Market Analysis Report

MVIS-CryptoCompare Index

The MVIS CryptoCompare Digital Assets 10 Index has closed at 6,683.72 with a loss of 1.91% for the day.

See the live index here

Market Update

The Bitcoin value has been rising since the recent opening of CBOE’s futures markets. The trading volume immediately spiked at precisely 23:00 UTC when the futures trading opened.

At the time of writing, the Bitcoin price is sitting at $16,662, representing a gain of 22.62% in the last 24 hours. More than $2.8B worth of BTC were exchanged in the BTC/USD market, representing a 30.6% share of daily volume, second to the JPY at 42.7%.

Currently sitting at $462, the Ethereum price has risen 5.6% in the last day. Over $250M worth of Ether were exchanged in the past 24 hours on the ETH/USD pair which has a 27.3% market share of the daily trading volume.

See live charts here and here

CBOE Website Crashes as Bitcoin Futures Trading Begins

Yesterday, Bitcoin futures went live on the CBOE Exchange. The massive influx of orders caused the CBOE website to perform slower than usual within moments of the exchange opening, unable to handle the massive amount of traffic resulting from the launch of its Bitcoin futures contract. The announcement reads:

"Due to heavy traffic on our website, visitors may find that it is performing slower than usual and may at times be temporarily unavailable. All trading systems are operating normally."

Australian Exchanges Must Register at Financial Intelligence Agency

Australian lawmakers have ratified new legislation regarding the operation of Bitcoin exchanges. The “Anti-Money Laundering and Counter-Terrorism Financing Amendment Bill 2017” is meant to update Australia’s regulatory financial framework for the cryptocurrency age. From now on, all the exchanges in the country must be registered with the government’s financial intelligence agency to operate legally.

Read more here

Soccer Star Leo Messi Promotes a New Crypto Phone

Moshe Hogeg, an Israeli serial entrepreneur and Bitcoin advocate, revealed that one of his ventures, Sirin Labs, has signed up soccer superstar Leo Messi to promote an upcoming mobile phone and operating system for security-paranoid cryptocurrency users.

Messi wrote about his involvement with Sirin Labs to his almost 90 million Facebook fans. The post reads:

“I am usually busy trying to decentralize defenses and after digging deeper into Blockchain and decentralized systems. I’m excited to join SIRIN LABS as an ambassador to make blockchain more friendly with their upcoming operating system for smartphones.” 

Read more here

Britain’s GCHQ Spy Agency Is Closely Monitoring Bitcoin

GCHQ, the British equivalent of the NSA, is closely monitoring Bitcoin at the behest of its government. The code-cracking agency, famous for deciphering German communications via its Enigma machine in World War II, now has a new threat to track. Like many other government agencies around the world, it has taken a keen interest in Bitcoin.

Chris Ensor, the deputy director for GCHQ’s National Cyber Security Centre division, told The Telegraph that British government departments have ordered it to investigate security risks posed by Bitcoin. He stated:

"We are interested in anything that could affect the country, so Bitcoin is a major thing now."

Read more here