Tag: blockchain

Singapore’s state investor, Temasek Holdings has officially been named a member of the Facebook-backed digital currency project Libra. Temasek as a portfolio value of 313 billion Singapore dollars (roughly $219 billion), making it one of the more prominent backers of Libra.      The Libra Association, an independent group based in Switzerland has also welcomed crypto investor Paradigm and Slow Ventures, a private equity firm.    Facebook, the company behind Libra, announced the digital currency initiative in 2018, which took the world by storm with its controversial project. With the ICO bubble having expanded exponentially in 2017, the public started to become aware of cryptocurrencies. Digital currency and cryptocurrency were still seen in the light of being scandalous, illicit, and u...

Visa applied for a new patent application to create a blockchain-based digital currency on a centralized computer, according to a publication by the US Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO).     The patent was originally filed in November 2019, and was described as “Digital Fiat Currency.” The US dollar was mentioned as one of the fiat currencies to be used potentially, although the patent could also apply to other central bank digital currencies including the pound, yen, and the euro.    Filed by Simon J. Hurry and Alexander Pierre with the Visa International Service Association, the application noted that Ethereum could be used as a possible network for the digital currency.   The central entity computer described in the patent will receive requests with details including the serial num...

China’s top digital bank WeBank has announced its partnership with Singaporean government-backed OpenNodes. This partnership will allow China’s FISCO BCOS blockchain platform to be brought to Singaporean academics for innovation and new initiatives. FISCO BCOS was deemed to be China’s version of Hyperledger Fabric when it was launched in 2018.      The Financial Blockchain Shenzhen Consortium (FISCO) is backed by more than 100 Chinese organizations, including Huawei, Tencent, JD Finance, and WeBank, which is partly backed by Tencent. Developed by FISCO, the enterprise blockchain protocol was the first blockchain to be supported by China’s Blockchain Service Network.   WeBank’s executive vice president and Chief Information Officer, Henry Ma said, “We seek to spur the next-generation tal...

Sunday’s episode of the Showtime series Billions featured a cryptocurrency mining scheme being executed in a prep school. The Bitcoin focused episode was written by Ben Mezrich, who also wrote the book Bitcoin Billionaires which tells the story of the Winklevoss twins, the venture capitalist’s behind the Gemini crypto exchange who are reported to own about 1% of Bitcoin’s total supply between them. Mezrich teased the episode on Twitter: Billions this Sunday night... I’m not sayin’ there’s definitely gonna be some Bitcoin... I’m just saying I did happen to write the episode...I mean, just sayin’... — Ben Mezrich (@benmezrich) May 14, 2020 Beg, Bribe, Bully The episode entitled “Beg, Bribe, Bully” told the story of Gordie Axelrod, son of the shows main character Bobby Axelrod. ...

The World Economic Forum (WEF) suggested that leaders around the world need to do more to ensure a quicker and more sustainable recovery for the global economy caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.      Amongst the 350 top risk professionals in the world surveyed, these risk managers expect a prolonged global recession, as a number of areas of concern were identified in the report compiled by the Forum’s Global Risks Advisory Board, Marsh & McLennan Companies Inc, and Zurich Insurance Group.   Half of the respondents expressed expected bankruptcies and industry consolidation, and failure of industries to recover, and a disruption of supply chains. The World Economic Forum published a report on the importance of blockchain in supply chain disruption amid the pandemic.    Saadia Zahidi, Ma...

The COVID-19 pandemic has brought many subjects to the forefront: our reliance on oil, manufacturing in China, the need for digital dollars, the frailty of our global supply chain, and our lack of preparation to deal with the outbreak. However, perhaps the strangest topic online and the most unavoidable has been the conspiracy theory chasing Bill Gates and his foundation’s efforts to produce a Covid-19 vaccine. The accusations range from him directly being the cause of the pandemic, to being the head of an Illuminati like circular cabal bent on controlling the world through microchips, and now an insidious plan to depopulate the planet of billions of people. Where we Came In We are a blockchain news site, while we absolutely love discussing technologies that may appear to border on fant...

A recent clip from a soon to be released documentary called ‘Plandemic’ features a disgraced virologist, Dr. Judy Mikovits accusing a sinister corporate-controlled “circular cabal” led by Bill Gates himself, of creating the coronavirus pandemic. Mikovits is adamant that this group she refers to as a “circular cabal” is led by Microsoft Founder turned philanthropist Bill Gates and she even goes on to accuse Dr. Anthony Fauci, the Director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases of burying her research which allegedly proved that vaccines weaken people’s immune systems and made them more vulnerable to the coronavirus. Disgraced Doctor’s COVID Theory Prior to the clip of Plandemic being released, Mikovits authored and published a book entitled ‘Plague of Corruption’ wh...

A billboard in Times Square has been hired by the ‘Free Ross’ movement as part of a campaign to release Ross Ulbricht, the founder of the Silk Road contraband marketplace on the darknet. Ross Ulbricht is currently serving a double life sentence for his role as a darknet marketplace entrepreneur. He is in the seventh year of his sentence and it would appear that he is unlikely to ever be released without a pardon. He is 36 years old. According to a tweet from the account ‘Clemency for Ross’, the billboard has been rented for several months. The post also claims the campaign message was paid for by a single ‘generous supporter’ and was not funded by any donations that they have received. Times Square says FREE ROSS! #FreeRoss2020 pic.twitter.com/lbeRvakH2c — Free_Ross (@Free_Ros...

Chinese officials are considering a cross-border Asian stablecoin in Hong Kong, to facilitate a cross-border payment network between three Asian countries, and four currencies - China, Japan, South Korea, and Hong Kong. The world’s second-largest economy is aiming to build Hong Kong into an international financial center in the digital economy era.     At China’s annual “Two Sessions,” also known as the National People’s Congress, China’s most important annual political event in Beijing, officials set the decision to impose new national security legislation on Hong Kong.    The annual political event was postponed due to the coronavirus pandemic, as the representatives of the National People’s Congress continue to advise on post-pandemic economic recovery.    Neil Shen, also known as Sh...

The French Central Bank, Banque de France has recently successfully trialed a central bank digital currency (CBDC) – the digital euro, operating on a blockchain.      The Bank of France experimented with the use of a central bank digital currency to test a sale of securities, which was carried out by Société Générale Forge.    Banque de France launched a program of experiments to test out potential central bank digital currency (CBDC) aimed for interbank settlements. Potential participants have been invited to submit their applications to experiment with the use of a digital euro.    The three main objectives of the CBDC experiment includes identifying benefits, analyzing potential risks, and modeling as CBDC-based interbank settlement.    A maximum of ten CBDC-related applications crea...