Cryptocurrency Adoption Grows Due to Crisis Caused By COVID-19

Willmen Blanco
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Cryptocurrency Adoption Grows Due to Crisis Caused By COVID-19

The COVID-19 crisis has forced people to seek alternative technological solutions. Meanwhile, blockchain and cryptocurrencies become increasingly popular.

In the field of cryptocurrencies, everything changes faster than in any other industry. This is quite appropriate as they were born in the Internet age.

China currently leads the global digital asset initiative. The innovation train seems to move faster since the digital yuan (DCEP) has boosted rapid development in the field of blockchain technology.

Rather than waste time on regulatory uncertainty, the Chinese government has shifted its attention to benefits. Despite being the country of origin of the new coronavirus, which has had a huge impact on society and the economy, technological development has not stopped but has accelerated at an amazing pace.

McDonald’s and Starbucks are reportedly part of a group of 19 restaurants, retail stores, and entertainment companies participating in a test of China’s digital yuan. While the launch of the Chinese central bank’s digital currency seems to be a few steps from occurring, the world is hungry for digital money and FinTech applications.

New Trends Change the Digital Landscape

Apart from having a negative impact worldwide, the current COVID-19 crisis has also forced people to seek alternative solutions to avoid using cash. Bitcoin (BTC) and Ether (ETH) remain popular, but these assets are unlikely to become units of account. However, Stablecoins and CBDCs can be part of the solution.

The People’s Bank of China says that the digital yuan has exceeded the Libra concept in terms of key technical features, such as the option to process offline transactions on mobile devices. According to the institution, one of the objectives of DCEP is to internationalize the yuan as a method for making cross-border payments, without intermediaries that charge huge fees and take longer to process transactions.

In the past month, several central banks have announced plans to experiment with CBDCs. Earlier this spring, the Bank of France officially launched a pilot program for a digital euro, testing the integration of a CBDC for interbank settlement of payments. Meanwhile, South Korea’s central bank announced a very similar plan a week later.

Opportunities in the Post-COVID-19 World

The emergence of digitized national currencies is very close to occurring. Besides, after years of initial coin offerings and fraud cases, numerous illicit players have begun to leave the blockchain scene. For that reason, there comes a new wave of stablecoins and the opportunity for DeFi loans.

World markets collapsed and then fluctuated on March 12th due to the pandemic. In that regard, Coin Metrics’ studies show the increasingly important role of stablecoins amid rising fees and the expansion of margins in cryptocurrency trading. After the coronavirus outbreak began to affect global markets, the supply of stablecoins began to grow.

Tim Draper stated that the use of cryptocurrencies will become widespread within five years, not longer than that. They continue to grow in popularity, utility, and ubiquity. They are also ditching their exclusive niche for geeks since society already has enough technical expertise to fully utilize and adopt that solution. For widespread use, the world needs a more user-friendly and convenient interface that allows interacting with cryptocurrencies more often.

By Willmen Blanco

Latin America Now Has New COVID-19 Tracking Blockchain Application

Alexander Salazar
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Latin America Now Has New COVID-19 Tracking Blockchain Application

The open source platform safeguards users’ privacy. The solution aims to become the cornerstone of a future immunization registry.

The LACChain regional alliance enabled a blockchain-based platform, for the population of Latin America, which allows the registration of COVID-19 immunity passports. The initiative offers citizens of the continent an open-source mobile application, called David-19, to share information related to the virus, without exposing users’ private data.

LACChain, an initiative led by the innovation laboratory of the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB Lab), announced the launch of the project, whose objective is to provide a blockchain-based technological tool to facilitate citizens’ movement, respecting the ethical standards for its features of being voluntary and anonymous, as the technical document describes.

The proposed solution aims to issue and manage COVID-19 health passports, registered on a blockchain for monitoring, in real-time, the population’s immunity status. Marcos Allende, LACChain’s technology coordinator, revealed that they will use the Hyperledger network. It could also be the cornerstone of a future digital immunization registry, according to its GitLab repository.

To operate on the platform, users can download the available mobile application, which works as a virtual wallet adder. After selecting a digital wallet (for now, only the REM app is available), users should create their profile and start sharing key information to understand how COVID-19 moves in the region.

Most interactions between participants occur off the chain, with high levels of privacy, scalability, and flexibility. However, citizens can give their explicit consent through VC (verifiable credentials, electronic equivalent of physical credentials) to allow the application to send specific information to the health authorities of each country.

Every Goliath has a David

In the face of the COVID-19 pandemic, solutions such as the David-19 platform bring new challenges, especially when the magnitude of the battle requires a collective solidarity response. However, the technological gap makes it impossible for many citizens to join, since there are currently Latin America regions without Internet access and millions of people without smartphones.

Another obstacle to ​​an immunity passport as an alternative to unconfinement is the fact that the World Health Organization (WHO) does not support it.  The international agency has been recently calling for caution and warning that people should gradually conduct the removal of quarantine measures due to COVID-19. They even say that the population should do it by areas, differentiating between the most and least affected regions of each country. Otherwise, there may be a new and violent outbreak of the coronavirus.

Despite this, projects continue to emerge that promote the idea of ​​an immunity passport to track COVID-19. Only some of these solutions can operate in decentralized environments, which allows the protection of citizens’ private data. Others, such as the one presented by the Argentine Government a few days ago, cause concern in the population about how the State could use the personal data available to them.

Another alternative to COVID-19 contact tracking is a free and open-source application developed by the Zcash Foundation, which is already available for implementation. This platform allows monitoring contacts without surveillance, thus preserving users’ data.

By Alexander Salazar

Bitcoin’s Price Is around the USD-10,000 Barrier

Alexander Salazar
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Bitcoin’s Price Is around the USD-10,000 Barrier

The price of the cryptocurrency has increased by around 10% in less than 3 days. Its volatility increased to 14 on the day of the halving.

Data from CoinMarketCap indicate that the price of Bitcoin is currently overcoming resistance in the USD-9,500 range.

The chart of the price of Bitcoin since May 11th, the date on which the third halving of the Bitcoin network occurred, shows that it has had an upward trend since then. There has been an increase from USD 8,720, at the end of the 11th, to USD 9,645, at the time of writing this article. This indicates that in about 3 days the price of the first cryptocurrency has increased by 10.60%.

One of the indications of what is happening to the value of Bitcoin is its price volatility. It is important to remember that, its volatility was at 28.8% last March 29th. After that date, the metric started to decline slowly but steadily, which brought it to 11% on May 7th.

Since then until May 11th, the day of the halving, the price volatility of Bitcoin increased to 14.1%. At the time of writing this article, its volatility is 13%. This metric does not predict price changes, but only translates into figures the frequency or intensity with which the price will change.

Market analyst Marcel Pechman states that a drop in implied volatility means that traders were already anticipating a drop or recovery in the price after the halving. The recovery of the price of Bitcoin has shown in the short term that investor confidence is improving. It is possible to see this, considering that the market since May 9th was testing psychological support at USD 8,200, while the most notable resistance was at USD 9,000 until May 13th.

Investor Confidence Improves

After breaking this resistance, the price of the cryptocurrency has been testing new supports at USD 9,500. It seems that the market is flirting with resistance at USD 10,000, so Bitcoin could return, in the short term, to values ​​such as those registered on May 8th.

According to a GlassNode chart, exchanges have had a significant reduction in net cash flow. Furthermore, the data provided by this company show that there are more active addresses that receive Bitcoin than addresses that send the cryptocurrency. The GlassNode team says that, although investors are withdrawing their cryptocurrencies from exchanges, this has not harmed the price of Bitcoin.

Last May 7th, the BTC unit reached USD 9,960 at the end of the day, while the price of the cryptocurrency is USD 9,645 at the time of writing this article. The movements of the price of Bitcoin can be considered as something natural in the continuous breathing of the market.

These movements could be related to the increase in investor confidence after the halving. However, it will be necessary to wait for a medium-length or long time to be able to appreciate the true implications that the halving will have on the price of the first cryptocurrency.

By Alexander Salazar

Traders and Analysts Predict the Price of Bitcoin After the Halving

Maria Rodríguez
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Traders and Analysts Predict the Price of Bitcoin After the Halving

Some analysts consider that the price of Bitcoin could rise to 75,000 and even a million dollars. However, in the short term, the price of Bitcoin could fall to USD 6,000.

After the third halving of Bitcoin, which took place last May 11th, analysts calculate that the price of the digital asset could exceed USD 500,000, whilst other analysts believe that it will reach USD 75,000 or even fall below USD 6,000.

Market analyst Plan B recently published an analysis on its Twitter account. In the tweet, Plan B assured that the halving of 2020 could make Bitcoin’s price exceed USD 100,000. This analysis also shows that the price of Bitcoin can reach a million dollars in 2024 if it follows the trend of previous events.

According to the analysis that different users published on Twitter, the price of Bitcoin can reach USD 545,000 per bitcoin if the scenario is like after the halving of 2012. The second halving occurred in November 2012. After that event, the price of Bitcoin progressively rose from USD 2.01 to USD 270.94 and even more than USD 1,100 in late 2013. In total, the price of Bitcoin rose by one 7.562% in less than a year after that first halving.

After the halving of July 2016, the price of Bitcoin also reached a significant increase. This increase in the price of Bitcoin appreciated months later. Each Bitcoin was worth USD 164 In July 2016. On the other hand, each Bitcoin was worth USD 20,089 in December 2017.

The history of these two events suggests that the price of Bitcoin could reach USD 545,000 in 10 or 11 months. This increase would be possible since the halving reduces the bitcoin reward and increases the demand in the market.

Halving and Coronavirus

Last May 17th, the price of Bitcoin was USD 9,750. Days before this year’s halving, the average was USD 7,000 per bitcoin. For this reason, if the price of Bitcoin rises 7,000 % and happens the same that in 2012, the price could reach USD 545,000.

Other analysts are much more optimistic. Former Facebook executive Chamath Palihapitiya and three other experts indicated, in late April, that the cryptocurrency may be worth between USD 20,000 and USD 1,000,000 after halving.

According to Chamath, Bitcoin has a 10% chance of reaching a million dollars. This trend, he says, could increase due to the crisis that the Covid-19 pandemic caused. “If the probability was 1 %, unfortunately, the probability is now 5 % or 10 %”, he said.

Short-term Bearish Scenario

Despite these optimistic predictions, some traders recall that, after a halving, the price of the cryptocurrency may drop before increasing significantly in the following months. In the short term, many cryptocurrency traders predict that the price of Bitcoin will drop to USD 6,500.

A drop to USD 6,400 would consolidate the support area of ​​USD 6,000, strengthening the Bitcoin rally for a more robust bullish trend in the second half of 2020.

However, other traders predict that the price of Bitcoin will experience lower support levels after it falls to USD 8,100. Since the price of Bitcoin fell after the previous two halvings, technical analysts expect the price to drop to USD 6,000 as its lowest point.

If this happens, the digital asset that is worth more than USD 9,000 today could drop below 6,000 before boosting to USD 10,000 and continuing to rise. If Bitcoin’s momentum is overwhelmingly strong and breaks the trend, it can trigger a major bullish trend in the coming months.

By María Rodríguez

Small BTC Wallets Increased 235 % more after 2020 Halving than in 2016

Maria Rodríguez
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Small BTC Wallets Increased 235 % more after 2020 Halving than in 2016

More and more users have at least 0.01 BTC in their wallets. Days after the halving, analysts forecast an increase in the price of Bitcoin in the coming months.

The date that the mining community expected in this 2020 arrived. Last May 11th, the third halving in Bitcoin’s history reduced the number of rewards per block. After this third halving, there has been an increase in the number of Bitcoin wallets that have less than 0.01 BTC.

According to Glassnode, pioneering platform on chain-market analysis, the number of Bitcoin (BTC) addresses with less than 0.01 BTC (USD 86) increased by 235%, compared to Bitcoin’s second halving, which occurred in July 2016. For this reason, there are currently about 10 million Bitcoin wallets with at least 0.01 BTC.

On the other hand, addresses with a balance between 0.01 BTC and 0.1 BTC (approximately between USD 86 and USD 860) increased by 204% compared to 2016, whilst the number of Bitcoin wallets with more than 0.1 BTC, but less than 1 Bitcoin increased 142%.

Glassnode published this data on its official Twitter account, @glassnode, last May 11th. The firm published this tweet with a chart that compared the current number of wallets with 1 BTC to the number of wallets in 2016.

Likewise, the number of wallets with 1 BTC increased by 63.2%, those wallets with 10 BTC increased by 11.2 %, addresses with 100 BTC (USD 860,000) increased by 6.3%, and those with 1,000 BTC (USD 8.6 million) increased by 13.2%.

“The Bitcoin network has seen immense growth since the 2nd halving” Glassnode commented on Twitter.

Bitcoin’s Behavior After the Halving

Sergio Ávila, Analyst at IG Markets, explained that the halving seeks to prevent all bitcoins from ending in only a few hands. “It is a shield that its creator invented to make this coin efficient”, he said.

This Bitcoin distribution mechanism makes the experts consider that the halving will continue to raise the price of this cryptocurrency. The increase could take place months after the halving.

A theory called stock-to-flow allows predicting the Bitcoin price range after the halving, which tends to drive the price of the cryptocurrency, as has happened on previous occasions. The first halving in Bitcoin’s history was in November 2012. After that event, the price of Bitcoin progressively increased from USD 2.01 to USD 270.94.

The second halving was in July 2016, when the price of Bitcoin was USD 164. After the halving, the price saw a sharp rise. On December 17th, 2017, the price of Bitcoin was USD 20,089. With this record, the 2020 halving could also trigger a bullish wave.

Market analyst Plan B recently published an analysis on its Twitter account. In the tweet, Plan B assured that the halving of 2020 could make Bitcoin’s price exceed USD 100,000. This analysis also shows that the price of Bitcoin can reach a million dollars in 2024, following the trend of a great appreciation in each halving.

According to Plan B, and due to the results of the 2012 and 2016 halving, the price of Bitcoin is preparing to reach values ​​never seen before. The increase could occur even 10 or 11 months after the halving.

However, the main obstacle that Bitcoin will have to face is overcoming its volatility and not falling when traditional markets do so, as happen in mid-March due to the crisis that the Covid-19 pandemic caused.

In the so-called Black Thursday, the price of Bitcoin fell to USD 4,700. (50%). This is a behavior that Bitcoin should avoid to obtain positive results.

By María Rodríguez

Buterin’s Many Mistakes about Release Date of Ethereum 2.0

Alexander Salazar
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Buterin’s Many Mistakes about Release Date of Ethereum 2.0

Test network coordinator Afri Schoedon opposed Buterin’s comments. Phase 0 of the new network version may not arrive until 2021.

The release date of phase 0 of Ethereum 2.0 has changed once again, which has aroused much expectation in the ecosystem. Vitalik Buterin, who attended a virtual conference last May 11th, stated that the next version of the network would finally arrive next July. However, some hours later the programmer said that there was a misunderstanding as he could not hear one of the questions.

The long-awaited launch will mark the first step to change the protocol from PoW (Proof of Work) to PoS (Proof of Stake) on Ethereum. Even though it was initially announced for January of this year, the release date was changed to the second quarter. Now, all seems to indicate that it is only planned for the third quarter, and according to Buterin’s words, the activation will not take place in July.

He explained that he listened to the interview again and noticed that the question contained the word “July.” However, he admitted that he did not remember having heard it and that it was his fault for having misheard. He apologized and said that his current position is that Ethereum 2.0 is on the right track since there are no unexpected events. He then said that he would turn to client developers about timing and, if they said that the launch would be in the third quarter, he would believe them.

The co-founder of Ethereum then explained that the next network upgrade is in process and there is no reason to think that further delays will arise. However, he did not provide a specific date.

Afri Schoedon, Ethereum 2.0 testnet Coordinator, said on his Twitter account that he disagreed with Buterin’s comments. He noted that it seems too soon to talk about a date for the launch of the new version of the network since it is simple mathematics. The final specification is not implemented on any client and they have not yet launched a coordinated test network. He remarks that “going to the stages or panels and throwing dates” is of no help. Although he said that he did not listen to the speech, he does not think that Vitalik said “July.”

Marco Levarato, a developer working in partnership with Ethereum, also disagreed that the release is close to happening. In this regard, he noted on his Twitter account that Vitalik made a lot of predictions about the wrong time. He also said that it is simple mathematics as July will be in 2 months, but there is no official testnet at the moment.

Afri Schoedon hinted that the launch of Phase 0 of the new version of Ethereum may not arrive until 2021. However, the new version was audited, after which experts noted that there are problems in the P2P network of Ethereum 2.0 and its validating system.

By Alexander Salazar

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