Month: April 2018

Bitcoin, Ethereum, Ripple, Monero Prices Surge–Is The Train Leaving The Station Again

April 19, 2018 David

Bitcoin, Ethereum, Ripple, Monero Prices Surge--Is The Train Leaving The Station Again

Bitcoin, Ethereum, Ripple, Monero Prices Surge–Is The Train Leaving The Station Again

Shaking off a host of negative news, major cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin, Ethereum, Ripple and Monero continued to surge recently. Bitcoin is up 2.05% over the last 24 hours and 17.53% over the last seven days, Ethereum is up 1.95% and 21.74% over the same periods, while Ripple and Monero registered even higher gains—see table 1.
 

Table 1

7d Price Change For Major Cryptocurrencies

Cryptocurrency %24h %7d

Bitcoin 2.05 17.53

Ethereum 1.95 21.74

Ripple 5.47 37.56

Monero 14.45 35.84

Source: Coinmarketcap.com 4/18/18 at 4:30 p.m.

 

The cryptocurrency rally comes as markets shake off a host of negative news ranging from regulators cranking down on cryptocurrency exchanges to large Bitcoin sales by major investors, and tax sell-offs, and extends across the entire chain, with 96 out of the top 100 cryptocurrencies advancing—see table 2.
 

Table 2

Number of Cryptocurrencies That Advanced/Declined In The Top 100 Ranks

Cryptocurrencies Advance/Decline Number

Advance 96

Decline 4

Source: Coinmarketcap.com 4/18/18 at 4:30 a.m.

 

Does this mean that the cryptocurrency train is leaving the station?

Todd Rowan, President and CEO of Rewardstoken.io, thinks so.“Bitcoin is the current engine pulling the crypto train,” said Rowan.“It seems to have found traction post-tax season selloffs; this is good for everyone. Ethereum is finding strong support along with Ripple and others. Next week will tell us if we are leaving the station. We could be off for another bull run.”

Ben WayCEO of Digits.io also thinks so. For ICO’s with real value, that is. “The train has definitely left the station for entrepreneurs trying to do an ICO on the back of a napkin,” he says. “However just like the shakeout in the dot-com bust, the ICO's with real value and real technology and concepts will be in good shape…..this happens in almost every market at some point, next we will see the same in AI and Robotics.”

Michael Collins, Founder and CEO of GN Compass, is bullish on Bitcoin and Cardano. “After a four-month bear, there are now strong indications that we are heading towards a bull,” he notes. “Bitcoin dropping to about $6600 on the 5th of this month was probably the bottom for the year, its price will continue to climb and will probably hit a peak of $15,000 this year. Other coins are following suit with Cardano being the most impressive so far.”

And Roman Guelfi-GibbsCEO, Lead Systems DesignerPinnacle Brilliance Systems Inc. thinks that investors have little time to get aboard the cryptocurrency train. “Investors have some time to make up their minds before the train leaves the station, but they will have to decide soon,” hesays. Guelfi-Gibbs sees Bitcoin heading to 10k, once crossing the $8500 mark.

 

What about Ethereum? “Ethereum has been recovering nicely over the past two weeks and was able to surmount the $500 hurdle,” notes Guelfi-Gibbs. “Whereas Bitcoin has been subject to some while swings, Ethereum has been moving steadily upward. I would expect that trend to continue after a brief pullback to support.”

 

Panos Mourdoukoutas , CONTRIBUTOR

Posted by David Ogden Cryptocurrency Entrepreneur

David – http://markethive.com/david-ogden

What is the Blockchain

April 19, 2018 David

I make no apology for this being very much a 101 level blog but I assume there still many like me who are still trying to get their heads around this latest technology and have their heads full of various terms which they have yet to fully understand.

From my perspective I like to at least understand the basics and it strikes me that the Blockchain is the one to get to grips with , given that it is most likely to be adopted universally by many industries whether it is for financial purposes or supply chain logistics. I've obviously had to find a suitable source and so have chose one from https://cointelegram.com (thanks Tom for listing all those channels on Telegram for "sloths"  like me to tune into)   

In simple terms a blockchain is a "dairy that is almost impossible to copy"

This is because a program called a hash function is used. 

A Hash is  string of numbers and letters and is a mathmatical function that takes a variable number of characters and converts it into a string with a fixed number of characters.

# Transactions are entered in the order in which they occur. Order is very importsnt. Even a a small change in a string creates a new hash.   

# A database entry that records tractional information results in the creation of  a hash.

#The hash depends not only on the transaction but also on the previous transaction's hash

#Even the smallest of changes produces a has that has no similarity to the original.

For example :

Ann gives 10 coins to Mary. Hash: cff4e860bd57c2bfb7c010927c3f6fee

Mary gave 5 coins to Jack. Hash: 803c28370e9a16e628a23d46d3ebe711

If Jack decides to change the records (to give himself more money);

Mary gave 8 coins to Jack

the resulting hash would be : 4ae41f8cc3d4cc905f664c75ceab9dao

To make it  impossible to forge a record, various technics are applied to each hash record that make any unauthorised changes to be effectve impossible, because of the distributed nature of the database, and the need for the forger to alter every assocated record in every node of the network. One such technic is called a "nonce" (00 added to the end of every record), makes it impossible for even computers to figure out quickly

These computers are called Nodes  and each node has a copy of the digital ledger or "Blockchain" and each transaction must be approved by each Node in the blockchain. Once each node has check the transaction (some will agree and some will disagree as to its validity) there a "sort of an electronic vote" to decide.

A very  important point to note is that one spreadsheet (of a fixed size) is a block and a family of blocks is a blockchain which updates itself across all nodes every tem minutes AUTOMATICALLY. There is NO Master or Central computer that instructs the computers (ie the Nodes) to do this . When that node involves literally millions of computers spread across the world the ability to resist interference and attempts to take over is extremely powerful. Hence the resistence from the Command and Control lobby to this type of technology.   

Hopefully this is only part one of my BlockChain voyage of discovery . 

David – http://markethive.com/david-ogden

Bitcoin Price Technical Analysis for 18th April – Look Out for this Reversal Pattern

April 18, 2018 David

Bitcoin Price Technical Analysis for 18th April – Look Out for this Reversal Pattern

 

Bitcoin Price Key Highlights

  • Bitcoin price is forming a head and shoulders on its 1-hour time frame to signal a potential selloff.
  • Price already seems to be breaking below the neckline to confirm that sellers have the upper hand.
  • Technical indicators are still suggesting that the uptrend could carry on, though.

Bitcoin price formed a short-term head and shoulders pattern, which is a classic selloff signal.

Technical Indicators Signals

The 100 SMA is still above the longer-term 200 SMA on the 1-hour time frame to indicate that the path of least resistance is to the upside. In other words, the uptrend is more likely to resume than to reverse.

Bitcoin price has broken below the 100 SMA dynamic support, though, so selling pressure could be picking up. Price could test support at the 200 SMA dynamic inflection point around $7600 next. The gap between the two is narrowing to signal weakening bullish momentum.

The head and shoulders pattern spans $7750 to $8400 so the resulting drop could be of the same height. If the current support levels hold, bitcoin price could recover to the shoulders around $8200 or past the head at $8400.

Stochastic is pointing up to show that there’s some bullish pressure left, but this oscillator is nearing overbought levels to reflect exhaustion among buyers. RSI is just starting to make its way out of the oversold region to signal a return in bullish momentum.

Market Factors

Traders had been expecting a strong rebound in bitcoin price after the tax deadline has passed, but it looks like market watchers are holding out for more clues. Sentiment has mostly been positive, coming off reports that big hedge funds are ready to place bets on the industry and the acquisition of Earn.com by Coinbase.

Dollar demand has been able to stay supported in recent sessions thanks to mostly upbeat economic data and hawkish Fed commentary. Easing geopolitical tensions have also lifted US bond yields, drawing traders back to the US currency as well.

Nonetheless, Q2 has historically been a positive quarter for bitcoin price and traders would likely try to take advantage of this tendency.

 

Author SARAH JENN | APRIL 18, 2018 | 4:31 AM

 

Posted by David Ogden Cryptocurrency Entrepreneur

David – http://markethive.com/david-ogden

This Exercise Will Help You To Stop Wasting Your Time

April 17, 2018 David

I came across this article by Darius Faroux and thought it might be of interest.

"The reason I research productivity is simple. I think that a productive life equals a happy life.

Also, if you’re more productive than average people, you’ll advance faster in your career. You learn more. You do more. And eventually are rewarded more.

And when I talk about productivity, I talk about being effective.

Because productivity doesn’t suggest that you get the right things done. It just means you get a lot of stuff done. But that’s not what matters.

Effectiveness, however, refers to getting the right things done.

And if you want to do your job well, earn money, live a meaningful life, or learn skills, that is what matters the most. Otherwise, you just run around in circles. You might appear busy, but you won’t achieve anything meaningful.

In other words: It’s easy to do useless work. Work that doesn’t bring you closer to the outcomes you desire."

Check ot what else he has to say at http://dariusforoux.com

 

David – http://markethive.com/david-ogden

Bitcoin Price Technical Analysis for 17th April 2018 – Another Pullback Zone to Watch

April 17, 2018 David

Bitcoin Price Technical Analysis for 17th April 2018 – Another Pullback Zone to Watch

Bitcoin Price Key Highlights

  • Bitcoin price recently broke out of its descending channel to show that an uptrend reversal is underway.

  • Price hit resistance at $8450 and is gearing up for a pullback, possibly until the broken resistance.

  • This lines up with several inflection points, so plenty of limit orders may be located in this area.

Bitcoin price looks ready for a pullback to a key area of interest visible on the 4-hour time frame.

 

Technical Indicators Signals

 

The 100 SMA is still below the longer-term 200 SMA on this time frame, though, so the path of least resistance is to the downside. In other words, the selloff is still likely to resume. Then again, the gap between the moving averages is narrowing to reflect slowing bearish pressure.

 

Bullish pressure could kick in once an upward crossover is completed. The 100 SMA is in line with the broken channel resistance to act as an additional inflection point. The 200 SMA lines up with the 50% Fibonacci retracement level and an area of interest that might be enough to keep losses at bay.

 

Stochastic is already indicating oversold conditions and looks ready to turn higher, drawing more buyers in. RSI, on the other hand, has plenty of room to fall so the correction could keep going for a bit longer.

Although bitcoin price is retreating from its recent climb, analysts have reason to believe that the gains could continue. For one, the second quarter of the year has historically been positive for cryptocurrencies and once the tax deadline has passed, investors could reopen their long positions.

 

Besides, Coinbase reportedly bought former bitcoin mining company 21 Inc, which is now known as Earn.com. This company has rebranded itself as a social media platform that incentivizes users to complete tasks in exchange for cryptocurrency rewards.

 

The deal was reportedly valued at over $100 million and reminds traders of the consistent developments in the space amid regulatory concerns.

 

 

Author:SARAH JENN | APRIL 17, 2018 | 3:46 AM

 

Posted by David Ogden Bitcoin Miner

David – http://markethive.com/david-ogden

How Smart is Your Coffee

April 16, 2018 David

Are you Really Still Drinking those "Junk Food Coffees" ?

Check out the video and you'll see there is a much better option available

 

 

Product Experiences:

·      More natural energy

·      Reduces oxidative stress

·      Provides anti-stress and anti-anxiety effects

·      Greater mental clarity

·      Enhanced memory

·      Reduced brain fog

·      Increased alertness, focus and concentration

·      Enables anabolic responses

·      Burns fat

·      Increases metabolism

·      Reduces fatigue and appetite

·      Powerful antioxidant

·      Reduces sugar and carbohydrate cravings

·      Elevates positive mood

David – http://markethive.com/david-ogden

HODL On – In Defense of Bitcoin’s Best Investment Strategy

April 16, 2018 David

HODL On - In Defense of Bitcoin's Best Investment Strategy

HODL On – In Defense of Bitcoin's Best Investment Strategy

In 1987's Black Monday stock market crash, Sam Walton, the world's richest man, lost more than half a billion dollars in a few hours.

When reached for comment, Walton said, "It's paper anyway. As far as I'm concerned we're focusing totally on the company doing well and taking care of our customers."

He didn't care about dollars; he cared about his asset Wal-Mart, and he still owned that.

History of the #HODL
In bitcoin's volatile and roller coaster past, "HODL" was the meme that bound the cryptocurrency community together. It stood for the proposition that we all believe in the future of bitcoin. It's both funny and insightful.

Here is the original post by GameKyuubi on a Bitcoin Talk forum (spelling errors and profanity included):

It was not about bitcoin versus bitcoin cash or 1,000 other cryptocurrencies. It was bitcoin vs. the world and we ALL embraced it.

It only took 11 minutes for this post to become a meme that became the rallying cry for the entire crypto world. We were all on the same rollercoaster ride and GameKyuubi, in the depths of his frustration, had (sort of) elegantly articulated both what it feels like and the best trading strategy for an asset this volatile.
Buy and HODL.

The good traders
GameKyuubi was wrong about only one thing: There aren't any good traders.
There are lots of us who believe we are good traders. But we aren't. Of course, some of the loudest voices on Reddit regularly remind us about how well they time the market. Except when they don't time the market well.

A paper published last October by the Haas School of Business at UC Berkeley entitled "Do Day Traders Rationally Learn About Their Ability?" used nearly 15 years of stock market day trading data to conclude that all day traders are irrational, the vast majority of day traders lose money, and even when day traders are successful, they "irrationally attribute success disproportionately to their ability rather than luck."

This sounds exactly like the crypto trader. Any post you see mocking HODL is likely someone who thinks they are really smart because they made money by trading crypto last year.
Of course, their success was due to their unique trading ability and not the fact that the entire market rose like a rocket.

HODLing works
Still, empirically, even in volatile assets like bitcoin, carefully choosing an asset and holding long-term positions has proven to offer the best return.

Warren Buffett, the most successful investor of modern times, has often said that he only invests in what he knows. His preferred holding period: forever. With that model, his company, Berkshire Hathaway, has averaged a 19 percent annual return since 1965 which means it has risen more than 1 million percent.

Theoretical models that assume participants know when markets will move against them can offer better returns but, in practice, market movements cannot be reliably predicted so even when people like Bernie Madoff try to make us think that they've figured it out, they haven't.

Long-term investment in quality assets remains the only reliable investment strategy.
Simply put, HODLing works.

More possibilities
For those not interested in limiting their activity to HODLing, there are two new and useful ideas that have begun bouncing around that really do advance cryptocurrencies: #BUIDL and #SPEDN.

BUIDL has been used to help remind us that, in the words of a CypherPunk's Manifesto, "Cypherpunks write code." In order for the blockchain to really be useful and valuable, we need to build stuff on it. Watching the price go up and down either as a trader or a HODLer does nothing to make bitcoin work better.

We need to create some of the promised applications that can really change the world. To date, the blockchain community has fallen short in this regard outside of the areas of payments but there are some real wins.
Just this weekend, Voatz, a Medici Ventures portfolio company is running party county convention voting in Utah, state convention voting in Michigan and state primary voting for overseas and military voters in West Virginia, all on a blockchain platform.

Blockchain voting is a simple application, but it is one that can bring a much-needed security and transparency to elections. And we are doing it now.

SPEDN is a nod to the many of us who realize that, for bitcoin to be useful, we need to be able to spend it to buy things. And I mean everything. It really doesn't matter whether it is through second-layer solutions like lightning or forks like bitcoin cash; we need more ways to use cryptocurrencies in real-world transactions.

A focus here, rather than complaining about HODLers would be helpful. We need many more merchants to accept cryptocurrency before it becomes useful. Options to spend bitcoin remain severely limited in most areas and this will ultimately limit bitcoin's value

.
As for me, I will HODL until I can buy useful stuff and SPEDN.

HODL on
This year has seen intense regulatory pressure on cryptocurrencies and its time we stop pretending that HODL was stupid. It isn't and it wasn't. Anyone who doesn't like the HODL mentality needs to give HODLers something else they can do with their bitcoins.

Trading is no solution for intelligent people. What we need are new ways to use cryptocurrency.
We need BUIDLers and merchants who will let us be SPEDNers.

 

Author Steven Hopkins  Apr 16, 2018 at 04:00 UTC

Steven Hopkins is chief operating officer and general counsel of Medici Ventures, an Overstock.com subsidiary focused on the advancement of blockchain technology.

 

 

Postedby David Ogden fellow HODLer
 

David – http://markethive.com/david-ogden

Tim Draper Predicts Bitcoin price to hit $250,000 in 4 years

April 15, 2018 David

Tim Draper Predicts Bitcoin price to hit $250,000 in 4 years

Tim Draper Predicts Bitcoin price to hit $250,000 in 4 years

According to Bitcoin bull Tim Draper, cryptocurrency could reach $250,000 in four years.

 

Tim Draper, the founder of Draper Fisher Jurvetson, wrote on Twitter about this on:

He also mentioned that earlier he tweeted a prediction about mistakenly posting $25k instead of $250k.

The investor, who commenced investments in Skype, Tesla, Twitter, and SpaceX, is known to have bought Bitcoin worth $30,000 from the U.S. government in 2014. However, those funds fell into government hands after an exchange that massively used the cryptocurrency, Silk Road, was shuttered.

According to Draper, he was fascinated by the idea that a digital currency is not bound to a government.

He told Fortune in January:

“So when Bitcoin showed up, I was all over it.”
 

DFJ also includes investments in other cryptocurrency-linked companies, such as exchange Coinbase.

The prediction was made based on the fact that the price of Bitcoin rose 17% to about $8,000. The cryptocurrency has been struggling since the start of 2018, with investors bothering about hints of regulatory crackdowns from governments including that of South Korea. Currently, the value of Bitcoin remains below its price at the start of the year, at about $14,000.

 

According to Barron’s estimates, It is uncertain on what basis Draper estimated a price of $250,000 by 2022. Investors, like Murray Stahl of Horizon Kinetics, hypothesize that Bitcoin is worth the value of all the currency in the world—about $361,000 per Bitcoin.
 

Anyhow it seems that Bitcoin would become a worldwide currency. Investors and critics also agree to the fact that, Bitcoin does face scalability issues. The Bitcoin network is presently handling about eight transactions in a second. Meanwhile, Visa says it can manage about 65,000 operations per second at maximum. And while the cryptocurrency community has at times tried to address the issue, it’s also divided the group.

And even now, the debate between Bitcoin Cash and Bitcoin continues, with early Bitcoin believer Roger Ver now batting for Bitcoin Cash.

“Bitcoin Cash is Bitcoin,” the investors wrote in a Twitter post, asserting that Bitcoin Cash is what Bitcoin should’ve been.

 

Author Renita April 14, 2018 12:04 pm

David Ogden Cryptocurrency Entrepreneur

David – http://markethive.com/david-ogden

A Bullish Sign Returns For Bitcoin, Ethereum, Ripple, EOS, And Other Cryptocurrencies

April 14, 2018 David

A Bullish Sign Returns For Bitcoin, Ethereum, Ripple, EOS, And Other Cryptocurrencies

A Bullish Sign Returns For Bitcoin, Ethereum, Ripple, EOS, And Other Cryptocurrencies

Major cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin, Ethereum, Ripple and EOS have been on fire lately. Over the last seven days, Bitcoin is up 21.80%, Ethereum is up 39.36%, Ripple is up 40.89% and EOS 51.84%–see table 1.

Table 1

7d Price Change For Major Cryptocurrencies

Cryptocurrency %7d

Bitcoin 21.80

Ethereum 39.36

Ripple 40.89

EOS 51.84

Source: Coinmarketcap.com 4/13/18 at 10:30 a.m.

 

The cryptocurrency rally extends across the entire chain. Only one cryptocurrency out of the top 100 dropped in the last seven days, while 99 advanced–see table 2.

Table 2

Number of Cryptocurrencies That Advanced/Declined In The Top 100 Ranks

Cryptocurrencies Advance/Decline Number

Advance 99

Decline 1

Source: Coinmarketcap.com 4/13/18 at 10:30 a.m.

And that’s the return of a bullish technical indicator that helped cryptocurrencies stage a big rally back at the end of last year.

Some cryptocurrency experts aren’t surprised by the renewed interest in cryptocurrencies. Matthew Spoke, CEO of AION and Founding Board Member of the Enterprise Ethereum Alliance is one of them. “The fundamentals have not changed,” says Spoke. “A large portion of the crypto market value is reflective of the real innovations happening around the world. Although investor confidence will sometimes falter, long term growth across the market will continue if you zoom out far enough. I’m very bullish for 2018.”

Larry Temlock, CFO and Co-Founder, Sun Exchange is another cryptocurrency bull. “In recent months, volatility masked the rising average intrinsic value of the top coins gained during the 4Q17 boom,” says Temlock. “All it took was a few events like Cambridge Analytica and an FBI raid to spur reversion to the (rising) mean. Advances like Lightning Network and other second layer tech will just keep those intrinsic value gains coming.”

Shidan Gouran sounds rather skeptical on the recent cryptocurrency rally, attributing it to the end of the taxing season.

"The recent upward swing in cryptocurrencies is an apparent symptom of tax season,” says Gouran. “It all follows a pretty logical pattern; people got their paychecks for the end of March, paid their bills, and realized they would need to have a certain amount of funds handy to pay their taxes – which many crypto traders will owe. If they'll come up short, they need to sell off some of their cryptocurrencies to pay their taxes. Hence, the big drop at the beginning of April, which was likely because of an excess of supply. Now that we're less than a week away from the April 17th deadline for US taxes, most people will know if they're getting a refund (or may even have gotten it already).“

And apparently, they rushed to invest that refund back into cryptocurrencies at “bargain” prices.

[Author. note: Investing in cryptocoins or tokens is highly speculative and the market is largely unregulated. Anyone considering it should be prepared to lose their entire investment. Disclosure: I don't own any Bitcoin.]

That means that new money is flowing into the entire sector rather than to major currencies only.

 

Author Panos Mourdoukoutas

Posted by David Ogden Entrepreneur
David ogden Cryptocurrency Entrepreneur

David – http://markethive.com/david-ogden

Bitcoin Breakout – Price Jumps $1K in 60 Minutes

April 13, 2018 David

Bitcoin Breakout – Price Jumps $1K in 60 Minutes

 

Bitcoin rallied over $1,000 in an hour this morning, having spent a better part of the last two weeks trading sideways in a narrow price range.

The cryptocurrency clocked a two-week high of $8,055 soon before press time and is currently trading at $7,850, according to CoinDesk's Bitcoin Price Index. The move marks a 13 percent gain from the previous day's close of $6,939.

Bitcoin Breakout - Price Jumps $1K in 60 Minutes

It appears short liquidation or unwinding of short (sell) BTC trades has played a big role in the sudden rally, according to some sources.

The cryptocurrency picked up bids at $6,766 at 07:00 GMT and scaled the $7,000 mark at 11:00 GMT – a move that seems to have triggered stop losses on short trades, as reported by WhaleCalls.

Further, technical buyers may have jumped in as the move above $7,000 also marked an upside break of the falling wedge pattern.

It's worth noting that, while it took two hours to move from $6,766 to $7,000, the next $1,000 jump happened in just 45 minutes.

The speed of the ascent should not come as a surprise as wider the range and the longer the duration of the consolidation zone, the more violent a breakout tends to be.

For now, it appears bitcoin's period of consolidation has ended with a notable bullish breakout. Next, a move to $8,500 cannot be ruled out if the cryptocurrency closes (as per UTC) above $7,510, confirming a bullish double bottom breakout.

 

Author Omkar Godbole Updated Apr 12, 2018 at 19:47 UTC

Posted by David Ogden Entrepreneur

David – http://markethive.com/david-ogden