Welcome to Crypto & V1.3 Release Notes Thanks to a sky rocketing price, Ethereum has grabbed the attention of many hundreds of thousands of new investors.Those same investors are no doubt looking at the last 48 hours in disbelief – possibly renewing some initial scepticism about the future of crypto. are – quite frankly – a bloody mess.But hardened cryptoasset investors will be drooling at the sight.We have been here before.We’ll be here again.And the fundamentals of Ethereum and others remain unchanged.For those looking for some speculation as to what happened in the last 48 hours: This Senate bill in the United States grabbed mass attention.Bitcoin may split in two in the first week of August.V1.3 Release notes: Graphing updated to allow for more granularity Timeframe preferences are now available at the top right; no longer forced to only “Today’s” changes Users can now reset cookies from the preferences menu – deletes all cookies and resets to standard ETH/USD weighted average price 5-minutely data will now be available for up to 1 month (collecting from now) I will be adding some useful information to help new users purchase and secure Ethereum in the coming weeks.

Go to top A Rising Tide Lifts All Boats Bitcoin, Ethereum and a dozen or more altcoins have all had dramatic price increases in recent weeks.Volatility is as high as ever, but the general direction for a huge number of these coins has been upwards.This increase in market capitalization across multiple cryptocurrencies hasn’t been seen before, and could be indicative of a large stream of “new money” funnelling into the ecosystem.In the past few weeks, there have been a series of positive news stories and developments in the blockchain industry as a whole including: SEC gives Bitcoin ETF a possible second shot Japan legalises Bitcoin; causing massive demand in the country Ethereum ENS launches, attracting $10M in auction bids Japan’s largest bank partners with the consortium blockchain, Ripple (XRP) Russia plans to legitimize Bitcoin; with the country’s largest retailer Ulmart, announcing they will accept the cryptocurrency Australia to treat Bitcoin “like money” from June 1st 2017, dramatically improving its position with regards to taxation Litecoin successfully activates Segregated Witness (a scaling fix which can be applied to Bitcoin) ShapeShift.io announces its plans to become a smart-contract driven decentralized exchange (full details not yet known, but anticipated to be operating on the Ethereum blockchain) Investors have always been nervous of cryptocurrency competition, often speculating that one’s rise may lead to another’s decimation.

What has transpired in 2017 so far is that an increase in cryptocurrency adoption as whole has tremendous effects on the price of each coin, and that a price rise of one does not come at the expense of another.bitcoin faucet gamblingThis year is showing itself to be the year of the blockchain ecosystem (Bitcoin, Ethereum and altcoins), and I only anticipate that this will get stronger as interoperability between chains takes hold in 2018.ethereum card comparisonGo to top Ether Classic Added Ether Classic was formed after the Ethereum blockchain hard forked in the summer of 2016.bitcoin mining usb driveThe hard fork was the result of a policy decision to rollback the DAO attack in which $60M of investor funds were stolen.bitcoin pwc

Due to this decision not having the full backing of the community, a separate branch of Ether forked away, now known as Ethereum Classic (ETC).ethereum token listEthereum Classic is a separate blockchain to Ethereum, and the two should not be confused as they are now wildly different.litecoin more profitableEthereum has the backing of the Ethereum Foundation, its development team and the roadmap outlined in Ethereum’s crowdsale – which includes the introduction of Proof of Stake, Sharding and so on.litecoin asic vs gpuEthereum Classic does not share these attributes, however there is much speculation over ETC’s future value as a digital asset, with Barry Silbert – owner of Grayscale Investments LLC – forming the Ethereum (ETC) Investment Trust.asic usb bitcoin miner driver

House prices have broken free from reality and defied gravity for far too long, but they are an asset like anything else, and there are six clear reasons a nasty correction looms in the coming year .ethereum trust twitterGlobal asset price crash Asset prices around the world soared as central bankers embarked on the greatest money printing experiment in history.While much of that money flowed into the stock market, a great deal also found its way into house prices.What we are now witnessing on trading screens around the world is the unwinding of the era of monetary excess, and house prices will not escape the fallout.The end of easy money began when the US stopped its third quantitative easing programme in October 2014.That date marks the point the US balance sheet, or amount of money in the system, stopped rising, having soared from $800bn in 2008 to more than $4 trillion.Without an ever-increasing supply of money the world economy is now slowing sharply.

The first assets to be impacted by the downturn were commodities.The price of things such as oil are set daily in one of the largest and most highly traded markets across the world and as a result it is highly sensitive to any changes in demand and supply.Admittedly there are also supply-side factors impacting the oil price, but the weak demand from a slump is still a major factor.The next asset to fall was share prices.There was a delay of about 12 months because even though shares are also traded daily, their value depends on the profits of the company, and the impact of the commodity collapse took about a year to feed through.Ticking time-bomb There is a delayed effect on property prices because the market is so inefficient.Transactions can take up to three months to complete and the property itself may have to languish on the market for even longer.The prices are also dictated by estate agents, who have an interest in inflating them to raise fees.The number of transactions is also still about 40pc below that of 2006 and 2007, which allows prices to stray from the fundamentals for a longer period.

It is true that Britain is suffering from a housing shortage, which drove UK house prices to a record high of an average of £208,286 in December, but like all asset prices they are on borrowed time.The fundamentals of demand and supply in UK housing will undergo a huge shift in the year ahead.Death of buy-to-let A large portion of the demand for UK housing will fall away as the benefits of buy-to-let have effectively been killed off in recent budgets.George Osborne slapped a huge tax increase on buy-to-let in the summer Budget, which will take effect from 2017 onwards.The removal of mortgage interest relief was the first stage and was followed by hiking stamp duty four months later in the November review.This could prove a double whammy on the housing market, turning potential buyers into sellers, and flooding the market with additional supply.A survey of landlords suggested 200,000 plan to exit the sector.The rapid growth of buy-to-let during the past decade looks set to be slammed into reverse.

• Mapped: how buy-to-let will lose money in 91pc of regions by 2021 Overseas buyers strike The UK property market has been a highly attractive place for wealthy individuals across the world to protect their savings.However, many of the biggest buyers have been forced out of the market.Chinese buyers have been locked out by state controls which mean each person is restricted from taking more than $50,000 (£34,000) a year out of the country.The stock market collapse will also destroy wealth.The Russians have also had their wings clipped as the country’s economy goes into freefall.The Russian ruble has collapsed in value by 50pc against the pound during the 18 months.The oligarchs have also seen their wealth evaporate as their holdings in mining and oil companies slump in value.Photo: Alamy The petrodollars from Saudi Arabia have steadily flowed into UK property for more than a decade, but the Gulf nation's investors are now pulling those funds out at a rapid rate to support the economy at home.

A fire-sale of assets is taking place to plug the largest recorded budget deficit in history.The shares will go first followed by the homes.Interest rate shock Interest rates have been held at emergency lows in the UK and US for around six years.The US has moved first, with rates rising to around 0.5pc last month.UK rate rises are expected to follow shortly after.The impact on the cost of mortgages will be dramatic.An entire generation of homebuyers don’t know what an interest rate is.In the US following the December rate rise the cost of mortgages has soared by 50pc.The current market expectation is for the interest rate to rise four more time to about 1.5pc by the end of the year, or some 300pc higher than its current level.• Latest UK interest rates predictions Drowning in debt UK households are simply drowning in about £40bn of debt according to the latest figures from the Office of Budget Responsibiliity.When budgeting is this finely balanced, it doesn’t take much to tip it over the edge.