Best Stories of the Week
Bitmain drama as Micree Zhan Brings Security Guards to takeover office
Bitmain’s internal issues returned to the fore this past week as the previously shunned co-founder Micree Zhan took over the company’s Beijing office, using security personnel to do it. Micree had been kicked out of the company after Wu sent an email to all staff telling them of the change in October last year. Now, it would appear that Bitmain staff are being forced to choose between the warring leaders after the June 3rd takeover of the office by Micree. However, Wu, who is based in Bitmain’s Hong Kong holding, said he still held the power as this was the main office. The saga at Bitmain continues.
Coinbase continues its Issues
Coinbase has received numerous complaints in recent times from frustrated customers locked out of their accounts as their servers crashed. Many frustrated crypto users kept seeing the phrase “Temporarily unavailable”, with this weeks instance the fourth time in just three months. The crashes all seem to happen after big price movements from Bitcoin with some annoyed users thinking there is an algorithm in the system to block the site after a movement of over $500. Dan Gambardello of Crypto Capital Venture’s rightly asked: “How does an exchange with an $8 billion valuation crash every time Bitcoin pumps 5%?”
Japan sees a spike in popularity for Bitcoin last month
Japan was the second-largest market in the world for trading volume in Bitcoin in the month of May a report from Coinmetric has revealed. The report figured this metric out by analysing the Bitcoin transactions and the currencies used. According to JPCointelegraph, Fiat currency-denominated bitcoin transactions are usually $1.2 billion (about 130 billion yen) per day worldwide. The U.S. dollar is about half, 559 million dollars (about 58.7 billion yen), and the Japanese yen was 380 million dollars (about 41.4 billion yen). Japan has long been a leading nation for cryptocurrency adoption and could be launching a national cryptocurrency soon.
Cardano Price Jumps 60%, Shelley Virtual Summit for July
Cardano’s native token, ADA, has rallied 60% following the announcement of the Shelly upgrade launch from founder Charles Hoskinson. On a Youtube podcast titled Cryptolark with Lark Davis, Hoskinson revealed the roadmap for Cardano’s upgrade, with the full roll-out of the Shelley upgrade to arrive by July 7th at the latest. Hard forks and taking rewards were also set out on the podcast filmed May 23rd. To celebrate the launch of Shelley, Cardano has organised a virtual summit for early July. Keynote speakers include Vinton G. Cerf. This man is known as the “Father of the Internet” and Stephen Wolfram, inventor and founder of Wolfram Research.
Crypto Scams see Billions of Dollars in 2020
Cryptocurrency related scams have pocketed a whopping $1.4 billion in the first five months of 2020, CipherTrace has claimed in their latest report. The figure means 2020 could yet outdo the record-setting 2019 which pocketed $4.5 billion. Scams have seemingly increased in recent months with more examples of email phishing hacks. The public has been especially gullible with the Coronavirus outbreak, and many scammers have looked to profit off the chaos. Some hackers have impersonated the World Health Organisation and Red Cross for their ill-gotten gains.
