Blockchain

Cardano’s Mary hard fork to offer native multi-asset support in February

Published

2 months ago

January 12, 2021

Cardano Founder Charles Hoskinson’s updates have been crucial to the development of the ecosystem over the past year. So is the case this time too, with IOHK’s CEO giving the community some important updates during his latest AMA. During the same, Hoskinson revealed that the Mary hard fork is coming in February, with the same promising to deliver “native multi-asset support” to the Cardano network.

The long-awaited functionality has been running on Cardano testnets for a while now and the Hard Fork Combinator (HFC) event is expected to see it moved over to the mainnet, along with the addition of infrastructure for the extended UTXO model.

Native assets on Cardano would be implemented in a way that eliminates the added complexity that is required by Ethereum for the same functionality. According to an IOHK blog, Ethereum requires custom code for user-defined tokens to be supported on the chain. This adds a layer of complexity, cost (gas is needed to pay for the execution of the code), and inefficiency since token code for both standards is replicated and adapted, rather than being part of the system itself.

Cardano reportedly supports user-defined tokens natively, without the need for custom code, through the native tokens framework. This eliminates the need to use custom code or costly smart contracts.

2021 is the year for #Cardano

— Kaizen Crypto (@KaizenCrypto) January 12, 2021

In fact, Cardano credits itself as being far more decentralized than Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies, with Hoskinson claiming that this has been calculated by Cardano having 100x more unique entities producing blocks than Bitcoin. “Usually when we say decentralization, we strictly mean the amount of nodes participating in the consensus process and how many unique people are making blocks,” he said, adding,

“In the case of Bitcoin, 3 to 5 usually make the same blocks again and again. We (Cardano) have 300-500 stake pools consistently making blocks that are unique.”

He also noted that there are over 1200 registered stake pools and as such, he feels very comfortable with making the claim that Cardano is 100x more decentralized.

For the 8th day in a row more than 3.000 new wallets were created.

9th day in a row more than 1000 wallets delegating #ADA.#Cardano really taking off since january. pic.twitter.com/6si70W8gIW

— Pieter Nierop (@nierop_pieter) January 11, 2021

In fact, according to data from Staking Rewards, Cardano recently overtook Polkadot to become the most decentralized network, with over 69.53% of its circulating supply now staked. There are also some reports of over 100 million ADA staked per day, with an average of 1500 new delegators to the network each day.

Source: https://ambcrypto.com/cardanos-mary-hard-fork-to-offer-native-multi-asset-support-in-february

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Blockchain

NFT Google Search Volume Exceeds DeFi and Ethereum (ETH) As Celebrities Join the Craze

Published

20 mins ago

March 5, 2021

Republished by Plato

Non-fungible tokens popular as NFTs are soaring in a wild rage currently in the crypto markets. The craze around NFTs is so high that the Google search for NFTs has skyrocketed in recent times thereby exceeding decentralized finance (DeFi) and coming closer to the interest of Ethereum (ETH). As crypto-journalist Wu Blockchain reports:

“According to the google index, the Google search volume of NFT has suddenly skyrocketed since February 7, and it has far exceeded DeFi and is close to ETH. The reason may be related to celebrity NFT, Logan Paul’s NFT has a huge search volume, and opensea is most searched platform”.

A non-fungible token (NFT) s a special type of cryptographic token representing something that is unique. Thus, no two NFTs are mutually interchangeable. These tokens are basically created to represent digital scarcity, and give digital ownership.

Recently, celebrities and billionaire investors interested in high-ticket items have also joined the NFT craze. Billionaire Marc Cuban has already joined the NFT mania and much recently he shared a digital collectible commemorating Luka Doncic and Dirk Nowitzki.

Look what I found! An Exclusive Moment Commemorating Luka Doncic and Dirk Nowitzki collectible https://t.co/ute4TSFJjo? #rarible #ethereum #nonfungible #digitalasset #nft via @rariblecom

— Mark Cuban (@mcuban) March 5, 2021

Ethereum blockchain has been one of the popular destinations for NFTs. It hosts some of the popular NFT games like CryptoKitties that caught massive craze in late 2017. However, other NFT marketplaces like Rarible and OpenSea are catching up with popularity at a quick speed.

Top NFT News Over the Last Week

Over the last week, the crypto market has been flooded with NFT news with NFTs and digital collectible worth millions of dollars have been sold in the open market. Popular personalities from different frontiers like music, digital artwork, sports and others are warming up to NFTs.

American Rockbank Kings of Leons is planning to launch its new album “When You See Yourself,” in the form of NFT. The album will be available on NFT Marketplace YellowHeart later today and the sale process will continue for a period of two weeks. The rock band will also offer several other exclusive items in the form of a series called “NFT Yourself”.
Recently, the original artwork of Banksy dubbed Morons, worth a massive $100,000, was destroyed only after converting it to a non-fungible token (NFT). The destruction of the physical artwork took place earlier this week in Brooklyn, New York and live-streamed. The auction for the Banksy NFT is taking place on the OpenSea NFT marketplace and will continue up to March 9. The winning bidder gets the unique digital code of the artwork.
250-year-old auction house Christie’s recently conducted a sale of digital artwork by Mike “Beeple” Winkelmann using NFTs on the digital marketplace MakersPlace.
Legendary digital artist Ben Mauro, recently conducted the sale of his 21 NFTs which were all sold in a flash sale of just under 7 minutes raising a whopping $2 million. The sale took place on the VIV3 Marketplace leveraging the Flow Blockchain.
National Basketball Association (NBA) has joined hands with Dapper Labs to launch its own digital collectible NFTs. dubbed as NBA Top Shot, it is a marketplace for NFTs. NBA Top Shot Marketplace is built using Dapper Labs’ Flow blockchain platform. As per a CNBC report, it has already generated $230 million worth of sales in the form of NFTs.

Going ahead at this rate, NFTs could soon be a multi-billion dollar market and probably might also see explosive growth like the DeFi market. To support NFT investors, Hex Trust has launched the first-ever NFT custodial service.

To keep track of DeFi updates in real time, check out our DeFi news feed Here.

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Source: https://coingape.com/nft-google-search-volume-exceeds-defi-and-ethereum-eth-as-celebrities-join-the-craze/

Blockchain

Reuters: SEC’s Lawsuit Didn’t Impact Ripple’s Business in Asia-Pacific Region

Published

26 mins ago

March 5, 2021

Republished by Plato

Brad Garlinghouse, the CEO of Ripple in a recent interview with Reuters had said that the ongoing SEC lawsuit against him and his company didn’t impact their business in the Asia-Pacific region, their key remittance corridor. Ripple has flourished as a remittance solution provider with the help of the XRP ledger and has partnered with hundreds of private and central banks across the world to facilitate instant cross-border transactions.

“It (the lawsuit) has hindered activity in the United States, but it has not really impacted what’s going on for us in the Asia Pacific. We have been able to continue to grow the business in Asia and Japan because we’ve had regulatory clarity in those markets.”

Despite the current issues with its operations in the US, the firm has continued its progress in the Asia-Pacific region, especially Japan.

The SEC lawsuit had quite a domino effect on crypto platforms and exchanges in the US who decided to delist XRP from their platforms until the lawsuit settles.

Ripple’s Key remittance partners in the US such as MoneyGram had also claimed that they have stopped using Ripple services for the time being. However, the fact that the majority of its business is located outside the US has helped the company to grow despite regulatory woes in the US. The CEO explained,

Ripple has signed more than 15 new contracts with banks globally since the SEC brought its lawsuit, and the lack of clarity in the United States has been a “hindrance” to innovation.

New Developments Give Ripple an Upperhand in its Court Battle

The SEC filed the class-action lawsuit against Ripple and two of its executives back in December last year that led to a delisting spree among US-based crypto exchanges fearing legal liabilities. However, some recent developments in the case that came before as well as during the first virtual hearing seem to have given Ripple an upper hand in the case. The first major development came in the form of an amended complaint where the SEC removed market manipulation claims from the lawsuit.

The second breakthrough came from the legal counsel of Ripple during the first court hearing where it was revealed that SEC ignored queries about XRP’s security status back in 2018-19 from major exchanges, which can put SEC in a spot. Also, the fact that major crypto-compliant nations such as Japan have cleared XRP trading could play in Ripple’s favor.

We’re looking forward to learning more about the SEC’s meetings with major XRP market participants who asked for guidance but were never told that XRP txns would be subject to the federal securities laws. Full filing here 2/2 https://t.co/lnzkQK7sX3

— Stuart Alderoty (@s_alderoty) March 5, 2021

Garlinghouse has even filed a motion to dismiss the recent amended complaint against him claiming SEC lacks clarity over regulations.

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Source: https://coingape.com/reuters-secs-lawsuit-didnt-impact-ripples-business-in-asia-pacific-region/

Blockchain

Cardano (ADA) price signals weakness after 10% dump

Published

27 mins ago

March 5, 2021

Republished by Plato

ADA/USD rebounds to $1.14 but still vulnerable after declining 10% over 24 hours

Cardano dropped nearly 10% on Thursday to see lows of $1.07 and then continued to feel the bearish pressure in early trades today as prices touched support at $1.03.

The drop signalled some weakness in Cardano’s remarkable rally over the past few weeks, with the likely bearish turn starting to appear after bulls reached an all-time high of $1.48 last week.

At the time of writing, ADA/USD is trading around $1.12, with bulls displaying conviction in the past two hours.

If the upside signal strengthens, buyers could push for a break above $1.20 as they target higher levels. On the contrary, ADA could also drop to $1.00 or lower.

ADA/USD price short term outlook

ADA/USD broke below the support line of an ascending parallel channel and retested the 20-day exponential moving average at $1.08. While it completed a five-day downward streak, the decline to lows of $1.03 signalled further weakness.

Cardano’s price could thus see more losses if bulls fail to react and retake control above the lower boundary of the old channel.

The Relative Strength Indicator (RSI) hints at added downward pressure with bearish divergence, while MACD has the histogram printing below the signal line to suggest an influx of selling pressure if the indicator validates a bearish crossover.

*ADA/USD daily chart. Source: TradingView*

If ADA price turns negative from current levels, bulls will rely on a few key support levels to prevent further losses. The initial support lies at $1.08, which is where we have the 0.382 Fibonacci retracement level of the upswing from $0.43 to $1.48.

There’s also an ascending trend line (blue, dotted) near the Fib level and if bears break lower, the primary support is at the 20-day EMA ($1.06) and then the psychological $1.00 level.

Further rot for ADA/USD could see bulls battle to keep prices above the 0.5 Fib retracement level ($0.965) and the 0.618 Fib retracement level ($0.83).

On a positive note, ADA/USD remains in an uptrend and could very well make another all-time high in the short term if bulls hold above $1.00. This will call for buyers to break above immediate resistance at $1.14, with a run to $1.20 bringing into focus the 0.236 Fib level ($1.23).

A break into and continuation inside the rising channel could see prices rally to the apex resistance line, which extends past the all-time high of $1.48. From here, buyers can attempt to set another record. In this case, short-term targets are likely to be $1.60 and $2.00.

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Source: https://coinjournal.net/news/cardano-ada-price-signals-weakness-after-10-dump/