Category Archives: Bitcoin

A new report from the Bank of Canada has unearthed some intriguing facts about the state of Bitcoin ownership across the country.

The report found that about 13% of Canadians owned Bitcoin in 2021 but that investors of average financial literacy are the least likely of all to buy in.

As the central banks survey showed, Bitcoin ownership figures in 2021 were more than double the 5% ownership present from 2018 to 2020. The increase was largely driven by the wider availability of products for purchasing Bitcoin, alongside widespread increases in Canadian savings during the pandemic.

Meanwhile, about 90% of Canadians are now aware of Bitcoins existence. This broad awareness mimics Grayscales survey results last year, which found that 99% of U.S. investors know of Bitcoin.

Knowledge of Bitcoin beyond the term itself was less common, however. 40% of survey respondents who owned Bitcoin (and 66% who did not) demonstrated a relatively low level of knowledge when verifying core statements such as Bitcoin is backed by a government (which is false). This figure was higher than in previous years, in which the share was typically under 30%.

The timing of when investors bought Bitcoin also had some bearing on their motivation for doing so. Post-2019 buyers were more likely to take an interest in Bitcoin as new technology, whereas long-term holders were more attracted to it due to a lack of government trust or as a payment method.

That said, both parties were overwhelmingly likely to see Bitcoin as an investment vehicle. Naturally, long-term holders benefitted more strongly from the Bitcoin price run-up in 2021 than recent holders.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, most Bitcoin holders were not whales. The median Bitcoin holder held $500 CDN worth of the asset, while 70% held under $5,000 CDN worth.

Financial literacy proved a strong predictor of whether someone bought Bitcoin but not as one might expect.

In 2021, Canadians with low financial literacy had a 15.6% chance of owning Bitcoin, according to the full report. However, a similar figure was found among highly literate investors, standing at 14.7%. The discrepancy was funda mong average literacy investors, of which only 8.8% owned Bitcoin.

In previous years, low-literacy investors were the most common holders. The figures for low, medium, and high literacy levels in 2020 were 8.4%, 5.3%, and 5.3%, respectively.

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Only the Smartest (and Most Foolish) Investors Own Bitcoin: Bank of Canada - CryptoPotato

Data from blockchain analytics firm Chainalysis shows that October is the biggest month in the biggest year ever for hacking activity. The firm added that crypto hackers have grossed over $3 billion across 125 hacks so far this year.

Chainalysis shared some crypto-related hacking statistics Wednesday. The blockchain data analytics firm explained that back in 2019, most hacks targeted centralized exchanges. However, a vast majority of targets are now decentralized finance (defi) protocols. Chainalysis wrote:

After four hacks yesterday, October is now the biggest month in the biggest year ever for hacking activity So far this month, $718 million has been stolen from defi protocols across 11 different hacks.

The four hacks that took place on Tuesday involved Rabby wallet, QANPlatform, Temple DAO, and Mango Markets. The biggest exploit of the four was the Solana-based defi protocol Mango Markets hack which saw about $115 million stolen.

Cross-chain bridges remain a major target for hackers, with 3 bridges breached this month and nearly $600 million stolen, accounting for 82% of losses this month and 64% of losses all year, Chainalysis detailed, elaborating:

At this rate, 2022 will likely surpass 2021 as the biggest year for hacking on record. So far, hackers have grossed over $3 billion dollars across 125 hacks.

What do you think about the findings by Chainalysis? Let us know in the comments section below.

A student of Austrian Economics, Kevin found Bitcoin in 2011 and has been an evangelist ever since. His interests lie in Bitcoin security, open-source systems, network effects and the intersection between economics and cryptography.

Image Credits: Shutterstock, Pixabay, Wiki Commons

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.

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Crypto Hackers Gross Over $3 Billion From 125 Hacks so Far This Year Featured Bitcoin News - Bitcoin News

Cardano founder Charles Hoskinson has been pointing out the flaws affecting the Ethereum protocol following its latest upgrade.

A major issue, according to Hoskinson, is the locking mechanism that prevents investors from withdrawing their staked Ether (ETH) from the Beacon Chain until the completion of the next upgrade.

Ethereum is the Hotel California of cryptocurrencies. You can check in, but you cant check out, said Hoskinson in a recent Cointelegraph interview.

According to Hoskison, this mechanism heavily impacts ETHs liquidity and could eventually spark a liquidity crisis.

Youll have less and less Ether trading in the marketplace, he explained. And then what will ultimately happen is youll have a liquidity crisis where a lot of volatility comes in.

Cardanos founder is also critical of the proof-of-work mining system that powers Bitcoin (BTC), which he sees as wasteful and unnecessary in the long run.

While Hoskinson acknowledged the importance of proof-of-work in the process of creating new BTC, he doesnt believe its effective when BTC is used as a financial instrument.According to Hoskinson, once BTC is mined, it could be moved onto a different, less energy-consuming blockchain in the form of wrapped assets:

To learnabout Hoskinsons thesis on Bitcoin and Ethereum, watchthe full interview on our YouTube channel, and dont forget to subscribe!

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Cardano founder points out flaws in Ethereum and Bitcoin - Cointelegraph

Golden Bitcoin coins.

Tsokur | Getty Images

Cryptocurrency prices dropped Thursday to new October lows after key U.S. inflation data came in hotter than expected.

The price of bitcoin was last lower by less than 1% at $18,994.22 and ether slid 2.8% to $1,260.90, according to Coin Metrics. Earlier in the day they fell as low as $18,492.33 and $1,220.80, respectively.

Bitcoin dropped below $19,000 early on Thursday as investors anxiously awaited the latest read on the consumer price index. It fell more sharply after the report came in, showing a slightly larger-than-expected increase in inflation, despite the aggressive rate hikes the Federal Reserve has brought into play to combat rising prices.

Cryptocurrencies have been trading mostly sideways since the end of August, with bitcoin hovering within $19,000. That's been a key level to watch for analysts, who say a break below it could lead to new lows below those hit in June, when bitcoin fell below $17,800 and ether fell under $900.

"Crypto markets are still overwhelmingly driven by macro. Bitcoin continues to trade within a tight range since June," said Michael Rinko, venture associate at AscendEx. "However, today's CPI print may threaten to break this range to the downside."

Steve McClurg, chief investment officer at Valkyrie investments, said the market reaction is to be expected with high inflation suggesting to investors that the Fed will continue with its planned rate hikes.

"Given what we know about Powell's stated goal right now, and the fact that we are in what appears to be a deep recession, it makes sense that we'd be down today," he said. "We firmly believe that markets still have not yet reached a bottom, and that there's still likely another 10% to 15%leg down for digital assets, and even more for equities," he added.

Elsewhere in the market, bond yields moved higher following the inflation report, which put initially put pressure on crypto equities. Rising rates make future profits, like those promised by growth companies, less attractive.

Coinbase was hit hardest, by about 11%. Block and Microstrategy followed, down 6% and 5%, respectively. Silvergate Bank lost 4% and bitcoin mining stocks were lower across the board by at least 4%.

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Bitcoin falls below $19,000 after latest U.S. inflation report - CNBC

Bitcoin is having a sluggish Uptober as compared to how it rallied during the same month last year.

According to online crypto data provider Statmuse, the largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization ended October 2021 with an average price of $58,051, peaking at $66,890 on the 21st day of the month.

But bitcoin is in a different space right now as for the first 12 days of the month, it is averaging $19,516, tallying its month-high on October 6 when it hit $20,408.

At press time, according to tracking to Coingecko, the digital currency is trading at $19,108, down 5.2% for the past week.

As the asset remains in a narrow price fluctuation range, investors, analysts and experts are all waiting if a bitcoin rebound is about to happen.

While the cryptocurrency is struggling to sustain the $20,000 marker, on chain data indicate bitcoin is on its way to a strong and short rebound soon.

One indicator to watch out for is the cryptos trading volume. Despite being affected by what is being referred to now as crypto winter and bearish market, BTC showed spikes in its daily and weekly averages.

As of this writing, bitcoins trading volume is at $22.1 billion. According to CryptoQuant, an uptick in this indicator might hint a bull market.

It is not uncommon for an assets trading volume to rise even during bearish momentums and BTC is showing the crypto space once again that not everything about it declines when the market is painted in red.

After the month of March this year, the maiden crypto has made at least four rebounds from significant price drops.

CryptoQuant believes that if it can sustain increases in its trading volumes and averages, bitcoin will be in a good position to make another rally, although it will still fail to compare with what it did in October 2021.

As for the bull market for the asset, Midas Touch Consulting Managing Director Florian Grummes shared an alarming information that may dampen the hopes of investors that are looking for more favorable market position.

The official believes a bullish market for bitcoin is not yet due for at least a year, as the cycle is yet to end.

Earlier this year, Grummes said Bitcoin could be put in a position to test the $6k price marker in a worst-case scenario given that the crypto market is facing liquidity crisis.

He predicts halving for BTC to come in May of 2024 and will be immediately followed by a bullish market.

Excerpt from:
Bitcoin Rebound Is About To Happen, This On-Chain Data Show - Bitcoinist

Justin Bennett, a crypto analyst observed the trend in the crypto market capitalization excluding Bitcoin and predicted a massive breakout. The analyst argues that it remains undecided whether Bitcoin will hit the $10,000 or the $29,000 level.

Also read: Solana exploit alert: Exploiter behind $100 million Mango Markets hack issues warning

Justin Bennett, an internationally recognized Forex trader and crypto analyst evaluated the total crypto market capitalization chart excluding Bitcoin and predicted a massive breakout. Bennett believes that the quiet period for cryptocurrencies is about to end and the longer a market coils, the more explosive the breakout.

Bennetts prediction is based on altcoin market capitalization that hovers around $518.92 billion at the time of writing. The analyst has asked traders to prepare for the breakout. It remains unclear whether the breakout will be in the upward or downward direction, however Bitcoin has shown its resilience sustaining above the $19,000 level despite the decline in the S&P 500.

Despite Bitcoins correlation with the US stock market, the cryptocurrency has remained steady in the face of declining stock prices and rising inflation. In the latest update from the US Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC), the monetary policy maker assured that higher interest rates are here to stay. This implies traders would remain cautious in their approach towards risk assets like Bitcoin and cryptocurrencies.

DonAlt, a pseudonymous crypto analyst known for his accurate predictions has marked key price levels for Bitcoin, in a new video. While the analyst is unsure of a Bitcoin price rally to the $33,000 level, DonAlt believes BTC could either hit the area between $12,000 to $14,000, a common price target for Bitcoin bears or the $29,000 level.

The $29,000 level is considered a key point in Bitcoin price trend as the asset will derisk at this point and DonAlt has revealed his strategy to shed his BTC holdings here.

DonAlts Bitcoin price targets

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Bitcoin price: Analyst predicts massive breakout in crypto, BTC to $10,000 or $29,000? - FXStreet

Galaxy Digital CEO Mike Novogratz is updating his outlook on the future of the current bear market and the crypto markets as a whole.

Novogratz says in a Yahoo Finance interview that Bitcoin (BTC) and other crypto assets are likely to rally once the Federal Reserve pauses its monetary tightening measures.

According to the Galaxy Digital CEO, the crypto market selloff was caused by the Federal Reserve hiking interest rates.

Since the Fed has decided to try to smash inflation by raising rates aggressively, the most aggressive rate-raising in our lifetime, Bitcoin sold off with other assets. Its actually done better than most.

I think if you finally get the pause, you will start seeing Bitcoin pick back up. Bitcoin and all cryptocurrencies.

Are we going to get the pause? At one point, yes.

On when the crypto downturn could end, Novogratz says that the prevailing bear market could last up to six more months.

You know the bear case is weve got two to six months left of this pain. The bull case is the market starts breaking. And were seeing a lot of breakage. Not necessarily in crypto but in the rest of the world.

According to the Galaxy Digital CEO, sellers in the crypto market are largely exhausted.

Cryptos interesting in that three months ago, after the big selloff and the deleveraging, most people that needed to sell sold.

And so youve seen price is much more muted. Things take off when theres a good story and they sell right back off when the story goes away.

And so a lot less activity in crypto, a lot less for sellers. But also a lot less new buyers.

I

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Billionaire Mike Novogratz Forecasts How Long the Bitcoin and Crypto Bear Market Will Last - The Daily Hodl

Employees work on bitcoin mining computers at Bitminer Factory in Florence, Italy.

Alessandro Bianchi | Reuters

Software used in bitcoin mining just got its first upgrade since late 2012, and a coalition of companies including payments giant Block (formerly Square) is trying to help push the open-source protocol forward to become an industry standard.

The move could help open bitcoin mining to more participants by supporting lower-quality internet connections, as well as improving security so miners get properly compensated for their work.

Bitcoin operates on a proof-of-work mining model, meaning that miners around the world run high-powered computers to create new bitcoin and validate transactions. Mining requires professional-grade equipment, some technical know-how, a lot of electricity and a special kind of software.

Rather than directly accessing the bitcoin protocol, the vast majority of miners today work through an intermediary protocol called Stratum, which facilitates communication between the bitcoin network, miners, and the mining pools that combine the hashing power of thousands of miners all over the world.

Miners use Stratum to submit their work and to collect a reward if they successfully complete a new block of transactions.

On Tuesday, a coalition of bitcoin developers is releasing version 2 of Stratum under an open-source license for the mining industry to evaluate and test.

It will take some work to convince the mining industry to adopt the new protocol, so Spiral a subsidiary of Jack Dorsey's payments companyBlock(formerly Square) is teaming up with bitcoin mining company Braiins to launch a group to test and fine-tune the open-source software before they push mass adoption.

Steve Lee, the lead at Spiral, tells CNBC there are several significant benefits to the upgrade, including cutting down on the use of data.

Currently, it is common for each mining rig in a large farm to directly connect to a pool. This setup wastes a lot of energy. Lee says that Stratum V2 supports a proxy that aggregates all the connections and only establishes one connection with the pool.

The process of sending that data is also changing to a more efficient method.

"All told, much less data needs to be transmitted between miners and pools, and this could help miners in remote regions of the world with poor internet," noted Lee.

The upgrade is designed to improve security, as well. Today, it is possible to steal hash rate from a miner, which can lead to some miners losing money. Hash rate is a term for the collective computing power of the bitcoin network. To resolve this, Lee says Stratum V2 introduces a standard security mechanism with authentication and encryption between miners and pools.

The version being released Tuesday is for initial testing, and in early November, a more robust version will come out that supports additional functionality, including job negotiation a "feature that represents a historic shift in the censorship-resistant mechanics of bitcoin mining by replacing a pools responsibility of assigning work to miners with the ability for miners to select their own work," according to a joint statement released by Spiral and Braiins.

There are orders of magnitude more miners than pools, so if miners select transactions it is far more decentralized than just a handful of pools, Lee explained.

"Working for industrywide adoption of the upgraded Stratum protocol is one of the most important developments in improving the decentralization and censorship resistance of bitcoins architecture," Lee said.

As for timing, the pilot and integration testing will happen this fall, and next year, the upgraded protocol will likely see greater adoption once miners and pools are confident it is working well.

"I'd anticipate a gradual increase in hash rate in 2023," Lee told CNBC. "Reaching 10% hash rate by the end of 2023 would be a great success," continued Lee.

Lee added that it will likely take several years to see the latest version of Stratum replace the original.

Miners know the benefits of upgrading to Stratum V2 very well, but pushing the entire mining industry over some of the remaining development and adoption hurdles is a big task," said Jan Capek, co-founder of Braiins.

"Universal standards for running and building Stratum V2 and the efforts of this working group to push the industry forward will provide the momentum bitcoin needs to finally upgrade from a version of its mining protocol that was built a decade ago, continued Capek.

Similar to the Lightning Network, which is a technology built on top of bitcoin's base layer to make payments more efficient, there will be different implementations of Stratum V2. However, the open-source version released Tuesday will make it easier to collectively test out the technology. It will also ensure that the various projects can interact with one another.

Tuesday's announcement is part of Block's larger push into the bitcoin mining industry.

On the sidelines of the Bitcoin 2022 conference in Miami in April, digital assets infrastructure company Blockstream and Block announced that they were breaking ground on a solar- and battery-powered bitcoin mine in Texas that uses solar and storage technology fromTesla.

Tesla's 3.8 megawatt solar PV array and 12 megawatt-hour Megapack will power the facility.

Block is also independently working on a project to make bitcoin mining more distributed and efficient.

The idea of making the mining process more accessible has to do with more than just creating new bitcoin, according to Block's general manager for hardware, Thomas Templeton. Instead, he says the company sees it as a long-term need for a future that is fully decentralized and permissionless.

"Mining needs to be more distributed," Dorsey wrote in a tweet in October,when he first floated the idea. "The more decentralized this is, the more resilient the bitcoin network becomes."

Toward that end, the company is solving one major barrier to entry: Mining rigs are hard to find, expensive and delivery can be unpredictable. Block says it is open to making a new ASIC, which is the specialized gear used to mine for bitcoin.

The project is being incubated within Block's hardware team, which is beginning to build out a core engineering team of system, ASIC and software designers led by Afshin Rezayee.

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The software used in bitcoin mining is getting its first big makeover in more than a decade here's what's changing - CNBC

The crypto market has been showing signs of decline recently as prices of Bitcoin and other crypto assets keep dropping. With the hikes in interest rates from most of the global central banks, the global economy is getting tighter. The impact on both the crypto and traditional markets is significantly devastating.

Following the events, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) warned about economic decline. Furthermore, it speaks of a possible worse global recession in 2023. This means that financial markets will go risk-off, creating extreme fear for the markets.

Hence, there could be a drastic decline in the prices of crypto assets and conventional stocks.

The price of Bitcoin has depicted a strong correlation with equity assets for more than a year. This is seen with most of the trends for BTC and some stocks in most cases. Several factors and conditions have been highlighted as explanations for the correlation. One of the stocks with a solid link to Bitcoin is S&P 500.

Bitcoin witnessed a price drop during the global pandemic recession in 2020. This was the same story for equity stocks. But as the economic conditions gradually progressed positively, the system transited accordingly. As a result, the crypto and equity markets sold off in December 2021 and May 2022.

Most of the correlated trends could indicate the performance of markets for securities once they hit a certain liquidity threshold. But, conversely, it could suggest that institutional fund has reached a sizable portion of capital inflows.

The price of Bitcoin could be tossed around firmly and fiercely despite the causative factors of a declining economy. However, the primary crypto asset could meet a drastic fall once theres a global recession. This will propel investors to pull out their funds through massive sell-offs.

The price of Bitcoin will boost in a situation with favorable intervention. For example, the US Federal Reserve and other central banks globally could take the IMF warnings and cut down rates to curb recession. Such a situation will create a price rally for Bitcoin and other crypto assets. Also, equity stocks will strive positively.

However, there could still be hope even without the intervention of the central banks. This means that a recession will emerge and pull down the crypto market, with the price of BTC dropping. Such lower prices could become an attractive entry point for some investors of the crypto assets.

Recall that the 2008 recession brought no prominence to Bitcoin. But following its collapse in March 2020, the primary cryptocurrency got a massive bull market that spiked its dominance in the crypto market. From then, Bitcoin rallied far above the equities and has been sustaining its stance.

With the overall outplay of events, Bitcoin depicts a bullish outlook on a long-term basis. At press time, the BTC price is around $19,137, indicating a drop over the past 24 hours.

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Will Bitcoin Tank If A Recession Hits, IMF Issues Warning - NewsBTC

Bitcoin is often addressed as digital Gold. Will the largest cryptocurrency flip the market cap of physical gold?

The current market cap of Bitcoin is over $366 Billion, while the market cap of gold is estimated to be over $11 Trillion. Bitcoins market cap will have to grow over 30 times to flip the gold market cap.

Bitcoin has just progressed by 3.32% on its journey to flip the shiny metal, according to a Twitter bot that compares the exchange rate and market cap of Bitcoin and gold.

Both Bitcoin and gold are used as a store of value and a medium of exchange.

The precious metal has an additional use case in the form of jewelry. But the exact physical nature of gold makes it challenging to store and transfer. Bitcoin can be transferred faster because it has no physical limitations. Bitcoin also eliminates the need to involve a third party for transactions.

Furthermore, only experts can verify if a bar of gold is authentic, whereas verifying Bitcoin is just a few clicks on the internet.Due to these factors, the community believes that the flip is inevitable.

Economist Peter Schiff believes that Bitcoin is not backed by anything that holds intrinsic value. He stated in a podcast:

The truth is the real success of Bitcoin rests on more people buying it. If you own it, you need to get many of your friends or colleagues to buy it because thats the only way its prices go up. Bitcoin is not an asset like real estate where you can collect rent, stocks where you could collect a dividend or bonds where you get paid interest. Its not like a commodity where you actually can use it for something, like oil to generate power. Its not like gold, where you could make jewelry out of it or conduct electricity with it or use it in all sorts of industrial applications like other metals.

There are various counters to Peter Schiffs anti-Bitcoin stance, most notably by Michael Saylor, who believes that Bitcoin is a commodity that provides utilitarian benefits. The co-founder of MicroStrategy has made a bold statement that Bitcoin will cross over $100 trillion in market cap, surpassing the market cap of gold by a significant margin.

There are various perspectives offered by the Bitcoin community and the community with an anti-Bitcoin stance. Only time will tell which side wins the prediction game.

For BeInCryptos latest Bitcoin (BTC) analysis, click here

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Bitcoin vs Gold: Will BTC Flip the Market Cap of Physical Gold? - BeInCrypto