Crypto Guides, Knowledge & Insights

MicroStrategy stock finally takes a breather following massive BTC-inspired rally

Shares of MicroStrategy (MSTR), a business intelligence firm with considerable exposure to Bitcoin (BTC), declined sharply on Monday as profit-taking ensued following a parabolic rally over the past month.　　The stock touched an intraday low of $464.51 in New York trading, representing a decline of almost 13%. It would later pare losses to trade around $500 pe share. At current values, the company has a total market capitalization of around $4.6 billion. Last week, the stock peaked just below $512, marking a new all-time high.　　MSRT went parabolic after CEO Michael Saylor decided to buy Bitcoin. Source: Yahoo Finance　　The broader equity market was also under pressure on Monday, with the S&P 500 Index and tech-heavy Nasdaq each falling more than half a percent.　　MSRT‘s pullback coincided with a sharp decline in both the price of Bitcoin and the broader crypto markets as investors took profits following a relentless surge over the past three weeks. Even with the decline, MSRT’s share price has gained a whopping 300% since last summer when CEO Michael Saylor first disclosed the companys Bitcoin position.　　MicroStrategy is the worlds largest corporate holder of Bitcoin, with 70,470 BTC on its books as of Monday, according to industry data.　　The firm has been

2021-01-12Deep Dive

Pirated Academic Database Sci-Hub Is Now on the ‘Uncensorable Web’

The pirated database of academic papers is now accessible directly through the services portals as well as through NextDNS, a privacy-focused, cloud-based domain name service resolver which converts IP addresses into domain names.　　“The DNS is like a phonebook for the internet. The addresses in the phonebook are the server IP addresses. DNS was created to give IP addresses human-readable names so with our platform, youre finding the IP address through Handshake, not through a certificate authority,” Namebase CEO Tieshun Roquerre told CoinDesk.　　For a website that has had various domain names revoked over the years and which is now suspended from Twitter, the censorship-resistant DNS will help keep Sci-Hub accessible even as the legacy domain name system applies pressure.　　Sci-Hub is a worldwide database of academic publications, which pulls the research papers from under the paywalls of academic magazines and uploads them to the internet for everyone to download and read. Its maintained by a single coder from Kazakhstan, Alexandra Elbakyan, who is raising donations via Russian payment network Yandex and bitcoin， CoinDesk wrote last year.　　How does Handshake work？　　Handshake is “is effectively a decentralized domain name server,” Roquerre said. Instead of using the web-standard certificate authority to authenticate user connections to a

2021-01-12Deep Dive

Babel Finance Is Letting Crypto Mining Firms Use Machines as Loan Collateral

Babel Finance is letting bitcoin mining firms put up their machines as loan collateral so the lender can offer them better terms.　　The loan-to-value ratio (LTV) for these loans is 30%, in part because Babel keeps the freshly mined crypto until the borrower pays back the loan. The LTV is significantly cheaper than the 160% Babel normally charges, which means borrowers would need to put up $1.6 million worth of bitcoin in order to borrow $1 million in U.S. dollars. 　　In a bull market miners are increasingly uneasy parting ways with mined cryptocurrency. These loans allow the miners to cover expenses like paying electricity bills or purchasing new equipment while giving up less BTC or ETH.　　“For miners, the biggest asset they have is their machines,” said Lei Tong, Babels managing director of financial services. “After the March 12 price drop, they really wanted to keep as many coins as possible. Putting their machines up as a mortgage is a much better way for them to get loans versus using bitcoin.” 　　The service launched in June 2020 and has since accumulated $22 million worth of machine-backed loans. 　　To offer the service, Babel has teamed with the worlds largest ETH mining pool, Spark

2021-01-12Deep Dive

Institutions Use This Strategy to Hide Their Bitcoin Orders

Institutional investors and speculators trading large quantities of bitcoin are taking on a new method to hide the real sizes of their trades. They are doing so – many times with the quiet help of many major exchanges – to cut the risk of exposing their intent to the market, be they bullish or bearish, which can cause unfavorable price moves.　　　　Avi Felman, head of trading at BlockTower, took note of one such trade in the last week of December when someone, or possibly an institution, bought a substantial amount of bitcoin (BTC, +1.14%) on U.S.-based crypto exchange Coinbase. However, the order book only showed a constant bid (buy order) for 20-40 bitcoin. Essentially a large quantity was purchased via multiple small orders.　　“Somone [sic] (@elonmusk？) has been sitting 20-40 bitcoin on the Coinbase bid and reloading since $26,800,” Felman tweeted on Dec. 31.　　Avi Felman　　This has broader implications for what happens in the market. Thats because if an institution were to post a large-sized order, it would telegraph its position to the rest of the market, causing prices to move against it. Having smaller orders, in essence, fools the market into thinking there is not much interest at lower price levels when

2021-01-12Deep Dive

Bitcoin’s Active Addresses, Trading Volumes Now at All-Time Highs

Trading volumes and active addresses for bitcoin have now surpassed their previous all-time highs during the last crypto bull run in 2017, and the data has given some analysts confidence the bull market for bitcoin is not over yet.　　Source: CryptoCompare　　Data from CryptoCompare shows that bitcoin trading volumes on the eight major exchanges tracked on the CoinDesk 20 have passed $11 billion, a new all-time high from the previous record during 2017s crypto bull market.　　“This is first and foremost a sign of how much bigger and mature the industry is, with a lot more money flowing on these exchanges,” Bendik Norheim Schei, head of research at Arcane Research, told CoinDesk. “It is great to see higher volumes, making the market more liquid and efficient.”　　The surging volume due to Mondays sell-off came in part from newcomers to the market, according to Schei.　　“Some of this volume is definitely from new and unexperienced investors entering the market for the first time and panicking when the price starts falling,” he said. “These corrections are necessary and healthy, even in a bull market.”　　At the same time, the number of active bitcoin addresses has also broke its previous record on Jan. 8, according to data from Glassnode.　　The

2021-01-12Deep Dive

Yearn.finance founder hints at collaboration with top DeFi protocol Curve

Over the past few months, Yearn.finance (YFI) has been on a collaboration spree.　　Late last year, project founder Andre Cronje announced that it would be absorbing Pickle Finance, a DeFi yield aggregator. This was followed by a series of other announcements in which Cronje revealed that Yearn.finance would be absorbing the resources of other protocols to realize key synergies.　　By now, Yearn.finance has Pickle Finance, Cream Finance, Akropolis, SushiSwap, and Cover Protocol under its expanding wings.　　Cronje is not done yet, though. On Saturday, the developer revealed that his team is currently working with the Curve team on an unannounced project.　　YFI x CRV　　On Sunday, Curve turned one year old. Yearn, launched as iEarn, is now also around one year old.　　Both projects launched in early 2020, as did Aave, to kick off the explosion in the DeFi space that took place last year.　　Thus far, Yearn‘s involvement with Curve could arguably be seen as “parasitic.” Right now, users deposit stablecoins into Yearn’s Vault system, which is then used to systematically yield farm and dump Curve‘s native token, CRV. It is sometimes argued, in fact, that Yearn’s Vaults are one reason why CRV has performed so poorly since its launch in Q3 2020.　　This may soon change,

2021-01-11Deep Dive

HSBC Blocks Transactions From Crypto Exchanges

As Bitcoin cools from its recent all-time high, HSBC has become the latest banking giant to restrict what its customers can invest in by preventing them from transferring any profits from crypto exchanges to their bank accounts.ban　　According to a recent report in The Sunday Times, HSBC has blocked transactions to or from crypto exchanges as it takes a heavy-handed approach to Bitcoin and its brethren. A number of U.K. banks have also made moves to prevent their customers from buying crypto assets using their debit or credit cards.　　The U.K. is regarded as one of the more anti-crypto nations, alongside the U.S., as its financial institutions and regulators have increasingly strived to stifle the industry.　　More Banking Duplicity　　CNBC host and Onchain Capital founder, Ran Neuner, pointed out that customers will ultimately make the choice to bank elsewhere when faced with draconian restrictions on what they can and cant do with their own money;　　Many banks will put themselves out of business like this. pic.twitter.com/7JvRT777qT　　— Ran Neuner (@cryptomanran) January 9, 2021　　Jason Yanowitz from Block Works Group added;　　“Legacy financial institutions will do everything in their power to stop this movement. Theyre literally denying their customers access to the greatest performing asset of the past decade.”　　Banks

2021-01-11Deep Dive

Solana (SOL) trading volume soars as DeFi investors seek ETH alternatives

2021 got off to a quick start and the current crypto bull market has seen assets like Bitcoin (BTC) and Ether (ETH) shoot to new all-time highs on an almost daily basis.　　While new price highs are positive for investors, they do present a range of challenges relating to fees, transaction speeds and the centralization of what is meant to be a decentralized ecosystem. Since mid-2020 institutional investors have been steadily flooding into cryptocurrency and this is exacerbating the issue of scalability, high transaction costs and lengthy confirmation times on the Bitcoin and Ethereum blockchain.　　Eth2 is steadily rolling out, but it could still be some time before users will benefit from its host of new features. This leaves the door open for other viable candidates to fill the void and a handful of layer 2 projects are gaining traction in the decentralized finance space.　　One such project that has been making waves in the past 6 months is Solana (SOL). Founded by Anatoly Yakovenko and designed a team of former engineers from globally recognized companies including Intel, Dropbox, and Qualcomm, Solana claims to be a censorship-resistant blockchain that provides the open infrastructure required for global adoption.　　SOL/USDT 4-hour chart. Source: TradingView　　Some experts view

2021-01-11Deep Dive

Bitcoin Collapses to $37K as Miners Start Dumping Their Coins

Bitcoin, the largest cryptocurrency, dropped below the $38,000 at 17:23 UTC on the Bitstamp exchange after trading at as high as $41,450 earlier today.　　The cryptocurrency is currently down almost five percent over the past 24 hours.　　Image by tradingview.com　　Miners are in a selling mood　　As noted by CryptoQuant CEO Ki Young Ju, the Miners Position Index (MPI) recently reached its highest level since July 2019, the month Bitcoin topped out at roughly $13,700 before seeing a huge correction.　　Image by @ki_young_ju　　Very high MPI readings suggest that miners are actively taking profits instead of accumulating, thus exerting pressure on the market.　　Bitcoin is extremely overbought　　Earlier today, NorthmanTraders lead market strategist Sven Henrich noticed that the relative strength index (RSI) had reached 93, it highest level ever, on the weekly Bitcoin chart. This suggests that the volatile commodity is extremely overbought.　　Image by @NorthmanTrader　　However, earlier this week, veteran trader Peter Brandt claimed that assets typically remain overbought during raging bull markets, which is exactly what happened during Bitcoins last bullish cycles.

2021-01-11Deep Dive

Maker’s Daily Transfers Hit All-Time High as Price Surges by 50%

Makers transfer volume over the last 24 hours hit an ATH of $11 million, surpassing the former ATH set on 13 August 2020 of $10.9 million, according to metrics site Glassnode.　　The transfer volume describes the total value of coins transferred on-chain.　　Glassnode distinguishes between transfer volume, which involves the transfer of wealth between network participants, and overall trading volume on exchanges, some of which occurs off-chain and also comprises reshuffling between internal wallets. Daily trading volume for Maker today sits at close to $1 billion.　　Makers price also rose by over 50% in the last 24 hours. Taken together, the metrics indicate a greatly heightened demand in the token.　　Maker‘s price largely fluctuated in the $500s throughout most of December, though by New Year’s Day it crossed $600, a growth spurt that remained an important portent for its performance since. On January 6 it hit a remarkable ATH (albeit briefly) of $1,244. Today it stands at an impressive ATH of around $1,750.　　MKR‘s recent rally is the result of a growing DeFi sector. MKR is a governance token that helps stabilize MakerDAO’s native stablecoin, DAI, at a price of $1.　　Buying a governance token is like buying shares in a company. MKR holders, for example,

2021-01-11Deep Dive

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