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Crypto Daily Topic

Bitcoin Cash Successfully Undergoes its First Halving

Bitcoin Cash, one of Bitcoin’s most controversial forks and the current fourth largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization underwent its first block halving on Wednesday at 10.19 am UTC. The halving took place at the 630,000th block while the next one will take place at the 840,000th block. The halving saw the number of block rewards reduced from 12.5 BCH to 6.25 BCH. This reduces the number of mining rewards for miners. 

BSV and BTC to Follow

Bitcoin cash’s other fork, Bitcoin Satoshi’s Vision (BSV) underwent its halving a few days ago – at block number 628, 775. Bitcoin’s halving is expected to take place sometime in May. 

BSV forked from BCH one year later after BCH forked from BTC. The second forking was a result of a falling out between the two camps that engineered the first forking, with Roger Ver and Craig Wright (self-declared Satoshi) going separate ways. Both coins are however successful, with BSV currently ranking at 6 in market capitalization. 

BCH’s Price Surge

The halving saw the coin surge past $270, albeit briefly, and has dipped to $264.79 at the time of writing. The halving signals a limited supply going forward, thanks to a reduction in miners’ incentive. Multiple analysts had postulated a significant surge in price but the subdued uptrend is now raising questions on the effect of the halving on BCH, as well as on BTC when it undergoes it’s halving next month. 

Hashrate Drop 

It seems miners are bailing out after the halving, with 65 blocks mined since the halving and a low hash rate overall. In fact, the generation of a new block took almost two hours instead of the usual 10 minutes. Although the block generation time has sprung back to 10 minutes, the hash rate is yet to, having slashed by almost half from 4.05 to 2.24. 

Also, mining BCH at the current price and the halved rewards is anything but profitable for now. Let’s wait and see what the future stores for BCH after these developments. 

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Crypto Market Analysis

Daily Crypto Review, Feb 5 – XRP Skyrockets after Breaking a 2-year Downtrend; Bitcoin SV Upgrade Tesults in Chain Split

While the crypto market is still mostly in the consolidation phase, the outlook is much greener in the past 24 hours. Cryptocurrencies are mostly in the slight green with a cryptocurrency losing a tiny bit of their value here and there. Bitcoin, the largest cryptocurrency by market cap, is currently trading for $9276, which represents a 0.08% decrease on the day. Meanwhile, Ethereum gained 1.5% on the day, while XRP went parabolic and gained 10.59%.

Decentraland took today’s most prominent daily gainer title with gains of 19.82%. On the other side, ICON lost 16.64% on the day, which made it the most prominent daily loser.

Bitcoin’s dominance kept decreasing over the past few days as altcoins outperformed it slightly each day. It is now at 64.65%, which represents a decrease of 0.17% when compared to the value it had yesterday.

The cryptocurrency market capitalization stayed at pretty much the same level as yesterday. It is currently valued at $261.13 59.66 billion, which represents an increase of $1.47 billion when compared to yesterday’s value.

What happened in the past 24 hours

Gemini, a well-known cryptocurrency exchange founded by Tyler and Cameron Winklevoss, announced the integration of the popular trading analysis service TradingView.

As TradingView announced on Feb. 4, Gemini added the trading service as a trading partner. This will allow its institutional customers to trade directly through TradingView. As part of this integration and partnership, Gemini is now listed in the TradingView’s Trading Panel. It can also be found in the TradingView’s Brokerage Section.

Honorable mention

Bitcoin SV 

Bitcoin SV performed a scheduled chain upgrade called Genesis on Feb. 3. However, most nodes have not yet updated, which resulted in a minor chain split. Bitcoin SV is now split into two versions.

Somewhere around 1/4 of all blockchain nodes are still running the old version, which means that they cannot synchronize to the main BSV chain. On top of this, a chain split occurred several hours later, where the old chain got extended by one block, which means that some miners also failed to upgrade to the new chain.

This event does not appear to be a premeditated attempt at creating a new BSV sub-chain.

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Technical analysis

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Bitcoin

Bitcoin’s price might be in trouble as the sentiment grows bearish for the short-term. The largest cryptocurrency fell out of the consolidation range bound by $9,251 which indicated the possibility of price going further down. However, the $9,120 resistance was strong enough to keep Bitcoin bears at bay, and Bitcoin is now trying to regain its position above $9,251.


Bitcoin’s RSI is slowly rising in value while its volume is slightly below average.

Key levels to the upside                    Key levels to the downside

1: $9,251                                           1: $9,120

2: $9,585                                           2: $9,070

3: $9,732                                          3: $8,905


Ethereum

Ethereum also went down slightly as the ETH bears tried to test the $185 support. However, the support held and the downward-facing trend got rejected. Ethereum’s price is now pushing above the middle of the range, bound by $185 to the upside and $193.6 to the upside.


Ethereum’s volume increased greatly in the past few hours, while its RSI level is approaching overbought territory.

Key levels to the upside                    Key levels to the downside

1: $193.6                                            1: $185

2: $198                                              2: $178.5

                                                         3: $167.8


Ripple

XRP is certainly the best performer out of the top3 cryptocurrencies (and beyond). After breaking a downtrend it was in for two years, the price skyrocketed and reached above $0.266. The price increase was accompanied by a major spike in volume. XRP is now trading in-between $0.266 to the downside and $0.285 to the upside.


XRP’s volume is enormous when compared to the volume it had previous days/weeks. Its RSI level on the 4-hour chart is deep into overbought territory.

Key levels to the upside                    Key levels to the downside

1: $0.285                                            1: $0.266

2: $0.31                                              2: $0.2454

3: $0.324                                            3: $0.235

 

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Crypto Daily Topic

Bitcoin Cash ABC vs. Bitcoin Cash SV – Examining the Bitcoin Cash Hash War

The debate about Bitcoin’s scalability began almost with its very inception. A few years later, that debate tore the Bitcoin community right down the middle. The core of the matter was Bitcoin’s 1MB block size. Satoshi wrote a 1MB limit on the code to prevent the block size from being up to miners’ discretion, which would lead to some miners producing bigger blocks than others and potentially causing the chain to split.

However, Satoshi certainly didn’t envision the firestorms that would later erupt out of this issue. As transaction volumes increased on the chain, it became clear that some things needed to change. But what would change, and how, was the main bone of contention in the community.

This contention gave birth to the Bitcoin Cash hard fork, which, paradoxically, later split into Bitcoin Cash ABC and Bitcoin Satoshi’s Vision – for the same reasons Bitcoin Cash had split from Bitcoin.

What was the lead up to this perplexing chain of events? Let’s dive into the famous ‘hash war,’ how it began, its implications, and its conclusion.

What is Bitcoin Cash, and Its Origin? 

Before we delve into Bitcoin cash and its origin, we need to look at the events that precipitated its creation. These events are the scalability issues facing Bitcoin and the disagreements among ‘factions’ in its camp as to how to address them. 

Bitcoin’s block size limit of 1MB meant that as the network grew in popularity and more people used the network, the network became clogged, leading to slow transactions and high transaction fees. It also meant the network couldn’t compete with payment models like Visa, which processes thousands of transactions per second, as compared to Bitcoin’s seven transactions per second. 

This issue meant a scaling solution had to be created. The problem is the Bitcoin community couldn’t come to a consensus as to how it would be done. One group wanted to maintain the 1MB block sizes and look for a scaling solution that would operate off of the main blockchain. The other group wanted to increase the block size and allow for more transactions in each block while keeping transaction fees low. However, this idea was met with censorship and indignation from the other group.

In 2017, Bitcoin had achieved mainstream status, and its popularity had grown more than ever. The foreseen transactions backlog that would slow down the network were now a reality. Network users were already complaining of several days waiting time before their transactions could be confirmed. For your transaction to be confirmed fast, you had to pay higher transaction fees. This also meant that Bitcoin could not be relied upon to conduct everyday transactions like micropayments. 

At this point, one camp suggested ‘Bitcoin Unlimited,’ an upgrade to increase block sizes. The other camp suggested a Segregated Witness (SegWit), an off-chain technology that would retain the block size, but also allow for faster transactions. 

However, Bitcoin Unlimited meant the network had to hard-fork, which meant the new version would not be compatible with the older version, and users all over the world would have to migrate to the new version. The SegWit camp preferred to maintain the status quo and maintain Satoshi’s version, whilst working on a solution that wouldn’t necessitate hard-forking. Bitcoin Unlimited also meant that miners with large processing power would have an unfair advantage over those with limited resources – which was against the democratization that Satoshi envisioned. 

The SegWit’s camp idea was to ‘segregate’ some part of the transaction (mainly transaction signatures) and store it outside the main chain, hence creating more space in each block. SegWit proponents viewed it as a less risky approach. However, the opposite camp saw it as a temporary solution to a permanent problem. 

The 2017 Hard Fork and SegWit2x

On August, 1, 207, the vast majority of Bitcoin miners indicated their support for SegWit2x. SegWit2x meant a potential implementation of SegWit with an agreement to later increase the block size limit to 2MB. 

However, a pseudonymous contributor going by ‘Shaolin Fry’ suggested a user-activated soft fork (UASF) that would implement SegWit without the contribution of miners. A UASF would comprise users, Bitcoin exchanges, and Bitcoin businesses. Since the users outnumber miners, it was clear a SegWit implementation was going to be effected without the participation of miners. (Miners were against SegWit because it would supposedly expose a ‘covert’ algorithm that ASIC mining machines were using to boost their processing speeds). 

Even then, a part of the community was not satisfied with SegWit – electing to initiate a hard fork of the Bitcoin chain. The new blockchain was called Bitcoin Cash, and it has an 8MB block size compared with Bitcoin’s 1MB. Bitcoin Cash went on to become one of the most successful cryptocurrencies, entering the top ten in terms of market capitalization. 

Bitcoin Cash developers envisioned a blockchain that allowed faster transactions and hence be used as a payment system for everyday transactions. The argument was Bitcoin can be an investment asset, but Bitcoin Cash can be a cheaper and faster payment model as compared to the traditional system. This, they argued, was what Satoshi had intended. 

One Year Later, More Block Size Limit Wars 

When the world thought the Bitcoin block size push-and-pull was over, Bitcoin Cash itself split into Bitcoin Cash ABC (ABC for Adjustable Blocksize Cap) and Bitcoin Cash SV (SV for Satoshi’s vision). Bitcoin Cash ABC proponents wanted to further increase the block size as well as enable the running of smart contracts on the platform. 

Bitcoin Cash ABC (BCH ABC) has implemented some changes such as Canonical Transaction Ordering Route (CTOR). CTOR means that transactions are arranged by following a dictionary sequence, as opposed to the Topological Transaction Ordering Route (TTOR) used by Bitcoin. CTOR is supposedly a more effective and elegant way of arranging transactions. Bitcoin Cash ABC also maintained the simpler name ‘Bitcoin Cash.’ 

But not everyone was enthusiastic about the idea of making the BCH blockchain a smart contracts platform. The leader of the anti-BCH ABC crowd was Craig Wright, a controversial figure who insists he’s the original creator of Bitcoin (earning himself the pejorative moniker ‘Faketoshi’). Another vocal critic of BCH ABC was Calvin Ayre, owner of the powerful mining entity, Coingeek. On his part, Ayre argued that miners would not pick up CTOR. 

The anti-BCH ABC camp led to the creation of Bitcoin SV. The BSV camp argued that it represented the true vision of Satoshi Nakamoto. The new version also had some upgrades to facilitate faster transactions. 

The two most prominent figures in the BCH camp were Roger Ver and Jihan Wu. Ver is the owner of Bitcoin.com, the Bitcoin exchange, while Jihan Wu is the co-founder of Bitmain, a Bitcoin hardware manufacturer owner of mining company Antpool. 

Hash Wars

After the hard forks, what followed next was a battle on who would get to keep the BCH ticker. With both sides having heavyweight owners of mining companies, a ferocious war was impending. Each side used their mining power on their chains to push liquidity of each crypto in the market – hence the name ‘hash rate war.’

Soon, however, the hash war came to naught – with both sides burning millions of dollars into a mining contest that incurred losses amounting to millions, for both forks. According to bitcoinist.com, BCHSV incurred a loss of $2.2 million, while accruing a negative profit margin of 441%.On its part, BCHABC incurred $1.3 million in losses and a negative profit margin of 51%.

Both sides also implemented replay protection on their respective chains to prevent accidental use of coins on both chains by users.

The hash wars also hurt the whole cryptocurrency market. Bitcoin, in particular, tanked to its lowest level that year. And major crypto exchanges like Coinbase, Kraken, and Bittrex assigned the BCH ticker to the BCHABC hard fork.

The BSV side soon agreed to let go of the ‘Bitcoin Cash’ name as well as the BCH ticker and reluctantly agreed to adopt the name ‘Bitcoin SV’ and the BSV ticker.

The two coins went on to compete against each other in the market, just like any other cryptocurrencies.

Bitcoin Cash VS Bitcoin SV Today

After the war between the two coins, Bitcoin Cash stayed ahead in terms of price and market capitalization. Some crypto exchanges like Kraken and Binance have gone on to delist BSV.

BSV surprised everyone in early 2020 by surging past 300% to a price of $372 and briefly overtaking Bitcoin Cash to become the fourth largest crypto by market cap. Many people speculated the rise in BSV is attributable to Craig Wright’s current legal woes – which have helped increased publicity for the coin.

But BCH has since reclaimed its position over BSV. As of January 27, 2020, BCH is trading at $368.55, with a market cap of $6, 724, 517, 583, while BSV is trading for $284.05 with a market cap of $5, 176, 171, 633.

Final Thoughts

We don’t know who Satoshi is, but we’re certain he didn’t anticipate, neither would he have liked the acrimonious factions that arose out of his 1MB block size idea, and one that threatened to bring Bitcoin on its knees. Thankfully, Bitcoin has since rebounded from the hash war implications, as have the two hard forks that arose out of it. We can only wait and see future dynamics playing between both hard forks. 

 

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Crypto Market Analysis

Daily Crypto Review, Jan 20 – India at a crypto crossroads; Bitcoin outperforms altcoins

The cryptocurrency market had a red weekend as Bitcoin could not make it through $9,000 to create a clear bull market path for the rest of the cryptos. Bitcoin’s price went down 4.61% on the day. It is currently trading for $8,643. Meanwhile, Ethereum lost 5.93% on the day, while XRP went down 5.95%.

The past 24 did not have any particular prominent gainers. Seele gained 6.78% on the day, making it the biggest daily winner. On the other side, Steem lost 14.74% on the day, which makes it the biggest daily loser.

While every cryptocurrency in the top10 by market cap performed better than Bitcoin during the price rise, each one of them (excluding BSV) fell more than Bitcoin once it was time to go down in price. Bitcoin’s dominance, therefore, increased over the weekend. It is now at 66.31%, which represents an increase of 0.47% when compared to the value it had yesterday.

The cryptocurrency market capitalization decreased over the weekend. It is currently valued at $237.26 billion, which represents a decrease of $8.54 billion when compared to the value it had on Friday.

What happened in the past 24 hours

Following the last August session, the Supreme Court of India reconvened once again this week. The topic was the Crypto v. RBI case. The Supreme Court had asked the Reserve Bank of India to further clarify its position towards crypto and to explain why it enforced a nationwide ban during the last session. It was also on the agenda to discuss if this move was constitutional at all.

In an attempt to defend its stance, the RBI tried to showcase all the security breaches that happened in the crypto industry, therefore presenting itself as an entity that takes care of its peoples’ financial safety.

Honorable mention

Bitcoin SV

Anyone who watched the markets over the past week saw the explosive gains that Bitcoin SV made, as well as the price drop afterward. The cryptocurrency led by Craig Wright, a prominent figure in the crypto industry that claims to be Satoshi Nakamoto, is leading a campaign claiming that Bitcoin SV is the “real deal” because he is the real Satoshi.

He is scheduled to appear before the court on Feb 3 to present the keys to the Tulip Trust that holds over 1.1 million Bitcoin. He supposedly got the rest of the key required from his former business partner Dave Klaiman.

An important thing to note is that most of the volume that brought Bitcoin SV’s surge was actually fake. The majority of the volume came on small exchanges that are easily influenced by one person. There is much evidence pointing to wash trading rather than a genuine interest in this cryptocurrency.

However, Bitcoin SV did manage to be the only cryptocurrency that ended up in the green over the past few day.

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Technical analysis

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Bitcoin

Bitcoin tried to push over $9,000 over the weekend, but failed to do so. Pushing over this barier would, to most people, mean the start of a bull market. However, afterfailing to secure its position above the desired price, Bitcoin tumbled all the way down to $8,460. It has recovered since and is currently trading right above the $8,640 level. The level got tested several times, and might not hold if tested more.


Bitcoin’s volume is on the levels similar to the past week’s levels. Its RSI is in the lower part of the value range.

Key levels to the upside                    Key levels to the downside

1: $8,815                                           1: $8,640

2: $8,905                                           2: $8,436

3: $9,115                                           3: $8,130


Ethereum

Ethereum followed Bitcoin both to the upside and downside. While its gains surpassed Bitcoin’s during the “bull phase,” its losses were larger than Bitcoin’s during the price drop. Ethereum couldn’t break $178.65 and fell back down. It dropped under $167.8 where it is at currently. It is trading in a very tight range between $167.8 to the upside and $163.5 to the downside.


Ethereum’s volume currently on the lower end of the spectrum. Its RSI is near the middle of the value range.

Key levels to the upside                    Key levels to the downside

1: $167.8                                             1: $163.5

2: $178.65                                          2: $160

3: $185                                               3: $154.2


Ripple

XRP performed very similarly to other cryptocurrencies over the weekend. Its price was surging until it hit a wall at $0.24545. The only difference was that XRP actually managed to pass over the resistance a few times before dropping below it once again. It dropped more and more until bulls picked up the pace at $0.226. XRP’s price is now consolidating in a tight range, bound by $0.27 to the downside and $0.234 to the upside.


XRP’s volume is descending and currently on the lower end of the spectrum, while its RSI is in the middle of the value range.

Key levels to the upside                    Key levels to the downside

1: $0.234                                            1: $0.227

2: $0.24545                                        2: $0.221

3: $0.253                                           3: $0.211