Crypto News: Bitcoin Cash, Bakkt, Vechain, IOTA, Swiss ETP, Aeternity (19th – 25th of November)

Crypto News: Bitcoin Cash, Bakkt, Vechain, IOTA, Swiss ETP, Aeternity (19th – 25th of November)

Crypto News: Bitcoin Cash, Bakkt, Vechain, IOTA, Swiss ETP, Aeternity (19th – 25th of November)

Crypto Exchange-Traded Product to Launch on Swiss Stock Exchange

SIX Swiss Exchange, Switzerland’s principal stock exchange based in Zurich, approved the listing of a crypto exchange-traded product (ETP) with the ticker “HODL.”

The ETP will track an index “the top 5 crypto assets in terms of market cap and liquidity”. The index will not include stablecoins, tokens that are designed for anonymity, illiquid or very new tokens. It was prepared by the crypto startup, Amun AG.

“The Amun ETP will give institutional investors that are restricted to investing only in securities or do not want to set up custody for digital assets exposure to cryptocurrencies. It will also provide access for retail investors that currently have no access to crypto exchanges due to local regulatory impediments,” Hany Rashwan, co-founder and chief executive of Amun, said.

This is a positive milestone for the industry but there are some differences between ETF and ETP meaning this doesn’t really help ETF proposals in the USA.

Bakkt Delayed

On 20th of November Bakkt, an upcoming crypto retail payment system and futures platform, announced that they are delaying its launch to better ensure the platform’s success at release.

The new initial launch is being postponed until January 24, 2019. According to CEO Kelly Loeffler, the delay is meant to give the project more time to make sure that the platform is operationally sound at launch.

They also indicated that the team is still working “with customer onboarding and securing regulatory approvals,” as the futures trading platform is still “subject to regulatory approval

The market did not react well since a lot of people are counting on Bakkt to start new bull run. However it is also good that they are ensuring that everything is polished and ready for the release without any major issues

Vechain and H&M usage

It was confirmed this week that VeChain is being tested by H&M fashion empire for Arket – their clothing brand which is trying out the blockchain based technology to track the respective products. Arket has done a small Proof of Concept (POC) through a pilot testing with VeChain to use blockchain technology to secure product data traceability in the value chain.

It is worth pointing out that Arket’s collaboration with VeChain is far from a done deal, and merely an experiment at this point but this is a very positive sign for blockchain application in shipping/logistics and very positive sign for Vechain.

IOTA Updates

IOTA had some significant developments recently the first one being a creation of the IOTA Research Council. The council will oversee the work of the research professors, researchers and scientists working on the ledger technologies, to form the backbone of a future automated data-driven society.

The other news is collaboration between IOTA Foundation and HIGH MOBILITY. HIGH MOBILITY is an API platform used to develop apps specifically for cars. First stage of this collaboration via a smart charging blueprint in the all-new IOTA Workspace. Both partnertship and council creation are very good signs for long term future of IOTA.

Bitcoin Cash fork

On November 15th Bitcoin Cash forked into two separate cryptocurrencies: Bitcoin Cash ABC (BCHABC) and Bitcoin Cash SV (BCHSV). Both forks are lead by two crypto personalities (Roger Ver and Craig Wright) incorporate some different solutions and changes to the existing infrastructure.

While there is no direct proof it is possible that the fork caused the price decrease for most cryptocurrencies since it could be another sign that there is some discord in the cryptocurrency world.

As always with fork like these the outcome is unpredictable but it seems that Bitcoin Cash is now two blockchains. As always in these situations exchanges have different approaches. Coinbase for example treats ABC chain as normal BCH while Binance, Poloniex and Bittrex list both coins. Overall BCH lost almost -50% in value due to fork.

Aeternity Token Migration

Aeternity is going through their first stage of the token migration event. This means that the AE tokens on the ERC20 Ethereum platform will be transported to the æternity Mainnet.

This first phase of AE Token Migration will last until November 25. The genesis block, which is the first block of the æternity blockchain, will include all tokens migrated by users during Phase 0. The entire Aeternity migration plan is divided into stages thorough hard forks. The scheduled hard forks will include new features and improvements to the æternity protocol such as the governance system or the new virtual machine.

Aeternity aspires to be a generalist solution that can be applied to any and all situations that might come to mind when you think of the term “smart contract.”

Aeternity is currently around 35th place on CMC with total mcap of around 150M.

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