[This week news.Bitcoin.com spoke with Jack Kingston, a cryptocurrency trader from Melbourne, Australia, who lost $430,000 USD worth of bitcoins at the exchange BTC-e. Mr. Kingston was quite surprised when he tried to log in one day, and the exchange was “under maintenance.” However, the Australian trader was even more astonished to find out the U.S. government painted all of the platform’s users as criminals and took his money.]

This week news.Bitcoin.com spoke with Jack Kingston, a cryptocurrency trader from Melbourne, Australia, who lost $430,000 USD worth of bitcoins at the exchange BTC-e. Mr. Kingston was quite surprised when he tried to log in one day, and the exchange was “under maintenance.” However, the Australian trader was even more astonished to find out the U.S. government painted all of the platform’s users as criminals and took his money.

https://news.bitcoin.com/australian-trader-loses-430k-at-btc-e-nothing-illegal-tied-to-my-funds/

[Could SegWit2x Lead to Three Different Bitcoins?]

Could SegWit2x Lead to Three Different Bitcoins?

he New York Agreement which ostensibly solved Bitcoin’s scalability crisis may actually end up causing a third Bitcoin to be created.

The agreement resulted in the creation of the SegWit2x plan, calling for the immediate implementation of Segregated Witness and agreeing to a November hard fork that will double the Bitcoin block size.

While this sounds entirely logical, the problem is that SegWit2x is a compromise. Like all compromises, neither side gets everything they want.

Not an ordinary compromise

SegWit2x isn’t an ordinary compromise, though. One side, the big blockers, had to grant an immediate concession by activating Segregated Witness. They now have to trust that the other side, SegWit supporters, will follow through with their promised block size increase in a few months.

However, having received what they wanted, the implementation of Segregated Witness to be exact, the SegWit camp could easily renege on their promise to increase the block size.

If this happens, miners who support big blocks might go ahead and launch the hard fork anyway. This could result in BTC-SegWit (what we have today), Bitcoin Cash launched on Aug. 1 with little miner support at present, and BTC-SegWit2x.

Such a split would actually be significantly more damaging than the Bitcoin Cash chain split since it would presumably have the support of a large number of miners.

It’s also likely that some non-big block miners would go along with the fork since they promised to do so when they signed the agreement.

https://cointelegraph.com/news/could-segwit2x-lead-to-three-different-bitcoins

Mt. Gox Trial Update: Karpeles Admits ‘Willy Bot’ Existence

Former Mt. Gox CEO Mark Karpeles has admitted operating a so-called ‘Willy Bot’ (obligation exchange) before prosecutors in Japan.

As Karpeles’ trial continues at Tokyo District Court, live rolling coverage is available online thanks to Kolin Burges, a Mt. Gox creditor and creator of action website mtgoxprotest.com.

In a series of tweets today, Burges said that despite “super tight security” and a “small courtroom,” he was able to get a place inside, albeit without his interpreter.

https://cointelegraph.com/news/mt-gox-trial-update-karpeles-admits-willy-bot-existence

[Wall Street Journal: Bitcoin ‘Need Not Compete With Dollar’ For ‘Respect’]

Wall Street Journal: Bitcoin ‘Need Not Compete With Dollar’ For ‘Respect’

The Wall Street Journal has joined the increasing number of mainstream news sites newly bullish on Bitcoin.

In an article Monday, Northwestern University law professor John O. McGinnis led a buoyant appraisal of the virtual currency’s potential versus government-controlled fiat.

“To continue to flourish, Bitcoin does not have to become a more stable store of value than the US dollar,” he wrote together with lawyer Kyle W. Roche.

“It can climb the rungs of respectability by prevailing over less trustworthy currencies.”

Bitcoin’s appeal over national currencies has been a classic area of criticism and even ridicule from mainstream sources in the past.

Commentators such as Business Insider CEO Henry Blodget told networks such as CNBC just months ago that Bitcoin “has no intrinsic value,” implying fiat currency does in the form of government backing.

Discussing how this argument is irrelevant, McGinnis and Roche follow opinions from figures such as Snapchat investor Jeremy Liew, who has said developing markets hold the key to Bitcoin’s propagation.

“[Bitcoin] is already gaining strength and stability by competing successfully against monetarily oppressive regimes and helping poor immigrants in the developed world remit money to their relatives back home,” he continued.

“As Bitcoin gains stability, it can become even more competitive because even the best fiat money is subject to political risks.”

Social media users reacted broadly positively to McGinnis and Roche’s perspective.

https://cointelegraph.com/news/wall-street-journal-bitcoin-need-not-compete-with-dollar-for-respect

Changelly, a well-known cryptocurrency exchange, has announced its partnership with Jaxx, one of the most prominent wallets in the crypto community. Changelly’s API is going to be built directly into the application, allowing frictionless conversions between different cryptocurrencies available in Jaxx wallet.

https://news.bitcoin.com/changelly-announces-partnership-jaxx-wallet/

I think this will really benefit customers who are using this exchange and Jaxx wallet.

The EU and blockchain: taking the lead?

Introduction

Long time the European Union has taken a positive, but wait-and-see attitude towards blockchain and distributed ledger technology. Both related to use cases and regulatory intervention. But that is changing rapidly. Last week the European Commission announced the launch of its #Blockchain4EU Project enlarging their scope to more than FinTech applications. This proves that the EU is taking steps (may be) to become one of the leading economic blocks in the blockchain race. It may therefore be interesting to take a closer look at what the plans/initiatives are from the various EU institutions such as European Commission, European Parliament, ECB, ESMA and others related to blockchain.


https://www.finextra.com/blogposting/14216/the-eu-and-blockchain-taking-the-lead

Identity without the Blockchain? Skepticism Grows for Once-Hot Use Case


A rising tide of skeptics is arguing that identity might not be the blockchain use case it's often cracked up to be.

For much of 2016 and 2017, the general consensus has been that by distributing a ledger that can validate identifying information, users themselves can determine who accesses their data and what others can see. In theory, those users would own their own identities, as opposed to Facebook, Google, the government, or any number of organizations, all of whom want to keep a record of – and profit from – that data.

But that doesn't mean those seeking solutions are sold on the technology.

To look deeper into question of how to improve the way the world's citizens prove who they are, non-profit ID2020 launched the ID2020 Alliance earlier this week, with founding members including Microsoft and Accenture.


http://www.coindesk.com/identity-without-blockchain-skepticism-grows-hot-use-case/

'Absolutely Necessary': How Blockchain Could Help Tech Giant Cisco Reboot

Cisco is changing.

The technology firm best known as the supplier of enterprise computer hardware has seen a slow, steady decline in revenue from some of its core products. As as result of an increasing number technological services being virtualized, and the storage of information moving to the cloud, the $158bn firm has been restructuring and exploring new ways to capitalize on connected devices.

http://www.coindesk.com/absolutely-necessary-how-blockchain-could-help-tech-giant-cisco-reboot/

Bitcoin dips after hitting technical resistance

Investing.com - Bitcoin fell on Wednesday, on the back of concerns that the cryptocurrency may be set for a period of selling pressure as it entered technical levels that could offer strong resistance to upside momentum.

BTC/USD traded at $2,528.9, down $213.1, or about 7.77% by 13:29 EDT.

Goldman Sachs) chief technician Sheba Jafari recently warned clients that the bitcoin market may be heading for bearish territory, adding that they should consider the possibility of reinitiating positions after a pull back to between $2,440 and $1,915.

"It's on track to forming a bearish key day reversal if today's (June 12) close settles below 2,749. It will also form a key week version if Friday's close is below 2,475. Both daily/weekly oscillators are diverging negatively. All of this to say that the balance of signals is looking broadly heavy."
The move lower in bitcoin comes a few days after the digital currency hit a record high of $3,000 on Monday.

Sharp rallies and steep troughs are not uncommon moves for bitcoin, according to Raoul Pal — author and publisher of The Global Macro Investor, an elite macroeconomic and investment research service – who said “[Bitcoin] goes through this periodically… it rises several hundred percent, and then collapses.”

The sharp move lower in bitcoin was mirrored by a similar move in Ethereum, which dipped by 7.5% to $355.79.
Investors, however, remained optimistic that Ethereum would be the alternative cryptocurrency that usurps bitcoin as the largest and best capitalized blockchain – a phenomenon referred to as “the flippening”.

At current prices, Ethereum’s market cap of nearly $34 billion is not far behind bitcoin’s roughly $42 billion.


https://www.investing.com/news/forex-news/bitcoin-dips-after-hitting-technical-resistance-495455

[https://btcmanager.com/shadow-brokers-response-team-cancels-its-crowdfunded-bid-for-nsa-exploit-tools/]

"On May 30, a group of cybersecurity researchers launched a crowdfunding campaign in the hopes of raising $25,000 with which they were planning to pay a hacker group called the Shadow Brokers for hacking tools that were supposedly taken from the NSA. The effort raised $3,906.62 in 36 hours. However, the campaign was canceled. The cybersecurity group later decided that buying these tools from a criminal organization could raise a lot of legal issues.

Before the group could go any further with this bid, lawyers and legal experts warned the organization that it would run into serious trouble by buying stolen hacks from a criminal organization linked with WannaCry, the latest cyber epidemic that affected millions of Windows users worldwide. The group then decided to cancel the crowdfunding campaign."

https://btcmanager.com/shadow-brokers-response-team-cancels-its-crowdfunded-bid-for-nsa-exploit-tools/

This is the first time that I heard this news. I think this is too risky indeed and the assurance that the hackers will give you all the tools that they stolen from NSA is zero.

Jeff Gundlach: Bitcoin is Soaring Because of China

GUNDLACH: BITCOIN SURGE LINKED TO SHANGHAI COMPOSITE FALL

Jeffrey Gundlach, CEO of DoubleLine Capital, tweeted the above, making the assertion that the surge in Bitcoin price has coincided with a drop in the Shanghai composite, saying:

Bitcoin up 100% in under 2 months. Shanghai down almost 10% same timeframe, compared to most global stocks up. Probably not a coincidence!

This drop in the Shanghai composite has not followed the trend of most major indexes which have so far climbed this year.

That the Shanghai composite fell this year was seen to be a sign of it being under pressure from increasing Chinese regulation, with the index being down almost 10 percent over the last two months.


http://bitcoinist.com/jeff-gundlach-bitcoin-soaring-china/

Consensus 2017: BitPay CEO Calls Bitcoin Fork 'Only Option' For Businesses

BitPay's chief executive made the case for a fork at the bitcoin scaling discussion panel at CoinDesk's Consensus 2017 conference today.

Centered on a two-year debate focusing on the size of transaction blocks on the bitcoin network, global discussion on the issue has so far passed through a few phases with varying proposals to increase the throughput of the system being put forward along the way.

Most recently, investment firm Digital Currency Group advanced a proposal that would see the Segregated Witness upgrade activate and start a countdown to a 2MB block size increase – though, a similar idea has been proposed and rejected by developers before.

As this debate has been raging for a couple of years now, members of the scaling panel were quick to note their frustration.

http://www.coindesk.com/consensus-2017-bitpay-ceo-bitcoin-fork/

Bitcoin Price at New All Time High; Flirts With $2000

Bitcoin markets broke through any resistance that was in place with the last rally. Prices continue rising above all time high levels. In the meantime, resistance continues being shattered by the strong buying pressure. Bitcoin prices through all markets are now approaching a major breakthrough point at $2000 price levels. Traders across exchanges appear to have come prepared for such an outcome by setting sell walls, yet the market’s sentiment has showed enough momentum to surpass such resistance.

http://insidebitcoins.com/news/bitcoin-price-at-new-all-time-high-flirts-with-2000/50353

Ernst & Young Joins Bitcoin Association Switzerland to ‘Support Local Bitcoin Community’

The Swiss arm of “Big Four” accounting and services giant Ernst & Young is now a corporate member of the Bitcoin Association Switzerland, a bitcoin advocacy group.

In a year where Ernst & Young (EY) Switzerland began accepting bitcoin as a payment method for services rendered, the services giant is continuing to endear itself to bitcoin adopters by joining the Bitcoin Association of Switzerland (BAS), a Swiss community of bitcoin enthusiasts and advocates.

“As an Association, we want to pave the way for Bitcoin to flourish and unfold its full potential,” reads a BAS mission statement. The association also raises bitcoin awareness by presenting the cryptocurrency at third-party events.

https://www.cryptocoinsnews.com/ernst-young-joins-bitcoin-association-switzerland-corporate-member-support-community/

[In the Wake of the WannaCry Attack, News Sites Almost Get Bitcoin Right]

In the Wake of the WannaCry Attack, News Sites Almost Get Bitcoin Right

In the wake of the WannaCry ransomware attack, it’s instructive to note that although mentioned, Bitcoin is not typically being blamed or associated with the attack. Rather, it is rightly being described as a payment method the hackers are demanding.

This is a far cry from the way Bitcoin would have been portrayed just a few years ago – a sign that the money of the darknet is graduated to being at least somewhat respectable.

That isn’t to say that news sites are getting their facts right, however. News.com.au is currently running an explainer article that is laudable in its neutral tone, but falls a bit short in its accuracy.

It’s worth more than an ounce of gold right now.

False. This is a claim that gets made when the price of Bitcoin rises above the price of an ounce of gold – but that’s a false comparison. With market cap of 30ish billion dollars, one bitcoin would have to be worth on the order of 350,000 dollars to be at true parity with gold. As a Bitcoin advocate who hopes it will one day rise to be the world reserve currency, a role once played by gold, I can dream, but we’re nowhere near there yet.

Bitcoin allows users to spend money anonymously.

**Get started with Bitcoin at Coinbase.**

Not exactly true. The proper term is pseudonymous. The actual transaction addresses and amounts are permanently, publicly available for view by anyone with a computer. The reason it’s pseudonymous and not anonymous is that  we do have information about the transaction, we just lack that final bit of information – the name of the transactor. And, it is is often possible to associate Bitcoin addresses with actual people and organizations. The donation address I have on this site, for example, links that address to this site and, finally, to me.


 
There are methods of obscuring this link which the hackers will no doubt use, but it is not true that people can just use Bitcoin and feel that their identities and transaction histories are forever inscrutable.

(T)the currency (is) popular with libertarians as well as tech enthusiasts, speculators — and criminals.

https://epeak.info/2017/05/15/in-the-wake-of-the-wannacry-attack-news-sites-almost-get-bitcoin-right/

Hong Kong Urged to Recognize Digital Currencies & Commit to Blockchain

An advisory body has urged the Hong Kong government to recognize digital currencies and invest in blockchain or distributed ledger technology (DLT) amid a wider FinTech-forward remit as it plays catch up to the likes of Singapore in the region.

Established in 2013, the Financial Services Development Council (FSDC) – an advisory body to the government – released a research report this week in a bid to push development of the FinTech sector in the country.

“Hong Kong has a world-class financial sector, but only a nascent FinTech sector,” an excerpt from the report read. “The aim should be to develop Hong Kong’s FinTech on a par with its mainstream finance, to secure a better future for the financial sector and for Hong Kong as a whole.”


The report highlights Mainland China as the model, “by far the world’s largest and most established FinTech market’, highlighting the use of FinTech payment methods among 40% of consumers.

A separate blockchain-specific FSDC report outlines a four-pronged strategy for Hong Kong to take a leap in blockchain development. It calls the government to create a “DLT lead function” supported by an advisory group comprising of industry and academics. This blockchain lead would be tasked to coordinate ‘public sector efforts on blockchain, engage regulatory support, promote and build DLT capability within the public sector’.

The advisory group also recommends the government install a DLT Hub as the focal point for the blockchain ecosystem to function as a center of knowledge, education and advocacy of the technology.

Putting the spotlight on digital currencies, the report adds that Hong Kong should introduce “a more solid regulatory footing” for digital currency firms operating in Hong Kong. Presently, bitcoin and other digital currencies are treated as virtual commodities and remain unregulated.

The advisory body notably recommends:

It would be desirable to recognize digital currencies, define the rights and obligations attaching to digital assets and liabilities, and establish an appropriate oversight regime.

The group specifically points out to toward the central bank digital currency endeavor taking shape in China. “Hong Kong needs in particular to capitalize on teh possible issuance of digital RMB overseas by the Mainland Chinese authorities in the context of RMB internationalization.” Such a move would help Hong Kong find firm footing as the ‘digital RMB payments rail in and out of Mainland China,” the FSDC added.

Finally, the group is pushing the government to develop its own blockchain proof-of-concepts (PoC), “to provide effective demonstration of blockchain’s capabilities and benefits and to attract talent to the territory.” Getting hands-on in developing and testing blockchain tech should be prioritized and backed with funding, the group added.

https://www.cryptocoinsnews.com/hong-kong-urged-recognize-digital-currencies-commit-blockchain/

Our Bitcoin Forecast For 2017 Is Accurate So Far

Two months ago, InvestingHaven’s research team published a very bullish bitcoin price forecast for 2017. Bitcoin was trading at $1250 at that time. The conclusion of that piece was: “We could easily see bitcoin’s price move to $2,000 in 2017.”
Last week,the price of bitcoin peaked at $1550. That is amazing. One virtual coin which nobody can see or touch is worth more than one ounce of gold. Who could believe in such a scenario, say 5 years ago?

Cryptocurrencies are strongly rising, and we believe because of fundamental reasons. They are moving from early adopters to the first stage of wider acceptance. Regular investors are starting to purchase bitcoins and cryptocurrencies, and an increasing number of merchants are getting paid by cryptocurrencies, first and foremost bitcoin.

Note that Eteherum and Dash are booming as well.

All cryptocurrencies combined are now worth $40 billion, which is still nothing compared to total money in circulation and the value of many funds.
And media are taking note, which suggests that the first phase of acceptance could start accelerating to a wider acceptance any time soon.
Because of that we wrote two months ago that bitcoin’s long term chart looks very constructive, hence our bullish bitcoin price forecast for 2017 and beyond. We added that “readers should compare the steep rally in 2013 with the steady and solid rise in the last 2 years. As the price of bitcoin took out all-time highs, it suggests it has much more upside potential.”

Currently, the bitcoin price chart, which, by the way, should be read in a different manner as stock chart or other market charts, is in the process of accelerating its rally. We do not exclude a parabolic rise going forward. Our bitcoin price forecast for 2017 is potentially met very soon.

https://www.investing.com/analysis/our-bitcoin-forecast-for-2017-is-accurate-so-far-200187549

Damn... almost everyone is now on the bitcoin bandwagon.... Billionaires now Market Speculators... who's next to jump on the hype?

Its looks like we have set another ATH for this year:

Bitcoin price surpassed its previous all-time high to achieve $1,377 across major Bitcoin exchanges in Japan and the US, including Bitstamp and Bitflyer.

Such analysts as BKCM CEO Brian Kelly attribute the recent upward trend of Bitcoin price to the re-examination of the Winklevoss twins’ Bitcoin ETF COIN proposal. While Kelly emphasized that the probability of the US Securities Exchange Commission approving a Bitcoin ETF in the near future is quite low, investors are quite optimistic in regard to the situation.

https://cointelegraph.com/news/bitcoin-price-sets-new-all-time-high-at-1377-main-factors

Bitcoin Price is Once Again Above Gold Despite ‘Altcoin Bubble’ – Inside Bitcoins


Bitcoin Price Hits New Highs, Back Above Gold

The price of one bitcoin now sits at $1,283 USD at the time of writing, according to Bitcointicker.co.

The last time BTC was breaking its all-time high was in early March amid the COIN ETF euphoria. At the time, the price spiked to as high as $1,350 on some exchanges.

Worth mentioning is the glaring price difference among various exchanges, particularly Bitfinex, where one BTC sells for $1,377. You can read more about why this is happening here.

The previous official all-time high was established as somewhere around the $1,275 mark, which has now been broken. Moreover, Bitcoin is now back above gold price per ounce or $1,264.09 per ounce, according to gold.org.


http://insidebitcoins.com/news/bitcoin-price-is-once-again-above-gold-despite-altcoin-bubble/44596

UASF Developer Revises Controversial Bitcoin Scaling Proposal


A controversial proposal for upgrading the bitcoin blockchain saw a notable strategy shift this weekend.


Since its publication on the bitcoin-dev mailing list on 25th February, a proposal by pseudonymous contributor Shaolinfry for a user-activated soft fork (UASF) has been widely discussed – and framed by some as a possible way around the current deadlock over SegWit activation.

Conversation has so far centered on how the need for a supermajority consensus in network decision-making means that any mining pool with enough hashing power holds effective veto power over any proposal, a fact many believe is responsible for delays in SegWit adoption.

The logic of a UASF, by contrast, is to bypass this veto power and put signaling into the hands of the digital currency's user base as a whole.

After the first general proposal for a UASF, Shaolinfry put forward a second proposal, BIP148, focused on putting the onus of supporting SegWit onto the 'economic majority', moving power out of the miners' hands.

Yet, even after it gained momentum, high-profile voices such as Bitcoin Core developer Gregory Maxwell and other bitcoin developers rejected the proposal on the basis it could undermine the stability of the bitcoin ecosystem.

"We should use the least disruptive mechanisms available and the BIP148 proposal does not meet that test," Maxwell wrote.

It's against this backdrop that Shaolinfry has announced work on a redraft of the proposal, which is aimed to address some of the concerns voiced by Maxwell and others in the community.

Shaolinfry conceded at the beginning of an announcement post that the reason for the changes is related to technical criticisms of how the plan would upgrade the network.

Shaolinfry wrote:


"BIP 148 is certainly not what a normal UASF would or should look like. While support for BIP 148 is surprisingly high, there are definitely important players who support UASF in general but do not like BIP148 approach."

The revised proposal, allocated the identifier BIP8, is an addition to BIP9, a proposal that concerns how soft forks are implemented.

Scaling context

The changes also hint at what could happen should bitcoin's scaling debate continue over the course of 2017.

Currently, if the 95% hashrate support for SegWit is not reached by the end of a certain time window (15th November), the proposal is set to be discarded by default.

However, technical changes made in a proposal under the terms of BIP8 would be automatically locked in at the end of the time period, although they could also be adopted sooner.

Shaolinfry's suggestion is that after the 15th November cut off date, a UASF SegWit proposal be made under the terms of BIP8.

This would mean that the community would have a full year from the present date to prepare for upgrading by means of a UASF, removing the possible destabilizing effect of a short-term.

The developer argued in the post:

"I believe this approach would satisfy the more measured approach expected for bitcoin and does not have the issues [Maxwell] brought up about BIP148."

So far, there has been less of a response from the community on the terms of BIP8, but the idea of an automatic lock-in could be contentious.

However, with the community stalled over SegWit (and litecoin moving forward on its upgrade), the suggestion of an unambiguous adoption procedure will doubtless seem appealing for many observers.

http://www.coindesk.com/lets-try-this-again-uasf-developer-puts-forth-new-proposal/