Nuclearis, a manufacturer of precision mechanical components for the nuclear industry, is using the Bitcoin blockchain to verify the manufacturing blueprints of parts that make up nuclear power reactors.

Announced Tuesday, Nuclearis, which is headquartered in Buenos Aires, Argentina, and has offices in the U.S. and China, is using the Bitcoin-powered RSK blockchain as an immutable anchor, keeping tabs on critical documents. The firm has open-sourced the framework so other players in the nuclear industry can use it.

Its not the first time blockchain tech has been leveraged within the nuclear industry. Estonias Guardtime has been using its own version of DLT for some time to distribute data as a way to prevent cyberattacks on nuclear infrastructure. There have also been projects using blockchain to track the uranium fuel supply chain and also track what happens to nuclear waste.

Safety is everything when it comes to nuclear. The track and trace use case for manufacturing documents is important because there have been forgeries in the past, where antiquated nuclear reactors have opted for shortcuts to revamp equipment (a high-profile case of this sort went through the courts in France in 2016.)

Some 150 new reactors are set to be built over the next 30 years and the NuclearTech space is all about instilling trust within the operators of nuclear power plants, said Nuclearis CTO Sebastian Martinez.

Part of the problem is that there are many intermediaries in this supply chain and parts of it are still paper-based, said Martinez. We hash the manufacturing documents and upload to the blockchain at the point of creation of the steel part. Months or even years later, when we deliver the part, the power plant can check if everything digitally matches.

Nuclearis, which is working with Argentinas three power plants Atucha I, Atucha II and Embalse said the Argentine government and the countrys main operator of nuclear power plants, Nucleoelctrica Argentina, are looking to adopt its blockchain system.

The RSK blockchain developed with consultancy IOV Labs uses a process called merged mining to run a sidechain on the Bitcoin blockchain and harvest the hash power of the largest cryptocurrency.

The immutability and security that blockchain provides are of the most importance for the nuclear industry, IOV Labs CEO Diego Gutierrez Zaldivar said in a statement. We are very excited about Nuclearis solution in that industry and thrilled they have chosen RSK blockchain and RSK Infrastructure Framework (RIF) technologies for its development.

The RSK-based platform now in use is only for tracking the provenance of new parts, but there are lots of interesting use cases going forward around areas like decommissioning of parts, Nuclearis said.

If you replace something like a pump from a primary circuit that has been radioactive for the last 50 years, you have to decommission it, get it out of the reactor and dismantle it, said Martinez. Traceability of that stuff is very important so it doesnt turn up on some black market, or worse, finds its way into a dirty bomb.

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How the Bitcoin Blockchain Is Being Used to Safeguard Nuclear Power Stations - CoinDesk - CoinDesk

NEW YORK CITY, NY, UNITED STATES - 2020/02/17: A view of an american multinational financial ... [+] services corporation Fidelity Investments logo. (Photo by Alex Tai/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images)

Yesterday, Fidelity filed paperwork with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to create a new fund dedicated entirely to bitcoin, which will require a minimum investment of $100,000.

CEO of Onramp Invest, Tyrone Ross, notes Fidelitys minimum investment size indicates they have no immediate plans to expand into retail offerings, but rather want to focus on the higher end institutional side of the business.

The likely logic behind Fidelitys decision is better margins and pre-existing formula for success via industry leader, Grayscale. Grayscales bitcoin trust caters to high net worth individuals and institutions, and has seen its assets under management balloon over the past few years, now topping almost $5 billion.

Tyrone Ross further comments that Fidelity also knows that they carry a brand legacy that other investment managers and custodians simply cant match. Fidelitys brand recognition could allow them to beat out first movers like Grayscale for the growing pie of institutional capital allocated to bitcoin and other digital assets.

https://www.coinbase.com/price/bitcoin

Additionally, the Boston investment giant has ~$8.3 trillion of assets under management, which in theory, if even a small portion of their clients bought into the new bitcoin fund, it would not take long before Fidelity would rival Grayscale. For example, 1% of client assets into their bitcoin fund would give it $83 billion in assets under management, i.e. greater than 16x Grayscale.

If Fidelitys fund proves successful, the price implications for bitcoin are quite clear. For example, back in June 2020, analyst Kevin Rooke determined that Grayscales trust was buying bitcoin faster than it could be mined post-halving.

Unbelievable.

Grayscale added 19,879 BTC to their Bitcoin Trust since last week (53,588 BTC since the halving).

Bitcoin miners only produced 7,081 BTC since last week (39,544 BTC since halving).

That's almost 400,000 BTC under management for $GBTC pic.twitter.com/aMtSGHZnz2

— Kevin Rooke (@kerooke) June 25, 2020

Given bitcoin currently has a market cap of $208 billion and just underwent its third halving, the aforementioned scenario could easily happen again if Fidelitys fund gains traction.

Furthermore, it could be more potent this time around. Per GrayscalesValuing Bitcoinreport, only 37% of outstanding bitcoin are actually available for trading. The remaining amount has not been touched in over 1 year.

https://grayscale.co/insights/valuing-bitcoin/

There are numerous questions still unsolved from Fidelitys surprise announcement principally, can it gain demonstrable traction with its existing clientele? If so, Fidelity has the potential to be the next 1000 pound gorilla buying up more bitcoin than is being mined, thus a strong tailwind for price.

Disclosure: The author owns bitcoin and ethereum.

Link:
Fidelity Is A 1,000 Pound Bitcoin Gorilla In The Making - Forbes

London blockchain venture builder Coinsilium(AQSE:COIN) is pivoting into a surging growth industry.

And the market is responding, with shares advancing by more than 10% inthe last two weeks alone on rising volume.

The company has in its hands the world of decentralised finance, orDeFi for short.

The numbers involved are scarcely believable as retail andinstitutional capital floods in.

In just the last 30 days, the total value in these new financialproducts has more than doubled to more than $9 billion.

Coinsilium is moving to profit here by investing in the infrastructurethat underpins not just DeFi, but an entire emerging industry.

Bitcoin booms again

As central banks switch from cautious inflation targets to unfettered trillion-dollarmoney-printing programmes, safe haven stores of value like gold andcryptocurrencies have been the biggest beneficiaries.

And cryptocurrency is deep in the throes of a new bull market. Thatsbeen shown as the price of Ethereum just hit a 19-month high.

Meanwhile, the Bitcoin price has stabilised above $11,500 per coin,surging 110% since March.

That makes it one of the worlds best-performing assets. Far beyond the38% added to the gold price.

Analysts have put a near-term $16,000 price target on the worlds largest cryptocurrency.

Smart contracts,smarter business

The first breakout star of DeFi is cryptocurrency lending.

All loans are carried out automatically by what are called smartcontracts pieces of code that stipulate the terms of loans and how and whenthey must be paid back.

Smart contracts are already part of English law. A panel of top UKjudges and regulators confirmed that they constitute binding legal contracts back in May 2019.

So there is growing faith in what has often been something of aregulatory Wild West for investors.

And this is where Coinsilium comes in.

The firm began a JV with Singapore tech firm IOV Labs in January 2020 to promote the adoption of the RSK blockchain.

RSK is building projects that use Bitcoin smart contracts.

Most smart contracts are currently based on Ethereum. But there is ahuge gap in the market for smart contracts based on Bitcoin.

And there are a near-infinite number of potential uses for Bitcoinsmart contracts.

For example, Californias prime energy agency is now trialing RSKs Bitcoin smart contracts as a way to bring more transparency and liquidity to carbon credittrading.

As with other smart contract projects, auto-executing code sets out theterms and conditions of each carbon credit trade.

Digital tokens represent a companys share in the process.

Today carbon credit trading is not digitized, explains Eduardo Javier Munoz, CEO of one of the businesses taking part in the pilot. It is a very unconventional market. Now it will be easier to hold [credits] and trade them.

Digitizing carbon credit reporting creates new opportunities forbusinesses to redeem these credits but also makes participation much cheaper.

The bridge betweenold and new

RSK builds products using Bitcoin smart contracts.

What is crucial to the growth of this business is a key feature calledan interoperability bridge.

RSKs developers have managed to link the Bitcoin and Ethereumblockchains together so that smart contracts work well on both platforms.

When a user transfers any token, the bridges smart contract locks theoriginal and creates a corresponding amount of new tokens on the otherblockchain. Ethereum-based tokens can be transformed into RSKs RRC20 tokens,and back the other way.

Interoperability has been a cornerstone of the RSK vision from the start. We believe being able to offer Bitcoins benefits to Ethereum users and to connect these respective developer communities is a crucial step for the blockchain ecosystem as a whole. Adrian Eidelman, RSK Strategist, IOV Labs

Bitcoin and Ethereum are the two largest and most-used blockchains inexistence, but processes tend to remain isolated and segregated to eachnetwork.

As industry website Coindesk notes, interoperability makes it much easier for projects to operate ondifferent blockchains and take advantage of things like faster transactionsspeeds and lower costs.

Projects can cater to a broader base of users who would otherwiseremain siloed in closed networks. So it is a huge usability upgrade.

Fast growth, moreuses

Those utilising RSKs model include Bitcoin stablecoin protocol Moneyon Chain. The project says it will use the RSKBitcoin-Ethereum bridge to cross its stablecoins into the Ethereumecosystem.

Today, the advantages of building Decentralized Finance [DeFi] applications for Bitcoin on top of the RSK Network are far superior in terms of security and other features compared to putting it on top of Ethereum. Max Carjuzaa, Money on Chain co-founder

Making the system blockchain agnostic opens up a vast potential newmarket and user base for smart contracts as a whole.

Effectively, people who own Bitcoin can use their holdings in RSK tointeract with Ethereum-based smart contracts.

And there are far more retail and institutional investors who ownBitcoin than Ethereum.

Bitcoin dominates the cryptocurrency market. Theres a reason why it isused as shorthand for the entire industry and the most easily recognisabledigital asset.

Fidelitys 2020 Asset Management survey found 36% of large US and European institutions, including hedge funds,investment advisors and pension funds, own digital assets. 25% hold BTC, while11% hold ETH.

That means there is a huge amount of untapped power in opening up smartcontract projects to Bitcoin owners.

AndCoinsiliums link withRSK gives it direct access to the largest growth area of this fast-movingtrend.

See the rest here:
Coinsilium backs RSK as Bitcoin and DeFi rocket (COIN) - Value The Markets

A record 3.5 million crypto wallet app downloads were recorded in July 2020, representing an increase of 81% when compared to the same period last year. In addition, the number of active users went up by 110% between January 1 and August 19, 2020.

According to a report authored by Madeline Lenahan of Apptoppia, the increase in the number of crypto apps downloads is observed right after countries began imposing lockdown measures in the wake of Covid-19.

In the previous year, the number of downloads averaged just under two million, with the month of May and June being the only time when this mark is passed.

Explaining this years increasing downloads, Lenahan, says they didnt think it would last but were surprised to see that the trend has persisted for a few months.

Lenahan offers another possible reason for the growth in wallet downloads:

Cryptocurrency is becoming increasingly mainstream in emerging markets, particularly in regions of Africa. Crypto.com, for instance, has seen a 339% increase in new installations from Nigeria in the past 90 days. Coinbase has seen a 113% increase there.

Apptoppias data shows that Coinbase and Crypto.com have the highest number of users per day with 969,000 and 576,000, respectively. Some of the wallet applications making it into the top ten include Blockchain, Luno, BCH, BRD, Trust and Binance.

Also, recent data from Bitcoin.com shows Nigeria accounting for a greater number of Bitcoin.com Wallet downloads between August 10 and 16. From the total number of downloads of 18,613, Nigeria had 3,473 wallets ahead of the United States, which had 2,802 downloads. The same data shows India in the third position with 1,420.

Both Apptoppia and Bitcoin.com show that Nigeria is cementing its position as one of the biggest cryptocurrency markets in the world.

Meanwhile, in his comments on the increasing download of wallets, mobile app developer Adem Bilican said: Mobile is the way to go for blockchain and cryptocurrencies mass adoption, I am super happy to see these numbers.

Lenahan believes August is likely to set another record as the rate growth appears real and is lasting.

What do you of the increased wallet downloads so far this year? Share your thoughts in the comments section below

Image Credits: Shutterstock, Pixabay, Wiki Commons, Apptoppia, Wallet.Bitcoin.com

Disclaimer: This article is for informational purposes only. It is not a direct offer or solicitation of an offer to buy or sell, or a recommendation or endorsement of any products, services, or companies. Bitcoin.com does not provide investment, tax, legal, or accounting advice. Neither the company nor the author is responsible, directly or indirectly, for any damage or loss caused or alleged to be caused by or in connection with the use of or reliance on any content, goods or services mentioned in this article.

Original post:
3.5 Million+ Crypto Wallets Downloaded in July, Active Users up 110% in the Year | Wallets - Bitcoin News

As whispers of Bitcoins (BTC) promised financial breakthrough failing to materialize over the last few months have continued to garner steam, the price of the premier crypto asset recently surged above the all-important $12,000 psychological threshold, only to once again slip right under.

However, as part of this development, the total cap of the crypto market reached an impressive $386.4 billion, a level only attained back in 2018. That being said, a multitude of factors, such as poor investor perception and lack of regulatory direction, seems to be preventing the market from flowering as previously envisioned by many experts.

In this regard, Sam Tabar, co-founder of decentralized P2P token trading network Airswap and ex-managing director for Bank of America in the APAC region, believes that while there is a long term structural upside for Bitcoin, there will be cyclical ups and downs like with any nascent asset class. However, the primary issue holding traditional capital market participants from entering this market is information asymmetry: Certain players aka whales control most of the market and have created massive market spikes or collapse. Market gyrations are ok, but massive information asymmetry is not.

Expounding his views on the matter, Ariel Zetlin-Jones, associate professor of economics at Carnegie Mellon Universitys Tepper School of Business, told Cointelegraph that a primary headwind against cryptocurrency demand continues to be the COVID-19 pandemic, especially as more people start to face the economic uncertainty. He further added that its only natural that during uncertain times, not many casual investors would be willing to invest their life savings in a highly volatile asset class such as Bitcoin.

Amid the pandemic, the United States dollar has thus far maintained its strength, in part, due to being the worlds reserve currency, and as long as countries continue to see the U.S. as a global powerhouse, its monetary value will continue to remain strong regardless of the recent stimulus packages.

However, in terms of the dollars recent performance, there have been some hiccups. For starters, the U.S. dollar index is currently at 93.2, down nearly 10% from its peak in March. Also, due to being a global reserve currency, the dollar tends to increase in value during downturns, complicating assessments of its performance at such times.

Furthermore, increasing social and political tensions along with incessant printing of dollars are creating conditions that can potentially form a bubble of hyperinflation in the foreseeable future. The situation has pushed some major investors like Warren Buffett, the CEO of Berkshire Hathaway, to trim his companys position in banking and investing heavily in stable stores of value such as gold.

Buffetts decision to completely close Berkshires position on Goldman Sachs also comes at a time when the financial institution recorded its second-ever highest quarterly trading revenue of $13.3 billion, thereby suggesting that Buffett and his associates are not comfortable with the idea of betting big on the long-term prospects of the banking industry. Ryan Taylor, CEO of the Dash cryptocurrency, told Cointelegraph:

The U.S. is not the only country to undergo massive stimulus in 2020. Also, in times of crisis demand for USD tends to spike globally. These two considerations give the U.S. a lot of leeway to inflate supply without immediately devaluing the dollar. However, we are starting to witness signs that inflation is a risk. Certainly the massive stimulus started by inflating asset prices, including equity and debt. And just last week the U.S. CPI for July registered the highest monthly growth rate since 1991.

Even though many naysayers have repeatedly pointed out the fact that BTC has failed to surge exponentially and reach new all-time highs despite the economic conditions being ripe for it, the cryptocurrency market as a whole seems to be having a stellar year.

For example, Ether (ETH) has quadrupled in value, rising from $105 to $440 since hitting relative lows earlier this year in March. Similarly, currencies like Bitcoin, Ripple (XRP) and Dash are up by 72%, 50%, 124%, respectively, while many other smaller cryptocurrencies, especially in the decentralized finance sector, are seeing triple-digit growth as well.

Tabar believes that cryptos strong performance can be gauged in terms of the fact that some family offices have started to include BTC in their portfolio holdings. Not only that, certain neo-banks like Revolut and easy access investment apps such as Robinhood have also enabled easier access to crypto. This suggests that the next generation of young investors may eventually help spur the adoption of this asset class. In comparison to traditional commodities, Taylor has pointed out that crypto has outpaced most precious metals, like silver, which is up about 54% year-to-date:

Other precious metals are generally below 40% returns, especially if they have industrial uses. I suspect the attention of the general public continues to be fixated on the performance of stocks and bonds that makes up their retirement portfolios.

Also, Bitcoin has fared much better in comparison to oil than many fiat currencies, as oil prices have dropped due to negative growth in the economy influenced by the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. Statistically speaking, the year-to-date price of oil is down 32%. Furthermore, when compared with the S&P 500 (which is up +5.8%), Bitcoins year-to-date return currently sits at around 71.2%. Peter Goodrich, tax manager at U.S. accounting firm Prager Metis, told Cointelegraph:

When comparing the top market cap cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin, Ethereum, XRP to precious metals like gold and silver, there are increasingly positive correlations being witnessed between both markets that were accompanied by delayed market impulses.

Zetlin-Jones also pointed out that leading cryptocurrencies are appreciating relative to USD, gaining almost 0.3% per day on average over the past 90 days in comparison to May 2020, beating out the S&P 500 that has posted an average daily gain of 0.05%. However, Denis Vinokourov, head of research for digital asset exchange and brokerage firm Bequant, believes that since gold does not really compete directly with oil, Bitcoin too should not be related directly with traditional commodities: It has properties that others do not and that is its strength, putting Bitcoin against the rest of the market is like comparing apples to oranges.

While its still far too early to judge, Taylor believes that with each passing month, expectations of inflation will continue to increase, leading many investors to seek out inflation-resistant commodities like top-tier digital assets. I personally believe that were in the early stages of a bull run thats actually moving along quite steadily, he said. Also worth remembering is that the last major crypto bull run started in about mid-2015 and built up gradually to explode in the second half of 2017, suggesting that an overnight surge is unrealistic.

Lastly, despite increasing adoption, there are still a lot of challenges for the masses when it comes to owning cryptocurrencies. For example, opening a digital wallet or even a crypto trading account is still not as easy as many would like to think. Commenting on the subject, Mike Onghai, serial entrepreneur and seed investor for Coinbase and TZero, told Cointelegraph:

If you look at history, it took about 20 years for cell phone web browsing to become as easy as it is now today. It took web browsing several years to go from Netscape to where it is now. Ease of owning cryptocurrencies will take some time. [...] The digital assets age still feels early it feels like 1995 in the web browser era (after Netscapes crash).

A somewhat similar opinion is shared by Vinokourov who believes that most people tend to forget the relatively young age of Bitcoin as well the rest of the market. Not only that, while Bitcoin and other digital assets have shown their worth during times of geopolitical and economic uncertainties, these assets are still considered to be much riskier by most:

There has only really been one cycle of initial coin offerings that did attract substantial interest from traditional firms. The core market may not be as hot at the moment, but another area of the market that has attracted VC money recently is decentralised finance (DeFi). Its always helpful to remember that this is a marathon, not a sprint.

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Bitcoin and Economic Uncertainty: Patience Is the Name of the Game - Cointelegraph