A top European Central Bank official on Wednesday called for governments to regulate and tax bitcoin, labelling the cryptocurrency an object of speculation and a tool for money laundering. “One ought to apply what the basic rule is in any other financial transaction: everyone involved should reveal their identity,” ECB governing council member Ewald Nowotny told the German daily Sueddeutsche Zeitung. “We need a value-added tax on bitcoin, since it’s not a currency,” said Nowotny, who is head of Austria’s central bank. Nowotny’s comments echo those by other ECB officials,…

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The value of cryptocurrencies skyrocketed in 2017 to more than $600 billion, minting scores of crypto millionaires. A few lucky holders are also breathing the rarefied air of the billionaires club — and not just in the most valuable cryptocurrency Bitcoin, which has a market capitalization of $237 billion. Two billionaires who now easily rank among the wealthiest Americans include the current and former CEOs of Ripple, a San Francisco-based company using blockchain technology in international financial transactions. It issues a token called XRP that, as of Monday Jan. 1,…

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Bitcoin’s value grew by more than 1,000% in 2017, but that wasn’t enough to even place it among the 10 best-performing cryptoassets of the year. In a breakout year for cryptocurrency trading, the biggest winners were Ripple, which is touted as a new kind of payment system for banks, along with less familiar names like NEM, Ardor, and Dash. Here are the top 10 cryptoassets of 2017—plus bitcoin, which came in 14th place (Image above). Cryptoassets include standalone cryptocurrencies as well as tokens issued on the ethereum blockchain. Our ranking…

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Ripple (XRP) has overtaken Ethereum as the largest altcoin by market cap in a surge which has divided the cryptocurrency community. After the payment network’s token reached as much as $2.65 on some exchanges this week, investors are celebrating returns which have topped 1,000 percent in just three weeks. At the start of December, XRP traded at just $0.24. Multiple altcoins have seen astronomical gains towards the end of this year as Bitcoin’s own surge fueled copycat behavior which saw new all-time highs for assets including Monero, Ethereum and Ethereum…

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In 2014 bitcoin rose in value to be worth several hundred dollars after being worth virtually nothing at its launch in 2009 and for some time afterward. At around the same time or earlier other cryptocurrencies were issued for various purposes. As of now, there are more than 1,000 different cryptocurrencies. Their purposes vary. Some were for the porn industry, such as sexcoin, some for hip hop lovers, but others had more serious aims such as ethereum and litecoin. A recent article in the Verge looks at two of the…

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BitMEX, a Hong Kong-based cryptocurrency trading platform, has sold all of the Bitcoin Cash (BCH) cryptocurrency granted to its customers during the Bitcoin clone’s creation in August, and says it will credit those users with an equivalent value of Bitcoin (BTC). BitMEX didn’t disclose the volume of the selloff, but BitMEX accounts for the majority of Bitcoin-to-dollar trading globally, implying it had sizable BCH holdings. There’s no sign that the move had a direct market impact, though. Both Bitcoin and Bitcoin Cash continued to trend down following the announcement of…

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Bitcoin investors are claiming Australia’s banks are freezing their accounts and transfers to cryptocurrency exchanges, with a viral tweet slamming the big four and an exchange platform putting a restriction on Australian deposits. Cryptocurrency trader and Youtuber Alex Saunders called out National Australia Bank, ANZ, the Commonwealth Bank of Australia and Westpac Banking Corporation on Twitter for freezing customer accounts and transfers to four different bitcoin exchanges – CoinJar, CoinSpot, CoinBase and BTC Markets. Bitcoin, a currency once known for its use by criminals trading online through a ‘Silk Road’…

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Bitcoin transaction fees have gone from around $2 a transaction in October to $37 in late December. Bitcoin use in the real world may have started with the purchase of a pair of pizzas, but you’d be unlikely to see it used for such a minor exchange today. That’s because as bitcoin has soared in popularity it’s become too expensive to use in small transactions. The problem came to a head in early December, when Steam, the popular downloadable video game store, announced it would stop accepting bitcoin payments for…

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Ripple just became the world’s second most valuable cryptocurrency. This is a big deal. But why? Is Ripple a good investment? Will banks adopt it? Let’s find out. Why is Ripple causing waves? While Bitcoin and the rest of the top 10 cryptocurrencies are well below their peak, Ripple is enjoying a meteoric rise and is trading at $ 2.22, up more than 49% from this time yesterday. In fact, it just unseated Ethereum as the #2 cryptocurrency in terms of market cap. So why is Ripple’s current so strong?…

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