The percentage of Ethereum blocks complying with orders set by the United States Office of Foreign Asset Control (OFAC) has now fallen to 47% — the lowest since Oct. 11. The latest milestone in reversing censorship comes nearly three months after the percentage of OFAC-compliant blocks reached its peak at 79% on Nov. 21. OFAC-compliant blocks are those that exclude transactions involving parties sanctioned by the U.S. Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control. A fall in compliant blocks could be seen as a win for those that oppose censorship within the Ethereum ecosystem. In a statement, blockchain consulting firm …

Taproot support across the industry is still crawling one year after the Bitcoin soft fork, indicating a strong potential for innovation and broader adoption of Web3 solutions to be unlocked through the world's largest cryptocurrency, sources told Cointelegraph. "Since early on, Satoshi predicted that layers being built on top of the Bitcoin blockchain would enable Bitcoin to move beyond being only sound money by adding programmability, which makes Bitcoin the optimal framework to build out Web3 capabilities," noted Alex Miller, CEO of the Web3 developer platform Hiro. The Taproot upgrade took place in November 2021 and laid the foundation for …

SegWit has come a long way since its first appearance during the 2015-2017 blocksize war. However, despite its relative success as a Bitcoin upgrade, crypto exchanges including Binance and Gemini are still not committed to using SegWit addresses for sending Bitcoin (BTC). Implemented in 2017, segregated witness (SegWit) is a soft fork upgrade that separates “witness” data from the base transaction. In an “explain like I’m five” kind of way, SegWit allows for a safer and faster Bitcoin, making scaling the network easier. While most exchanges and individuals were quick to upgrade their infrastructure to take on SegWit, reaching the …

Selecting a timeframe for technical analysis is always a tricky topic, but usually, the longer the trend, the higher the odds it shall prevail. For example, those analyzing the 3-day Bitcoin (BTC) chart will unarguably identify an ascending channel pattern that initiated in late June. Bears will also always find ways to justify their views despite the fact that Bitcoin has hit new all-time highs following the United States consumer price surge to 6.2%, which is the biggest inflation surge in 30 years. However, data from on-chain analytics firm Glassnode shows that long-term investors have stopped net accumulating and are …

The Bitcoin (BTC) network successfully activated the Taproot soft fork following a 90% lock-in consensus from miners and mining pools between blocks 709,488 and 709,632. The milestone signifies the first major upgrade for Bitcoin since August 2017, which saw the launch of Bitcoin’s leading layer-two solution, the Lightning Network and Segregated Witness (SegWit). The Taproot upgrade aims to improve the scripting capabilities and privacy of the Bitcoin network. To do this, the soft fork introduces the concept of Merkelized Abstract Syntax Tree (MAST). According to a Taproot-dedicated website run by prominent Bitcoin developer Hampus Sjöberg: “[MAST] can help make smart …

Real-world use cases are one of the main adoption drivers for every crypto ecosystem, which also holds true for the Bitcoin (BTC) network. In the next seven days, the Bitcoin protocol will undergo a soft fork in the name of Taproot upgrade, which aims to improve the network’s privacy, efficiency and smart contracts capability. Taproot is Bitcoin’s first major upgrade since August 2017, which saw the introduction of Segregated Witness (SegWit) and resulted in the launch of Lightning Network. While the previous fork primarily sought to fix transaction malleability and improve Bitcoin’s network scalability, the Taproot upgrade aims to revamp …

The latest rally in the Cardano (ADA) market has activated a classic bearish pattern that threatens to lower its prices by as much as 15%. Dubbed as a rising wedge, the textbook pattern forms when the price consolidates between upward sloping resistance and support trendlines. Its occurrence typically prompts a bearish reversal, confirmed by a voluminous break below the lower trendline. The profit target during such a negative move comes to be as below as the maximum wedge height. ADA/USD currently ticks all the boxes for forming a falling wedge pattern, as shown in the chart below. The pair now …

Cardano blockchain’s native asset, ADA, reached a new record high on Monday as investors pinned hopes on an upcoming smart contracts feature that expects to boost the cryptocurrency’s adoption. The ADA/USD exchange rate topped out at $2.899 around 9:00 am UTC, raising anticipations that it would easily close above $3 in the coming sessions. Many analysts, including pseudonymous chartist PostyXBT, noted that the Cardano token had entered a “price discovery mode.” Meanwhile, David Gokhshtein hinted that ADA/USD might continue its bull run until Sep. 12, the day Cardano is going to integrate a smart contracts feature to its blockchain via …

On June 12, Bitcoin (BTC) mining pool Slush Pool mined block 687,285 with the transaction including a Taproot upgrade activation signal. That particular block was the 1,816th to include a signal for Taproot activation by a BTC miner within the difficulty epoch that lasted from May 30 to June 13. With 2,016 blocks created every difficulty period, crossing 1,816 blocks with a Taproot activation signal satisfied the 90% signaling threshold required to lock in the upgrade. This event meant that Taproot, Bitcoin’s first protocol upgrade in over four years, was set for its activation phase to be expected in mid-November. …

The Taproot upgrade has achieved the first significant milestone on the road to activation as 90% of the Bitcoin (BTC) mining hash rate signaled for the protocol improvement within the current difficulty epoch. Data from Taproot.watch, a webpage created by Bitcoin developer Hampus Sjöberg, shows the lock-in stage is now completed. All recognized mining pools signaled for the upgrade with Slush Pool being the first to do so. It is perhaps fitting that Slush Pool also mined block 687285 that sealed the Taproot lock-in. TAPROOT LOCKED IN AT BLOCK 687285 BY SLUSHPOOL pic.twitter.com/FFDdibtmGt — pourteaux (@pourteaux) June 12, 2021 AntPool …

Disclaimer: This article has been updated to reflect that BTC.Top has begun signaling for Taproot activation. The top-10 Bitcoin (BTC) mining pools by hash rate distribution are now signaling for Taproot activation with BTC.Top being the latest among them as of the time of writing. Indeed, 90% of Bitcoin’s hash rate briefly signaled for the protocol upgrade with the figure now standing at about 73%. Tweeting on Monday, crypto exchange giant Binance announced that Binance Pool had begun signaling for Taproot. According to the Taproot Signal Twitter bot, Binance Pool’s maiden Taproot signal occurred at block height 683,878. Based on …

The road to the Taproot upgrade finally coming in 2021 is already underway, with major Bitcoin (BTC) mining pools already signaling support. According to data from Taproot.watch, a webpage created by Bitcoin developer Hampus Sjöberg, Taproot signaling now accounts for about 44% of the total Bitcoin hashing power as of the time of writing. AntPool and F2Pool — the two largest Bitcoin mining pools by hash rate — are among the earliest supporters of the Taproot activation in the mining arena. Other pools in support are Foundry USA and Slush Pool, with the latter responsible for mining the first signaling …