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Bitcoin transactions  The relatively high transaction fees on the Bitcoin network were a major topic of conversation last year, but these fees have been plummeting so far in 2018.  According to data from CoinMetrics , bitcoin miners are now collecting less than a third of the value they were collecting in fees at one point in December 2017. So what’s causing this decline in the costs of on-chain transactions? Is it as simple as declining demand leading to a lower price? Are there other factors at play? Let’s take a closer look. The Simple Explanation for Lower Fees In 2017, the congestion on the Bitcoin blockchain led to a bidding war over block space, especially as speculative interest in bitcoin continued to rise over the course of the year. According to CoinMetrics , bitcoin transaction fees started 2017 at an average of $0.30, but they eventually peaked at over $40 in December. As the price tripled during a month-long stretch from mid-November to mid-December, those w

Crypto Beginners Guide / Bitcoin Beginners Guide   When sending  Bitcoin , it can be easy to make a small mistake causing you to want to cancel your Bitcoin transaction. Oftentimes, funds can become stuck if the miner fee you enter isn’t high enough for any miner to confirm your transaction. Unfortunately, the steps to cancel a Bitcoin transaction are a little more complicated than just pressing an “Undo” button. In this brief guide, I’ll walk you through the process to cancel an unconfirmed  Bitcoin  transaction. Has your transaction been confirmed? The first step in canceling your Bitcoin transaction is to  check whether or not it has any confirmations . When you made your transaction, you should have gotten a  transaction ID  that looks something like this: 240615b6ab59a5adb19ba52cb969aeb16ff82d2082b7a72cb2912c5d38c297cf Take your transaction ID and enter it into a block explorer.  Blockchain.info  is a great option. On the next page, you can see information about you

Bitpay  On December 14, 2017, BitPay  announced  a first step toward enforcing the payment protocol: All orders of the  BitPay Card  will require payments from Payment Protocol-compatible wallets, such as BitPay’s own wallet and a few others. This announcement came after an initial notice in November 2017, when BitPay first  announced  that BitPay invoices would soon require payments from wallets compatible with the  Bitcoin Payment Protocol . BitPay’s move has since been met with resistance by some wallet developers that don’t support the Bitcoin Payment Protocol; some are suggesting that BitPay is abusing its leading position in the payment processing space and putting user security at risk. “We absolutely do not support BitPay in aggressively using their dominant position of market share to bully wallet providers into supporting their business plans or bully users into a system that degrades their privacy and the fungibility of bitcoin as a whole,” stated bitcoin wallet  Sam

Bitcoin  In October 2017, LendEDU, a marketplace for financing loans, credit cards and other financial products, polled 1,000 Americans asking a series of questions related to Ethereum, Ripple and initial coin offerings (ICOs). They did this to gain insight into the average American’s perception of cryptocurrency.  The poll  was conducted by online polling company OnePoll, which acted as a third party and was able to provide an age and gender breakdown of respondents. The poll was answered by 1,000 Americans ages 18 and up over two days, from October 27 to 30. Ethereum : At the time of writing, with a market capitalization of $28.49 billion, Ethereum is the second-largest cryptocurrency, about one-fourth the market capitalization of Bitcoin. Since the start of 2017, the price of ether has grown from $7.98 to $298. 31.60 percent of Americans have heard of Ethereum and 18.20 percent of Americans are planning to invest in ether (ETH) The survey showed that American awareness of Ethe

Bitcon China is clamping down on cryptocurrency, that much is clear. But while the developing story dominates headlines, a notable trend is the lack of official information. Chinese officials seem to systematically decline requests for comments, local sources are willing to provide information on condition of anonymity only, while leaked documents remain unverified. Despite this lack of clarity, here’s what’s known so far. Effects on Trading The most important thing we know for sure is that Chinese bitcoin exchanges will be closing down, or at least exiting China. BTCC — the oldest bitcoin exchange in the world — was the first exchange to announce they’d be closing shop within the Asian country, by the end of this month. The exchange  cited  guidelines  published by the Chinese central bank (the People’s Bank of China; PBOC), which initially appeared to only affect ICOs, as its reason for closing down. Other exchanges quickly followed BTCC's lead.  ViaBTC  and  Yunbi  both a

Bitcon China is clamping down on cryptocurrency, that much is clear. But while the developing story dominates headlines, a notable trend is the lack of official information. Chinese officials seem to systematically decline requests for comments, local sources are willing to provide information on condition of anonymity only, while leaked documents remain unverified. Despite this lack of clarity, here’s what’s known so far. Effects on Trading The most important thing we know for sure is that Chinese bitcoin exchanges will be closing down, or at least exiting China. BTCC — the oldest bitcoin exchange in the world — was the first exchange to announce they’d be closing shop within the Asian country, by the end of this month. The exchange  cited  guidelines  published by the Chinese central bank (the People’s Bank of China; PBOC), which initially appeared to only affect ICOs, as its reason for closing down. Other exchanges quickly followed BTCC's lead.  ViaBTC  and  Yunbi  both a

cryptocurrency With the aggregate cryptocurrency market cap soaring above $150 billion, an  above-800% increase  in the first eight months of this year, parties that previously dismissed digital currencies as a niche market are starting to make their mark. Governments and financial institutions, which were previously observers, are now taking a more active role in the development of  token sales  and the trading of digital currencies. Some analysts and speculators are interpreting these developments as the glimmers of  the cryptocurrency bubble  preparing to burst. However, some interesting developments are indicative that the landscape might in fact be evolving into a more stabilized market. While stricter regulation might put a plug into the hype surrounding cryptocurrencies, it will also help bring order to the chaotic landscape of cryptocurrencies. In tandem, startups and projects are emerging to help the market adapt to the new rules. Crypto exchanges mature The first crypto

If you aren’t sure which coins to mine then it can be a difficult process carrying out the required research to find the largest profit margins. Thankfully there are already websites available that simplify the selection process. First you need to establish whether you are mining with a GPU or ASIC’s device. Then head over to  whattomine.com  and then select GPU or ASICS link from the top of the page. You will instantly be presented with the crypto coins with the highest profitability in realtime. Now once you have mined your coins you may want to convert your cash back into a safer currency such as BTC or LTC. Well there are tools for this as well. Check out  Shapeshift  a website that allows you to instantly convert your coins from one coin to another. I for example would generally move some of my profits back into LTC or BTC as I feel more comfortable with the stability of these currencies. As of today the most profitable coins to mine by GPU are as follows The most profitabl

The number of countries with banks experimenting with blockchain technology is growing rapidly. The Pacific island nation of Papua New Guinea (PNG), north of Australia, has joined the movement with its own central Bank of Papua New Guinea running blockchain trials. Central Bank Governor Loi Bakani,  known  as a champion of new technologies as a way to enable financial inclusion, recently hosted a conference to showcase his country’s commitment to blockchain technology, with participants from at home and around the world, including Abt Associates, Paycase, Othera, IDbox, Pacific Markets, UCash, Seso and ADCCA. At the conference, Bakani described the blockchain trials underway at the  Bank of PNG  and introduced the  PNG Digital Commerce and Cryptocurrency Association  for the growing number of Papua New Guinea tech entrepreneurs and businesses interested in blockchain technology. Bakani said, “This will allow PNG to join the Global Blockchain Forum, which gets PNG a cutting edge in

One of the fundamental questions many people have about Bitcoin revolves around the tokens themselves. Questions about its value, security and history, all eventually lead to one place: Where do bitcoins come from? While traditional money is created through (central) banks, bitcoins are “mined” by Bitcoin miners: network participants that perform extra tasks. Specifically, they chronologically order transactions by including them in the Bitcoin blocks they find. This prevents a user from spending the same bitcoin twice; it solves the “double spend” problem. Skipping over the technical details, finding a block most closely resembles a type of network lottery. For each attempt to try and find a new block, which is basically a random guess for a lucky number, a miner has to spend a tiny amount of energy. Most of the attempts fail and a miner will have wasted that energy. Only once about every ten minutes will a miner somewhere succeed and thus add a new block to the bl

If you’ve made the decision to buy some bitcoins, you may now be asking yourself how to store the digital currency. In name, the answer is what you might expect from experiences with fiat currency. But the details require a little explanation. The private keys that are necessary for accessing a Bitcoin address are stored on a “bitcoin wallet.” In general, wallets grant you access to your public Bitcoin address and allow you to sign off on transactions, but they differ based on how you choose to access them. Factors to consider when choosing  the best bitcoin wallet  for you  include security, anonymity and control. Desktop wallets  allow users to create an address for sending and receiving bitcoins and provide a place to store the private key for doing so. This can be done by downloading software to an individual computer. Mobile wallets , accessed through apps, allow users to transact on the go. While “full Bitcoin” clients download the entire Bitcoin blockch