Bitcoin, LiteCoin, Ethereum and Ripple Prices to Soar in Cryptocurrency Boom During 2018, Experts Predict (Metro.co.uk)
A group of 13 experts have suggested Bitcoin will be the best performing of all cryptocurrencies this year and could shoot up to a value of $14,928 by March 1 and hit $43,472 by the year’s end – more than four times the $9,200 it’s currently worth. To make this prediction, the price comparison website finder.com assembled a council of 13 crypto-experts, including financial technology entrepreneurs, Bitcoin investors and financial analysts. The group said Ethereum would experience huge growth, surging by almost 200% this year.
Western Union Says It’s Testing Transactions With Ripple (Bloomberg)
Western Union’s long-rumored relationship with Ripple is turning out to be real. After more than a month of speculation, the money transfer company said it’s evaluating blockchain technology and is testing transactions with Ripple, the San Francisco-based startup behind the cryptocurrency of the same name. “We are looking especially in the processing settlement and working capital optimization, also in the regulation part, on the compliance part on the blockchain capabilities,” Western Union Chief Executive Officer Hikmet Ersek said on a conference call after the company reported results Tuesday. “And we do test, we do have some tests with Ripple.”
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Litecoin Price Surges On News Of LTC-Fiat Payment Service And ‘Scam’ Hard Fork (CoinTelegraph.com)
Litecoin (LTC) outperformed all major cryptocurrency assets Wednesday, Feb. 14, jumping over 30 percent against the US dollar on combined LTC payment service and hard fork news. Having announced its intention to create a merchant solution for Litecoin similar to BitPay for Bitcoin in late 2017, a company called LitePay announced Monday, Feb. 12, that it would release the service on Feb. 26. “We started because the people asked (BitPay) to accept LTC. They wouldn’t, so we took the challenge,” the project explained in their tweet Monday.
Bitzumi Launches First Cryptocurrency and Blockchain Related Reg A+ Investment Opportunity (PRNewswire.com)
NEW YORK, Feb. 14, 2018 /PRNewswire/ — Bitzumi, Inc. (“Bitzumi” or the “Company”), a digital content and asset platform that plans to enable users to transact in the cryptocurrency and blockchain marketplace, today announced it will launch its Regulation A+ offering at 12 p.m. EST on www.bitzumicorp.com, allowing any investor the opportunity to own stock in the Company. With the goal of raising $10 million USD, Bitzumi is offering 4,000,000 shares at $2.50 USD per share. The Company has filed a listing application with the NASDAQ Stock Market to list its common stock. Bitzumi also announced that it has entered into a strategic joint venture transaction with Acacia Research Corporation (NASDAQ: ACTG), which included an initial $1 million equity investment in Bitzumi.
Bitcoin ETFs “Holy Grail” for Investors – JPMorgan Note (Cryptovest.com)
We have already witnessed the launch of futures contracts based on the price of Bitcoin, but there has been virtually no development where other crypto-related financial instruments are concerned. The argument for Bitcoin exchange-traded funds (ETFs) just got a serious boost as JPMorgan called such a release a “holy grail” for investors. In a note dispatched to clients, the bank argued that ETFs would make investments in Bitcoin more accessible. “Investors need wallets to trade the physical Bitcoins today, making it hard to access. ETFs are frequently traded and highly accessible via investors’ brokerage accounts,” the Wall Street behemoth wrote.
Love is in the air for Ethereum Classic (ArabianBusiness.com)
Amid plenty of sideways trading in the cryptocurrency space since the partial recovery from the late-January sell-off, Ethereum Classic (ETC) – the original currency on the Ethereum blockchain – has rebounded to its pre-crash prices. This morning, it reached $35.41 according to CoinGecko’s website, a value last seen on January 16, the day Bitcoin tumbled 20 percent. This is the first cryptocurrency to rebound to mid-January levels and represents a 152 percent increase in value from its February 6 lows of $14.
Chances For Ripple To Recover (EthereumWorldNews.com)
Ripple is gradually recovering after the selloff in January, although not very actively. The bulls are still wary, while the price has gone above $0.91, which is a signal for stabilization, as Dmitriy Gurkovskiy, Chief Analyst at RoboForex concerns. The buyers succeeded in pushing the coin towards $0.95, which was the downtrend resistance, and then went ahead to $0.9550, which lead Ripple to the current price and the test at $1.02. Speaking short term, the situation is mixed and looks like a whipsaw, with every next step of the buyers being less effective, and the momentum being exhausted.
Bitcoin Mining SHOCK: GPU Shortage is Hindering Search for ALIEN LIFE (Express.co.uk)
BITCOIN mining is taking a heavy toll on the teams of dedicated scientists scanning the universe for signs of intelligent life. Leading UFO hunters have now blasted the crypto craze as it has led to a severe shortage in available GPU cards. Scientists at the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence (SETI) are looking to expand their operations twofold, but are being held back by increased cryptocurrency mining. Ever since bitcoin and other tokens hit mainstream levels of awareness, crypto miners have severely driven up the demand for Graphics Processing Units (GPUs).
Cryptocurrency: eToro Adds Stellar as Investor Appetite for Crypto Grows (IBTimes.co.uk)
eToro, the trading platform that allows investors to view, follow and copy the network’s top traders automatically, has added Stellar, bringing the total number of cryptocurrency assets available on the site to eight. eToro, which boasts some nine million users, is bullish on crypto. Stellar, an open-source protocol for exchanging money, will now be available alongside Bitcoin, Ethereum, Bitcoin Cash, XRP, Litecoin, Ethereum Classic and Dash. In July of last year, eToro announced that users on its platform would own the actual asset, rather than a CFD, recognising the growing interest among users to buy and hold the asset, rather than speculate on price movements.
Report: Millions of Android Users Have Had Their Phone Hijacked for Cryptocurrency Mining (9to5google.com)
You would have had to live under a rock for the past several months in order to skip the non-stop talks about cryptocurrency this year. Massive spikes in Bitcoin value triggered a lot of people to check out cryptocurrency, and it also triggered new methods on monetizing websites… Recently, a trend has emerged with websites using the power of their users’ computers to mine cryptocurrency with their “unused computing power.” It’s a cool idea, but it can be a bit sketchy if the user isn’t aware. According to a recent post by MalwareBytes, quite a lot of Android users have been affected by a site that does this exact same thing. The “drive-by” campaign works by redirecting Android users to a website that hijacks their device for the purpose of mining the cryptocurrency Moreno, similar to an attack we saw on YouTube recently.
