Matthew Najar or the growth of a crypto expert? Governments in major economies are encouraging financial technology (fintech) innovation with regulatory and advisory initiatives designed to accelerate the availability of online payment solutions and other financial services for businesses. The initiatives generally aim to attract innovative fintech companies and help them operate in the regulated financial sector, while ensuring adequate financial protection for customers.
Matthew Najar believes without new FinTech initiatives, we will stall: “FinTech, blockchain certainly included, is critical for our generation to solve inherent financial system issues and progress forward”.
The U.K. has also been encouraging fintechs in other ways, and other countries including Australia and the U.S. are adopting some of the same approaches. For example, the U.K. Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) operates an “innovation hub” designed to help new and established businesses from the U.K and other countries introduce innovative financial services. The hub provides a dedicated team that helps fintechs understand the regulatory regime and apply for authorization to offer financial services; its role also includes identifying areas where the regulatory framework needs to be adapted to enable further innovation.
Among the efforts are new licensing and regulatory approaches that help fintechs offer new or broader services, including banking. Other moves include advisory services that guide new companies through financial regulations, and “regulatory sandboxes” that let firms test new services with customers before obtaining full regulatory approval. Najar, who has been in the fintech space since 2014, has been one of the loudest voices in support of increased spending in the financial technology space, having provided continuous leadership services for AMEX Group as well as external consulting for smaller start-up Blockchain firms.
Paper: wallets are easy to use and provide a very high level of security. While the term paper wallet can simply refer to a physical copy or printout of your public and private keys, it can also refer to a piece of software that is used to securely generate a pair of keys which are then printed. Using a paper wallet is relatively straightforward. Transferring Bitcoin or any other currency to your paper wallet is accomplished by the transfer of funds from your software wallet to the public address shown on your paper wallet. Alternatively, if you want to withdraw or spend currency, all you need to do is transfer funds from your paper wallet to your software wallet. This process, often referred to as ‘sweeping,’ can either be done manually by entering your private keys or by scanning the QR code on the paper wallet.
The U.S., which is home to some of the world’s biggest fintech companies, is also kicking off innovation initiatives similar in concept to those already up and running in other countries. The OCC plans to establish an Office of Innovation in 2017 to help the agency ensure that financial institutions operate in a regulatory framework that is responsive to financial innovation; its roles will include an outreach and technical assistance program for banks and nonbanks developing financial services. In addition, a bill to introduce a regulatory sandbox was introduced in the U.S. Congress in 2016, with the goal of passing enabling legislation in 2017.
Technically speaking, cryptocurrencies are transactions or entries targeted in a restricted database. Specific conditions must be met to modify these transactions. Created with cryptography, transactions are protected with mathematics, not with people. Transactions are published in a database, but it is a special type of database that is shared is a peer-to-peer network.
During an ICO (Initial Coin Offering), startups offer the general public an early chance to invest in their idea through a crowded sale. In return, these investors are allocated tokens at a lower price with a promise to sell them at a much higher price when listed on an exchange. Time has proven that ICOs can quite successful with records showing that some tokens ended up more than ten times the value of the projected returns. But what’s the catch in this, you might ask… ICOs have attracted a large number of investors clearly due to their high returns; however, another large number of ICOs have turned out to be total scams. People have lost millions worth of investments.
The prices of most altcoins depend on the current market price of Bitcoin. It is vital to understand that Bitcoin is relative to fiat currencies and is quite volatile. The simpler version of this is that when the value of Bitcoin goes up, the value of altcoins goes down and vice versa. The market is normally foggy when the Bitcoin price is volatile and, as you would imagine, this prevents most traders from gaining a clear understanding of what goes on in the market. At this point, it is advisable to either have close targets for our trades or simply not trade at all.
What makes Bitcoin and many cryptocurrencies innovative is their underlying technology. But if you don’t understand the foundations of the technology, the road will be risky. You don’t want to rely on others’ ‘knowledge’ to make your investment decisions. Until you can judge these projects for yourself, you will be missing out on big opportunities. After all, the creators of Bitcoin and its first adopters were all techies. To avoid this, find educational sources you trust, take the time to learn, and most importantly, enjoy the journey of learning.