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HARD FORK V2: The ethereum community will try executing its system-wide upgrade, Constantinople, for a second time later this month. The hard fork was previously scheduled for mid-January, but was postponed after the discovery of a critical security bug in one of the upgrades.
Now, developers are confident that the hard fork can proceed on schedule. Hudson Jameson, who handles developer relations for the Ethereum Foundation, told CoinDesk that “the block number has been set and [the upgrade] is hard coded in the clients now so it’s going along fine.”
The hard fork in a few weeks will actually consist of two separate upgrades executed simultaneously. The first, Constantinople, will launch all five Ethereum Improvement Proposals originally planned, while a second, dubbed Petersberg, will roll back EIP 1283, the source of the security flaw.
EIP 1283 is still being included in Constantinople due to the fact that many ethereum testnets, such as Ropsten, already activated the hard fork weeks before the bug was discovered. Developers determined it would be easier to roll back the upgrade than create a new hard fork package which excluded it. Full Story
XRP INCENTIVES: Silicon Valley fintech startup Ripple goes out of its way to say it didn’t create the cryptocurrency XRP. But that doesn’t mean the company doesn’t rely on its vast reserves of the token when courting prospective hires.
One engineer who asked to remain anonymous showed CoinDesk a recruiting email from late 2018 that promised an XRP package from Ripple worth up to $3 million, in addition to a generous salary offer.
Salaries may vary according to seniority, but based on conversations with two prospective recruits, XRP bonuses for engineers generally range in value from $1 million to $6 million, according to the company’s own evaluation. As of press time, XRP is trading at roughly $0.30 per token.
Ripple declined to comment on bonus packages, including whether they are still being offered in 2019. One former employee noted generous equity deals are standard in Silicon Valley.
A company representative did say that Ripple added 100 new employees across the company in 2018, adding: “We move fast to acquire the best talent out there – especially considering the highly competitive nature of other startups who want to hire similar candidates.” Full Story
JACK O'LIGHTNING: A bitcoin scaling solution called the lightning network may soon come to Square’s Cash App for mobile payments.
Twitter and Square CEO Jack Dorsey, an investor in the bitcoin-oriented startup Lightning Labs, recently announced during an interview with podcaster Stephan Livera that there are plans to integrate the scaling technology with Square’s mobile app.
“It’s not an ‘if,’ it’s more of a ‘when,’ and how do we make sure that we’re getting the speed that we need and the efficiency,” Dorsey told Livera. “We don’t think it stops at buying and selling [bitcoin]. We do want to help make happen the currency aspect.” Full Story
ORACLE'S DOZEN: Despite years of hype and chatter, enterprise blockchain deployments actually in production are few and far between. But according to Oracle, the list just got a little bigger.
Announced Tuesday, the software giant now has up to a dozen enterprise customers using live applications that have sped into production since its cloud-based blockchain platform went live last July.
This includes a cargo tracking consortium called the Global Shipping Business Network (GSBN); China Distance Education Holdings, which shares educational and professional certificates; Circulor, which tracks conflict minerals; and SERES, a solution for dealing with invoices between franchisors.
Oracle said other customers are at the production stage, including Arab Jordan Investment Bank, Certified Origins, NeuroSoft, TradeFin, HealthSync, OriginTrail, ICS FS, SDK.Finance and Nigeria Customs.
Frank Xiong, group vice president of blockchain product development at Oracle, told CoinDesk: “Other vendors may still be experimenting, but we do have real customers in live production. I would say around 10 to a dozen are in a live situation.” Full Story |
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 Every quarter, CoinDesk Research takes stock of the key data, trends and events with its State of Blockchains reports. As our research efforts evolve and expand, we hope to provide amplification to a variety of perspectives within the crypto community. We reached out to analysts, builders, and lawyers to understand the industry from their unique vantage point. Check out the full article but here's a sample insight: "Q4 2018, also known as the great crypto-winter, saw an interesting shift in narrative and dialogue. While some in the industry continue to rail against regulatory interference, others applaud the possibility of regulatory acceptance with the introduction of the token-taxonomy act (and others). Experts continue to argue over the legality of certain types of offerings and ICO's have all but stopped completely. Many hope that the passage of legislation carving out exceptions for ICO's will bring a return to the highly speculative industry. Until then, the STO is the new shiny toy, but without adequate or available liquidity in the form of ready exchanges, the success of STO's remains to be seen." — Jason Seibert (@ FJasonSeibert), Seibert-Law (Attorney) We want to hear your perspective too! To add to the conversation, please fill out our survey. We will be releasing the results in the coming weeks. For more research insights, check out the CoinDesk Crypto-Economic Explorer here. |
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| BULL BREATHER: Bitcoin's pullback from the three-week highs hit on Friday could be a blessing in disguise for the bulls, as the correction has taken the shape of a bull flag – a pause that often ends up accelerating a bullish move. A break above $3,630 would confirm a flag breakout and allow a rally to $4,000. Full Story |
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BEST OF THE BEST CNBC: With the downturn in the cryptocurrency markets, cash-strapped startups in the blockchain industry are now letting go of skilled staff. While that is bad news for them, it’s good news for tech giants like Facebook, according to CNBC. For example, Facebook recently snapped up a group of employees from blockchain startup Chainspace – a firm working on "giving people ownership of their personal data." RBC internet analyst Zachary Schwartzman said such blockchain firms ultimately pose a risk to Facebook's business model. Yet, he concluded that the talent grab should be considered an "acqui-hire," rather than an attempt at something darker. JMP Securities’ Satya Bajpai said in the piece that there is likely to be more such blockchain acqui-hires going forward, as startups shrink and tech giants start to move into the blockchain space. Snapping up groups of talent in this way allows corporates to quickly assemble a team for a particular use case, he added. THE REST
SOCIABLE: Real estate and finance company Elevated Returns is planning on tokenizing $1 billion-worth of property on the Tezos blockchain, according to Sociable. The company has already held a sale of a security token on behalf of popular Colorado resort St. Regis Aspen Resort – a mid-2018 project that targeted $18 million in token-based funding. For that effort, Elevated Returns utilized the Ethereum blockchain, but it now says it will use Tezos for its property tokenization in future sales. According to the piece, the firm said Tezos’ platform is better suited to asset tokenization and offers better smart contract security. Elevated Returns ultimately hopes the move will “future proof” its token business model. The way real-estate tokenization can divide traditionally large investments into fractions potentially opens up the market to ordinary investors who might otherwise be priced out, the piece says. WASHINGTON TIMES: China is leaving the U.S. in the dust when it comes to cryptos, according to an opinion piece in The Washington Times by Charles Sauer. While China has built up a "majority control" of the two largest cryptos, bitcoin and ethereum, in terms of mining, the U.S. is still having a debate about having a debate on policy and regulation. The U.S. needs to act now, he continues, and provide a clear framework for cryptocurrencies that defines tokens based on new asset classes. The current “regulatory purgatory” risks losing U.S. firms to nations with clearer frameworks. Worse, Sauer writes, businesses could close over concerns their crypto product might be deemed a security risk by the SEC. |
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