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Binance Commences Trading For XRP And ETC Coin-Margined Perpetual Contracts

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Malta-based exchange of crypto-currency, Binance was launched in 2017 only three years ago. Despite a little late entering the crypto market, the exchange was quick enough to establish its position in the crypto-verse. Binance is currently the largest cryptocurrency exchange in the world. The exchange never fails to roll out new updates for its users and the platform. Despite being subject to several scandals, Binance continued to retain its position on the top. Earlier today, the exchange launched coin-margined perpetual contracts for two popular coins.

XRP And ETC Join The List

At 7:00 AM [UTC], Binance commenced trading services for coin-margined perpetual contracts for the coins XRP and Ethereum Classic [ETC]. Users would be allowed to leverage the coins within the range of 1-75x. The aforementioned coins would be paired against the United States Dollar [USD]. Binance made the announcement via a blog post and suggested,

“The XRPUSD and ETCUSD coin-margined perpetual contracts are futures contracts that use base assets i.e. XRP and ETC as collaterals.”

The Changpeng Zhao-led exchange recently rolled out the coin-margined perpetual contracts feature along with USDT-margined futures. Back in August, CEO CZ revealed that the volume of both Coin-margined, as well as USDT-margined futures, reportedly went up to a high of $13 billion.

While XRP and ETC are the latest additions to the list, Bitcoin [BTC], Ether [ETH], Chainlink [LINK], Binance Coin [BNB], Tron [TRX], Cardano [ADA] along with Polkadot [DOT] have been part of coin-margined perpetual futures. Even though the “Order Price Cap Ratio” for every coin is 5% the leverage for Bitcoin ranges from 1x to 125x while the leverage of altcoins is limited from 1x to 75x.

The crypto community seemed to be happy with the exchange’s latest additions, however, some of them pointed out that rolling out ETC futures would be a mistake citing the series of 51% attacks the network has endured in the past month. Twitter user, @simonadams19821 said,

“Are you seriously launching etc futures with the network constantly being attacked wow talk about irresponsible @cz_binance I urge you to reconsider this.”

Additionally, the price of Ethereum Classic [ETC] seems to have taken a hit post the 51% attacks. During the time of writing, the altcoin was trading at a low of $5.07 with a 1.39% plummet in its price over the last 24-hours.

Ethereum Classic Suffers Yet Another 51% Attack; 7,000 Blocks Reorganized

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Ethereum Classic [ETC] has suffered a 51% attack for the third time in a month following which reorganization of over 7000 blocks occurred on the network which corresponded to approximately two days of mining.

A chain reorganization takes place when a party gains more hashing power than the rest of the miners in the network. The offending miner then achieves the ability to rewrite the chain’s history and also “double-spend” the blockchain’s native token. The double spends made in the latest attack is not known yet.

A leading organization behind the Ethereum Classic network, ETC Labs called the entire fiasco “suspicious” as it occurred a day after the core-dev meeting.

The 51% attack was first spotted by the mining pool Ethermine’s parent entity Bitfly which revealed that all the lost blocks will be removed from the immature balance and that the platform will check all payouts for dropped transactions.

Ethereum Classic official Twitter handle also responded and tweeted,

“While ETC is still making progress in evaluating proposed solutions, we are aware of the current risk to the network at these low hash rate levels. To miners, exchanges, and other service providers we suggest keeping confirmation requirements levels well above 7K for now.”

Following the attack, Ethereum Classic’s hash rate which was declined significantly over the past couple of months was down by 4.77% in the last 24 hours. At 3.78 Th/s, the hash rate was still hovering close to its three-year low.

ETC Cooperative, which happens to be another prominent foundation supporting ETC network’s development also addressed the recent turn of events and tweeted,

“We are aware of today’s attack and are working with others to test and evaluate proposed solutions as quickly as possible. As ETC makes progress in areas, it still makes up just ~3% of ETH’s hash rate. We kindly ask that miners, exchanges, and others raise confirmations to >12K.”

The network suffered its first 51% attack of the year between July 29 and August 1, when 3,693 blocks were reorganized. Less than a week later 4,000 blocks were reorganized after the network was hit by the second attack. During this time, the adversary was able to double-spend 807,260 ETC [nearly $5.6 million, at that time] after spending 17.5 BTC [around $200,000] to acquire the hash power for the attack.

In light of these events, cryptocurrency exchange, OKEx had revealed that it was considering the removal of the asset.

The series of attacks pertaining to the network insecurity has pushed ETC’s price further down the bearish region as it was down by nearly 50% since February this year. Notably, ETC had suffered a similar attack in 2019.

Bitquery: Ethereum Classic 51% Attack More Than Just a Technical Glitch

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A new study has revealed that the latest Ethereum classic attack was more than just a malfunction, that authorized a double spend that resulted in the loss of millions. The Ethereum classic 51 percent attack netted the hacker crypto worth $5 million. The majority of the people initially presumed it was just an innocent slip; however, blockchain data analysis firm Bitquery has discovered the method used by the hacker to steal ETC.

On August 5, the blockchain analysis firm published an analysis breaking down every step the attacker did to carry out a 51 percent attack on Ethereum during the weekend. The steps highlighted indicate prudent planning and deep understanding of the Ethereum classic blockchain structure, in such a way that the hack was completed without instantly notifying blockchain securities until it was uncovered a few days too late.

How the Ethereum classic blockchain was compromised

The attacker transferred Ethereum classic from the exchange platform to his crypto wallet, then back to the exchange via the original ETC blockchain. Subsequently, the hacker used more than 51 percent of the accessible hash power to mine thousands of ETC blocks. Notably, some of the hacker-mined blocks contained transactions that sent ETC to different addresses that he owns rather than to an exchange.

In the end, the hacker broadcast his vicious blocks, which led to the restructuring of the blockchain framework, replacing the genuine blocks with those owned by the attacker. The attacker is said to have spent about 12 hours transferring Ethereum classic to exchanges for sale or converting it to alternative currencies.

51 percent attacks on a blockchain can be tragic

After the malicious blocks were identified, the digital ledger showed that the transactions that were being made to the exchange from wallets did not occur. Instead, the ETC remained with the hacker, suggesting how dangerous 51 percent attacks can be to a blockchain infrastructure that is meant to be unalterable. The study by Bitquery suggests the hacker spent under $200,000 to commit the damage, utilizing hashpower provided by daggerhashimoto.

It is not yet verified whether the attacker was aware of the situation or whether a stroke of luck hit him. In conclusion, 51 percent attacks are a worrying indication in the crypto industry. However, the public nature of blockchain and the rigorous detective work by blockchain watchers may provide us with expectations that such incidents will seldom go unidentified.

Ethereum, Litecoin Price Analysis: Altcoins Try to Surge as Bear Still Looms Large

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The beginning of the new week kick-started a price surge in the cryptocurrency market, as several major coins witnessed a slight uptick in their value. This move further prompted investors and holders to presume that the bear market could soon be turning a corner.

The two cryptocurrencies that have had an impact on the market recently were Litecoin and Ethereum Classic. Being Silver to Bitcoin’s Gold has certainly raised Litecoin ‘s status in the crypto realm with Ethereum Classic still aiming to reach the top 20 club.

Litecoin

At press time, Litecoin was trading for $42.2 with a total market cap of $2,74 billion. A 1.82 percent price increase over the previous 24-hours had taken the daily market volume to $1.334 billion. The Charlie Lee founded cryptocurrency was in the 7th place on the cryp[to charts with Bitcoin Cash and Bitcoin SV ahead of it.

Litecoin

Technical analysis of Litecoin showed that the cryptocurrency was still in the midst of an increasingly positive investor sentiment atmosphere. The Relative Strength Index was near the overbought zone, which meant that more people were selling LTC than buying it. The Chaikin Money Flow for LTC was, however, positive. At the moment, the CMF was above the zero line because the capital coming into the LTC market was more than the capital leaving the market.

Ethereum Classic

Ethereum Classic has had a tumultuous period over the past few months with the value constantly changing. Since January, ETC has not witnessed any significant change but that did not mean that its supporters had given up. At the time of writing, ETC held a value of $5.75 with a market cap of $668.816. Over the past 24-hours, the altcoin saw a 2.4 percent increase in its price which was a better hike than the ones enjoyed by its counterparts.

Eheruem Classic

The Ethereum hard fork was behind altcoins such as Neo and VeChain with a slight market cap difference. The Chaikin Money Flow indicator for ETC was right on the zero line. This was a sign that the capital coming into the ETC market was almost equivalent to that of the capital leaving the ETC market. The Relative Strength Index for ETC showed a similar pattern to that of Litecoin’s as the graph was again near the overbought zone.

A closer look revealed that the RSI was climbing up ever so slightly but it would still take some time to draw more people into the ETC ecosystem to buy more of the tokens. An increased buying pressure would help keep the ETC blockchain buoyant.

Is Ethereum, Cardano and Ethereum Classic leading the “Altcoins Season”?

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In the first few months of 2020, as the collective crypto industry witnessed a boom, a strong narrative gained traction in the “Altcoins Season.” With Ethereum leading its march from the front, an unexpected collapse as a result of COVID-19 ‘s impact on the traditional market spilled cold water on the argument.

However, as observed in May, after Bitcoin’s halving momentum came to an end, other altcoins started to pick up the pace and attracted a considerable amount of attention.

Now, according to Coinmetrics’ recent state of the network report, it was indicated that another “Altcoins Season” could be on the cards.

Per the report, a radical shift has started towards the end of April. From April to May, there was a significant change in the spot-volume markets of major exchanges such as Kraken and Coinbase. It has been noted that May has turned out to be extremely positive for retail activity as online brokers such as Robinhood, Fidelity, TD Ameritrade, etc. have all recorded a huge amount of activity.

Inspired by an old-school financial trait, investors might turn “overconfident” on the market and possibly try to take on more risk-on assets. As a result, the trading volume could have shifted from fiat on-ramp exchanges to those platforms that cater to a list of riskier digital assets.

Coin

From the above chart, the shift in spot trading can be observed. As pictured, major assets such as Bitcoin registered a minor dip in terms of its spot volumes as other assets such as Cardano, Ethereum Classic, THETA, and Matic facilitated an increase in the industry.

As the trading volume moved into these riskier Altcoins, the report speculated on the possibility of the beginning of an “Altcoins Season.”

Altcoins Season and its Question Marks

Now, the argument is quite constructive in the report, but a closer look is needed for assets that have improved their spot volumes.

Ethereum led the charge in the built-up, but the largest altcoin has been steadily increasing in activity due to the advancement of Ethereum 2.0.

Another increasingly active asset was Cardano, but a large part of the community believed it was due to the anticipation of Shelley Testnet.

It is therefore conceivable that the “Altcoins Season” is yet to arrive and it is imperative that the performance of another month be taken into account before filing those bags with the top altcoins.

ETC Labs Teams Up With Chainlink With Oracle Technology Usage In Sight

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Ethereum Classic was one of the ventures on cryptocurrency that had fallen into the background during 2019. ETC seems to have decided to go up the ante as developments continue to pour into 2020.

Etherum Classic Labs has recently announced that it is partnering with ChainLink to use its oracle technology. This has been done to make ETC much more compatible with that of Ethereum, its parent blockchain.

In a blog post, Ethereum Classic listed out the reasons why the organization decided to bring decentralized oracles to its fold. One of the main reasons for this was to create a bridge between Ethereum Classic and other blockchains outside its systems. This was due to the fact that Ethereum Classic and Ethereum do not natively interact with off-chain services.

Chainlink’s oracle technology is the bridge that Ethereum Classic referred to. Oracles enable off-chain connectivity for smart contracts by reformatting the original external connection points. Through this method, oracles will be able to send and receive data between two different software applications. According to Chainlink:

“Chainlink can give smart contracts access to data providers, web APIs, enterprise systems, cloud providers, IoT devices, payment systems, and other blockchains. Importantly, Chainlink is a proven decentralized oracle network, which allows Ethereum Classic smart contracts to interact with off-chain resources with the same security guarantees as the underlying blockchain.”

Security is considered to be of paramount importance because if a decentralized smart contract is triggered by a centralized oracle, it could cause havoc on the network. Chainlink has assured users that it will bring both decentralization to the data source and the overall data retrieval process. Chainlink has always prided itself on being very close to the developers, and that’s what they did at this turn.

Developers will also be given the option to decentralize the data retrieval mechanism. This will be done by commanding multiple Chainlink oracles to retrieve the same data point. The extended functionality provided by the company is expected to bring in more people to the Ethereum Classic blockchain.

One of the main applications of oracle technology is the provision of DeFi on the fledging Ethereum Classic network. DeFi projects can fully utilize the power of aggregated data that can then be stored and studied at a later date. Analysts and developers both hope that companies will soon be launching more products to increase adoption across tokens.

Ethereum Classic [ETC] Cannot be Mined with Antminer E3 anymore!

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On 24th February, 2Miner the popular Altcoin mining pool announced that Ethereum Classic mining had a sudden drop of hashrate with Antminer E3 [ETC mining hardware] for which complaints from multiple people were registered.

Antminer E3 was released in the summer of 2018 and the product is by Bitmain, the mining giant. It’s the world’s first Ethash ASIC miner and the profitability of an Antminer E3 is higher than the profitability of an ordinary GPU mining rig. Some details of the product are as follows:

Announced hashrate: 180 MH/s
Actual hashrate: 200 MH/s
Power consumption: 800 W
Retail price: $1,800 ($800 for the very first batch)

From 21st February, 2Miner has been receiving complaints. Miners reported that hashrate had dropped significantly. The miners said that the Antminer E3 was mining Ethereum Classic [ETC] at 30 MHZ from the past 3 hours while the factory declared hashrate of Antminer E3 is 180 MH/s and the reported hashrate is even more.

In the official statement, they mentioned receiving “a lot of requests last week on Telegram Support Chat and 2Miners Helpdesk” about the inconvenience, everyone was experiencing to mine ETC. “We have investigated this issue and the conclusions are disappointing.” said the team.

The problem.

To mine an Ethash algorithm every GPU needs to download a heavy file called DAG [Directed Acyclic Graph] at the beginning of the mining process. The DAG [Every 30 000 blocks, a new piece of data (a DAG) is used for mining new blocks] grows more in every round of Epoch.[ Each new group of 30 000 blocks is known as an epoch]. Which is the major reason why memory matters a lot in Ethereum mining? Ethereum Classic has 328 mining epoch while Ethereum has 318. With investigation, 2Miner found out that the DAG file increment was the reason Antminer E3s had such a drop in its hashrate for ETC.

2Miner reported this issue and informed Bitmain, to which it responded saying:

“Thanks for your consultation!

Sorry for your inconvenience we got the confirm from technical department
E3 miner is a 4G video card. E3 is related to eth algorithm, and DDR capacity is up to the upper limit, so E3 will not be able to continue mining.

the meaning is E3 only can mine to January 2020, then will not mine again

Please let us know if you have additional questions or concerns.”

As per Etherscan.io the avg. ETC block time is about 13 seconds. Each epoch is 30,000 blocks. Making it approx. 45 days for ETC to reach 328 epoch. Indicating that Antminer E3 would stop mining Ethereum Classic by 8th April 2020.