Weekend Roundup: The Blockchain as EU’s ‘Weapon Against De-flation’, Robocoin Becomes ‘Android of ATMs’

1. Greece’s Varoufakis: Bitcoin Can Be Used in Eurozone ‘As Weapon Against Deflation’

Greek finance minister Yanis Varoufakis has hit back at criticism resulting from his appraisal of Bitcoin in a blog post last month, calling Bitcoin “too deflationary to work” while continuing to support its underlying technology. He writes:

“[A]lmost paradoxically, the technology of Bitcoin, if suitably adapted, can be employed profitably in the Eurozone as a weapon against deflation.”

2. Robocoin Relaunches to Become ‘Android of ATMs’

BTM developer Robocoin has unveiled its hotly rumored new direction in the form of a software development kit (SDK), which will allow any ATM to function as a Bitcoin ATM (BTM).

CTO John Russell added:

“It's analogous to Android's ability to bring software and a user ecosystem in a device-agnostic manner.”

3.  50,000 of Ulbricht’s Bitcoins up for Auction by US Govt

The US is set to sell off 50,000 bitcoins previously owned by jailed Silk Road founder Ross Ulbricht in a sealed auction.

“Registration has already commenced for bidding on the coins, which were seized in October 2013 during a raid on Ulbricht’s computer equipment, and will run until March 2. The auction is made up of two series, 10 blocks of 20,000BTC and 10 blocks of 30,000BTC respectively.”

Additionally, Andrew Auernheimer, the alleged hacker who made the news last year after billing the US government for 28,296 bitcoins, has surfaced to claim ownership of the Silk Road lot.

4.  Scam Exposed: Crypto Media Outlets Targeted by Fraud Ring

Cointelegraph has uncovered a profit sharing scheme where self-proclaimed “hackers” lure unsuspecting clients to sell their coins after reading promotional articles purportedly posted on crypto media outlets such as NewsBTC and CryptoCoinsNews.

“Apparently, the scheme operates by paying out customers for their coins (from hacked PayPal accounts) above market price for small amounts at first. Then, after the customer sees that these transactions are successful, they will sell larger bitcoin amounts, after which the payments will no longer go through and the customer is left with no bitcoins and no money.”

The list of the fraudulent websites includes:

btcgoi.com btclowen.com mywalletbtc.com sellbtcinstant.com

It is suspected that as a result of the exposure, Cointelegraph has been the target of malicious DDoS attacks throughout the week and has experienced intermittent down times. You can read more here.

5.  Reuters $600 Breakeven for Miners Claim is Wrong

According to Independent economic researcher and an MBA from Oxford, Hass McCook, Reuters used his figure, which was from June, when the bitcoin price was in the 600’s and did not take into account the current economics and price of bitcoin.

When demand decreases, the price plummets as most miners will turn off and only the best and most efficient ones will stay on. According to McCook, this is very similar to the oil industry:

“If the price drops to US$10 big mining will stop mining to bring their cost back up to breakeven based on equilibrium in supply and demand. This is no different from what you are seeing in oil. The Saudis can still afford to drill at cheaper oil because their cost structure is lower while others drop off.”

Elsewhere

‘Super Size Me' Director, Morgan Spurlock, lives on Bitcoin in New CNN Special. You can watch the full episode on YouTube here. The documentary seems to have inspired some people to buy bitcoins. Merchant adoption appears to be gaining steam as PC seller Dell announces that it will accept cryptocurrency payments from the UK and Canada, according to the Telegraph. An election to fill two member seats at the Bitcoin Foundation ended without a clear winner, voting results show. Participants in the run-off election will include Olivier Janssens, Jim Harper, Bruce Fenton, and Michael Perklin, reports CoinDesk.

Market activity

Bitcoin’s prices against the dollar remained almost unchanged compared to the end of last week hovering at around US$245 mark. It seems the news of recent exchange hacks such as those of BTER and Cavirtex along with the expected US Marshal’s sale of the 50,000 bitcoins had little effect on the BTC price.

USD exchange trade volume cooled off this week and is testing the monthly low for February. Transaction numbers remained just below last week’s record high of around 107,000 but nevertheless remained strong at around the 104,000 high for the week, which occurred on Thursday.

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