ETH

NFT Digital Art That Changes With Bitcoin Price Volatility Sold for Record $101,000

19/09/2020 by Idelto Editor

Matt Kane’s “Right Place & Right Time,” a non-fungible token (NFT) digital artwork that changes every day with the bitcoin price volatility, claims the artist, has been sold for a record 262 ether or $101,100 on blockchain platform Async Art.

According to a description of the artwork on Async Art’s website, a new composition for the master is generated independently each day based on BTC’s volatility and price action from the previous 24 hours.

The work is composed of what the platform calls “layers”. Kane’s piece has 24 of these. Each hour’s price programmatically controls rotation, scale, and position of a correlating layer, it says. Viewers can surmise the day’s price volatility by examining the artwork. However, it appears that the artist himself might have some influence on the variations.

“It’s humbling. I’m most excited I’ve helped open price levels for other digital artists to have their work taken seriously and begin making a living from art sales,” said Chicago-born Kane, in a statement shared with news.Bitcoin.com.

“Until we could prove provenance and scarcity on the blockchain, how we sold digital art was prehistoric by comparison,” added the artist, who wrote the code, which generates the daily image changes.

Token Angels, a crypto-focussed angel investor, and art collector, bought Kane’s piece. Variations of the artwork will be minted over the next 10 years and the artist will periodically put an NFT digital art on market to represent an important day in the life of Bitcoin. This NFT will also grant its token holder the right to purchase a physical print.

“As a nod to Bitcoin’s 21 million fixed supply, the collector receives 21% revenue share of the individual NFT and print sales and there will only be 210 NFTs minted,” said Matt Kane. The artistic experiment will run as a creative counterpart to Bitcoin, using visualized volatility to aid the artist in mining 210 NFTs, he explained, adding:

I’ll be investigating what a decentralized artwork can evolve into, as proof-of-work necessitates increasing challenges over time. But just like Bitcoin, the passage of time will be required in order to observe the grander masterpiece that is at work.

Async Art says more than $2.3 million has changed hands on the platform since launch in February 2020. Artist sales have totaled over $400,000, it says.

Built on the Ethereum blockchain, the platform specializes in something called programmable art – “digital paintings split into ‘layers’, which you use to affect the overall image.”

More than $109 million worth of NFTs has been sold throughout the world since such sales started a few years ago, according to data from nonfungible.com. That’s from 4.82 million pieces sold at an average price of $22.65.

What do you think about Matt Kane’s bitcoin-based NFT? Let us know in the comments section below.

The post NFT Digital Art That Changes With Bitcoin Price Volatility Sold for Record $101,000 appeared first on Bitcoin News.

Ethereum’s Gas Spike Forces Coinbase Pro to Pass Network Fees to Customers

19/09/2020 by Idelto Editor

While Ethereum network fees have jumped to new highs this year, the popular cryptocurrency exchange, Coinbase Pro, announced that the trading platform would be passing network fees onto customers. The move followed the exchange listing Uniswap’s native token UNI, an airdrop that saw miners collect close to $1 million in gas in less than an hour.

The decentralized finance (defi) ecosystem has seen significant demand in 2020, but it has also contributed to the Ethereum (ETH) network’s rising fees. Ethereum miners are collecting a massive amount of revenue from gas payments, as miners are capturing between $700k to $850k per hour or 700 gwei per transaction.

ETH fees have touched an all-time high in 2020 and defi lending applications, yield farming, and decentralized exchange swaps (dex) have bolstered high fees.

The centralized exchange (cex), Coinbase Pro announced on Thursday that network fees will now be passed down directly to their customers.

“Starting today, Coinbase Pro will pass along network fees directly to our customers,” the exchange tweeted. “These fees (sometimes referred to as “gas fees” on the ETH blockchain) are paid directly to crypto miners that process transactions and secure the respective network,” the San Francisco-based exchange further added.

Meanwhile, on social media, a number of people got upset about the announcement, while others said that alternative blockchain networks were more beneficial. “Once again, this showcases the use case for low fee transaction blockchains like Bitcoin Cash (BCH),” the BCH proponent David Shares tweeted to Coinbase Pro in response to the fee announcement.

A few other individuals expected the move and said that any profitable company would do the same.

“A lot of people seem upset at this but it just makes sense to me,” one individual wrote. Transactions are actually getting expensive now and they’re running a business so that’s why they have to up their prices.”

Coinbase Pro detailed that in the past, the San Francisco firm absorbed the network fees for the customer. “Historically, Coinbase Pro has absorbed these fees on behalf of our customers. However, as crypto has begun to gain broader adoption in applications like defi, payments, and other projects, networks have gotten busier,” the company’s followup tweet said.

Additionally, Coinbase detailed that the company does not charge people for transferring funds between two different Coinbase accounts. “To ensure a smooth experience for our customers and reasonable transaction processing times, Coinbase Pro will charge a fee based on our estimate of the network transaction fees that we anticipate paying for each transaction,” the company concluded.

What do you think about Coinbase Pro passing on network fees to customers? Let us know what you think about this subject in the comments section below.

The post Ethereum’s Gas Spike Forces Coinbase Pro to Pass Network Fees to Customers appeared first on Bitcoin News.

East Asia Dominates World’s Onchain Crypto Activity, Europe and North America Trail Behind

19/09/2020 by Idelto Editor

Crypto activity continues to flourish worldwide, according to a new cryptocurrency adoption index published by the blockchain intelligence firm Chainalysis. The researchers compile onchain digital currency retail value transferred, onchain crypto deposits, peer-to-peer exchange volume, and other types of methodology.

Chainalysis recently published a new report called the “2020 Geography of Crypto,” a study that examines 154 countries and the flourishing cryptocurrency adoption in these areas. The company created a crypto adoption index from the large list of nation-states and only 12 countries had very little traction compared to the rest.

Nation-states that ranked the lowest in the adoption index include Afghanistan, Algeria, Cape Verde, Chad, Fiji, Laos, Libya, and Mongolia.

The top ten countries are ranked by four individual metrics that are combined to create the official ranking. The top country, as far as onchain value received, onchain retail value received, number of onchain deposits, and peer-to-peer trade volume is the Ukraine.

This country is followed by Russia, Venezuela, China, Kenya, U.S., South Africa, Nigeria, Colombia, and Vietnam respectively. “Cryptocurrency is truly global,” the Chainalysis report notes. “Developing countries have high grassroots cryptocurrency activity,” the study adds.

Chainalysis continues by adding:

Venezuela is an excellent example of what drives cryptocurrency adoption in developing countries and how citizens use [crypto] to mitigate economic instability— Venezuelans use cryptocurrency more when the country’s native fiat currency loses value to inflation.

The study emphasizes that the wealth preservation tactic is leveraged in Africa and East Asia as well. Moreover, peer-to-peer cryptocurrency exchanges are essential to digital currency adoption in developing nations, Chainalysis highlights.

In the section that covers Africa, the blockchain intelligence firm says both remittances and currency devaluation is what’s driving crypto adoption throughout the large continent. The study notes that major cryptocurrency trading platforms now look at Africa as an “opportunity.”

Chainalysis details that in Africa regions like Kenya, Nigeria, and South Africa have been seeing more adoption than other areas throughout the continent. Central & Southern Asia and Oceania (CSAO) is also covered in the Chainalysis study and researchers say growth is “already strong.”

The CSAO area is seeing a number of cryptocurrency regulations adopted within a variety of countries. CSAO is the fifth-most active region worldwide when it comes to cryptocurrency activity and it’s seen over $41 billion sent and $40 billion received during the last 12 months.

East Asia is the world’s largest crypto market, in terms of crypto activity, capturing 31% of all the digital currency transactions in the last year. Crypto addresses stemming from East Asia accounted for $107 billion received.

East Asia’s cumulated data is 77% larger than the crypto activity in Northern and Western Europe. East Asia is dominated by “pro traders” and “stablecoins,” the Chainalysis report highlights. Stablecoin usage in East Asia is “off the charts” in comparison to other regions worldwide.

Eastern Europe has the fourth-largest crypto activity rating globally, and it also contains the top two countries represented in the Chainalysis’ crypto adoption index: Ukraine and Russia. “Eastern Europe shows a strong grassroots-level of cryptocurrency adoption,” Chainalysis notes.

One reason Russia and Ukraine take the cake, as far as cryptocurrency activity is concerned, is because adoption has come “amidst regulatory uncertainty.” For instance, Chainalysis says that Ukraine has zero crypto regulations, but the government just started monitoring crypto activity.

Latin America is smaller in terms of onchain activity, and cryptocurrency adoption is low in contrast to the aforementioned regions. Latin America saw $25 billion in crypto assets sent and $24 billion received in the one-year timeframe.

In any 30-day span, Latin America represents 5% to 9% of the crypto activity aggregate on any given month, Chainalysis emphasizes. Even though Chainalysis says the region is one of the “hottest markets,” it also holds the second-lowest growth rate from the regions the researchers studied.

The crypto forensics firm says the Middle East is a smaller digital currency ecosystem, and the region is the second-smallest worldwide. According to the “2020 Geography of Crypto” study, Turkey captures the most crypto activity in the Middle East. Out of the 154 countries Chainalysis studied, Turkey ranks 29th in the crypto adoption index.

Chainalysis mentions that Turkey is a strong crypto adopter due to the Turkish lira falling in value. The fiat currency crisis was sparked by President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s authoritarianism and Turkey’s mountains of private foreign-currency-denominated debt.

Toward the end of the report, Chainalysis touches on North America (the United States & Canada), which captures “conservative buy-and-hold” investors, and institutional investors as well. North America accounted for $52 billion sent and the same value received during the course of the 12-month span.

“North America is the third most active region by cryptocurrency volume moved onchain, just behind Nothern & Western Europe (NWE) and well behind East Asia,” Chainalysis says. Addresses stemming from North America accounted for 14% of all the crypto activity studied during the company’s research.

Chainalysis further notes:

North America also hosts a growing class of institutional investors conducting even larger transfers of cryptocurrency.

Additionally, Chainalysis highlights that a number of the global regions have formed crypto alliances. “North America and Nothern & Western Europe (NWE) form a quasi-common market, plus heavy trade with East Asia,” the “2020 Geography of Crypto” findings detail.

NWE has a “strong professional market” but also a “surprising” amount of illicit activity. As far as crypto activity is concerned, NWE is the second-largest territory behind East Asia. The NWE region accounts for 17% of all the crypto transactions worldwide.

NWE exhibits similar characteristics to North America in terms of institutional and professional traders. However, NWE’s crypto activity is also “largely driven by ransomware and darknet markets.”

The 130-page study shows that crypto adoption and activity has grown exponentially in certain regions. A number of other countries and the regional bureaucrats are just becoming aware of cryptocurrency technology, and are falling behind the eight-ball in comparison.

Today in 2020, East Asia is the crowned king of crypto activity worldwide with NWE following behind the region. The report concludes with an interactive crypto index table that shows all 154 countries’ Chainalysis studied during the year.

What do you think about East Asia’s crypto dominance and the “2020 Geography of Crypto” study? Let us know what you think in the comments section below.

The post East Asia Dominates World’s Onchain Crypto Activity, Europe and North America Trail Behind appeared first on Bitcoin News.

Defi Economy Rebounds: Total-Value Locked Jumps 28% Capturing Close to $9B

18/09/2020 by Idelto Editor

,The total-value locked (TVL) in decentralized finance (defi) economy has recaptured much of the value lost during the Sushiswap fiasco last week. At the time, the defi TVL tumbled down to $6.8 billion from the $9.6 billion high on September 8, suffering a loss of close to -29%. Since then, however, the rise northbound has been parabolic, as the defi TVL has climbed 28% so far, with locked value rising to $8.75 billion on Thursday morning (ET).

Last week, the anonymous creator of Sushiswap caused an uproar within the decentralized finance (defi) community after cashing out some tokens meant for the project’s future development.

At that time, the total-value-locked (TVL) in defi was inching toward the $10 billion realm, when it crossed $9.6 billion on September 8. Although, the TVL shed a decent amount of value after the Sushiswap incident and the price of ethereum (ETH) tumbled by 30%.

Today, according to defipulse statistics the current TVL on Thursday, September 17 is $8.75 billion with the defi lending platform Aave capturing 15.3% of the TVL dominance. This is followed by the defi platforms Maker, Curve Finance, Uniswap, and Sushiswap.

On Thursday morning (ET), the crypto community has been discussing Uniswap’s UNI token, which saw 60% of UNI’s genesis supply allocated to Uniswap community members. Since the launch, Coinbase Pro announced UNI support on the exchange and the crypto platform Binance also listed the token a few hours after the release.

The Uniswap team says 21.51% will be reserved for future employees and developers with a four-year vesting period. 17.80% of the UNI supply will be distributed to investors with a four-year vesting timeframe as well.

The UNI launch announcement notes that the token will be leveraged for a governance treasury and governance will have access to the allocation on October 18. Uniswap’s governance token airdrop contributed to ethereum (ETH) miners capturing a lot of money in transaction fees.

“Following Uniswap Protocol’s announcement of the UNI token today, Ethereum saw a massive surge in miner fees,” the data analytics firm Glassnode tweeted. “Almost $1M USD in fees were spent in a single hour. This is a new record high (anomalous tx fees earlier this year excluded).”

Last Saturday, the Yearn Finance (YFI) token touched an all-time high reaching $43,678 after Coinbase Pro announced listing the defi crypto asset.

The token has been very popular among the yield farming community and notoriety for YFI’s price per token surpassing bitcoin (BTC) in value. Although YFI has lost -27.34% since the Coinbase listing announcement and the token is currently swapping for $31,736 per coin.

Since news.Bitcoin.com’s recent study on the defi economy on August 29, the total defi users over time jumped 17.78% from 388,011 users to 457,012 users on September 13. Defi-based decentralized exchange (dex) action has seen $5.2 billion in global swaps during the last seven days.

Dune Analytics data shows dex volumes during the last 24 hours was around $645 million. Uniswap is still the top dex in terms of volume exchanged capturing over 60% of the week’s trade volume.

With this week’s defi TVL rebound closing in on the highs it saw last week, it goes to show that the defi economy isnt letting up any time soon.

Meanwhile, ethereum (ETH) has regained much of the coin’s losses at the crypto asset trades for $383 per ether at the time of publication. Since last week’s report concerning 68 new whales joining the ETH network, the large concentration of ETH holders added another 1% to the aggregate tally.

What do you think about the defi ecosystem regaining momentum this week? Let us know what you think about this subject in the comments section below.

The post Defi Economy Rebounds: Total-Value Locked Jumps 28% Capturing Close to $9B appeared first on Bitcoin News.

Over 15% of ETH Supply Locked in Smart Contracts, BTC Dominance Declining

17/09/2020 by Idelto Editor

The rapid growth of decentralized finance (defi) protocols is contributing to the increasing proportion of ETH supply that is now locked in smart contracts. More than 15% of the total ETH supply is now locked, compared to 11.5% from a year ago. This growth led to the inevitable decline of BTC dominance.

According to a report, over 5% of ETH is locked up in the WETH (wrapped ether) smart contracts, enabling it to interact with other tokens more easily. Most of this WETH has then been locked up in defi contracts, including Maker, Uniswap, and Balancer.

The report also notes that aside from “defi use cases via WETH, the largest ETH balances in smart contracts are for exchange multisigs.”

While exchange multisigs simply “represent custodial passive holding, the other contracts (WETH, Compound, etc.) are all examples of how ETH is moving beyond the simple ‘store of value’ use case.”

Meanwhile, despite seeing its dominance diminish, BTC still showed “bullish fundamentals, both in terms of on-chain activity and price trends.”

Also, taking note of the interesting similarities between what happened during the 2017 ICO boom and the current defi craze, the report states:

A similar trend played out in the bull run of early 2017, when money flowed into high-yield ICOs at a much faster rate than BTC. However, later in 2017, BTC started to regain dominance as ICO investors took profits and de-risked into a more reputable asset.

While it might seem logical to conclude that investors will move profits from high-yield defi tokens into BTC, the report presents a different possibility:

“Many investors now talk of ‘stacking wei’ as opposed to ‘stacking sats,’ signifying a potential shift in BTC’s status as the default store of value within crypto markets.”

This suggests that BTC’s waning market dominance might be permanent this time around, as far as retail crypto investors are concerned. However, given the growing interest in BTC by institutional investors, the digital currency stands a “better chance of attracting investment from traditional hedge funds than the defi community.”

What do you think of BTC’s declining dominance? Tell us what you think in the comments section below.

The post Over 15% of ETH Supply Locked in Smart Contracts, BTC Dominance Declining appeared first on Bitcoin News.