San Francisco-based crypto lending and borrowing firm Dharma has announced the start of a closed beta for a new version of its platform. Upcoming changes and short-term timeline Dharma announced its new platform iteration in an official blog post on Aug. 29. According to the announcement, Dharma has partnered with the Ethereum-based money market Compound and will reportedly use its protocol as infrastructure for the new platform. Additionally, Dharma will now make its smart contracts open source prior to production, per the announcement. Dharma V2 is currently in closed beta, which means that it is only accessible to existing Dharma …

Pat Gelsinger, the CEO of major cloud computing and virtual machine company VMWare, has condemned Bitcoin (BTC) as being “bad for humanity.” Fortune spoke to Gelsinger about Bitcoin prior to VMWare’s annual conference in San Francisco on Aug. 26. According to Gelsinger, one issue with Bitcoin is its purportedly high energy consumption, which contributes to climate change. Gelsinger said: “It takes the energy of a home, half-a-home a day, to do a single entry into a Bitcoin ledger [...] It’s climate intolerant, it is so extreme, it is bad design.” Gelsinger also claimed that people primarily use Bitcoin (BTC) for …

San Francisco-based crypto lender Dharma has decided to pause new deposits and loans on its platform. Dharma announced their decision in a series of official Twitter posts on Aug. 7. Their second tweet in the series reads: “For now, we're pausing new deposits and loans in Dharma. If you have an existing deposit or loan with Dharma, you'll still be able to access your account and will have the option to withdraw any funds that are not currently locked up.” While not appearing to offer any further details, Dharma assured the public in the rest of their posts that they …

Tron founder Justin Sun broadcast a live video from San Francisco to disprove reports that he was prevented from leaving China due to a police investigation. On July 23, Sun launched a live video on Twitter to deny rumors that he was prevented from leaving China by local authorities based on charges of money laundering, gambling and spreading pornography. Additionally, Sun posted a picture with him and his “aka bodyguard” Cliff Edwards, the Tron director of communications, with the Bay Bridge in the background. Justin Sun and Cliff Edwards in San Francisco. Source: Twitter Earlier today, local Chinese media outlet …

A recent market report by Grand View Research suggests that blockchain is one of the digital technologies driving market growth in the global transportation management systems (TMS) sector, according to a press release on July 11. According to Grand View Research, a market research company based in San Francisco, the TMS market is expected to reach $198.82 billion by 2025 with a compound annual growth rate of 16.2%. A number of digital technologies are credited as driving forces for current and projected TMS market growth alongside blockchain, including аrtificial intelligence, cloud transportation management systems, the so-dubbed Internet of Things, and …

Billionaire Henry Kravis has started investing in the cryptocurrency space, according to a report by Bloomberg on June 28 Ben Forman, a former employee of Kravi’s KKR & Co, said that Kravis has invested in the flagship fund for his blockchain-focused investment firm ParaFi Capital of San Francisco. Discussing his decision to leave KKR to found ParaFi Capital, Forman said that he intends to pursue cryptocurrency investing at his new firm: “While I toyed with the idea of pursuing blockchain investing within KKR, it was clear to me that the firm did not provide the optimal format to do so. …

San Francisco-based incubator for the blockchain Ethereum Classic (ETC), ETC Labs, has announced that it will create a solution for Ethereum (ETH)/ETC interoperability in a collaboration with Metronome, in an official blog post on June 27. Per the announcement, blockchain interoperability—also referred to as “chainhopping”—is a property of a blockchain asset meaning that it can be transferred between separate blockchains. In this case, the cryptocurrency Metronome (MET) will be transferable between the ETH and ETC blockchains. The ETH and ETC blockchains initially split in the summer of 2016 after a contentious vote to return money lost when The DAO collapsed …

San Francisco-based payments company Square has just made bitcoin (BTC) deposits available on its Cash App on June 26 Cash App users will now be able to deposit bitcoins from external wallets into their app bitcoin address. According to Square’s announcement, deposits are limited to $10,000 worth of bitcoin in a seven day period. It also notes that transfers could take several hours to be confirmed on the blockchain. As noted by Coindesk, Square apparently made bitcoin deposits previously available for some users. Twitter user and self-proclaimed “Bitcoin Permabull” Dennis Parker recently claimed on June 25 that BTC deposits were …

Coinbase Custody announced immediate support for the mainnet iteration of the KIN token today, April 30, 2019. As Cointelegraph previously reported, KIN is a cryptocurrency created by Canadian organization Kik Interactive of Kik Messenger fame. The token was originally developed on the Ethereum and Stellar networks and now operates on its own blockchain (a fork of Stellar). “KIN holders can now benefit from Coinbase Custody’s industry-leading offline storage platform and insurance coverage,” they say. Coinbase Custody is a custodial service provided by San-Francisco-based platform Coinbase. Coinbase Custody was first announced on Nov. 16, 2017 and launched on July 2, 2018. …

Major global crypto exchange Coinbase reportedly saw around $520 million in revenue last year, Reuters reported on April 18. The publication calculated the sum by looking at a filing to Britain’s corporate registry last week showing Coinbase’s non-U.S. revenue equaled around 154 million euros ($173 million), noting that a Coinbase executive once stated that the non-U.S. revenue is equal to almost one third of the overall revenue Based on Reuters’ calculations of Coinbase’s 2018 revenue, the crypto exchange has generated 60% less than its stated plans. In late October 2018, Bloomberg published an article claiming that Coinbase had projected that …

An executive at electronics giant HTC is leading a new $50 million blockchain-focused venture capital fund, Proof of Capital, that includes a partnership with the firm, TechCrunch reports on April 17. The new blockchain fund is reportedly held in fiat currency and focused on “regular VC deals, as opposed to token-based investments.” The fund will reportedly mainly target early stage blockchain firms in fintech, as well as the consumer sphere of blockchain ecosystem. According to the firm’s LinkedIn profile, the San Francisco-based fund will have a particular focus on Asian markets and emerging economies. Proof of Capital fund is led …

San Francisco-based blockchain lending firm Dharma Labs has raised $7 million from big investors including Coinbase Ventures, as the company confirmed to Cointelegraph on Feb. 5. According to crypto news outlet The Block Crypto, Dharma Labs is planning to use the raised capital mostly for its Lever product, a platform providing instant margin loans for cryptocurrency traders and high-volume investors. Max Bronstein, head of the Dharma Labs marketing team, reportedly claimed that Lever represents a decentralized smart contract alternative to Genesis Global Trading. Genesis, a Bitcoin (BTC) over-the-counter (OTC) trading firm that was the first New York-based to acquire a …