Bitcoin Forum

NYSE Operator Announces New Global Digital Assets Platform, Plans Bitcoin Futures Launch

Intercontinental Exchange (ICE), the operator of 23 leading global exchanges including the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE), has announced plans to create a Microsoft cloud-powered “open and regulated, global ecosystem for digital assets,” according to a press release published August 3.

The operator of NYSE is forming a new company, dubbed “Bakkt,” and will work alongside a marquee group of enterprises that includes BCG, Microsoft, Starbucks, and others, to create the new ecosystem.

The intention is to create an integrated platform that enables consumers, merchants, and institutional clients to buy, sell, store, and spend digital assets on a “seamless global network,” the press release notes.

First use cases will be for trading and conversion of Bitcoin (BTC) against fiat currencies, which ICE notes is currently “the most liquid cryptocurrency.” This conversion into fiat will enable consumers to purchase any item at their local Starbucks, in what will be crypto’s debut with the popular chain.

The ecosystem is expected to include “federally regulated markets and warehousing” alongside “merchant and consumer applications”:

Source: https://cointelegraph.com/news/nyse-operator-announces-new-global-digital-assets-platform-plans-bitcoin-futures-launch

Their own second layer sounds like it might have a fair bit of possibility for weirdness.

If anyone has the time they should give this a listen - http://www.bitcoin.kn/2018/08/caitlin-long-financialization/

TLDR - paper Bitcoin, a la hundreds of times more paper gold than actual gold, may become a greater likelihood thanks to this.

This reminds me of the 2016 era when China seemed to run the Bitcoin market. Back then, as a day trader, you had to watch the Chinese markets, as the western markets consistently lagged behind them. As such, I was glued to the screen every week at OKCoin futures settlements.

Anyway, take a look at this volume churn on a single Chinese exchange (Huobi):
https://i.imgur.com/Eyd014X.png

4.5 million BTC traded in a single day, really? ::) And this practice was mimicked on the other major Chinese spot and futures exchanges as well.

I bring this up for two reasons. First, the perception of high liquidity and high volume has a tangible effect on traders/speculators: we trade or follow the most liquid markets. Second, note in the chart above what happened when the Chinese government audited the exchanges and they all turned off their volumizer bots. Some traders think it's no coincidence that when the volumizers left, the lid was finally lifted off the price. I'm agnostic on that, but I mention it because of the discussion about a paper market's potential effect on (manipulation of) the spot market.

I'm in that camp myself. The timings are extremely close. Chinese whales playing on there just had to sit back and let the same thing happen over and over - let the white devils get confident, and then shit on them again as for some reason Western exchanges were scared of them because of their 'volume'. Repeat for eternity.

The Chinese casinos fucking off is one of the single healthiest things to occur. They were a cancer sucking the life out of everything.

They're saying it's 1-1 backed so no paper, but everyone starts off like that...

Considering how eager real people holding and trading real Bitcoin are to roll over and let large penises enter them because of the illusion of their greater authority, I don't think it would pan out well. Regular people don't realise how powerful they can be until it's too late.

Yeah, it became almost comical at some point how much the Chinese exchanges dictated the market. As an intraday trader, I nearly stopped charting Stamp and Bitfinex entirely during those times. They only ever followed.

That changed a lot when the big 3 Chinese exchanges shut down withdrawals last year. Since then, Bitfinex and GDAX lead the market more than anyone else. So yup, them getting shut down was definitely a good thing for the market.


Yup. I see the seeds of a new era of manipulation being sowed here. And it could be more effective than many BTC megabulls think.