Author: RareHippo News
Depending on who you ask, cash will not remain king. The Covid-19 pandemic not only accelerated the shift toward digital and contactless payments, but also led to a more mainstream acceptance of physical cash alternatives like cryptocurrency that will likely stay, economist Eswar Prasad tells CNBC Make It. “For many consumers and businesses that made the switch to digital payments, there is probably no going back, even if the pandemic-related concerns about the tactile nature of cash were to recede,” says Prasad, author of “The Future of Money: How the Digital Revolution Is Transforming Currencies and Finance.” Prasad, a senior…
The world’s fastest-growing major financial exchange has no head office or formal address, lacks licenses in countries where it operates and has a chief executive who until recently wouldn’t answer questions about his location. Started just four years ago, Binance is the exchange giant that towers over the digital currency world, a crypto equivalent of the London, New York and Hong Kong stock exchanges combined. After a burst of growth, Binance processes more trades for cryptocurrencies such as bitcoin and ether each day, $76 billion worth, than its four largest competitors put together, according to data provider CryptoCompare. The years…
Investors may be better off owning bitcoin directly versus buying shares of Coinbase Global to avoid expected headwinds, including increasing competition and the ongoing “commoditization of cryptocurrency exchanges,” Mizuho Securities USA told clients in a note Thursday. Mizuho has a neutral recommendation on Coinbase shares and a $300 price target. Coinbase was recently trading at around $339 per share. Analyst Dan Dolev also said that yield compression continues to be a headwind for Coinbase, and “isn’t limited to one type of market condition.” Mizuho noted the performance of bitcoin and Coinbase have been similar since the latter’s first day of…
Many notable names are dipping their toes into crypto. Apple executive Tim Cook said Tuesday in an interview with DealBook that he owns crypto, has been interested in it for “a while” and that it’s “reasonable to own it as part of a diversified portfolio.” (He added, however, that he wasn’t giving investment advice and Apple itself didn’t plan on incorporating crypto into the company’s operations.) And he’s just the latest in string of celebrities and affluent entrepreneurs who are filling up their virtual wallets with bitcoin, ether, dogecoin, and other types of crypto. Here are the kinds of crypto…
Kazakhstan is struggling to meet the energy needs of its booming cryptocurrency mining industry, which is flourishing thanks to cheap power and an exodus of crypto miners from neighbouring China. The Central Asian nation of 19 million has become the world’s second-biggest bitcoin mining location after the United States in recent months, according to the Cambridge Centre for Alternative Finance. Now the government is trying to decide how to tax and regulate the largely underground and foreign-owned industry, which has forced the former Soviet republic to import power and ration domestic supplies. Moreover, local mining farms are mostly powered by…