The blockchain/crypto week in quotes

“I think the blockchain revolution will reshape key social institutions. We have designed and breathed life into perhaps the most significant blockchain keiretsu in the world, a network of blockchain firms seeking to revolutionise identity, land governance (= rule of law = potential = capital), central banking, capital markets, supply chains, and voting. 

In three of those fields (land governance, central banking, and capital markets) the word “trillions” comes up when calculating the disruptive opportunity of blockchain. In those three fields, our blockchain progeny (Medici Land Governance, Bitt, and tZERO, respectively) are arguably the leading blockchain disruptors in existence.” Former Overstock CEO Patrick Byrne

“People always ask how I am coping with living on Bitcoin, but the truth is that my lifestyle hasn’t really changed. Buying things with crypto is easier than people think – there are many online merchants that accept Bitcoin and I use them to buy what I need throughout the month – everything from tech-related items such as Raspberry Pi products or cooking equipment from Amazon.” Zakk Lakin

“My sense is that we should use the same framework we use to regulate all other electronic financial transactions today. That’s essentially what these (cryptocurrencies) are. These are monies moving through markets, or in some case disintermediated transactions…The same rules that apply to transactions flowing through SWIFT or flowing though our financial institutions ought to apply to those transactions as well. But I concede it will be difficult to do.” US Secretary of State Michael Pompeo

“I think there is a day in the future where we can’t live without crypto, or imagine a world before crypto.” Cameron Winklevoss

“It’s ridiculous that in 2020 we are still standing in line for hours to vote in antiquated voting booths. It is 100% technically possible to have fraud-proof voting on our mobile phones today using the blockchain. This would revolutionise true democracy and increase participation to include all Americans — those without smartphones could use the legacy system and lines would be very short.” Andrew Yang, a 2020 United States presidential candidate in the Democratic Party

“Earlier this week Forbes reported that Bitcoin’s dominance is thought to be more than 90%. Our view is that rather than compare Bitcoin against altcoins as a flat value, it logically makes sense that the Forbes report has taken liquidity into consideration. Imagine trying to sell $100 million worth of Dogecoin in a very short period of time – the price would evaporate very quickly, whereas with Bitcoin, it would be a drop in the ocean.

Altcoins are slowly dying out in respect of interest when compared to Bitcoin – and as always in this industry, it eventually comes back to Bitcoin. At CoinCorner, our numbers also correlate with the 90% Bitcoin dominance figure. Last year, we introduced support for a number of altcoins – Ethereum, Litecoin and Ripple – alongside our Bitcoin offering as a result of customer demand. This demand for altcoins followed the Bitcoin “hype” in 2017 that saw the price of Bitcoin hit nearly $20,000.

Looking back on the last year, we believe that the demand for altcoins was caused by the sudden increase in initial coin offerings (ICOs) and that the buzz around these pushed many people to experience FOMO, hoping that altcoins/ICOs would be the “next Bitcoin”. We always knew that this would not be the case and our data supports this – 93% of customer transactions on CoinCorner are Bitcoin, leaving the other three altcoins to make up the remaining 7%.” CoinCorner CEO Danny Scott    

“I do see the potential for a new form of global currency that is protected and secure. When Bitcoin became well known, many questioned its legitimacy, and while the jury is still out on the future of Bitcoin, I do believe currencies with a blockchain base will continue to surface and may become more widely accepted across the globe, especially outside the US, which has a well-accepted credit card payment system.” Booking CEO Glenn Fogel

“Any assertion that we have misled our customers about Tether (USDt), its backing, or about the negotiated transaction between Bitfinex and Tether is false. We remain committed, as ever, to protecting our customers, our business, and our community against the New York Attorney General’s meritless claims.” Bitfinex

“Clearly, a non-sovereign digital asset like bitcoin is attractive to people who are interested in moving capital into a place where they can control it themselves. That underscores a lot of interest that’s been there over time. It’s the digital gold thesis, and I think a lot of both institutional accumulators of Bitcoin, individuals, very specifically individuals in jurisdictions or environments where the intense concern about capital controls are there. That’s an underlying thesis that I think has had an impact on it for the last eight years.” Jeremy Allaire, CEO, Circle

“The Praxxis consensus protocol simultaneously overcomes the scalability, privacy, and security challenges faced by legacy blockchains, the “trilemma”, to deliver the “purely peer-to-peer version of electronic cash” that Satoshi called for in the first few words of his whitepaper. And Praxxis currency is also designed to leverage the power of its sister Elixxir’s privacy-protecting platform.” E-cash inventor David Chaum