Staff Picks - September 2020

The month of September was marked by the official launch of the XRP Ledger Foundation with the launch of their website and press release on September 24.

After Flare’s announcement of the XRPL snapshot date, GateHub and many other companies hopped on board. In light of the current DeFi craze on Ethereum, Flare is trying to create something new. Check out our FAQ on Flare to learn more.

In the regulations and compliance sector, we have seen moves that act to the benefit of crypto but also efforts to further limit and regulate markets. Ethereum blockchain’s transaction costs have skyrocketed due to the emergence of DeFi like Chain Link and Uniswap.

Highlights

The XRP Ledger Foundation was officially launched on September 24. A $6,5M grant from Ripple, Coin and GateHub will be used to accelerate the development and adoption of the XRP Ledger as well as improve the infrastructure, create an objective list, support the global developer system and promote scaling and sustainability.

The Flare team is working on creating a unique DeFi use case outside of the Ethereum ecosystem by developing their own blockchain based on consensus and kickstarting it with a distribution of the native Spark token to XRP users on the XRPL. The project is set on solid technical and philosophical foundations.

Claiming Spark FAQ's

Hugo PhilionFLARE NETWORKS

From our Compliance Team

After the initial ban of cryptocurrencies in 2018 and relaxed regulation earlier this year, India is once again looking to ban trading in digital assets. This could affect more than 1.7 million users and entities outside of India who welcomed Indian users. The move seems to be aimed at protecting uninformed investors but is also limiting seasoned investors.

The Swiss canton of Zug will start accepting BTC and ETH for tax payments in 2021. This system will not pose any risk for the Zug administration as Bitcoin Suisse will be converting BTC and ETH to Swiss Francs immediately. This move can be seen as a new level of crypto acceptance by governments.

Stablecoins have been around for some time and we have gotten used to how they are used in the crypto space. The European Commission was called upon to draw up stricter regulations for asset-backed cryptocurrencies to protect consumers and regulate who can issue a stablecoin and how.

From our Product Team

Transaction costs on Ethereum have been so high due to increased DeFi activity that some businesses had to pause their operations or shut down completely. Some exchanges have passed the costs down to their customers as a result of this fee increases. Check out the challenges and opportunities.

New to crypto? Coin Market Cap’s glossary is a must read for any newcomer to the space. It never hurts to do research on a new topic and this glossary is a good start if you want to get in on the action. You will never again be confused by abbreviations and strange jargon like DYOR, Shill, Fork, FOMO and others.