Judging by the recent price increases for digital currencies, more and more investors are considering the idea of getting their very own digital currency portfolio. However, as easy as it may sound, having a crypto portfolio with a high-yield potential can often be difficult if certain tips aren’t followed, and especially if investors are on a budget.

Therefore, when making digital currency investments, it is often essential to reach a perfect balance in your portfolio, by finding smart ways of diversifying it. In return, this will lead to an increase of the potential yield, while also reducing possible loses, based on market volatility.

During the last couple of months, Bitcoin has been on a bullish streak, with prices considerably increasing day after day. At the moment of writing, Bitcoin is just short of hitting the threshold of $7,000 per unit, after reaching $6,900 for the first time ever, and currently trading at $7,359.

The increase in price has also lead to a big increase of the digital currency’s total market cap, which is now situated at $120 bln. Not only this, but the overall market cap of all digital currencies combined is situated at $188 bln.

During the last couple of months, Russia’s attitude towards Bitcoin and other digital currencies was quite conflicting, yet surely negative for the market. Recent reports indicate that the President of Russia, Vladimir Putin, has just ordered the government to begin drafting up legislation for digital currencies, ICOs and mining.

At this time, there are several reports available on what these laws will do, and what they will restrict.

Since its birth, the bitcoin ecosystem has seen numerous debates on the right protocol changes required to continue its success. A couple of months ago, we were all witness to one of the first hard forks, which created an entirely separate digital currency known as Bitcoin Cash (BCC), following a new protocol.

This has happened yet again, as on October 25th 2017, Bitcoin Gold seceded from the bitcoin blockchain, into a new digital currency. The main difference about it is its new proof-of-work algorithm.

We have often talked about the huge potential of the blockchain network, and how companies and institutions throughout the world are actively researching blockchain technology. Now, it seems like the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, commonly known as MIT, which has issued diplomas to over 200,000 students since its creation, has just started issuing graduate diplomas via a special, blockchain-based app.

The Blockcerts Wallet App, which is the hero of the story, uses blockchain technology in order to grant students access to easily-verifiable, tamper-proof versions of their diplomas, which can be shared with potential employers throughout the world with ease. In a recent press statement, the CEO of Learning Machine, a company involved with the creation of the Blockcerts Wallet app mentioned that: “MIT has issued official records in a format that can exist even if the institution goes away, even if we go away as a vendor (…) People can own and use their official records, which is a fundamental shift.”

In the past, raising money as a start-up required small companies to convince banks, investors and financial institutions to take big risks, by investing large amounts of money into unproven technology and ideals. However, this has changed with the appearance of Initial Coin Offerings, also known as ICOs.

For those who do not know, an ICO represents a crowdfunding event that start-ups and other companies use in order to raise money for their business venture. It is a form of symbiosis between the well-known Kickstarter projects and Initial Public Offerings. Therefore, upon making an investment, people receive tokens that will then increase in value when the company reaches success- therefore, companies are making their shares available to the investing public without having to get listed onto the stock market. However, it is important to point out that these tokens aren’t exactly shares of the company, yet as the start-up in question becomes more profitable, so will these tokens which can be traded on exchanges for real money.

Not long ago, Willy Woo, an important bitcoin researcher made a statement where he revealed that the number of bitcoin users throughout the world doubles approximately every year. Additionally, Dutch Bank ING released a paper where they state that bitcoin transactions use so much energy that potentially, the amount of electricity needed to verify a single transaction would be enough to power a house for an entire month.

To put things better into perspective, bitcoin transactions need to use so much energy in order to make verifying trades expensive for those who do it. Because of this aspect, fraudulent transactions that would be confirmed on the blockchain network are much harder to attain, as those who wish to do so, would need to make a large investment in both computing equipment and electricity to be capable of misusing the currency.

With time, consumer demands and expectations across all industries tend to change, therefore encouraging disruption through new technologies that could better fill the needs of both consumers and companies throughout the world.

As you may have probably heard, blockchain technology has the potential to change the future for numerous industries, with better services being provided. For those who do not know, a blockchain is more or less a continuously increasing list of records known as blocks, which are then secured and linked using cryptographic protocols. While the blockchain technology is still fairly new to the market, experts are now finally understanding the fact that its potential doesn’t only reside in the financial and banking sectors. In this article, we will outline a few important industries which could be significantly changed after the introduction of blockchain technologies.

Digital currency regulation represents an issue that numerous governments throughout the world are dealing with, as the cryptocurrency ecosystem continues to evolve. In the case of Malaysia for instance, there are more and more talks about how and if bitcoin should be regulated, alongside with whether it should be banned entirely.

To put things better into perspective, reports suggest that the Central Bank is now taking a couple of cues from China, following a couple of statements that haven’t been positive towards digital currencies and possible regulation in the future. It is interesting to see how things changed, judging by the fact that in 2014, the BNM stated that: “The Bitcoin is not recognised as legal tender in Malaysia. The Central Bank does not regulate the operations of Bitcoin. The public is therefore advised to be cautious of the risks associated with the usage of such digital currency.”

The last couple of weeks have once again proven that bitcoin remains a strong, yet volatile digital currency, due to the numerous changes in value. To put things better into perspective, bitcoin finally ended up staging another rally over the end of the week, thus hitting a one-month high.

This was quite surprising judging by the fact that economic analysts have been warning against another negative volatility event. At the time of writing, bitcoin is trading at $4,625, which is the highest level that it has reached since the 8th of October. This is significantly better when compared to the value that it has a couple of weeks ago, when the digital currency ended up declining a bit below the $3,000 mark.