14/05/2018: Biggest Stories in the Cryptosphere

Too Long; Didn't Read

<a href="https://www.coindesk.com/research/state-blockchain-q1-2018/" target="_blank">Coinbase’s State of Blockchain report</a> presents data on public blockchains, distributed ledger technology (DLT), consortium chains, initial coin offerings (ICOs), trading and investments, and regulation. It also shows the results of Coinbase’s extensive sentiment survey. According to this <a href="https://www.coindesk.com/coindesk-releases-q1-2018-state-of-blockchain-report/" target="_blank">summary</a>, there were 6 main trends. 1) It identified the bear market for cryptocurrency, which saw huge drops following the end of 2017, but Coinbase’s survey showed respondents were still optimistic. 2) The market has been maturing, with the introduction of the bitcoin futures market in Q4, and a steady growth of activity in this area during Q1. 3) Miners appeared to remain unphased by dips, with market activities not appearing to affect their mining as much as expected. 4) Taxes are an area of concern for many investors, with an estimated $70billion in global tax revenue generated by cryptocurrencies last year. Many say they are struggling to understand their tax liability. 5) ICOs continue to be an area of high activity, with $6.3 billion raised in Q1. 6) Transaction fees on the bitcoin network dropped from the freakish highs seen in Q4 2017, and most other cryptocurrencies saw declines of 60 to 90 percent.