None.

None.

Tier 2

MOD

 Tier 3

REQ

SUB

LINK

NANO

KNC

Tier 4

BNTY

TAU

WISH

PHR

LOCI

XBY

ELA

ECC

POE

HPB

BIX

EVE

XVG

NULS

DNA

NAVCoin

NAVcoin ($NAV) is a Privacy coin with upcoming Platform features. NAVcoin has been around for 3 years. It is not minable, instead being based on a Proof of Stake system in which stakers earn 5% annual returns. Theoretically this means there could be 5% inflation on the supply, however, that would require every coin holder to stake, so likely there will be very marginal inflation between 1 and 3% year over year. It is a currency originally based off of Bitcoin version 0.13, which should tell you it’s got a good foundation from which to build its feature set. Being based off Bitcoin, it currently is a method of transaction, with notable upgrades in the form of Segwit (with possible lightning network integration in the future) and 30 transaction times with extremely marginal fees. That’s great but a lot of coins have that going for them, so thankfully we’re just getting started with the real interesting pieces of NAV. The first and currently only implemented feature, NavTech is a unique dual blockchain technology. Essentially, NAV runs on these two blockchains in order to completely disconnect the sending wallet (your wallet), to the receiving wallet (where the money is getting sent). Think of it like a VPN, NavTech completely strips the sender’s details so the transaction is completely anonymous. The anonymous transaction space has really gotten big lately, with Monero’s recent price action and Ethereum’s implementation of ZKSnarks being two big examples that come to mind.Moving on to the roadmap, there are two big upcoming features for NAV:

• The first is Polymorph, which is a really cool blend of Nav’s anonymous transactions and Changeally’s instant exchange. What this means is that, for example, I wanted to pay someone in Bitcoin but I wanted to do it anonymously. Polymorph would take my bitcoin, turn it into navcoin in order to be processed and sent anonymously using the Navtech dual blockchain, then turned back into bitcoin at the to be sent to the receiving wallet. This will certainly set NAV apart, as it guarantees anonymous transaction for all of the coins on changeally. This is huge for exposure, and a great opportunity for NAVcoin to gain trust, which is absolutely critical anonymous transaction coins.  
• The second big upcoming feature is ADApps, or Anonymized Decentralized Apps. This is also a huge potential win for Nav as there is already a huge amount of interest in the crypto space surrounding Dapps, such as Ethereum and Omni. Adding in the anonymous layer would attract projects that would value the anonymity. Nav is still in the planning stages for this project so it could still be awhile before it comes to fruition, but we should see the whitepaper for it soon, and if they could be first to market with ADapps that could prove to be a killer feature for them as it would give them first access to the interested demographics.

Ripple

Ripple ($XRP) is a real-time Payment protocol for anything of value. It’s a shared public database, with a built-in distributed currency exchange, that operates as the worlds first universal translator for money. Ripple is currency agnostic and has a foreign exchange component built right into the protocol. Ripple acts as a pathfinding algorithm to find the best route for a dollar to become a euro or airline miles to become Bitcoin. It will look at all the orders in the global order book. The case for XRP comes down to the following: 1) Payment systems work best with bridge assets to focus liquidity. 2) There are good reasons to expect a cryptocurrency to be the most popular bridge asset. 3) There are good reasons to expect that cryptocurrency to be XRP.

• Open, decentralized payments will have lots and lots of assets, including national currencies of all kinds and cryptos. A significant fraction of payments will be among assets that aren’t the most popular. Using intermediary assets to settle those payments concentrates liquidity and reduces spreads.
• National currencies are always tied to jurisdictions and can’t be universal. Systems built around them will never be as open and inclusive as systems that aren’t.
• XRP settles faster than any other major crypto. It higher transaction rates than other major cryptos. It is beat by others only by the amount of liquidity available today. And, most importantly, XRP has a company that is devoted to making sure XRP succeeds for this specific use case.

ICON

Simply put, ICON ($ICX) is a massive scale blockchain Platform that allows

• Decentralized Application (DAPPS) – Build DAPPS on ICON Platform like on Ethereum and NEO. Yes, soon, you will see ICOs happening on ICON platform for different DAPPS
• Interchain (Interoperability with Blockchains) – Allows different blockchains connecting to one another through their protocol. ICON is fully compatible with traditional blockchains like Bitcoin and Ethereum and in future can bridge other public blockchains such as Qtum, NEO and many others to achieve their mission statement – “Hyperconnect the world”
• Artificial Intelligence (AI) – Use of AI to ensure all nodes contributing to ICON Republic/platform are rewarded fairly and not to have certain powers over distribution policies. AI will continue to learn a variety of variables to determine optimal distribution policies and achieve complete decentralization.
• Decentralized Exchange (DEX) – ICON will integrate different DEX protocols on their platform to facilitate exchange of ICX and other future ICON platform currencies. Bancor protocol will be their first DEX protocol when mainent launches this month end and Kyber and others will follow. Not just throwing Kyber’s name out there, it was confirmed they are working with each other, official partnership yet to be announced.

Tuesday 5/15

Norway-based registrar organization DNV GL has invested in blockchain startup VeChain.

VeChain CEO Sunny Lu told CoinDesk that the companies would continue their partnership.

“We are able to provide with VeChain a solution that balances safety and [speed],” Luca Crisciotti, chief executive of DNV, explained, adding:

“Our mission is the ability to make sure that product is reaching the shelves, that it’s ultimately reaching the consumer … What we are providing to our customers is commitment.”

Meanwhile, ICON also had a large partnership announcement today.

“Unchain will create a blockchain ecosystem fueled by a token economy, where the users are rewarded for their contributions to the network. DApp services discovered through ICON and Unblock, a subsidiary of LINE dedicated to blockchain research and to accelerate DApp projects, will be integrated with Unchain. This joint venture takes blockchain and decentralization another step closer to being a part of our everyday lives.”

We found the following video to be a great summary of where we are with Blockchain today:

Monday 5/14

The Ontology Foundation and the NEO Foundation signed a memorandum of understanding on May 14th, 2018, concerning strategy and technology integration:

Whereas: Ontology is a distributed trust network that focuses on digital identity, data exchange and other trust collaboration scenarios. NEO is dedicated to realizing a distributed network that serves the smart economy. Both Ontology and NEO share a common technical understanding and vision, and both wish to promote blockchain technology and its applications.

Purpose: Ontology and NEO together provide compliance-ready, regulatable protocols to global developers. These protocols are supported by NeoVM with exceptional finality and a smart contract system with a robust and stable infrastructure-level network.

As such, the Ontology Foundation and the NEO Foundation have agreed to cooperate as follows:

Key Cooperation Areas

1. Ontology will provide digital identity, data exchange services and other customized services. NEO brings a mature and complete smart contract platform as well as distributed network infrastructure services to the table.

2. Smart Contracts: Ontology and NEO will work together to build a smart contract ecosystem, fully support the development and adoption of NeoVM and NeoContract, and collaborate on developing smart contract open standards.

3. Data Integration: Both parties will provide standardized technology interfaces (APIs, SDKs, etc.), and share and communicate development achievements and research results.

4. Cross-chain: Both parties will push forward with cross-chain research, with the eventual goal of producing integrable mainnets.

… We see this as an extremely promising step forward for both projects, and for the larger NEP5 ecosystem. The system of cooperation is one way this space moves forward, and we see NEO’s smart economy as a big part of that.

We’ve started to do some swing trades on alts, tracked in the previous section. I am mostly focusing on the top 10-20 coins for now until we confirm that we’re back into an overall bull market.

I am doing the majority of my Technical Analysis work on TradingView and Coinigy, and I have a BitFinex app on both my iPad and Android smartphone. All of these charting platforms call a TradingView API. TradingView is the 800 lb. gorilla in the Crypto charting space until the “established” players want to make a go at Crypto, like Ninjatrader, Tradestation, eSignal, Sierra charts, etc. My sense is that TradingView has such a head start that it will be very difficult for the big boys to make a dent in this space for a while. Until that point, TradingView has almost a monopoly in this space. If you have a particular tool that you think is superior, please let me know.   You can access the BitFinex and TradingView platforms for free, however there are some paid features that you might want to consider depending on your needs, such as expanded watchlists, different study sets, account alerts, etc.

  Coinigy is a great tool for determining prices on each exchange, however I may not have access to the full suite of tools on TradingView charts. I am currently not using it as a front-end GUI for my exchanges, which it supports.I also use Blockfolio to give me a quick snapshot of my holdings, and find that it does an excellent job to aggregate all of my holdings into one easy-to-read snapshot of my cryptocurrencies, which are typically located in many different places.

I am also trialing the Profit Trailer and CryptoHopper trading apps which are working well in this choppy market.