The price of a single bitcoin on Tuesday touched its highest level in more than a month as populists in the U.S. and Europe threaten the established political order, increasing the appeal of alternative investments like cryptocurrencies, market strategists said.

The price touched $1,060 US:BTCUSD on Tuesday, according to Coin Market Cap. Thats its highest level since Jan. 4, when bitcoin traded as high as $1,100, its highest level in more than three years.

A poll released over the weekend showed Marine Le Pen, the far-right candidate representing Frances National Front party in the April presidential election is poised to win the first round of balloting. The news sparked a selloff across European bond markets, and rattled stocks.

Read: Treasurys boosted; Europe election jitters set tone

Bitcoins valuable more than doubled in 2016, largely thanks to Chinese buyers who hoped to protect their wealth from a rapidly depreciating Chinese yuan USDCNY, +0.0901% by using bitcoin to circumvent stringent capital controls.

The U.K.s June vote to leave the European Union, U.S. President Donald Trumps unexpected electoral victory and the rising popularity of far-right candidates in France, Germany, Italy and the Netherlands have made the political situation in the West appear increasingly precarious, market strategists said.

The dollar gained 0.3% to trade at 6.88 yuan on Tuesday.

Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss run a bitcoin exchange on which investors trade on average $1 million in bitcoin per day. But is this cryptocurrency safe or a fad?

Previously, the currencys valuation languished in 2015 and 2014 after the collapse of popular bitcoin exchange Mt. Gox effectively ended a speculative bubble that saw the price of a single coin climb to an all-time high around $1,2050 in late 2013.

Bitcoin weakened sharply in January after Chinese authorities announced they would investigate the countrys largest cryptocurrency exchanges to ensure compliance with local laws. Initially, investors feared this could signal a shift to a more aggressive approach by Chinese regulators who had previously left the cryptocurrency world more or less along.

Read: And 2016s best-performing commodity isbitcoin?

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Instead, Chinese authorities appear to have reached an understanding with local exchanges. Several exchanges adopted a 0.2% trading fee to cut down on market manipulation while strengthening controls to prevent money laundering, all in accordance with regulators wishes.

Others are betting that the U.S.s first bitcoin-focused exchange-traded fund now faces an easier path to approval thanks in part to the unexpected electoral victory of President Donald Trump, who has promised to scale back financial regulations. The Securities and Exchange Commission is expected to make a decision by March 11.

Continued here:
Bitcoin price soars past $1060 as political worries intensify - MarketWatch

On January 1, 2017, the Central Bank of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) published a new framework covering digital payments in the country. According to the new Regulatory Framework For Stored Values and Electronic Payment Systems, which is applicable to all electronic payment services providers, all Virtual Currencies (and any transactions thereof) are prohibited.

In the new framework, the definition for virtual currencies that the central bank has identified is any type of digital unit used as a medium of exchange, a unit of account, or a form of stored value. This would suggest that bitcoin and other digital currencies have been officially banned by the UAE central bank as of January 1.

However, on February 1, Mubarak Rashed Khamis Al Mansouri, governor of the UAE central bank, informed Gulf News in a statement saying that these regulations do not cover virtual currency, which is defined as any type of digital unit used as a medium of exchange, a unit of account, or a form of stored value. In this context, these regulations do not apply to bitcoin or other digital currencies, currency exchanges, or underlying technology such as blockchain.

He added that digital currencies are currently under review by the Central Bank and new regulations will be issued as appropriate.

In the statement, Governor Al Mansouri further highlighted that fintech development will play an integral role in the future of the UAEs financial industry, which is the reason why the new framework was introduced at the beginning of the year.

While the new framework for e-payments and the confusion surrounding bitcoin regulations may sound worrying to some, the reality is that the UAE aims to become a leading center for blockchain innovation by 2020 and intends to become the first government to execute all of its transactions using the distributed ledger technology.

To achieve this goal, Dubais Crown Prince, Sheikh Hamdan bin Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, launched the Dubai blockchain strategy to improve inefficiencies in governmental departments by eliminating paper transactions and by reducing the work hours involved in handling paper transactions. Furthermore, the blockchain strategy also aims to facilitate company incorporations for Emiratis, expats and foreign investors by creating a blockchain-based incorporation system.

As the UAE aims to become a leader in blockchain technology, it would be extremely surprising if its regulators would then stunt innovation in this area by restricting or prohibiting the use of digital currencies. Hence, any future bitcoin regulations in the UAE will most likely favor blockchain startups and the bitcoin economy.

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Bitcoin Exempt from UAE Central Bank's Ban on Virtual Currencies ... - Bitcoin Magazine

Momentum for Bitcoin Unlimited continues to increase as a new pool is to enter the network. Chandler Guo, a well-known and liked bitcoiner in China, is to take his current hashrate of around 50P, or 1.5% of the network, out of BW.com and into a new Xpool which will mine with Bitcoin Unlimited.

Guo has further revealed a plan to raise 12 million ETC in an ICO to increase the pools hashrate to around 100 to 120 petahash, which would translate to around 3.5-4 percent of the network. In combination, this would send Bitcoin Unlimited to nearly 30%, a significant psychological threshold which may increase even further BUs momentum.

ETCs price jumped on the news, reaching new highs it has not seen since it was added to Poloniex during summer 2016. It would be its first ICO with 21 million XBTC tokens to be issued tomorrow. As dividend, some of the pools profits will go towards buying back and destroying the tokens, according to a google translation. An English page detailing the plan will soon be released, Guo told CCN.

ETCs Price Jumps as an ICO is to Launch for a Bitcoin Unlimited Pool image from poloniex

After a two-years debate on scalability, the decision has now come down to the hashrates with Bitcoin Unlimited apparently the only proposal standing as segwit has fully stalled.

The new grassroots client, created by ordinary bitcoiners for bitcoiners, has attracted a number of developers including Peter Tschipper, Andrea Suisani, Andrew Stone, Tom Harding, Dagur Johannsson, Amaury Schet, Tom Zander, Jerry Chan, ftrader as well as many others.

It continues the transaction capacity increase method bitcoin used for much of its existence. Without any centralized direction, miners increased the block limit from 250kb to 500kb in March 2013 to the apparent opposition of Peter Todd and Luke-Jr. That was followed by a smooth increase to 750kb and then finally to 1MB in line with demand. With Bitcoin Unlimited, miners can increase transaction capacity in roughly the same manner to 2MB or 4MB as demand requires as well as technology progresses.

It appeared during summer last year a maxblocksize increase was unlikely as miners were almost checkmated, with just one move to make. That move was made by Jiang Zhuoer, a former employee at China Mobile and founder of a new mining pool BTC.TOP. Responding to threats of an intentional chain split if maxblocksize is increased, he told CCN three days ago that $100 million has been set aside to ensure there is no chain split after the upgrade of transaction capacity.

That statement was considered a checkmate by some. Price jumped $30, Bitcoin Unlimited surpassed segwit in hashrate share, and now a new pool is to join.

Some are wondering whether bitcoin can really break free and increase its very limited transaction capacity, ending the backlogs that have led to a huge number of user complaints and increased frustration.

We do not yet know. What we do know is that supporters of bitcoin unlimited appear to be highly passionate about the new client. They believe they are standing by Nakamoto.

They have been censored, banned, DDoS-ed, smeared, doxed. Kicked out of public discussion spaces, mailing lists, IRC even had commits removed but as some were silenced or metaphorically exiled, new advocates for Nakamotos vision kept rising.

Nakamoto was told that bitcoin cannot scale a number of time and that we need bitbanks now known as a settlement layer. He rejected the proposition each time, insisting it can reach VISA levels.

The repetition of the bitbanks argument by Daniel Larimer shortly before Nakamoto left even led him to lose his cool in a rare instance of public emotional display. If you dont believe me or dont get it, I dont have time to try to convince you, sorry. Nakamoto finally concluded.

If Bitcoin Unlimited continues to increase in momentum and gains more than 50% of the hashrate, some may see it as conclusive proof that his assumption, which relies on the honesty of 51%, is sound and can indeed protect this $16 billion market without any centralized control.

Whether it can actually do so remains to be seen, but the mood in many corners is slowly shifting from dreading a continuation of censorship and tight control, to that of celebration as it appears the wall that keeps transactions limited may indeed come down.

Image from Shutterstock.

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Chandler Guo to Open a New Bitcoin Unlimited Pool - CryptoCoinsNews

Here's a look at what we are focusing on in the bitcoin price this evening.

So that is another day out of the way, and it has been a pretty interesting one as far as volatility is concerned in the bitcoin price. When we kicked off the session this morning, we noted that action over the weekend had been relatively flat, And that we were hoping for a spike early in the session in order to get things moving again. As it turned out, we did get the volume spike, but it pushed price down, and we ended up tradinglower than we were when we first started the session. This isnt a bad thing for our intraday strategy we get in both long and short depending on where action takes us but from a long-term holding perspective, it is not great.

Anyway, thats the way things have fallen, so lets move into this evenings session and try and outline some key levels to keep an eye on moving forward. As ever, take a quick look at the chart below to get an idea of the levels in focus.

As the chart shows, the range we are looking at this eveningis defined by support to the downside 1055, and resistance to the upside at 1065. With around a $10 range, there is just enough to go out from an intrarange perspective, so long at support andshort at resistance. Stops just outsideof the entry to define risk. From a breakout perspective, if we see price break through resistance, we will enter long towards an immediate upside target of 1075. A stop loss on the trade at 1061 defines risk. Conversely, if price breaks below support, we will enter towards 1045. On this one, a stop at 1058 will work to take us out of the trade in the event of a price reversal, and ensure that we are not stuck on thelosing end of an irretrievable position.

Charts courtesy of SimpleFX.

The rest is here:
Bitcoin Price Watch; Here's What's On Tonight - NEWSBTC - newsBTC

Steve Jobs once said that the ones who are crazy enough to think they can change the world are the ones who do.

Thats the motto an anonymous person took to heart as he shook up the financial world by creating an unregulated tech-based currency in early 2009. That very currency was developed using another revolutionary technology which is now in the news for its uses beyond trading unregulated online money, and has become a hot topic amongst financial and business executives recently.

Last year, Facebook's VP of Design thought the TNW Conference main stage was the best she'd ever been on.

Lets discuss what both technologies offer their users, and what the future holds for each.

Bitcoin is a cryptocurrency, created and held electronically on your PC or in a virtual wallet. No one controls it or sees it its decentralized so no person, institution or bank controls the currency.

It was the year 2009 when bitcoin burst onto the financial scene, and soon computers all over the world started running sophisticated programs that would mine blocks of bitcoins by solving extremely complex mathematical equations. Mining bitcoin means to discover or verify new bitcoins because unlike traditional currency, bitcoin cannot be printed. Miners make money every time they discover new bitcoins or verify a bitcoin transaction.

There can only be a fixed 21 million bitcoins [to prevent inflation], out of which 15.5 million are currently in circulation, which leaves 5.5 million bitcoins to be discovered. These valued blocks of online information skyrocketed in price as time went on and investor appeal in the new technology grew. Today, January 19th, bitcoin is showing an upwards trend and is trading at US $890.90, below the US $1000 threshold it broke in November 2013.

Figure 1 Bitcoin price between July 2010 and Jan 2017. Source: Coindesk

Trading could be done online anonymously, quickly, without hassle from regulatory and exchange bodies. The ease of use and lack of a trail led to flexibility unheard of in the financial world. But for all its benefits, the currency was overshadowed because of its anonymous, unregulated nature as it became easy for people to use the currency for illicit transactions that would stay off the books, as well as for schemes that swindled people.

Coinbase has been one of the biggest proponents and enablers of bitcoin use. In an era where most traditional financial institutions avoid bitcoin discussions, the company sticks vehemently to its stand on bitcoin, likening the resistance of business executives to bitcoin to how companies once preferred private intranets over the open internet. We all know who won that battle!

While bitcoin had the power to make transactions untraceable, it was another innovation that promised to make every transaction transparent and permanent. Underlying the use of bitcoin is blockchain, which is almost entirely opposite its more famous alter-ego. Blockchain possesses the ability of having permanent records of the transactions the blocks (the name for their portions of value) are used for, and at any time people can see those changes online in real time. It is this transparency that people have hopes in, but thats not the only thing blockchain does differently than the cryptocurrency it drove for so long.

Blockchain can easily transfer everything from property rights to stocks and currencies without having to go through a middle man and clearing institution like SWIFT, while offering the same safety, higher speed and lower costs. Consider it from the financial perspective: billions of dollars are transferred daily in the financial markets, with every transaction being cleared by a middle man. Replacing the middle man with a revolutionary technology that is faster, cheaper and as secure will help save millions for businesses.

To put into perspective just how big the market is now and how big it will become, the World Economic Forum shared some metrics on Bitcoin and Blockchain. It estimates that currently $20 billion dollars worth of Bitcoin exists now on record. The bigger prediction, though, was that by 2027 about 10 percent of the entire global GDP would be stored on blockchains, meaning anyone who wanted to become part of that process still has time to get a piece of the pie.

Because of its cleaner reputation than bitcoin, blockchain has garnered the support of different financial institutions behind its design. Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan, and Bank of America have expressed great interest in blockchain by joining a coalition to implement it into banking practices. In addition to those large financial players, Visa, NASDAQ, Citi, and others have also agreed to be clients for blockchain related services and technology. These large, long established institutions feel that blockchain has less of a negative image attached to it than bitcoin, and because of that they seem more open to trying out the technology.

The rush towards blockchain is simple: banks can increase the efficiency of their transactions by using their own permissioned blockchains to record all transactions done by their customers, as opposed to trying to record all that data with different types of software that become outdated every few years.

However, some experts like Don Tapscott [University of Toronto] think that banks should be using blockchain technology not just to increase their banking capabilities, but to completely change how banking computing looks like for the entire industry.

Indeed, outside of traditional banking, blockchain services have allowed users to engage in high value currency transactions already. The processing times on these transactions are very quick, and allow for a high volume of money to be exchanged and recorded.

Major bitcoin players include names such as Bitreserve and Circle.

Bitreserve serves as an online portal to convert currency from one form to another. In the beginning, users had to deposit their currency in bitcoin form, and could then convert their bitcoin into 25 other world currencies or fourdifferent types of valuable metals. Circle at first only allowed use of its transfer services amazingly quick money transfers to anyone, anywhere to be done in bitcoin money, including the process of depositing, holding, and sending of currency.

Many of the companies who started off using bitcoin as their main currency are changing to focus on blockchain as a whole. Bitreserve changed its name to Uphold and has since allowed depositing of currency in any form, and Circle has changed to allow use of credit and debit cards to be used for deposit, holding, and sending of money worldwide.

Many startups that were created with a focus on bitcoin are changing to accommodate alternative currencies and to let others know that they are not nearly as bitcoin dependent as before for what seems to be a similar reason to the one banks use: that bitcoin has a negative connotation to it, and since blockchain is the hot commodity now, it seems like a smarter idea to tie the business to that. They hope that, as more businesses and users adopt the blockchain technology, their use of it will also allow them to gain in popularity and use.

For players in the financial sector, the best thing to do right now would be to seriously consider the advantages of blockchain. While bitcoin is the most top of mind for the general public, blockchain is attracting the biggest forces in the finance sector with its clean reputation. More than that, blockchain offers the opportunity to revitalize modern value transactions as we know it, and those who get their stakes in before that happens will have the best chance to shape what happens after. Its business management 101: first-mover advantage!

Is it crazy to change course of your company to try something so new, something so different from what you have has been accustomed to. Maybe so. But as Steve Jobs very rightly noted when thinking about changing the world, financial or otherwise its usually the crazy ones who do.

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Shh. Here's some distraction

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How Blockchain is overshadowing Bitcoin