The Digital Asset Review
JULY 16, 2019

"July 15 will mark the first day in the office for the United States Commodity Futures Trading Commission’s (CFTC) new chairman, Heath Tarbert. As the crypto community is bidding farewell to the regulator’s outgoing head, J. Christopher Giancarlo, his successor’s stance on digital assets remains unknown.

Turning to Tarbert’s record as a civil servant and attorney in the financial markets field could shed some light on the direction that the agency might take under his leadership. "



"Vertalo has just announced that they are currently working towards integrating their own services with Hedera Hashgraph.

The cap table software, built by Vertalo, utilizes a distributed ledger as the ‘core database system’. By integrating with Hedera Hashgraph, Vertalo gains access to a fair, secure, scalable distributed ledger on top of which they can offer their services."



"We have not seen institutions growing faster,” Binance's chief executive Changpeng Zhao, who's often known simply as CZ, told Bloomberg, a financial newswire. "What we’ve seen is a pickup in both places. The number of institutions coming into this industry has not increased that tremendously in 2019 yet."

According to CZ, retail investors still account for about 60% of trading volume on Binance, about the same percentage as last year, though both have increased. "


"The number one question asked about digital assets — what some call Security Tokens — is ‘when liquidity’? Liquidity is often cited as the primary reason for tokenizing an asset, and that makes sense for some asset classes. But not all. Not yet.

Is it time to ask some different questions?

‘What deserves liquidity?’, ‘what is going to trade?’,‘when should an asset become liquid?’ and ‘How can we improve liquidity’ are questions that lead to deeper insight. These questions enable the development of an understanding of which digital assets are available today, what’s been issued, and the challenges posed by those assets."


"Blockstack said it will conduct a $28 million cash offering beginning Thursday, July 11th at 11:00 am ET. As part of the offering, an additional $12 million in tokens will be allocated to Blockstack’s App Mining Program, which rewards the developers who create the top-ranked applications within the Blockstack ecosystem.

Another interesting aspect of the offering is the fact that the token is being issued as a security but the company would like to see the token morph into a utility – something the SEC has indicated it is comfortable with – contingent upon the characteristics of the digital asset. "



"Coinbase, one of the largest cryptocurrency exchanges in the U.S., seems to be actively working on solving the insurance problem—by being its own insurer.

According to sources familiar with the matter, Coinbase has been actively discussing the possibility of launching its own regulated insurance company. The exchange has reportedly also reached out to Aon, one of the largest insurance brokers in Europe, to help it establish an insurance subsidiary.

The two companies have a history together—back in April, Aon provided a $255 million coverage for Coinbase’s hot wallets. "



“Visa has reportedly led the round along with major cryptocurrency venture capital (VC) firm Blockchain Capital to support institutional-grade crypto custody service Anchorage, which previously raised $17 million in an investment led by Andreessen Horowitz.

In the new round, both the amount of Visa’s contribution and Anchorage’s private valuation were not disclosed, the report notes. Both Visa and Anchorage are founding members of Facebook’s cryptocurrency project Libra, which was officially revealed on June 18. "


"Let’s be clear: It was not the substance of Donald Trump’s tweet that made his critique of bitcoin and Libra so important last week.

It should be of no surprise that this US President would declare himself “not a fan” of “highly volatile” cryptocurrencies “based on thin air” that “facilitate unlawful behavior” or that he much prefers a “dependable and reliable” currency “called the United States Dollar!”

What matters is the very fact that a sitting president mentioned cryptocurrencies at all. Indeed, from a price perspective, Trump’s disparaging remarks are, on balance, positive for bitcoin. By Friday evening, the post-tweet price action reflected that.

More importantly, the tweet marks a symbolic milestone in the gradual but ever-expanding presence that cryptocurrency occupies in the public conversation around money and policy.

It also marks the starting point in a titanic battle over the shape of our global money system."

Upcoming Events
July 23, 2019
Las Vegas, NV

This invitation-only gathering is setting the stage for thought leaders in Real Estate, Blockchain, and VC to share their insights about the future of RE.

Vertalo CEO, Dave Hendricks, will be speaking, along with Michael Arrington, Natalia Karayaneva, and others.
September 16 -17, 2019
Chicago, IL

Attendees will hear presentations and panel discussions from fintech industry experts pertaining to blockchain, robotic process automation, artificial intelligence, machine learning, big data, banking APIs and more!