The State of The Market — March 8, 2019BTC: $3,936.60 (+0.45%)ETH: $137.92 (-0.47%)XRP: $0.313290 (-1.03%)
The crypto market remains flat, with just $300 Million added to the total market cap in the last 24 hours. It is a mixed market today, with most of the cryptocurrencies changing my less than 1%. Bitcoin (BTC) and Stellar (XLM) are the only cryptocurrencies in the top 10 that are in green right now. The biggest gainer is Enjin Coin (ENJ), which is up by nearly 60% after Samsung confirmed a partnership for its latest Galaxy S10.
In other news, Coinbase acquired blockchain intelligence startup Neutrino for $13.5 Million. Its CEO Giancarlo Russo, CTO Alberto Ornaghi, and CRO Marco Valleri will receive $2.9 Million each. Also, 360 Capital, a European Venture Capital firm that invested $565,000 in 2017 will receive $4.99 Million. Also, cryptocurrency exchange KuCoin has announced that it will support the mainnet token swap of IOST. On the 25th of February, IOST successfully launched its Mainnet Olympus v1.0. Since then, most major exchanges have announced support for the token swap. The latest among them is KuCoin. The exchange will help users with the conversion of the tokens to mainnet.
1) Ripple has donated $1 million to its new partner Tipping Point, and the funds will be used to help fight against poverty in the U.S. state of California’s San Francisco Bay Area. Both Tipping Point and Ripple are San Francisco-based companies and Tipping Point is spearheading a campaign to help assist Bay Area residents who are too poor to meet their basic needs. Ripple also said that it’s “employees are eager to support Tipping Point” and the company currently “matches employees’ donations to any non-profit on a dollar-for-dollar basis [but] Ripple will match employee donations to Tipping Point two-to-one.” In 2018 Ripple also launched its “Ripple for Good” initiative and to date the company has allocated nearly $100 million to the campaign. (Read More)
2) A press release from the exchange and social network for investors and traders (eToro) announced the launch of trading and brokerage services in the U.S. eToro services will be available to the residents of 31 US states and clients will have access to the more than 1,500 assets offered by the exchange. eToro will directly complete with Coinbase cryptocurrency exchange and Robinhood trading app which offers fast, fee-free trades. The company also announced that it will launch its eToro multi-signature wallet which supports Bitcoin, Litecoin, XRP, Stellar, and Ripple and users will be able to send and receive digital assets. eToro’s platform also features a “Copy Portfolios” function which allows users to allocate funds to trade in a way that proportionally mirrors the portfolio of another user. (Read More)
3) QuadrigaCX co-founder Michael Patryn is reported to be linked to Reddit user MikeXBT, a charismatic trader known for posting comments about his multi-million dollar long and short positions on BitMEX. Comments made by MikeXBT last month suggest that he could have been a shareholder in QuadrigaCX and last month MikeXBT also responded to a post referring to him as “Mr. Patryn”. Nearly five years ago MikeXBT was also directly linked to Michael Patryn, a candidate applying for a spot on the Bitcoin Alliance Board. Around the same time Bull Bitcoin founder, Francois Pouliot, posted information about Patryn on a public forum and referred to him by the “MIKE XBT” handle. A recent report published by Globe and Mail adds additional intrigue to the QuadrigaCX debacle. The media outlet reported that Patryn’s real name is Omar Dhanani and the article mentions that Dhanani was a “convicted felon who served time in the United States for his role in an online identity-theft ring.” Patryn denies any involvement in QuadrigaCX’s current problems and he claims to have parted ways with QuadrigaCX founder Gerald Cotten after having an argument about taking the exchange public. (Read More)
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