NetworkNewsWire Newsroom: September 2018

Friday, September 28, 2018

IBM, Other Blockchain Industry Veterans to Inform at First Annual Blockchain Shift Conference in Miami

New kids on the blockchain are entering the cryptocurrency market in the wake of its climb to astronomical heights last year, the result of exuberance over the the open-source ledger’s technology and its potential to reduce dependence on governmental fiat currencies while building a secure and transparent record of business transactions. The first annual Blockchain Shift conference, set in Miami, is a place for this rising generation of fintech entrepreneurs and investors to network and become better informed about the diverse industries adapting the technology for market purposes.

The October 11-12 tech conference will include elected leaders, Wall Street veterans, regulators and crypto enthusiasts in a caldron of Miami convention culture that seeks to advance the democratization of finance. The conference is particularly valuable to startups, which will gain a chance to energize their crowdfunding drives with a presentation stage.

Among the key speakers presenting insights on the technological revolution in the world of business and finance, IBM will field six of its experienced managers at three events.

Distinguished Engineer Christopher Ferris, IBM’s CTO over Open Technology in the Digital Business Group, will open the conference’s first day of business with a discourse on the Linux Foundation’s Hyperledger Organization, an open source community where the smartest engineering minds could gather to solve the challenges involved in adapting blockchain technology to innovative new uses. Ferris has technical responsibility for all of IBM’s strategic open source and standards initiatives and represents IBM on the Hyperledger Governance Board. He will talk about how Hyperledger came into being, how it grew from its initial vision into a mature community of focused engineers, what the varied active and incubating projects are, and what he believes are some of the key new innovations to look for in the coming year.

Later in the day, former IBM Global Business Development Executive for Media and Entertainment Bartt C. Kellermann, now the founding CEO of Global Capital Acquisition and its worldwide “Battle of the Quants” conferences, will moderate a panel discussion on “Cryptocurrency Trading – The Current and Future Landscape of the Crypto World — Who Will Survive and Where Will Prices be at the End of the Year?”

On the second day, Adam Mastrelli of IBM Blockchain Ecosystem’s Strategy and Business Development section will moderate a panel titled “Women in Blockchain — Leaders of the Blockchain Paving the Way for Gender Diversification” that will feature IBM Blockchain Product Manager Laura Loughran, IBM Blockchain’s Blockchain Offering Manager Carolyn Rogers and IBM Cloud Worldwide Technical Vice President of Innovation and Technologies Rene Bostic.

Loughran is currently bringing to market the IBM Food Trust Solution, a Blockchain ecosystem dedicated to transparency and accountability in the food chain. Rogers is responsible for the go-to-market strategy for the company’s blockchain platform. Bostic leads the Cloud technical sales mission for IBM’s varied services.

For more information, visit https://blockchainshift.io/

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2018 iBlockchain Summit to Feature 30+ Speakers and 60+ Exhibitors from 40+ Countries Focusing on Blockchain Trends in Asia

Summit is in Guangzhou, located 50 miles north of Hong Kong; agenda will focus on blockchain trends in Asia and how supply chains will be affected
Two-day event will be packed with speakers from blockchain investors and funds; keynoters will include Christopher Emms, CEO at TokenKey Ltd., and Brad Maclean, Gatecoin COO
Topics to be discussed include how to turn blockchain technology into a commercial advantage, the application of blockchain technology and market forecasts into the future

The 2018 iBlockchain Summit will offer a comprehensive program of blockchain trends in Asia from experts in the technology, investors and leaders of the industry. It will be held on November 2-3 at the Guangzhou Baiyun International Convention Center. Guangzhou is a destination outside of Hong Kong that’s extremely popular for its international trade fairs.

2018 iBlockchain Summit’s speaker lineup will highlight industry experts, investors and leaders. Keynoters will include Yoram Golandsky, general partner with Smart Ventures; Lee Willson, founding president of World Blockchain Foundation; Paul Liu, president and founder of Fast Access Blockchain; and Aly Madhavji, fund partner with Blockchain Founders.

Topics to be discussed will include, ‘Does Blockchain Really Need An Operating System?’; ’How To Prevent Fraud In Blockchain Projects?’; and ‘The Importance Of Accurate And Timely Market Information.’

For more information, visit www.iBlockchainSummit.com

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Marifil Mines Ltd. (TSX.V: MFM) (OTCQB: MFMLF) Well-positioned in Argentina Mining Boom

Marifil exploring for gold, lithium and cobalt in metals-rich South American zone
Argentina aims to capture as much as 45 percent of lithium market; investments in country’s lithium resource have grown tenfold since 2011
Marifil’s recent drilling at San Roque property yields good results, with a 19-meter intersection of 1.89 grams per tonne gold

As a metal exploration boom elevates the prospects of Argentina’s mining industry, Canada-based Marifil Mines Ltd. (TSX.V: MFM) (OTCQB: MFMLF) continues to examine the prospects of its properties through drilling and sampling techniques. The company is focused on exploring for gold, lithium and cobalt because of their significant commercial potential, and on September 11, it published the results of its most recent round of exploration drilling on its San Roque property within the Province of Rio Negro, near the Atlantic coast, that significantly add to the advancement of the property (http://nnw.fm/RzvM3).

The San Roque property is held by Minas San Roque S.A., which is jointly owned by Marifil Mines (51 percent) and NovaGold Resources Inc. (TSX: NG) subsidiary NovaGold Argentina Inc. (49 percent). Marifil is the project operator. It is an advanced-stage exploration project that encompasses some 42,320 hectares (104,575 acres) of mineral rights wherein significant gold-silver-indium-lead-zinc epithermal sulphide mineralization (http://nnw.fm/U7Uso) has now been drilled by 112 holes.

Results from the latest four drill holes are highlighted by a 19.8 meter intersection of 1.86 g/t Au near the surface, adding substantially to the extent of a gold mineralized area known as Zone 34. The company believes that Zone 34 holds potential for discovery of a heap leachable gold deposit similar to those found in Nevada. In another hole more than a kilometer away on Zone 33, a drill hole hit a composited intersection of 83 meters at 0.50 g/t Au, which also contains significant lead and zinc sulfide mineralization.

An NI 43-101 resource report has not been completed on the San Roque site, but, in the company’s judgment, there exists large volumes of mineralized earth within six distinct zones scattered across four square kilometers of its land holdings. All of these zones are open to expansion by further drilling.

Although the gold mining sector has seen little interest from investors this year because of a lackluster price for the precious metal and a dearth of new mining projects, recent M&A activity has increased market optimism (http://nnw.fm/X0uWa), and Marifil has been undaunted about its exploration, noting in its news release that it has arranged a round of private placement financing for gross proceeds of $1 million, subject to regulatory approval.

Marifil’s Las Aguilas property in central Argentina is currently the country’s largest known nickel and cobalt-producing site, and the company’s 15,267-plus hectares (37,726 acres) of Puna grasslands are located within the famed ‘Lithium Triangle’, where that metal has been found in abundance to form a zone crossing national boundaries between Argentina, Chile and Bolivia.

Lithium, cobalt and nickel have become particularly attractive to junior miners in recent years because of their vital importance in the low-heat, high-efficiency lithium-ion batteries that power most of the world’s computer technology. The worldwide growth of interest in environmentally friendly electric vehicles has drawn attention to the limited supplies of cobalt and lithium, in particular, as automakers and national governments have raced to ensure a secure pipeline for their concerns.

Argentina expects to become a lithium superpower by increasing its share of the world’s supply from about 16 percent of the market now to as much as 45 percent by extracting the metal from brines in the Puna, described as the “Saudi Arabia of lithium” (http://nnw.fm/Bjkk5).

Mining Secretary Mariano Lamothe told Chile’s Strategic Excellence in Mining conference last month that Argentina could be producing 290,000 metric tons per year of lithium by 2023 (http://nnw.fm/Ym6GQ). Until Argentina’s government switched from a mining-averse stance to economic development friendliness two years ago, only one company was producing lithium on a commercial scale from Argentina’s brine deposits. Since then, lithium production has increased by nearly 60 percent (http://nnw.fm/mGJ54).

Lamothe told the conference that Argentina is pushing Chile and Bolivia to organize a price index for lithium in order to stabilize market volatility, advancing the possibility that the price could be based on the metal’s carbonate quality, hydroxides, or other technical specifications, according to local media (http://nnw.fm/w9Zh6). According to Lamothe, a metric ton of lithium currently can go for anywhere between $14,000 and $25,000, depending on the producer.

According to Lamothe, investment in the country’s lithium mining potential has grown to 10 times its level in 2011, evidence of booming interest and the country’s potential.

For more information, visit the company’s website at www.MarifilMines.com

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Net Element, Inc. (NASDAQ: NETE) Enabling Global Commerce with Flexible, Multi-Channel Electronic Payment Solutions

Strong financial results reported for Q2 2018, with $32.45 million in revenue, up nine percent over same quarter of previous year
Net Element subsidiary Unified Payments and Payment Club, Inc. raise $7 million to expand subscription-based payment processing service
Company delivers flexible offerings to emerging global markets with diverse banking, regulatory and demographic conditions
Ranked as one of North America’s fastest growing companies on Deloitte’s 2017 Technology Fast 500

Net Element, Inc. (NASDAQ: NETE), a global technology-driven group that specializes in mobile payments and value-added transactional services, continues to add flexible, convenient options to its array of electronic payment solutions. The company’s growth in revenue supports its strategic approach in providing yet another avenue for small and mid-sized businesses to accept cashless payments. News that Net Element subsidiary Unified Payments is launching a subscription-based payment processing service through a partnership with Payment Club, Inc. is a value-added case in point, with $7 million raised to finance related expansion plans (http://nnw.fm/eLiP8).

“Utilizing a transparent subscription-based pricing model combined with the latest technology solutions, Payment Club can provide positive options to frustrated merchants and streamline their payment processes,” Anthony Kutscher, president and co-founder of Payment Club, stated in a news release.

For business owners who are often stymied by rising or hidden costs, this subscription-based cashless payment operating model makes sense in more ways than one by providing access, efficiency and a cost effective service through a subscription-based economy, as detailed in a recent Forbes article (http://nnw.fm/O20ui). Businesses of all stripes are entering a phase where, through subscriptions, cost-effective access to virtually unlimited resources is the new reality, the article asserts. In other words, “businesses don’t have to own the resources they need to enable their business, but rather can pay for efficient access to only the resources they need when they need them.”

Unified Payments’ newly created subscription-based billing engine allows Payment Club and many Independent Software Vendors (ISVs), Value Added Resellers (VARS) and Independent Sales Organizations (ISOs) to bill and manage any payment services and software licenses in a convenient and transparent way, according to an earlier news release (http://nnw.fm/3Tn8K). The turn-key solution includes everything needed for businesses to accept payments in a multi-channel environment, including smart point-of-sale devices for card present transactions and fully integrated point-of-sale systems, as well as online and mobile solutions developed exclusively for Payment Club by Net Element.

“Small businesses often complain about the fees they pay for accepting cashless transactions and the burden it places on their business,” Vlad Sadovskiy, president of integrated payments for Net Element, explained in a news release. “At Unified Payments, we make it fast, easy and affordable to accept cashless payments using the newly introduced subscription-based processing.”

A new independent research report, now available from Fundamental Markets (accessible through registration), highlights Net Element’s progress in building revenue and expanding its roster of electronic payment services (http://nnw.fm/69iHz). In the report, Net Element’s reported revenue for the first quarter of 2018 increased by 17.85 percent, coming in at $15.98 million versus $13.56 million over the same period last year.

For more information, visit the company’s website at www.NetElement.com

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Leading Food Scientist Forum Prominently Features Pressure BioSciences Inc.’s (PBIO) Patented Laboratory Tools

Institute of Food Technologists meeting draws 20,000 participants in food industry, academia and policymaking – IFT is the world’s largest annual meeting of the food industry
Researchers discussed using Pressure BioSciences’ laboratory tools in innovative projects
The company’s current high pressure instruments can be used in studies whose results could help scientists better understand and kill food-borne pathogens, such as E. coli, Listeria, and Salmonella
The company’s future Ultra Shear Technology could result in safer, better-tasting, longer shelf-life and chemical-free food products

Pressure BioSciences Inc.’s (OTCQB: PBIO) high pressure instruments, processing methods and platform technologies were prominently featured at the recent annual meeting of the Institute of Food Technologists (IFT) in Chicago, Illinois. IFT is the world’s largest annual meeting of food industry professionals. Both in scheduled sessions and in the company’s exhibit booth, attendees at IFT2018 were able to hear of groundbreaking progress the company has made in the continuing development of its Ultra Shear Technology (UST) platform. In particular, attendees learned of PBI’s collaborative program with the Ohio State University’s College of Food, Agricultural, and Environmental Sciences, a program funded by the U.S. Department of Agriculture (http://nnw.fm/14yqP).

The IFT’s annual meeting, which drew over 20,000 attendees worldwide from across the food industry, academia and government, is the industry’s largest annual event. The IFT seeks to provide a forum where industry professionals, academics and government representatives can work together to leverage their technical knowledge into applications that will benefit the wider population, particularly in food safety.

Dr. Aliyar Fouladkhah, director of the Public Health Microbiology Laboratory at Tennessee State University (TSU), spoke at the event about his team’s research into developing ways to eliminate pathogens from food. Of interest in this field is the development of a commercially viable way to make food safer with longer shelf-life and with no added chemicals, while retaining its taste, smell, texture, and quality.

In a news release, Fouladkhah said, “I was the co-chair of a special session on the adoption and validation of high pressure-based technologies by the food industry at the recent IFT annual meeting. My research group presented on the effects of high hydrostatic pressure on the inactivation of foodborne pathogens of major public health concern, such as E. coli, Salmonella, Cronobacter, and Listeria. We believe the data we presented, much of it generated with PBI’s high pressure-based instruments, will assist food safety researchers and stakeholders worldwide as they consider the use of pressure-based interventions for their microbiological studies.”

Fouladkhah also voiced confidence that the food science community will require and embrace a continued flow of next-generation equipment, technologies and methods for years to come, and that Pressure BioSciences’ Ultra Shear Technology platform may be one such technology. Currently in development, UST is expected to greatly benefit the food and many other industries, as it is designed to inactivate the most resistant pathogenic organisms in food matrix, resulting in safer and more stable products, Fouladkhah noted.

Pressure BioSciences’ President and CEO Richard T. Schumacher added that his company achieved a number of key goals at the IFT conference. “Our assessment was that IFT 2018 was a highly successful meeting for PBI,” he said in a news release. “Related to our first major goal, we came back from the meeting with a list of food science researchers interested in learning more about how our products could better enable their research programs. Related to our second major goal, we had the opportunity to discuss the power and potential of the UST platform with Key Opinion Leaders in industry, government, and academia worldwide. We learned a lot, met many important and knowledgeable leaders and food industry stakeholders, and had the opportunity to deeply examine current competitive technology platforms.”

Schumacher continued, “Based on what we learned, we made several very important decisions concerning the opportunity for and future path of our UST Program. As our action path unfolds, further highlights of these decisions will be made public over the coming weeks.”

For more information, visit the company’s website at www.PressureBioSciences.com

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Blockchain to Prevent Another Economic Crash?

Like any other system, the global economy is susceptible to failure at many different points. Unfortunately, due to the interconnectedness of the world, an economic crisis in one country could have disastrous consequences for other countries. This was the case during the United States economic crisis of 2008 in which the stock market crashed.

Economic collapse on any scale usually happens as a result of disparities in the system that can easily be overlooked in the absence of clarity. However, blockchain technology could help avoid a financial crisis due to its transparency, security and decentralized mechanism. Cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin are powered by this same technology which acts as a ledger for all transactions carried out on a network.

The endless benefits of the technology have attracted countless investors over the years. Now, it is fast becoming an addition to every major corporation, from IBM and Mastercard to Nasdaq. Its properties are also attractive to financial institutions which constitute the industry that is most in need of the benefits it provides.

The financial crisis of 2008 caused by a lack of transparency, greatly impacted various significant financial institutions and economies on a global scale. Blockchain technology affords banks full transparency, allowing them to spot such a crisis from a mile away. This way, they can take the appropriate preventive measures to ensure that it does not happen again. Banking authorities must make an effort to study the technology and better understand how it can be a force for the prevention of the next financial crisis.

What Was the 2008 Economic Crash?

The economic crash of 2008 was the worst economic disaster in the U.S. and the world since the 1929 Great Depression. The crisis caused a great recession after the cost of housing fell by 31.8%, even lower than that of the Great Depression. Although the crash occurred in 2008, the first signs were observed in 2007 when the prices of homes were too high.

As a result, homeowners began to default on mortgage payments, leading to a downward economic turn which spread to the U.S. financial sector and eventually affected other countries. At the time, houses became extremely cheap, and homeowners were given loans worth up to 100% of the value of their new homes. Taking advantage of the profitable real estate sector, banks also made investments in subprime areas.

The affected institutions stretched from investment banking corporations to commercial banks, insurance companies, and lenders. The situation was so bad that financial institutions had to lay off their staff. Apart from financial institutions, the crisis affected individuals and businesses that were reliant on credit payments at the time. The economic disaster led to massive suffering on the part of businesses because banks stopped giving loans out. They did not trust anyone to pay back the loans due to the state of the economy.

Shortly after the crisis began, the American auto industry was on the edge of destruction and pleaded for a federal bailout. Unfortunately, banks were in the middle of damage control and bailouts were nearly impossible to get. Globally, share prices plunged, and the recession trickled down to other countries.

By the end of the year, most countries in the world including Germany, Japan, and China had gone into an economic recession as well. According to the National Bureau of Economic Research, the great recession had begun in December 2007, making it the third longest recession in the country since World War II.

In Europe, investors who had been involved with real estate securities in the U.S. took a hard hit. The same could be said for investors in smaller countries. However, China and Japan were able to escape that situation but registered huge losses where export was concerned. Their American and European markets were experiencing a fall in demand due to the recession.

Developing countries that depended on foreign investments for growth capital also lost their markets and investments. Since the largest countries were in a recession, the situation became a hopeless one with no chance of an easy recovery. Two years after the end of the recession, the unemployment failed to fall below 9 percent.

Why are Banks Looking to Use This Technology?

Banks are looking to use blockchain technology because its transparency can reduce the issue of financial losses that stem from a lack of it. There are three major ways in which the banks hope to achieve this:

1. Maintaining Financial Security

When banks have a bird’s eye view of all the financial transactions within an economy, it is easier to find discrepancies and adjust them. Due to the immutability and append-only function of a blockchain, it is easy for banks to keep open records of transactions that can be tracked easily.

Tracking cash flow can help institutions find and mitigate economic threats that may arise due to bad policy and bank operations. Using this technology, the banks can determine whether a financial institution, including shadow banks, requires support or control.

Another way that blockchain technology promotes financial security as a way to prevent an economic crisis is by providing access to information. With this information, these institutions can determine risks and potential points of failure within the system. It can also clarify the effects of various monetary policies and help out in the gathering of statistics for research purposes. Generally, if the banks have more information, then they can perform better and cut the costs associated with running separate systems as opposed to a single blockchain.

2. Preventing Fraud

Banks can prevent fraud and bad debtors using smart contracts and digital cryptographic identities. Each institution can create smart contracts between the customers and banks, as well as between the banks and the central bank. This creates an immutable record of the exact terms of the contract and will only execute when the terms are fulfilled. Banks can also avoid loan fraud by using digital identities to find out the loan history of each customer, drastically lowering the chances of bad debt in the process.

The use of a cryptographic ledger ensures that stored information can only be accessed using cryptographic keys which are usually in possession of the owner of that information. A hacker would have to compromise every single system on a network to break such a system. This makes blockchain a secure way to store information.

3. Eliminating Shadow Banking

According to the People’s Bank of China, shadow banking falls into three main asset classes– entrusted loans, trust lending, and banks’ acceptances — which saw a $555 million increase in 2017. Using blockchain technology, banks can eliminate shadow banking since all transactions will be recorded.

Final Thoughts

The financial crisis of 2008 left many nations utterly devastated. The trickle-down affected various sectors even outside the financial sector, resulting in a near collapse of the economy. However, the world moved on from the effects of that event, and most countries have been able to pull themselves out of recession. However, it is essential to take measures that ensure that the crisis is not repeated.

For banks, the best bet may be the use of blockchain technology to securely store data, access information and ensure transparency in the system. Used properly, it can serve as an open system in which all transactions within the economy are recorded. With a clearer view of all banking processes, banks and other financial institutions can successfully prevent another economic crisis.

Originally posted on MintDice.com