For one week, the Iran–United States military crisis gripped the crypto community. It began on Jan. 3 with a U.S. drone strike on a convoy traveling near Baghdad International Airport, killing Iranian major general Qasem Soleimani of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. The price of Bitcoin (BTC) soared. As reported by Cointelegraph at the time, there is strong evidence to suggest that BTC’s price surge from $7,000 to nearly $8,500 is strongly linked to the tensions between the two nations. For example, the push toward $8,500 took place at the same time as mainstream media began to report on a …

Earlier this week, the world’s flagship crypto asset saw its value surge from around the $8,000 mark to just over $8,430 within an hour’s time. This latest price action came after the Iranian government decided to launch a missile attack on an Iraqi military base housing American troops. However, it bears mentioning that Iran’s actions were prompted by United States President Donald Trump’s decision to eliminate Iranian general Qassem Soleimani — a controversial figure in the West but loved by the masses in his home country. The overall value of Bitcoin (BTC) is now up by around 15% this year, …

United States-based cryptocurrency brokerage BitOoda has secured $7 million funding from major investors including former senior investment exec at JPMorgan. Founded in 2017, BitOoda positions itself as a digital asset financial services platform that combines digital finance and applied science. Investors are former execs from British Petroleum, JPMorgan and S&P Global Platts According to an official announcement on Dec. 23, BitOoda’s new seed round featured founder of international energy analytics firm PIRA Energy Gary Ross, who is also a former head of global oil analytics and chief energy economist at S&P Global Platts. Other investors included Roy Salame, former managing …

A group of 10 major global oil and gas firms including heavy-hitters like Chevron and Shell has successfully digitized industry balloting using blockchain. The Oil & Gas Blockchain Consortium (OOC) successfully piloted a blockchain-based system for Authorization for Expenditure (AFE) balloting in partnership with Canadian technology provider GuildOne. According to an announcement on Dec. 18, the AFE balloting proof-of-concept (PoC) is the first initiative of its kind and intends to allow participants to send ballots and make elections digitally using blockchain technology. Digitizing conventional paper-based processes As noted in the report, AFEs are used in the oil and gas industry …

Venezuela plans to back its national oil-pegged cryptocurrency, the Petro (PTR), with 30 million barrels of crude oil. Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro announced that the oil inventories are sitting in the country’s storage tanks and are ready for immediate commercialization to serve as a “liquid, physical, material backing” for the Petro. The president announced the news on Nov. 20 on state television, according to a Reuters report. In the announcement, Maduro called the Petro a “sovereign Venezuelan crypto asset.” Venezuela initially planned to back the Petro with 5 billion barrels of oil While Maduro has not provided any details on …

Ripple Labs, the administrator of blockchain payments network Ripple, has come under criticism for allegedly misleading representations that it “discovered” — rather than created — the XRP token. In a series of heated tweets on Oct. 9, Coinmetrics.io co-founder and Castle Island Ventures partner Nic Carter took the company to task for ostensibly attempting to obfuscate the nature of its relationship to XRP: “For the record, these psychopaths are still literally and without a shred of irony claiming that they ‘discovered’ XRP as opposed to having created it.” “Akin to Chevron’s relationship to oil” Carter’s aforementioned tweet links to an …

Australian startup Incent plans to offer a 20% payback in its INCNT token on fuel purchases at United Petrol stations for a limited time. Incent announced in a press release published on Sept. 26 that participants will have to sign up on its platform and sync their bank accounts in order to receive the tokens. The firm also claims that the crypto asset in question is “Australia's first cryptocurrency for all purchases at United Petrol stations.” A substitute for point-based loyalty programs United Petrol reportedly owns over 450 stations across Australia. Per the press release, the system’s advantage over classical …

A consortium of oil companies including Exxon Mobil, Chevron and Royal Dutch Shell looks to blockchain to manage water used in oil extraction in North Dakota’s Bakken oil fields. Oil and water As Reuters reported on Sept. 10, the Offshore Operators Committee (OOC) Oil & Gas Blockchain Consortium has awarded a contract to blockchain startup Data Gumbo to pilot water handling technology in North Dakota’s oil fields. Per the report, Data Gumbo will use blockchain to automate payments and deploy their GumboNet platform to manage and synchronize wastewater data. One member of the consortium, Norway’s state-owned Equinor, expects to save …

A subsidiary of Chinese oil and chemical giant Sinochem Group is reportedly in discussions regarding a blockchain platform with Royal Dutch Shell and Australian financial services firm Macquarie Group. As Reuters reported on Sept. 5, sources familiar with the matter said that Sinochem Energy Technology entered into negotiations with the two companies to examine the development of a blockchain platform for crude oil in July. $14 million blockchain platform The planned blockchain-based platform is reportedly dubbed Gateway, with a value of 100 million yuan (~$14 million). Sources also revealed that Shell and Macquarie decided to invest in Sinochem Energy Technology …

Austin-based Antelope Water Management has announced that it is going to start using a blockchain platform developed by Data Gumbo. The announcement appeared in a press release on Aug. 15. Antelope Water Management is a company that develops sustainability-focused water services for oil and gas extractions, while Data Gumbo provides blockchain services for the oil and gas industry. According to the release, Data Gumbo’s blockchain network, GumboNet, will provide Antelope’s customers and vendors with data transparency, automatic contract executions and payments. Antelope CEO Dustin Brownlow remarked: “Data Gumbo is a game changer enabling us to provide customers, vendors and regulators …

London-based bank and financial services firm Standard Chartered has completed its first cross-border blockchain letter of credit transaction in the oil industry with Thai state-owned oil giant PTT Group. On-chain letter of credit Standard Chartered announced that it has successfully executed a pilot letter of credit (LC) transaction for PTT Group, PTT International Trading Pte Ltd and IRPC Public Company Limited over the Voltron blockchain platform in a press release published on its website on Aug. 7. Per the release, oil companies are often reliant on letters of credit as a form of short-term trade finance because of the significant …

Global oil operators can save at least 30% by using blockchain in their infrastructure, according to data by blockchain startup Data Gumbo. Andrew Bruce, CEO of American blockchain startup Data Gumbo, discussed blockchain-powered automated contract execution in the oil industry on Bloomberg Commodities Edge on July 19. When asked how much oil industry players can save by implementing blockchain applications such as blockchain-based contract execution instead of traditional paper contracts, Bruce argued that such solutions could save at least 30%, referring to internal studies by the company. According to Data Gumbo’s data, oil and gas market accounted for $2.6 trillion …