What a difference a few days can make to the value of cryptocurrencies against the US dollar.
Traders were in the doldrums and wailing over the falling price of Bitcoin and other cryptos last week.
This week, the values have rallied, dropped back and bounced back a little more again.
Bitcoin ended the week at around $6,200 – a price traders lamented as too cheap to make mining worthwhile.
Now, Bitcoin is trading around $6,700 with a 6.22% daily gain after spiking at just over $7,000 across the weekend.
Other cryptos have followed the Bitcoin profile over the weekend, with XRP Ripple again performing well at 9.22% up at $0.4597.
EOS has also showed resilience at 7% up on the day at $5.65.
At the other end of the crypto world, Modum has tanked by 23% on the day, down to $1.17 and Tether has had a bad time, losing 5% to sink to $0.92.
Start up’s ambition for Middle East
Start up Menachain Solutions is promising to revolutionise banking and payments in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) by developing what the company wants to be the region’s most-used digital currency.
Around 440 million people – 84% of the population – have no banking access, so Menachain wants to cash in with an Islamic cryptocurrency offering an ecosystem based on:
- MenaPay – a gateway for transactions and a utility token
- MenaCash – a US dollar pegged stable coin
Backed by the Saudi royal family, MenaPay hopes to have 5 million users by May 2019.
“MenaPay is what people and companies needed not only in Saudi Arabia, but also for the whole Islamic world in MENA. We strongly believe that MenaCash is going to be the most holistic currency in the Saudi Arabia. It will also be the solution for 84% unbanked population in MENA by decreasing transaction time and costs while being transparent and secure at the same time,” said a spokesman.
Mining malware loads in a flash
A Monero mining malware app is masquerading as an Adobe Flash update to lure computer users into downloading and running the software.
The cryptojackers trick people to load the software by opening a screen offering to update Flash online with a click of an ‘agree’ button.
“In most cases, fake Flash updates pushing malware are not very stealthy,” said Brad Duncan, threat analyst for online security consultancy Unit 42. “Because of the legitimate Flash update, a potential victim may not notice anything out of the ordinary.”
