Torn between, “If it isn’t broken don’t fix it” or “Everything can be improved on”, innovations in the blockchain space strive for the latter at every turn.
Last week saw strong financial backings for cryptocurrency in the form of investments from payments company Visa and reports of a government-owned cryptocurrency in China.
Bitcoin Transactions Hit Another Milestone
Last week, Fold, a payments startup based in the USA, announced a payments solution that would allow big named companies like Uber, Amazon, Starbucks, Home Depot (and a few other retailers) to accept payments via the lightning network.
The lightning network is a system built to make bitcoin transactions faster and more efficient. The lightning network bitcoin usage means of the transaction just like any currency.
Opera Wallets, Anyone?
Developers of widely used browser, Opera Mini had announced the inclusion of cryptocurrency wallets on all their browsers to enable users to send and receive cryptocurrencies. In a new report, they have taken a step further to include support for Bitcoin (BTC), Tron (TRX) and TRC-10 standard tokens. Users can now send and receive BTC and TRX using the Opera browser on Android phones.
News Uncensored, Courtesy Bitcoin
A group of developers are working on using Bitcoin to eliminate news suppression by authoritarian governments. The developers are using a combination of Bitcoin and orbital communication which are both censorship-resistant.
China’s Cryptocurrency?
Reports from China indicate that the government is allegedly fast-tracking its cryptocurrency plans following the release of Facebook’s cryptocurrency whitepaper. According, to some analysts, Bitcoin’s price gains in the past week could be attributed to this news.
Visa and Cryptocurrency
Last week, the payments company, Visa, invested 40 million USD in Anchorage, a cryptocurrency startup. Anchorage is building the first crypto-native custodian to help financial institutions invest securely in digital assets. This is the second time Visa would be investing in a cryptocurrency startup. It is also worthy of note that Visa and Anchorage are both founding members in Facebook’s Libra.
