Cryptocurrency News
February 2020
Cryptocurrency headlines reported in February 2020 – items across digital currency, central bank digital currency projects, retail-focused digital payments and more, looking at Asia and Oceania. Items are also gathered and delivered from beyond the broad Asia-Pacific region to provide need-to-know industry knowledge.
- Bitcoin treasure hunt launches on Minecraft via SatoshiQuest mod
- No other currency in the world can ever be more scarce than Bitcoin, and scarcity will act like a gravitational force driving adoption and communication of value.
- Peter Thiel-backed Layer1 Technologies begins bitcoin mining in Texas, aiming to secure 30% of global hash rate and offset China’s current dominance in Bitcoin mining
- In an ideal future, everyone not only uses Bitcoin but also holds their private keys and runs their own full node; i.e. everyone is a first-class Bitcoin citizen…but…
- Hello Bitcoin – an open source presentation deck to help Bitcoiners give local talks in communities and workplaces about how Bitcoin works and why it is important
- A look at Electroneum’s unbanked-focused AnyTask freelancer platform, allowing buyers to pay via debit or credit, with providers paid in cryptocurrency
- ICYMI: Residents of Switzerland’s ski resort of Zermatt now able to settle bills for taxes and other gov’t services using bitcoin
- ICYMI: 300M Barcelona FC fans to have use of crypto tokens via Chiliz blockchain startup, giving fans voting rights, gifts and club merchandise
- Cryptocurrency: Telegram vs Facebook – two competing visions for how we will send and receive money online
- Cryptocurrency: “Without cash, there is ‘no chance for the kind of dignity-preserving privacy that undergirds an open society'”
- CoinDesk’s Crypto Lending 101 – who participates, as well as the advantages and risks of crypto lending
- ICYMI: Lightning Labs raises $10M Series A, focused on launching its first paid service for merchants wishing to accept bitcoin payments
- Why cryptocurrency? “…imagine..that there was a base metal as scarce as gold with one special property: Can be transported over a communications channel”
- ICYMI: US Marshals to auction approximately 4040 bitcoin, worth $37.7M, seized from criminal activity, ‘cleaned’ and now re-entering the crypto marketplace
- ICYMI: US Federal Reserve is investigating potential for central bank digital currency as the backbone for a new, secure real-time payments and settlements system
- ICYMI: Visa credit card giant grants Coinbase ‘principal membership’ status, allowing the firm to now issue Bitcoin, Ether and XRP debit cards
- ICYMI: Sweden’s central bank, The Riksbank, launches year-long pilot project of proposed digital currency, the e-krona
- Shopify e-commerce giant to join Facebook’s Libra Association, ignoring the departure of eBay, Visa, Stripe, PayPal, Mastercard and others
- ICYMI: UNICEF Kazakhstan office deploys ethereum-based system for processing internal payments such as fund transfers to local education programs
- Download: The Case for Electronic Cash – Why Private Peer-to-Peer Payments are Essential to an Open Society (pdf)
- ICYMI: Near half the revenue generated by Square’s Cash App in Q4 2019 came from bitcoin activities
- Central banks of UK, Switzerland, Sweden, Canada and Japan, with European Central Bank and Bank for Int’l Settlements set April for first digital currency meeting
- ICYMI: Near 1/2 of Sweden’s retailers expect to stop taking cash payments by 2025; whilst 97% still accept cash, only 18% of all transactions actually involve cash
- A brief look at Handshake Network, blockchain and cryptocurrency project aiming to make domain names censorship-proof
- Why cryptocurrency? “…imagine..that there was a base metal as scarce as gold with one special property: Can be transported over a communications channel”
- South Korea: Litecoin, world’s 7th-largest cryptocurrency, gains MeconCash h partnership, enabling fiat withdrawals at over 13000 ATMs
- As the North Korean regime finds ways to bring in cryptocurrency, it also needs ways to cash out…it relies on regional cryptocurrency exchanges that operate below the radar
- Taiwan’s CoolBitX crypto wallet and security startup raises $16.7M to make cryptocurrency more banking regulations-friendly
- Bitcoin treasure hunt launches on Minecraft via SatoshiQuest mod
- No other currency in the world can ever be more scarce than Bitcoin, and scarcity will act like a gravitational force driving adoption and communication of value.
- Peter Thiel-backed Layer1 Technologies begins bitcoin mining in Texas, aiming to secure 30% of global hash rate and offset China’s current dominance in Bitcoin mining
- In an ideal future, everyone not only uses Bitcoin but also holds their private keys and runs their own full node; i.e. everyone is a first-class Bitcoin citizen…but…
- Hello Bitcoin – an open source presentation deck to help Bitcoiners give local talks in communities and workplaces about how Bitcoin works and why it is important
- Cambodia: Electroneum blockchain and crypto startup strikes landmark deal with Cellcard, major mobile network operator, to provide airtime and data top-ups
- Central banks of UK, Switzerland, Sweden, Canada and Japan, with European Central Bank and Bank for Int’l Settlements set April for first digital currency meeting
- Wells Fargo invests $5M in UK’s Elliptic in move towards blocking crypto-related activities around money laundering, terror fundraising, fraud and financial crimes
- Hong Kong: Pawnhub crypto-lending startup becomes HK’s first fully-licensed and insured digital currency lender, adding to offices in UK, Switzerland, Thailand and Taiwan
- Japan: Daiko Holdings takes controlling stake in Bitgate cryptocurrency exchange parent, in step to keep up with competitor crypto moves
- South Korea: Ministry of Science and ICT hits pause on further technological developments in their blockchain sandbox program until crypto policy is passed
- South Korea: Central bank to launch second central bank digital currency team, a year after disbanding first group, likely in response to China’s digital yuan moves
- Samsung’s new flagship Galaxy S20 range continues crypto focus with secure processor to protect PINs, passwords, patterns and Blockchain Private Keys
- Download: How North Korea Revolutionized the Internet as a Tool for Rogue Regimes (pdf)
- Fast-growing US-based cryptocurrency lending startup BlockFi preps for Singapore office opening to focus on Asia Pacific institutional clients
- Taipei Exchange receives authorization to formulate regulations governing issuing and trading of STOs, security token offerings
Asia’s tech news, daily
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