American cryptocurrency exchanges get subpoenas

The US Commodity Futures Trading Commission demanded trading data from four major cryptocurrency exchanges, suspecting price manipulation.

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The price of Bitcoin as defined by these companies is what sets the price for the Bitcoin futures sold be CME Group.

Call centre managers released in Philippines

Ten days ago we reported that a group of Israeli citizens had been arrested in the Philipines for running a boiler room operation. They were displayed, shackled and clad in prison uniforms, on local television.

The operation used a fake company name and pretend licence and employed locals to cold-call people all over the world to sell them fake financial investments. The alleged ringleaders were released last week because they were “not committing any offense” at the time of their arrest, according to Philippine authorities.

McAfee vs. the SEC

Eccentric millionaire and cryptocurrency enthusiast John McAfee attacked the Securities and Exchange Commission of the US for viewing cryptocurrencies as securities, inviting agency head Clayton to debate him.

Clayton had said in an interview that he feels that most ICOs are selling securities. McAfee responded: “I will fight with every last breath to ensure that this absurd overreach by the SEC will not stand!!”

TRON acquires BitTorrent

Justin Sun, the developer of the TRON blockchain platform, purchased the company behind the peer-to-peer file transfer protocol BitTorrent. Details of the deal were not disclosed, and BitTorrent employees were told not to share them.

The deal was first reported in May, and Sun apparently signed a letter of intent in January. He also filed a temporary restraining order against BitTorrent, preventing it from searching for other buyers.

Interview with Chief Business Development Officer of Lykke Corp

New regulations are coming to Europe on the 1st of August courtesy of ESMA. The rules are going to affect the profitability of foreign exchange brokers, but nobody knows to what extent.

In this exclusive interview, Dr. Demetrios Zamboglou of a Swiss blockchain company Lykke Corp discusses how leverage will change, his Microsoft-funded research into trading behaviour, and whether brokers will be able to survive the new rules.

EOS madness

EOS, the blockchain project that raised $4 billion in its ICO, finally went live last week, following a number of postponements due to technical issues.

The network was waiting for 15 percent of token holders to vote for activation, which was complicated by last-minute changes to the EOS protocol. Now the process has begun – at the time of launch the project’s market capitalisation was almost $10 billion

Analysis: women in the blockchain industry

Gender discrimination is as much of an issue in the blockchain technology as it is in any other, especially since it is beginning to segue with the male-dominated arena of traditional finance. At the same time, cryptocurrency has enormous potential in giving financial freedom to women who are heavily constrained by the demands of family and/or patriarchal society.

After a report in the New York Times in February report told us that only 4-6% of blockchain investors are female, we felt it was time to check if there has been any progress since then.

Binance has a busy week

On Tuesday we reported that giant cryptocurrency exchange Binance had announced reading 9 million users, a huge jump from the 2 million that it served in January.

It also added a new cryptocurrency to its roster – Ethereum Classic, a fork of Ethereum with a market capitalisation of $1.4 billion.

Later that same day we reported that it will be accepting fiat currency for the first time via its office on the island of Malta.

The news was broken by Bloomberg following an interview with CEO Zhao Changpeng. Reportedly, the exchange has already opened a bank account on the island.

On Wednesday, we reported that giant cryptocurrency exchange Binance had signed a memorandum of understanding with an industry organisation on the island of Jersey, a British territory situated off the coast of France.

It will be opening an exchange on the island while assisting the local government to promote digital education and training amongst the population.