Cardano’s ADA cryptocurrency surged on Sunday, bringing the smart contract platform back into elite territory in terms of market capitalization rankings. ADA charted 14% growth to reach $1.83 on major exchanges, marking a new all-time high. It was last seen hovering just below $1.80, having gained 14% on the day, 31% on the week and over 47% in the past month. At current values, Cardano has a market cap of $57.8 billion, flipping Tether (USDT) for sixth spot on the market leaderboard, according to Coingecko. Cardano's market ranking could be seen as high as fifth on CoinMarketCap. ADA was also …

After rallying 1.510% in 2021, QTUM price hit a $35.70 all-time high on May 7. This relatively obscure altcoin launched in September 2017 is a fork of the Bitcoin Core 0.13 version, but it also integrates the Ethereum virtual machine (EVM) and smart contract execution capability. Following Bitcoin's (BTC) April 23 crash down to $47,500, QTUM faced a 52% correction in 4 days before bottoming at $10. However, the situation for the altcoin improved on May 5 as QTUM initiated a 160% rally in two days, reaching the $35.70 peak. Qtum combines Bitcoin's transaction model with Ethereum smart contracts The …

An oracle system has launched on Binance Smart Chain — enabling developers to create DApps and decentralized autonomous organizations that are fueled by real-world data. Bridge Oracle, which first made its debut on Tron, says the expansion of its easy-to-use infrastructure is a significant milestone. Now, a diverse range of data sources can be integrated into smart contracts — boosting their utility immeasurably. Data can be fetched using HTTP and HTTPS requests, or through the computational knowledge of WolframAlpha. Oracles can be used to generate random numbers, and this infrastructure also paves the way for enterprises to integrate blockchain technology …

An Australian senate committee has published a report calling for a blockchain-based national land registry, better clarity over laws relating to smart contracts, and continued efforts to establish international standards for distributed ledger technology. The Select Committee on Australia as a Technology and Financial Centre’s second interim report offers 23 recommendations spanning blockchain, consumer data and corporate taxation. Five recommendations deal specifically with blockchain and digital assets, including that the Council of Financial Regulators Cyber Working Group takes into account international data standards. The committee recommended National Cabinet consider supporting a blockchain-powered national land registry as a pilot project for …

A startup in a blockchain ecosystem says it eliminates the conflicts of interest that are often seen on fiat platforms. Value Network enables users to create binary options markets based on their very own parameters, including asset pair, price level and time of expiration. This peer-to-peer approach means they don’t have to bet against centralized brokers, some of whom have been linked to scams and fraud in a largely unregulated space. Binary options expire at a set date in the future — with a yes or no outcome. A successful bet means users win the funds of those who had …

A British government-sanctioned task force has proposed a dispute resolution framework that would keep cryptocurrency and smart contract disagreements out of the courts. A 14-page report published by LawTechUK’s UK Jurisdiction Taskforce puts forward new “Digital Dispute Resolution Rules” that aim to provide a standardized means of dealing with smart contract disputes. Under the remit of the new rules, crypto-based disputes could be resolved without any major intervention by the courts. The laws would allow for the appointment of an independent tribunal to adjudicate on matters of dispute, and any decision reached by the tribunal would be legally binding. The …

Digital Asset, the creator of the Daml smart contract programming language, has secured $120 million in Series D financing from investors 7Ridge and Eldridge, setting the stage for continued expansion of the blockchain and data infrastructure company. The impressive funding round follows a year of significant growth for Digital Asset. The company tripled its customer base in 2020, with 50% of new business coming from non-blockchain domains, according to Emnet Rios, Digital Asset’s chief financial and operating officer. He explained: “We saw significant demand for Daml to solve internal challenges of data silos within an organization. As a result, we …

Decentralized lending protocol Cream Finance is backing another major effort to improve the security of decentralized finance. On Tuesday, Cream Finance announced a new security campaign in collaboration with several DeFi platforms like Immunefi, Armor and DeFiSafety to bring stronger security to its protocol and the wider DeFi ecosystem. As part of the campaign, Cream Finance is launching a $1.5 million bug bounty program with blockchain bounty platform Immunefi to strengthen Cream’s protocol, API and website security. The new bug bounty will focus on Cream Finance’s smart contracts and the prevention of potential exploits against user funds, assets and data …

Payments app Square made headlines — and dollars — when it integrated Bitcoin trading into its mobile platform back during the crypto bull market of winter 2017. Now, rival payments firm Venmo, owned by PayPal, is following suit by launching cryptocurrency trading for four major coins: Bitcoin (BTC), Ether (ETH), Litecoin (LTC) and Bitcoin Cash (BCH). Beginning on Tuesday and set to be widely available within the new few weeks, Venmo’s 70 million+ customers will be able to buy, hold and sell crypto directly within the Venmo app. The launch is offering users access to in-app guides to help them …

There has been a lot of talk about the recent “hacks” in the decentralized finance realm, particularly in the cases of Harvest FInance and Pickle Finance. That talk is more than necessary, considering hackers stole more than $100 million from DeFi projects in 2020, accounting for 50% of all hacks this year, according to a CipherTrace report. Related: Roundup of crypto hacks, exploits and heists in 2020 Some point out that the occurrences were merely exploits that shined a light on the vulnerabilities of the respective smart contracts. The thieves didn’t really break into anything, they just happened to casually …

For several years, one of the biggest hurdles to blockchain adoption has concerned the fact that it’s a rather technical space. Experienced developers find it daunting to build decentralized apps using this technology. Meanwhile, consumers unaccustomed to tokens and crypto wallets often struggle with user interfaces that are far clunkier than what mainstream platforms provide. With cryptocurrencies punching into the mainstream consciousness like never before, it has never been more important for blockchain platforms to seize the moment and offer the streamlined, easy-to-understand products and services that the masses can embrace with minimal hassle. As the old saying goes: “If …

Chainlink unveiled its new white paper on Thursday, which details a planned expansion and pivot into creating oracle networks for computation. The proposal would see Chainlink generalize its oracle network into a “meta layer” of Decentralized Oracle Networks. The new architecture supports a larger selection of use cases, expanding its suite of services to off-chain computation of data. In Chainlink’s vision, these computational oracles would create a class of “hybrid smart contracts” where part of the logic could be offloaded to the oracles. The new oracle networks would continue to focus on functions that blockchains or even layer-two networks are …