August Newsletter

A major website update, more inflation, a possible Australian bitcoin ETF and is the low in for the bitcoin price?

HardBlock Update

We've been working hard behind the scenes to bring our users a significantly improved user experience, especially on mobile. Look out for a special announcement with more information in the next few weeks.

Listen

If you're interested in setting up an SMSF so that you can invest in Bitcoin, then check out the recent episode of the Australian Bitcoin Podcast which goes through this process step-by-step:

E34: Setting up and maintaining a SMSF and deciding how to invest (eg, bitcoin, gold, stocks, etc)

Once you've set up your SMSF, you'll most likely want to self-custody your bitcoin, there's an episode on a way to do that without a hardware wallet:

E35: Bitcoin Self Custody & Cold Storage (Paper Wallets, Air Gapped Devices, and Seed Calculators)

Search for Australian Bitcoin Podcast on the major podcasting apps or YouTube.

Bitcoin Headlines

Feeling time-poor and want to listen to the latest bitcoin news? Check out the Australian Bitcoin Podcast's recent news episodes for a summary of the stories below (Episode 33).

Global News

• 80% of countries now have a Consumer Price Index (CPI) over 6%!
• Argentina pledges to end budget financing by money printing, as the country aims to tame their annual CPI (which is above 60%)
• Binance and MasterCard launch a bitcoin pre-paid credit and rewards card in Argentina (the card offers 8% cashback and can be used in over 90 million merchants globally)
• Honduras launches "Bitcoin Valley", a bitcoin-focused circular economy in the town of Santa Lucia (similar to Bitcoin Beach in El Salvador, Bitcoin Jungle in Costa Rica, and Bitcoin Ekasi in South Africa)
• Galoy (Bitcoin Beach Lightning wallet creators) are adding a new feature: bitcoin-backed synthetic US dollars, which will enable users to send, receive, and hold US dollars that are backed by bitcoin (ie, rather than needing a separate stablecoin token)
• Michael Saylor resigns as CEO of MicroStrategy; he will remain as Executive Chairman and focus more of his energy on their bitcoin acquisition strategy
• BlackRock (the world's largest asset manager, with over $10 trillion in assets) partners with Coinbase to bring bitcoin trading to their institutional clients
• World's largest Bitcoin ATM firm to list on NASDAQ.
• Sullivan Bank, established 1895, offers Bitcoin services.
• SEC delays another Spot Bitcoin ETF application. Van Eck's first application for a bitcoin ETF was in 2017.
• CME will launch Euro priced Bitcoin futures to meet institutional demand.

Australian News

• Australia's annual CPI (at the end of June) reached 6.1%
• OTR petrol stations now accepting bitcoin (sort of)
• This time there might actually be a spot bitcoin ETF on the ASX

Technical News

• Bitfinex and Tether have collaborated with the Hypercore open-source protocol team to launch a new peer-to-peer communications application, Keet (which allows users to exchange instant video, message, and file communications)
• Anthony Ronning and Paul Miller release a privacy-focused Lightning wallet
• Lightning network capacity reaches an all-time-high of over 4400 BTC
• Whirlpool unspent capacity reaches an all-time-high of over 5200 BTC
• Drivechain is a bitcoin improvement protocol that could make altcoins obsolete.
• Machankura app allows Africans to send bitcoin via SMS.

Price Analysis –

Where is the bitcoin price going? Logically with inflation starting to become a problem hard monetary assets like bitcoin and gold should be flying, but the opposite is the case. We've seen significant leverage flushed from the ecosystem in recent months which is necessary for a sustained move higher. We now appear to be at a strong support level. We are at an intersection between the 2017 high price and a lower channel line that has held since 2014. The chart below uses monthly candles to remove short term noise. We believe that the current price just under US$20,000 is the low for this cycle, and if the blue channel holds we could see US$30,000 before the year is over. But, the future is unpredictable, so we don't trade bitcoin, we HODL.

Food For Thought

It's a positive sign of bitcoin's maturity that more recent innovations are focusing on how to display Bitcoin's data in a more user-friendly manner. While our favourite blockchain explorer for reviewing fees and transactions is mempool.space, we are also struck by the sheer beauty of watching transactions come into the mempool on bitfeed.live

Bitfeed.live displays graphically every transaction arriving in the mempool, and then when a new block is mined, the transactions, represented as small squares of varying size, move into the new block. It's surprisingly watchable and a great way to explain Bitcoin to newbies.

HardBlock Careers – Expression of Interest

Interested in joining the HardBlock team? We occasionally recruit for bitcoiners with a range of skills and experiences. Submit an expression of interest if you're keen!