Today on Altcoins This Week we comment on the United Nations’ decision to begin discussions on blockchain adoption, we review which coins Coinbase could be adding to its platform and more.
Lawsuits Still Loom While Tezos Offers Grants To Developers
The Tezos Foundation has invited applications for a new grant program which, it says, is open to community members, research institutions and other interested parties. In its announcement, the Foundation said that the grants will focus on three key areas: Research that furthers the Tezos Protocol; development of tools to support the burgeoning Tezos ecosystem; and efforts to strengthen the Tezos community.
With the beta version of the Tezos network live since the beginning of June, the Swiss-based Foundation hopes to launch the Mainnet later this year. Having raised more than $230 million dollars in its ICO, this is an event that is keenly anticipated. However, not everyone is supportive of the Tezos Foundation, and four class action lawsuits have been filed against the company alleging that its ICO breached US securities law.
United Nations Seeks Unified Approach to Blockchain Adoption
The United Nations has assembled a “high-profile groups of tech experts” tasked with “putting the benefits of digital technology to better use”. The Secretary-General’s High-Level Panel On Digital Co-Operation, as the task force is known, will be co-chaired by Melissa Gates and Alibaba founder, Jack Ma.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Gutteres assembled the twenty plus tech leaders because of his belief that digital technology is developing at warp speed, far outpacing international cooperation on the issue. The Panel will map trends in digital technologies, identify gaps and opportunities, and outline proposals for strengthening international cooperation.
Baseball Star Collectibles Now On Ethereum
Eight months since CryptoKitties introduced the strange idea that digital furry animals stored on the blockchain could be big business, Lucid Sight hopes to tap into the great American tradition of baseball card collecting, by launching its new brand of limited edition Major League Baseball collectibles, available to buy and store on the Ethereum blockchain.
Lucid Sight raised eyebrows earlier this year when assets for its Ethereum based space-game Crypto Space Commander sold for thousands of dollars. Now it hopes that baseball fans will part with large sums to get their hands on these rare digital baseball stars, which are being released in partnership with the MLB. The avatars will form part of MLB Crypto Baseball, a new Ethereum based game being launched by Lucid Sight later this summer.
Will Coinbase Add 5 New Coins?
Most Altcoins were in the red this week, but there were five notable exceptions. Cardano, Basic Attention Token, Steller Lumens, Zcash and Ox, all saw gains on foot of an announcement that Coinbase was considering adding one of them to its popular crypto exchange and wallet platform. The five coins all saw their value increase by up to 15% following the announcement, although they are still trading at levels far below the last peak for the crypto market at the end of April.
Coinbase hinted that it may not facilitate wallets for whichever coin it eventually lists, and confused matters further by stating that it might not list any new coin at all. One coin it will definitely list in the near future is Ethereum Classic, which is on course to join Bitcoin, Bitcoin Cash, Ethereum and Litecoin in the Coinbase stable in the very near future.
Altcoins Having A Good Week
Ether (ETH) recovered some of its early-week losses, opening at $446.50 on Thursday before retreating to $430 by close. It stayed steady until Sunday when it hit a high of $454 before closing out the week at $449. XRP still struggles to make the $0.45 mark, opening Thursday at $0.449 which was as good as it got as it slipped to $0.43 on Friday before turning upwards slightly, closing Sunday at $0.445. Bitcoin Cash (BCH) opened on Thursday at $706.98 and the weekend saw it trade for between $670 and $707 before a more sustained increase on Sunday saw it close the week at $722.97. EOS started Thursday on $7.17 but struggled to find any upward momentum until it rallied on Sunday, closing the week at $7.40. Finally, Litecoin (LTC) opened Thursday at $78.59, before losing ground and hitting a low of $76.11 on Friday. It too bounced back seeing out the week at $78.94.
A steady but unspectacular few days for the leading Altcoins then, but it was those below the leaders that really made ground, with the five Coinbase linked currencies gaining up to 15% over the half-week.
