Crypto Block Wire

The developer of enterprise blockchain solutions – R3 – launched a “Universal Settler Application” called the Corda Settler. This new dApp will facilitate global payments on the Corda blockchain network. Moreover, the surprising thing is that R3 will support XRP as the first settlement mechanism on the Corda Settler.

Details About the Corda Settler CorDapp

The Corda Settler is an open-source CorDapp. According to the official press release, the Corda Settler decentralized application that facilitates settling of payment obligations raised on the Corda blockchain platform “through any of the world’s payment systems, both traditional and blockchain-based”.

The top-performing cryptocurrency of the day is Waves. Waves (WAVES) traded up 14.78% against the US dollar during the twenty-four hour period ending at 06:00 AM Eastern Standard Time on December 05, 2018. Its market cap is $200,763,567. Waves traded $71,300,315 worth of on exchanges in the past 24 hour period. One token can currently be purchased for about $2.01 or 0.000517166 BTC on major cryptocurrency exchanges. The amount of Waves in circulation is 100,000,000 WAVES.

With the advent of blockchain technology, the healthcare industry is currently witnessing important changes. Blockchain’s ability to efficiently manage and transfer data finds it a potential use case in healthcare.

As a result, the U.S. Healthcare Alliance has decided to trial blockchain solutions to reduce costs and simultaneously improve data quality. On Monday, Modern Healthcare publication reported that Aetna and Ascension have recently joined the Synaptic Health Alliance.

Ascension is the largest not-for-profit health system in the U.S., while CVS Health-Aetna currently offers services to 22 million members. Other members of the alliance include Quest Diagnostics, Multiplan, Humana, UnitedHealthcare, and UnitedHealth Group’s Optum.

At the latest G20 summit in Buenos Aires, Argentina, leaders of the member nations agreed to bring upon an International Cryptocurrency Tax. All the member nations have signed a document to collaborate and work in this regard. The G20 declaration states: “We will seek solutions for the international taxation issue accompanying the digitization of the economy and will continue to collaborate”.

Smartphone maker SIRIN LABS has unveiled the final design of its blockchain-powered handset FINNEY. The smartphone features a price tag of $999. Integrating the blockchain technology, FINNEY aims to provide its users a unique experience interacting with decentralized apps.

According to SIRIN LABS’ chief monitoring officer Nimrod May, the company will start shipping FINNEY probably between Dec. 15 and 25. Also, SIRIN LABS has picked Foxconn as its handset manufactures. Note that Foxconn is the same company manufacturing Apple iPhones.

One can also pre-order FINNEY from its official website.

Features of the FINNEY Handset

While the FINNEY handset has specs similar to other traditional handsets, its major USP is its crypto-centric features. The most exciting feature is the built-in cold-storage wallet for safe and secure storage of digital assets.

As TRON technology continues to make progress, a number of developers continue to delve into it. TRON’s dApp weekly report in the period between Nov. 17th to Nov. 23rd shows that TRON Network sees growing participation from more teams. However, there’s no surge in the number of dApps listed on the DApp House.

TRON also says that nearly 20 dApps are running on its mainnet via other channels.

Improving Transaction Volume

Over last week, there’s a surge of 15 percent in the transaction volumes contributed by dApps on the TRON network. Post 640,000, the account number of surged past EOS’ with daily transaction volume growing steadily to 1.5 million.

Moreover, with the daily transaction volume going over 100 million, Tron’s official DEX has shown consistent growth. The report mentions, “DEX receives a lot of application for token listing every day.”

One of the top performing cryptocurrencies of the day is Bitcoin Private. Bitcoin Private (BTCP) is currently up 38.18% compared to USD over the last 24 hours, ending at 07:00 AM Eastern Standard Time on November 28, 2018. BTCP has a current market cap of $40,953,789. Bitcoin Private traded with a volume of$238,698. One Bitcoin Private token can be bought for $2 or 0.000495092 BTC. The amount of Bitcoin Private in circulation is 20,524,490 BTCP.

Japan-based cryptocurrency exchange, Coincheck, has finally resumed the trading XRP after a long wait. Earlier this year, Coincheck suffered a massive crypto hack with a loss of $500 million. Soon after, the crypto exchange went defunct for sometime before the Japanese financial services giant Monex Group acquired it completely.

Resuming the XRP Trading Service at Coincheck

Monex Group released an official press release making the announcement. It reads that Coincheck will resume trading services for both – Factom (FCT) and XRP. It shows that the exchange is now completely operational while making all its earlier trading pairs available to the public.

“[To this date], Coincheck has been steadily resuming as each service’s technical safety is confirmed through the supports [sic] of external experts. As of the announcement today regarding XRP and FCT, Coincheck has resumed depositing and purchasing services for all tradable cryptocurrencies on Coincheck,” the press release notes.

Last week, on November 21st, the South Korean arm of Tezos Foundation entered a business agreement with Yonsei University. The two parties signed a Memorandum-of-Understanding (MoU) to spearhead the blockchain development by nurturing unique talent.

Details of the MoU

The two parties will also engage in blockchain education cooperation, exchange of academic information, and developing smart contract experts. According to the press release, the two official parties involved in the MoU include the Tezos Korea Foundation and the Seoul-based Digital Society Research Center at Yonsei University.

Through this agreement, both sides will strengthen its position in blockchain and education expertise. The two will work to tap several opportunities in the blockchain sector.

The University of Tokyo joins a growing list of higher learning institutions expanding their offering into the blockchain space. The prestigious learning institution has started offering a blockchain course at its graduate engineering department.

Blockchain Course

Blockchain Innovation Donation Course is the name of the blockchain course on offer. Rolled out on November 1st, 2018, the course is to run to October 2021. The university has already received an $800,000 USD donation from the Ethereum Foundation and banking giant Sumitomo Mitsui. Other donors supporting the course include Good Luck Three, JSS Corp, and Money Forward Inc.

The blockchain course will seek to impart valuable insights and knowledge about fintech as well as the game-changing technology. Likewise, the course targets business-minded students with outstanding talent when it comes to mathematics.

Fintech startup TransferWise revealed that it plans to stay away from Ripple and blockchain. However, it might reconsider its decision if more banks start using them to facilitate money transfer.

TransferWise is a cross-border money transfer service started about seven years ago. Its goal was to create a faster and cheaper money transfer service. Traditional money transfer services through banks and other platforms such as Western Union and banks are usually slow and expensive.

Nonetheless, TransferWise Co-Founder and Chairman, Taavet Hinrikus, pointed out that his company will not use blockchain or Ripple. The company will only consider switching to blockchain infrastructure for its services if more banks jump on board.

Malaysian banking giant, CIMB Group, which is also the fifth-largest ASEAN bank, has recently joined RippleNet. RippleNet is a consortium of over 100 financial institutions who pledge to use Ripple’s blockchain-based products.

As part of the strategic alliance, CIMB and Ripple will work to establish instant cross-border payments in the ASEAN market. Since past several years, payment systems in the ASEAN market have been lacking behind. Compared to other regions, ASEAN countries always used slow and inefficient payment systems.

CIMB is the first ASEAN bank to adopt blockchain technology to facilitate cost-effective and instant cross-border global payments. Tengku Dato’ Sri Zafrul Aziz, CEO of CIMB Group, expressed optimism on joining RippleNet. Aziz emphasized that this partnership will help both companies to leverage each others’ capabilities.

“We are delighted to be part of RippleNet and look forward to a fruitful partnership with Ripple by leveraging each other’s strengths and capabilities. This innovative blockchain solution will revolutionize international cross-border remittances, and is a testament to CIMB’s ongoing efforts to enhance its digital banking proposition by providing speedy and cost-efficient solutions to our customers across ASEAN,” said Aziz.

IBM and Columbia University have joined forces all in an effort of accelerating blockchain innovation and adoption. The two intellectual heavyweights have since launched two blockchain accelerator programs. These programs target startups looking to provide a home for innovation.

IBM-Columbia University Blockchain Partnership

The two accelerator programs are part of Columbia-IBM Center for Blockchain and Data Transparency. The innovation center came into being this summer as the two intend to spearhead blockchain innovation.  Similarly, the latest accelerator program seeks to support as many as ten startups.

At the onset, the focus will be on offering startups a network of business mentors that they can turn to, for advice. Similarly, IBM and Columbia University will provide technical support essential for blockchain project development. Likewise, the startups will also gain access to Columbia’s University student talent and research community. The startups will further be granted access to IBM cloud technology resources.

Although more unique altcoins like Stellar (XLM) have their own infrastructure, a decade since its inception, Bitcoin (BTC) still continues to be the ‘big daddy‘ of the cryptocurrency market. The Bitcoin price movements still happen to dictate the mood of the entire crypto coin market.

This happens because most of the altcoins have its trading pair linked to Bitcoin. In turn, it shows that investors still trust Bitcoin as the most preferred and sound investment in the cryptocurrency market.

However, there are a few projects which have built their own robust infrastructure and announced their independence.

“Decoupling” from Bitcoin

Stellar (XLM) is one such project moving towards independence while “decoupling” itself from Bitcoin. Decoupling of altcoins basically means reducing their dependence to Bitcoin. To decouple from Bitcoin, altcoins require a higher price stability backed with a robust infrastructure.

The top-performing cryptocurrency of the day is Digitex Futures. Digitex Futures (DGTX) traded up 43.43% against the US dollar during the twenty-four hour period ending at 06:00 AM Eastern Standard Time on November 18, 2018. The market cap for DGTX is $53,178,678. Digitex Futures traded $801,738 worth of on exchanges in the past 24 hour period. One Digitex Futures token can currently be purchased for about $0.072723 or 0.000013013 BTC on major cryptocurrency exchanges. The amount of Digitex Futures in circulation is 731,250,000 DGTX.

While we have heard many times the instances of blockchain’s application in healthcare, here’s a new potential application in genetic services. Blockchain genetics company, Digital DNAtix Ltd., launched the demo of its blockchain-powered beta genetic wallet platform.

Innovative Direct-to-Consumer Genetic Services Platform

Currently, there are not many companies in the market which offer direct-to-consumer genetic services of the similar grade to DNAtix. The blockchain-powered genetic service by DNAtix specializes in “genome sequencing, testing, storage and transfer of DNA.”

This is a proprietary technology by DNAtix for a dedicated blockchain allowing users to store, test, and securely transfer the DNA. Also, the launch of the demo gives the first glimpse into the path-breaking genetic services from DNAtix.

A cloud-based Blockchain-as-a-Service (BaaS) provider, SIMBA Chain, has won a contract to allow the U.S. Air Force to explore its platform. Basically, the U.S. Air Force would use the company’s platform to understand how blockchain technology can enhance its logistics and supply chain operations. This has become critical given that the Air Force has a complicated logistics and supply chain network. Within its network, the Air Force moves huge parts to different nooks and crannies around the world. As a result, this system needs to function at optimum without any interruption.

How the U.S. Air Force Will Deploy the SIMBA Platform

Media reports say that the Air Force would be using SIMBA Chain to scale its supply chain following a request the institution made earlier this year. Through Small Business Innovation Research (BIR), the Department of Defense (DoD) asked for innovative technologies that can streamline its supply chain and logistics network. While making the call, DoD, which controls the U.S. Air Force, maintained that the cutting-edge technological approach must have commercial applications. Moreover, DoD pointed out that the measure has become necessary because a need exists for Air Force’s supply chain and logistics network to stay ahead of the tech curve.