Litecoin has had a great run this year as it was once up over 300%. However, like all Cryptocurrencies in July, Litecoin has also pulled back as well.
With the halving event one week away, will the event help Litecoin price leg up like it has in the past? The block mining reward halves every 840,000 blocks, and this one will see it decrease from 25 to 12.5 coins. It’s a simple supply and demand equation and should make owning Litecoin more valuable.
After hitting the daily supply at $137, Litecoin has pulled back almost 50%, but has since bounced off the daily demand at $75. The chart suggests it’s going to be tough for the halving event to serve as the catalysts for the next leg up because recently the buyers failed to take out the sellers.
In additional, even if the daily supply at is taken out, the buyers have another battle with the sellers at the daily supply at $124.
The chart suggests this time around the halving event served as a buy the rumor, sell the news type of play.
This post is my personal opinion. I’m not a financial advisor, this isn’t financial advise. Do your own research before making investment decisions.
Yesterday I bought myself (another) 75 KuCoin Shares (KCS).
Yes, I know that my previous post was all about the KuCoin Exchange (The Best Crypto Exchange just got Even Better! (Again)). I apologise for the lack of variety, but this is important and time is of the essence! Similarly, I can’t just write another “Shopping Cart” post and risk you missing this important buy!
I bought those 75 KuCoin Shares (trading STEEM and Ethereum for them) in order to be able to take part in the latest KuCoin programme. Of course they only released this information after my last post – Murphy’s Law at work once again!
So what is the latest KuCoin programme (as if they haven’t already launched enough new initiatives this month already!)?
This is it:
From https://www.kucoin.com/news/en-kucoin-will-launch-the-kcs-lockup-cash-back-program-and-burn-plan
Of course, if you follow me on Twitter, then you probably already know this:
From https://twitter.com/brain_bit
If you have a Twitter account and you don’t want to follow me… then, well, I guess I’m sorry – I don’t know how to cure “stupid”.
What is the KuCoin Lockup Plan?
The lockup plan is a three-month lockup of KuCoin Shares on the KuCoin exchange. In other words, it’s a staking contract. The more you stake, the more you can earn. Importantly, the sooner you stake, the more you can earn too. And that’s where it gets impressive:
Recently I staked my WAX coins on their new native (EOS-cloned) blockchain. Returns on that contract amount to 100% over a period of 3 years, which I think is very good! But the KuCoin figures are even better: returns are far higher, working out to a rate which equates to an estimated annual ROI of 50%. Over the three-month period of their staking contract, that works out to just over a 10% return. Not bad for three months, especially with no work involved! That is, quiet simply, the best staking contract I know of in crypto. By far. Yeah you could also get those sort of returns by running the right crypto masternode, but that would probably be considerably more risky – and possibly a lot more expensive.
To get into the KuCoin Staking contract you will need a minimum of 200 KCS. The news of this opportunity caused a price rise in KCS, the tokens have gone up from around $1.30 each to around $1.60. Thus (at time of writing) it will cost you a minimum of $320 to get into the programme – which isn’t cheap, but I consider it to be well worth it if you have the money available! There is a good chance that prices may drop after the staking contract closes, but I really don’t care: KCS is a long-term hold and will no doubt shoot up in price as the platform gets busier (As it has before – to an ATH of $20.17).
Set your alarms:
The lockup plan works as follows: it runs for the month of August, but those who lockup first stand to score the most. Estimated returns start at an annual rate of 50%, but then drop off by 0.5% every day thereafter, so you want to lockup on day one! The staking contract opens on 1 August (I assume directly after midnight) and the time zone used for that is UTC +8. In other words, the contract opens at 16:00 UTC on 31 July, at least I think it does.
For the whales out there, there is a maximum daily lockup amount of 10000 KCS. There is another limit that applies to everyone: a maximum of 500 000 KCS can be locked per day, so don’t wait too long! If you do miss day one or two, it isn’t the end of the world, 49% annual ROI on day three is still pretty darn fantastic! Even if you lockup on the final day of the month, the annual ROI rate will still be 35%, which stillbeats practically any other staking contract! The entire lockup programme will stop if and when 5 000 000 KCS is locked. This could happen in as little as 10 days, or it may not happen at all. Here is an added bonus: however much is locked up in the programme (in total), that same amount of KCS will be burnt in December 2019. KuCoin are burning KCS like wildfire at the moment (check my previous KuCoin post), a trend which seems to be continuing. This is great for KCS holders, especially when they are getting more KCS for free! If 5 000 000 KCS is burnt, that will mean that the total amount of KCS in existence drops by 2.8%! If you prefer to work with circulating amount (which I do not advise), then that percentage rises to 5.6%! Remember: you can always check out the latest information about KCS specifically at the KCS dashboard at https://kcs.kucoin.com
You don’t have much to lose
For those who fear that KCS price will drop radically during the three-month staking period, take heart: you can cap your USD losses at 10%. This is because KuCoin have built a safety net into the system: they have a guaranteed service that works like this (in their own words):
After the KCS unlocks, KuCoin provides a service for repurchasing the user’s locked KCS at the price of 10% off the average KCS price (USDT price) on the day of the user’s lockup
What this allows you to do is to turn your recently unlocked KCS into USDT a price of 10% less than what it was worth during the lockup period. The programme is thus not only a good way to buildup your crypto holdings, but also a way to hedge against drops in the market! This offer expires 24 hours after unlocking and is only valid as long as you have not traded or moved your KCS.
On the downside, tokens locked into the new programme do not earn the usual daily staking rewards that KuCoin offers to KCS holders. However, those rewards are FAR less than what you stand to gain by participating.
Conclusion
I fully intend to lock up my KCS for this period, and I will do so as soon as I can. For those who don’t hold KCS, I think that the rise in the token price has been minimal and that it is still well worth your time to participate. I truly believe that KCS is an excellent token to hold and that it is greatly undervalued. I also firmly believe that KuCoin is a fantastic exchange. I’ve been using it for nearly two years now and I am 100% happy with it, in fact it often exceeds my expectations!
Following hot on the heels of “Soft Staking”, KuCoin is obviously focusing on staking lately and their offerings in this regard are extremely impressive. I hope they continue in this vein, if they do it should win them many new customers. I do not know what will happen after the three month lockup period ends, I know that your staked KCS will be returned to you, but I don’t know if another programme will follow thereafter, I hope it does! Perhaps it will become an annual event, who knows? At this stage information is still limited. Read the latest of KuCoin’s own articles about the the lockup here: “KuCoin Will Launch The KCS Lockup & Cash Back Program and Burn Plan”
If you are not a KuCoin user yet, please consider clicking my “KuCoin” banner in my signature and signing up wit my referral link. I get tiny amounts of some of your transaction fees if you do, for which I would be most grateful. While you are at it… remember that Nash goes live next month!
From https://twitter.com/brain_bit
Nash and its NEX token should become big names in the world of crypto exchanges. After its launch, I see Nash being the best DEX by far, even better than Binance DEX. Initially trading pairs will be limited, but that will change with time. The highly advanced Nash platform and the myriad added features should make it extremely attractive to investors and crypto traders alike. I have built up a relatively big stack of NEX which I am hoarding jealously. I strongly recommend that you look into NEX if you have not already done so.
In the meantime, why not sign up so long? Once again, I have a referral link in my signature. You HAVE to use a referral link to sign up – there is no option to sign up without one. This is designed into the system to help spread the word. The referral link gives you entry into a competition: you can win BTC and NEX by signing up. The lucky draw is at the end of the year, and the more people you refer with your own code (that you will get after signing up), the more entries you get into the competition. I have never been this excited about the launch of an exchange before!
Yours in great crypto exchanges Bit Brain
Attribution: Featured image from https://www.kucoin.com/news/en-kucoin-will-launch-the-kcs-lockup-cash-back-program-and-burn-plan
Yours in crypto
Bit Brain
“The secret to success: find out where people are going and get there first”
~ Mark Twain
“Crypto does not require institutional investment to succeed; institutions require crypto investments to remain successful”
Active trading is more than just reading charts. Sentiment, news announcements and sometimes just simple logic can all play a part in making a trade, especially one that offers a big move.
That’s what Guy Gentile did trading Beyond Meat (BYND)
How One Guy Crushed It Trading Beyond Meat
Beyond meat is a meatless food company (think burgers, etc.). They had an initial public offering back in late May and the stock had basically skyrocketed since.
The hype around the company and stock was a big part of that. Kind of like anything “new” that gets the “this is the next big thing to boom” vibe throughout the masses.
Granted meatless food products isn’t new, but they have a burger that is apparently very good and used that fact to expand like crazy and then raise a ton of money to fund it.
Either way there were plenty of signs, that atleast in the near-term the stock was far ahead of itself.
Higher Valuation Than JetBlue and Coors?
As shared in @rollandthomas post has beyond meat seen its best days the value of beyond meat had blown past some rather larger companies that do way more business such as beer maker coors and airline operator jetblue.
I’m sure the meatless burger is good, but can they sell enough to generate more revenue than the two companies above?
The chart also gives us a nice indication that things may be a bit ahead of themselves…..
There is always a Catalyst
As you can see the stock ripped higher into earnings and gave us a nice doji candle meaning the buyers were not fully in control anymore.
Now it was just a matter of what happened at earnings. Here is the thing though, the hype around the stock was so high that even an earning beat might mean a sell off. Buy the rumor sell the news is a mantra for a reason.
Shorting with Leverage and Safety to Crush It
Mr. Gentile made a big play with the use of options (which is good cus it establishes your risk up front) by buying weekly put options heading into the earnings announcement.
If the stock goes down he has the right to buy the stock at those lower prices or he can just sell the put option for the higher valuation it has at that point.
With the stock trading around 230 on Friday he bought 230 strike prices down to the 215’s in 5 point increments, thousands of them. If he was right he gets paid. If he was wrong he loses only what he spent no more.
Well, he was right and the stock is down 30 plus point from Friday’s close. Just booking the profits by closing out those put options is a homerun.
However, he leveled up (and did take on my risk) by selling a bunch of the 220 calls that expire this week. Basically if the price of BYND closed below 220 this friday he will also keep all the premium collected from selling those calls.
Conviction Meets Size
There are times to make regular trades and times to load up. He saw this as a time to load the truck up and get paid. You won’t always be right, but to make real money actively investing you need to take the occasional big swing when all the signs line up.
Just be sure that if you are wrong it doesn’t knock you out of the game. Never put yourself in a position where one trade can blow out your whole account. Always live to trade another day.
You can read a detailed article about the trade including an interview with Mr. Gentile here:
NANO seen from the temporality of 1D we can see how the price has made an upward movement after making a tweezer bottom at 0.9083, in the upward movement has made a correct structure of three points so we should expect a decline in the price to the area indicated in the chart within a blue rectangle that is located within the price range of 1.1320 – 1.2082, the bulls will be located in that zone of demand where the price should have a positive reaction, otherwise, the price would be put into a bearish structure.
NANO seen from the temporality of 4H we can observe more closely the movement of the candles within this structure, we see how the price has drawn us a double ceiling near the weekly supply, this setup is a reversal of trend so it would support our operation and zone of demand mentioned above. In the chart above I have also drawn the possible trajectory that the price should follow over the next few days.
In conclusion, the current structure of the price movement is very good to look for a next long entry, for this we must wait for the price reaction once it reaches the demand zone located within the price range of 1.1320 – 1.2082, a continuation setup (ABCDE) must be formed to continue towards our objective that I have pointed out in the first graph above located at 1.7799.
As I always say, you have to be aware of the movement, invalidations can occur, there is no 100% reliable analysis, take your own precautions when trading.
Beyond Meat priced its initial public offering at $25 and now the stock is up more than 800% since the IPO. Beyond Meat, a maker of plant-based meat products is the new IT THING on Wall Street because they are trailblazing a new secular movement away from animal protein.
Beyond Meat had their second
quarterly earnings announcement yesterday.
Although they reported a second quarter loss of $9.4 million, sales
nearly quadrupled from a year ago. In
additional, Beyond Meat raised its revenue guidance for 2019 to $240 million on
Monday, up from more than $210 million previously.
“Growth in net revenues for the second quarter of 2019 was driven primarily by an increase in sales of the Beyond Burger, expansion in the number of retail and food service points of distribution, including new strategic customers, as well as greater demand from our existing customers,” Chief Financial Officer Mark Nelson said in a conference call Monday afternoon.
However, shares tanked in after hours trading after they announced that it would be selling an additional 3.25 million shares of common stock. Three million of these shares are held by current stockholders, and 250,000 shares will be newly issued and are set to trade on August 1. Although the additional shares dilute earnings/profits, the money will go towards expanding the business.
However, it didn’t matter as investor took profits and short sellers took the opportunity to short the stock because they say the stock price as being overvalued.
That valuation is higher than that of roughly 25% of the companies in the S&P 500 index, including decades-old industry stalwarts like Molson Coors, Viacom, Under Armour, and JetBlue. At its Friday morning levels, Beyond Meat’s market cap was twice the size of Macy’s.
But while investors might still be hungry for this stock, experts’ appetites are starting to wane.
“My understanding is it’s a good product, but … from a valuation standpoint, it’s beyond ridiculous,” Quint Tatro, chief investment officer at Joule Financial, said Thursday on CNBC’s “Trading Nation.” “The company is trading at 100 times sales, 300 times cash, so … it’s not a matter of whether it’s justified at this price. It’s can they actually keep growing to justify this valuation?”
For context, Microsoft — which, at over $1 trillion, is the most valuable company in the market — trades at eight times sales and eight times cash. Amazon, a $970 billion company, trades at about four times sales and 20 times cash, Tatro said.
All in all, his thesis on Beyond Meat is simple: “It’s a no-touch.”
Personally I think it was a great move to raise capital to expand aggressively because the competition is coming. If you believe Beyond Meat is a 10 year story vs. the latest fad, there are two daily demand zones to pay attention to for an opportunity to go long.
This post is my personal opinion. I’m not a financial advisor, this isn’t financial advise. Do your own research before making investment decisions.
Not-for-profit organisation OpenAI (co-founded by Elon Musk) and Microsoft have formed a $1bn strategic partnership focused on integrating Microsoft’s Azure cloud platform with its on-going work.
The two firms will jointly develop Azure AI supercomputing technologies, but also focus on creating artificial general intelligence(AGI).
OpenAI will port its existing services to Microsoft’s cloud and use Microsoft as preferred partner for marketing commercialised AI technologies.
Analysis and Comments
The main difference between AI and AGI is that AGI is not developed for a specific application and therefore more multi-functional in nature. So, while an AI can be incredibly good at one task (e.g. screening scans for cancer), the aim for AGIs is to have the ability to perform any task that a human can.
Some experts have predicted the development of an AGI to be achieved as early as 2030, however, most lean towards later dates, such as the year 2060 or even 2099.
Regardless, OpenAI has already achieved several impressive milestones in the AI world, for example, by setting new benchmarks for robot dexterity, with one of its video gaming bots recently beating human champions at Dota 2, while one of its text-generation systems can write anything from fake news articles to convincing song lyrics and short stories.
Amazon Air includes 50 planes and several new regional hubs, including a $1.5 billion hub opening in northern Kentucky in 2021. Amazon’s play into logistics and shipping is so they can lower their shipping cost and control their destiny of getting that package to your house…the so called “last mile.” Amazon even had the nerve to in their 2018 annual financial filing to list “transportation and logistics services” as competitors for the first time. However, according to UPS Amazon is years away from this happening.
UPS Inc. (NYSE: UPS) reported on Wednesday, July 24 that next-day air volumes in its second quarter surged by 30 percent over the year-earlier period, a pace of year-on-year gains that no one can ever recall. The numbers were likely skewed by volumes from e-tailer Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ: AMZN) which migrated to UPS after FedEx Corp. (NYSE: FDX) said in early June that it wouldn’t renew its U.S. air services contract with Amazon.
Still, coming on the heels of UPS reporting an 8 percent year-on-year increase in the first quarter, Wednesday’s results indicate that after 20 years in the desert, next-day air has found a trend – namely the push toward one-day delivery spearheaded by Amazon’s move to compress delivery commitments for users of its “Prime” service – it can sink its teeth into.
However, UPS was downgraded by Stifel’s today with a $118 target price. Stifel stated that investors may want to consider waiting for a better opportunity to buy the “large, improving cash flow machine” of a company. Was the downgrade, random or planned? The downgrade occurred right when price came into daily and monthly supply, so the downgrade wasn’t random….this is just how Wall Street works.
This post is my personal opinion. I’m not a financial advisor, this isn’t financial advise. Do your own research before making investment decisions.
In Elliott Wave terms, CPT began a wave one advance in August 2018. The red wave one (blue sub-waves i-ii-iii-iv-v) finished in October 2018, and the red wave two (blue sub-waves a-b-c) correction ended on July 21 this year. If this wave count is correct, CPT should be heading next towards the October 2018 peak in the red wave three.
The Semiconductors have been on fire as of late. Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSM) is the world’s largest manufacturer of semiconductors beat analyst estimates for sales for this past quarter and signaled a rebound in the chip sector. Memory chipmaker Micron Technology (MU) reported better-than-expected earnings and say it expects demand to recover in the second half.
But are all Semiconductors on fire. Off the top of my head, I would say no and suggest stick to the name brand semis. However, a fellow mate wanted me to look at three semis: NVIDIA Corporation (NVDA) and Himax Technologies, Inc. (HIMX).
NVIDIA Corporation (NVDA)
Nvidia needs no introduction, but just to remind you, not only is Nvidia the leader in gaming, but also the leader in supplying chips needed for artificial intelligence and high performance computing the data center arena and driverless vehicle market. NVidia was once up over 300%. However, NVidia sold off with the Markets from its all-time high of $289.39 per share back in October. Nevertheless, the stock is up over 20% YTD.
The bullish investing thesis on Nvidia (NASDAQ:NVDA), the current leader in GPUs, is pretty clear. GPUs work better than CPUs for artificial intelligence applications and as a result, the chip maker — and NVDA stock — seem well positioned in a market with what is essentially huge growth potential.
If price is going to get to $200, it must get through this band of support / resistance.
Himax Technologies, Inc. (HIMX)
Himax fabless semiconductor company, provides display imaging processing technologies in China, Taiwan, the Philippines, Korea, Japan, Europe, the United States, and internationally. The company creates semiconductors for touch screen displays, microdisplays like smart glasses and VR goggles, images sensors for cameras, and more. However, its down over 60% the last several years and was down 61% in 2018. But as some of the new technologies continue to develop, Himax products may soon be more in demand.
First and foremost, its CMOS image sensor business is a promising one. As the world looks for better ways to secure and protect arenas, airports, train stations, and more, Himax may be working on the solution. In fact, the company is working on a machine-vision sensor product line with Emza at the moment. Essentially, machine vision gives an automated way to detect threats in these areas, and considering the market at the moment, demand for its WiseEye AIoT intelligent vision solution could see momentum. There’s also promise in the LCoS business, which is being used in Google’s AR device. While the device from Google may not generate significant revenue for a few years, the product is slated to be met with high demand and gives the company the ability to boost margins in the long run. Finally, the company’s 3D sensing arm could see strong demand as smartphone manufacturers look to include the latest and greatest technologies in their upcoming product launches.
Right now price is at a major monthly support/resistance line at $3.25. If this level doesn’t hold, the chart suggest price will head down to the monthly demand at $1.40 where is would be selling at a major discount. Even if the $3.25 level holds, the next test would be the $5.15 level. I personally would think it would be a buy above $5.15 and a bigger buy at $1.40.
This post is my personal opinion. I’m not a financial advisor, this isn’t financial advise. Do your own research before making investment decisions.
Since volume keeps on diminishing and trading activity slows down due to narrowing prices I am trying to get the most positive scenario thus I am considering the possibility of being in a “Falling Wedge” Pattern:
The falling wedge pattern is characterized by a chart pattern which forms when the market makes lower lows and lower highs with a contracting range. When this pattern is found in a downward trend, it is considered a reversal pattern, as the contraction of the range indicates the downtrend is losing steam. When this pattern is found in an uptrend, it is considered a bullish pattern, as the market range becomes narrower into the correction, indicating that the downward trend is losing strength and the resumption of the uptrend is in the making. (Source)
If this pattern is triggered, the most likely result would be the continuation of the trend previous to the pattern, so UPTREND…towards 14000 USD.
But then, you have another pattern in formation, this time is the other face of the coin…
Yep, a very bearish pattern here, pointing towards 4800 USD.
In my opinion, nowadays we have a 50/50 chances on one of the both options so, very difficult to take a decision now… we have to wait for one of the two get triggered and follow the trend.
What about you?
Let’s see what is the opinion of the audience here.
I am curious to read what is your opinion about which of the two proposals are more likely to happen next. I will upvote all the comments on that regards.
Disclaimer: This is just my personal point of view, please, do your own assessment and act consequently. Neither this post nor myself is responsible of any of your profit/losses obtained as a result of this information.
