Category Archives: News
Mint Adds Coinbase Bitcoin Balances to Investments Dashboard
Mint.com is a free web-based personal financial management service for the US and Canada created by entrepreneur Aaron Patzer and acquired by Intuit in 2009 for $170 million.
Mint is a dashboard to watch all of your investment accounts. The site gathers data from your Fidelity account, your Bank of America account, your credit cards, and even your car loan and mortgage so you can see, at a glance, a single view of your financials and spending.
As Bitcoin is increasing in adoption, and price, it’s important for investors to keep tabs on their Bitcoin holdings. Well, now you can watch your Coinbase balance on Mint.com. Coinbase announced the news on their blog.
“This partnership marks a milestone in the ongoing evolution of bitcoin as Mint becomes the first personal finance and money management tool enabling users to view their bitcoin transactions,” said Coinbase. “We’re proud to serve as Mint’s official wallet for these bitcoin transactions and look forward to seeing continued adoption of bitcoin.”
To add your Coinbase account to Mint, you have to enable your API key and provide it to Mint.
Mint is not the first company to provide this monitoring capability. Venture-backed Bitcoin services company BitGo allows users to monitor all of their Bitcoin balances in one dashboard by entering public Bitcoin addresses.
“BitGo offers Bitcoin portfolio management services for BitGo users. Keep track of all your Bitcoin holdings, even cold storage,” says BitGo’s product description. “Set up email and mobile alerts for activity on any Bitcoin account.”
Bitcoin Week: BitGo CEO, NYC Hearings, TigerDirect, Charlie Shrem
Bitcoin Week
Here is a roundup of the top Bitcoin news from last week.
BitGo CEO Will O’Brien and Bitcoin Foundation General Counsel Patrick Murck appeared on TV in an interview with KING5 tech anchor Renay San Miguel. O’Brien shares his vision of building a “Charles Schwab for Bitcoin” and Murck comments on what it is needed to build stability in the Bitcoin ecosystem. Watch the video footage to learn more.
In news that shocked the Bitcoin world, Bitcoin entrepreneur Charlie Shrem was arrested for conspiracy to commit money laundering. Shrem was vice chairman of the Bitcoin Foundation and CEO of BitInstant, a Bitcoin exchange funded by the Winklevoss twins. Shrem has since stepped down from his post at the Bitcoin Foundation.
In merchant news, Overstock.com has reportedly processed over $1 million in Bitcoin since launching Bitcoin payment processing earlier this month. Overstock.com processed $124,000 on its first day.
Another major online retailer, TigerDirect, also launched Bitcoin payments this past week and processed $250,000 in its first day.
This week, New York State’s top financial regulator, Benjamin M. Lawsky, is hosting a public hearing to discuss the implications and potential of Bitcoin with an invited group of Bitcoin entrepreneurs and investors. In November, the public hearings held in Washington D.C. saw positive sentiment from a Senate Committee. We will see how this hearing plays out.
Charlie Shrem of Bitcoin Foundation and BitInstant Arrested for Money Laundering
Charlie Shrem is a veteran in the Bitcoin space and currently operates two high-level roles: vice chairman of the Bitcoin Foundation and CEO of BitInstant.
In breaking news, Shrem was arrested on charges of conspiring to commit money laundering and operating an unlicensed money-transmitting business, along with a Silk Road user Robert Faiella. In a statement, the DOJ said that Shrem and Faiella were involved in a scheme to sell over $1 million in Bitcoins to users of “Silk Road,” the underground website that enabled its users to buy and sell illegal drugs anonymously and beyond the reach of law enforcement.
Read: The Fall of Silk Road
Shrem (pictured below) was arrested at Kennedy airport in New York, while Faiella was arrested at his home in Cape Coral, Florida.
Manhattan U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara said in the statement: “As alleged, Robert Faiella and Charlie Shrem schemed to sell over $1 million in Bitcoins to criminals bent on trafficking narcotics on the dark web drug site, Silk Road. Truly innovative business models don’t need to resort to old-fashioned law-breaking, and when Bitcoins, like any traditional currency, are laundered and used to fuel criminal activity, law enforcement has no choice but to act. We will aggressively pursue those who would coopt new forms of currency for illicit purposes.”
Shrem was CEO of BitInstant, a Bitcoin exchange that raised funding from the Winklevoss twins and later suspended operations. The Winklevosses issued this statement today.
When we invested in BitInstant in the fall of 2012, its management made a commitment to us that they would abide by all applicable laws – including money laundering laws – and we expected nothing less. Although BitInstant is not named in today’s indictment of Charlie Shrem, we are obviously deeply concerned about his arrest. We were passive investors in BitInstant and will do everything we can to help law enforcement officials. We fully support any and all governmental efforts to ensure that money laundering requirements are enforced, and look forward to clearer regulation being implemented on the purchase and sale of bitcoins.
If these allegations are true, this is bad news for the Bitcoin ecosystem. Charlie Shrem was deeply involved and well known in the ecosystem as a founding member of the Bitcoin Foundation and a CEO of a premier Bitcoin startup. While it is positive news when the government arrests criminals who are misuing Bitcoin, such as Silk Road’s operator, this news is not inspiring when the person involved has a high-profile position in the community.
On Reddit, users were scrambling to understand the implications of this news. One user called Shrem’s case a witch hunt, saying “The US government case against Charlie Shrem is full of legal contradictions.” Another user criticized the government for letting big banks get away with money laundering and making an example of people like Shrem and Faiella, “So are they going to do what they did to HSBC? Just fine them and move along? Or, let me guess, they’re going to get screwed to the wall, financially drained, and serve prison sentences.”
In a trailer for the upcoming documentary The Rise and Rise of Bitcoin posted in May 2013, Shrem was quoted saying “I spend thousands of dollars, every day, on lawyers just to make sure I don’t go to jail.” Shrem’s part starts at 1:20 below.
Below is the full DOJ complaint against Shrem and Faiella.
Entrepreneur Mines Bitcoin Phenomenon – BitGo CEO Talks to KING5 Seattle
Veteran technology entrepreneur Will O’Brien recently took the job as CEO of BitGo, a venture-backed Bitcoin services company offering the industry’s first multi-signature digital wallet.
Having spent the last 4 years in Seattle at casual games juggernaut Big Fish Games, Seattle’s premier TV news station KING5 wanted to catch up with O’Brien to find out about the move to the Bitcoin industry.
“This was the beginning of the Internet all over again,” said O’Brien in an interview with KING. “This was something magical, where companies could be built and an entrepreneur wanting to take a big risk could go after an opportunity here.”
KING5 tech anchor Renay San Miguel interviewed O’Brien and Bitcoin Foundation General Counsel Patrick Murck in a Tech Talk segment that aired on Monday, January 20.
O’Brien said that BitGo has foundational multi-signature technology that is positioning his company to build the Charles Schwab for Bitcoin. “You need two signers – just like two missile keys or two signers on a bank account – to unlock or transfer the (Bitcoin) funds,” he said. “With that foundational technology, we believe we can build a suite of services for both businesses and consumers around monitoring and managing your portfolio, around corporate treasury services, around escrow and other types of services that need to be part of the core infrastructure around financial services based on digital currency.”
Related: James Hong Explains Why BitGo Multi-Signature Wallets Are Most Secure
Watch the video below to see the full segment with Will O’Brien, CEO of BitGo, and Patrick Murck, General Counsel of the Bitcoin Foundation.
Visit bitgo.com and bitcoinfoundation.org to learn more about each organization.
Bitcoin Week: Overstock Takes BTC, BitPay Payroll, PayPal Sentiment
Bitcoin Week
Here is a roundup of the top Bitcoin news from last week.
PayPal President David Marcus tweeted about his belief in Bitcoin, even though his company has yet to integrate the digital currency and is blocking the sale of Bitcoin.
Bitcoin payment processor BitPay announced a new payroll API. “For the longest time the hard question was ‘How do I buy bitcoin?’” said Tony Gallippi, co-founder and CEO of BitPay. “Now the answer is easy: ‘Ask your employer.’”
Overstock.com now accepts Bitcoin, making it the first major online retailer to support Bitcoin. @BitcoinLeah contributed this story.
And more!