The blockchain/crypto week in quotes

“Breaking through the $6,000 barrier is a moment of truth for Bitcoin. This had been a major support level throughout most of 2018 and holds major psychological significance for the community. I expect to see a small sell-off initially before the price breaks higher.

If this happens, we could see prices reach levels last seen at the start of 2018, potentially hitting the $12,000-$14,000 range by the end of the year. Given that global markets are having a bit of a wobble at the minute, Bitcoin’s price growth in recent weeks means it is one of the strongest asset classes so far in 2019.” Simon Peters, analyst at eToro

“The situation with Tether and Bitfinex seems like a really big mess that probably won’t get better. Tether is somewhat important to our ecosystem because it’s used by different institutions to effect more fluid trading. There are other price-stable tokens out there – many others – and I think they’re going to gain traction because of this. I think that will be a really good thing.” Joseph Lubin, Co-founder of Ethereum and Founder of ConsenSys

“Cryptocurrencies are not really currencies, they are assets. A euro is a euro, today, tomorrow, in a month, it’s always a euro. And the ECB is behind the euro. Who is behind the cryptocurrencies? So they are very, very risky assets.” European Central Bank (ECB) President Mario Draghi 

“The attack on Binance is a yet another case showing how unreliable centralised exchanges are. Obviously, even with the presence of impressive financial resources, enabling the exchange to address the security issue properly, and despite the trust of millions of users around the world (as is well known, Binance is one of the leaders in trading volumes), such exchanges are outdated and are more like a giant game of Russian Roulette than a financial ecosystem that stimulates the favourable development of the crypto market.

It is highly likely that a similar situation will soon happen at other “Binance-like” major exchanges that will remain nameless. The consequence of such events is the slowing down of the development of the crypto financial market, since such attacks increasingly weaken the confidence of participants and delay the entry of institutional entities into the market. Market participants have high expectations related to attacks: namely, that the market will begin to develop strongly and become more orderly and professional. In other words, the institutional entities will lead the market to a higher professional standard.

There is only one way out, and that is to urgently and drastically change the approach to the storage of client funds. The funds must either be kept in the custody of licensed, highly-reputable third-party custodians or with the client in a personal decentralised account, which, in our opinion, is a more reliable option. At Xena, we are actively working on this solution and will soon present it. Only the client is able to access their funds, and the relationship with the exchange must remain independent and trustless.” Julie Plavnik, CBDO, Xena Exchange

“Despite the Binance hack, Bitcoin seems to be continuing with its current upward trend. That’s not to say that we’re unlikely to see any more falls. While the market has been overdue a rally, it won’t just be a straight line upwards from here on out. Prices are likely to remain volatile with wild swings.

While some attribute the rally to the upcoming New York blockchain week, this seems more coincidence than cause. The main driver is likely to be the anticipated halving of the mining reward for Bitcoin. While still a year away it has been identified that a rally in Bitcoin tends to precede this event. This has happened every time a halving has taken place, as a diminished supply will naturally lead to more demand.” Gavin Smith, CEO, Panxora

“With Facebook Coin, Facebook has lit a fire in the pants of every major FinTech and financial institution in the US.” Blockchain Capital partner Spencer Bogart 

“BitPay is at the cutting-edge of blockchain-payment technology and has proven itself as a valuable partner to numerous companies and consumers globally. I believe that BitPay has the opportunity to be a game-changer in the financial technology and payment space as the use cases for blockchain payments grow around the world. I am very excited to be part of this journey and join the team.” Glen Braganza, BitPay Chief Financial Officer

“Blockchain…very interesting development.” Prince Charles

“I think the people who are professional traders that go into trading cryptocurrencies, it’s just disgusting. It’s like somebody else is trading turds and you decide, ‘I can’t be left out.'” Berkshire Hathaway Vice Chairman Charlie Munger