TechBullion interviews Stani Kulechov, Founder of ETHLend; Ethlend is creating a global network for borrowers and lenders; discusses the benefits of using distributed ledger technology for loan transactions; the company currently has 20 people based around the world and delivered their Alpha-version in May 2017. Source
Chinese bitcoin exchange ViaBTC plans to open an overseas platform after Beijing ordered the closure of all cryptocurrency exchanges on the mainland; ViaBTC announced a week ago that it would follow Beijing’s orders and shut down its Chinese exchange business by the end of September. Source
The trading suspension was announced for American Security Resources Corp. (ARSC) on August 24, 2017; the suspension will be effective until September 8, 2017; according to the SEC, "The Commission temporarily suspended trading in the securities of ARSC because of questions that have arisen regarding publicly available information about the company in press releases on OTCMarkets.com, dated August 1, and August 8, 2017, concerning, among other things, the company's business transition to the cryptocurrency markets and early adoption of blockchain technology."; the SEC has suspended trading on at least two other companies involved in bitcoin that are listed on the OTC markets. Source
Canadian securities regulators released what they call a staff notice on "cryptocurrency offerings"; Coindesk reports on the notice, "With the offerings that we have reviewed to date, we have in many instances found that the coins/tokens in question constitute securities for the purposes of securities laws, including because they are investment contracts."; this has now become a trend in the market as the US SEC released a report and Chinese regulators released a statement about how they view this emerging capital raising method; the statement also covers companies looking to set up funds and encourages a regulatory sandbox to be created. Source
Coinbase has raised $100 million in a Series D funding round led by IVP; firm has exchanged over $25 billion of digital currency and plans to use the funding for expanding its business operations; the company currently has three main products: Coinbase for retail digital currency trading, GDAX for institutional and professional digital currency trading, and Toshi a browser for the Ethereum network. Source
Fidelity’s chief executive Abigail Johnson spoke about the company’s current projects involving cryptocurrency at the Consensus conference; they have made venture investments and are also looking at applications of blockchain technology; Fidelity has set up a mining operation which is making money for the company. Source
BTCC, one of China’s biggest bitcoin exchanges, on September 14 announces that it will stop new user registration immediately, and will shut down cryptocurrency exchange business from September 30 onwards; its mining pool business will stay intact though; for now, BTCC only trades four “mainstream” cryptocurrencies, being Bitcoin, Litecoin, Ethereum, and BCC. Source
Cryptocurrencies have received a lot of attention in the last few months; currently there are about 15 dedicated hedge funds to the space, by end of 2017 there will be about 100 crypto hedge funds; General Crypto's Managing Partner Logan Kugler talks about the hedge fund growth and the strategy behind his fund buying and holding coins with game changing value; with a significant jump in institutional capital coming he helped put together a list of top cryptocurrency investors who all share their thoughts on their top three crypto choices. Source
The SEC's report on ICOs as securities has prompted ShapeShift to review the listings on its cryptocurrency exchange; ShapeShift will likely delist some of its traded listings and says it does not want to be characterized as a securities exchange; ShapeShift and its legal counsel will apply the Howey Test to the cryptocurrency listings which is the current market standard also used by the SEC for determining whether an offering is considered a security. Source
Omise is planning a funding round through digital cryptocurrency; the blockchain digital payments startup will sell digital ether tokens with a fundraising target of up to $16 million; the fundraising will begin in May and the service plans to launch in the fourth quarter; the digital cryptocurrency fundraising represents a new funding alternative to venture capitalist investing and allows the firm to gain public participation from a broad set of stakeholders without selling equity in the company. Source