Hey everyone,
In my Weekly Crypto Overview, I will assemble the important news of the last week and make a summary of it. This way you will have one place to go for all the significant events that happened the week before in crypto. I hope you enjoy it and that it saves you a lot of time searching for all the news. I know not everyone has the privilege to be full-time in crypto, so I hope this is a solution for many of you.
So let’s dig in… What kept the crypto world at hands last week?
- SEC Guidance on Crypto Tokens is Coming
- Bitcoin Lightning Coming to Cash App
- Two Public Pensions Joining Crypto Venture Capital
- Ethereum’s Constantinople Hard Fork Take Two
- Nasdaq Will Add Bitcoin and Ethereum Indices
- JPMorgan Will Have Own Crypto Token
- Lightning Fast Pizza
SEC Guidance on Crypto Tokens is Coming
SEC Commissioner Hester Peirce said in a speech that the SEC is working on supplemental guidance to help projects determine whether their crypto-fundraising efforts fall under the securities laws or not.
The Howey test is the US standard for determining whether something is a security, Hester Peirce said that token offerings do not always resemble traditional securities offerings.
As example, Peirce explained that capital raised from decentralized token offerings could mean it is not truly owned or controlled by a company or person, unlike with traditional securities which are controlled by issuers or promoters.
Bitcoin Lightning Coming to Cash App
The Bitcoin scaling solution the lightning network may soon come to Square’s Cash App for mobile payments. In a recent interview with Stephan Livera Twitter and Square CEO Jack Dorsey told that there are plans to integrate the scaling technology with Square’s mobile app.
It’s not an if, it’s more of a when, and how do we make sure that we’re getting the speed that we need and the efficience. We don’t think it stops and buying and selling Bitcoin. We do want to help make happen the currency aspect.
You can listen to the interview here.
Two Public Pensions Joining Crypto Venture Capital
Morgan Creek, an asset manager, focused on institutional clients and family offices, announced Tuesday a new crypto-focused venture fund with $40 million invested. The two public pensions anchoring the fund are Fairfax County, Virginia’s Police Officer’s Retirement System and Employees’ Retirement System.
Speaking to the conservative bent of those involved, the new fund’s investors also include a university endowment, a hospital system, an insurance company and a private foundation.
Morgan Creek’s new fund will primarily make seed investments in equity, Pompliano explained, though in certain limited cases it will also invest in token-based projects that don’t create equity opportunities but do have cash flow. It will also hold a small amount of key cryptocurrencies.
You can read Coindesk’s full article about it here.
Ethereum’s Constantinople Hard Fork Take Two
With the code expected to activate sometime during the last week of February, at block number 7,280,000, ethereum core developers are confident that Constantinople won’t fail this time.
Users anticipating the launch of Constantinople can either go to forkmon.ethdevops.io or Ethernodes to watch the release in real time. A number of other sites are also available for live metrics including mining hashrate and market prices.
You can read Coindesk’s full article about it here.
Nasdaq Will Add Bitcoin and Ethereum Indices
Nasdaq to Begin Dissemination of New Third Party Indexes on GIDS, Effective Monday, February 25, 2019, according to their announcement.
The Bitcoin Liquid Index (BLX) and the Ethereum Liquid Index (ELX) are each designed to provide a real-time spot or reference rate for the price of 1 BTC and 1 ETH respectively, quoted in USD, and based on the most liquid ends of their markets. Both indices are calculated using a methodology that has been independently audited against key IOSCO principles. The BLX is one of the most widely-referenced BTC indices among crypto traders and has been calculated back to 2010. Likewise, the ELX has been calculated back to 2014.
JPMorgan Will Have Own Crypto Token
JP Morgan is rolling out the first US bank-backed cryptocurrency to transform payments business. Engineers at the company have created the ‘JPM Coin’ a digital token that will be used to instantly settle transactions between clients of its wholesale payments business.
Only a tiny fraction of payments will initially be transmitted using the cryptocurrency, but the trial represents the first real-world use of a digital coin by a major U.S. bank.
While J.P. Morgan’s Jamie Dimon has bashed bitcoin as a “fraud,” the bank chief and his managers have consistently said blockchain and regulated digital currencies held promise.
You can read CNBC’s article on it here.
If you can’t beat them, join them!
You can read Coindesk’s full article here.
Lightning Fast Pizza
The crypto payments startup Fold, which launched the web-based Domino’s portal on Wednesday, basically makes fiat pizza purchases on behalf of hungry lightning users. Fold product lead Will Reeves put it this way:
We’re trying to make bitcoin fun again and illustrate that lightning is at a point where it is mainstream-ready
The Fold web app plans to integrate lightning for all its shopping options over the next six months, including Starbucks, Whole Foods, Dunkin Donuts, Target and Uber. Since these aren’t official partnerships, the crypto startup places orders on users’ behalf and converts payments to fiat to offer a seamless experience.
You can read Coindesk’s full article here.
That’s it for now. All the best to everyone!
Khilone
The material contained in this article is not to be regarded as an recommendation to buy or sell or the solicitation of any offer to buy or sell securities in any jurisdiction where such an offer or solicitation is against the law, or to anyone to whom it is unlawful to make such an offer or solicitation, or if the person making the offer or solicitation is not qualified to do so. The information on this document does not constitute legal, tax, or investment advice. You must not, therefore, rely on the content of this document when making any investment decisions.
