Siemens Blockchain to work with Microgrids
An American startup has started a new partnership to help the Siemens Blockchain project, as the company wants to develop a peer-to-peer energy transfer program based on the Ethereum Blockchain.
Siemens Blockchain Project with LO3
To do so, LO3 will work together with tech giant Siemens to help its new TransActive Grid project, which allows users to sell their own power to other microgrid stakeholders.
In a press release published today, Siemens said they will provide the startup with its microgrid control technology.
Recently, we need to remember, LO3 was awarded as a patent for its decentralized energy transfer project by the US Patent and Trademark Office.
Thanks to this collaboration, LO3 will work together with Siemens’ Next47 Unit, opened earlier this year.
Siemens indicated that this project created between the two companies will be able to have future impacts on its own global client base.
In fact, Siemens is one of Germany’s biggest companies, and also one of Europe’s largest engineering businesses.
CEO for Siemens’ Energy Management Division, Ralf Christian, explained:
“We’re convinced that our microgrid control and automation solutions, in combination with the blockchain technology of our partner LO3 Energy, will provide additional value for our customers whether on the utilities side or on the prosumer side.”
Siemens and LO3 will test blockchain-powered microgrids in New York and other worldwide locations, as the two companies explained today.
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Bitcoin Price trades at $750, $900 in India
The bitcoin price is currently trading at $750, its highest level in five months.
At the moment, bitcoin price rose by about 2%, and by $50 since this Monday.
Recently we said that the election of the 45th U.S.A. President Donald Trump might be one of the reasons behindthis bitcoin Price growth.
Earlier this week the bitcoin price grow of about $30 in just one hour, and now bitcoin is approaching the 2016 high it reached in June, when the price was at $764.
At that time, bitcoin price was growing mainly due to the halving event, as experts explained that it has a key role in the growth of demand, as it reduces the block reward by 50%.
Conversely, this time the bitcoin price growth is not attributable to a single cause.
Recently, bitcoin has been enjoying bullish feelings among its avid traders, and there are a few signs that its recent ascent might have been drived by foreign market forces.
For example, India has recently experienced a ban on certain denominations of banknotes, a development that local bitcoin companies claim has supported business, though public data platforms (including LocalBitcoins) explain the effects are not so clear.
In fact, on the Indian exchange Unocoin, one bitcoin traded for 61,688 India rupees, or more than $900, an event that boosts claims of strong local demand.
Another reason why the price is growing could be the devaluation of China’s yuan, as it is falling down this week.
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Sweden Digital Currency: a new Bitcoin?
Today I want to talk about the new Sweden Digital Currency project.
Sweden’s central bank, in fact, is considering the possibility of issuing its own national virtual currency, but the technology behind it is yet to be revealed.
According to an article published today by The Financial Times, Riksbank wants to create the new virtual currency because of a strong decline in domestic cash use. In fact, according to a report, the amount of notes in circulation has declined 40% since 2009.
Sweden Digital Currency and other solutions
Deputy governor Cecilia Skingsley commented that the central bank wants to test various technologies. Although she did not mention blockchain drectly, the Financial Times explained that the distributed ledger might be one of the options the Sweden bank could consider.
“We need to do the homework because it’s not an option for the public sector to stay on the sidelines and see the private sector cut off access to central bank money for individuals.”
Skingsley said that the digital currency could be issued together with banknotes and coins, but the Riksbank do not want to encourage illegal activity.
Tomorrow Skingsley will give a speech and he might explain more details about the Sweden Digital Currency project.
With this announcement, Sweden will become the latest country to have its own central bank considering to issue a new digital currency, an idea that for the greatest part of nations meant doing several reseatches related to blockchain-based cryptocurrencies.
During the latest few months, the Bank of England has started to discuss and test issuing its own digital currency using the blockchain; and the People’s Bank of China is investigating the idea too.
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Unicef Blockchain Startup: new details
Today we talk about the new Unicef Blockchain Startup.
The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), in fact, decided to invest in a South African startup related to the blockchain.
In February UNICEF revealed that its decision to fund projects focused on the distributed ledger thanks a new innovation fund created in 2015.
At the time, UNICEF explained it was interested in investing in the areas of digital identity and remittances, but later UNICEF decided to hire a person on blockchain.
Right now, the association is starting to fund companies in areas that support its mission to promote child and family welfare.
UNICEF invested in several startups, including 9Needs, which uses the blockchain to develop identity features for children’s education.
9Needs will receive about $100,000 in investment, which will be used to scale the platform already developed by the startup.
Chris Fabian of UNICEF’s Office of Innovation Ventures explained that the organization decided to fund 9Needs as it promotes social progress.
“The sense of the company we got of the company, in talks with them, they seem like a really cohesive group of people using a sophisticated technology to solve a pressing set of problems.”
Read more about UNICEF Blockchain Startup Investment by clicking here.
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OCBC Blockchain: new tests on the ledger
In this article we will talk about the new OCBC Blockchain tests.
One of the major banks in Singapore, in fact, decided to test a distributed ledger payment service, with the goal to develop new commercial products created thanks to this revolutionary techonolgy.
OCBC started to use the ledger to send money between its operations in Singapore and Malaysia, as well as do transactions with the Bank of Singapore, one of its own private financial group.
To do so, the bank explained it worked with the BCS Information Services, a local financial brand that helped to do the OCBC Blockchain tests.
This is only the latest test in the Asia’s banking sector. Read more news about the blockchain tests and researches made in Asia previously this year.
OCBC senio vice president, Praveen Raina explained to Coindesk:
“We hope this will be a catalyst for more banks to adopt the blockchain technology so that, together, we can achieve efficiency and cost effectiveness while delivering more high-value financial services to our consumers.”
The bank announced its news on its official website, but currently the details of this announcement appear to have been removed.
Stay tuned for the next updates related to the blockchain and follow HolyTransaction on Facebook.
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Deutsche Bank Blockchain: report and results
According to a new Deutsche Bank Blockchain report three out of four capital markets participants believe that distributed ledger will be used by everyone and everywhere in the world by the end of 2022.
Conducted by Deutsche Bank, this report about the blockchain wanted to explore why financial institutional, investors, banks, financial sponsors and broker-dealers are working or studying the distributed ledger and how they want to implement it into their business strategy.
The survey includes 200 market participants, and 87% believes it is likely to have an impact on securities services.
However, 75% of partecipants think that distributed technologies will be widely used within the next 3 or 6 years; and the report authors believe that this is a surprising degree of certainty about the blockchain.
Deutsche Bank’s head of Custody and Clearing, Deborah Thompson, explained in the report:
“Respondents were clearly positive about the potential impact of blockchain — almost all participants saw it as either moderately or completely disruptive to existing business models — and an overwhelming majority believe it will be actively used within the next six years.”
Also, the greatest part of report respondents think that the technology will help firms to reduce costs; and almost half (48%) said they believe that the blockchain could solve systems failures.
Earlier this year, Deutsche Bank has already demonstrated how it is interested in the blockchain. Click here to read more about Deutsche Bank Blockchain research and tests.
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World Economic Forum Blockchain led by Estonia
The World Economic Forum Blockchain created a new working group focused on the distributed ledger with the Estonian President.
This so-called “Global Futures Council on Blockchain Technology” will be met for the first time during an event held in Dubai later this week. According to the World Economic Forum Blockchain the group will be focused on the development of governance models related to the distributed ledger.
Toomas Hendrik Ilves, president of Estonia for 10 years, will co-chair together with Jamie Smith, chief communications and marketing officer for bitcoin mining and blockchain services firm BitFury and a former official in the Obama White House.
Members of the group are: Ma Jun (chief economist for the People’s Bank of China’s research outfit) and Claire Sunderland Hay (head of the Bank of England’s fintech startup accelerator).
The group also include representatives from bitcoin-related startups such as BitPesa, Everledger, Ripple and Chain; and institutions such as Barclay’s and Deutsche Bank.
Here you can read the full list of the “World Economic Forum Blockchain” members.
“The distributed ledger or blockchain system of preserving data integrity and security is one of the most promising new technologies to emerge in the past decade. Its full potential is only now beginning to be realized. This Council will play a leading role exploring how blockchain can be used to improve security on the internet.”
The WEF counducted an internal research about the blockchain since 2015 and this new working group is part of a broader network of Global Agenda Councils, focused on problems such as climate change, AI and cybersecurity.
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With Donald Trump Bitcoin Price could grow
America has its 45th President today and several bitcoin investors and analysts believe that with Donald Trump Bitcoin price could grow, as its presidency could provide a boost to bitcoin prices.
Analysts explained that even if Bitcoin markets would not see any significant change from Clinton’s election, instead Trump could impact worldwide investors, so traders agree that Donald Trump will be a good thing for bitcoin business.
Jacob Eliosoff commented:
“I think a Trump presidency would be great for bitcoin, much like nuclear war would be great for bitcoin. It would be an epic disaster in a bunch of respects – economic, geopolitical, democratic – and in the fear and chaos bitcoin would be a defensive asset people could turn to.”
If Hillary Clinton won, experts have suggested that she would be a boom for the blockchain markets, given her open embrace of the tech as part of her innovation platform. Previously, in fact, she suggested she would use the distributed ledger.
The Donald Trump Bitcoin Effect
Donald Trump hasn’t put bitcoin on his agenda yet, but he defined himself as a “Washington outsider”, so traders believe that he lead to uncertainty and move towards alternative assets.
This might create just a temporary increase in bitcoin prices, but it might have a little lasting effect.
In fact, ARK Invest‘s Chris Burniske underlined that bitcoin can be useful in unpredictable times like this, and the election could add evidence to this claim.
“The way in which its price movement is uncorrelated from other capital market assets may be a desirable characteristic for many investors in the face of uncertainty. Depending on how people feel about the election, they may choose to hedge themselves from the more traditional markets by using bitcoin.”
So, in a few words, if bitcoin benefits from the election result, don’t give Trump too much credit for that, any other cataclysm would have done the same.
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Thailand Bank tests Blockchain with IBM
Thailand bank tests blockchain to certify official documents. To do so, it is is working with the IBM company.
According to Reuters magazine, in fact, Kasikornbank wants to cut costs related to record keeping.
The bank is one of the most important in Thailand and it is looking to create a document certification service by next year.
Also, Kasikornbank is talking with other Thai banks with the goal of establishing new collaborations that could involve a few members of the national financial system. According to the current plan, other banks together with Kasikornbank could use the blockchain network to certify documents.
In a press release published back in April, Kasikornbank revealed its decision to study and test new technologies, including machine learning and the distributed ledger.
At the time, the Thai bank explained that blockchain is “a technology that offers other benefits, e.g., reducing costs and increasing cross-border settlement efficiency that can be verified”.
This news also represented a turn within the Thai country, as two years ago the specter of a bitcoin ban in Thailandia led to problems for the local exchange activity.
After that, Thailand decided not to ban digital currencies, but published a warning to its citizens about their use.
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Switzerland Bitcoin Regulation will arrive next year
Switzerland Bitcoin Regulation might arrive next year.
Recently its national railway service “have jumped on the bitcoin bandwagon”, as explained by Coindesk, so now it’s time for Switzerland to start regulating fintech and digital currency.
A few days after the Swiss railway-related announcement, as SBB decided to sell bitcoin through its network of ticket kiosks – the Federal Department of Finance (FDF) announced its plans to regulate fintech with the goal of introducing a new regulation next year.
Key elements include plans for a new kind of license geared specifically toward fintech companies and a so-called regulatory “sandbox” for experimental firms. Under the proposed regime, the Financial Market Supervisory Authority would become the primary regulator of fintech firms working in Switzerland.
In a press release, the FDF explained that it will guide more researches about bitcoin and other digital currencies and it will study the distributed ledger broader applications .
The company explained:
“The FDF should conduct additional clarifications in cooperation with the interested authorities on reducing further barriers to market entry for fintech firms, also those outside financial market law (e.g. legal treatment of virtual currencies and assets).”
During a recent speech, Ueli Maurer, Swiss Finance Minister, commented that the proposed Switzerland Bitcoin regulation would help to attract more brands – even if the nation positive attitude has already attracted the attention of several blockchain-related startups to make their home in the country.
“We assume that with the steps we have prepared and the commitment we have to the overall financial services industry we can provide a solution that puts us among the top (countries) in the world that regulate this,” he explained.
Read more here about the Switzerland involvement in the fintech sector.
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