Welcome to The Blockchain Report, your daily rundown for the latest in crypto, with your host Taylor Nikolai.
First up, Binance’s CEO says the cryptocurrency market is still good, and that trading volume is better than it seems. According to CCN, Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao (aka CZ) believes that the cryptocurrency market is still rock solid despite the fall in prices since the beginning of January.
He said that although trading volume has fallen significantly, it is still better than a few years ago. CZ said: “Compared to January, we are probably down 90 percent. So we only have one-tenth of the trading volume compared to what we had in January. But, compared to like a year or two years ago, we’re still trading at huge volumes. Business is still okay, we are still profitable, and we are still a very healthy business.”
CZ also clarified that the number of Binance users has been steadily increasing since January as well as a steady increase in the number of people depositing Bitcoin onto Binance.
Next, the Cryptocurrency Exchange EtherDelta paid a $400,000 fine to the SEC. According to The Daily Hodl, the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has announced that they’ve settled charges against Zachary Coburn. Coburn is the owner and founder of the ethereum-based cryptocurrency exchange EtherDelta. The SEC decided to charge Coburn with unlawfully operating a securities exchange and failing to register with the SEC as an exchange.
Stephanie Avakian, who works with the SEC, said, “EtherDelta had both the user interface and underlying functionality of an online national securities exchange and was required to register with the SEC or qualify for an exemption.” What makes this case interesting is that the EtherDelta exchange runs using smart contracts and it runs entirely on code. However, the SEC says that ultimately the programmer who wrote the code must take the same responsibility as a person running a centralized exchange.
Next, the Singapore government developed a Blockchain Based Token System. According to NewsBTC, a trading platform was created between the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) and Singapore Exchange (SGX). The aim of the platform is to enable the settlement of tokenized securities among different blockchain platforms.
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MAS chief fintech officer Sopnendu Mohanty stated: “This project has demonstrated the value of blockchain technology and the benefits it can bring to the financial industry in the short to medium term. The concept of asset tokenisation, as well as other learnings gleaned from this project, can potentially be applied to a broad spectrum of the economy, creating a whole new world of opportunities.”
Tinku Gupta, head of technology for SGX, meanwhile said: “We are delighted to drive this important industry effort to accelerate innovation in the marketplace. Based on the unique methodology SGX developed to enable real-world interoperability of platforms, as well as the simultaneous exchange of digital tokens and securities, we have applied for our first-ever technology patent.”
Next, BAT is CRASHING! As reported by CCN, the whole crypto market dropped a whopping $6 billion over a 48 hour period, but nothing was hit harder in the marketplace than the Ethereum-based, BAT, or Basic Attention Token. BAT, which is an Ethereum ERC-20 token, fell 18% in one day.
BAT recent rally in the marketplace was due to its addition to the Coinbase Pro platform. About a week later, the Basic Attention Token became available on Coinbase.com. It looks like crypto investors bought the rumor and sold the news, causing it to crash.
And finally on today’s show, IBM says blockchain can power ‘Open Scientific Research.’ Coindesk reports that in a new patent filing, the process of scientific research can be helped by blockchain technology. Utilizing the Watson Research Center, the application states that tracking research will be more fluid across institutional borders.
The filing calls it “a tamper resistant log of scientific research.” The filing states: “The blockchain system can form a blockchain representing a research project, wherein the blockchain comprises a first block of research data and a second block of analysis data representing a log of an analysis performed on the research data. Summary blocks and correction blocks can also be added to the blockchain representing the post analysis of the research results.”
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