Tuesday, January 1, 2019
Phillip Frost Agrees to Settle Riot Blockchain Related Case for $5.5 Million
Riot Blockchain, Inc. replaced its CEO in September after the SEC charged him in connection with a fraudulent $27 million pump and dump scheme. Now another person involved in that case, biotech billionaire Phillip Frost, has agreed to pay $5.5 million to settle the charges.
Also Read: The Daily: Best Selling Authors Introduce Bitcoin to Followers
$5.5 Million Settlement
The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) charged a group of 10 individuals and 10 associated entities back in September for fraudulent schemes that generated over $27 million from unlawful stock sales and “caused significant harm to retail investors who were left holding virtually worthless stock.”
According to the SEC’s complaint, the group of “microcap fraudsters” was led by Barry Honig who was once the largest shareholder in Riot Blockchain, Inc. (NASDAQ:RIOT) and included John O’Rourke, its former CEO. From 2013 to 2018, the South Florida-based group manipulated the share price of the stock of three companies in pump-and-dump schemes, and Miami billionaire Phillip Frost allegedly participated in two of these.
On Thursday, Frost and his company OPKO Health, Inc. (NASDAQ: OPK) announced they have agreed to a settlement with the SEC to resolve the action brought against them, subject to court approval. Without admitting or denying the SEC’s allegations, OPKO agreed to a $100,000 penalty. Frost agreed, also without admitting or denying the SEC’s allegations, to approximately $5.5 million in penalties, disgorgement, and prejudgment interest. He also agreed to a prohibition from trading in penny stocks, with certain exceptions. Frost will continue to serve as OPKO’s CEO and Chairman.
“We have reached agreement with the SEC that will end a potentially expensive, contentious and time-consuming litigation and I am happy that we can focus on an exciting and productive 2019 for OPKO Health,” said Frost.
Riot Blockchain
Before October 2017, Riot was a biotechnology company known as Bioptix, Inc. that specialized in the development of veterinary diagnostic tools. On October 4, 2017 Bioptix announced it was changing its name to Riot Blockchain and shifting its business focus to investing in blockchain technologies.
In February 2018 Riot was hit with a class action lawsuit in the Southern District of Florida. The complaint alleged that the company failed to disclose that it had changed its name to Riot Blockchain in order to generate investor enthusiasm and tie the company to the then recent rise in the price of cryptocurrencies. This was done despite Riot’s lack of a significant blockchain business in order to further an insider scheme that would allow controlling shareholder Barry Honig and his associates to sell their Riot securities at artificially inflated prices.
Do you think the $5.5 million settlement imposed by the SEC was fair? Share your thoughts in the comments section below.
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December Volume Report: Top Markets See Strongest Trade of H2 2018
The five most traded cryptocurrency markets saw an increase in volume during December, when compared with the previous month. Despite the spike in trading activity posted by the dominant markets, many crypto assets ranked below the top five saw a decline in month-over-month volume.
Also Read: Report: Indian Government Updates Progress on Crypto Regulation
USDT and Top Altcoin Markets See Volume Increase
BTC saw a slight increase in volume during December, with $157.2 billion worth of trade taking place, up from $156.5 billion during November. As such, BTC posted its strongest volume since May.
Tether (USDT) has continued to see a rise in month-over-month volume, likely reflecting the increase in altcoin trading that has taken place in recent months. December saw $115.7 billion worth of USDT change hands, a roughly 8.5% increase over last month, and a 66% increase when compared with October’s volume. This past month comprised the strongest month of trade during the second half of 2018.
$68.2 billion worth of Ethereum (ETH) was traded during December, up 16% month-over-month, and 65.5% since October. ETH also posted the strongest volume for the second half of 2018.
XRP Sees Drop-Off in Volume
Eos (EOS) was the fourth-most traded cryptocurrency of the past month, posting a 30-day volume of $25.3 billion – the strongest since June. EOS saw a slight gain in month-over-month trade activity, gaining 4.5% over November’s 24.2 billion.
Ripple (XRP) was among the few leading altcoin markets to see a reduction in monthly trade activity during December, with nearly $17.3 billion worth of XRP changing hands. Despite volume dropping 21% month-over-month, December produced the second-strongest 30-day volume for XRP pairings of the second half of 2018.
Litecoin (LTC) has held its position as the sixth-ranked cryptocurrency by monthly volume, producing $13.2 billion worth of trade during December. LTC saw a slight gain over November’s $13 billion, making December the strongest month of trade for the latter half of the year.
BCH and ETC See Recession in Monthly Volume
Bitcoin Cash (BCH), which was the seventh-most traded cryptocurrency of the past month, posted its second-weakest monthly volume for 2018 during December with $9.87 billion in trade. 30-day volume fell by 38% when compared with November’s $13.6 billion, pushing BCH to its lowest rank by monthly volume for 2018.
December saw Qtum (QTUM) rank eighth by 30-day volume, placing it in the top 10 for the first time since June. QTUM pairing generated approximately $4.4 billion worth of trade for the second consecutive month during December.
Ethereum Classic (ETC) was the ninth-most traded cryptocurrency of December, comprising its weakest ranking since May. ETC pairings produced roughly $4.23, down 20% from November’s $5.27 billion.
Dash Holds Position in Top 10
Dash (DASH) closed the month as the 10th-ranked cryptocurrency by 30-day volume, placing in the top 10 for the entire second half of 2018. Dash produced $4.09 billion in trade during December, a 21% decline month-over-month.
Zcash (ZEC) ascended two ranks by monthly volume, placing 11th with $3.78 billion worth of ZEC changing hands in the last 30 days. Despite moving up the rankings, total trade activity for ZEC pairings dropped by 7.5%
Bitcoin SV (BSV) pairing produced $3.74 billion worth of trade during December, moving it from 14th to 12th by 30-day volume. BS saw a 14.5% increase in trade activity when compared with November’s $3.27 billion.
NEO, XLM and TRX See Increase in Trade Activity
December saw Neo (NEO) comprise the 13th most-traded cryptocurrency following two consecutive months of ranking in the top 10. $3.73 billion worth of NEO changed hands this past month, a 33% drop from last month’s $5.57 billion.
Stellar (XLM) saw a significant increase in trade activity during December, moving up one position to rank as the 14th-most traded cryptocurrency. $3.29 worth of XLM was traded during the last 30 days, the strongest month of trade for the second half of 2018 and a 20% increase over November’s $2.74 billion.
Tron (TRX) pairings produced $2.97 billion in trade this past month, ranking it as the 15th-most traded cryptocurrency. TRX saw a roughly 23% gain in 30-day volume when compared with last month’s $2.42 billion.
Stablecoins Increasingly Crowd Volume Leaderboard
Pairings for Ck Usd (CKUSD), a stablecoin traded exclusively on Allcoin and Bcex, produced $2.81 billion in volume during December. CKUSD ranked as the 16th-most traded crypto asset for December, falling five places after posting a 37% reduction in the 30-day volume.
Paxos standard token (PAX) ranked 17th by monthly volume during December, producing $2.03 billion in trade over the last 30 days. PAX posted an approximately 32% gain in trade activity month-over-month.
Trueusd (TUSD) retained its position as the 18th-most traded crypto asset during December, with TUSD pairing generating $1.44 billion in trade. TUSD trade activity increased by roughly 45% when compared with November’s $995.5 million.
BIT-Z token (BZ), an in-house token traded on Bit-Z exchange, ranked among most traded cryptocurrencies for the first time during December, placing 19th with a 30-day volume of $1.02 billion.
Waves (WAVES) also placed as a top-ranking cryptocurrency by trade volume during December, ranking 20th with nearly $920 million worth of Waves changing hands.
Do you think that we will see a continual increase in trade volume throughout 2019? Share your outlook for the markets in the comments section below!
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PR: ZPool Launches ZCash Mining Pool
This is a paid press release, which contains forward looking statements, and should be treated as advertising or promotional material. Bitcoin.com does not endorse nor support this product/service. Bitcoin.com is not responsible for or liable for any content, accuracy or quality within the press release.
2019.1.1, one of the world’s largest ZCash mines—ZPool officially opened up its ZCash mining pool, and started recruiting miners from all over the world free of service charges.
KIENG KESSARA, the founder of ZPool, noted that, ZPool was formerly known as Megabigpower Bitcoin mine, which was built in September 2017 in Idaho, the United States. It now only serves ZCash, a digital currency. ZCash is an encrypted currency that realized complete privacy protection by using the zero-knowledge proof (zk-SNARKS). For individuals, privacy is a rigid demand; enterprises, on the other hand, propose more demanding requirements for privacy protection in the block chain. Therefore, privacy protection is one of the most important and the most difficult directions of the technical pursuit related to block chain. In addition, through totaling 21 million, ZCash only had about 5.5 million circulating in the market—high rarity. With respect to investment, ZCash is the most valuable digital currency; moreover, compared with BTC and ETH, it boasts less difficult to compute power and higher return.
For miners, a good mining pool would lead to better results, no matter “good” here refers to safe and stable or a good service attitude. ZPool owns the first-rate technical team and a professional management system. The unique technical architecture of its mining pool could directly improve its security and stability. What’s more, ZPool plans to arrange its nodes worldwide, minimizing rejection rate and guaranteeing miners’ profits through the expansion of mining broadband or the deployment of proxy servers combined with optimization of network layers and other methods.
To facilitate miners’ profit analysis and measurement and to stabilize miners’ gains, ZPool, supported by the powerful mine and the computing power, directly adopted the PPS revenue model, under which profits were generated as long as the mining machine functioned normally (and the profits had nothing to do with the lucky point of the pool and the transaction fees).
ZPool’s direct profits come from the ZCash mines and the computing-power ecology. Since January 2018, many digital currencies have seen the drop of their prices by 60%-90%, for which the profits received from mining was next to nothing. Under such a situation, every pool still took the service charge of 1%-3%, increasing the pressure on miners. ZPool’s founder believed that, time has passed when the mining pool industry made profits on high service charges. To expand the ZPool ecology and to maximize the profits from computing power-based mining, ZPool practiced zero-service charge for miners and realized free renting global computing power, measurable transactions and the negotiable and visualized computing value.
ZPool has begun to enter Hong Kong and other areas in the Asian-Pacific region for development of its ecology, including opening the service addresses for mining in the Asian-Pacific region, computing power rental servicers, node campaign, exchange, wallet, shopping mall and other one-stop supporting services on the mining pool. ZPool will provide to users top-grade block chain products and services in a software and hardware-combined manner, while promoting the development of mining pools toward the new mining industry.
Service Address for ZCash Mining :zec.pool.zpool.vip:9518
Supporting Link
http://www.zpool.vip/
Contact Email Address
master@zpool.ren
This is a paid press release. Readers should do their own due diligence before taking any actions related to the promoted company or any of its affiliates or services. Bitcoin.com is not responsible, directly or indirectly, for any damage or loss caused or alleged to be caused by or in connection with the use of or reliance on any content, goods or services mentioned in the press release.
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The Daily: Best Selling Authors Introduce Bitcoin to Followers
In the first edition of The Daily for 2019, we feature two best selling authors from outside the cryptocurrency community that recently used their social media reach to introduce the idea of Bitcoin to their numerous followers. Tony Robbins simply wants his readers to know “what the heck is bitcoin,” and Jordan Peterson explores crypto donations to avoid possible censorship by the likes of Patreon, Paypal, Visa or Mastercard.
Also Read: Bakkt Completes First Round of Funding With $182.5 Million
Tony Robbins Explains Bitcoin to His Followers
Tony Robbins is a popular motivational speaker who published four best-selling self-help books. He recently sent out a link to an article on his website to his over three million followers on Twitter promising to explain, “What the heck is bitcoin, and how does it work?”.
The article, which was written by Team Tony back when the price of BTC was at $9979, introduces cryptocurrency as a brand new concept. It uses simple language rather than insider jargon to make the somewhat complex subject accessible to a boarder audience.
“Bitcoin is decentralized,” the article explains. “No single bank, government, company or individual owns the network or has control over it. This means that your accounts can never be frozen, a government cannot devalue the currency, it can be used in every country, and, more ominously, because of the anonymous nature of bitcoin, the technically savvy can avoid taxation and use bitcoin as payment for any kind of illegal good or service.”
What the heck is bitcoin, and how does it work? Find out here. https://t.co/KkenntACZd
— Tony Robbins (@TonyRobbins) December 30, 2018
Jordan Peterson Goes Further Down the Rabbit Hole
Jordan B. Peterson is a clinical psychologist and professor at the University of Toronto whose last book sold around 2 million copies around the world during 2018. He recently became alarmed about the power Patreon has over many public figures on Youtube who depend on it for securing their livelihoods after the crowdfunding platform banned without warning a video creator with over 800,000 subscribers.
Peterson, who has a following of over 1.7 million subscribers on Youtube himself, begun looking for an alternative to Patreon and for now simply added a BTC address for donations on his site. “Time magazine praises Bitcoin as a potential bastion of freedom,” Peterson twitted, linking to an article by a human rights activist that explains how cryptocurrency can help people retake control of their lives from oppressive governments.
“Further down the rabbit hole,” Peterson later added. “Why are MC/Visa/PayPal/Patreon transforming themselves into censors? They have decided to fight ‘hate speech.’ But, the crucial question–the Achilles heel–remains: who defines hate? Answer: those to whom you would least want to grant such power.”
What do you think about today’s news tidbits? Share your thoughts in the comments section below.
Images courtesy of Shutterstock.
Verify and track bitcoin cash transactions on our BCH Block Explorer, the best of its kind anywhere in the world. Also, keep up with your holdings, BCH and other coins, on our market charts at Satoshi’s Pulse, another original and free service from Bitcoin.com.
The post The Daily: Best Selling Authors Introduce Bitcoin to Followers appeared first on Bitcoin News.
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Report: Indian Government Updates Progress on Cryptocurrency Regulation
The Indian government has reportedly provided an update on its progress toward the country’s regulatory framework for cryptocurrencies. The government provided its latest stance in areas such as the national cryptocurrency and licensing of crypto businesses. It is pursuing crypto regulations “with due caution,” according to reports.
Also read: Indian Supreme Court Moves Crypto Hearing, Community Calls for Positive Regulations
No Specific Timeline
The Indian Ministry of Finance has reportedly answered some questions regarding cryptocurrencies asked by Lok Sabha, the lower house of India’s bicameral parliament. A document circulating on social media details five questions as well as their answers by Shri Pon Radhakrishnan, Minister of State in the Ministry of Finance. According to the document, the questions were to be answered on Dec. 28.
One of the questions concerns the composition of the panel established to draft crypto regulations, its recommendations, and “the timeline for the expected release of the regulation,” the document reads.
The minister explained that the government has constituted an inter-ministerial committee “under the chairmanship of Secretary, Department of Economic Affairs, with representatives from concerned departments to study all aspects of cryptocurrencies and crypto-assets including bitcoin.” The committee includes representation from the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), the Securities and Exchange Board of India, and the Central Board of Direct Taxes. The answer to this question reads:
In absense of a globally acceptable solution and the need to devise [a] technically feasible solution, the department is pursuing the matter with due caution. It is difficult to state a specific timeline to come up with clear recommendations.
This document surfaced after the media reported on the panel recommending a ban on crypto transactions and another report claiming that there were recommendations to legalize cryptocurrencies with strong riders. Both cited anonymous sources.
National Crypto and Licensing
In response to the question of legality, the minister wrote, “The government has not recognised cryptocurrencies as legal tender. The issue of permitting trading in cryptocurrencies is currently under examination by an inter-ministerial committee.”
The government also denied keeping track of the value of cryptocurrencies traded by Indian nationals within the country. Regarding licensing or authorizing any entities or businesses to deal with bitcoin or other cryptocurrencies, the minister confirmed:
No decision on licensing and authorising any entity or company to operate such schemes or deal with bitcoins or any virtual currency has been made as yet.
Lastly, the minister also revealed that the committee “is examining all issues, including the pros and cons of the introduction of an official digital currency in India.”
What do you think of the Indian government’s approach to regulating the crypto industry? Let us know in the comments section below.
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