Category: Bitcoin

Aristocrat Shakes Up Social Casino Games with Big Fish Deal

Reading Time: 2 minutes

Last week, in a rare twist of events, Australian gambling machine manufacturers Aristocrat Leisure announced its intent to buy social casino games development company Big Fish Games in Seattle. The $990 million game deal is a rare occurrence hence it did not draw a lot of attention but from the looks of it, the results will definitely be headliners in social casino circles.

Apparently, this deal with Aristocrat Leisure is Big Fish Games’ second major dealer – in 2014, Big Fish Games was bought by Kentucky Derby owner Churchill Downs for $885 million. Now, Aristocrat also seems to be toying with the idea of incorporating a business model that mixes their gambling expertise through their slot machine business and non-gambling social casino games where players get to play on virtual slot machines but without the perks of being able to win real money.

“The surprise announcement to acquire Big Fish for nearly $1 billion combined with its recent acquisition of Plarium for $500 million will transform Aristocrat’s digital business into a business that should generate in excess of $1.1 billion in revenues and $250 million in [EBITDA, or profit before taxes etc.] next year,”Eilers &Krejcik analyst Adam Krejcik said. “Following the acquisition of Big Fish, we expect Aristocrat will be the No. 2 social casino publisher worldwide. Additionally, Big Fish (along with Plarium) will help expand the company’s addressable market opportunities as it relates to social games.”

Aristocrat Leisure’s stakeholders are anticipating that the deal will be closed within the first quarter of 2018 pending regulatory approval which should follow shortly after. If things go as well as
Aristocrat hopes and the company effectively executes on the revenue expectations, Aristocrat is set to outgrow rival game company Zynga whose current market value is $2.5 billion.

“Big Fish’s digital-first social casino content and industry-leading meta-game capability and applications are highly complementary to Aristocrat’s existing and industry-leading land-based digital content business. The acquisition of Big Fish will immediately provide scale across our entire digital platform” said Trevor Croker, Aristocrat’s chief executive officer. “The strategic and financial benefits from the acquisition are highly compelling”

After the acquisition, Big Fish Games will continue to operate independently as a stand-alone business and this will be alongside two other Aristocrat-owned digital businesses, Plarium, and Product Madness. Furthermore, players will still get to enjoy fan-favorite Big Fish titles like Fairway Solitaire and Gummy Drop! as well as amazing titles from Big Fish’s globally top-ranked social casino app, Big Fish Casino.

Bitcoin Bubble Burst: The App That Warns Against Crashes

Reading Time: 2 minutes

One thing that ardent Bitcoin lovers and the usual Bitcoin vultures have in common is their need to keep their eyes on the charts – everyone seems to be having bubble predictions which are simply anticipations of a crash that is expected anytime soon. On Sunday afternoon Bitcoin’s value shot up to over $11,770 from a low of $9,9400 on Thursday. This rapid 1,434% increase in value that has been witnessed in just a few months has led people to think that its volatility is a clear indication that the Bitcoin bubble will burst soon.

Now, innovative apps are coming into play to help the Bitcoin community in monitoring changes in Bitcoin’s prices. Presented at the Disrupt Berlin hackathon, the Bitcoin Bubble Burst app is one such handy tool that allows Bitcoin users to focus on other important things while it monitors changes in Bitcoin’s price and related news events then alerts the users in real time. There are, of course, plenty other apps that offer alert services for changes in Bitcoin prices or trading volumes but the creators of Bitcoin Bubble Burst are offering something totally different with their app. While none of the other similar apps offer adequate warnings, Bitcoin Bubble Burst makes use of neural networks and an advanced machine learning system that they trained on data linked to Bitcoin price changes. These include trading patterns as well as key news items all of which are detected by the Bitcoin Bubble Burst’s system and once they attain a certain vital threshold, users are alerted via email with a logical justification of the warning.

“Sometimes huge events, like the ban of Bitcoin in China, are mentioned in social media and the news – before it affects the value,” the creators of BBB say on their website. The idea behind the project was not just to spot and monitor the dynamics of the Bitcoin ecosystem but also to offer Bitcoin users relevant advice on whether they should either buy or sell. Also, according to the creators, Bitcoin Bubble Burst will not have ads or spam and it will be an open source, encrypted service that will only give alerts when they are important.

Fundamentally speaking, the Bitcoin world is still unpredictable which therefore implies that the viability of this app, and other similar ones, still needs to be tested over a significantly extensive stretch of time. Other than that, the idea of having an app that does all the hard work for you is exceptional. Who wouldn’t want that?

Survivalists and Doomsday Preppers Switching from Gold to Bitcoin

Reading Time: 2 minutes

It is now safe to say that this is officially Bitcoin week. Other than just breaking barriers and reaching all-time highs of over $11,000 the decentralized digital currency has also caused quite a stir in the financial world. People have been wondering what the hell is happening right now in regards to Bitcoin’s speculated price changes. Will it go higher? Will it crash again? By now, Bitcoin has already managed to dwarf some of the largest financial market bubbles in history – and if it is indeed a bubble, then what next for its enthusiastic adopters?

Some North American doomsday and survivalist preppers, however, have a different opinion regarding Bitcoin. In addition to the usual humongous supply of nonperishable food that they usually have stacked away in their doomsday bunkers, the preppers are now ditching the habit of stockpiling gold bars and coins for the invisible Bitcoin wallets in cyberspace – they are confident about the internet staying intact even if the world’s civilization collapses. Devoted survivalists are convinced that the decentralized cryptocurrency is definitely going to survive or endure global pandemics, economic collapse, catastrophes, climate change and even nuclear war. Very enticing, right?

While it seems rather counter-intuitional that some of Bitcoin’s most fervent proponents are a group of people whose motivation is in the belief that public and global infrastructures will crumple on the onset of social, economic and political distress, it is undeniable that these same group of people are partly key determinants of Bitcoin’s future. As it happens, these survivalists have very different perspectives when it comes to Bitcoin which they have labeled the currency of the future – this has been further propelled by Bitcoin’s 900% plus increase within the last ten months. To these people, Bitcoin is going to rival the euro, the dollar, the yen and even gold all of which are not doomsday-proof.

“People see Bitcoin prices going to the moon. No one thinks gold is going to the moon”

There have always been discussions about the pros and cons of cryptocurrencies especially on survivalist forums such as survivalistboards.com and mysurvivalforum.com and from what we could gather, the tides have shifted significantly. To put this into perspective, as Bitcoin’s value soars higher and higher more people are considering investing in decentralized digital currencies – now “buy Bitcoin” registers as a far more popular search phrase on Google as compared to “buy gold.” In fact, the US Mint’s gold coin sales are reported to have recorded decade-lows within the first quarter of 2017.  Still, the faith in Bitcoin can perhaps be attributed to its similarity to gold – both have a finite supply which, according to Bitcoin supporters, makes it immune to inflation. Digital currencies have been portrayed as the ‘knight in shining armor’ when it comes to breaking the society’s dependence on state monopoly over the issuance of currencies in a bid to dominate the economy. Bitcoin is definitely on a roll but is the quest for economic liberation enough to keep it going? Who knows? Maybe what everyone really needs is a guide to surviving Bitcoin, or surviving with Bitcoin.

2017 Gains Soar to 940% as Bitcoin Tops $10,000

Reading Time: 2 minutes

This week has been a great week for Bitcoin – the virtual currency soared to an all-time high above the $10,000 value which had been highly anticipated by many of its followers. But will it hold? As of now, Bitcoin seems to be doing pretty well on various major digital currency indexes and major exchanges including the renowned Luxembourg-based BitStamp. This year alone, Bitcoin has broken a ton of records by soaring to over 900% of its initial value at the beginning of January 2017 thus registering the largest gain of nearly all asset classes while at the same time having to cope with the increased institutional and market demand for crypto-currencies. Evidently, mainstream use of Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies has increased significantly and the horizons are looking clear, in most part.

Still, cryptocurrencies are still met with a significant amount of skepticism – Bitcoin’s value and price surge are seen by some of these skeptics to be nothing more than a speculative bubble that does not relate to any real financial market or the economy as a whole. Among the skeptics is leading banker and Credit Suisse Chief Executive Tidjane Thiam who openly expressed skepticism for Bitcoin saying;

“From what we can identify, the only reason today to buy or sell Bitcoin is to make money, which is the very definition of speculation and the very definition of a bubble.”

There have been endless raging debates regarding the legitimacy of Bitcoin but the fact that the decentralized digital currency has managed to stay afloat despite a number of major crashes across its 9-year lifespan has put certain opinions under review for reconsideration. Bitcoin’s value may vary from one market to another but the escalating trend of its value seems to be stabilizing and this is a core concern for potential investors and the Bitcoin community. Will it hold? How high can it get? We will just have to wait and see.

Good Weekly Start for Bitcoin as It Tops $9000 Mark

Reading Time: 2 minutes

Bitcoin’s forward trajectory has continued with the cryptocurrency’s dollar price rising above the $9000 mark – as of today, it stands at $9730 as it draws closer to the $10,000 region. This should come as no surprise as Bitcoin has gained a lot of popularity by breaching its all-time highs month after month. The price surge is expected to continue and maintain a similar trend as we approach 2018. This year, 2017, has been a particularly great year for Bitcoin in regards to its value. What began as a $1000-mark breach back in January marked the onset of the currency’s best year.

Is Bitcoin Liquidity Increasing?

In just two weeks or less, Bitcoins’ price has shot up from less than $7800 to over $9060, a surge that has caused a significant increase in its trading volume from about $2 billion to over $4.6 billion. This makes Bitcoin more liquid than even the most liquid stock in the world, a title that was previously held by Apple. Furthermore, Bitcoin now processes more trades than the major stock markets in the world like KOSDAQ in South Korea. As major financial institutions like the Man Group, a $95 billion hedge fund, participate in strictly regulated Bitcoin exchanges in the coming weeks, the price of Bitcoin might surpass $10,000 sooner than anticipated. In fact, financial firms like StandPoint and Wall Street analysts have already set new highs for Bitcoin’s interim price target moving it up from the previous $10,000 to $14,000.

According to StandPoint founder Ronnie Moas, “There have been many positive developments during the last five months and a few of the obstacles that were in Bitcoin’s way have been knocked down.”

Bitcoin mining is now more profitable than it has ever been in its 9-year life – only 4.3 million Bitcoins are left to mine as nearly 75 percent of the decentralized currency has already been mined and is used in the over 250,000 daily transactions on the network.

New USD Highs as Bitcoin Bull-Run Primes Altcoin Markets

Reading Time: 2 minutes

After recently establishing an all-time high of nearly $8400, Bitcoin has currently consolidated above $8000 a situation that has resulted in a liquidity shift towards the general altcoin markets. The outcome has been in favor of several of the major altcoins which have recorded very high dollar values even though the prices, when compared to Bitcoin’s value, can be considered to be relatively modest. For instance, Ethereum recorded a new all-time high value of about $420 with the prices stabilizing well above the $400 mark.

At the time of this writing, one Bitcoin is equivalent to about $8140 after it set a new record after establishing a new all-time high value of approximately $8380. Also, Bitcoins current total market capitalization stands significantly above $136 billion – the 24-hour trading volume is also well over $4 billion. This reasserts the market dominance that Bitcoin currently enjoys – it sits at 53.1% which, however, represents a 5% drop from its value a week ago.

Mark Keiser, host of Russia Today’s ‘Keiser Report’ anticipates that the price of Bitcoin is likely to soar from its current $8000 Value to new highs of about $100,000. While it is certainly still too early to tell how his predictions will play out, he has continued to express his confidence in the cryptocurrency’s market dominance saying that;

“Hundreds of obituaries have been written about bitcoin and none of them have come true and none will. Fact is, bitcoin is a gift from God to help humanity sort out the mess it has made with its money.”

November has not been a very good month for Bitcoin – its markets fell by approximately 28% shortly after attaining the preceding all-time high of $7890. This represents Bitcoins largest red weekly candle since its inception. Nonetheless, after dropping to its $5450 all-time low, Bitcoin rapidly regained its momentum and recovered to produce its largest weekly candle when it broke above the $8000 mark.

CME Announces Bitcoin Futures for December!

Reading Time: 2 minutes

In somewhat of an unexpected twist, CME has released its Bitcoin Futures market specifications with the date being officially announced on November 19. The launch date is, however, still awaiting relevant regulatory approval, a situation that the CME Group elaborated in a recent update that read, “Effective Sunday 10 December 2017 for trade date Monday 11 December 2017, and pending all relevant regulatory review periods, please be advised that CME will launch Bitcoin Futures.” Thus, the market will certainly need to wait a little longer even though most of the relevant information has been dispensed – the contract unit for the futures is $25 or 5 index points to be quoted in Bitcoin per US dollar and will be listed on CME, CME’s Globex central standard time and Clearport.

With this year’s planned Bitcoin Futures product, CME, which is currently the largest Futures exchange in the world, intends to prevent extreme Bitcoin volatility. In a CNBC interview, CME Chairman and CEO Terry Duffy expressed his confidence in CME’s self-certification process and the application process. He further confirmed the launch dates by hinting at the possibility of trading beginning by the second week of December 2017. This comes after CME’s huge revelation in October that it had been seeking approval from regulators to launch a Bitcoin-related product. During the reveal, CME expected to keep the futures to be settled through cash and be dependent on existing of 2016’s prevailing price indices – this has since changed and will be based on the Bitcoin Reference Rate. CME’s Bitcoin futures will be capped at price limits of 20% above or below the settlement price. Similarly, there is going to be a spot position limit of 1,000 contracts.

CME has been preparing for the launch for quite a while now as portrayed by Duffy’s sentiments during the CNBC interview where he went ahead to explain;

“I’m going to implement something. If the market drops precipitously, we’ll stop trading, and if we think a product is going away, we have the longs, we have the shorts, we’ll match them up at a price and that’s the way our rules read today.”

This has drawn a lot of attention from the Bitcoin community and everyone is looking forward to seeing how CME’s involvement will impact Bitcoin’s ecosystem.

While some Bitcoin users are speculating that Bitcoin spot markets will be less volatile with CME’s Futures products, stabilizing the weighty fluctuations in the price of Bitcoin with Futures markets is more theoretical than practical. Bitcoin’s price has already transcended the $8000 mark – an upward momentum that is expected to lead the cryptocurrency to all-time highs by the end of the year. To be more specific, Bitcoin’s price is likely to extrapolate towards the $10,000 mark in December if investors from various institutions and hedge funds buy into it.

Phil Ivey Nabs New Deal as Virtue Poker Adviser

Reading Time: 2 minutes

Just days after Tony G, renowned poker player, declared his support for CoinPoker, Virtue Poker which is also an online cryptocurrency-based online poker startup has signed another poker superstar to be its adviser. Phil Ivey is considered to be one of the best poker players of all time and his inclusion in Virtue Poker’s attempt at revolutionizing cryptocurrency-based online poker is a massive step forward. The Virtue Poker team has been busy fine-tuning their site and software ahead of their scheduled 2018 launch with Ivey’s signing coming just a couple of months after fellow poker bigwigs, Brian Rast and Dan Colman were signed by the Ethereum–based startup as its ambassadors. Joining the Virtue Poker team makes Phil Ivey one of the latest pro poker players to show support and advocate for the involvement of cryptocurrencies in online casino gaming, a trend that while is still in its baby steps is expected to take the entire casino industry by storm.

With cryptocurrencies like Ethereum and Bitcoin constantly showing an upward trend in their value, Ivey expressed his faith in the initiative pointing out that the peer-to-peer nature of Virtue Poker’s take on cryptocurrency-based online poker will definitely ramp up the value of every poker player’s online gaming experience.

“I’m looking forward to serving as a strategic adviser to the Virtue Poker team. I believe their new peer-to-peer solution built using blockchain technology can add significant value to the online poker experience,” Phil Ivey said during the announcement of his signing.

In essence, the peer-to-peer blockchain technology the startup uses makes data processing more transparent and safer – the system is decentralized thus making it less prone to fraud. Poker players will, therefore, have to worry less about safety and transparency as the blocks of data will be processed right on their computers. To put this into perspective, Virtue Poker co-founder Ryan Gittleson assures players that, “Instead of trusting a random number generator from an operator stored in some offshore server, every single player has an RNG built into the machine that they utilize and they shuffle the deck for each hand played on the platform.”

Virtue Poker also uses a peer-to-peer card shuffling protocol called Mental Poker where each and every player at the poker tables takes part in the shuffling of the cards making it impossible for poker operators to see players’ cards. These solutions are aimed at some of the biggest and most persistent detrimental issues in the online poker industry such as the unauthorized access to and misuse of players’ money as well as the illegal access to players’ cards by employees of online poker operators.

Phil Ivey and his fellow Virtue Poker Colleagues, Dan Colman and Brain Rast are going to work together alongside the Virtue Poker team to revamp online poker. These poker superstars were probably the best decisions the startup has made since each of them has quite a lot to bring to the table. Ivey, for instance, has several contacts within the casino industry as well as in-depth knowledge about branding and the dynamics of the poker industry, all of which will strengthen Virtue Poker’s foundation and reputation ahead of its 2018 launch date.

Why Zimbabwe Locals Can’t Get Enough of Bitcoin

Reading Time: 2 minutes

Everyone knows that Bitcoin is a safe haven for those who live in countries with political turmoil because the government can’t control it. Citizens of Zimbabwe are far from trusting their own government due to their unreliable political leaders.

Just last week the price of one bitcoin hit $13000 (USD) which is astonishingly almost double the international market price. This sudden rise in demand can be attributed to the news that president Robert Mugabe was put under house arrest by military leaders.

As political turmoil increases in Zimbabwe, the price of Bitcoin can only keep growing as the people lose faith in their government controlled local currency and financial companies. Bitcoin is by far their best option as a storage of value that guarantees security.

It was reported that the top Zimbabwe cryptocurrency exchange, Golix, had processed trading volumes of more than $1 million this past month which is a record breaking number for the country. In these 30 days alone, it had beat the 2016 year by almost tenfold.

“It is an unregulated platform and prices for bitcoin and other currencies are set by supply and demand”
– Taurai Chinyamakobvu, co-owner of Golix

Zimbabwe has always had an issue with currency inflation and it was not until 2009 that hyperinflation made the Zimbabwean dollar worthless. With no local currency, they have been forced to use US dollars and South African rand. It’s safe to say that more and more citizens will slowly transition to cryptocurrencies as global presence increases.

It is likely that Zimbabwe is only one of the many countries where its people will see huge value in Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies that allow them to be in control of their own money. Although he advantages of the digital coin are obvious, it’s difficult to say what will happen in the future in terms of possible regulations and bans.

The Story Behind the Rise and Fall of Bitcoin Cash

Reading Time: 2 minutes

“Bitcoin and Bitcoin Cash will coexist and serve different cases, just like Bitcoin and Ethereum. It is not a zero-sum game. Work on building your project, not on destroying the other,” that was what Bitcoin and security expert, Andreas Antonopoulos had to say to affirm the fact that Bitcoin Cash indeed has a market share based on its ability to serve immediate payments and short-term scaling. This comes after Xapo president Ted Rogers declared that the recent price trend exhibited by the cryptocurrency was not sustainable. But where did this all start?

In an unexpected twist, Bitcoin Cash soared to an all-time high price of $2800 on November 12 – a situation that made the three-month-old cryptocurrency the sole beneficiary of the SegWit2x hard fork cancellation. Nevertheless, this glorious achievement was short-lived with Bitcoin Cash struggling to sustain the upward momentum of its price which eventually dropped to $1100 in just a couple of days. Luckily for Bitcoin Cash users and traders, the price has stabilized at around $1110 as of now.

The collapse of the SegWit2x plan that was potentially the main cause for the dramatic pump in Bitcoin Cash’s price has been attributed to the lack of consensus among Bitcoin community members. There have been varying opinions regarding the future of Bitcoin and Bitcoin Cash with some still portraying an element of optimism while others expecting worse scenarios considering the over 50% retrace that the currency experienced earlier. The high prices of cryptocurrencies, like Bitcoin, have attracted millions of users who may or may not be savvy with the concepts revolving around these. The result, especially among the less savvy cryptocurrency users has culminated in the form of confusion which makes matters even worse. In fact, some cannot even tell the difference between Bitcoin and Bitcoin Cash – which leads us to the unpleasant reality that awaits. So, what can we expect?

According to Auxesis Group chairman and Cashaa founder Kumar Gaurav, “The quick rise [of BCH] from around 600 to 2400 USD in a few days makes it look like a typical artificial pump which was already being followed by a dump back to $1300 USD within 30 min. As compared to the FX market, the crypto market is still small, it is easy to do that and cannot be used to estimate the future of BTC vs BCC.” He further adds that unlike Bitcoin which has already surpassed a lot of expectations, Bitcoin Cash still has a long way to go before its growth in the long term can be estimated.

Divergent opinions suggest that there is still room for both flavors of Bitcoin to co-exist thanks to the increasing number of cryptocurrency users. In Hoskinson’s words, “Bitcoin Cash seems to be a productive split with its existence neither threatening Bitcoin’s nor requiring support from Bitcoin’s remaining adherents. Now Bitcoin is free to provide its small-block vision and cash the large block. My hope is that this will reduce fighting in the long run as both sides realize that the other isn’t going away. Just like we did with Ethereum and Ethereum classic.”