Looking at the headlines:

• World Bank Digs Deeper Into DLT and FinTech for Financial Inclusion
• The Suzhou trial – Digital Yuan Being Tested for a Workers’ Subsidies Scheme
• Aussie Crypto Unicorn Raises $160M With ‘Big Four’ Bank Backing
• The launch of 3iQ’s BTC Fund on TSX
• Berlin Real Estate Worth $12M Tokenized for Everyday Investors
• Akon City, a ‘sustainable eco-tourism smart city’ powered by Blockchain technology in Senegal.

Connecting the dots, the Blockchain’s shift from niche financial tool for techies to the mass adoption of digital currencies is happening into the conventional financial sphere. The interaction (blending or convergence?) of the two monetary worlds seems to be progressing positively.

The recent report by World Bank Group and Bank for International Settlements (BIS) further complement the previous report by BIS as CBDC (Central Bank-Issued Digital Currency) Is Well On Its Way.

Payment Aspects of Financial Inclusion Fintech Wheel by World Bank Group

Worth noting is the PAFI Fintech Wheel in the report.

Jolted below notes related to above mentioned headlines, the power to relate is important in getting the bigger picture.

Click on the respective headline to read the original report.

World Bank Digs Deeper Into DLT and FinTech for Financial Inclusion

The World Bank’s fintech-focused report on financial inclusion is not the organization’s first foray into blockchain and associated emerging technologies.

Among major PAFI tools, the World Bank listed distributed ledger technology (DLT), stablecoins, CBDCs and payment tokenization systems, placing them in line with other fintechs like big data analytics and cloud computing.

Combining several technologies, products and access models, the World Bank drew up the so-called “PAFI fintech wheel” to identify fintech developments that are potentially relevant to the payment aspects of financial inclusion.

In the 70-page report, the bank provided a detailed overview of selected advances in technology that are considered to be the most relevant to payments as well as described their applications and associated risks.

The Suzhou trial – Digital Yuan Being Tested for a Workers’ Subsidies Scheme

This month, agencies and enterprises in the Xiangcheng District of Suzhou will reportedly be paying 50% of local workers’ transport subsidies in the new digital currency (also referred to as DC/EP, for “digital currency/electronic payment”).

These patents indicate that the DC/EP adopts a two-layer architecture and two-tier delivery system, which enables licensed third-party payment institutions or banks to participate in secondary issuance of the digital currency.

… the report notes that the currency’s blockchain structure will ensure “traceability, encryption and supervisability.”

Aussie Crypto Unicorn Raises $160M With ‘Big Four’ Bank Backing

In March 2019, Airwallex received a $1 billion valuation — ranking it as Australia’s second unicorn alongside graphic design firm, Canva. Australia is currently home to three unicorns, with aerial imagery company, Nearmap, recently joining the list.

The launch of 3iQ’s BTC Fund on TSX

The launch of 3iQ’s BTC Fund on TSX was a historic event, to say the least.

The listing of a publicly-traded Bitcoin fund on a major stock exchange will serve as an important milestone for the industry as a whole — especially in regard to crypto being viewed as a legitimate asset class by the global investment community.

Currently trading under the name, “The Bitcoin Fund,” the offering has around 1.5 million Class A “QBTC.U” shares available on the Toronto Stock Exchange, or TSX.

At press time, each share is trading for around $12. The price indexes being used by the fund are from crypto data company CryptoCompare and VanEck Europe subsidiary MV Index Solutions.

3iQ is serving as the fund’s investment and portfolio manager.

The Bitcoin Fund is under the custody of the Winklevoss’ exchange Gemini, and thus Tyler and his brother Cameron are invested in the fund’s success.

TSX is Canada’s premier stock exchange, facilitating more than $97 billion worth of monthly trade.

• customer demand for regulated crypto products has been strong across the investing spectrum — be it the retail or institutional investor market.
• as time goes on, market demand for crypto offerings will increase.
• the demand for an easily accessible, securities-based product delivered through traditional channels.

Berlin Real Estate Worth $12M Tokenized for Everyday Investors

Germany’s Black Manta Capital Partners has launched a security token offering (STO) for Berlin real estate worth more than $12 million.

The project is a collaboration with the German real estate firm Tigris Immobilien and includes around 2000 square metres of real estate in total, mostly comprising individual apartments from 40 to 60 square meters in size. Construction is expected to be complete by 2022 and units will be sold to investors and owner-occupiers.

Token holders will share 20% of the sale profits through securitized participation rights. The company said the tokens will enable ordinary investors “to participate in a profitable real estate project normally reserved for professional investors.”

Minimum investment is just €500 (Fractionization / Fractional Ownership)

Blockchain technology is gaining steam in the real estate market with real estate security tokens now representing half of active security token markets and 15% of total volume.

• new “tokenization services” industry to emerge and the crypto custodian market to grow.
• institutional investors require regulated custodians

Akon City, a ‘sustainable eco-tourism smart city’ powered by Blockchain technology in Senegal

Blockchain’s shift from niche financial tool for techies to the mass adoption of digital currencies.

The celebrity singer famous for his “Lonely” song, is not only embark on lighting a million homes project, but also developing Akon City, a ‘sustainable eco-tourism smart city’ in Senegal.

While those listed above are quite a number of positive progress, some news shouldn’t be overlooked, especially when it concerns custodian services and legistration.

Where on the planet is KuCoin?

Unlike Binance, Coinbase and Ripple, KuCoin did not file with the Monetary Authority of Singapore to request a deferral of the requirement to operate without a payments license. Such deferrals allow those companies to operate as payments service providers without a license through July.

Without a license or a deferral, KuCoin cannot legally operate in Singapore. It remains unclear whether KuCoin is nonetheless operating in Singapore or if the exchange is in fact now operating elsewhere.

The post Financial Inclusion in The Fintech Era appeared first on Blockchain Insider.

“BRI reaches as much as 65% of the world’s population, while covering half of world gross domestic product (GDP), 75% of all known energy reserves, and a quarter of all cross-border goods and services trade.” ~ Deutsche Bank

The digital yuan could be weaponized as a tactical or strategic weapon. As it expands across the new Silk Road, China would be able to implement total surveillance over the economic activity of more than half the world’s population, tracking everyone’s spending habits and relationships. By holding authorization keys, China could freeze transactions it doesn’t like or seize digital assets by locking customers’ mobile wallets at will. Precursor systems are already rolling out in China, where a “social credit” system punishes or rewards individual behavior. It has already blocked millions from buying airline tickets.

Image source: https://www.reddit.com/r/interestingasfuck/comments/ca5720/chinas_social_credit_system/

Quantum Computing & Cryptography

If blockchain can be broken by quantum, all cryptography can be broken. And that’s a much bigger societal risk. Think about your bank, your browser, your smartphone or your laptop — computing has been integrated into all levels of our life. All those levels rely on existing cryptographic algorithms and are vulnerable in one way or another.

One of the promising aspects here is that quantum actually makes excellent cryptography. There’s a thing called quantum cryptography, and it’s very different from our understanding of how classical cryptography works. Quantum cryptography is used today in a small amount of applications. Some interesting research in this field shows that while quantum can break existing cryptography and make it useless, it actually introduces a different forum which could be used to fix the problem. I think it’s fascinating that the very thing that breaks cryptography also fixes it.

“…We could see quantum cryptography be the answer and even be actually integrated into future versions of blockchain, making blockchain a quantum-based system itself…Humans are awesome. We will come up with other ideas. It won’t just be quantum fixing the same problems it creates. And I’m also very confident that blockchain will evolve in the decades ahead.” ~ Dr. Jonathan Reichental, CEO of Human Future, a global business and technology education, advisory and investment firm.

Akoin

What to do after lighting a million homes in Africa?

One Africa. One Koin.

Akoin is a cryptocurrency powered by a marketplace of tools and services fueling the dreams of entrepreneurs, business owners, and social activists as they connect and engage across the rising economies of Africa and beyond; created by visionary global artist, change-maker, innovator and humanitarian, Akon.

Read the Akoin whitepaper.

Image by Gerd Altmann from Pixabay

Further Reading:

(1) China’s Digital Yuan Is an Economic Cyberweapon, and the US Is Disarming

(2) Talking Digital Future: Quantum Computing and Cryptography

(3) AKoin

The post Digital Yuan, Quantum Computing & Cryptography, AKoin appeared first on Blockchain Insider.

We had some discussion about Aegis Associates next move and how CVM can be part of their community partners.

The MoU was signed by both CVM and Aegis Associates’ CEO.

We look forward another fruitful journey through the community initiatives with Aegis Group.

The Aegis team comprises principals and experts from diverse backgrounds and disciplines including strategy consulting, digital marketing, entrepreneur development, digital payment systems, technology development, data security and Fintech services, whom aspire to be advisory and development company of choice for technology and fundraising using cryptocurrency, cryptokens and blockchain in the region.

The post MoU with Aegis Associates appeared first on Blockchain Insider.