Tag: Lead

  • Small Cap Index Lead Gains In February, But What Is Bitcoin Doing?

    Small Cap Index Lead Gains In February, But What Is Bitcoin Doing?

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    Altcoins have been bigger winners than bitcoin in the recent recovery. Even though the latter led the recovery, the smaller cap coins have been making all of the waves in the space, outperforming other indexes and bitcoin included. All of this has pointed to an altcoin season after a purported ‘crypto winter’ and the gains recorded so far in February are additional proof of this.

    Small Cap Index Takes The Lead

    The whole of the crypto market had suffered from the downtrend that began in December. However, the second week of February had come to some reprieve with double-digit gains across bitcoin and all of the indexes. The small, mid, and large cap indexes have all returned gains so far, but the small cap has taken the leading, showing increased bullish momentum in the smaller cap altcoins.

    Related Reading | Bitcoin Steadies Above $45k, US Inflation Comes In At 7.5% Year Over Year

    Just two weeks into February, the small cap index has seen gains as high as 19%. This is a huge step-up for the index after it closed out January as the worst-performing index, seeing accelerated losses compared to its counterparts. The tables have now turned as the gains for the small cap index have been 4% higher than all of the others.

    Small cap index returns highest gains

    Small cap index returns highest gains | Source: Arcane Research

    Bitcoin, the mid cap, and the large cap index all returned doubled-digit gains for January. Most of the gains recorded were from a single week that saw prices surge across the crypto market.

    What About Bitcoin?

    Bitcoin has no doubt also returned impressive gains for its investors in the same time period. It may not be as high as the small cap index but still remains one of the top gainers n the space. It follows the move of the market sentiment from extreme negativity back into the positive. Momentum picking up has also helped in this case.

    Related Reading | JPMorgan Puts Bitcoin At $150,000 In The Long-Term, But What About Its ‘Fair Value’?

    The Digital asset is now trading above its 20-day moving average but remains low on the 50-day average. At its current point, the next resistance for the asset to break lies at $45,240. However, a break above a second resistance point at $46,712 is what will really solidify its entrance into another bear rally. Until then, it will likely continue to hover between $43,000 and $44,000.

    Bitcoin price chart from TradingView.com

    BTC starts another recovery trend | Source: BTCUSD on TradingView.com

    On the support side, bitcoin’s break below $43,000 will see its next support at $42,790. Not a far-off point, but if it does not hold then another decline to $40,000 may be imminent.

    Nevertheless, the digital asset has shown strong sell signals around the 50 and 100-day moving averages. Unless buyers make significant headway in holding up the price of bitcoin, bears are more likely to take over, pulling bitcoin into another stretched-out downtrend.

    Featured image from Forbes, charts from Arcane Research and TradingView.com

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  • MicroStrategy Follows El Salvador’s Lead As It Buys Bitcoin Dip

    MicroStrategy Follows El Salvador’s Lead As It Buys Bitcoin Dip

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    For those who can afford it, the recent dips in Bitcoin price have been nothing more than an opportunity to buy the digital asset at a discounted price. This has certainly been the case for El Salvador and now MicroStrategy, as both these entities have moved swiftly to take advantage of the price dip to increase their holdings.

    El Salvador had quickly snapped up another 100 BTC when the price had fallen to $54,000, with the president once again saying that the country got the coins at a discount. MicroStrategy, the publicly traded firm that holds the largest amount of bitcoin on its balance sheet, followed in the footsteps of El Salvador. This time buying up $414 million worth of BTC.

    Related Reading | Report Shows Institutional Investors Are Abandoning Bitcoin For Altcoins

    MicroStrategy Deepens Bitcoin Bet

    MicroStrategy has renewed its promise to keep adding bitcoin to its balance sheet with its latest purchase. The firm which is headed by Bitcoin maximalist Michael Saylor announced that it had bought even more bitcoins to add to its already impressive holdings. MicroStrategy’s latest purchase consisted of a $414 million buy, which amounted to 7,002 BTC added to its balance.

    This recent purchase brought the total of MicroStrategy’s bitcoin holdings to a whooping 121,044 coins. The firm bought the digital asset at an average of $59,187 per coin, well below its record $69K high at the beginning of November.

    Bitcoin price chart from TradingView.com

    BTC recovers above $57K | Source: BTCUSD on TradingView.coms

    MicroStrategy has gradually filled its coffers with bitcoin and has so far spent approximately $3.57 billion in total. Despite bitcoin’s drop from its all-time high, the firm continues to remain in profit with an average price of $29,534 per bitcoin.

    Companies Betting Big On Bitcoin

    MicroStrategy is not the only company that has thrown its hat in the ring with bitcoin, although it holds the largest volume of all publicly traded companies. Electric vehicle maker Tesla had also announced that it holds bitcoin on its balance sheet. Tesla which is headed by another Bitcoin maximalist in the person of Elon Musk holds 48,000 BTC on its balance sheets, currently worth around $2.99 billion.

    Related Reading | El Salvador Buys Bitcoin Dip As Omicron Variant Ravages Market

    Galaxy Digital is headed by Mike Novogratz, an outspoken crypto bull that has reiterated the potential of bitcoin numerous times. The firm also holds16,402 bitcoins on its balance sheet, $956.69 million in today’s value.

    Square Inc. headed by Twitter boss, Jack Dorsey holds 8,027 BTC, while Marathon Patent Group holds around $280.7 million in bitcoin (4,813 BTC).

    A recurring theme around all these companies is that no matter when they entered the market, they are all in profit by at least 100% of the value the bitcoins cost at the time of purchase.

    Featured image from Forbes, chart from TradingView.com



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  • QED, Aims To Lead The Next Generation Oracle Products For DeFi With Its Robust Economic Model

    QED, Aims To Lead The Next Generation Oracle Products For DeFi With Its Robust Economic Model

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    Oracles, according to Cryptopedia, are protocols for smart contracts in the blockchain industry to interact with external data. Smart contracts are essentially computer programs that run within a blockchain and automate a set of transactions when certain conditions are met. Thus, smart contracts contribute to the complete decentralization of the blockchain industry by allowing transactions to take place automatically and without the intervention of a third party.

    As appealing as the concept of blockchain as a self-contained, permissionless, and trustless system is, it would have no real-world applications if there was no way to use external, off-chain data, which is where oracles come into play.

    According to a recent report, the blockchain industry has over 77 million active users, demonstrating the constant innovation in the space, even though it is only a decade old.

    Because oracles connect the blockchain world to the outside world, there is a need to keep up with the blockchain industry’s constant innovation. However, oracles have struggled with centralized control, as some protocols are controlled by a single entity and serve as the sole source of data for smart contracts. If blockchain technology is to achieve its primary goal of decentralization, oracle networks must also be decentralized to provide smart contracts with an increased level of security and transparency.

    The Importance Of Decentralized Protocols Like QED

    One of the significant issues with introducing oracles to the blockchain is that it contradicts the ethos of blockchain technology, which is trustlessness. One way to address this is to ensure that oracles connected to the blockchain are decentralized and not governed by a single entity.

    QED is a decentralized oracle protocol with a robust economic model that connects blockchains, smart contract platforms, and off-chain data resources. QED is a decentralized oracle that aims to achieve trustlessness by distributing data points among multiple entities and modeling the blockchain network.

    DelphiOracle, QED’s base software, is the most widely used protocol on WAX.io, the world’s most trusted blockchain ecosystem for NFTs, dApps, and video games. For more than four years, the Delphi oracle has served as a multi-party source of truth, providing smart contracts with real-time prices for asset pairings on the various blockchain networks. DelphiOracle has already proven itself in the blockchain industry, and QED is built on it. The purpose of introducing QED is to solve problems inherent in existing models of oracles and blockchain systems.

    Economic Model Of QED

    The economic model of QED distinguishes it from existing Oracle protocols because it focuses on both the technological and commercial sides, which are both important when it comes to delivering and aggregating real-world data for smart contracts. The following are some of the characteristics of the QED economic model:

    • Recourse: QED is customer-centric because it protects users by providing a recourse mechanism. Clients would eventually be able to use the external collateral provided by QED to process loss restitution that may have occurred due to systemic risks.
    • Accuracy: To maximize real-time accuracy, automated systematic and reliability scoring is implemented to phase out poor-performing articles by increasing allocation to more capital-efficient oracles.
    • Decentralization: QED used distributed ledger technology as a mode of operation, promoting decentralization and eliminating the lingering issue of centralization in Oracle protocols. The native token “$QED” also serves as an economic constraint for QED.

    Final Thoughts

    QED is a breath of fresh air for Oracle protocols. It aspires to lead the next generation of Oracle protocols that provide services to smart contracts in a fully decentralized, transparent, and open manner. To make the most of its innovative economic model, QED intends to integrate with public blockchains. Furthermore, to promote scalability and interoperability, the QED protocol is also powered by the UX network. QED’s economic model was implemented to address issues with the commercial viability of existing Oracle protocols, and it would as a model for the next generation of Oracle protocols shortly.

     

     

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