From Bitcoin’s back-to-the-future potential to news on a big upgrade for Ethereum, here’s a look at some of the stories breaking in the world of crypto.
Bitcoin
A technical analyst who writes for crypto news outlet Bitcoinist is backing Bobby Lee’s prediction that Bitcoin is on the long road to $333,000.
Lee, the co-founder of Hong Kong-based crypto exchange BTCC and crypto analyst Filb Filb, a frequent contributor on TradingView, are basing their math on the dramatic and cyclical rise and fall in the price of BTC in the past, which has plunged by about 87% before the next bull run.
Filb’s chart shows BTC hitting rock bottom around $2,500 – $3,100 over the next year, and trading below $10,000 in 2019. After Bitcoin’s next halving around May 27, 2020, BTC’s price, based on historical swings, could soar to $332,733.
Flib notes that traders and investors should always do their own research and that his predictions are never financial advice.
Ripple and XRP
Ripple’s senior vice president of product Asheesh Birla says that moving into 2019, finance remains the clear established use case for crypto.
In a new write up at CoinDesk, Birla compares the current state of crypto to the early days of the internet.
“Over the last few years, the crypto space deviated from the original vision of financial access, which was well articulated in Satoshi Nakamoto’s bitcoin white paper. Similar to the internet boom and bust, nearly every imaginable use case from tracking flower freshness to Kodakcoin used blockchain as a buzzword to gain influence and attract eyeballs.
However, just like the early internet, use cases have to match where the technology is in its development stage. For example, Netflix wouldn’t have been successful streaming TV shows in the year 2000 when fewer than one percent of people had access to broadband.
In the last few years, it’s become clear that payments are the one use case where blockchain works today.”
Ethereum
The release manager for the Parity Ethereum client says Ethereum is on track to launch its Constantinople upgrade on January 16th.
The upgrade is designed to optimize network efficiency and also change Ethereum’s miner rewards policy.
Stellar
Interstellar, the decentralized exchange built on the Stellar network, just launched a major upgrade.
“With Interstellar v3.5, we took our most unique feature, the crypto asset swap, and transformed it from something good to something insanely great. It now allows anyone to swap between any two crypto assets on the SDEX (Stellar Decentralized Exchange), even without a direct market between those two crypto assets. We achieve this feat by FINDING the best PATH between any two assets and use only the best path to swap one crypto asset for another. Hence the internal codename: PathFinder.”
Litecoin
Litecoin officially stepped into the ring at the UFC this weekend.
The Litecoin logo was featured front-and-center in the main event rematch between UFC light heavyweight champion Jon Jones and UFC light heavyweight Alexander Gustafsson.
Cardano
IOHK, the team behind Cardano (ADA), is launching what it calls the Cardano Ambassador Program.
“Cardano Ambassadors are people in the community who go above and beyond and provide regular, consistent and positive contributions to the project. This may be helping translate information on Cardano into other languages or organizing meetups in their local area. Whatever it may be, this program helps us recognize and acknowledge their good work! Furthermore, this program will help raise awareness and promote the Cardano project around the world.”
IOHK is calling out four roles that ambassadors can play to help grow and foster the Cardano community, including Meetup organizers, moderators, content creators and translators.