China’s first blockchain-based notary services opens in Beijing and first blockchain and AI powered business license issued in Guangzhou.

In another blockchain milestone, China’s first blockchain-based notary has opened offices in Beijing.

Local media reported the Beijing CITIC Notary office started offering blockchain-based services on Friday 19^th April. According to the director of the office, Wang Mingliang, blockchain-based notary services will combine the legal status of notarisation with the efficiency and certainty of blockchain certification.

Using the new system, certificate holders will be able to verify documents by simply scanning a code, and it is hoped that blockchain legal records can help prevent forgeries and reduce fraud.

Despite the Chinese government open hostility to cryptocurrency mining and exchanges, blockchain technology is gaining traction rapidly in the country, with the country estimated be home to around a quarter of the world’s current blockchain projects, and said to be one of the top filers of blockchain-related patents.

In another landmark day for Chinese blockchain, on Monday, Guangzhou, issued China’s first blockchain and AI-powered business license. Indeed, as AYO.NEWS reported last week, Donald Tapscott, executive chairman of Blockchain Research Institute, has predicted that China will go as far as switching to a digital version of the renminbi within 20 years (read more).

Several jurisdictions around the world are investigating the benefits of blockchain for legal record keeping. Last month we reported that commercial court clerks in France are to begin using a IBM-developed Hyperledger Fabric-based blockchain platform this year, in a bid to increase the speed and efficiency of legal changes to companies and related record keeping (read more).

Serena Williams, four-time Olympic gold medallist and eight time world no. 1 tennis player, invested in Coinbase in 2014.

According to an Instagram post from 17^th April, Serena Jameka Williams, the four-time Olympic gold medallist tennis player, back in 2014 she launched an investment business called Serena Ventures, and quietly invested in more than thirty companies – on of which was San Francisco-based Coinbase.

Now, in 2019, Serena Ventures claims the market cap of its portfolio is more than $12 billion! Its investment portfolio also includes Tonal, Rockets of Awesome, billie, OLLY, Honeylove, Floravere, S by Serena, Brandless, Lola, Daily Harvest, Propel, The Wing, Mayvenn, Little Spoon, Gobble, Teespring, Impossible, Wave, Adela, Masterclass, and Neighborhood Goods .

Proving that some people are just superhumans, in addition to her four Olympic gold medals, Williams was ranked world No. 1 no less than eight times by the Women’s Tennis Association, and her net worth is now estimated to be around $180 million.

Investing in Coinbase back in 2014 was certainly a smart move. Founded in June 2012 the company, by 2018 the company was being reported as valued at around $8 billion. Today is offers cryptocurrency – fiat exchange services in 32 countries and crypto transactions and storage in 190 countries.

Despite the extended ‘Crypto Winter’ and collapse in ICOs over the past year, Reuters recently reported that venture capital investment in blockchain and crypto startups is expected to break records this year, with even the US federal government expected to increase its blockchain spending more than 1,000% to $123.5 compared to the $10.7m spent in 2017 (IDC Government Insights).

AYO.NEWS says:

As we have noted many times, despite the mainstream media declaring crypto ‘dead’ and either ignoring or completely misunderstanding blockchain, behind the scenes smart people and businesses have been diligently investing and developing. Though most people still see the 2016-17 crypto boom as a bubble, it may well eventually be seen as merely the very start of an all-encompassing revolution.

Cambridge Centre for Alternative Finance, with support from Nomura Research Institute, publishes first study comparing global crypto regulations.

The Cambridge Centre for Alternative Finance, with support from the Nomura Research Institute (NRI), has published its first global study comparing the regulation of cryptoassets across 23 jurisdictions.

The jurisdictions included in the report are: Abu Dhabi, Australia, Bermuda, Canada, Estonia, European Union, France, Germany, Gibraltar, Hong Kong, India, Israel, Japan, Malta, Mexico, China, Russia, Singapore, South Korea, Switzerland, Thailand, United Kingdom, and United States.

The general picture that it paints won’t surprise anyone involved in crypto – highlighting a confused mix of inconsistent approaches, with progress hampered by a failure to even employ common international terminology.

Interestingly, the report found that the nations with the most sophisticated regulatory frameworks tend to be those with more relaxed traditional financial regulations and low domestic crypto activity. Conversely the nations with more domestic crypto activity tend to be those which are trying to shoehorn cryptos into existing laws and regulations.

It also highlights that, thus far, regulators around the world have been focused almost exclusively on Initial Coin Offerings (ICOs) and exchanges, paying scant attention to things like alternative token distribution methods, like airdrops and forks, or even crypto mining.

Illustrating the confused global approach is distribution of regulatory authorities that issued the first official statements on cryptoassets in their respective jurisdictions. In 40% is was a Central Bank, 17% a Financial Supervisory Body, 17% a Government Department, 8% a Tax Administration, 8% a Legislature, 5% an AML Regulator, and in 5% several simultaneously.

Another important observation was that the vast majority of examined jurisdictions have distinguished cryptoassets that exhibit characteristics of a security from other types of cryptoassets. This has meant that activities dealing with cryptoassets that qualify as a security are automatically subject to securities law.

Perhaps most fascinating is the analysis of the terminology used by regulators from 2013-19. For example, in the early years of 2013-14, it was common for official authorities to refer to cryptoassets as ‘bitcoin’ – something that died away around 2017. Today almost half of regulators use the term “Virtual currency”, but other are also using an array of terms including “Cryptocurrency”, Digital currency”, “DLT asset”, “Virtual asset”, “Cryptoasset”, “Digital financial asset”, and “Digital asset” – all to refer to the same things!

The full report can be read here.

AYO.NEWS says:

We highly recommend anyone interested in cryptocurrencies takes a look at this thorough 123-page report – it’s a long but fascinating read, packed with insights and nice graphs and visualisations.

The confused mix of terminology is a natural result of the rapid emergence of a totally new field, of which existing experts and officials had little or no understanding. We expect to see terminologies naturally tend towards standardisation over time – though it would undoubtably be beneficial for all to speed this process.

Regarding the countries with more relaxed traditional financial regulations and lower domestic crypto transactions taking the lead with the most sophisticated crypto-specific legislative frameworks, we would suggest this is simply due to the fact that its easier for small nations to pivot quickly.

Taking Malta as a case in point – its much easier to create and pass completely bespoke legislation in a smaller government, where there are fewer people who need educating and convincing, and fewer special interest groups with vested interests in maintaining the status quo.

The smaller the nation is, the quicker the benefits of embracing the new industries like cryptocurrency become noticeable too – leading to a self-reinforcing enthusiasm for things like crypto and blockchain businesses.