Rakuten Wallet To Launch In June And Coinbase Custody Introduces Staking and Governance
April 2, 2019 Weekly Crypto Round Up
What’s In Your Rakuten Wallet
Japanese online retailer Rakuten is launching a cryptocurrency exchange in June. Rakuten is the largest e-commerce site in Japan and ranks among the largest in the world by total sales. The online giant acquired Everybody’s Bitcoin Inc. last year for just over $2 million US dollars after Japanese authorities questioned the exchange’s risk management practices. Following a restructuring of management and internal controls, the newly established exchange will begin accepting account applications in April and operate under the name Rakuten Wallet.
The new announcement reiterates the optimism and interest surrounding digital assets, especially in this region and sector. Just days ago, a subsidiary of Yahoo! Japan announced it would launch a new cryptocurrency exchange in May called Taotao. In 2018, Rakuten even announced it would fuse blockchain technology with its Super Points loyalty program to create the Rakuten Coin. Users can spend their points on dozens of Rakuten services in an attempt to further connect customers with retailers and merchants. The latest news supports Rakuten’s claims that they expect the role of cryptocurrency in e-commerce to continue to grow.
Stake It Till You Make It
Digital currency exchange Coinbase announced support of Tezos (XTZ) staking for clients of Coinbase Custody. Staking — also known as baking within the Tezos ecosystem — rewards validators for helping secure the blockchain. Unlike active Proof-of-Work systems, users can passively participate merely by holding tokens.
However, with Tezos, bakers usually have to post a bond worth 10% of the total staked amount. With Coinbase Custody’s new staking project, Coinbase will post the bond in order to mitigate any risk of losing tokens stored online. The institutional player’s staked tokens will remain offline in cold storage and protected by insurance policies. Coinbase hopes the program will encourage fund managers and fiduciaries to participate in the networks without sacrificing security or considerations for compliance.
Shortly after implementing Tezos baking, Coinbase will focus on introducing governance rights for Maker and Tezos holders. MakerDAO’s Dai (DAI) has quickly emerged as one of the crypto-communities preferred stablecoins while Makercoin (MKR) is used to govern Maker smart contracts and DAI. Coinbase is working directly with Maker’s VoteProxy smart contract to allow institutional players to vote. Previously, those holding offline tokens with custodians could not participate in voting.
The Other News We’re Following
175million Bitcoin payments to be completed in 2019 according to the latest estimates from TheSpring.io
“It’s still very much an early adopter market.”
— Tom Jessop, Head of Corporate Business Development at Fidelity Investments and President of Fidelity Digital Assets
