Overstock CEO Patrick Byrne is exploring options to sell the retailer and use the proceeds to start a digital global property registry; Mr. Byrne would be teaming up with Hernando de Soto who says that formalizing land rights can help to stop poverty; they are looking to use the blockchain to list ownership records, this would make it easier to trace them back to the right owner and account for less forgeries; the new company, De Soto, would start in early 2018 and use more than 10 Overstock employees. Source.
Business Insider takes a look at the worldwide regulations surrounding the emerging Cryptocurrency market; in addition to cryptocurrencies they also take a deeper look at the regulatory structure beginning to be built around blockchain technology; regions covered include the US, Europe, China and more. Source.
Technology developer Misys has created P2P lending software for banks allowing them to add another layer to their lending capabilities; the firm is marketing the software to banks as an alternative for traditional lending; the software can integrate with traditional banking technology and allows borrowers to be matched with individual or institutional lenders willing to fund their loans; could affect new structuring of banking partnerships; large partnerships to date have included Spanish banking group Banco Santander with US marketplace lender Kabbage and JPMorgan with OnDeck. Source
Alex Tapscott has raised $20 million for NextBlock Global, an investment firm investing in projects selling cryptographic tokens; he now has plans to list the company on the Toronto Stock Exchange; Tapscott is also the co-author of "Blockchain Revolution," which he wrote with his father, Don Tapscott, last year; with the IPO listing of NextBlock Global he hopes to further accelerate adoption of ICOs and blockchain. Source
Federal Reserve Bank of New York President William Dudley said the U.S. central bank is starting to think about adopting its own digital currency; while talks are in their infancy Mr. Dudley does see the value in the technology behind bitcoin; he doesn’t see bitcoin being a rival to the dollar as it is currently to unstable. Source.
Credibility Capital has completed a sale of a pool of whole loans to a regional bank; details of the loan portfolio and regional bank were not included; according to Brett Baris, chief executive officer of Credibility Capital: "Orchard provided a seamless software solution that improved the process for both sides of the transaction. With Orchard's new tool we were able to easily share vast amounts of loan data with our client on a single, easy-to-use platform." Source
iZettle has raised 60 million euros ($63.46 million) in a Series D funding round and hired a new chief financial officer; the firm is now valued at more than $500 million; says an initial public offering is one scenario it is considering for its next growth phase; the payment processing firm is comparable to US-based Square, offering card readers and credit financing for merchants; iZettle is based in Sweden and provides its service in 12 markets with market transactions led by the UK. Source
Orchard published its Weekly Online Lending Snapshot with data through Tuesday of the Thanksgiving holiday week; commentary focuses on increased lending to small businesses and highlights Small Business Saturday which occurred on November 26; the Weekly Snapshot shows publicly traded marketplace lending company returns led by LendingClub with a monthly gain of 22.38% and LendingTree with a monthly gain of 16.09%; UK listed funds all reported losses on a monthly return basis with the VPC Specialty Lending Fund leading losses at -10.38% followed by the P2P Global Investments Fund reporting a monthly loss of -7.12%; the US listed, River North Marketplace Lending Fund has reported a positive monthly gain of 0.83%; in securitizations, SoFi is the latest issuer with the SoFi Professional Loan Program LLC (SOFI-2016-E) priced on November 17. Source
The European country is considering a coin offering that would include the issuance of estcoins; the offering would build on the country's progressive innovation in technology and specifically its e-Residency Program; Kaspar Korjus, director of Estonia's e-Residency program, has been a leading proponent for the ICO and the country is also supported by ethereum founder Vitalik Buterin; funds from the ICO would go towards investment in new technologies for the public sector as well as invest venture capital into Estonian companies. Source
Cybercrime is a growing problem with ID theft hitting a record high in 2016 affecting 15.4 million people; Credit card fraud resulted in $21.84 billion in losses across the world; synthetic identities are a top risk for the banking industry and banks need next-generation KYC tools to protect themselves. Source