Bitcoin and blockchain seem more and more like solutions looking for a problem

From QUARTZ -

"The bitcoin and blockchain world is in a bit of an investment slump.

Venture money flowing into startups working on cryptocurrencies or the technical principles underpinning them, generally known as blockchain technology, is getting harder to come by, according to data from trade publication CoinDesk. “It really seems like we’re in a slow phase with bitcoin and blockchain right now where people are mainly building infrastructure,” says Zavain Dar, a venture capitalist at Lux Capital who has taught classes on cryptocurrency at Stanford and has invested in Blockstream, one of the biggest companies in the sector."

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ABA Aims to Throw a Regulatory Blanket on Fintech

From Bank Innovation –

“The American Bankers Association today called for more regulation of financial startups.

In an interview on CNBC this morning, Rob Nichols, the new president and chief executive of the ABA, said there needs to be “a level playing field” between banks and fintech companies, and that more regulation of those fintech companies is the best way to achieve that.”

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Bitcoin's Regulatory Nightmare Is About to Get More Frightening

From Reason.com -



Let’s say you want to start a Bitcoin company in the U.S., chances are you’re going to need a Money Transmitter License, or rather 51 of them, because 47 states three territories and the District of Columbia each have their own permitting process for any business that handles money on behalf of its customers.



“Let’s say you want to start a Bitcoin company in the U.S., chances are you’re going to need a Money Transmitter License, or rather 51 of them, because 47 states three territories and the District of Columbia each have their own permitting process for any business that handles money on behalf of its customers.

This regulatory maze is thwarting the plans of many Bitcoin startups.

"Some [of our] applications have been in for over a year, and we're not able to determine the path forward because it's not a clear process," says Megan Burton, CEO of the Bitcoin exchange firm CoinX, at a May 16, 2014 public hearing of the Conference of State Bank Supervisors' Emerging Payments Task Force.”

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Will Apple Pay Accelerate Bitcoin Adoption? A Chicago Startup is Betting on It

ChicagoInno

“Is Apple unlocking the backdoor for bitcoin?

At last week's Apple announcement, CEO Tim Cook introduced Apple Pay, the company's new digital payment service. Though other tech companies (cough, Google, cough) have tried to replace the wallet, they've failed to gain any significant traction in the marketplace.

Apple's entrance into the payments space - which Cook playfully dismissed as "huge business" (there are $12 billion in transactions a day in the US) - is different in a couple ways. 1., it's Apple. The company has tremendous brand equity and an army of eager early adopters. 2., Apple has high frequency merchant partners, like McDonald's, Walgreens, Groupon, and more, that will help re-train people's purchasing habits.”

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JPMorgan is poaching talent from Silicon Valley

From Quartz

‘If you can’t beat them, hire them. That’s the strategy of JPMorgan’s Jamie Dimon.

The chief executive of America’s biggest bank by assets has started plucking talent from Silicon Valley in an effort to beef up the its digital presence in everything from apps to mobile payments.

This new crop of JPMorgan execs comes with résumés touting senior positions at tech hubs such as Google and Yahoo, or computer science degrees, rather than traditional banking credentials. And they’re climbing aboard at the sprawling consumer bank as traditional financial institutions face their stiffest competition yet from the likes of digital payment systems, including Jack Dorsey‘s Square and Google Wallet.’

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