Your Cryptocurrency Newsletter for 18 August, 2020

If you are interested in cryptocurrencies, this newsletter is for you. [img]  [Learn more about RevenueStripe...](   [Learn more about RevenueStripe...]( [img]( [FeedBinary Newsletter]( [DEX Grow, But Still Behind Centralized Exchanges]( The start of the year 2020 may have not been so good for many, with the novel Coronavirus and social distancing grinding economies and businesses to a halt. Yet, for decentralized exchanges, the current year has been nothing but a booming success. DEXs, or decentralized exchanges, have been around for some years now. They have their share of users, but these exchanges have always lagged when it comes to centralized ones. The main reason being they slow speed. Relying heavily on a block chain network, they can achieve a few thousand trades per second (TPS), whereas many centralized exchanges go into millions of TPS. Crypto exchanges have always been an irony. Built specifically for trading crypto assets, these platforms are mostly centralized in nature. A truer form of a distributed network, decentralized exchanges are exactly what they sound like. The exchanges are built using blockchain itself. Instead of traditional order books, the price of assets is determined by how much of the share is available as liquidity. A mere fraction of their cousins, these exchanges have gained immense traction in 2020 and the two dozen DEXs are witnessing a combined trading volume above USD 400 million. Extremely confident, decentralized exchanges are starting to flex their muscles and are trying to convince traders to join the revolution, experts have a different take on the scenario. The current market leader of DEXs is Ethereum based. With the ETH 2.0 on the horizon, the maximum the network will be able to achieve is 10 thousand transactions per second. This is for the whole network, where a DEX will be a small part. DEXs still have a lot to achieve in speed yet. Apart from the speed, a few basic issues have plagued DEXs, such as front running. The open nature of blockchain has allowed people to develop bots that place bids on DEX just before the block inclusion that are in favor of the owner. Originally meant for arbitrage where traders can claim a dispute, this can help people in market moves as the block created means that the transaction is locked forever in the network. The current technology, although very secure, limits the decentralized exchanges. Perhaps using traditional order books in DEXs can lead to a faster trading solution. A hybrid crypto exchange may be the only way forward, bringing the best of both worlds: speed and security. The post [DEX Grow, But Still Behind Centralized Exchanges]( appeared first on [Feed Binary](. [Read Full Story]( ------------------ [Bitcoin Surges Past $12,000 With Advocates Heralding New Era]( Bitcoin rallied on Monday, advancing past $12,000 to its highest level in a more than a year amid a wider risk-on rally in equity markets. The world’s largest cryptocurrency rose as much as 5.3% to around $12,473 in New York, the highest since July 2019. Crypto peers including Bitcoin Cash, Litecoin and Monero also gained, with the Bloomberg Galaxy Crypto Index rising to its highest since June 2019. After trading sideways for much of the summer, Bitcoin has re-gained its mojo as a rally in the stock market nudges the S&P 500 to near a new all-time high. And in an environment of ultra-low rates, a number of analysts and crypto fans say Bitcoin — along with other assets such as gold — could potentially act as an inflation hedge, should prices start to rise. “Inflation is currently low but real yields are across the board negative — negative real yields and the monetary stimulus/spending has driven investors to seek out inflation hedges such as gold,” said Seamus Donoghue, vice president of sales and business development at METACO. “Given its limited supply and growing institutional acceptance, Bitcoin will also likely benefit from the market seeking inflation hedges.” At the same time, some Wall Street veterans have taken a greater interest in the coin. Paul Tudor Jones made waves when he said he’s been buying Bitcoin amid central bank money-printing, while Michael Novogratz, founder of Galaxy Digital Holdings, told Bloomberg Television last week that about 25% of his net worth is tied up in the cryptocurrency. Bitcoin’s advance past $12,000 makes it one of the best-performing asset classes this year. It’s gained about 70% since the end of December and is up more than 100% since mid-March, when it briefly traded below $4,000. This year’s surge still leaves it about 40% below the all-time-high of almost $20,000 reached in December 2017. And technical indicators painted a positive outlook for the token: Bitcoin’s surge took it to the upper limits of its trading envelope indicator, a measure that smooths moving averages to map out higher and lower limits. While a breach of this level typically indicates a reversion to the mean — and, therefore, a price decline — technicals suggest this time might be different. Bitcoin, with a 14-day Relative Strength Index (RSI) reading of 69, isn’t overbought, signaling that further gains could be ahead. “The best analogue for today is perhaps the Great Depression,” said Nicholas Pelecanos, head of trading at NEM. “From the conclusion of this crisis to the years that followed, the price of gold more than doubled, rising with inflation, and it is this macroeconomic backdrop that makes Bitcoin so appealing to investors.” [Read Full Newsletter]( The post [Bitcoin Surges Past $12,000 With Advocates Heralding New Era]( appeared first on [Feed Binary](. [Read Full Story]( ------------------ [As Bitcoin Meets Resistance, Hash Rate Soars]( Bitcoin is still struggling to break through strong resistance at $12,000, but the good news is that its hash rate has hit a new all-time high. Historically, the crypto’s price has followed its hash rate, which is an estimate of the amount of computing power being devoted to processing transactions on the blockchain. Data from Blockchain.com confirms that on August 15, Bitcoin’s seven-day average hash rate reached a new peak of 129.075 TH/s. The achievement comes after two weeks of fairly stagnant hash rate growth. Bitcoin surged past $12,000 twice in August before falling back into the same mid-$11,000 range. The price continues to meet resistance at the $12,000 level, remaining between $11,700-$11,900 range over the weekend. Gold-bitcoin correlation With many investors turning their backs on traditional finance due to fears over the impact of central bank money printing in response to the Covid-19 crisis, a stronger correlation between bitcoin and gold may emerge in 2020. Billionaire investor Warren Buffet recently surprised observers when he dumped his bank holdings in favor of gold miner stocks. He has traditionally taken a dim view of the safe-haven asset as an investment, so his decision is seen by observers as an indication that he sees choppy waters ahead, particularly for the banking sector as the spectre of negative rates looms on the horizon. This could be good news for bitcoin, an asset the elderly American regards with contempt. In an interview with CNBC in 2018, he called the leading crypto a “mirage,” adding that “the idea it has some huge intrinsic value is a joke in my view.” He has also called it a “gambling device” and “rat poison squared.”However, TV presenter and bitcoin proponent Max Keiser says the Berkshire Hathaway tycoon’s move into gold could help push the crypto to $50,000. The Heisenberg Capital founder says the influential investor’s move supports the emerging safe-haven narrative, which will help make assets that are expected to behave in a counter-cynical manner such as silver and bitcoin more attractive to the mainstream. Buffett has missed out on several investments such as Apple and Amazon as “his timing is poor.” At the same time, Buffett “shunned gold for 20 years while gold outperformed Buffett for 20 years.” Because he has seen the light with gold, Keiser thinks Buffet – along with bitcoin-bashing gold bug Peter Schiff – he will be forced to reconsider his position.. “My guess is that Buffett (or whoever takes over after he passes) will start panic-buying bitcoin at $50,000, just like Peter Schiff will do,” said Keiser. “The only major player in the money management business that knows what they’re doing is Paul Tudor Jones, who I expect will take his Bitcoin allocation up from the current 2% of the portfolio to 10% in the near term.” [Read Full Newsletter]( The post [As Bitcoin Meets Resistance, Hash Rate Soars]( appeared first on [Feed Binary](. 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