The Blockchain Summit Whatever the controversy around ICOs, blockchain technology is riding a wave that’s sweeping through the mainstream. Just about every bank and financial institution has a blockchain lab of their own or is quietly experimenting with blockchain technology. Reflected in record-breaking registrations for last week's Blockchain Summit with over 3,200 senior professionals and decision makers from [...]
Audit Straight to (Blockchain) Video Audit is about to change – so is regulation. While regulators around the globe grapple with Blockchain technology and its implications, including tokenisation of securities, fractionalisation of assets and ICOs, others – including at least one of the co-inventors of the technology – are working on a quiet revolution they believe is destined to transform [...]
Return of the (Crypto) Gold Standard? Perhaps the biggest criticism, indeed difficulty, with cryptocurrencies and tokens is price volatility. So how about a return to the ‘Gold Standard’? Enter asset-backed and ‘StableCoins’. One of the great promises of blockchain technology is the mobilisation of whole swathes of assets, from property through jewellery, fine art and luxury goods to commodities such as [...]
Brains, Chains and Autobots August 28, 2018 They’re usually talked of as completely disparate fields; but ‘Brains and Chains’, or Artificial Intelligence and Blockchain technologies, have already started to converge – despite claims they’re philosophically incompatible. So where’s the join? Google, Amazon, Microsoft and the like have invested billions in AI over the years. Billions more are being poured into Blockchain ventures [...]
Can Publica Disrupt the Disruptor-in-Chief? August 21, 2018 Blockchain and ICOs are not just for payments, but hold promise to revolutionise a wide range of industries – from music and wine to logistics. Amazon famously disrupted publishing – but will blockchain disrupt the disruptors? As most authors will tell you, not only is it near impossible to make any money at it, but [...]
A-Team Mission: Make Bitcoin Mainstream August 14, 2018 What if Microsoft came together with Starbucks and the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) on a mission to take Bitcoin mainstream? A strong enough signal that cryptocurrencies are going mainstream? Well they have! Resulting in a new platform dubbed Bakkt. Meanwhile what's the significance of the first international scientific conference, backed by the first peer-reviewed [...]
‘Exodus’: Top Talent Heading to Cryptoland? August 7, 2018 If you want to know what the future holds then one of the better ways, especially for the near term, is to see where the top talent are investing their time and careers. In another strong signal that cryptocurrencies are here to stay and that blockchain innovation will redefine the mainstream, in much the way [...]
Blockchain Tech: Opportunity or Threat? July 31, 2018 Last week PwC, this week Deloitte – another strong signal cutting through all the noise – concluding in their new 'New Tech on the Block" report that "those who do not consider the possibilities [of Blockchain technology] are at risk of falling behind" and "by contrast early adopters of the technology will have the ability [...]
Venture capital finds that its lunches are being eaten July 24, 2018 The news is bad for those who hoped that the clocks could turn back, that ICOs might go away. There are now strong signals that not only are blockchain and cryptocurrencies here to stay but token offerings and ICOs too, as their novel merits are increasingly appreciated in the mainstream. PwC recently published its third [...]
Regulators Wrangling Crypto Coins and Successful ICOs with Their Own Novel Challenge July 17, 2018 The biggest debate around ICOs, coins and tokens has been what they really are. The real answer is that they can play so many different roles that they’re not like anything else. On top of which this blockchain technology allows us to create digital entities, or assets, which have no previous equivalent. This is no [...]