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Finance News

Bank of Canada Rates Remain Steady – A Cautious Attitude

Currently, the Bank of Canada continues to build their case for some higher interest rates. However, they have stopped for the moment. The central bank has remained with a key rate unchanged from 1.25% on Wednesday. Related to this, they cited the present weakness in housing, as well as trade and investment when it comes to export.

A Cautious Attitude

Many key ingredients for sustaining higher rates seem to be okay. However, the bank declared its intention of remaining cautious when it comes to other policy adjustments in the future. Currently, we look at Canada’s economy while it’s operating with ‘little slack’. Moreover, inflation has been edging higher and now it’s in line with the 2% target set by the bank. All this information was presented in a statement issued by the bank to justify its rate decision. Don’t forget that the rising wages are also making the consumption growth stay quite ‘robust’.

An Interesting Evolution

Ever since last June, we witnessed three raises of the key rate of the bank. What’s more, the investors and economists expect us to see one more in 2018. Andrew Grantham works as an economist for the Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce. According to him, the statement shows that the Bank will most likely make another rate hike in July. However, they’re not rushing to move anytime soon after that.

We can blame the go-slow attitude of the bank partly on the expansive capacity to grow of the economy. For 2018, 2019, and 2020, the bank boosted its own estimate for the potential output grow by 2 – 4%. This information was present in the Monetary Policy Report, which they had released on Wednesday. Now, the median should equal 1.8% in all these three years. If they are right, an increased capacity can help the economy grow faster without triggering the inflation.

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Crypto

Ripple (XRP) Price Would Soar After A Deal With An International Financial Messaging Service Such As SWIFT

A very interesting video was posted on YouTube by a crypto vlogger, Thinking Crypto, and discussed a possible connection between Ripple and SWIFT, the handler of the “The Global Provider of Secure Financial Messaging Services”, through which the majority of interbank transactions are conducted. Of course, Ripple (XRP) would soar after such a deal. But how possible would be a partnership between Ripple and an international financial messaging service?

About SWIFT

SWIFT is probably the oldest and the most used transactions handler between banks and other financial institutions. Recently, SWIFT released an enhanced version which already connects more than 11,000 banks from every corner of the world.

SWIFT is not a bank or a financial institution, it doesn’t store accounts or money! It is, similarly to the Ripple platforms, a system which conducts transactions.

In 1977, SWIFT has substituted Telex, the technology used since then to conduct every transaction between banks.

Through SWIFT, banks, custodians, investment institutions, central banks, market infrastructures and corporate clients, can connect with one another exchanging structured electronic messages to perform common business processes, such as making payments or settling trades.

Extracted from the SWIFT’s site

Ripple (XRP) would soar after a partnership with SWIFT

You might think SWIFT is old and expired but it is still the most used and trusted international financial messaging service. Even more than that, if you look deeper, you’ll notice that this system is like the ancestor of the blockchain.

On the other hand, both Ripple and SWIFT are similar payments and trades handlers, therefore, a partnership between them would be fruitful for every party, including banks and their customers.

First, if SWIFT system will merge with Ripple blockchain, customers will enjoy instant cross-border transactions. Secondly, the banks will gain more traceability over the transactions.

This partnership, however, is unlikely to happen soon since both Ripple and SWIFT have their own market and, above all the similarities, they are competitors for the same sector.

However, Thinking Crypto, the crypto vlogger who came up with this “crazy” idea, managed to point out some common grounds between the two services and, even more, it has been shown that, instead of competing to each other, SWIFT could be complementary to Ripple and vice-versa.

In the end, such a partnership will definitely increase the XRP adoption rate, stability and, eventually, Ripple (XRP) would soar after a partnership with SWIFT, the major international financial messaging service.

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Crypto Finance News

Soft Cryptocurrencies Regulations Are The Solutions Proposed By The IMF Director, Christine Lagarde

The boss of the IMF believes that crypto coins and blockchain technology could lead to a “more efficient and potentially more robust” financial system but only if soft cryptocurrencies regulations will be adopted.

A month ago, Christine Lagarde warned, in a blog note, about the “dark side” of cryptocurrencies, citing their high volatility and the fact that they can be used for money laundering or terrorist financing. But, as the boss of the IMF prepares to welcome in the Washington political leaders and central bankers for the traditional spring meetings, the former French Minister of Economy split Monday a new blog note where she shared another point of view, now recognizing the crypto and blockchain technology value but only under the conditions of soft regulations.

Undeniable security and speed

Drawing a parallel with the first financial bubble in history, the Tulipomania in Holland in the 17th century, Christine Lagarde first points out the following:

With more than 1,600 cryptocurrencies in circulation, it seems inevitable that many of them will not survive to the process of creative destruction. But those who take root will “have an impact on the way we put money aside, invest and pay our bills.

Christine Lagarde

Christine Lagarde praises, in particular, the speed and the low-cost of the financial transactions conducted via cryptocurrencies blockchain.

The IMF leader also emphasizes the security of transactions enabled by the blockchain technology, stressing out, again, that the cryptocurrencies and blockchain technology could have applicability for governments but only under soft cryptocurrencies regulations.

A more balanced ecosystem

Christine Lagarde hopes that decentralized services stimulated by cryptocurrencies will lead to a diversification of the global financial landscape and ultimately, they will create a more balanced ecosystem, which will be, at the same time more efficient and more secure.

However, the IMF director remains vigilant, saying that cryptocurrencies must still “win the trust and support of consumers and authorities,” which, according to her, is only possible by the implementation of soft cryptocurrencies regulations a better definition of the blockchain role in the financial sector.

Categories
Crypto News Tech

Ethereum (ETH) Blockchain To Be Used By NASA For Space Exploration

A science project developed and funded by NASA has in planning to use Ethereum (ETH) Blockchain technology for deep space exploration. Dr. Jin Wei Kocsis is the leader of this surprising project and got a $330,000 grant from NASA to create the Resilient Networking and Computing Paradigm (RNCP) which uses smart contracts blockchain technology for fast transactions.

However, the project is designed for space exploration and NASA requested RNCP to develop a “smart-spacecraft” capable of detecting and avoiding small space object, such as debris, by its own, without any human intervention.

Wei Kocsis admitted that the NASA idea is to develop a system based on blockchain technology to support the spacecraft’s instantaneous debris detection and the reduction of the ship’s dependency on engineers.

In this project, the Ethereum blockchain technology will be exploited to develop a decentralized, secure, and cognitive networking and computing infrastructure for deep space exploration. The blockchain consensus protocols will be further explored to improve the resilience of the infrastructure.

Wei Kocsis

This would be the first time when the blockchain technology will be used for space exploration

Noone at NASA (or any other space agency) has ever thought to implement blockchain, more specifically the Ethereum (ETH) blockchain technology, to create faster, smarter, and securer networks for communications and navigations for space exploration.

From the NASA’s Gleen Research Center, the Advanced Communications Program’s Manager, Thomas Kacpura, said that:

It is expected that the potential is high to contribute to the next generation space networks, and also allow tech transition of these algorithms for commercial systems.

Thomas Kacpura

The project has already received positive feedback from both space exploration enthusiasts and blockchain communities members, which stated on social media that NASA proved that the blockchain technology can have tremendous applications.

In short, NASA created and funded RNCP, a project designed to implement the Ethereum (ETH) blockchain technology for changing the future of space exploration.

Categories
Crypto

Bitcoin Private (BTCP) To Be Added On Ledger Nano In The Next Firmware Update

Both Bitcoin Private (BTCP) and Ledger Nano are evolving in their respective areas but, with the next firmware update, the Ledger Nano will implement Bitcoin Private.

This addition comes to bring more varied and secure methods to stock cryptocurrencies in Ledger Nano, while, at the same time, will offer the Bitcoin Private users to keep their coins safe in the wallet.

This announcement transpired from Nicolas Bacca, one of the Ledger Nano team’s members, on GitHub. Bacca admitted that with the future version of the Ledger Nano, the developers will add support for Bitcoin Private (BTCP).

Nicolas Bacca replied on a topic opened on GitHub about a month ago:

I have tested signing and broadcasting transactions from a custom build of electrum-btcp with success. Please advise concerning adding to the chrome webapp vs. adding to the new desktop app in development.

Nicolar Bacca, on GitHub

Bitcoin Private (BTCP) becomes more and more popular in the cryptocurrencies market

Bitcoin Private forked from Bitcoin (BTC) and ZClassic (ZCL) and was created to improve the privacy of the Bitcoin Network. This has been possible thanks to the ZClassic’s zero knowledge snarks blockchain technology add-on which enhances the security frames on the BTC network.

At the moment of this article, Bitcoin Private (BTCP) is ranked 36th among the other cryptos and is trading at 25.21, recording a decrease of only 0.21% in the last 24 hours.

BTCP has a market capitalization of only a little above $500 million but, as I’ve said, it has drawn investors interest and, most probably, this figure will positively change in the future.

As we speak, Bitcoin private (BTCP) is available for trading at a few cryptocurrencies exchanges, including TradeSatoshi, Nanex, Exrates, and Ocaex, but, according to some speculations, Binance and HitBTC will list it in the near future, which will definitely increase this crypto’s adoption.

In conclusion, Ledger Nano will add support for Bitcoin Private (BTCP) in the next version of the wallet’s firmware, a fact which allows Bitcoin Private holders to keep their coins safe in the wallet.

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