The Veil of Cash: BTCManager’s Week in Review Dec. 19

Two important, related events have secured Bitcoin’s place as one of the most important assets in the world. Firstly, a deterioration of the situation in Venezuela. Following the decommission of Venezuela’s largest bill, December 17/18 saw protests and lootings. People are even burning Bolivars, illustrating the rapidly shifting sentiment against fiat currency.

While the country’s president, Nicolas Maduro, suggested citizens should use electronic payments, around 40 percent of the population do not have access to bank accounts, a ripe place for Bitcoin to flourish and provide an escape from the situation.

Secondly, the Australian government will seek advice from an independent panel of experts on whether to ban the A$100 bill, mirroring a cash ban enacted in India. Both events are setting precedent for a crackdown on cash worldwide and are demonstrating the veil that cash really is, a piece of paper backed by a promise.

As these events lead people to realize the ‘veil of cash,’ this will serve to increase the attractiveness of Bitcoin and cryptocurrency as a reliable store of wealth.

This week’s review is compiled from contributions by Christoph Bergmann, Jamie Holmes, Joseph Young, Nigel Dollentas, and Michael Scott.

A global war on cash has begun, as many countries have imposed heavy capital controls and have placed restrictions on fiat money. Three countries, India, China and Venezuela, were victims of heavy criticisms this week from financial experts, analysts and investors as their strategies to enhance the economy have backfired. Australia is also mulling a ban on the A$100 bill.

Ethereum Classic Considers Bitcoin-esque Monetary Policy

A new proposal, ECIP 1017, looks to model Ethereum Classic monetary policy on the Bitcoin model, discussed on Dec. 13 in a London Ethereum Classic meetup. As stated in our most recent cryptocurrency report, we anticipated the announcement of the monetary policy proposal will boost the value of Ethereum Classic’s token. ETC is approaching our target of $1.20, trading at $1.14 at the time of writing.

Overstock Successfully Issues Shares Over the Blockchain

Overstock has always had a forward stance when it came to Bitcoin, being one of the first major retailers to accept the cryptocurrency. Now they have taken it a step further, making history by issuing shares by leveraging the Bitcoin Blockchain. Overstock CEO Patrick Byrne hopes to license it to not only other businesses, but use T Zero’s platform to revolutionize stock exchanges, banks, and other financial institutions.

Nomura Identifies Loss of Faith in Fiat as Grey Swan Catapulting Cryptocurrency

In a recent article published by Dagens Næringsliv discussing the financial market ‘Grey Swans’ for 2017 compiled by Nomura Holdings, a prominent Japanese investment bank, “a breakthrough for digital currencies” made the list, based on a scenario of a widespread loss of faith in fiat currency.

BitGive’s Philanthropic Collision with a Bit of Technology

Crypto-based philanthropist BitGive, the first Bitcoin 501(c)(3) nonprofit in the U.S., announced on December 8 the launch of GiveTrack, a revolutionary blockchain-based donation platform. The transparent platform is the first of its kind, delivering the ability to transfer, track, and create a permanent record of global financial contributions from inception to endpoint.

Byteball’s Christmas Day Giveaway to Bitcoin Holders

Bitcoiners will receive a gift in the form a new cryptocurrency on Christmas Day, proportional to their holdings. The name of this cryptocurrency; ByteBall, which utilizes a DAG, or a Directed Acyclic Graph, instead of a blockchain, to circumvent the block size issue, issues with throughput or any future scalability problems that Bitcoin faces.

Zug, the Heart of the Swiss Crypto Valley, Warms to Bitcoin

The little Swiss city of Zug became famous worldwide for being the first city to accept bitcoin for municipal services. Now the city says it has had “positive experiences” with accepting bitcoin – and that it plans to adopt non-monetary blockchain applications for the city’s administration; it wants to evaluate if the Blockchain can play a role when it will push the digitalization of its city administration and municipal e-governance.