THE “world’s first Bitcoin music festival” and “Shark Tank” will be held at the 2022 Miami crypto conference starting TODAY, and the site of the convention features a “Charging Bull” to rival the famous Bull of Wall Street.
The music festival is called Sound Money Fest, and it will feature several artists, including Logic, Steve Aoki, and Run the Jewels. The festival will close out the conference on April 10.
The Bitcoin conference is being held at the Miami Beach Convention Center from April 6 to April 9, and on the first day, a techy version of Wall Street’s Charging Bull was unveiled and stole the show, tweets from the conference revealed.
More than 6,000 industry leaders, 80 different speakers, and more than 4,000 companies are set to take part in the event, according to the conference website.
The conference will also feature a “Comedy Hour,” starring Hannibal Buress.
Interestingly, on the event’s first day, the price of Bitcoin was down. Bitcoin saw a price change of -3.66 percent over the past 24 hours as of Wednesday morning and had a price of $44,941.97, according to Coinbase.
Read our Bitcoin 2022 live blog for the latest news and updates…
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Is the US considering banning crypto?
The United States is not one of the countries looking to fully ban cryptocurrencies — at least not yet.
In fact, Federal Reserve chairman Jerome Powell previously said that there are no intentions of banning cryptocurrencies including Bitcoin.
So, for now, events like the Bitcoin 2022 conference can go off without a hitch.
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Can governments ban cryptocurrency, continued
China’s government, for instance, claimed it was concerned that people were using digital assets for fraud and laundering and ended up banning crypto.
That country and its government have also expressed concerns over the impact on the environment, as well as the potential of the destabilization of the country’s financial system.
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Can governments ban cryptocurrency?
Some countries have already fully banned cryptocurrencies, including places like Egypt, Iraq, China, and Qatar.
Some might think the reason cryptocurrencies are banned in some countries overseas is over volatility – but that’s not necessarily true.
A big issue is the scams users are susceptible to.
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Bitcoin volcano
A Bitcoin volcano is on display at the conference, meant to be “a nod to El Salvador’s plans to build Bitcoin City at the base of a volcano,” CoinMarketCap reported.
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Bitcoin still down
As the conference began on Wednesday, the value of Bitcoin was still down.
Coinbase reported the cryptocurrency is down -5.78 percent over the past week.
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What is cryptocurrency mining?
Mining is a complex and energy-intensive process, which requires a lot of computer power and involves using a computer to solve a mathematical problem with a 64-digit solution to create new coins.
For each problem solved, one block of Bitcoins is processed.
In addition, the miner who is the first to solve the problem is rewarded with a new bitcoin.
These new coins are then stored virtually through an online database called the blockchain.
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How many bitcoins are there?
There are currently 19,004,362.5 total BTC in existence, according to Buy Bitcoin Worldwide.
And the total number of bitcoins left to be mined is 1,995,637.5.
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The Miami Bull unveiled
At the conference on Wednesday, “The Miami Bull, a techy version of Wall Street’s Charging Bull, was unveiled at the Miami Beach Convention Center,” according to Amanda Rosa, a reporter, on Twitter.
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Industry Day
Wednesday is Industry Day at Bitcoin 2022.
“It’s time to make history,” the event tweeted this morning.
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What is Bitcoin?
Bitcoin is a virtual currency created in 2009 by an unknown computer user under the alias Satoshi Nakamoto.
Unlike physical currencies such as pounds, dollars or euros, which come in physical notes and coins, Bitcoin isn’t printed or minted.
Bitcoin tokens are a digital-only form of payment and are created by a computer code.
The value of Bitcoin is determined by how much people are willing to exchange it for and its price has fluctuated wildly since it was introduced.
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Student passes sold out
Student passes to Bitcoin 2022 have sold out, according to a tweet from the event’s Twitter account shared on Wednesday morning.
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Who will speak at the conference?
The extensive list of people who will speak at the conference includes:
- Yeonmi Park
- Nayib Bukele
- Peter Thiel
- Odell Beckham Jr
- Olaoluwa Osuntokun
- Jo Jorgensen
- Aaron Rodgers
- Francis Ngannou
- Senator Cynthia Lummus
And many more notable speakers.
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Play-to-earn gaming, part two
The new play-to-earn gaming model that rewards gamers with cryptocurrency for playing isn’t technically free.
Gamers could have to spend $1,000 or more in order to start earning in the Axie Infinity universe, according to Forbes.
The popular platform for play-to-earn gaming requires beginners to have three “Axies,” which are available for purchase on the game’s Marketplace Dashboard.
Participants can then earn cryptocurrency for selling potions, breeding rare Axies, and playing various games.
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What is play-to-earn gaming?
A unique model called play-to-earn gaming is driving non-fungible token (NFT) and cryptocurrency growth, Forbes reported.
Axie Infinity is the most popular platform for play-to-earn gaming at the moment.
It allows users to build a collection of “Axies” that players can use across its universe of games.
The company then uses Blockchain to reward players for gaming, according to Forbes.
Any digital assets earned by participants can be sold on the platform or traded outside Axie Infinity’s universe.
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The IRS on cryptocurrency in 2021 taxes
For 2022, 1040 US Individual Income Tax Return form has a question about cryptocurrency which states: “At any time during 2021, did you receive, sell, exchange, or otherwise dispose of any financial interest in any virtual currency?”
Additionally, the IRS addresses questions on its FAQ page on digital currencies stating: “If your only transactions involving virtual currency during 2020 were purchases of virtual currency with real currency, you are not required to answer yes to the Form 1040 question.”
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How to buy Bitcoin
There are digital currency exchanges such as FTX or Coinbase where Bitcoins can be bought and sold.
When setting up a Coinbase account fro example, it can be linked to your bank account or Paypal account to be able to make a deposit into a virtual wallet. After funding the virtual wallet, traditional currency can be exchanged for Bitcoin.
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What is the difference between a fungible and non-fungible token?
According to The VERGE, the main difference between a fungible and non-fungible token is that a fungible token can be traded, whereas, a non-fungible token cannot be traded.
Thus, a Bitcoin, which is a fungible token, can be traded for another Bitcoin. However, a unique trading card, which is a non-fungible token, cannot be traded because it is a unique, one-of-a-kind asset.
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Why is the value of cryptocurrencies unpredictable? continued
Experts have also warned cryptocurrency traders of the dangers associated with trading.
In an interview with The Sun, Susannah Streeter, senior investment and markets analyst at Hargreaves Lansdown stated: “Many cryptocurrencies and tokens are heralded as being part of the decentralized finance movement, which aims to disrupt current payment systems.”
She added: “In this murky world, where the use case of cryptocurrencies is far from proven, traders should only dabble with money they can afford to lose.’’
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Why is the value of cryptocurrencies unpredictable?
The value of cryptocurrencies has been unpredictable because of several unrelated factors that have contributed to its depreciation or appreciation in value.
For instance, the value of cryptocurrencies slumped in May 2021 because of a tweet by Elon Musk, where he stated that his company, Tesla, will no longer accept Bitcoin payments because of the negative environmental impacts of mining cryptocurrencies.
Within that same month, the value of cryptocurrencies decreased when the Chinese government banned crypto exchanges within the country.
In stark contrast to the reason given by Elon Musk, the Chinese government stated: “Recently, cryptocurrency prices have skyrocketed and plummeted, and speculative trading of cryptocurrency has rebounded, seriously infringing on the safety of people’s property and disrupting the normal economic and financial order.”
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Countries that ban cryptocurrency trading, part two
According to the Law Library of Congress, 42 countries have placed an implicit ban on certain cryptocurrency trading activities as of November 2021.
Some of the countries include:
- Bahrain
- Burundi
- Cameroon
- Central African Republic
- Gabon
- Georgia
- Guyana
- Kuwait
- Lesotho
- Libya
- Macao
- Maldives
- Vietnam
- Zimbabwe
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Countries that ban cryptocurrency trading, part one
According to the Law Library of Congress, nine countries have placed an absolute ban on cryptocurrency trading as of November 2021.
The countries include:
- Algeria
- Bangladesh
- China
- Egypt
- Iraq
- Morocco
- Nepal
- Qatar
- Tunisia
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El Salvador builds Bitcoin city
El Salvador is planning to build a coin-shaped city named “Bitcoin City”, on the side of a volcano powered by thermal energy.
The new city will be funded by cryptocurrency, and will look like the crypto coin from the sky when it’s built in the south-eastern region of La Unión.
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Bitcoin as legal tender
In September 2021, El Salvador became the first country to adopt Bitcoin as legal tender.
El Salvador’s president, Nayib Bukele, stated that this decision was made to help citizens abroad to send money back home.
However, Salvadorians protested against this decision by the president due to fears of inflation and instability.
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Risks of Robinhood, part three
In July 2021, the platform was also ordered to pay nearly $70million in fines and compensation for misleading customers and outages.
If you are seeking a discount broker and are looking to open an IRA account, you can check out the following platforms: Vanguard, Fidelity, TD Ameritrade, Merrill Edge, among others.
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Risks of Robinhood, part two
For investing individual stocks, make sure you check company reports, Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) filings, broker notes, and press releases so you can make the best decisions for your money.
Another risk when choosing Robinhood along with other brokers is that they can restrict trading when there’s unusual activity.
In fact, Robinhood faced some outrage earlier last year when it restricted trading on meme stocks including GameStop and AMC.
