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From a big league investment in the future of Bitcoin and cryptocurrency to the first bank to utilize XRP, here’s a look at some of the stories breaking in the world of crypto.

Bitcoin

The 23rd richest man in the world is investing in the Bitcoin and cryptocurrency platform Bakkt.

Hong Kong billionaire Li Ka-shing invested in the upcoming cryptocurrency exchange, which is backed by the parent company of the New York Stock exchange, through his venture capital firm Horizons Ventures. According to the yearly billionaires list published by Forbes, Li Ka-shing is worth about $34.9 billion.

Bakkt is pushing to launch physically-backed Bitcoin futures in the first quarter of this year, along with an institutional-grade regulated exchange, clearing and warehousing services for physical delivery and storage.

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Phase two of Bakkt, set for later this year, will utilize Microsoft’s cloud solutions to allow people to buy, sell, store and spend cryptocurrencies on a global network. The plan will also give Starbucks customers a way to convert crypto to US dollars to make purchases.

Ethereum

The founder of the Ethereum-based development studio ConsenSys just sat down for an interview on the Epicenter podcast.

Joseph Lubin talks about his background in engineering and finance, and the events that led to his fascination with Bitcoin and Ethereum.

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Ripple and XRP

The director of London-based Euro Exim Bank – the first bank to implement Ripple’s XRP-powered xRapid – says the technology will help it create a new level of service in the industry.

“As a leader in trade finance solutions for global corporates and fintechs, we are uniquely placed to offer new payment channels and ways to source liquidity.

Our customers—whether big corporates or individual remitters—have historically been restricted from obtaining suitable funds or settling transactions in a cost efficient and timely manner. Working collaboratively with Ripple and selected counterparts, we have designed, tested and are implementing both xCurrent and xRapid in record time, and we look forward to the benefits these will bring our customers.”

Litecoin

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The Litecoin Foundation has released a report on its recent sponsorship with the UFC.

The exhaustive report looks at the bump of interest in Litecoin triggered by the sponsorship, and says the Foundation is constantly searching for similar initiatives.

“While some of these measurable results are extremely important, the opportunity this sponsorship has already created for LTC is hard to understate. While we have been fortunate to command steady interest from some great brands over the last couple of years, the ilk of globally recognizable brands that are reaching out to the foundation since UFC 232 has increased dramatically.

Of course, not every partnership will make sense, but where there are ways to spark awareness amongst large swaths of the globe, activate the public, or create new and exciting use cases, we will continue to evaluate these.

As for the UFC, we plan to continue to discuss how to move this partnership forward in new and exciting ways. As this evolves, we will keep you posted.”

Stellar

The Stellar wallet and decentralized trading client Stellarport just released a new wallet update.

The improvements let users easily track their wallet value across all of the coins offered on the platform.

“Aside from user interface changes, we also added more information. Starting today, you can see the value of each of your balances, as well as your overall wallet value – in any asset on the Stellar network…

To view the values in another currency, just click “change” in the “Wallet Value” panel and select your favorite Stellar asset. After selecting an asset, you should see all your balances, as well as the overall wallet value, displayed in the asset of your choice (e.g. USD).”

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Tron

Tron has released a white paper describing how the new BitTorrent Token (BTT) will work. Users on the peer-to-peer file sharing platform will be rewarded with the token for sharing files with others.

“By introducing a mechanism for value storage and exchange we aim to greatly broaden the universe of possible participants – either service requesters, service providers or both..,

Optimizing the existing BitTorrent protocol is an obvious first step in the introduction of a cryptographic token but it barely scratches the surface of what is rapidly becoming possible.”

You can check out the full white paper here.

VeChain

VeChain just released a new episode of its Deep Dive series, which looks at the technical aspects of the platform. This episode looks at sidechains, reconstructed accounts, and plug & play storage.

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IOTA

IOTA is partnering with Crypto Storage AG to deliver first institutional-grade multi-signature storage solution designed to securely store high volumes of IOTA tokens.

“This storage solution is designed to meet the needs of financial intermediaries as well as significant partners across a variety of industries working on concepts that use IOTA.

The collaboration between the IOTA Foundation and Crypto Storage AG enables private and public investors, as well as institutional investors and beneficiaries to securely manage access to their IOTA tokens.”

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