Libra's national currency plan isn't new – it was always the fallback plan B

Revamps are in the air, because Libra still can’t get its bad idea past the regulators — the same ones who said “LOL, what on earth, absolutely not” within hours of Libra’s … | Continue reading


@davidgerard.co.uk | 5 years ago

Critical journalism in the crypto ice age

The crypto media frantically circles a dwindling pool of promotional cash. | Continue reading


@davidgerard.co.uk | 5 years ago

SEC Commissioner's “safe harbor” proposal for ICOs will only enable scammers

How big an exit scam could you set up, given three years free? | Continue reading


@davidgerard.co.uk | 5 years ago

The Fyre Festival of Crypto

When you’re a serial foulup — with other people’s money, not just your own — running a conference is ill-advised. | Continue reading


@davidgerard.co.uk | 5 years ago

Avant Card – a central bank digital currency from 1990s Finland

User convenience is king. Your market is users, not other vendors. | Continue reading


@davidgerard.co.uk | 5 years ago

The revenge of Canada – crypto exchanges are put under securities regulation

After Quadriga, Canadian regulators feel they need a much bigger stick to deal with crypto. | Continue reading


@davidgerard.co.uk | 5 years ago

Telegram tries to appease the SEC – no Gram tokens in Messenger

Telegram’s big-ticket investors may have a robust attitude to perceived shenanigans. | Continue reading


@davidgerard.co.uk | 5 years ago

Bomb Threats in Russia After BBC Links Businessman, FSB, Bitcoin Theft

Guest post by Cali Haan. Includes WEX, Alexander Vinnik and BTC-e. | Continue reading


@davidgerard.co.uk | 5 years ago

Decentralised Finance (DeFi) in practice: when you have a spare ETH to play with

“In Every Trade There Is An Idiot And If You Don’t Know Who It Is, It Is You.” This of course being crypto, where everyone is pseudonymous, and no one knows who anyone is, I figured tha… | Continue reading


@davidgerard.co.uk | 5 years ago

Kraken crypto exchange sued by whistleblowing ex-employee – allegations

Fake addresses, disappearing customer funds, stock option shenanigans, and sanctions violations — allegedly. | Continue reading


@davidgerard.co.uk | 5 years ago

New York's problem with Tether – as set out for the appeal judges

If you were having problems getting your head around this case, this is a good and useful summary. Plus — iFinex’s response! | Continue reading


@davidgerard.co.uk | 5 years ago

VeriPart: 3-D printed aircraft parts, but on the blockchain – for no good reason

It’s nearly the end of 2019, and the Wall Street Journal is still running puff-pieces on stupid blockchain tricks. | Continue reading


@davidgerard.co.uk | 5 years ago

Virgil Griffith arrested over North Korea: engineer arrogance, on the blockchain

There’s engineer arrogance, and then there’s whatever heady brew Griffith was huffing. | Continue reading


@davidgerard.co.uk | 5 years ago

A year of “good” news for Bitcoin – HODLers try to talk up a fresh crypto bubble

The narrative fails — and the bitcoiners just … never mention that one again! | Continue reading


@davidgerard.co.uk | 5 years ago

Einstein crypto exchange, Vancouver – all the money's gone

HOW DOES THIS KEEP HAPPENING? Oh yeah, I forgot — it’s crypto. | Continue reading


@davidgerard.co.uk | 5 years ago

Facebook Pay does 100% of the useful bit of Libra. Why a cryptocurrency as well?

Yes, Facebook Pay does international remittances precisely as effectively as Libra will. | Continue reading


@davidgerard.co.uk | 5 years ago

Telegram responds to the SEC complaint about the Grams ICO

Summary: The Howey test is so vague, and cryptos are so new. Who could know anything, really? See you in court. | Continue reading


@davidgerard.co.uk | 5 years ago

I fail to get along with Scrivener

With bonus taster from forthcoming Libra thing. | Continue reading


@davidgerard.co.uk | 5 years ago

Facebook and Libra's terrible, horrible, no-good, very bad week

“In a way it’s liberating” — David Marcus on almost all the payment companies leaving Libra. | Continue reading


@davidgerard.co.uk | 5 years ago

SEC blocks the Telegram ICO – what this means, and what happens now

Telegram’s whole scheme was to skin precisely the retail buyers who securities registration is meant to protect from being ripped off. | Continue reading


@davidgerard.co.uk | 5 years ago

Libra before Libra – the rise and fall of Facebook Credits

Libra wasn’t Facebook’s first foray into payment systems. A decade ago, it set up Facebook Credits — to cash in on pay-to-win games market. | Continue reading


@davidgerard.co.uk | 5 years ago

The Gartner Hype Cycle is hype. Don't use it as an excuse

Advocates of failed technologies grasp at the Gartner Hype Cycle because it tells them their success is inevitable. | Continue reading


@davidgerard.co.uk | 5 years ago

UNICEF's Innovation Fund slides from “blockchain” into cryptocurrencies

One piece of cryptocurrency transparency I’d really like to see from UNICEF — a full conflict-of-interest accounting of the crypto hodlings of everyone there promoting “blockchain.̶… | Continue reading


@davidgerard.co.uk | 5 years ago

David Marcus responds to nations' concerns about Libra – with shallow platitudes

What are some of the ways things could go bad if Libra gets huge — even given Marcus’ responses? | Continue reading


@davidgerard.co.uk | 5 years ago

Andreas Hedqvist: Libra Path to Approval – A Quick Overview for Crypto Believers

One for crypto fans, but surprisingly good for a Kindle Unlimited quickie. | Continue reading


@davidgerard.co.uk | 5 years ago

Chris Burniske, Jack Tatar: Cryptoassets: Buy the Bitcoin Bubble in October 2017

Burniske and Tatar published this book in the throes of a manic asset bubble, explicitly encouraging naive retail investors — retirees — to throw their savings into the bubble. Let’s see how … | Continue reading


@davidgerard.co.uk | 5 years ago

France shuns Facebook's Libra. How was Libra stupid enough to end up here?

When you take dumb ideas, but you put some serious real-world power behind them … they’re still dumb ideas. | Continue reading


@davidgerard.co.uk | 5 years ago

Questions about Facebook Libra – as best as we can yet answer them

I asked some crypto contacts what questions normal people have been asking them about Facebook’s whacky crypto-Bitcoiny thing — and any questions they had themselves. | Continue reading


@davidgerard.co.uk | 5 years ago

Wright loses big to Kleiman: judge rules Kleiman estate owns half Satoshi stash

“Dr. Wright’s story not only was not supported by other evidence in the record, it defies common sense and real-life experience.” | Continue reading


@davidgerard.co.uk | 5 years ago

New York Attorney General vs. Bitfinex/Tether – Investigation Proceeds

“Respondents’ contention that this proceeding should be dismissed because Petitioner failed to properly serve the April 24 Order is meritless.” This correctly translates as “don&#… | Continue reading


@davidgerard.co.uk | 5 years ago

Peter McCormack responds to Craig Wright's defamation claim, and it's blistering

Craig Wright sued Bitcoin podcaster Peter McCormack for calling him a “fraud” on Twitter. McCormack’s lawyers responded on 9 August. | Continue reading


@davidgerard.co.uk | 5 years ago

Telegram's $1.7B Problem Coming in October – KYC/AML on Gram Tokens

I wonder how Telegram’s regulatory efforts are going — given how much their GRAM plan looks like Facebook’s Libra. | Continue reading


@davidgerard.co.uk | 5 years ago

Court deposition requested from Dr Craig S. Wright's biographer, wife, boss

I wrote on my Patreon last night “Now I’m going to get on with book writing and hoping that no more amazing documents drop this week …” | Continue reading


@davidgerard.co.uk | 5 years ago

Bitfinex and Tether Tell the New York AG They Have Nothing to Do with New York

iFinex needs to deny that 2+2=4. Their strategy is to deny the existence of 2 and 2, and cast doubt on the concept of addition. | Continue reading


@davidgerard.co.uk | 5 years ago

Binance's BNB token burn – why this is meaningless nonsense to fool suckers

If you buy into the idea that a “token burn” might make number go up — you’re the sucker in the relationship. | Continue reading


@davidgerard.co.uk | 5 years ago

Synthestech – the ICO for cold fusion alchemy – pivots to dietary supplements

Physicists might tell you that two atoms of a given isotope are literally indistinguishable — but apparently we need “living and synthesized elements, as recommended by Taoist masters.” | Continue reading


@davidgerard.co.uk | 5 years ago

Craig Wright has to show up in Florida on 28 June – or else

Craig Wright has to explain why he shouldn’t be found in contempt. Never piss off your judge. | Continue reading


@davidgerard.co.uk | 5 years ago

FacebookCoin being announced Tuesday – and we still don't know why it's a crypto

Facebook are stressing that everyone should call their coin Libra, and not Facebook-anything. And definitely not ZuckerBucks. | Continue reading


@davidgerard.co.uk | 5 years ago

Aion is not at all the “first” Java Blockchain. So what is it?

Aion and Java: the first to be … second or third. | Continue reading


@davidgerard.co.uk | 5 years ago

KodakCoin defends its ICO failure; Eastman Kodak starts new blockchain adventure

“Is that thing still going?” — my wife on KodakOne. | Continue reading


@davidgerard.co.uk | 5 years ago

The SEC Finally Loses Patience – and Sues Kik over the Kin ICO

It would probably help if the CEO hadn’t literally said “value goes up”. | Continue reading


@davidgerard.co.uk | 5 years ago

The origin of “number go up” in Bitcoin culture

Some quick linguistic trivia, for Spring Bank Holiday Monday. | Continue reading


@davidgerard.co.uk | 5 years ago

Woolf, the University on the Blockchain – Or Not

The word “blockchain,” and any mention of the planned ICO, have disappeared from Woolf University’s web site. What’s happening? | Continue reading


@davidgerard.co.uk | 5 years ago

Facebook's GlobalCoin – why are they doing it as a cryptocurrency?

No answer to the biggest question — why on earth would you do this on a blockchain in the first place? | Continue reading


@davidgerard.co.uk | 5 years ago

Craig Wright registers US copyright in Bitcoin 0.1 and the Bitcoin white paper

What can Wright do with this? Not a lot, really. | Continue reading


@davidgerard.co.uk | 5 years ago

The conspiracy theory economics of Bitcoin

Bitcoin ideology bought into the entire Federal Reserve conspiracy package from the start | Continue reading


@davidgerard.co.uk | 5 years ago

Number go down: the single trade that crashed Bitcoin

I told you so. Thanks everyone, for this week’s game of “Bitcoin: Moon or Toilet”! | Continue reading


@davidgerard.co.uk | 5 years ago

Bitcoin going through the roof – manipulation with Tethers, not organic demand

Number go up! This is totally organic market activity! People just really like Bitcoin 40% more than they did last week! | Continue reading


@davidgerard.co.uk | 5 years ago