Nigeria-based KuCoin users will begin being levied a 7.5% value-added tax (VAT) on transaction fees starting on July 8. Some observers believe that Kucoin’s decision to implement this tax is intended to enhance its chances of securing an operating license. A Lagos-based crypto industry player stated that implementing the tax will likely harm the industry. […]
Bitcoin News
AI Depin Project Grass to Implement Rewards Distribution Using Solana
Grass, an artificial intelligence Depin project, has announced the inclusion of Solana wallets as part of its ongoing rewards distribution process. Grass stated that this new addition will allow them to track the origin of each piece of scraped data and reward the node providing this info according to its relative value. AI Depin Project […]
Bitcoin News
Companies in Two Capital Markets Reportedly in Negotiations to Implement Microstrategy’s Bitcoin Business Model
Companies in two capital markets are looking to implement the business model that Microstrategy, led by entrepreneur Michael Saylor, pioneered in the U.S. According to David Bailey, CEO of Bitcoin Magazine, who denied one of these markets to be Korea, these operations are currently in the negotiation stage. More Companies Looking to Adopt Microstrategy’s Bitcoin […]
Bitcoin News
7 Senators Urge Treasury and IRS to Rapidly Implement Crypto Tax Reporting Rule
Seven U.S. senators have called on the Treasury Department and the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) to “implement the proposed crypto broker reporting rule as rapidly as possible.” The lawmakers stressed: “We are alarmed by the self-inflicted two-year delay for the rule’s implementation.”
Senators Want Crypto Tax Reporting Rule Implemented Swiftly
Senators Elizabeth Warren, Angus King, Richard Blumenthal, Gary Peters, Bernie Sanders, Sheldon Whitehouse, and Brian Schatz sent a letter to Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen and Internal Revenue Service (IRS) Commissioner Daniel Werfel on Oct. 10 concerning cryptocurrency taxation. “We write regarding the Treasury Department and Internal Revenue Service’s (IRS) recently proposed rule concerning tax reporting requirements for crypto brokers,” the letter begins.
“We are alarmed by the self-inflicted two-year delay for the rule’s implementation, which would contravene the requirements of the bipartisan Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, disadvantage law-abiding Americans, and cause the federal government to lose out on billions of dollars in tax revenue,” the lawmakers emphasized, adding:
We urge your agencies to limit this troubling delay and implement the final rule as swiftly as possible, while maintaining the rule’s substance in the face of industry attacks.
The reporting rule requires brokers to “provide crypto users with the information they need to file their taxes through a modified 1099 form” and “provide the IRS with income information from crypto trades so that would-be tax avoiders are easier to track down,” the senators explained. Moreover, the rule defines “brokers” to include “any party who facilitates crypto sales while in a position to know the identity of the seller and the nature of the transaction,” the letter clarifies.
“Limiting any further delay in the implementation of the Administration’s proposed rule would combat industry efforts to evade regulation, provide clarity to law-abiding taxpayers, and generate billions in tax revenue from a chronically tax-avoidant industry,” the lawmakers noted, adding:
Accordingly, we request that the Treasury Department and IRS implement the proposed crypto broker reporting rule as rapidly as possible and ask that you provide an update by October 24, 2023 on your efforts to do so.
What do you think about the senators asking the Treasury and the IRS to implement the proposed crypto tax reporting rule as rapidly as possible? Let us know in the comments section below.
Ethereum Upgrade to Implement Beacon Chain Withdrawals Scheduled for April 12
During the Execution Layer Meeting streamed on March 16, 2023, Ethereum developers announced that the blockchain is scheduled to upgrade on April 12, in 27 days. The upgrade, known as the Shanghai-Capella upgrade or Shapella, will include the implementation of Beacon chain push withdrawals. This will enable Ethereum network validators to support withdrawal operations following the ruleset change.
Ethereum Validator Withdrawal Operations and Fee Optimization Enhancements Set to Go Live in 27 Days
At the time of writing, the Beacon chain contract holds 17,680,535 ether, worth .33 billion using today’s Ethereum exchange rates. The upcoming upgrade, called Shapella, will enable the Beacon chain to use push withdrawals as operations through Ethereum Improvement Proposal (EIP) 4895.
According to the EIP-4895 documentation, this will “support validator withdrawals from the Beacon chain to the EVM via a new ‘system-level’ operation type.” Additionally, the summary notes that EIP-4895’s architecture is “‘push’-based, rather than ‘pull’-based, meaning withdrawals must be processed in the execution layer as soon as they are dequeued from the consensus layer.”
The latest Ethereum upgrade was originally planned for this month, but the consensus change was postponed. During the Execution Layer Meeting on Thursday, Ethereum developers announced that the upgrade is now scheduled for April 12, 2023.
In addition to the Beacon chain push withdrawals proposal, the upgrade will include the implementation of EIP-3651, EIP-6049, EIP-3860, and EIP-3855. These enhancements are aimed at optimizing fees, such as limiting the “maximum size of initcode to 49152 and applying an extra gas cost of 2 for every 32-byte chunk of initcode,” as described in EIP-3860.
Recently, Ethereum developers conducted testing of the upgrade on several testnets. On Tuesday, the developers completed the Goerli testnet upgrade, which was essentially the final step before the activation of Shapella on the mainnet.
What impact do you think the upcoming Ethereum upgrade and the implementation of Beacon chain push withdrawals will have on the future of the Ethereum network and its users? Share your thoughts about this subject in the comments section below.
What Happens To Dogecoin If Twitter Fails To Implement Crypto Plans?
The price of Dogecoin has been rallying in tandem with the bullish news of Elon Musk purchasing Twitter. It continues to maintain such high values even in a bear market due to the expectations that Musk, who has publicly expressed support for the meme coin in the past, would incorporate the crypto into the social media platform. However, Musk has not shown any indication of doing this so far, so what happens if crypto is not implemented into Twitter?
Twitter Dropping Its Crypto Plans
Elon Musk’s ownership of Twitter has come with a lot of expectations, especially among crypto investors. At first, it did look like the billionaire planned to move forward with its plans for implementing and making crypto a prominent part of the platform. But this has changed with news coming out of the market on Friday.
Twitter has reportedly officially stopped its plans to develop its crypto wallet feature. This product would have allowed users to send, receive, and store cryptocurrency on the social media platform, but it has now been shelved following massive layoffs by the company.
On Thursday, the social media platform reduced its workforce by 50% and is reportedly focusing its manpower on other products including the verification fee proposed by Musk. The platform apparently wants to get this feature launched in November, alongside a product previously called “Super Follows.” The latter would be relaunched as “subscriptions” allowing creators to put their content behind a paywall.
DOGE down 25% from Tuesday highs | Source: DOGEUSD on TradingView.com
Naturally, the products that Twitter has chosen to move forward with, (or not move forward with), will have an impact on the price of Dogecoin, which is already apparent given the meme coin’s performance early Friday.
Dogecoin Now Follows Twitter
Elon Musk’s standing in the Dogecoin community and his ownership of Twitter has now effectively made it so the performance of the meme coin is now closely tied to that of Twitter. It was proven following the acquisition and now following Twitter’s announcements.
On Friday, the price of Dogecoin dropped 10% after it was reported that Twitter would be pausing its crypto wallet development. So while the majority of the market was seeing green, DOGE had plunged in tandem with the Twitter stock price which sits at .85 ahead of the start of the trading day.
DOGE would likely see more decline in its price if there are no definitive crypto plans for Twitter made public in the coming weeks. This also extends to the addition of DOGE as a payment method in the “Tip Jar” feature. The meme coin has already shed more than 25% of its Tuesday highs and could see more downside as the market enters the weekend.
Featured image from Capital.com, chart from TradingView.com
Follow Best Owie on Twitter for market insights, updates, and the occasional funny tweet…
Plugin Partners With Inclusive Growth Chain to Implement the ‘Project Pollution Check’
The Plugin and Inclusive Growth Chain have collaborated to implement the ‘Project Pollution Check’. The Pollution Check is designated to collect and tabularize the data regarding air pollution. And further help end-users like air purifier producers, realtors, and the environment conversalists both in public & private sectors.
In this context, let’s investigate the Plugin and Inclusive Growth Chain partnership and the way the ensuing blockchain-based answers will assist to enhance real-time air-pollutants tracking and ease the development of specific blockchain outcomes.
Today, poor ambient air quality is one of the most crucial public health concerns around the globe. Exposure to polluted air causes more than 6.6 million premature deaths each year and makes up close to 8% of the global burden of disease. What’s more, exposure to air pollutants reaches far beyond respiratory illnesses. Research shows that there are links between air pollution and non-communicable diseases like diabetes, cancer, and more recently COVID-19 health outcomes.
While air quality is a global sustainability issue with varying severity and effects across nations, there’s a need to adopt novel approaches to manage the issue. One approach to the problem is technology. Leveraging tech will help overcome factors that put pressure on ambient air quality.
On that note: blockchain technology and its novel use cases holds a lead position in helping track air pollution in real-time using data feeds from authoritative off-chain sources.
Plugin & Inclusive Growth Chain: Who they are and what they offer
Plugin is a decentralized oracle platform providing cost-efficient solutions to smart contracts that run on the XDC Network Ecosystem. The novel solution focuses on providing cost-efficient solutions to users that need reliable data on their smart contracts. And being a fork of Chainlink open-source technology built to benefit the XDC Network Blockchain Ecosystem, Plugin enables smart contracts to communicate seamlessly with the outside world and store data gathered from reliable partners. Plugin guarantees dedicated support, reliable data feeds, thoroughly tested platform for quality, and enterprise-grade service level agreements.
On the other hand, Inclusive Growth Chain (IGC) is an integrated blockchain, artificial intelligence, and machine learning platform that seeks to address social and environmental problems. Recently, the organization won the top prize for creating a blockchain-enabled platform that aggregates air pollution data with high accuracy and at minimal costs. The platform also works with Farmer Producer Organizations (FPOs) in India, helping redistribute value chain gains to farmers.
Plugin—Inclusive Growth Chain Partnership
Through the Plugin—IGC partnership, the entities will work towards implementing the “Project Pollution Check”. Given the benefits to be accrued upon launching the project, it has been touted as a more impactful decentralized application on the XDC network, which leverages PLI.
So, what’s “Project Pollution Check”?
Pollution check is a blockchain-enabled use case that allows air pollution tracking and tracing in real-time. Conceptualized by IGC, the project proposes to collect real-time data on air pollution, helping users with air pollution-related health issues or allergies make appropriate decisions. Worth noting, that the solution will be available to users across the globe.
In this project, the Plugin will act as an oracle service to bridge the data (Air pollutants) from the external world into a decentralized application. What’s more, the air pollution tracking and tracing application will target end-users like real estate properties provider and developers, real estate buyers, air purifier companies, and government agencies tasked with protecting the environment.
For real estate property providers and developers, Pollution checks will help them decide where to construct housing that meets their client’s air quality index (AQI) requirements. As well, this may help with pricing real estate properties—that is, areas with lower AQIs can fetch a premium as compared to those with significantly higher AQIs.
On the other hand, Pollution-check will help real-estate buyers determine—in real-time— the pollutant levels in an area prior to making purchase decisions. To illustrate, Pollution-check will help families with kids and elderly members to avoid buying or renting homes in areas whose air has high levels of carbon monoxide.
Air purifier companies will also leverage the solution. With accurate data on pollution in different locations, air purifier companies may tailor their services and offer models that are most effective for specific regions. This will help reduce air pollution-related issues for clients in different locations.
Government agencies tasked with safeguarding the environment can leverage Pollution-check to pass laws on appropriate mechanisms to reduce air pollution. For instance, government agencies may introduce policies favoring the increase of electronic vehicles. This will help reduce air pollution resulting from diesel and petrol-powered engines.
That said, what other areas will the Plugin and IGC partnership touch on?
Well, in addition to “project pollution-check”, IGC and Plugin also plan to collaborate on other solutions in the Private & Public Blockchain space. IGC will also avail Big data, Machine Learning & Artificial Intelligence expertise on a demand basis, helping strengthen Plugin’s technology landscape.
As well, plugin seeks to onboard IGC as a masternode operator following the MOU. This will happen after consultations with respective network community members.
While air pollution remains a major concern around the globe, the inception of novel technologies through the PLI-IGC partnership holds the potential to reduce and reverse some resulting effects. For example, the inception of “Pollution check” holds significant potential in mitigating air pollution-related issues. By allowing real-time checking of air pollution levels in different locations, the solution will enable end-users like real estate property providers and developers, real estate buyers, air purifier companies, and government agencies to make appropriate decisions.
As well, the PLI-IGC partnership helps leverage each firm’s capabilities to boost their respective abilities.
Why Polygon Will Implement Ethereum’s EIP-1559 Update
Ethereum’s scalability solution Polygon will implement this network update in its fee model via EIP-1559. According to an official post, this upgrade will introduce a burning mechanism for MATIC and will improve its fee visibility.
Related Reading | Polygon Expands Its Footprint As Evolving NFT And Gaming Ecosystems Seek Ethereum Alternatives
Ethereum introduced EIP-1559 with Hard Fork London back in 2021. The update was highly anticipated as it was supposed to aid mitigate Ethereum’s congestion issues and made fee more predictable. Some users even claimed the update was going to significantly reduce Ethereum fees which has proven to be false.
However, as seen below, data from Messari suggest that fees on Ethereum have actually increased since the implementation of EIP-1559. At least in a one-year period and comparing the period pre-London, and the posterior months.
Source: Messari
According to Polygon, their team is got ready to roll out the update today January 18th. As the post claims, EIP-1559 changed Ethereum’s first-price auction model for fee calculation to establish a fixed fee to include a transaction on a block. This base fee can vary and its burn once the transaction has been validated. The post explained:
The burning is a two-step affair that starts on the Polygon network and completes on the Ethereum network. The Polygon team has created a public interface where users can monitor and become part of the burning process.
The team behind Polygon will publish a link to the monitor at a later time. As seen below, users will be able to see the amount of MATIC that has been burned and watch the burning process live.
Source: Polygon’s blog
Polygon To Improve Fee Mechanism, Will EIP-1559 Deliver On Its Promise?
The team behind Polygon claims users, validators, delegators, and everyone on the MATIC ecosystem will benefit. A burning mechanism will contribute with the token’s appreciation as it creates deflationary pressure on its supply.
Some experts believe EIP-1559 was one of the reason for ETH’s price year of continuous appreciation and its bullish momentum. Others have expressed disappointment; they believe the issues present on Ethereum, allegedly to be fix by this update, persist.
The inventor of Ethereum Vitalik Buterin recently defended EIP-1559. Based on a study conducted by two major academic institutions, Buterin claimed this update has achieved its objective of decreasing average waiting time to process transactions on the network.
Excellent paper by some researchers at Peking University and Duke University on the consequences of EIP 1559. Particularly appreciate the confirmation that EIP 1559 has greatly decreased average waiting times for transactions.https://t.co/2rvzx93Yar pic.twitter.com/nPtnAJNle9
— vitalik.eth (@VitalikButerin) January 17, 2022
In an interview for NewsBTC, the co-founder of the non-profit organization Aleph Zero, Adam Gagol, talked about the MEV problem on Ethereum, its impact on the fee cost for users, and the advantages and tradeoffs of EIP-1559. Gagol told us:
(…) the EIP-1559 implementation in London upgrade made the problem even worse. Although it put mechanisms in place to lower fees and protect them against volatility, it did so at the expense of miners. Block production revenue was cut by something like a third, so MEV is more incentivized than ever.
Related Reading | Polygon ’s Side Of The Story: Hard-Fork Resolved A “Critical Vulnerability”
As of press time, Polygon (MATIC) trades at ,09 with a correction to the downside in the past 24 hours.
MATIC trends to the downside in the 4-hour chart. Source: MATICUSDT Tradingview
NewsBTC
StackSwap Completes $1.3 Million Round To Implement The World’s First DEX On Top Of The Bitcoin Network
StackSwap’s plans to launch the first decentralized exchange on the Bitcoin network just finished their first private round. After raising .3 million, with a leading investment from the Stacks Foundation, and major international investors such as HashKey, Genesis Block Ventures (GBV), and SOSV, the project is set to launch in November.
The partners were drawn to the initiative due to their common vision of making Stackswap the biggest decentralized exchange deployed on top of the Bitcoin network. The platform will be powered by the Stack Protocol and its Stack PoX mechanism to operate with a direct connection to the Bitcoin blockchain.
Conceived to run as a second layer solution using Bitcoin as layer 1, the Stacks mainnet will introduce smart contracts functionalities to BTC expanding its utility and use cases. Unlike other DeFi projects, Stackswap’s DEX will leverage Bitcoin for its true decentralization and security.
Thus, it will provide users with a unique platform that will hold 1:1 parity to the underlying blockchain via Stack’s PoX consensus mechanism. Upon its launch, the Stack Protocol will host the world’s first Bitcoin DEX by combining the advantages of both networks.
This is poised to transform the DeFi sector, where Ethereum, Solana, Binance Smart Chain, and other blockchains have maintained a predominant position. Now, Bitcoin can leverage for the users for an innovative use case and to transcend BTC’s traditional use as collateral in the form of synthetic versions known as Wrapped Bitcoin.
The surge of Stackswap and its Bitcoin DEX marks the beginning of a new stage for the network. Already the dominant asset in the crypto market, the benchmark crypto and its ecosystem could disrupt the DeFi sector with the Stack power DEX and take the network to the next level.
Sharing the excitement of bringing DeFi functionalities to the Bitcoin network, Stackswap’s team gave the following statement:
We are very happy that Stackswap will be able to engage with a wider scope of audience and institutions on our new trading platform through this investment. We have a very competent global team of professional developers who have researched and have had extensive experience with the DeFi and related systems for a long time.
Stackswap Brings The Know And The Innovative For Bitcoin DeFi
The DEX will support the features that made Uniswap one of the most popular platforms in the Ethereum DeFi. Users will be able to trade tokens and do liquidity mining on their favorite assets. In addition, the DEX running on Bitcoin will offer new features.
Stackswap will offer entrepreneurs a Launchpad to create and deploy their own tokens, create liquidity pools, and execute PoXL mining with a never-before-seen Bitcoin-based reward payment system on an easy-to-use interface that removes the friction associated with this process. Much of the code and manual work needed to launch a project on a blockchain has been automatized.
Therefore, any team looking to get a start on a project will have an accessible entry further boosting the growth of the Stacks Protocol and Bitcoin ecosystem. On top of that, entrepreneurs will have access to financial support via the Launchpad’s automated mechanism which allows the platform’s VC partners to quickly review and invest in a project.
How Stackswap Will Usher A New Wave Of Adoption For Bitcoin
The Stacks Protocol and the Stackswap launchpad already host many initiatives, such as the Stacks Accelerator. Backed by prominent Bitcoin Maximalist looking to implement DeFi capabilities into Bitcoin.
Another major partnership was consolidated with the city of Miami to launch MiamiCoin. A project aimed at bringing a fresh revenue stream for the city without having to excerpt pressure on its citizens.
Stackswap has been backed by major investment firms besides the ones that supported it in its private rounds, such as Coinbase Ventures and Winklevoss Capital. As the first project greenlighted by the U.S. SEC for a token sale, the Stacks Protocol enjoys vast legitimacy.
With an estimated value of 0 billion at its peaked and high institutional demand, the DeFi sector is one of the hottest trends in the crypto space. By deploying the first DEX on Bitcoin, Stackswap will open an uncharted track for the ecosystem to reach the mainstream and potentially perceive a new wave of adoption.
VeChain Foundation Announces Vote To Implement Upgrade, Bullish For VET?
Via their Twitter handle, the VeChain Foundation announced the start of the voting process that will allow the community to decide to implement or reject a major update to their network: Proof-of-Authority (PoA) 2.0. This upgrade could usher a new wave of blockchain “mass adoption”, the announcement said.
As NewsBTC reported, the PoA 2.0 upgrade will eliminate the tradeoffs of the Nakamoto Consensus and Byzantine Fault Tolerance (BFT) consensus implemented on cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin.
Related Reading | VeChain And DNV Launch First Blockchain-based IVF Service App
If approved via the voting process, the upgrade will enable blockchain VeChainThor to benefit from a high throughput capability. In addition, the PoA 2.0 upgrade will bring guaranteed data finality to the network to attract more companies and high-volume use cases without compromising its security. The Foundation said:
(…) the VeChain Research and Development teams have been working on a massive upgrade of the VeChainThor blockchain called SURFACE (PoA 2.0), standing for a Secure, Use-case-adaptive, Relatively Fork-free Approach of Chain Extension.
The VeChain Foundation believes this update will allow the blockchain VeChainThor to “lead the pack on the road to mass adoption due to the development of many revolutionary technologies”. If approved the PoA 2.0 will operate as one of the first “combined consensus mechanism”.
The voting will take place from October 11 at 10:00 pm (UTC+8) to October 18, 2021, at 10:00 pm (UTC+8). The authority masternodes and Economic X nodes will have a 40% voting authority each, while the Economic nodes will have a 20% voting authority.
Related Reading | Why The VeChain Foundation Met With China’s Government Officials
These entities will have to confirm or reject the implementation of the PoA 2.0 in its first phase, to introduce the Verifiable Random Function (VRF) as a source of randomness.
Part of the VIP-193, this mechanism will “balance the unpredictability and the unbiasedness” of the block production on the blockchain VeChainThor to increase its level of security. The foundation claimed:
After months of testing by the core team, as well as our partners and community developers, we are now confident that this upgrade is ready to be deployed on the main net.
Potential Impact On The Price Of VeChain (VET)
As seen below, the VeChain Foundation disclosed their roadmap for the implementation of the PoA 2.0. Much of the progress on the testnet has been achieved with similar progress on the mainnet route.
Source: VeChain Foundation
The Foundation called on every stakeholder on the blockchain VeChainThor to cast their vote. In that way, the implementation of PoA 2.0 can continue to make progress.
Only after a successful vote by all stakeholders, an implementation on our main net can take place, and that’s why we need your vote! Voting can be done by all those that are eligible using Sync or the VeChainThor mobile wallet.
VET has failed to positively react to the announcement by the VeChain Foundation. In the daily chart, VET records a 2.9% loss trading at ,11, at the time of writing.
VET with minor losses in the daily chart. Source: VETUSDT Tradingview
VET’s current price action could be driven by Bitcoin recent move to the upside reaching into May’s highs. In the coming days, most of VET’s price performance will be determined by the BTC Dominance.
Related Reading | This VeChain Partnership Will Enable VET Holders To Buy On Ebay, Amazon And Others
In that sense, holders could take up the opportunity to increase their holdings as VeChain enters a key channel, as pointed out by analyst Justin Bennet:
VET continues to coil above its long-standing channel support. The fun begins above 0.155. I’m using this time to accumulate.
Source: Justin Bennett via Twitter
NewsBTC