Crypto ‘Unlikely To Disappear’, Says Internal Report Attributed To J.P. Morgan

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J.P. Morgan has called cryptocurrencies the “innovative maelstrom” around Blockchain[1] and said they are “unlikely to disappear” in what appears to be an internal report[2] from the company, published Feb. 8, 2018.

In an extract from what is allegedly the banking giant’s executive summary on cryptocurrency, the company appears bullish on crypto’s future.

“Cryptocurrencies are the face of the innovative maelstrom around the Blockchain technology that is bringing both massive price volatility and a constant trial-and-error of new product try-outs and failures,” the report states.

Despite the report’s mixed tone, the distinction from J.P. Morgan’s public position on cryptocurrency over the past six months is palpable.

In September, 2017 J.P. Morgan CEO Jamie Dimon became notorious after he called Bitcoin a “fraud[3],” triggering the very price volatility the bank now cites as a “challenge” crypto assets face.

Dimon subsequently claimed[4] he was “not going to talk about Bitcoin anymore,” while last month publicly disclosing[5] he “regretted” making the fraud comments.

Speaking to Cointelegraph[6] at the World Economic Forum in January, 2018, Dimon flatly refuted the idea that he was a “skeptic” on Bitcoin.

The recently published report meanwhile offers ideas as to how cryptocurrencies could be used most effectively.

“CCs [Cryptocurrencies] are unlikely to disappear and could easily survive in varying forms and shapes among players who desire greater decentralization, peer-to-peer networks and anonymity, even as the latter is under threat,” the summary continues in a positive vein.

“The underlying technology for CCs [cryptocurrencies] could have the greatest application in areas where current payment systems are slow, such as across borders, as payment, reward tokens or funding systems for other Blockchain innovations and the Internet of Things, as well as parts of the underground economy.”

Last week J.P. Morgan was one of several US banks to ban[7] clients from purchasing cryptocurrency with credit cards.

Blockchain Platform To Help Promising Athletes To Jump Financial Hurdles

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In modern sport, it is often the financial side that draws equal attention to the action itself. Sponsorship, advertising and complicated contracts are just as important as the action on the field. As the stakes continue to rise, it can be difficult for young athletes to break through without exceptionally high levels of financial backing. SportyCo[1] are an innovative new company looking to remove these monetary barriers through new Blockchain technologies.

On February 2 2018 SportyCo announced[2] its partnership with the Spanish football team RCD Espanyol, which plays in La Liga (the top professional association football division of the Spanish football league system). According to their website, SportyCo has received endorsements from various high-profile professional footballers such as Ronaldhino.

Previously named SportyFi, SportyCo state that they are a ‘decentralized sports funding and investment system’. At its heart, the aim is to enable promising professional sports players to progress their game, by removing the increasingly high monetary barriers involved when it comes to becoming an elite athlete. This is achieved using a Blockchain[3] system, which once again is showing its versatility after proving its worth preventing double-spend and digital advertising fraud.

SportyCo’s model works through a Blockchain-run crowdfunding[4] model. The analogy in their whitepaper[5] details the case of a young tennis player who can’t afford to travel abroad for a big tournament that would play a key part in progressing her career. Through an online campaign, guided by SportyCo staff, she is able to crowdfund enough SportyCo tokens (SPF) to exchange into dollars, attend the tournament and contribute to her ‘rising star’ status. SportyCo will take a cut of the money raised as their administration fee.

SPF tokens are Ethereum smart-contract (ERC20) compatible and can be purchased on exchanges such as Okex, HitBTC and LiveCoin. The December 2017 ICO reached over $5 million dollars, and as well as gaining public support from several professional athletes (including welcoming Roberto Carlos as a partnership manager). Additionally, Bitcoin advocate and pioneer Charlie Shrem and Phillip Nunn, CEO of The Blackmore Group, Blockchain evangelist and public speaker, are outspoken backers.

SportyCo has announced that the platform will be officially launching on March 31 2018. Should the project be successful, it could prove revolutionary for many aspiring elite athletes who are currently barred from achieving their full potential due to financial obstacles.

Disclaimer. Cointelegraph does not endorse any content or product on this page. While we aim at providing you all important information that we could obtain, readers should do their own research before taking any actions related to the company and carry full responsibility for their decisions, nor this article can be considered as an investment advice.

CME Plans To Develop New System To More Easily Modify Blockchain Protocols

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A patent[1] for a system that would allow for modifications of a Blockchain protocol without a consensus from all participants of the network, originally filed by the CME[2] Group in December 2017, has been published by the US Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) last Thursday, Feb. 8.

In most Blockchain-based networks, such as Bitcoin’s[3], modifying the protocol currently requires a network consensus that can be hard to achieve, making the system more resilient, but also harder to upgrade when needed.

The Segregated Witness[4] (SegWit) upgrade, originally designed to add transaction malleability but now focused on Bitcoin scalability, required a 95 percent consensus in order to be activated, which took several months[5] to form.

CME uses the example of an airline frequent flyer program to demonstrate the potential problems with using a Blockchain[6] that cannot be easily modified.

If an airline needs to increase transactions fees for transferring airline miles or add a KYC[7]/AML [8]identity program, it would need every node and miner on the network to approve the change by updating their software. If the majority doesn’t go along with the change, a fork[9] in the Blockchain would occur, potentially leading to unpredictable results.

CME proposes in their patent a “method for synchronizing rule changes in a system which implements a blockchain for transactions.” When a processor determines that a data message with a change to how blocks are “processed for addition” to the Blockchain is valid, it generates a transaction in a new block which contains the information about the change to the Blockchain’s operation.

This data will then be communicated to other systems in the Blockchain, and all subsequent transactions after the block containing the data for the operation change will operate under the new rules.

CME Group has already shown they are open to innovative ways to work with the Blockchain and cryptocurrency space, becoming second to CBOE in launching Bitcoin futures[10] in Dec. 2017.

Singapore Central Bank: Speculators Pose Risks To ‘Fabulous’ 2020 Blockchain Goals

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Speaking to CNBC on Monday, Feb. 12[1], chief fintech officer of the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) Sopnendu Mohanty said it will be “two years” before the central bank’s Blockchain project sees “real impact.”

Discussing the state of its “Project Ubin[2]” and cryptocurrency in general, Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) chief fintech officer Sopnendu Mohanty described the concept of Blockchain technology as “fabulous.”

Mohanty told CNBC:

“I think it has another two-year run before we get the transportation layer done, the transmission of data, storage of data… the whole Blockchain has to be across multiple-sector common infrastructure, then the real impact comes.”

Singapore has remained bullish[3] on the potential both cryptocurrency and Blockchain hold despite varying opinions given by governments throughout the world along with continued periods of volatility.

Cointelegraph reported[4] Feb. 6 that MAS had confirmed it was “closely studying” crypto and and “potential risks,” but that it saw “no systemic risks concerns” and there was “no strong case to ban” them.

On the topic of volatility and profiteering, Mohanty nonetheless warned that excessive speculatory activity was “perhaps negatively impacting the whole experimentation of cryptocurrency.”

“We’re going to continue to experiment on this fabulous (Blockchain) technology and find a use case hopefully in the long run,” he explained.

In January, MAS managing director Ravi Menon additionally pledged support[5] for the “more meaningful technology associated with digital currencies and blockchain,” saying he hoped any volatile periods or even a “crash” would not erase it altogether.

Is Yet Another Escrow Project to Become a Big Deal for Investment Process?

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The concept of escrow services has been attracting investors’ attention over the last six months. Numerous startups have been promoting the idea that investing in ICOs may be protected by escrow mechanisms, which have various applications. For instance, a startup called Escroco[1], that ran its pre-ITO and ITO rounds in autumn 2017, offered a fund-reserve in order to grant reimbursement against losses.

Why freezing tokens?

Escroco describes itself as an escrow and insurance service that aims to connect investors with borrowers in a way that lowers risk and maximizes profits.

The team states[2] in the project’s white paper that its coin-value architecture is targeted towards making Escroco limited in supply as well as highly needed, “thereby mitigating against inflation, mining[3] and improving control of the currency across the market.”

The core idea of an escrow is that funds should be raised with all the risks of loss being insured. For example, a startup plans to use the frozen deposits. When a borrower wants to borrow large amounts of Bitcoin[4], they will have to use some Escroco token. The token will be frozen in an escrow account. But at the end of an investment package, the borrower can get Escroco back.

A referral charge is tagged to investment packages. According to the white paper, “It is to be paid by the borrower that created the package based on its patronage.” These charges are based on a percentage of investment cost. The fee is collected only when investors successfully establish a contract of investment on a particular package.

Moreover, the startup sets up a safety fund with almost one-third of its tokens. “From the token production, two mln out of 3.1 mln ESC will be in circulation, while 1.1 mln will be in a safety fund account and used for such purposes. At the same time, a very small percentage of the investors profit will go to a separate insurance account.

According to the Escroco team at Bitcointalk, the project is quite different to Bitcoinnect or any other lending coin: “Our module is new and we are closer to salt and etherlend, but we give investors the interest that paid by borrowers.”

Airdropping a new token

On Jan. 15 the Escroco team revealed on Twitter[5] the plan on issuing and delivering a new token for its users, which is called Escroco Cash Airdrop (ESA).

The reveal states that Escroco “will be airdropping a new token that will be worth a fixed $1 (at least for the first few weeks), which our holder will get for free at the ratio 4:1- four ESC get one ESA. Only those who keep their coin on waveswallet.io will be able to get the new coin.”

So far the Escroco project has completed the first and second rounds of the ITO. The next round, ICO, is planned for Q3 2018. In January 2018 the startup has also released the platforms for borrowers and investors.

Today Escroco’s tokens may be purchased at crypto exchanges. Since Dec. 1 2017 Escroco tokens are being listed on two exchanges: livecoin.net[6] and openledger[7]. Both platforms offer many currency pairs, including trading ETH/ESC, BTC/ESC and BCC/ESC.

Disclaimer. Cointelegraph does not endorse any content or product on this page. While we aim at providing you all important information that we could obtain, readers should do their own research before taking any actions related to the company and carry full responsibility for their decisions, nor this article can be considered as an investment advice.

‘A Sociological Innovation’: Big Finance Advisors Preach Blockchain At T3 Conference

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Mainstream financial advisors are publicly propagating Blockchain[1] this month, telling that it is a “sociological innovation” during the US Technology Tools for Today (T3) conference, CNBC reports[2] Monday, Feb. 12.

A summary of the T3 Advisor Conference[3] in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, which ran Feb. 6-9, demonstrates the significant U-turn in attitudes from advisors in 2018.

“Blockchain is a sociological innovation. It is a piece of technology, but it enables us to transfer and transact value on the internet and to organize networks in a way that we were not able to before,” senior economist Magdalena Ramada of the global advisory company Willis Towers Watson told the audience.

Traditional finance and banking have long studied[4] the cost savings and increased efficiency Blockchain promises, but its impact on a human level is rarely mentioned outside cryptocurrency circles.

A focus on so-called distributed ledger technology and ‘permissioned’ or ‘private’ blockchains have become bywords for financial institutions looking to create Blockchain-based products over which they still exert centralized control.

This week, Cointelegraph reported[5] how CMEGroup, which released the first Bitcoin futures contracts in December 2017, had applied for a patent on a system which would allow changing the rules of a Blockchain without requiring network consensus.

Prior to that in September last year, Accenture had acquired[6] a patent for what it called “editable Blockchain” technology.

Regardless of its packaging, however, high-level business consultants are now aware of the need to embrace the disruptive nature Blockchain presents.

“Anyone who stands between the buyer and seller is gone, so stockbrokers are gone, mortgage brokers are gone, ticket sellers are gone,” Ric Edelman, founder and executive chairman of Edelman Financial Services continued.

“Anybody who serves as that middleman is obsolete due to the blockchain.”

Microsoft To Implement Blockchain-Based ID System

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Microsoft[1] revealed its plans to integrate Blockchain[2]-based decentralized IDs (DIDs) into its  Microsoft Authenticator app, the company announced[3] in a blog post Monday, Feb. 12.

As reported in the post, Microsoft is looking to provide new a model of digital identity that would not be controlled by any centralized institution and would guarantee fully private data storage, enabling the individual to have full control of “all elements of [their] digital identity.”[4]

After considering a number of standards for decentralized identity systems, Microsoft reports they decided that Blockchain technology and protocols were “well suited” for the task, stating:

“Some public blockchains (Bitcoin [BTC], Ethereum, Litecoin, to name a select few) provide a solid foundation for rooting DIDs, recording DPKI operations, and anchoring attestations.”

Moving forward, Microsoft plans to add DID support to its Microsoft Authenticator app to manage identity data and cryptographic keys. The app, which was launched[5] in August 2016, is used by millions of people, according to the company.

In October, 2017, Cointelegraph reported[6] that a number of governments globally are considering adopting Blockchain-based identity management systems to shift the control of data from the government or corporations to individual citizens.

Blockchain Platform to Allow Workers From Low-income Countries to Earn as Data-labellers

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The proliferation of artificial intelligence[1]  (AI) technologies continues to march onwards as AI becomes a globally established industry. However, these billions of dollars in AI revenue are rarely seen by those working at the lower end of the AI workforce. Dbrain, a new Blockchain platform, allows anyone with a smartphone to carry out AI-related tasks and be rewarded with cryptocurrency.

Coins for validating datasets

The company points out that 80% of AI development is data related, and labelling and maintaining these datasets require a lot of human effort. By creating this platform, Dbrain[2] say they can enable those in lower income countries to take a share of the booming AI industry, rewarding workers with Dbrain coins (DBR) for their efforts. Workers can label as much or as little as they choose, and can cash in their coins for USD whenever they would like.

AI companies can have their datatsets created and verified quickly, accurately and easily, and those struggling to find work or break into the AI business can earn a living. Labelled datasets are guaranteed to be of good quality, as they are validated by other workers on completion (an example of a Subjective Proof Of Crowd Work, or SPOCK, system).

In terms of security, Dbrain prevents dataset leaks to third parties through the use of the Protocol for Indirect Controlled Access to Repository Data (PICARD). Dbrain says PICARD also gives data scientists the ability to “train AI models using the datasets without downloading them, and sell AI solutions to business clients later”. The company also claims:

“Dbrain platform integrates AI app lifecycle into a single product that automates most of the human-in-the-loop workflow. It is currently the only working solution that combines functionality to label data, create customized models, ensure the data security, and validate the markup results with cryptocurrency payments and payouts to both labelers and AI developers.”

Winning the trust and support

The Dbrain team[3] is vastly experienced. For example, CEO Dmitry Matskevich has previously founded other Big Data companies, and sold flocktory.com for $20 million last year, and CTO Aleksey Hahunov is also the founder of connectome.ai and R-SEPT.

Having already partnered with Microsoft[4], SingularityNet, Kupivip, Proskater and other notable brands, Dbrain has won the trust and support of some of the most prestigious AI developers in the world. With an estimated reduction in labelling costs of between 50-90% compared to other competitors in the industry such as AMT, Dbrain could become an appealing offer for any AI companies looking to cut spend on creating reliable datasets without taking risks with security and quality.

Disclaimer. Cointelegraph does not endorse any content or product on this page. While we aim at providing you all important information that we could obtain, readers should do their own research before taking any actions related to the company and carry full responsibility for their decisions, nor this article can be considered as an investment advice.

Through your VR glasses: A Startup Sets Up A Virtual Apartments Contest

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MARK.SPACE, an ambitious Singapore-based startup with Russian roots, has recently made a visual designer construction kit publicly available, and started a 3D design competition among its users promising massive token rewards. In addition, the platform has cooperation agreements with such partners as Jaguar Land Rover, GAS Jeans, Desigual, Trussardi, Baldinini, Patricia Pepe, Liu-Jo, Dstrezzed, Satorisan and others. Therefore, there is no need for a SOFT-CAP installation.

Imaginary rooms and real tokens

Founded in 2015, MARK.SPACE[1] is showing great promise, and it is one of a few VR startups that has decided to develop a platform built on its own Blockchain[2].

The project represents itself as “one-of-a-kind platform where anyone can create their own 3D website or unit that is compatible with VR — in a fast and easy way”. This also has applications in business-to-business transactions – users can apply the model for business, e-commerce and communities.  

Following the project’s roadmap, a concept development decentralization platform was finished in July 2017. And in the end of 2017 the project launched a 3D constructor for users.

On February 9 2018, MARK.SPACE management announced a virtual real estate[3] contest for the project’s participants. The so called “Best Apartment” contest allows all registered users to create from scratch a 3D and VR compatible online web-space, or unit, as the company calls it.

According to the announcement, the contest will end on February 28 2018 and will include three nominations: “Best Creative Job”, “Best Content”, and “Community Favorite”.

The most popular submissions in each nomination will be awarded a large amount of MRK tokens – the platform’s internal currency. Submissions are to be published either on Facebook or Twitter, with all votes coming from the platform’s large community, the announcement says.

Make it real, virtually!

According to the project’s white paper[4], the MARK.SPACE universe consists of multiple VR spaces (units), in which each unit can be linked directly to its own top-level domain.

“The property right to the units is guaranteed by recording all transactions involving units (creation, sale, purchase or rental) on the Blockchain”, says the white paper. All unit owners may buy, sell or rent their units to others using smart contracts.

The startup has already invested more than $5 million USD of personal funds in the development of the platform and currently has a working prototype[5].

The first stage of MARK.SPACE tokensale closed on February 7 2018 and the company has succeed to raise $7 million. The hard cap of this stage was $35 million. The second stage is planned for January 2019, after the goal of Blockchain implementation will be reached.

An internal currency – the MARK token (MRK) – is a utility token allowing all users to sell and buy VR spaces and objects, consume various goods and use services, pay salaries to their employees and to buy advertisements to promote their businesses through the platform.

Disclaimer. Cointelegraph does not endorse any content or product on this page. While we aim at providing you all important information that we could obtain, readers should do their own research before taking any actions related to the company and carry full responsibility for their decisions, nor this article can be considered as an investment advice.

Kodak Postpones ICO To Verify ‘Accredited’ Status Of 40K Potential Investors

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The Eastman Kodak Company announced Jan. 30 that the launch of their cryptocurrency KODAKCoin would be delayed in order to evaluate the status of potential investors. The delay was announced the day before[1] the Initial Coin Offering (ICO) was set to start, according to the project’s Jan. 9 press release[2].

As explained in on the company’s website, Kodak intends to run an ICO that offers security tokens as an ‘exempt offering’ — this means the company does not have to register their security with the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), but only “accredited investors” can participate in the ICO.

The SEC requires that an individual accredited investor[3] have a net worth that exceeds $1 million, or an annual income of at least $200,000, along with other conditions.

The company claims it needs “several weeks” to verify the “accredited investors” status of those who applied to invest in the ICO, which Kodak reports is more than 40,000 people.

Potential investors from outside the US will be considered in accordance with their local jurisdictions, the company added.

According to Marketwatch[4], Kodak’s stock (KODK) prices sharply increased after the press release of the project on Jan. 9[5] from $3.1 to almost $11 the next day. However, after the delay was announced on Jan. 30, the stock dropped by more than 18 percent, and continues to trend downwards Feb. 1.