The 5 Phases of Bitcoin Adoption

By John Mauldin

The 5 Phases of Bitcoin Adoption

What will it take for Bitcoin to gain broad adoption and become the foundation of a new global financial system?

Worth Wray sat down with Barry Silbert, founder of the Bitcoin Investment Trust, to discuss. As one the most active venture capitalists in the industry (with investments in over 30 Bitcoin-related portfolio companies through the Bitcoin Opportunity Corp.), Barry has gone all-in on Bitcoin and Bitcoin-related businesses.

He believes the rise of Bitcoin from 2009 to 2014 is just the beginning… and the virtual payment system may be approaching a big inflection point as Wall Street takes the baton from Silicon Valley.

Silbert thinks about Bitcoin adoption in five general phases.

(1) Experimentation Phase. (2009–2010)

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COMPANIES ARE TRYING TO GET RID OF PASSWORDS ENTIRELY, AND LAUNCHKEY JUST RECEIVED $3 MILLION IN FUNDING TO IMPLEMENT A REPLACEMENT

By Clay Michael Gillespie

In a time where password technology is so easy to breach, the world is ready for a new technology to take over. In response to the vulnerability that passwords hold, some companies have started implementing two-factor authentication.

LaunchKey, on the other hand, looks to get rid of password technology altogether and take the world into multi-factor authentication. On top of that, they just raised $3 million in funding thanks to Metamorphic Ventures and Pantera Capital. According to LaunchKey, the funding will push them to expand their team and bring LaunchKey to market in the next year.

Geoff Sanders, the president, and CEO of LaunchKey, released a statement upon the announcement.

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BITPAGOS LAUNCHES RIPIO IN BRAZIL TO EXPAND BITCOIN’S REACH

By  Evander Smart

BitPagos, who has successfully launched Bitcoin service in Argentina is now expanding into South America’s largest country, Brazil, with the release of Ripio.com. Ripio allows anyone living in Brazil to be able to make Bitcoin purchase orders through their website, and with a basic bank slip, can buy Bitcoin at thousands of locations throughout Brazil.

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Bitcoin, Stellar and Sidechains Feature at Future of Money Summit

The fifth annual Future of Money & Technology Summit brought together both bitcoin believers and traditional financial industry experts at the Hotel Kabuki in San Francisco on Monday.

Organizer Brian Zisk said more than 500 people in total came to the event to learn more about how innovation, both within the bitcoin ecosystem and beyond, is changing the finance industry.

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Bitreserve Brings Bitcoin To The Gold Standard

The bitcoin-based financial services company Bitreserve is merging one of the newest innovations in currency with the world’s oldest.

Through the institutional precious metals trading house Gold Bullion International, Bitreserve has created a new gold standard, linking its bitcoin currency exchange and payment services with gold.

Now, using Bitreserve, customers can hold gold in their accounts and convert it to bitcoin to buy goods and services.

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This Investor Thinks Bitcoin Will Change EVERYTHING — Not Just Finance

Bitcoin will change a lot more than finance. It could also change how software is built and upend a bunch of today's biggest web companies, argues Joel Monegro of Union Square Ventures.

His argument starts with the block chain, the shared ledger where every Bitcoin transaction is recorded. Validating these transactions requires computing power. When each transaction is validated, a new block is added to the chain, which makes future transactions even harder to compute.

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