Open Network service from Baidu aims to help small developers to build DApps

Open Network service from Baidu aims to help small developers to build DApps

by | Jan 8, 2020 | News

Baidu, the Chinese online giant, started a blockchain-based service for developers and small and midsize-businesses to build dapps (decentralized software).

The new service, translated as Open Network from the Chinese, will enable users to develop and deploy applications without building their own blockchain platforms, according to a Chinese media report by STCN, a state-owned daily newspaper. 

The Open Network is a part of Baidu’s business blockchain community Xuperchain and intends to entice smaller users with a better price and technological challenges.

The network can be also considered a way in which the Chinese government tries to embrace the blockchain technology and its desire to encourage its use by smaller businesses throughout the country.

How much does it cost to use the Open Network platform from Baidu?

Baidu stated the price of using the new service can be as low as 1 yuan (US14 pennies ) using its quantity-based fee arrangement until March, according to the report. The new service enables clients to use smart contracts templates along with other practical elements created to boost efficacy, in order to simplify the procedure and build new apps.

According to their site, the Xuperchain system has almost 3.5 million consumers and has processed over 450 million trades. The system has seven masternodes such as Tsinghua University and streaming solutions giant iQiyi to assist and confirm transactions on the stage.

Baidu announced in May it would make its Xuperchain community open source to people and start looking into the possible challenges its potential users could experience.

The new service isn’t the organization’s first attempt to assist programmers to build their own software. In February, Baidu Cloud established Baidu Blockchain Engin (BBE) to handle computing and storage problems for programmers when they attempt to construct programs.

Baidu launched its own Blockchain-as-a-Service (BaaS) platform in January 2018. The system aims to be the blockchain infrastructure for apps. Unlike the newest Company, the BaaS platform needs companies and developers to have their very own blockchain first.

Thank My Famer, the IBM blockchain app that tracks coffee beans!

Thank My Famer, the IBM blockchain app that tracks coffee beans!

by | Jan 7, 2020 | Blockchain, News

Thank My Famer is an app powered by IBM’s blockchain, which produces a permanent digitized series of trades that can’t be changed – monitoring each step of a coffee bean’s journey.

Based on IBM’s Worldwide Blockchain Leader, Paul Chang, every participant to the Thank My Farmer app has a copy of all the transaction information. Each piece of data is added to the blockchain and broadcasted across the community based on each participant’s level of permission. This permits farmers, retailers, and traders to interact better while providing consumers with insights concerning the sources of the coffee.

According to the founder and president of Farmer Connect, David Behrends, the “Thank My Farmer” app provides customers with an interactive map to show the journey of the coffee by scanning a QR-code:

“After scanning a QR-code, consumers are taken straight to a product page that gives details about the coffee they are drinking. Below that description is an interactive map that shows the journey the coffee has taken. We say you can travel the world through a cup of coffee, and we’d like to help consumers visualize that.”

IBM blockchain is powering Thank My Famer app to track coffee beans

How is this different from other blockchain-based solutions?

Although the Thank My Farmer app is powered by the IBM blockchain, Farmer Link is not a part of IBM’s Food Trust Network, which now includes over 200 food providers and retailers such as Walmart and Carrefour. But the program uses the very same assets as the Food Trust platform.

“We took the assets from the Food Trust network and put those in a dedicated environment for Farmer Connect to address the coffee industry supply chain. As a result, Famer Connect doesn’t have to worry about scalability, security and robustness of the network, as everything has already been proven out by Food Trust.”

The purpose of Thank My Famer wasn’t to experiment with new technology but to define a more sustainable ecosystem for coffee farmers, drinkers and the rest of the players involved.

This new Thank My Famer app is different from the rest of the blockchain-based options that allow users to scan a QR barcode to obtain the origin of a particular food item. Carrefour, for instance, the European supermarket, has integrated the QR barcode technology into a few of their goods, but customers are able to just determine where these foods came from. Farmer Connect enables users to make direct donations to farmers, and that is a specific element of the app. David Behrends, the president of Farmer Connect, further clarified this, stating:

“Thank My Farmer app is an industry lead initiative being supported by the entire industry. Others in space are trying to do something similar by showing consumers where their food comes from, but we are addressing issues that the coffee industry is also facing.”

Farmer Connect is considering expanding into other food industries, like cocoa and tea, in which products are created by smaller farmers.

Bitcoin sold at a premium price in Venezuela

Bitcoin sold at a premium price in Venezuela

by | Jan 6, 2020 | News

The reality is that Venezuela is poor now but Bitcoin sold at a premium price in Venezuela. WHY?

The prices for cryptocurrencies vary for different nations. The ‘advertised’ price is often an average of all the prices available on exchanges. At the moment, the demand for Bitcoin in Venezuela seems to be increasing significantly, and this can push the price of one BTC into a five-digit number.

At the moment, most people from all over the world know that the financial situation in Venezuela isn’t at its best. Hyperinflation has plagued the nation for years, and things continue to get even worse. There’s little to nothing the authorities and central bank can do in order to block the fiscal onslaught.

What are the main issues in Venezuela?

Firstly, president Maduro introduced a nationwide cryptocurrency some time ago. Since day one, there were lots of uncomfortable questions concerning this specific venture. Because Venezuela doesn’t have any more oil reserves to back up the Petro, there isn’t any actual use or need for this federal cryptocurrency.

Bitcoin sold at a premium price in Venezuela

Prices for services and products are still skyrocketing virtually daily while the national fiat currency devalues even farther. For all, the only solution would be to attempt to enhance their financial resources. Bitcoin is now of fantastic interest in the nation, and that trend isn’t slowing down.

In a state where digital and physical money is losing worth frequently, the requirement for other assets will become more evident. Venezuela is good example in this situation and Bitcoin is one such asset. The nation has witnessed a lot of spikes of BTC trading volume via peer-reviewed platforms like LocalBitcoins.

What’s even more notable is that the price people are prepared to pay for 1 Bitcoin.

Given the current international price of $7,560, an individual from Venezuela would be expected to pay a premium price in Venezuela.  This isn’t something most are willing to believe, but when it comes to Venezuela, the difference between this international price and the one available locally can be steep.

To understand the difference, consider the price of 1 BTC in Venezuela, which is currently near $9,500. That’s around a $2,000 extra fee to just escape the Venezuelan bolivar. It is not the first time that prices in Venezuela spike, as Venezuela has consistently had greater prices for BTC.

Why is Bitcoin sold at a premium price in Venezuela?

At the current rate of inflation that Venezuela is suffering from, this digital currency can’t be bought via a bank account, or card, because of the financial situation. The desire to escape inflation and buy something which resided outside of this system builds up the demand for Bitcoin. And when the acquisition is impeded by the very system, then is when the scarcity appears.

Venezuela is facing hard times, and its people are willing to put their last money of anything else than the Venezuelan pesos. Foreign fiat currencies such as the US dollar is in the same situation as Bitcoin: Hard to get and sold at a premium price.

For the rest of the world, these prices don’t apply, and we will have to wait for a bigger demand from all over the world the get that price up again.

Crypto World December 2019: China wants more blockchain, Buy crypto with Visa, blockchain school in Rwanda

Crypto World December 2019: China wants more blockchain, Buy crypto with Visa, blockchain school in Rwanda

by | Jan 3, 2020 | News

Chine is open for private and public blockchains

In November 2016, the very first blockchain industrial park has been opened at Shanghai’s Baoshan District together with the objective of not just developing blockchain technologies for government-related work, but also for linking the tech together with finance, insurance, property, intellectual property and other sectors.

Soon after the launch at Shanghai, blockchain industrial parks emerged in different cities around China, for example Hangzhou, Chongqing, Suzhou and Changsha, with a whole investment of over 170 billion RMB ($24 billion) and a great deal of this funding coming from the authorities. With this quantity of investment and spread “playgrounds” to learn more about the nation’s potential with blockchain technologies, it’s normal that China is planning to be a pioneer in the blockchain area.

Binance offers card payment for 4 of its cryptos

Binance, the worldwide cryptocurrency exchange offers the option to purchase cryptocurrency using Visa debit and credit cards.

On the 26th of December, Binance explained in an announcement that its customers have the ability to buy four cryptocurrencies after binding their account into Visa cards issued inside the European Economic Area.

After the user links the Visa cardto his/her account, the user may purchase any of these four cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin (BTC), Ether (ETH), XRP and Binance’s native token Binance Coin (BNB) using Euros or British pounds.

According to the statement, Binance intends to include support for Mastercard and extra currencies in the future. Binance also intends to expand the support to other authorities past the European Economic Area.

Rwanda will have a school for blockchain professionals

The Africa Blockchain Institute (ABI) will start Rwanda’s apparently first blockchain faculty in 2020, offering five new classes for local programmers, professionals and policymakers.

The ABI Executive Director, Kayode Babarinde, disclosed the new college has five important classes from the pipeline: a blockchain essentials certificate training course, a blockchain programmers’ class, a venture blockchain program, blockchain for attorneys and blockchain for effect.

Babarinde said that the ABI laid the basis for the work in Rwanda by conducting a pilot stage for the faculty from Ghana, where it established the inaugural class to get a blockchain essentials certificate program.

While the five class areas had been extensively sketched out before this pilot in Ghana, the college’s program has been rehauled and upgraded on the basis of their answers and experiences of class participants.

The Bahamas will experiment with crypto

The Central Bank of the Bahamas (CBOB) will present an electronic form of the Bahamian dollar at the Exuma district.

According to the press release, the CBOB will establish its electronic money (CBDC) pilot Dec. 27, which will expand at the first half of 2020 into Abaco, a set of islands and barrier cays from the northern Bahamas.

The electronic money has been developed under the initiative named Project Sand Dollar and are the Bahamas’ first electronic money. The initiative intends to make access to financial services more effective and non-discriminatory.

Is Bitcoin going to fix the banking crisis?

Is Bitcoin going to fix the banking crisis?

by | Dec 20, 2019 | News

Bitcoin Beats Banks

As another week goes by, countless billions were created into the US financial system by its own central bank. According to the WSJ the FED added another $57.5 billion in temporary liquidity into financial markets.

The central bank started interfering in markets since September and intends to boost repurchase operations within the vacation period. More than double the recent Bitcoin market capitalization is going to be pumped back into the market by the FED.

The additional $425 billion is a part of continuing quantitative easing programs and the bank stated that it is ‘perfectly normal’. Printing countless dollars to prop up lending markets isn’t normal by any criteria and illustrates the flaws of the fiscal system.

According to usdebtclock.org, the federal debts are of over $23 trillion, but even so, banks have been encouraging taking credits in the market.

Crypto business analyst ‘PlanB’ compared this to the Bitcoin stock to flow model, which is much smaller compared to the trillions of dollars which were printed over the past ten years.

“You think bitcoin stock-to-flow model predictions are unrealistic, flawed, absurd? I think negative interest rates & quantitative easing are absurd, printing $21 trillion out of thin air since 2008,”

A recent report by RT stated that the US government could have misspent an identical sum as the ineptitude escalates. Two divisions may have spent up to $21 trillion on matters they can not account for between 1998 and 2015.

Is Bitcoin going to fix to the banking crisis?

Bitcoin has a fixed total supply and its fixed inflationary rates are a mathematically way to solve the monetary madness that’s presently being orchestrated by global banks.

These banks brought on the 2008 financial catastrophe and they’ll cause the subsequent one that could be imminent if present trends persist.

PlanB also stated on Twitter:

“Companies are buying back their own shares with that money. CEO’s of those companies are getting richer and richer and have few other options than to put their money in real estate.”

The main point is that you can not print Bitcoin! More individuals are starting to realize this. BTC is the greatest hedge for anyone desiring a parachute once the monetary walls come crumbling down.

Amazon and Alibaba to reshaped e-commerce?

Amazon and Alibaba to reshaped e-commerce?

by | Dec 19, 2019 | Blockchain, News

The online era fundamentally changed the way people shop. Companies as Amazon and Alibaba laid out the basis of e-commerce.

Jeff Bezos founded Amazon in the early 1990s, and clients reacted well to Amazon’s services. In May 1997, Amazon developed the initial public offering. The issue price was $18 per share at the moment. After 21 years, the stock touched the historical $2,000 mark in August 2018. This is the way Bezos became the wealthiest man on the planet and Amazon turned into a $1 trillion firm. Amazon’s stock has increased more than 1000 times since its beginning. On December 12, AMZN stock returned 14% year-to-date.

Alibaba, often referred to as the Chinese version of Amazon, has not such a different story. Alibaba was first funded by the CEO of SoftBank, Masayoshi Son, and it issued 2 different series of stocks. In 2014, Alibaba received a record-setting $21 billion of initial funding after listing ADRs (American depository receipts) on NYSE. In 2019, throughout the trade war between the US and China, Alibaba was confronted with a possible threat of becoming delisted. After some deliberation, Alibaba went forward using a second listing on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange at the end of November 2019 under the ticker 9988. Alibaba inventory rose by 6.5% on the first day of listing in Hong Kong. By November 2019, the Alibaba IPO was the biggest IPO recorded.

In December 2019, Saudi Aramco’s IPO surpassed Alibaba’s IPO record. The state-owned oil firm from Saudi Arabia draw over $25 billion in its IPO.

E-commerce business transformation

Each time a new technological invention springs upward, the companies that set the new technology up the fastest, are the most successful.

Amazon and Alibaba are great examples of businesses embracing the online world. The world wide web has made it feasible to search for products and services while still sitting in your home. Nowadays, emerging technologies such as fintech are catapulting e-commerce to another level.  Everyday consumers are able to instantly purchase their desired goods thanks to fintech. These are only a couple of examples of how e-commerce has adapted to newer variants of this technology. Lots of new start-ups have emerged and are interested in finding methods to add value to the e-commerce industry using modern technology.

With blockchain, enterprises can streamline daily operational tasks. The technology is highly transparent and secure. It could drastically reduce costs.