On New Year’s Day, the U.S.-based crypto exchange Bittrex announced via Twitter that it was delisting three leading privacy coins: Monero (XMR), Zcash (ZEC) and Dash. A link promised further details, but those who followed it learned nothing to explain why trades in those tokens would end on Jan. 15. Still, the news couldn’t have been entirely surprising. Regulators, both in the United States and abroad, have been casting a gimlet eye at privacy coins these days. Unlike Bitcoin (BTC) and Ether (ETH), the coins promise enhanced anonymity by hiding users’ addresses and transaction amounts, which make transactions more difficult …

A recent tweet from Dash’s official Twitter account has invited criticism that the cryptocurrency, which once advertised its privacy features, is wilting in the face of possible regulatory scrutiny. On Jan. 1, the US-based Bittrex exchange announced in a tweet that it would be delisting Monero, Zcash, and Dash: #Bittrex Customers: The $XMR, $ZEC, and $DASH markets will be removed on Friday, January 15th at 23:00 UTC. Details: https://t.co/8qAdjuwryJ — Bittrex (@BittrexExchange) January 1, 2021 The delistings follow a similar Dec. 29 announcement last week that Bittrex would be delisting XRP following a SEC lawsuit against Ripple, prompting speculation that …

Dash has moved development work on the v0.17 update of its platform to the testnet phase, according to an announcement released on Wednesday. Back in July 2020, Cointelegraph reported that the Dash Core Group was looking to release the platform testnet before the end of the year. As part of the announcement, Dash revealed that the testnet environment is five times larger than Evonet, which is almost exclusively owned by the Dash Core Group. According to Dana Alibrandi, head of product at Dash: “This is the biggest deployment of Dash Platform, and consequently, this release marks the most significant milestone …

Bitcoin (BTC) has topped $19,000 in a fresh bullish surge, but traders are all about altcoins on Nov. 24. In what many are heralding as the beginning of “alt season,” large-cap cryptocurrencies are seeing their biggest gains in three years. XRP, XLM lead new “alt season” Cointelegraph takes a look at five of the biggest movers, all of which have returned to at least a $1 billion market cap. XRP Ripple’s XRP token is gaining traction on social media after a curious lull, thanks to its weekly gains that have topped 110%. At press time, XRP/USD traded at $0.62, having …

Bitcoin (BTC) has made a stellar comeback from its March lows in 2020 and this performance is getting noticed by institutional investors. Recently Rick Rieder, BlackRock’s CIO of fixed income, said that Bitcoin could replace gold as it is “more functional than passing a bar of gold around.” Comments like these are a positive sign as they demonstrate that the narrative of Bitcoin being increasingly viewed as digital gold even among traditional investors has been gaining wider acceptance. A new report by crypto investment firm Pantera Capital attributes the recent uptick in Bitcoin’s price to PayPal’s new crypto service. According …

It shouldn’t come as a surprise that regulators are starting to pay close attention to cryptocurrencies this year. For instance, as the price of Bitcoin (BTC) continues to soar, it’s predicted that regulators will start taking direct action – possibly even banning Bitcoin completely. While the ban may sound extreme, regulators have recently honed in on the use of privacy coins like Monero (XMR), Zcash (ZEC) and Dash. For example, in September this year, the United States Internal Revenue Service offered a bounty of up to $625,000 for intelligence firms that could break the untraceable privacy coin Monero. Moreover, on …

Cryptocurrency exchange ShapeShift recently delisted three privacy coins: Dash, Zcash (ZEC) and Monero (XMR). This was an unexpected move to say the least, given the exchange’s historic commitment to privacy. As a noncustodial platform, Shapeshift did not impose user identification requirements on traders in its early days, although this began to change with the gradual introduction of a mandatory membership model, compliant with Know Your Customer rules, as of 2018. Why then, did it move to delist Dash, Zcash and Monero, even as other exchanges such as Coinbase, Kraken and Binance.US still list these coins? In a statement shared with …

Dash holders will soon be able to access a wide range of decentralized finance, or DeFi, services through a collaboration with StakeHound. According to an announcement on Monday, tokens that are deposited with StakeHound will also earn network rewards through the Dash masternode system. In order to take advantage of the burgeoning DeFi market, Dash holders must send tokens to StakeHound, which will then instantly generate and send back a wrapped ERC-20 representation called stakedDASH. StakedDASH will be tradable and usable in major DeFi platforms such as UniSwap, Aave, Curve and others, using the Ethereum or Radix networks. They will …

Once viewed as one of the crypto industry's top privacy-focused assets, Dash (DASH) no longer operates under that classification, according to the Dash Core Group, the body overseeing the asset and its development. When asked if Dash should remain under the category of a privacy asset, Fernando Gutierrez, CMO for the Dash Core Group, told Cointelegraph: "No, Dash is a payments cryptocurrency, with a strong focus on usability, which includes speed, cost, ease of use, and user protection through optional privacy." Dash launched as a fork of Bitcoin in 2014. Originally called XCoin, before changing its name to Darkcoin, and …

Dash Core Group, the entity responsible for developing the privacy-focused coin DASH, publicized fresh changes to the asset's proof-of-stake network on Sept. 30. "Dash Core v0.16.0.1 binaries are released and ready for deployment on mainnet by node operators," said an announcement on Medium from Pasta, one of Dash Core Group's Developers. "This is a major release and is a mandatory upgrade for all miners and masternodes." The network update improves the DASH ecosystem in a number of ways, including methods for confirming appropriate masternode holder software, wallet user interface enhancements and better anonymity capabilities when using PrivateSend — the project's …

Payments-focused cryptocurrency Dash is starting to release insights into its new platform, which enables data to be stored within the network in the form of decentralized cloud service. The forthcoming Dash Platform has been developed from longstanding ideas to evolve the cryptocurrency’s functionalities — dating back to the announcement of “Dash Evolution” back in 2015. Dash Platform will incorporate four features: a Dash Drive, a decentralized API, or DAPI, a username layer, or DPNS, and the Dash platform protocol, or DPP. Speaking to Cointelegraph, Mark Mason outlined what exactly the company means by “turning Dash into a decentralized cloud.” In …

The Dash platform will be introducing protocol versioning and other new features in its latest update. Dash announced its fourth update over the weekend. The platform normally releases new functionalities every six weeks, so the next update is expected between October 6 and 20. Dash said it is adding versions of its protocol to make it easier for developers to begin transitioning to a testnet and mainnet. Previously, developers needed to wipe data on Evonet and update their platform software with each new release. The company said: “While this approach is fine for early testing, it is not appropriate for …