolen between May 30 and June 5 from crypto wallet GateHub have been frozen as they were passing through the platform. It was revealed on June 6 that nearly 100 XRP Ledger wallets on cryptocurrency wallet provider GateHub were hit by hackers, resulting in the loss of some 23 million XRP ($9.2 million). Crypto exchange ChangeNow revealed on June 11 that it managed to catch 500,000 ($200,000) of the stolen XRP as it moved across its platform. Once the hack happened, a blackl...
The upcoming Telegram token sale might be jumping the gun
Telegram’s $1.7 billion ICO in 2018 set tails wagging for Telegram’s next move, a public sale of its Gram token to regular schlubs like you and me. In 2018’s eye-watering raise, access was limited to accredited investors like Andreessen Horowitz and Union Square Ventures. Now, it would seem that all things are in order for the company’s rumored Gram token to be sold to the public on July 10. Kind of. Telegram isn’t planning on a sale of its tokens until October this year, so a third-party has ju...
Stellar to hold its first conference in Mexico City
Stellar is planning to hold its first-ever conference—dubbed “Stellar Meridian”—in Mexico City Nov. 4-5. Describing its ecosystem as "the most active in fintech," Stellar plans to use Meridian as an avenue for information sharing, community building and, of course, networking. The idea for a conference was floated in Stellar’s “Roadmap” last month. "Meridian is an opportunity to discuss big-picture questions around financial inclusion, efficiency, and innovation. Where are the greatest applicati...
Coinbase wants you to accumulate crypto and avoid getting REKT
Coinbase believes it can help you help yourself. Cryptocurrencies are way more volatile than normal currencies or traditional investments. The wild price swings have liquidated more than a few investors. Short sellers are getting crushed to the tune of $400 million and sob stories on the Reddit crypto forum abound. But leading crypto exchange Coinbase has a solution. It turns out that it’s one already used in traditional finance markets and is called dollar cost averaging (DCA). In a recent blog...
Rakuten taps CipherTrace as AML compliance partner for new crypto exchange
Japanese Internet giant Rakuten is making a play to one day be as popular with crypto traders as it is with online shoppers. And it seems that Amazon's e-commerce rival in Japan won’t be taking any shortcuts on its regulatory compliance to get there. On Wednesday, the company announced that it has partnered with the Silicon Valley-based blockchain security firm CipherTrace to ensure anti-money laundering (AML) compliance for its forthcoming crypto exchange, Rakuten Wallet. “Regulatory compliance...
Dash brings anti-51 percent attack software upgrade to mainnet
Dash’s highly-anticipated “anti-51 percent attack” network upgrade has finally been completed, marking “one of the most important updates” in the blockchain’s five-year history, according to an emailed statement from the Dash Core Group. The company behind the Dash cryptocurrency announced today that the Dash Core v0.14.0 software upgrade has officially gone live on its mainnet. The upgrade aims to solve the nightmare of 51 percent attacks while also providing near-instant transaction times, as...
