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In our Friday articles, we take a deep dive into the current state of Bitcoin. Every Friday we will continue to publish brief State of Bitcoin newsletters to keep subscribers up to date on news from the Bitcoin industry. For full disclosure, Brandon is a strong believer in Bitcoin and has allocated portions of his portfolios to BTC (HODL baby).
Top stories from the week:
Exchanges Stop Withdrawals: Celsius, Coinbase, BlockFi, and others have seemingly paused withdrawals or put limits on the amount of Bitcoin and other crypto assets that you can withdraw from their platforms. Ever since Mt. Gox, Bitcoiners have been yelling from the rooftops to get your Bitcoin off of exchanges and this is why. Exchanges are great for trading and accessibility to purchasing Bitcoin and other crypto, but these services drastically suffer in downturns. By putting your assets on an exchange you essentially trust a company to hold assets that you could hold yourself. These companies do not have a long track record and are in an industry that is just now starting to become regulated. Bitcoiners have been burned by this once and some newbies are just now getting into the game. This is their first rodeo and unfortunately this is a tough but necessary lesson to learn.
Fed raises interest rates by 75 bps: I feel like this is one of the more anticipated FED meetings where everyone anticipated a large rate hike. This is the largest rate hike in 28 years. The FED is raising rates in an attempt to fight inflation, but we currently are not just facing inflation due to monetary policy but also due to supply chain issues from lock downs. The FED is doing the only thing they feel they can do, we shall see if it is successful. It seems like an economic downturn is imminent, but will it be a recession or a depression is the real question.
Jay Z partners with Jack Dorsey for Brooklyn Bitcoin Academy: Jay Z and Block CEO Jack Dorsey are debuting the Bitcoin Academy in Jay Z’s hometown of Brooklyn, New York. The goal of this academy is to “provide people tools to build independence for themselves and then the community around them.” This will provide summer residents of the Marcy Houses with innovative financial education programs. This is bringing Bitcoin to the people who really need it. Inflation negatively affects the lower class more than the upper-class, so it's always great to see people give back but it is even better with Bitcoin.
Jack Dorsey Announcing Web5: The ETH crowd has been BIG on the development of Web3 and now Jack Dorsey is two-upping (?) them by developing Web5. Web5 is being developed with the idea to combine content-ownership goals of Web3 with the decentralized content creation of the traditional web, aka Web2 (therefore Web3 + Web2 = Web5). Is this development necessary? This will require everyone to have their own decentralized identify and storage, but do people actually want to put in the work to avoid giving up their data? I believe for Bitcoin to get mass adoption few will actually run their own Bitcoin node and would people actually run their own Web5 node or have their own Web5 server? I personally do not believe so.
The Central African Republic’s Path to BTC Adoption: The CAR highlighted the country’s access to electricity, internet and digital money as key features for successful Bitcoin adoption but the report did include limitations. Some of the limitations were the lack of energy and internet in many of the country’s villages. Also the purchase of a SIM card for a smartphone requires a government issued ID and many of the country do not own an ID. To further adoption the report focused on eight recommendations: focus on Bitcoin to facilitate adoption, buy and sell Bitcoin, integrate the Lightning Network, start Bitcoin mining, start education around Bitcoin, use the Sango Wallet, figure out taxation, and issue Bitcoin backed government bonds. It sounds like a similar plan to El Salvador, so I imagine Buekele along with other notable Bitcoiners such as Samson Mow and Alex Gladstein have been lining out a plan all along to help countries adopt BTC.
Up to 75% of Merchants May Accept Bitcoin: According to a survey published by Deloitte and PayPal, up to 75% of retailers in the US plan to accept Bitcoin and other cryptocurrency payments within the next two years. This survey is wild but is it unexpected? In my opinion, no chance. This is something that is going to be done out of necessity. More people are demanding the use of Bitcoin AND the Lightning Network allows retailers to cut out the middle men to eliminate those 3% fees and in a time of drastic inflation, this seems like a no-brainer.
A quick look on chain:
Current price: $20,327
Market Cap: $540.6B
Spent Output Profit Ratio: 0.9943
Current block height: 739790
Mean block interval: 9min. 35sec.
Meme of the Week
What would the BTC community do without memes? Every week on State of Bitcoin, we feature our favorite meme of the previous week. If you create or see a meme that you like and want us to consider featuring it, tag us on Twitter or instagram (both @Greencandleit)! This week we’re featuring a meme we came across on the @bitcoincrusader page:
Video Version!
For our complete rip, check us out on the pod (there was two this week!):
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Happy Friday everyone - get after it this weekend!
Brandon
Disclosure: The authors of this writing hold positions in cryptocurrency mentioned in this article. That cryptocurrency is Bitcoin. The article was written by Brandon Keys and occasionally a guest writer; it expresses the author's own opinions. They are not receiving compensation for it. The information presented in this article is for informational purposes only and in no way should be construed as financial advice or recommendation to buy or sell any stock or cryptocurrency. None of the authors of this article are financial advisors. I encourage all readers to do further research and do your own due diligence before making any investments.