In a busy week for news, let's take a look at the stories that dominated the fintech, forex and crypto worlds, in our best of the week segment.
Major Trading Outage Hits Interactive Brokers and Robinhood
As Finance Magnates reported on Monday, US traders were foiled, yet again, by an inability to place or close trades on many trading platforms during early Monday trading.
Users at Robinhood and Interactive Brokers were reporting technical issues ranging from delays in order updates to being prevented from accessing their accounts and trades.
Read more on the major trading outage at Interactive Brokers and Robinhood here.
France Launches Crackdown on Cryptocurrencies
Bruno Le Maire, the Finance Minister of France, ordered all cryptocurrency providers to check and reveal the identity of cryptocurrency owners in an effort to stop the potential involvement of digital assets in terrorism financing.
In the latest announcement, the French politician asked virtual asset service providers to completely ban anonymous crypto wallets.
Read more on the French Crypto Crackdown here.
Vitalik Buterin Warns about Security of Cryptocurrency Wallets
Vitalik Buterin, a Canadian-Russian programmer and Co-founder of the world’s second-largest cryptocurrency, Ethereum, asked the crypto community to talk more about security. He said that user-friendly wallets are needed because current wallets are insecure for non-technical users.
During a conversation at the Latin American Bitcoin Conference, Buterin mentioned that the cryptocurrency market did not give much importance to the security side and that is why it is much easier to lose a large amount in digital assets if a cryptocurrency wallet breaks.
Read more on Vitalik Buterin's crypto wallet security warning here.
eToro Triples Its Secondary Market Valuation to $2.5 Billion
As Finance Magnates covered this week, the valuation of Israel-based brokerage, eToro has surged to over $2.5 billion in the secondary markets from merely $800 million in its last funding round which closed in 2018.
The valuation was confirmed by the CalCalist as a US-based institutional investor purchased at least $50 million worth of eToro shares from existing investors and former employees at a valuation of more than $2.5 billion.
Read more on the eToro Secondary Market Valuation here.
World’s Top Hedge Fund Manager Compares Bitcoin with Gold
American billionaire Hedge Fund Manager and Founder of Bridgewater Associates, Ray Dalio said that bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies have established themselves as alternative assets in the last decade.
In a Reddit post this week, Dalio changed his tone on cryptocurrencies and presented a positive stance on digital assets. He compared bitcoin with gold and said that both have similarities as a store of value. The recent comments came as a surprise after Dalio bashed bitcoin last month for lack of adoption, high volatility and uncertain regulatory status.
Read more on Ray Dalio's bitcoin comments here.
Steve Wozniak’s Cryptocurrency WOZX Reaches $950 Million in 13 Minutes
Apple Co-founder Steve Wozniak's recently launched Efforce’s WOZX crypto tokens received a tremendous response from investors as its market cap reached $950 million in the first 13 minutes of the launch.
The Blockchain company Efforce, whose goal is to transform and disrupt the energy-efficient market, received a valuation of around $80 million by investors in private sales even before the official launch.
Read more on the Efforce WOZX launch here.
Why Is the Price of Bitcoin Falling & When Will It Stop?
In a popular Bitcoin analysis, we posed the questions on every bitcoin fan's minds: Why Is the Price of Bitcoin Falling & When Will It Stop?
With expert insights from Ilia Maksimenka, Chief Executive and Founder of PlasmaPay and Steve Ehrlich, Chief Executive Officer and Co-founder of crypto trading platform, Voyager, Finance Magnates dissected Bitcoin's decline and made a prediction for its future.
Read more on the Bitcoin Price decline here.
