Premium Daily Crypto Newsletter

February 20, 2018

 

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Crypto Market Commentary

Bitcoin / Litecoin lead the pack

Rest of market sideways

 

Today’s big story is around Segwit.

Bitfinex has added Segit support and likewise Coinbase has announced a rollout for next week.

So what does this mean for these exchanges and Bitcoin? The most noticeable change is a reduction in fees and processing times. While BTC fees and transaction times have largely come down from the absolutely egregious amounts they were at starting this year, a further reduction is necessary if Bitcoin is ever going to be seen as viable.

From Bitfinex, “SegWit is the process of increasing block size limits by separating signature data from transactional data in bitcoin transactions. In addition to increasing capacity, SegWit will also effectively fix transaction malleability, a potential attack based around the modification of transaction IDs prior to network confirmation.”

SegWit was introduced in August of 2017 through BIP 141 (Bitcoin Improvement Proposal) and was meant to bring efficiency changes to the Bitcoin network as a whole. That said, implementation of an improvement on a decentralized network is not easy and takes a long time to adopt. As it stands, the current adoption percentage is somewhere around 14%. To implement changes on the Bitcoin network, it requires consensus similar to a democracy, and naturally there are disagreements with regard to the best solutions.

For example, Bitcoin Cash was created, or forked, off the main Bitcoin chain because they felt increasing the block size was a better solution. Time will tell if they are correct, but we think it’s a great thing that cryptocurrency is open and free and if you don’t agree with something, you can go build a different solution. That’s how progress works.

In addition to two of the biggest exchanges implementing Segwit, the Bitcoin Core wallet will update to version 0.16.0 in the coming days which will also help with upping the adoption percentage substantially.

One of the most important aspects of Segwit implementation is that is necessary for the Lightning Network, a fix for transaction cost and speeds.

From Bitfinex, “SegWit also lays the foundation for future Bitcoin development efforts, including the implementation of Lightning Network, which will allow the network to process millions of transactions per second.”

The Lightning Network is neither a hard or soft fork, but an additional layer, and once added some people have referred to the result as “Bitcoin 2.0”.

All of this news around Segwit has given Bitcoin one of its best weeks in recent memory, and it’s nearly back to a 40% market dominance. The market sentiment around Bitcoin has shifted from “old and busted” to a potential contender for the race to process transactions faster than traditional payment networks, such as VISA.

Adding onto the pile of good news for Bitcoin, Paypal’s CFO was quoted in the Wall Street Journal stating, “The technology, there is real merit to it. I do think, though, it will be years down the road before we see the kind of ubiquity and acceptance that make it a form of currency that is used every day.”

Of course, his rhetoric was one of caution regarding volatility. The stance that merchants don’t want to accept an asset that can depreciate within minutes of a transaction and cut into their profit margin is a sensible one. Our response is simply that cryptocurrency is something that hasn’t existed before so people are just trying to figure out what it’s worth. Price stability is the signature of a mature asset, but crypto is less than a decade old, so we’ve still got a long way until prices calm down. That’s your opportunity.

New to Cryptocurrencies? Check out our archived class “Intro to Cryptocurrency Trading” which is available for immediate purchase/viewing in the Premium Member’s Home. View more about it and watch the class today by visiting this link.

 

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Offense – Adding Trades

Offensive Actions for the next trading day: 

  • Entered HPB position
  • Entered EVE position
  • Entered ITC position
  • Entered XBY position
  • Entered BIX position
  • Expanded TRAC position

Defense – Managing Risk

Defensive Actions for the next trading day: 

  • Exited NANO position
  • Exited LOCI position
  • Downgraded ICX position (T2 -> T3, no reduction in position size)

Current Portfolio

How to read this portfolio: Please click on the Chart Key tab above for definitions and color codes. The colors correspond to our 7 categories in the graphic below.

Tier 4

OriginTrail

OriginTrail enables seamless data sharing along any supply chain. The decentralized, blockchain-supported network protocol ensures trust, transparency, and security. It helps companies exchange relevant data seamlessly and in a secure way to build accountability, protect their brands and increase efficiencies.

Po.et

How do you take an open, trustless and decentralized system that anyone can write to at basically no cost and determine what information is useful, trustworthy or accurate? What’s to stop someone from copying a famous work, timestamping it to Po.et and claiming it as their own? How do you filter the “good” from the “bad”? Facts from “fake news”? The answers to these questions, these problems, can be crowdsourced by aligning economic incentives of content creators, publishers and curators via competing token-curated marketplaces, using the Po.et token — POE.

EVE

HPB

ITC

XBY

BIX

TRAC

 Tier 3

REQ

SUB

LINK

NANO

Tier 4

BNTY

TAU

WISH

PHR

LOCI

How to read this portfolio: Ticker: Contains the ticker code for the coin. You can search this ticker in Coinmarketcap to learn more about the coin. The color denotes the risk tier by our evaluation. Dark Red = T1, Dark Green = T2, Dark Blue = T3, Light Blue = T4 (Colors in the Ticker column do not interact with the colors in the other columns) Cost Basis = Our average purchase price for this coin. Current price = The average price of the coin based on the exchanges it is listed on. Strategy = What we plan to do with this coin. Staking is receiving dividends for that coin. Master node is also staking, but with a higher return rate for having a (large) number of that coin. Stop = Our exit point, if it exists What do the colors mean? The colors in the ticker column represent the risk profile of that coin. The colors in the other columns reflect what sector(s) that coin belongs to. Some coins belong to multiple sectors, which is indicated by multiple colors. The colors correspond to our 7 categories in the graphic below

ReadySetCrypto’s 7 Categories Of CryptoCurrency

Tier 1 coins are those coins which we have considerable assets invested, are firm believers in the project direction and execution, and have very little reason to sell within short to mid term. These are coins which we risk evaluated to be very solid, and have a high probability of existence duration.   

NEO

NEO ($NEO) is classified as a Dividend and Platform coin. As our largest holding, we believe NEO has the potential to become a dominant smart contract and DApp platform in 2018. It’s four most compelling features are:

  • An innovative consensus algorithm which will allow for greater TPS (transactions per second) over its competitors.
  • A dividend structure for holders, incentivizing coin retention and network stability / diversity.
  • SE Asia location, enabling NEO to break into markets more easily than competitors.
  • Agnostic smart contract language, allowing for smart contract developers to use existing mainstream programming languages, which allows for cheaper smart contract implementation as compared to Ethereum who’s proprietary smart contract language, Solidity, can be a barrier to integration.

NEO is best acquired through Binance. Storing NEO on the Binance exchange will result in a GAS distribution once a month on the first. We recommend the NEON wallet for safe storage. GAS will be distributed on the NEON wallet daily.  

WaltonChain

WaltonChain ($WTC) is classified as a Dividend and Utility coin. Waltonchain is on the cutting edge of using RFID hardware to enable supply chain management 2.0. We believe Walton has the potential to become a dominant IoT blockchain solution Waltonchain is the only truly decentralized platform combining blockchain with the Internet of Things (IoT) via patent pending RFID (Radio Frequency Identification) technology. The custom RFID chips are able to digitally sign and verify transactions at the integrated circuit level, automatically and instantly reading and writing data to the chain without human intervention. This unique implementation of blockchain + IoT facilitates the true interconnection of all things in the real world with the virtual world, creating a genuine, trustworthy and traceable business ecosystem with complete data sharing and absolute information transparency. Walton has two major competitive advantages:

  • A recently confirmed (to be signed) partnership with China Mobile’s IoT Alliance. China Mobile is the largest mobile telecommunications service in the world as well as the world’s largest mobile phone operator by total number of subscribers. Walton’s Management system is set to be implemented through mobile communication networks, and China Mobile is the largest one. Waltonchain is positioning themselves to be the single connector of the entire Internet of Things initiative put forward by the China Mobile IoT Alliance.
  • They implement the blockchain through the RFIDs at the foundational layer. Their technology is patent-pending and gives Waltonchain a solid claim as the only blockchain that connects the physical world with the virtual world with truly reliable data. This is because all other IoT solutions tag items through API, and this means all the data is first passed through a centralized intermediate, a potential point of vulnerability.

Ethereum

Ethereum ($ETH) is an open blockchain Platform that lets anyone build and use decentralized applications that run on blockchain technology. Like Bitcoin, no one controls or owns Ethereum – it is an open-source project built by many people around the world. But unlike the Bitcoin protocol, Ethereum was designed to be adaptable and flexible. It is easy to create new applications on the Ethereum platform, and with the Homestead release, it is now safe for anyone to use those applications.

Tier 2 coins are those coins which have performed extremely well, we have a large amount of assets with, and we believe will continue to operate with high marks. What separates these coins from our Tier 1 status is a flaw or they haven’t yet proven their defining feature, though we believe they will.

OmiseGO

OmiseGO ($OMG) is classified as a Dividend and Utility coin. OmiseGO is a Southeast Asia-based company creating an e-wallet that will make transfer of assets and currencies possible. Merchants and users of the wallet can transfer whatever asset or currency they desire. For example, you could use your ethereum, bitcoin, international fiat, or even your airline points to buy groceries using the e-wallet app on your mobile phone. Transfers can happen across borders, or even while traveling abroad. Unlike Western Union or PayPal for example, the fees are almost negligible, and the transfer is instant. Because it’s based on a blockchain, there are no intermediary banks necessary and users don’t need bank accounts to access those funds. This is especially good for migrant workers who send money home and often don’t have bank accounts and are forced to use expensive wire services instead.

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.

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.

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.

Tier 3 coins are those coins which we have moderate investments and we believe have a possibility of high performance in the future, but as of yet have not shown enough performance to reduce their risk profile. Tier 3 coins are coins which are moderately risky, but due to our risk analysis of the project and team we believe have minimal chance of failure. 
Tier 4 coins are coins which we have minimal stake in, are highly risky, and we are contributing no more than 2% of our portfolio to. These coins represent the outer fringe of our risk analysis, in that we have little information to work with, have little insight into the coin’s performance, and at the very best we are making an educated guess that they will be successful. If a coin performs well and proves that it has a commitment to its compelling feature, it will be moved to the Tier 3 status.  

Fundamental Currency Research

Today has been a nice break from the norm, as the only two in the green as far as the top 10 are concerned are Bitcoin and Litecoin.

As the two oldest coin in the top 10, it’s a “back to basics” kind of trend that we haven’t seen in some time. The “new” generations of blockchains and other distributed ledger technology solutions simply haven’t been around long enough to upend the tried and true purpose originally built into cryptocurrency: a peer-to-peer electronic cash system.

News like today’s regarding Segwit convinces us that Bitcoin and its many clones are here to stay for the time being. A strong Bitcoin is what the market knows best and the market may be signaling that keeping that trend alive is worth doing.

We’ve made quite a few additions to our portfolio that I’d like to discuss briefly.

Our strategy continues to be one of looking for trends in the market and identifying coins that belong to the sectors we like to invest in. In particular, we have invested much of our portfolio in Platforms and IoTBlockchain.

Platforms are those coins which require you to use the coin in order to build off the their existing framework. Ethereum is the best example of this, and 2017 was the year of Ethereum and ICOs on it. 2018 could very well be the year Ethereum overtakes Bitcoin, but the story there wouldn’t be Ethereum itself, it would be platforms as a whole and how they can serve a role as the core of your portfolio.

Everyone gets caught up on what crypto can do they forget that we need to build the infrastructure to make that happen. Better solutions come from better infrastructure. Sort of how Elon Musk wants to reuse rockets in order to bring down the cost of spaceflight to enable more missions, the next google or facebook or amazon is going to be built off a platform that allows people to focus on what to do with the blockchain instead of rethinking the blockchain itself. HPB and XBY are our newest bets on this sector.

IoTBlockchain, sometime referred to as RFIDBlockchain, is the infusion of physical assets and digital management.

The power of giving a physical item an immutable digital presence is astonishingly powerful. Tracking an item during shipment, proving authenticity, verifying safety, the applications are broad and disruptive. WTC, VEN, WABI, MOD, TRAC, and now ITC / EVE are all our plays in this sector. We look forward to watching these investments grow with the maturity of the sector and crypto as a whole. In particular, we’re excited to attempt to buy up enough TRAC in order to run a masternode, though details surrounding that, such as amount needed and return rate, are not yet confirmed.

Lastly, we need to talk about why we have decided to downgrade ICON ($ICX) from T2 to T3, which as you might have seen was my pick for the #1 cryptocurrency to have going into 2018. That prediction was made in December, and as such there was not a lot of price history, news, etc. on ICX. Based on the fundamentals alone, I surmised it to be one of the best platform coins I have seen and anticipated a very strong year for ICON. While ICON has certainly done well, the past few weeks have watched it fall with the rest and then fail to recover. While

I could try to defend the coin as suffering from an onslaught of FUD following their much anticipated mainnet release and annual summit last month, the reality is that our strategy is based on not falling in love over any coin. We certainly want the price to recover, but the market believes it is worth its current price and that will not change without some news, good or bad. Our job is just to do the best we can to anticipate where the market is going, and as such the best play right now is to anticipate a stop loss. Our tier system is one based on “trust”, and as such we no longer “trust” ICON as much as we one did. Mental preparation and emotional detachment help you make hard decisions that feel bad but are good in the long term, and this is us practicing just that.

In this section we’ll feature a daily ICO or new coin we think you should check out. Based on your country, you may not be able to participate in the ICO, but you will be able to trade the coin once it is listed on an exchange following its ICO (usually only a couple of weeks). ICOs are where a lot of money in crypto is made. Here’s proof.   That said, we should warn you: ICOs are highly risky endeavours and you need to mitigate any potential losses. Treat it as money you’ve lost the moment you contribute to the ICO. We are not responsible for the ICO’s performance. Today’s featured ICO / New Coin is:

Cardstack

For flipping Good. Decentralized internet projects has been gaining attention.

For long-term holding Good.

What is it? 

Cardstack is an open-source framework and consensus protocol that makes blockchains usable and scalable for the mass market, creating a decentralized software ecosystem that can challenge today’s digital superpowers.

What is our verdict? 

What we like: The marketing and message is hitting the right points, and the tech seems very impressive.

What we don’t like: Very technically heavy on the front end while the github is not active enough on the backend.

  • TOKEN SALE: 6 MAR

  • Ticker: CARD
  • Token type: ERC20
  • Fundraising Goal: 35,000,000 USD
  • Total Tokens: 6,000,000,000
  • Available for Token Sale: 40%
  • Whitelist: YES (SINCE 15 FEB, JOIN )
  • Know Your Customer (KYC): YES
  • Сan’t participate: USA
  • Bonus for the First: 10% FOR PRE-ALLOCATION
  • Min/Max Personal Cap: 1000 USD / 50000 USD
  • Accepts: ETH, BTC, USD

Website: https://cardstack.com/

Whitepaper: https://cardstack.attach.io/HJaZkzgn~

Technical Analysis Research

Bitcoin has almost doubled off of the recent lows at $6000, and has provided somewhat of a lift to the market…but not in all cases. Because BTC is rising, the alt-coins that are traded against BTC have to rise AT LEAST by the same amount percentage-wise in order for them to show gains as well. WTC is a good example of a recently-strong coin that has faded somewhat due to BTC’s rise, and WTC being less-strong.

  In today’s video I discuss how to find alternate charts in case they are not covered by the common exchanges that are plugged into TradingView.     We held an excellent class recently, Introduction to CryptoCurrency Trading. (Click here for more information and to sign up) This class is really targeted at the Crypto investor who wants to get moving but is somewhat uncertain about what they should do, and how to go about it. Another great candidate would be the recent investor who bought in at the top and is unsure of their actions. While you can’t attend the live class and the Q&A any more, the content is all there and we give you the slide download as well. If you go to buy the course at our online “store” you can receive $10 off the $59 street price with your member’s “coupon code” of member18crypto…or you can simply use the link above but that does not offer paypal.

  If we see the overall crypto market start to lift off again, then Alt-coins will normally float higher as well. I will work with Mav in the coming days to see if we can shed some dead weight from our portfolio and start to accumulate some new blood. Some of the coins that were absolute rock stars for our portfolios into the end of the year (like ICX) have begun to fade and are a drag on our overall return.

     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.

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