India’s stand on Bitcoin and cryptocurrencies

Recently, Bitcoin prices are touching the sky. Many other cryptocurrencies are also flourishing wonderfully. This is a big boon to the crypto world. India never had a proper stand, when it comes to cryptocurrency. The country was neutral for cryptocurrency. India neither supported nor proposed a ban for Bitcoin or cryptocurrency. The state of cryptocurrency is very uncertain in India.

India’s plan to ban crypto

Recently, news came that India is planning to ban cryptocurrency. Planning is going on to introduce a law for this. So, there will a law in place that bans all the private cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin and others. In the current budget, the lower house published this report. In the report, it says to prohibit all cryptocurrencies in India. However, certain exceptions will be present. With this, they want to promote the blockchain technology of cryptocurrencies. They are planning to exploit the uses of digital currency as well.

Additional Details

It will have an adverse effect on the economy. As crypto is booming recently, people could cash on this opportunity. The panel suggests banning all private cryptocurrencies and proposes punishment for offenders. As per the panel, the punishment will be 10 years of jail imprisonment. As per RBI, this step was necessary to stabilize the financial ecosystem of the country. The central body also told that it does not consider crypto as a currency and provided its reasons. It is not in paper or metal coins, so it does not have any physical existence. Another reason is it is not certified by any government agency. So, the Indians will lose the funds they invested in cryptocurrencies.

New plans to launch its own digital currency

After banning all private cryptocurrencies, the panel proposes a new idea. In the recent budget session, the new idea of creating a digital currency got presented. RBI will own and govern and make laws for this. This will be India’s official digital currency and RBI will issue the currency. So, primarily, India is planning to launch its own currency. Hence, it is creating the path for success for its currency.

Expert opinion

CoinDCX is a cryptocurrency exchange established in India. Sumit Gupta is the CEO and co-founder of this crypto exchange. He says that the Government is taking steps to ban crypto in India. However, he believes that the government will listen to the crypto holders’ concerns. Before taking any major decision, the government will consider the stakeholders’ concerns also. He added that they will be talking to other stakeholders in this regard. They will start communicating with the government panel in this context. The target would be to build a better economy that will help in the country’s growth.

New restriction

Bitcoin recorded its all-time high a few weeks back. It is gaining more investors day by day. It is in demand right now. From corporates to big investors want to cash on this opportunity. While Bitcoin is reaching new heights, shocking news came. Some banks in the UK decided to impose new restrictions on Bitcoin holders. This is applicable to all cryptocurrencies. This is first reported by The Sunday Times. Now, the banks will not accept any kind of transactions from Bitcoin exchanges. The banks will

not allow Bitcoin, Ethereum, and other cryptocurrencies. The banks will not accept any deposit from a crypto wallet into their bank accounts. The investors in the UK will not be able to buy cryptocurrency using their credit cards. Few big banks are also included in this list banning cryptocurrencies. One of the big banks is HSBC.

Its impact

HSBC is one of the largest banks in the UK. So, there is a high chance of impacting a large number of crypto holders. As per the new restriction, many investors in the UK will have to suffer. The investors will face a lot of problems, those holding with cryptocurrency. In addition to the above, there are a few more restrictions also. The users are not allowed to use their debit or credit cards for the purchase of any cryptocurrency. This will have a larger impact on the banking system in the UK. This is also a major setback for cryptocurrencies. It is bad news for the crypto world and its believers. Ran Neuner is a trader as well as the host of “Crypto Trader” at CNBC. He said that due to this restriction, many banks will run out of business. This restriction will have a negative impact on Bitcoin and cryptocurrencies. This may stop the surging value of Bitcoin for some time.

Strict measures against cryptocurrencies

From the beginning, the UK didn’t extend its support towards Bitcoin and cryptocurrencies. The UK is one of the hostile countries for the crypto industry. It is majorly for the retail investors holding cryptocurrency. The trading in BTC-based financial derivatives and cryptocurrency got banned in the UK. It happened in October 2020. This is as per the decision by their regulatory body, the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA).

FCA’s take on this

The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) claimed that it is protecting the investors’ money. As per FCA, Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies are assets that are not worthy of trust. It also considers that cryptocurrencies are prone to financial crime. Someone might be using it for illegal purposes. Accordingly to the US Treasury, cryptocurrencies are assets. But its usage could be for illegal and illicit activities. The Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) came up with a new regulation. This new regulation is against Bitcoin’s so-called “unhosted wallets”. This new rule by FinCEN received opposition from the complete crypto world. All these restrictions will create major complications for crypto holders. These restrictions could impact the new advancements happening in the crypto industry currently. However, regulatory bodies are trying to save the financial world.

Further Reasons

The value of the cryptocurrency has left gold and silver behind it. Bitcoin‘s price (BTC) has crossed the $13,000 mark on 24th October 2020. There was an 8 percent single-day rise which is the 20^th highest single-day rise since October 21, 2019. It is the highest value Bitcoin has seen since July 2019. Although surpassing $13,000 would be taken as a new milestone among crypto enthusiasts, it’s not fairly the largest rally in the past year. On Jan. 15, 2019, bitcoin was closed above $13,000. Crypto enthusiasts might be remembering that after 6 weeks after that day bitcoin reached an all-time high of $19,892.

The rally comes only after few hours of PayPal’s announcement of its entry into the cryptocurrency market. Recently, PayPal has revealed its plan of facilitating to buy, sell, and hold bitcoins, Litecoin, Ethereum, and Bitcoin BTC Cash.

Why Cryptocurrency is flying?

PayPal’s entry into the crypto market has provided a boost to the acceptance of digital currencies. Recently, Square and MicroStrategy have bitcoin investments. All this good news has resulted in this upsurge in bitcoin price.

This high rise of Bitcoin price implies that the world’s widely accepted cryptocurrency has now surpassed gold and silver to be the best “commodity” among the three. In the last week, the bitcoin price was up by 55% since October 21, 2019. Contrarily the price of silver and gold over the same period has increased by 40% and 27% respectively.

There are still people having skeptic views on cryptocurrencies. Recently Mike Novogratz, the former Goldman Sachs partner, and hedge fund manager has opined that Bitcoin is packed with values similar to “digital gold,” and will not likely be used as transactional currency for the next 5 years.

Positive impact on BTC share values

Blockchain stocks are keeping on rising as Bitcoin carry on mounting. Bitcoin-U.S. dollar prices reached a 16-month high in early U.S. trading this week. Bitcoin (BTC-USD, +4.5%) reached a new high, by breaching the $13.6K mark on 27th October 2020.

Bulls are in strong technical control as prices are in and keep on mounting on the daily chart. Indications are there, it may keep on rising in the coming weeks.

The bright future for BTC

BTC is going to be the digital currency of the future generation! Now the volume of the cryptocurrency market has reached around $397.9 billion. The figure was around $195 billion at the start of the year. To date, bitcoin has been the biggest digital coin with a market cap of $244 billion. Bitcoin has captured around 61% of the total market. Trends show that the worth of BTC is going to increase in the future.

Conclusion

Cryptocurrency has become the most valuable commodity while gold and silver are satisfied with the next two positions. The recent upsurge in the value of the digital currency is believed to be the entry of a few big names like PayPal, Square, and MicroStrategy, etc into the cryptocurrency market. The market analyses anticipate that the Bitcoin price is going to rise in the time to come.

PayPal has put its steps in the cryptocurrency market recently. The money online platform has announced that PayPal account holders now would be able to buy and sell Bitcoin and many other virtual currencies. PayPal Holdings, Inc. is a US-based company operating a global online payment system. It offers financial services like online money transfers, digital payment service, P2P payments, and debit card accounts. It has established itself as an electronic alternative to traditional money transactions.

PayPal has secured the first provisional cryptocurrency license from the New York State Department of Financial Services. To offer this service PayPal has partnered with Paxos Trust Company. It is predicted that by the end of 2021, the retail payments done with Bitcoin, Litecoin, and Ethereum by PayPal users could seemingly double and attain USD 50 billion marks. According to CEO Dan Schulman, the expectation for this development is to help nurture the global acceptance of virtual coins and to get ready for the firm for the upcoming digital currencies.

A Boost to Cryptocurrency

Industry experts believe that the entry of PayPal in the cryptocurrency market would boost it. PayPal’s entry implies that the 26 million PayPal account holders can now make cryptocurrency buying using the PayPal platform. After this announcement by Paypal, the market leaped by almost 15% in the BTC price. In addition to that, the other cryptocurrencies supported by PayPal also experienced an average weekly return of 10%-15%.

For the US market, PayPal is scheduling to bringing up buying options for the investors over the next few weeks, and within early 2021 it has a plan to fully rollout. PayPal has is planning to add a bunch of cryptocurrencies to its portfolio. The digital currencies that are waiting in rows are Litecoin, Ethereum, and Bitcoin Cash. The company confirms customers can now store all these digital currencies “directly within the PayPal digital wallet”.

PayPal is also aiming to amplify customer awareness around cryptocurrency. They believe this exercise would promote the adoption of crypto among users: They are planning to supply educational content regarding the cryptocurrency ecosystem.

Downsides of this PayPal Crypto association

However, it is revealed that PayPal wouldn’t allow its account holders to transfer their cryptocurrency into or out of PayPal. Secondly, they would not have any control of the private keys, a long string of numbers and letters that allow holders to move their digital assets. PayPal plays a kind of dictatorship on what users can do or not do with their cryptocurrencies.

PayPal Competitors

Considering ample opportunities and possibilities that cryptocurrency offer more numbers of big players are gradually embracing digital coins. Before the entry of Paypal, the Robinhood trading app has allowed crypto since 2018. Similarly, Square users have been trading in crypto for quite some time. After the announcement of PayPal’s entry companies like Visa and Ternio has also announced to team up to help crypto companies.

Bottom-line

Cryptocurrency, although consider as the “future currency” of the world, there are many who are still skeptical about virtual currency. But gradually crypto is getting more acceptance from big horses of the financial world. By the entry of PayPal in the fray, cryptocurrency is undoubtedly going to gain a lot in times to come.

The prediction

In a few years, the bitcoin price could breach the $1 million from the current figure of approximately $11,000mark. Amid mounting concern among the investors over “central bank and government stimulus measures”, this is good news. Raoul Pal, a former Goldman Sachs Hedge Fund chief, has recently had this startling prediction. He believes that bitcoin will surge to $1 million in the next five years. Pal told this to Stansberry Research in a recent interview.

Since January, the price of bitcoin has gone up to $11,400 per bitcoin. This is a 50% change since January 2020. According to Statista, a full-service market research firm and the world’s number one business data platform Bitcoin is the biggest digital currency. By market capitalization, it is at about $200 billion.

More revelation

Raoul Pal has invested more than 50% of his capital in bitcoin. He believes that the adoption of the digital currency by institutional funds is happening in a bigger way. It is because institutions realize that, due to the COVID-19 situation, it may take a very long time for the economy to return to normalcy. Every stakeholder is eyeing at it. There is no shortage of smart people who are working on it.

Pal said again, his trading positions are comparatively small. This is because he doesn’t foresee as much opportunity there, as in bitcoin. According to him, in reality, he possesses primarily, a small amount of cash, some gold, and bitcoin. He further reiterated that he is now thinking of selling his gold to buy more bitcoin.

As per Nigel Green, the chief executive of independent financial advisory deVere Group – Investor activity is increasing significantly. A range of on-chain metrics and high-level global political, economic, and social disturbances is signifying that there will be a price surge in the price of bitcoin before the year ends. According to Tyler Winklevoss, the quantitative- easing program is going to boost up bitcoin.

Bitcoin marching ahead

It is noteworthy, both bitcoin and cryptocurrency enthusiasts were enthralled last month. This was when a major Tesla investor predicted a $1 trillion market cap.

Pal said he got to know that there is an enormous wall of money coming into this. He realized this when he interacted with institutions and people who matters. According to him the upcoming developments in “the pipes” would encourage investors to buy bitcoin.

In recent weeks, several high profile companies have invested heftily in the cryptocurrency. Jack Dorsey, a blunt advocate of bitcoin and payments company Square has bought $50 million worth of bitcoin.

When other assets fall, just like gold, bitcoin has the potentiality to hold on to its value or even grow up in value. This enables investors to trim down their chances of loss. Investors will be more and more interested in secure digital currencies. This includes bitcoin which is highly decentralized and non-sovereign. These advantages would protect them from the potential issues and concerns generally experienced in traditional markets.

Bitcoin is an ordinary computer program. Only it is located not on any separate computer or server, but directly on the millions of computers that communicate directly with each other through this program.

Torrents work according to a similar principle. You install the program, and someone else does the same. After that, you can transfer files to each other directly, without the participation of any servers, and almost without control. This feature made torrents the main breeding ground for piracy on the Internet. So the bitcoin system works the same way. Only the task of this program is not to transfer files between users, but to give them “virtual points”.

Table of contents

1. What is Bitcoin: Understanding The Basics
2. Bitcoin Benefits
3. Bitcoin Wallets: Everything You Need To Know
4. 5 Ways To Buy Bitcoin
5. How To Sell Your Bitcoin
6. Inside Bitcoin Transactions: How It All Works
7. Where Can You Spend Bitcoin? Here Are The Places
8. How To Accept Bitcoin Payments For Your Business
9. The Best Bitcoin POS Terminals For Your Business
10. Can Bitcoin Scale?
11. Bitcoin Law: What Are The Rules?
12. Who Created Bitcoin? An Overview of Satoshi Nakamoto
13. Understanding Bitcoin Charts
14. Bitcoin Mining: How It Works
15. Want To Mine Bitcoin? Here’s How To Set Up
16. Bitcoin Mining Pools: Collective Mining Power
17. The Most Popular Bitcoin Mining Pools
18. Bitcoin Forums: Where To Discuss Bitcoin
19. What Is Bitcoin Cash?

The Ultimate Guide To Bitcoin

Bitcoin is an ordinary computer program. Only it is located not on any separate computer or server, but directly on the millions of computers that communicate directly with each other through this program.

Torrents work according to a similar principle. You install the program, and someone else does the same. After that, you can transfer files to each other directly, without the participation of any servers, and almost without control. This feature made torrents the main breeding ground for piracy on the Internet. So the bitcoin system works the same way. Only the task of this program is not to transfer files between users, but to give them “virtual points”.

How does Bitcoin work?

A certain character under the pseudonym Satoshi Nakamoto (or a group of characters) introduced the world to Bitcoin. In the already legendary research work, it was defined as “peer-to-peer electronic payment system”. In other words, Bitcoin is a decentralized peer-to-peer digital currency system. The whole system works thanks to the actions of a group of people called miners.

Adding transaction information to blocks

When a group of miners creates a new block, they become the temporary owners of this block. Imagine that Masha sent Pete 5 Bitcoins. Of course, she physically does not send anything, just users add information about this operation to the blocks in the blockchain, and only at the moment when the block is added, this transaction will become perfect, and Bob will receive her 5 coins.

Problems of scalability

To solve the problems of scalability, two ways were proposed: Soft fork and Hard fork.

Fork (fork) – in the practice of software developers, the so-called project cloning followed by changing its code. Thus, the original code of the project remains unchanged, and its new version can exist in parallel with the old one.

What is Soft Fork?

A soft fork is easiest to imagine as a software update with backward compatibility. What does it mean? Suppose you are using MS Excel 2005 on your laptop and want to open a spreadsheet created in MS Excel 2015. It will still open in Excel 2005 because MS Excel 2015 is backward compatible (with older versions).

What is Hard Fork?

The main difference between the soft fork and the hard fork is that the hard fork does not have backward compatibility. Once it is implemented, there will be no way to return to the original state.

What transaction data does the block body contain?

• Any transaction consists of three elements:
• The sender information is input.
• Information about the recipient – exit.
• Digital signature.

The digital signature is very important because it confirms that the sender has the necessary amount of funds required to complete the transaction. As you can see in the diagram above, it is part of the input. And although this is very important data, a big problem arises with them – they take up a lot of space. In a block of 1 MB in size, the signature takes up almost 65%!

What will happen to Bitcoin in the future?

If we talk specifically about Bitcoin, then it will be the same as with any other financial bubble. He will burst. But it will last for a long time because the system is “sharpened” under the automatic reduction of the issuance of coins to miners.

But if we talk about the idea of cryptocurrency in general, then it seems to me that everything is much more promising. The financial situation in the world is increasingly heating up due to a small flaw in the modern monetary system. Namely, the Fed issues the currency as they want, and they also demand to return this money with interest.

1. What is Bitcoin: Understanding The Basics

2. Bitcoin Benefits

3. Bitcoin Wallets: Everything You Need To Know

4. 5 Ways To Buy Bitcoin

5. How To Sell Your Bitcoin

6. Inside Bitcoin Transactions: How It All Works

7. Where Can You Spend Bitcoin? Here Are The Places

8. How To Accept Bitcoin Payments For Your Business

9. The Best Bitcoin POS Terminals For Your Business

10. Can Bitcoin Scale?

11. Bitcoin Law: What Are The Rules?

12. Who Created Bitcoin? An Overview of Satoshi Nakamoto

13. Understanding Bitcoin Charts

14. Bitcoin Mining: How It Works

15. Want To Mine Bitcoin? Here’s How To Set Up

16. Bitcoin Mining Pools: Collective Mining Power

17. The Most Popular Bitcoin Mining Pools

18. Bitcoin Forums: Where To Discuss Bitcoin

19. What Is Bitcoin Cash?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DT1dVIP1teE&frags=pl%2Cwn

UPayCard Review

It is a British-based company with its headquarters in London. UPayCard was established in 2013. Today, it regulates by the UK Financial Conduct Authority. The company is involved in activities like prepared payment systems and international payment transfers. Like its rivals, UPayCard Bitcoin debit card features an e-wallet that goes along with the respective virtual and physical cards. This one feature separates it from its competitors by giving it a competitive edge. They also issue both business and personal cards, making it a great investment for entrepreneurs interested in Bitcoin and also blockchain startups.

In the beginning, the company did face some setback due to its high fee structures. But it has learned from its mistakes and reduced their fees vastly.

In this brief review, we shall highlight the advantages and disadvantages of the UpayCard Bitcoin debit card and further learn what this debit card has in store for its users.

Advantages

1. UpayCard Bitcoin debit card is mastered up with MasterCard, making it acceptable in 99% of the stores worldwide.
2. The debit card has a user-friendly mobile app along with an e-wallet facility. This allows easy access to users as they can track their balance when on the go.
3. UpayCard Bitcoin debit card is also very secure. Its customers can enable a two-factor authentication system and also a PIN-code/password.
4. There are no bank transfer charges involved when transferring money amongst pay cardholders.
5. A majority of their services are up for grabs free of cost. UpayCard doesn’t have a monthly maintenance fee. Setting up an account is also free of cost. Moreover, the user doesn’t have to pay any extra charge for inactivity and neither when topping up via bank transfer.

Disadvantages

1. Despite being charge-free on top-up, there is still a 1% fee associated when dealing with Bitcoin.
2. Sadly, UpayCard Bitcoin debit card doesn’t offer anonymity. The users must verify their identity, proof of address and other requisites in the Know your Customers section.

UPayCard debit card Charges

• Most of the services offered with UpayCard Bitcoin debit card are free of cost, but not all. When topping up with a MasterCard or Visa, users are faced with a setback of 1.2% to 2.9%.
• Transfer services like Wechat, Alipay or UnionPay costs about 1.2%.
• ATM withdrawals are quite expensive too. Jus the tracking of your balance on an ATM will charge you €1.
• No matter where you are, withdrawing cash will cost €3.5.
• When converting payments, there is a 3% standard foreign exchange rate with UPayCard.

Summary

• Physical card: Yes
• Virtual card: Yes
• Card type: MasterCard
• Mobile app: Yes
• Supported fiat currencies: EUR, GBP, and USD
• Supported cryptocurrencies: Bitcoin (BTC), Ripple (XRP) Ethereum (ETH), Litecoin (LTC) and 80+ other cryptocurrencies
• Anonymous: No

Final Word

When established, the company specialized in international money transfers and prepaid debit cards only. Today, they also feature Bitcoin as an option. The reason why UPayCard has such a big following is that customers are reassured of its services as it previously dealt in debit cards. On the downside, many still find its fees quite pricy and Bitcoin as the only cryptocurrency option as a limited opportunity.