Closing tabs.

Two things:

1) I contacted Wedbush Securities about their new report and asked them what their citation for their first point regarding payments was.  They responded by saying they used the Blockchain.info transactional volume chart.  The reason this is interesting is because based on the past 8 months, that chart does not actually support their argument.  Perhaps this will change in the future, but it may not.

2) I have a short article about the unseen costs/subsidies in the mining space, it is mostly a rehash of chapter 3.  I suspect that once we have “Peak Hashrate” prior to the next block reward halving in 2016, some of the hand waivers will begin to realize what the real costs of securing and transacting is: How many bitcoins does it cost to maintain the Bitcoin network?

• Former PayPal Exec Offers Up a Solution to the PayPal-eBay Split Talk from Entrepreneur (could something like Stellar, Ripple or Hyperledger be used alongside?)
• Bitcoin’s Popularity Boosts Phishing Scam Success from CoinDesk (see also: Bitcoin Might be Safer Than You Think from Inside Bitcoins)
• Gavin Andresen’s ‘Fractional-Reserve Mining’: Cloud Miners Respond from CoinTelegraph (as an aside, do “exchange-traded mining contracts” meet the Howey test criteria?)
• BitSharesX: Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence by Preston Byrne (see also the comments below the post)
• Tech race fuels Bitcoin mining bubble from Financial Times (i wonder where she got all of her info on say, ArtForz…)
• Re: Scalability and transaction rate by Satoshi Nakamoto in July 29, 2010 (incidentally a few weeks after ArtForz began his farm)
• From Gold Rush to Arms Race: Why Bitcoin Mining is Heading North from CoinDesk (“It has to do a lot with access to cheap cooling and cheap energy. The energy costs and the energy taxes are interesting in [the Arctic], and there are several countries in the region that are well positioned. These countries are also very keen on getting this business. In general, the Arctic Circle will be the center of these developments going forward.”)
• Block.io: A Fool-Proof API and Wallet that Shakes Service Fees from CoinTelegraph (somewhat similar to HelloBlock, BlockCypher and Chain)
• Peer-to-Peer Lending Is Poised to Grow from Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland
• Blowing the lid off the CryptoNote/Bytecoin scam (with the exception of Monero) from Bitcoin Talk (tin foil hats or real deal?)
• Proof of Developer from Crypto Asian (really clever idea, i foresee this taking off in many other dimensions)
• Bitcoin Price Reaction: “An Ecosystem Built on Clay Feet” from Inside Bitcoins (and people think i am a skeptic!)
• In Pursuit of a Better Payment System from the Federal Reserve Financial Services
• Reinvestment of Crowdsale Donations (AngelShares AGS Part 2) from CryptoCrumb
• Virtual Property by Joshua Fairfield (an older law journal paper that incidentally delves into some of the issues that intersect with bitcoin/digital currencies today)
• USDcoin May Become Reality, Says Cryptolina Bitcoin Regulation Panel from Cryptocoins News (already have a USDCoin, it’s called a digital dollar…)
• Wells Fargo Launches Accelerator To Promote Innovation In Financial Services from TechCrunch
• A conversation with BitOcean CEO Nan Xiaoning from The Coinsman (interesting though no word on what the average ROI for an ATM operator is or the average bid/ask spread on the ATM itself)
• What happens if Bitcoin mining companies vertically integrate? by Richard Brown