The specialists agreed that trying to ban Bitcoin is not a viable option. Coin Center’s director said that “a little crime is tolerable,” but Digital Holdings CEO disagreed.

A group of experts recently discussed what should be the best way to regulate the industry of Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies. Digital Holdings CEO Colleen Sullivan, Coin Center’s director Peter Van Valkenburgh, and DLx Law’s co-founder Lewis Cohen all expressed their views on the matter.

Sullivan suggested that “there should be specific federal legislation on the cryptocurrency industry.” This businesswoman considers that Bitcoin is unstoppable, so there needs to be regulatory clarity. She believes that a unique regulation would help companies in the United States that want to create businesses around cryptocurrencies.

Although Cohen agrees on some ideas with Sullivan, he is not very optimistic about changes that may benefit the ecosystem shortly. This lawyer highlights that “there is a stalemate in the Senate” over the regulation on cryptocurrencies.

“We should be cautious about hoping for legislative solutions in Congress,” Cohen explained. He recalled the US regulations that prevent the advancement of any business “that puts its consumers at risk.” Therefore, “the volatility of Bitcoin (BTC) and other crypto assets puts them in a difficult position on legislative matters,” he said.

“It Is stupid” to Regulate a Technology like Bitcoin

Coin Center’s director Van Valkenburgh adopted a clear position on how to approach the regulation on Bitcoin and other digital currencies. He stated that “we should not regulate technologies but activities” that involve their use in the country. “It is stupid to regulate an entire technology like Bitcoin in the US system, but we could regulate some activities,” he explained.

According to Van Valkenburgh, there have been regulations on many of the activities involving the use of Bitcoin in the United States since 2013. As an example, he mentioned the case of a company that “is managing other people’s bitcoins and sending them on their behalf.” He explained that they “need to be registered and their customers must meet suspicious activity reporting requirements.”

The executive also spoke about the measures that the Trump administration took during the last days of his administration. Due to that “urgent midnight regulation”, exchanges “now need to enforce more than KYC policies.” They “must also know the name and physical address of the people to whom they send cryptocurrencies.” Coin Center believes that “that is going too far.”

It is Possible to Tolerate a Little Crime

Van Valkenburgh said that Bitcoin “protects the privacy of the individual and honors the autonomy of individuals.” The reason for this is that it does not require a centralized entity to conduct financial transactions.

Coin Center’s manager said that “if we believe that human beings are genuinely and generally good, a little crime is tolerable. Most people will use non-permissioned networks to do the right things.”

Sullivan disagreed with him, saying that “one of the beautiful things about Bitcoin is that it is friendly to law enforcement and regulators. By not being completely anonymous, it allows detecting nefarious activities through blockchain analysis.”

By Alexander Salazar

For two months, Bitcoin miners exhibited a negative balance with higher sales volume. This new behavior could raise the price of the pioneering cryptocurrency as the supply would decrease.

Right now, Bitcoin (BTC) miners are holding more coins than they are selling in the markets. According to Glassnode metrics, after two months of spending, the miners of the main cryptocurrency are returning to saving their rewards.

Between December 28^th, 2020 and February 25^th, 2021, Bitcoin miners exhibited a negative balance. In other words, the volume of their coin sales was greater than the amount that they kept in their possession.

In January, their daily sales were higher, with caps almost reaching 24,000 BTC. However, the trend started to decline in February, with a sales cap of 6,100 BTC on the 5^th.

According to Glassnode, there was a positive balance in miners’ addresses, reaching 1,368 BTC. That happened after two months of sales on February 26^th, but the balance remained favorable a day later, with a saving of 658 BTC.

Incidence of Bitcoin Savings on the Increase of Its Price

If miners’ saving trend remains or increases, the price of Bitcoin could increase further. That is because the supply of Bitcoin in the markets would decrease, thus increasing its scarcity.

The high demand among institutional investors would signal the lower availability of Bitcoin in the markets. Firms like Tesla, MicroStrategy, Square, and mutual fund Grayscale mutual are acquiring increasingly large amounts of Bitcoin.

In 2020, the third Bitcoin halving occurred, which reduced the issuance of new coins by 50%. The network issued incentives of 12.5 BTC for each block mined through mid-May. However, the figure is now only 6.25 BTC, that is, the reward underwent a reduction by half.

Miners made their sales while the price of Bitcoin was booming. During that period, the price of the cryptocurrency jumped from around USD 27,000 to an all-time high of USD 58,640, according to data from CoinGecko. Bitcoin reached the highest price in its history on February 21^st.

Opinions on Miners’ Saving of Bitcoin

Social media users gave their opinion on the behavior of Bitcoin miners. Analyst Lex Moskovski believes that the savings could indicate an upcoming bullish trend in the cryptocurrency market. “Miners stopped selling and started hoarding Bitcoin again, which is a bullish sign,” Moskovski noted on Twitter.

Similarly, user @OMatthew explained that this is a usual move in cryptocurrency markets. Regarding the supply of and the demand for Bitcoin, he highlighted that “miners do not have an infinite supply. They hoard for a time and then dispose of their coins when they consider it appropriate to do so.”

He added that “this is probably as simple as sellers’ reducing their supply during this correction phase. Therefore, the selling pressure is diminishing and the bullish movement is approaching.”

In 2020 and so far in 2021, Bitcoin has had its highest levels of volatility. The cryptocurrency went from less than USD 5,000 per unit to almost USD 30,000. Regarding price fluctuations and the role of miners in them, there is little evidence that the latter is responsible.

By Alexander Salazar

In just 24 hours, Cardano went up by 27%, thus becoming the third largest-cryptocurrency. The growing institutional interest in altcoins ensures the potential that networks such as Cardano offer.

Exceptional performance in recent weeks pushed the price of Cardano (ADA) to a new all-time high. That also made it become the 3rd largest cryptocurrency in the ecosystem.

At the time of writing this article, Cardano is trading at USD 1.36, accumulating a gain of 27.72% in the last 24 hours and 30.64% in the last 7 days.

The main catalyst for the rise that this cryptocurrency is experiencing is the wait for the launch of Mary. This Cardano update will allow moving forward into the Age of Goguen. There, the network will finally be able to support smart contracts.

It is not only retailers who are entering this market eagerly awaiting improvements to the Cardano network.

Cardano became the 3^rd largest cryptocurrency on the derivatives market, thanks to open interest in futures worth USD 580 million. With this, it exceeds Litecoin, which had exceeded it by more than 50% advantage until recently.

Institutional Trust in Cardano

As if that were not enough, cryptocurrency hedge fund FD7 Ventures announced that they sold USD 750 million worth of Bitcoin. They did it to increase the holdings of Polkadot and Cardano.

Investing that amount of money implies a great movement of trust towards these cryptocurrencies. It is equivalent to 75% of the USD 1 billion that is under their administration.

There is great institutional interest in migrating to different altcoins. In this case, the fund ensures the potential those networks such as Cardano and Polkadot offer for the construction of Web 3.0.

Both networks are increasingly viable alternatives to Ethereum since high gas prices have put pressure. That has made users choose other platforms that are compatible with smart contracts.

Cardano Exhibits a Clear Bullish Trend

This upward behavior shows that Cardano has a short-term clean bullish trend. It recently picked up demand in the support zone near USD 0.84 to start the search for new all-time highs.

The price of ADA is developing short-term momentum, now showing some exhaustion. The proximity of the update and a bullish moment suggest that there should be no sales.

If a crash occurs, it will be nothing more than profit-taking, since the bulls will eventually regain control.

There Is Still a Long Way to Go for Cardano against BTC

Although there are all-time highs against the US dollar, Cardano is still far from doing the same against Bitcoin. Trading at 0.00002929 BTC, ADA is 200% off its all-time high compared to the pioneering cryptocurrency.

In addition to the strength of Bitcoin in the ecosystem and its hierarchy as a store of value, it also shows that there is room for greater gains.

This is just a new all-time high against the US dollar since the cycle should extend further. The adoption of the Cardano network as an alternative to Ethereum could lead to a rally that accelerates the speed.

By Alexander Salazar

The initiative that seeks to improve MIT’s Bitcoin network will run for four years. The American educational institution has already received USD 4 million in donations.

In recent days, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) announced a new project to further strengthen security on the Bitcoin (BTC) network. The educational institution explained that the objective of the initiative is “to face new threats.” They expect to develop it in four areas in the next 4 years. The proposal has already received the support of relevant figures from the Bitcoin ecosystem, among whom are the CEOs of MicroStrategy and Twitter.

The American institute would work on expanding the MIT team of researchers and engineers from three to eight. Furthermore, they would build defenses against potential vulnerabilities, contribute improvements to the Bitcoin Core client, and formulate new software tools.

Another objective of the project would be to contribute to the reduction of “bottlenecks” in the ecosystem that could lead to centralization. In this regard, the idea is to ensure the transmission of the knowledge already acquired to new generations of developers to strengthen security.

“The design of the research and development program aims to further strengthen the Bitcoin network. At the same time, it seeks to maintain the industry’s commitment to funding open source software,” the institute said on its website.

Millions of US Dollars in Donations to MIT

The donations that the program began to receive already amount to USD 4 million. MIT hopes to raise a total of about USD 8 million to complete its research in the time set.

Supporters who have already contributed funds include Gemini, a renowned exchange for Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies. The firm committed to providing USD 1 million, at a rate of USD 250,000 each of the next four years.

Reputable figures such as Michael Saylor (MicroStrategy), Jack Dorsey (Twitter), Fidelity Digital Assets, Meltem Demirors (CoinShares), Suhas Daftuar (Chaincode Labs), Reid Hoffman (LinkedIn), and Alex Morcos (Hudson River Trading) have also contributed capital to the project.

The institute has been closely following the development of Bitcoin as a digital system for years. The educational institution has emphasized the security of the network, considering that it is crucial when dealing with decentralized schemes.

“The security of Bitcoin is critical to the continued evolution of the underlying technology. It is also important for the fulfillment of the promise of the public good of cryptocurrencies,” said the institute.

The security of Bitcoin is normally associated with the processing power of the network. In other words, a greater number of participants or miners in the system means that it is more secure. In recent weeks, this computing capacity reached new all-time highs at 176 EH/s.

The issue of security has played a relevant role in the cryptocurrency ecosystem since Bitcoin’s birth. For that reason, the interest of large institutional investors in the development of new cryptographic security systems has grown. The MIT initiative is just one of many that seek to protect users’ cryptocurrencies.

By Alexander Salazar