2020 could be the year that crypto companies step forward and take the plunge into going public. As the biggest players in the industry cautiously watch for opportunities to gain regulatory approval, Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse used the prestigious Davos World Economic Forum summit to announce that the firm was considering an initial public offering later on in the year. Crypto companies looking to go public face a paradox. Financial firms often have to meet stringent regulatory standards. Failing to adequately reassure regulators can result in companies being frozen out of lucrative markets or forced to shut down altogether. But …

Cardano will become the most decentralized cryptocurrency in the world, 50 to 100 times more decentralized than Bitcoin once all its upgrades are implemented. At least that’s the word according to Cardano co-founder and CEO of IOHK Charles Hoskinson, who caught up with Cointelegraph at CV Summit, a day-long crypto event running alongside the 50th edition of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. Speaking with Cointelegraph’s Kristina Cornèr, Hoskinson said he believes the hard fork, consisting of an implementation of the Ouroboros Bizantine Fault-Tolerant Consensus Protocol, will be seamless and easy. Following the hard fork, the protocol will undergo …

The 50th World Economic Forum is over, and Cointelegraph was happy to cover the most important highlights from the event and reflect on the role of crypto in Davos discussions. The person who knows more than anyone about the potential that our favorite technology could have on the WEF community is its head of blockchain and decentralized ledgers. Sheila Warren joined the WEF team in 2018, several months before the 48th event was held. Since then, she has been working on promoting blockchain within the world’s most influential economic community. I talked with Sheila last year, 11 weeks after she …

Blockchain technology is an important tool in addressing the data protection crisis, Cambridge Analytica whistleblower Brittany Kaiser believes. Kaiser, a former business development director at controversial British data analytics firm Cambridge Analytica, has discussed global data privacy issues in an interview with Cointelegraph on Jan. 23. Currently serving as co-founder at digital intelligence startup Own Your Data Foundation, Kaiser first came into the spotlight during the Cambridge Analytica scandal, which revealed that the firm had collected raw data from up to 87 million Facebook profiles for the Trump campaign. Speaking with Cointelegraph’s head of news Dylan Love at the World …

Last week saw a whole host of world leaders — including United States President Donald Trump and Prince Charles of Wales, along with a number of other prominent dignitaries — come together to attend the 2020 iteration of the World Economic Forum that was held in Davos, Switzerland Jan. 20–24. As part of the five-day event, the WEF announced its decision to establish a global consortium for governing digital currencies — including stablecoins. Following the news, the price of Bitcoin proceeded to swiftly rise from around the $8,200 mark to $8,455 within an hour’s time. The consortium will consist primarily …

Coming every Sunday, Hodler’s Digest will help you track every single important news story that happened this week. The best (and worst) quotes, adoption and regulation highlights, leading coins, predictions and much more — a week on Cointelegraph in one link. Top Stories This Week World Economic Forum debuts framework for central bank digital currency It was a c-c-c-cold week in Davos, but Cointelegraph’s reporters wrapped up warm to bring you all the news from the World Economic Forum. One particularly big announcement saw the WEF unveil a central bank digital currency policymaker toolkit. The framework, created in tandem with …

If you wanted to go deep on blockchain at the World Economic Forum, you needed to attend the conference’s side events. Perhaps the largest of these crypto-friendly events was CV Summit, an all-day conference organized by CV Labs. The Switzerland-based organization (operated by CV VC) endeavors to offer crypto entrepreneurs whatever resources they need to succeed, from fundraising help to coworking space. On Thursday, January 23, that meant offering a full agenda of speakers and panel presentations to crypto-hungry Davos attendees. The docket was loaded with speeches by high-profile crypto people, from MakerDAO’s Rune Christensen to IOHK’s Charles Hoskinson and …

Women are still at risk of being excluded from jobs in fast-growing careers like blockchain and artificial intelligence (AI), a LinkedIn co-founder warned. Allen Blue, co-founder of major professional social network LinkedIn, has raised concerns about occupational inequality in industries like blockchain at the World Economic Forum annual meeting in Davos on Jan. 24. The executive delivered his remarks on the issue in an interview with Abu Dhabi-based news agency The National. The LinkedIn co-founder urged the global community to take measures to prevent the further extension of the gender gap in employment when it comes to jobs of the …

The World Economic Forum (WEF) has created what it claims is the first ever global consortium dedicated to designing a framework for the transnational governance of digital currencies, including stablecoins. A press release shared with Cointelegraph on Jan. 24 reveals that the newly-formed Global Consortium for Digital Currency Governance will focus on the development of interoperable, transparent and inclusive policy approaches to regulating the digital currency space and fostering public-private collaboration in both developed and emerging economies. Tackling fragmentation The WEF says the impetus for the consortium’s creation is a recognition that well-designed global governance remains the key to realizing …

Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse predicts that initial public offerings (IPOs) will become more prevalent in the cryptocurrency and blockchain space in 2020. Speaking at the World Economic Forum in Davos yesterday, Jan. 23, Garlinghouse reportedly hinted that Ripple would itself be one of those firms to seek a public flotation: “In the next 12 months, you’ll see IPOs in the crypto/blockchain space. We’re not going to be the first and we’re not going to be the last, but I expect us to be on the leading side… it’s a natural evolution for our company.” “Natural evolution” An IPO refers to …

Major global economists credit Facebook’s Libra with pushing the world to start reconsidering the United States dollar as anchor currency. At a Jan. 23 panel at the annual World Economic Forum (WEF) in Davos, officials and financial experts discussed one of the most important mechanisms in the global financing system — the U.S. dollar, which has become the world’s reserve currency. Libra evoked a future digital currency Called “Challenging the Dominance of the Dollar,” the panel focused on factors that make the U.S. dollar the world’s dominant payment system and reserve currency, as well as the fact that countries over …

At the World Economic Forum panel discussing digital currencies, the conversation topics included Central Bank Digital Currencies (CBDCs). Calibra’s David Marcus highlighted that regardless of the nature of digital currency, these discussions are key to innovate cross-border payments and solve the issue of the unbanked. Retail CBDCs for consumer access Benoît Coeuré, head of the Bank of International Settlements’ Innovation Hub, revealed that as many as 80 percent of worldwide central banks are interested in CBDCs, primarily of the retail variety. Marcus explained the difference between “retail” and “wholesale” CBDCs: “Central banks could distribute the CBDCs in two possible ways. …