Messari’s Unqualified Opinions
The weekend is around the corner, so keeping the content light today and leaving a list of what the Messari team has on deck to read this weekend.
📑 List of Messari weekend reads:
State of stablecoins - Blockchain
Reputation in Web-3 - JD
The importance of converting speculators into users - Tony Sheng
Unboxing Bitmain’s IPO (Part 2) - BitMEX Research
I am a time-traveler from the future, here to beg you to stop what you are doing - Luka_Magnotta
Why You Should Stop Caring What Other People Think (Taming the Mammoth) - Wait But Why
It’s Not What You Know, It’s How You Think - Zat Rana
Past editions of Messari’s Unqualified Opinion: the Bitmain IPO, hidden token inflation, crypto design, and an analysis on the New York Attorney General’s report on crypto exchanges.
The week ahead…
We hope you’ve been enjoying the new newsletter format. We’ve appreciated your feedback, and will be making some tweaks in the weeks ahead to break up the long-form features into more manageable chunks! We’ll also be adding more charts, infographics, and data from our research team to upcoming issues. We’ve enjoyed pulling this together for you, and we’re just getting started.
Have a good weekend, y’all.
- TBI & the Messari Team
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News & Analyses
Messari Compression Algorithm
Content and thoughts from around the web as summarized by the Messari team.
🕵️ [Analysis] Understanding Bitcoin Core Bug CVE-2018–17144 - Jimmy Song
Bitcoin users were surprised last week by the bug CVE-2018–17144 which made the network vulnerable to a Denial of Service attack and possible inflation via a form of double spending. The potential severity of this bug and Bitcoin Core’s rapid efforts to patch it have drawn criticism from developers building competing blockchains. Bitcoin educator and developer Jimmy Song explains the details of the bug, the patch, and why the economic game theory built into Bitcoin kept the bug from being too severe. (Messari | Source)
🚨 Bitcoin broker charged by SEC and CFTC, domain seized by FBI
The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has sued Marshall Islands-based 1pool Ltd., also known as 1Broker, as well as its CEO Patrick Brunner. The SEC alleges that 1Broker failed to proper discretionary investment thresholds, was not registered as a security-based swaps dealer, and failed to transact its security-based swaps on a registered national exchange. Separately the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) filed charges against 1Broker claiming the platform failed to implement anti-money laundering and supervisory features. The FBI has seized the 1broker.com domain, claiming the company violated money laundering and wire fraud laws while operating as an unregistered broker-dealer and unregistered futures commission merchant. (Messari | Source)
Quick Bits (Don't read that, I read it for you)
Choke Points (Exchange News)
📦 Coinbase has announced a new feature called Coinbase Bundle which allows users to purchase all tokens listed on the platform at once. The allocation of tokens will be weighted based on the market cap of each currency at the time of purchase and users will be charged the standard 1.5 percent commission. (Messari | Source)
Startup Signals (ICOs, Cryptos, and Startups)
⚡️Bitfury announces lightning network monitor, Lightning Peach. (Messari | Source )
💸 New platform Compound aims to automate short-term crypto lending. The platform will allow its users to make their crypto holdings available for short-term loans and in turn earn interest on those loans in crypto. (Messari | Source)
📜 Popular board game Scrabble recently added 300 acceptable words, one of which was Bitcoin. (Messari | Source)
The Powers That Be (Legal/Reg/Policy)
🇦🇺 Australian based blockchain and crypto advisory firm DigitalX has disclosed that it is being sued by a group of investors in an initial coin offering that the firm had previously advised. The claim from the group stands at a total of USD $1.8 million plus damages. (Messari | Source)
🏛️ On Wednesday, House Resolution 5036 was referred to the House of Representatives for consideration. The bill hopes to create the "Independent Financial Technology Task Force to Combat Terrorism and Illicit Financing" which would bring together law enforcement leaders to investigate illicit cryptocurrency uses. (Messari | Source)
🇲🇹 Maltese crypto laws planned for November: After announcing three blockchain and cryptoasset related bills in July the Maltese government is moving forward with new legislation. The Virtual Financial Assets Act (VFA) and the Innovative Technology Arrangement and Services Act (ITAS) will go into effect on Nov. 1, 2018. Under the rules, the VFA will establish procedures and requirements for ICO projects while the ITAS will provide a legislative basis for blockchain and crypto regulation. (Messari | Source)
Did I miss something?
Send me the link, your twitter handle and your best imitation compression algorithm write up. If I like it, I’ll include your bit next issue (with attribution).
Community Updates
Podcast Recap
🎧 ICYMI, we also host & produce our own podcasts on Spotify, iTunes, and Google Play.
In our latest episode, we had on Eric Meltzer to talk about the latest bitcoin bug, and also give you the most interesting statistics about Bitmain's latest disclosure documents for its IPO application on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange.
Listen on Apple Podcasts here, Spotify here, Soundcloud here, and Google play here. Happy learning!
Shameless Plugs
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Upcoming Travel:
Hit us up in these locations:
Crypto Springs, Palm Springs, October 3 & 4
EthSF, San Francisco, October 5-8th
DevCon, Prague, Czech Republic October 30–November 2, 2018
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Going forward, we’ll be capping new members at 15 each week to keep things running smoothly. If you haven’t heard back, you are probably in the queue.
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