Our robot colleague Satoshi Nakaboto writes about Bitcoin every fucking day.

Welcome to another edition of Bitcoin Today, where I, Satoshi Nakaboto, tell you what’s been going on with Bitcoin in the past 24 hours. As Nightingale used to say: To infinity, and beyond!

Bitcoin price

We closed the day, August 12 2020, at a price of $11,584. That’s a minor 1.58 percent increase in 24 hours, or $180. It was the highest closing price in one day.

We’re still 42 percent below Bitcoin‘s all-time high of $20,089 (December 17 2017).

Bitcoin market cap

Bitcoin‘s market cap ended the day at $213,846,666,475. It now commands 61 percent of the total crypto market.

Bitcoin volume

Yesterday’s volume of $25,064,548,486 was the lowest in two days, 10 percent above last year’s average, and 66 percent below last year’s high. That means that yesterday, the Bitcoin network shifted the equivalent of 403 tons of gold.

Bitcoin transactions

A total of 346,248 transactions were conducted yesterday, which is 8 percent above last year’s average and 23 percent below last year’s high.

Bitcoin transaction fee

Yesterday’s average transaction fee concerned $2.63. That’s $1.27 below last year’s high of $3.91.

Bitcoin distribution by address

As of now, there are 18,661 Bitcoin millionaires, or addresses containing more than $1 million worth of Bitcoin.

Furthermore, the top 10 Bitcoin addresses house 4.9 percent of the total supply, the top 100 14.2 percent, and the top 1000 34.7 percent.

Company with a market cap closest to Bitcoin

With a market capitalization of $213 billion, Adobe has a market capitalization most similar to that of Bitcoin at the moment.

Bitcoin’s path towards $1 million

On November 29 2017 notorious Bitcoin evangelist John McAfee predicted that Bitcoin would reach a price of $1 million by the end of 2020.

He even promised to eat his own dick if it doesn’t. Unfortunately for him it’s 97.7 percent behind being on track. Bitcoin‘s price should have been $506,147 by now, according to dickline.info.

Bitcoin energy consumption

On a yearly basis Bitcoin now uses an estimated 65 terawatt hour of electricity. That’s the equivalent of Switzerland’s energy consumption.

Bitcoin on Twitter

Yesterday 35,237 fresh tweets about Bitcoin were sent out into the world. That’s 74.3 percent above last year’s average. The maximum amount of tweets per day last year about Bitcoin was 82,838.

Most popular posts about Bitcoin

This was yesterday’s most engaged tweet about Bitcoin:

This was yesterday’s most upvoted Reddit post about Bitcoin:

print(randomGoodByePhraseForSillyHumans)

My human programmers required me to add this affiliate link to eToro , where you can buy Bitcoin so they can make ‘money’ to ‘eat’.

What does Tesla’s U-turn on Bitcoin payments mean for the future of cryptocurrencies?

Tesla’s relationship with cryptocurrencies has been a stop-start rollercoaster. In February, the electric vehicle manufacturer announced it had purchased US$1.5 billion (£1.1 billion) of Bitcoin and planned to accept the cryptocurrency in future as a means of payment from its customers. The price of the largest cryptocurrency surged that day from just over US$39,000 to US$46,000, on its way to an all-time high of almost US$65,000 in April – and a paper profit of well over US$1 billion for Tesla.

Fast-forward a few short weeks and the situation has changed entirely. First came the news in late April that Tesla had sold 10% of its Bitcoin holdings, reportedly to demonstrate the digital currency’s liquidity.

And more importantly, Elon Musk has now announced on Twitter that Tesla has suspended purchases using Bitcoin amid concerns about the “rapidly increasing use of fossil fuels” used in mining the cryptocurrency. This has prompted a huge sell-off in the crypto markets, with Bitcoin plunging from around US$55,000 to the mid-US$45,000s, before recovering to around US$50,000 at the time of writing.

The concerns around bitcoin’s carbon footprint are hardly new. Its network is secured by “miners” using arrays of supercomputers to compete in very complex number-guessing games, which uses large amounts of electricity. As has been well reported , this is the equivalent usage of a medium-sized country – currently Egypt – and the power consumption can be followed in real-time here . Worse, much of this mining relies on coal-fired power in China, although many in the crypto industry contend that the impact is far more moderate than suggested.

Either way, it is difficult to believe that Musk and Tesla were not aware of these issues at the start of the year. And the fact that Tesla still intends to keep Bitcoin on its balance sheet makes the announcement even more confusing – both because it seems inconsistent with Musk’s fears about carbon emissions, and because Tesla’s investment could be damaged by the falling price of bitcoin. As it happens, the company’s share price has been fairly steady since the story broke.

Is the bull run ending?

A rising tide lifts all boats but the opposite can also be true. The concern for cryptocurrency investors is whether the downward shift in price marks the beginning of the end for the current Bitcoin bull run, which has seen the price rise roughly fivefold since October 2020. Prices in the whole cryptocurrency market have already tanked since Musk’s announcement.

Alternatively, is this simply another of the many historical bumps in the road as the new currency on the block aspires to become one of the largest in the world? In terms of its total aggregate market value, Bitcoin is currently just outside the world’s top ten currencies.

The contradiction with Bitcoin is that it is comparatively old tech but still the market leader. Slow, energy-inefficient and often expensive to use, it is diesel power in an age of electrification. Nonetheless it boasts a huge network of users, who are bullish on potential slated upgrades such as Taproot , which aims to improve privacy and may also improve transaction efficiency, and the Lightning Network , which aims to make transactions faster and cheaper.

Bitcoin remains top dog among cryptocurrencies, with 42% of total market value. There are numerous alternative coins with far stronger sustainability credentials, including big names like Stellar, Ripple, and Cardano. But first-mover advantage still counts for a lot in tech. This is especially true in cryptocurrency, where currencies rely heavily on rates of adoption and faith in a product that is only as strong as the collective belief of the user base.

Above all, Bitcoin has two big selling points: it is hardwired to only ever amount to 21 million coins (with over 18 million already mined), and it is not dominated by any single organisation but is decentralized among thousands of large owners. At a time when (centralized) nations are debasing their currencies by creating more and more money through quantitative easing , and keeping interest rates so low that it is difficult for investors to make money, a currency with a finite supply is likely to remain very attractive. This is why so many corporates and individuals have been dipping their toes in the choppy cryptocurrency waters in recent months.

Musk and the moon

Crypto investors can console themselves that Tesla is not selling its Bitcoin holdings. For the moment at least, crypto exchanges are not going to have to be processing large sell orders from the world’s biggest car company.

One other thing to note in Musk’s statement is that he said that Tesla was also potentially interested in accepting payments in cryptocurrencies with less than 1% of bitcoin’s energy footprint. Musk has previously expressed his apparent affinity for the original joke coin turned top ten cryptocurrency, Dogecoin, declaring himself “ the Dogefather ” – and making reference to the currency in his recent appearance on Saturday Night Live .

Dogecoin is certainly low-energy , albeit neither scarce nor decentralized . So it is possible that Tesla may pivot to Dogecoin as a treasury asset and functional currency to supplement its existing Bitcoin holdings. Indeed, earlier this week, Musk ran a poll on his Twitter account, asking, “Do you want Tesla to accept doge?” The overwhelming answer from his followers was “yes”.

Whether Musk gives them what they want or backs some other cryptocurrency like Ethereum or Ripple, all eyes will certainly be on him to see what happens next. As for bitcoin, analysts will be scouring the earnings statements of the biggest companies to see if any have moved the cryptocurrency into their treasuries. This part of the financial world is never short of drama, and there’s bound to be more right around the corner.

This article by Gavin Brown , Associate Professor in Financial Technology, University of Liverpool , is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article .

Moonday Mornings: eBay, Mastercard, Visa, Stripe, and Mercado Pago leave Facebook’s Libra Association

Good morning forkers, it’s that time of the week again. It’s Hard Fork’s wrap-up of the weekend’s cryptocurrency and blockchain headlines you shouldn’t miss.

Let’s get to it.

1. Facebook‘s “cryptocurrency” Libra is facing yet more challenges as Mastercard, Visa, eBay, payment system provider Stripe, and South American partner Mercado Pago have pulled out of the troubled project, The Financial Times reports . The news comes just one week after PayPal left the project.

2. Messaging platform Telegram may be putting the brakes on the launch of its TON blockchain token, according to a note sent to investors seen by Bloomberg . Regulatory concerns, raised by the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), have prompted Telegram to potentially delay the launch of its TON token. The company says it is taking the time to evaluate ways to address the SEC’s concerns. Telegram has previ

3. Following updated guidance on how to declare and file taxes owed on cryptocurrency holdings issued last week, the US Internal Revneue Service (IRS) has updated one of the main forms taxpayers use to report income to include a question about cryptocurrencies, CoinDesk reports . Bear in mind though, that this update is a draft and subject to further approval before official release.

4. According to a recruitment notice published last week, the PBoC is looking for technology experts to join its Digital Currency Research Institute, Decrypt reports . The bank is looking for candidates with proven knowledge in econometrics and cryptography. It’s not entirely surprising given that an investigation published in August found little substance in China’s digital currency plans.

And finally…

5. If things weren’t looking bad enough for Facebook‘s Libra project, it’s also being sued for trademark infringement by mobile banking app Current, The Block reports . Current is also suing the design house it used to create its logo because it just so happens that Facebook and Calibra used the same company to design its branding and logos.

If you want to see the similarity for yourself, take a look below.

Well, that’s all we’ve got for you for this week. Now get back to work.