Everyone knows about the strength of Ripple labs and their XRP token in the crypto market. Regardless if you think XRP is a true cryptocurrency or not, every move Ripple makes propels the crypto community further and further. In the coming years, almost every asset with become inter-operable thus making the market one living unit. Think of crypto projects as websites, and soon we will have a structure set in place like Google to surf all of the websites all under one umbrella.

This is a loose idea, but the purpose is simple. Encourage growth of all crypto projects. Any exposure is good exposure for this industry, and the further one asset can go into disrupting the traditional world, the better for all. With that being said, let’s take a minute to check out Ripple’s most recent hire and available jobs.

Nothing should be taken as financial or investment advice. Enjoy the ride.

Jobs at Ripple Labs

In the past two years, Ripple has been on a hiring spree picking up some of the best people possible with traditional market connections and experience. In particular, Ripple has been targeting people with experience or networks with the SEC and other regulatory bodies. Most recently, Ripple picked up another person that fits this mold, Michelle Bond.

Thrilled to welcome @Michellebond111 as @Ripple's Global Head of Governmental Relations! 15+ years of global govt relations, legal, and policy experience. Excited to have her on board as we continue to work closely with lawmakers, regulators, and partners worldwide!

— Stuart Alderoty (@s_alderoty) June 19, 2019

Michelle Bond at Ripple Labs

Michelle has worn many hats in her career. Here is a list of some of here jobs she has held since 2007. She has been on a clear path through the United States Senate to the SEC and now onto the blockchain space.

• Ripple 2019 to present – Global Head of Government Relations
• Blockchain 2018 to 2019 – Global Head of Policy
• Bloomberp LP 2014 to 2018 – Head of Global Regulatory Affairs and Public Policy
• United States Securities and Exchange Commission 2012 to 2014 – Senior Counsel
• United States Senate 2011 to 2012 – Counsel for the Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs Committee
• Hogan Lovells 2007 to 2010- Associate, Corporate & Securities, Financial Institutions

Why is this important for Ripple?

Ripple Is Not A Security

The entire purpose of Ripple hiring the brilliant minds to finagle the regulatory industry is to navigate the laws to make sure XRP remains either unclassified or classified as not a security. Thus far from everything reported, XRP is currently not considered a security. With Ripple bringing on people with deep connections and experience in these areas, XRP will likely be classified as not a security within the year following Bitcoin and Ethereum’s favorable outcomes.

Ripple Labs Available Jobs

Besides the large hires happening throughout the market and in general, Ripple is constantly posting jobs for people to apply for.

There are over 42 jobs listed currently for Ripple on Glassdoor with even more posted on their website.

Ripple Jobs Salary

A majority of the jobs are for Software Engineering, xRapid account support, and upper level management jobs. The Salaries are quite nice at almost all of the jobs starting above $100,000 a year. Many are much higher than this is you have the skill set required. If Ripple continues to grow and maintain the partnerships it currently has, it will not be long until Ripple starts to move the market all by itself.

Ripple Working With MoneyGram

The other top news with Ripple and MoneyGram has been substantially covered throughout the market. Simply, Ripple worked a deal with the company to buy out a certain percentage of the stock, projected over 10%, to create a partnership with the company. Essentially, this will solidify the use of xRapid throughout the client base of MoneyGram and expedite the on boarding process which takes so long to complete.

Ripple and MoneyGram Stock Movement

Additionally, the boost in exposure through blockchain association served to skyrocket MoneyGram’s stock prices instantly. Easily within the first few hours of the announcement, MoneyGram’s stock more than doubled in price. This is a great sign of the traditional markets opinion on blockchain related to partnerships and coordination.

The market has been twisting and turning for some time. Three assets specifically have not been surging as well as some of the other top assets in the market. Cardano, Ripple, and IOTA are those three assets. Each of these projects are unique and innovative in their respective ways, and I believe the lack of price movement means their accumulation periods are not over yet.

Each of these assets has a large and devoted community that are very committed to their assets.

Cardano specifically, has the three pillars of the main business model and the community that clearly loves and supports the project along with its leader Charles Hoskinson.

Ripple has been a long stable hold in the market with more partnerships than any other project on the market. Additionally, the XRP army paves the way for all doors to open and all haters to run.

Finally, IOTA was the largest gaining asset in 2017 and has huge partnerships and government connections. IOTA is also the top DAG based crypto in the entire market, which gives it a slight advantage to the other top assets.

Nothing in this article is meant to be taken as investment advice or financial advise. Enjoy the ride.

Upcoming Developments

There are huge releases, developments, and products coming out in the following months for these projects. There could be some massive price swings and FOMO if these items are completed and checked off of the list.

Shelly and Smart Contracts

Cardano has its Shelly test net update for single nodes coming up within days. Additionally, Charles has told us it will get rolled out and updated to completion quickly. The community is ready for this update and the following events of smart contract development on the Plutus function based programming language.

Coordicide of the Coordinator

IOTA’s main critique has constantly been the centralized consensus algorithm called the Coordinator. Recently, IOTA has been heavily investing in killing this problem since their network is finally strong enough. Once this passes, there will be no more excuses for those hating on IOTA and the market will start to take the project seriously again. Coordicide, as it is called, is projects to take place in 2019 which should be just in time for a nice December price pop.

xRapid, xVia, and xCurrent

Ripple’s three main products are continually pushing for more partnerships, markets, and developments. Most recently, Ripple signed on 14 more banks globally to their international monetary system. These products are all fully functional and banks are testing every one of them to utilize the Ripple network slowly but surely.

Fundamental Leaders

A very important note about each of these projects is that there is sound leaderships behind each one. Whereas Tron has Justin Sun shilling every second and pumping announcements of announcements into the market, BCH has Roger Ver tricking investors, BSV is well a joke lead by Fake Satoshi, and Stellar’s Jeb McCaleb is a con all the way back to Mt. Gox.

Ripple has sound leadership now that Jeb was kicked out many years ago and is lead today by Brad Garlinghouse. Brad is well respected in multiple industries and clearly has the connections to take Ripple to the next level.

Cardano is lead by the famous Charles Hoskinson. The only bad thing people have ever said about Charles is his choice of boots for shoes. Give the man a break ok? He’s the cowboy of the crypto revolution.

IOTA is lead by David Sønstebø. David is a brilliant man and sticks to his guns. He is also not the most boisterous. He tends to keep to himself and does not get brought up in the news much except for accomplishments and partnerships. The man is hard at work, and that’s who I want my money to be behind.

Marketing

Another reason these projects are ahead of the curve is their marketing approach.

Ripple is targeting the banks of the world and setting up a global network of payments. Ripple has connections on every continent and partnerships to match with them. Ripple’s marketing team is very strategic in their approach and are aggressive in targeting the largest banks around the world.

Cardano’s leader Charles Hoskinson, is leading the way by going to over 52 countries in the past 4 years. Charles has built relationships with kings, princes, government officials, congress men, and world leaders. There is a clear tactic to this approach, and we will see over time if working with the government will supply more utility then completely creating your own market and use cases.

IOTA is king of the internet of things. The leaders and founders have been invited to multiple EU events including the G20 previously to give a speech. Being invited to the most important meetings in the world to speak, is not to be over looked. IOTA additionally has great partnerships with multiple car companies aiming to provide a blockchain system to the future of autonomous driving.

End of Year Price Projections

Besides fundamentals, what can we expect price wise?

For Ripple, we can expect a strong push back to the $0.70 to $1 range. With Bitcoin finally being back over $9,000 we can start to look for the alts to make their move. Ripple has a huge community and high volume, but a little spark could easily send this coin soaring.

Cardano has been struggling to break the $0.10 range. From the constant accumulation period, I would not be surprised if Cardano grew quickly to the $0.20 – $0.30 range. This is a large growth from the current $0.09, but it is due time for this asset to have a pop.

IOTA is a hard asset to predict. With a lower volume, this asset could easily spike to great heights similar to the 2017 market. Currently IOTA is battling the $0.50 psychological level. Once broken, this asset could easily surge to a $0.75 to $0.90 price level with the hype surrounding the coordicide event.

Full disclosure, the author does own Cardano and IOTA. Ripple is also a great asset in general.

There’s been a large amount of news shifting around the crypto market. A constant stream of FUD and FOMO in both directions across the market from Google and Facebook stepping into the scene, to Binance completely changing the name of the trading game. Here is my analysis on the current market standings and whether or not there will be a bullrun in Q4 this year. Additionally, I will disclose a hidden company that has been working behind the scenes to provide the blockchain industry with security and protection.

Disclaimer, this article is not to be considered as investment advice or financial advice. Take everything with a grain of salt and enjoy the ride.

Current Market Status

The market has been on a roar since April 1st. The Price of Bitcoin has gone from $4,000 to easily over $8,000. Historically, this usually triggers an altcoin pump one to two months after initial Bitcoin pumps. Although, it seems whales and investors are largely concentrating on Bitcoin price movements instead of shifting to the alts. The altcoins in this market are not “pumping”, at least not in the way we would anticipate.

There is still a decent amount of growth in the altcoin market, but for instance, XRP spiked to almost $0.80 earlier in the year and has yet to even come close to those levels. Cardano is having a rough time breaking the $0.10 psychological levels and likewise, EOS has come tumbling down after their announcement.

What we would have expected, is a uniform pump across the market for altcoins. Although, this is not the case. There are sects of pumps and dumps based on news and announcement manipulation. The only top coins that are trending heavily with Bitcoin are BCH, BSV, ETH, and LTC. With BCH and BSV leading the charge with sporadic massive price surges.

Clearly, these surges are not organic which is not what market markers and speculators would like to see. The prices are heavily manipulated in these coins, but it seems that manipulation has become the name of the game as traders look to capitalize on these known pump and dumps.

End Of Year Projections

As we shift into Q3, 2019 could look similar to 2015. After the previous bull run of 2013, 2015 was a year of sideways trading and some decent gains for the market as a whole in Q3 through Q4. We could very likely see this same scenario play out end of year. As good news continues to roll out of partnerships and main net launches, we could potentially see new all time highs this year.

Likewise, if Bakkt launches or the SEC provides an approving tone to the market we could see extreme FOMO. Although in light of the market trends and historical data, this is not likely. Probably, the market will tapper off throughout Q3 and have a nice pop into the Q4 holiday season. Moreover, I could easily see a $10,000 Bitcoin followed by a nice array of altcoin surges.

Insurance Brokers in the Blockchain

The insurance broker utilizing blockchain is one of the largest in the world – Marsh & McLennan . Marsh has been heavily investing and researching new and innovative ways to promote and develop blockchain based solutions. Personally, I have spoken with New York’s Digital Asset Risk Transfer team (DART) that is bringing large clients to market like exchanges, brokers and hedge funds. The market is vast and needing. There is absolutely no shortage of clients needing these services, which actually plays into Marsh’s hands. This gives them the ability to be selective with who they want to bring to market to set the tone for the future. There are some smart people at play managing these accounts from personal experience.

Additionally, there are several other projects they are working on internally that cannot be disclosed. With the leader of the industry diving in head first, it is safe to assume other brokers and insurance companies are doing the same. Most of these projects will look to utilize a private ledger blockchain similar to Hyperledger or build their own. In some cases, they will use public ledgers to authenticate and transmit non-critical data.

With Binance capturing a majority of the market share of trades, it is no surprise that their native coin, Binance coin, is doing well. What most investors would consider an extremely high risk asset in comparison to historical exchange activity (Mt. Gox), Binance coin has proven to be a worthy investment.

Binance Coin Price Development Over Time Via CoinMarketCap

If you invested in Binance coin during the December crash after the BCH and BSV conflict, then you would easily have over 6 times your investment today. With those kind of gains and decoupling from Bitcoin price movement, BNB is moving into a digital asset class of its own.

What to expect coming up

With the price heavily inflated, BNB holders should be considering to hedge their portfolio. Although, the launch of Binance Chain in April 2019 seems to be signalling towards a continual climb of the asset price.

Most recently, the project has started to capture a majority of the Initial Exchange Offering market. By using BNB as the only investment vehicle on each monthly listing, BNB’s use cases are growing tremendously. Additionally, there is a strong pull towards margin trading for the platform. There have been several photos showing the margin trading platform, and on June 13, Binance tweeted about the new trading vehicle. Sign up now if this is something you are interested in for early access!

750 $BNB #HODLers now have margin trading enabled.

To join them fill out the form below:https://t.co/4awL4GaalM https://t.co/ArjOCu3X2S

— Binance (@binance) June 13, 2019

As big as this is for Binance, there are multiple things that are contributing to the BNB price success. Now, let’s look at my top reasons why Binance coin will soon become a top 5 cryptocurrency.

Token Burn

The total supply of Binance coin is approximately 189 million from CMC metrics with a circulating supply of around 141 million. This is just a small amount compared to most projects across the space. In addition, CZ has made a point to make quarterly token burns of this circulating supply from the internal revenue vehicles like exchange fees.

The token burns are scheduled to take place at the end of each quarter of the year. This is huge for asset price because this cuts the circulating supply and increases demand naturally from the deflationary system applied. In short, the price should organically rise from the continued coin burns.

Initial Exchange Offerings

Beside the diminishing supply, the Binance Launchpad, which is mentioned above, is the platform on which initial exchange offerings take place. Specifically, this platform gives the BNB coin even more utility then it already has. For every project launched on this platform like BitTorrent (BTT), investors are forced to buy into the offering by holding a sufficient amount of BNB coins. Investors that do not get in early enough or do not have a large enough stake are entered into a lottery system due to the surge of applicants.

Trading Fees

The surge of applicants will continue to grow into this next bull market. Hence, more and more traditional traders are going to gravitate towards crypto to capitalize. From being the largest liquidity provider, traders and funds will naturally hone in on the exchange with the lowest fees to manage assets. Binance will clearly be one of the top choices.

In sheer volume alone, every fund will have an exposure base to this exchange in the next bull market to capture gains and short efficiently. This increased amount of trading activity will multiple revenue which should in turn increase the token burn at the end of each quarter.

Binance Chain

On top of all the other use cases, projects are slowly but surely starting to migrate towards the Binance Chain. The benefits of basically partnering with the worlds largest exchange are endless, but simply it helps cement your project in the crypto scene by moving your token to the Binance Chain.

Binance Dex

After the launch of the chain, an upcoming endeavor is now the launch of the Binance Dex. As a decentralized exchange with a functioning and thriving eco-system, the Binance Coin should appreciate naturally from the continual use and revenue spikes. A article from Global Coin Report had this to say about the upcoming Dex:

Every transaction within the DEX will require BNB in some amount, and the coin will be larger than ever. In fact, many view it as one of the biggest coins in the future, which will serve on the biggest exchange, and be paired with every coin which enters the exchange.

Global Coin Report

Decoupled Price Movements

In addition to being a great investment, any coin that can decouple itself from the Bitcoin price movements is highly sought after. In the recent surge, it seems more or less that Bitcoin has left all of the altcoin market behind as it pushed to new levels not seen since early 2018.

Binance coin is an exception to the altcoins in that it seems to be growing organically at an astounding rate. With it being almost completely decoupled from the rest of the market, traders can now look to trade this coin independent of the market sentiment.

Asset Cash Flow

A common theme among many wealthy traditional investors like Kevin O’Leary and Mark Cuban is that they like to invest in projects that have a substantial amount of cash flow. Cash flow is vitally important to the success of any project as without it, the project can not survive stagnant markets. Clearly throughout the bear market, Binance not only survived but thrived. This is a huge indicator of long-term success for the platform as a whole.

Brand Trust

Finally, the market overall has a good amount of brand trust in the Binance name and in the CEO, CZ. Both of which have consistently proven themselves to be loyal, open and transparent hosts to the crypto community. From internal hacks, system malfunctions, announcements, and even to Craig Wright, Binance and its leader continue to build a reputation of dependability which will in turn reap benefits for their coin and platform.

BNB CAN BECOME A TOP 5 CRYPTOCURRENCY

With everything listed above, BNB is already setting greater standards than almost any coin that has come before. For BNB to reach the top 5 coins in the market, it only has to get to a $7 billion market cap which would currently put the price of one coin over $50. This is easily obtainable as we move into Q3 of 2019 and a token burn is fast approaching.

Nothing above should be taken as financial or investment advice. Do your own due diligence and research before investing. In full disclosure, I do not own any BNB.

The crypto space seems to be on a never ending surge. If not in price, then the news most certainly is. The two titans in the industry, Coinbase and Binance, are going head to head with each other trying to expand faster than the other. Today, Coinbase inches a little be closer to pulling ahead of its biggest rival.

Coinbase in Canada

Recently through r/cryptocurrency, a Reddit user posted about Coinbase now available via paypal in Canada. This is great news seeing how paypal can effectively be linked to a credit card, thus enabling Canadians to purchase cryptocurrency more efficiently once deposits are enabled. Currently, this feature is for withdraws only, but we can speculate that this will only be the case for a short amount of time.

The reason credit purchases are so important is that it enables natural leverage for traders interacting on the Coinbase platform in that region. With the additional funds, traders and speculators can have a larger impact on the market where as before, it was not as easy.

Canada has not received a large amount of news in regards to the crypto scene. Although, there is a substantial amount of mining facilities taking advantage of the cool air and cheap infrastructure costs in the region. To no surprise, there are numerous groups and organizations dedicated to promoting blockchain in Canada. Most notably would have to be Blockchain Canada, which has a host of team members and partners to speak of.

Margin Trading Coming To Coinbase and Binance

With Binance recently showing off their margin trading platform, it is only natural for Coinbase to strive to do the same soon.

Dark mode 🌚 or Light mode 🌝? #Binance pic.twitter.com/pGSb1np4yp

— Binance (@binance) May 24, 2019

This is speculation, but there have been mentions and discussions about Coinbase heavily looking at enabling margin trading. This would mainly be to encourage brokers and traders to utilize their platform. Additionally, CEO Brian Armstrong recently commented in the past weeks on this very topic.

He stated that debit margin trading is one of the most requested options from traders. The main problem is that regulatory issues persist with these options. Unfortunately as of today, there is no real movement yet on the platform towards this requested feature.

Coinbase or Binance

Regardless of the availability, Binance still seems to be the better trading platform with lower fees, better insurance protocols and constant growth. Coinbase is a close second, and really shines when it comes to fiat to crypto trading pairs. If you seek to liquidate your position into fiat, then Coinbase is a must use no matter which platform you like. If you are comfortable with hedging your gains into a stable coin like tether, then you will do just fine trading on Binance.