I think the logic is that the price of XRP will rise on or after the launch of Bitcoin futures on Dec. 18th by CME. The crazy rise over the past week started soon after 10/12 when CBOE launched its BTC futures. More money in BTC means more money in the system overall, particularly from institutional investors. When that money goes out of BTC it has to go somewhere and obviously some of that has gone to XRP over the past week and might do again after the 18th. (Just speculating, correct me if I'm wrong)

Also v interesting that its the same time as SWIFT's Sibos conference https://www.sibos.com/

https://ripple.com/insights/news/announcing-swell-by-ripple/

Full list of speakers:

Dr. Ben Bernanke, Chairman, The Federal Reserve System (2006-2014) to be interviewed by Gene Sperling, National Economic Council Director and National Economic Advisor under Presidents Clinton and Obama (1996-2001, 2011-2014)

Sir Tim Berners-Lee, Inventor of the World Wide Web who will present A Look Ahead Into the Future of Tech

Brad Garlinghouse, CEO, Ripple
Stefan Thomas, CTO, Ripple
Dilip Rao, Managing Director of APAC, Ripple
Amit Sethi, CIO, Axis Bank
Kristen Michaud, Managing Director, Treasury Operations, GE Capital
Brian Behlendorf, Executive Director, Hyperledger
Ed Metzger, Head of Innovation, Santander
Mr. Nobuo Ando, Representative Director, SBI Remit Co., Ltd
Takashi Okita, CEO, SBI Ripple Asia
Dr. Arak Sutivong, Head of Strategy, Siam Commercial Bank
Rahul Pai, COO, UAE Exchange
Marwan Forzley, CEO, Veem
Dharmesh Desai, Group EVP, Yes Bank

Swell by Ripple https://swell.ripple.com/

The second tweet is a Japanese translation of the first tweet.

Timing of Ripple's annoucnments are interesting, almost as if they want to avoid a quick pump and dump scenario to gain a sustained rise, at least until they release their news at the end of the week.  

Like the countdown means that most people won't just buy and dump because they're guaranteed another tweet and an announcment at the end if they stick with it. And the way they changed the timing of the tweet so people wouldn't expect it, first tweet was 9pm GMT and the second was 5pm GMT. Interested to see what time they will tweet today

3... 2...1... The countdown begins

https://twitter.com/Ripple/status/899724697876652033

I can't find anything about it either, I just came across a sponsored ad promoting it on Twitter.

It's interesting that their mockup features a Visa logo - wondering if that's a design oversight or if they have already managed to secure a deal with Visa ahead of some of the other cards

Mockup: http://www.lotcard.com/images/LOTcard.png

From the outset, developing a payment card that allows you to spend cryptocurrencies in the real world seems like a no brainer and I made a profit off the recent TenX pump but the space already seems so crowded.

Between Monaco Card, TokenCard and TenX, which project do you think looks most promising and what would you say are the major advantages/disadvantages of each?

Also came across this project that's still pre-ICO: http://www.lotcard.com/

I don't know myself, instinctively crypto payment cards seem like a good idea but on the other hand do they have long-term viability? I mean if we get to a stage where some cryptos are ordinarily accepted at the point of sale then a special card will be obselete won't it? Then there's the issue with volatile prices and exchange rates, and the question of usage, like most people hold their coins rather than using them to pay everyday expenses and that's unlikely to change within the next five years or so.

Sorry if I sound like a complete noob, just think its interesting that the space is already so crowded, not unlike the privacy coin space, like I count four cards so far. Any thoughts?

Re: iOS app in the last dev updates

"Still on track for closed beta on the 21st of August. The public rollout will happen in the weeks following"

https://blog.tenx.tech/dev-update-august-11-2017-95b61f7e05a

I think the real point is that the coin IS being responsive to their efforts and hardwork and that's why it hasn't moved. If you look at the Ripple price the past few weeks its stayed around 15c (Eur) and any time it gets to 16/17c it's back down at 15c again a few hours later. Imo the only way a coin can remain this stagnant while almost every other coin is making gains is because someone wants to keep it low on purpose, at least for the time being. Whether it's whales with huge bags or Ripple themselves idk.

I understood it as 1 billion released every month for 55 months, whatever is unused goes to the back of the queue and forms the 56th, 57th, 58th month etc.

So e.g. if 1 billion is released but they only use 500,000, that 500,000 goes to the back of the queue and in the 56th month 500,000 will be rereleased... and on it goes (I think)

Guppy is up about 60% on Bittrex atm, any special reason or a delayed reaction for the Alpha release?