The Merkel: Hardware wallets are secure devices that store the private keys (the unlock mechanism that gives control over the token balances of a public address) in a secure environment, i.e. the device’s flash memory. Storing this information in dedicated equipment is one of the most secure ways to hold any cryptocurrency.The Merkel Tree is a kind of graph,, organized by time of arrival. Used as he format of the BTC block chain, go back far enough and you can guarantee an honest bit coin to some guaranteed limit. Go all the way back and get a full guarantee.
With a hardware wallet, a user can authorize transactions in any computer without having to worry about malware intercepting the private key.
KeepKey offers an innovative hardware wallet, featuring a 3″ OLED screen, a single button to authorize transactions, an aluminum case to house the electronics, and a hardware-based random number generator.
These hacking and theft incidents are not new in the bitcoin world, as several sites have also been victim to malware or phishing attacks. In Loanbase’s case, the hackers were able to access the site’s SQL database and might’ve leaked or used sensitive user information such as email addresses, names, and phone numbers.Two worlds colliding, the idea that someone else made a crypto currency and someone else made an open internet. Ultimately, without even being conscious, we want to 'login' to the vault. We are not malicious, we are sitting at the edge of two conflicting technologies.
Earlier this year, bitcoin exchange Cryptsy also admitted that it suffered a hacking attack that led to even larger losses of 13,000 bitcoin and around 300,000 litecoin. This was accomplished through an IRC backdoor inserted into a bitcoin wallet code, making it act like a Trojan and take control of the site.
Loanbase clarified that these hackers were not able to access bitcoin wallets themselves and cited that they will provide more details on how their WordPress blog had a security loophole.
Users have been requested to change their passwords and update their 2FA to ensure that login information taken by the hackers will no longer be valid once the website is back up.
LA Times: California faces a statewide teacher shortage because so many are leaving the job and so few are entering the profession, according to a new survey released Wednesday. And most school districts surveyed said the problem is getting worse.
The staffing problem is both wide and deep, with 75% of more than 200 districts surveyed reporting difficulties with filling positions and low-income urban and rural areas hit hardest.
A striking picture of this lopsided reality is evident from the shares of the total job gains since the November 2007 pre-recession peak in employment. As the chart shows, of the five-million-plus net jobs added since that high-water mark nine years ago, some 56% went to Hispanics (rightmost green bar), about quadruple their 14% share of the labor force at the time (rightmost blue bar). Meanwhile, 29% of those job gains went to Asians, i.e., about six times their 5% share of the labor force (second set of bars from left). Moreover, 25% of those job gains went to Blacks, i.e., more than double their 11% share of the labor force (third set of bars from left).This may be a case of baby boomers retiring, with few kids.
In sharp contrast, Whites, who made up over 81% of the labor force in 2007 (leftmost blue bar) accounted for negative 9% of the net job gains (red bar). While the percentage shares for these four groups add up to more than 100% because White Hispanics are double-counted as both White and Hispanic, and Black Hispanics are double-counted as both Black and Hispanic, the reality is stark. Whites actually have fewer jobs than nine years ago, while Hispanics, Blacks and Asians together gained all of the net jobs added, and more.
Unlike other wallets, Bitcoin Core does enforce the rules—so if the miners and banks change the rules for their non-verifying users, those users will be unable to pay full validation Bitcoin Core users like you.
As long as there are many non-verifying users who want to be able to pay Bitcoin Core users, miners and others know they can’t effectively change Bitcoin’s rules.
But what if not enough non-verifying users care about paying Bitcoin Core users? Then it becomes easy for miners and banks to take control of Bitcoin, likely bringing to an end this 7 year experiment in decentralized currency.
If you think Bitcoin should remain decentralized, the best thing you can do is validate every payment you receive using your own personal full node such as Bitcoin Core.
We don’t know how many full validation users and business are needed, but it’s possible that for each person or business who validates their own transactions, Bitcoin can remain decentralized even if there are ten or a hundred other non-verifying users. If this is the case, your small contribution can have a large impact towards keeping Bitcoin decentralized.
"It’s not a good situation," said Mayor Bill de Blasio. "It’s going to cost the city a lot of money."
Days before that, Mayor Bill de Blasio delivered some worrying news.
The city's pension funds were not meeting expectations. The city would have to prop them up.
"It's going to be almost three-quarters of a billion dollars – $722 million over the next few years combined," de Blasio said. "So it’s going to be a real negative impact on our budget."
That's because the city's approximately $170 billion pension fund grew just 1.5 percent in the last fiscal year, which ended in June.
Following chatter that former Alaska governor Sarah Palin was in line for Interior Secretary, ABC News reports that President-Elect Trump is considering her to lead Veterans Affairs.
Anyone running an older version of the Android operating system, be warned: Malware is infecting 13,000 Android devices every day, putting at risk the private details of more than 1 million Google accounts.
That's according to cybersecurity software company Check Point, which discovered a new piece of malware called "Gooligan" that's infecting Android phones and stealing email addresses.
Users who download Gooligan-infected apps or click links in phishing messages are being exposed to the malware, which allows attackers to access sensitive information from Google apps like Gmail, Drive, and Photos.
Once attackers hack into the device, they're buying apps on the Google Play store and writing reviews posing as the phone's owner, Check Point says.
Business Insider: This research has broader significance beyond the auto-loan market. We've previously reported at length on the worrying state of US consumer finances.Hmm... OK, we are running a bit red,
According to UBS research, 65%, 36%, and 22% of lower-, middle-, and higher-income cohorts are "stressed." That means their income falls below or barely covers their expenses. And almost one in five stressed households, or 18%, agreed or strongly agreed with the likelihood of a default over the next year.
When these stressed households were asked what debt they were most likely to default on, auto loans ranked third, behind credit cards and student debt.
Bloomberg: A group of 81 British lawmakers have written to European Union President Donald Tusk to demand an agreement is reached on rights for Britons living in the EU and for Europeans in the U.K. before Brexit talks are formally opened.Here is a clue. Walk backwards from where you are, British Lawmaker, then look at where you walked from. That is the capital building of your country, get it?
The letter asks Tusk to add reciprocal rights for citizens to the agenda for a European leaders meeting on Dec. 15 and claims there is agreement across most EU states on the issue. Michel Barnier, who will lead negotiations for the EU, infuriated the group when he insisted talks cannot start on any aspect of Brexit until triggering Article 50 of the Lisbon Treaty, which formally starts the process of exiting the bloc. “No negotiation without notification,” Barnier tweeted on Nov. 21.
Liberty Street: As we noted in an earlier blog post, one feature of our data set is that it enables us to infer whether auto loans were made by a bank or credit union, or by an auto finance company. The latter are typically made through a car manufacturer or dealer using Equifax’s lender classification. Although it remains true that banks and credit unions comprise about half of the overall outstanding balance of newly originated loans, the vast majority of subprime loans are originated by auto finance companies. The chart below disaggregates the $1.135 trillion of outstanding auto loans by credit score and lender type, and we see that 75 percent of the outstanding subprime loans were originated by finance companies.The emphasis is mine. Should we worry? A little, but auto finance companies are much better at re-possession and resales of used cars, traditional banks don't do that much. But it has to be clear to investors that this is a partial measure of 'leasing' rates as many of these cars will recycle according to plan.
U.S. Treasury Secretary-nominee Steven Mnuchin outlined an economic agenda aimed at almost doubling the growth rate of the current expansion, saying he will boost jobs by making tax reform his overriding priority.Complete horseshit, and most of us know it.
Mnuchin, speaking Wednesday on CNBC alongside Wilbur Ross, the billionaire investor who is President-elect Donald Trump’s pick to be Commerce secretary, said tax cuts for businesses and the middle class, fewer regulations, infrastructure investment and bilateral trade deals can help the world’s largest economy achieve 3 percent to 4 percent growth. The U.S. expansion has averaged 2.1 percent at an annual rate since the end of the 2007-2009 recession.
“We’re going to cut corporate taxes which will bring huge amounts of jobs back to the United States,” he said. “There will be a big tax cut for the middle class. But any tax cuts we have for the upper class will be offset by less deductions that will pay for it.”
Yahoo: But Ross, who as Commerce Secretary would lead any trade negotiations, describes a more benign approach. On Mexico, he points out that the United States accounts for 80% of Mexican exports, which gives the United States plenty of leverage to lean on its southern neighbor to buy more American-made products. “If I’m a guy’s 80% customer, is he going to fight with me?” Ross says. “No, he’s going to negotiate.”And, we end up with a weird situation, Mexico leads the Southwest in negotiations with the Yawkers, Mexico has to represent the tri-lateral arrangement.
The goal, he says, wouldn’t be to punish US companies that produce goods in Mexico, but to reduce America’s $60 billion trade deficit with Mexico. That can be done two ways: by Mexico exporting less to the United States or buying more from it. Either could be accomplished, he says, without dismantling the North American Free Trade Agreement.
Zero Hedge: The US Dollar index is soaring, up most in a week as OPEC events and the London Fix ripple through FX markets. Yen, Euro, and Aussie Dollar are all plunging...All I said was that the American shale industry became productive by finding a solution to the OPEC dis-equilibrium. I didn't mean we should all run out and spike the dollar! But reality sets in, it wasn't me, I was just quoting known truths that someone else figured out.
The Hill: A coalition of major tech companies — including Google, Amazon and Apple — is calling on President-elect Donald Trump to appoint a Treasury undersecretary for technology.
Financial Innovation Now (FIN), which also includes PayPal and Intuit, is asking the Trump administration to appoint regulators and promote policies that will bolster the use of financial technology (FinTech) as it gains popularity and prominence.
One contrarian thing that I sometimes think about the big Libor scandal is that you can analyze it as a weird market. Some traders at some banks had interest-rate swaps that would profit if Libor was higher, so they pressured their Libor submitters to make up a higher Libor. Other traders at other banks had the other sides of those swaps, so they pressured their submitters to make up a lower Libor. The Libor rate that was ultimately set represented sort of a phantom clearing price for interest-rate derivatives; it may not have been a fair representation of banks' borrowing costs, but it was an imperfect approximate result of market forces.
The US economy grew 3.2% in the third quarter, according to newly revised government figures. That’s just three-tenths of a percentage point short of Donald Trump’s goal for growth, which is 3.5%.
Employers have created nearly 2.4 million jobs during the last 12 months. Donald Trump’s goal: 2.5 million new jobs per year. Again, we’re almost there.
Trump, the incoming president, campaigned on a litany of complaints about the economy’s performance under President Obama during the last 8 years. He repeatedly called the Obama economy “disastrous” and a “total failure.” Yet Trump now stands to inherit an economy that’s gathering steam and could make his first year or two in office a new standard for prosperity.
Trump supporters argue that recent economic news—almost all of it upbeat—is due largely to the fact that Trump won the presidential election and is now generating new hope about an economic revival. But it’s easy to break down the latest developments to determine which predate the election and which come after. The following updates were all published recently but refer to periods before the election, when most polls predicted Hillary Clinton would be the likely winner:
Zero Hedge on a potential Treasury official:
What makes Allison's candidacy especially notable is that he happens to be a prominent critic of the Federal Reserve, as well as an advocate of the gold standard. Allison has said his “long-term ambition” for monetary policy “would be to get rid of the Federal Reserve and get back to a private banking system.” He also accurately portrayed the Fed by saying that it is “a scary organization because there’s no control."
In a 2014 paper authored by Allison for the Cato Journal, he said he "would get rid of the Federal Reserve because the volatility in the economy is primarily caused by the Fed." Allison said that simply allowing the market to regulate itself would be preferable to the Fed harming the stability of the financial system.
"When the Fed is radically changing the money supply, distorting interest rates, and over-regulating the financial sector, it makes rational economic calculation difficult," Allison wrote. "Markets do form bubbles, but the Fed makes them worse."
Druckenmiller became an overnight bull on hopes the Trump administration would unleash a fiscal stimulus-based period of growth for the economy, with a a “large bet on economic growth." He also told CNBC that "I’m short bonds, Bunds, Italian bonds, U.S. bonds” a reflection of his expectation of higher deficits and stronger growth.
Fast forward to today, when Stan Druckenmiller spoke at the Robin Hood Investors Conference in Brooklyn, repeated he is bullish on the American economy following the U.S. election, and anticipates a much stronger dollar and higher bond yields. Druckenmiller joined Jeff Gundlach in predicting that US 10Y yields may rise to 6% over the next year or two,
CHARLESTON, SC (WCSC) - The Port of Charleston is the fourth busiest port on the East coast. It brings in $45 billion every year and employs more than 260,000 workers across South Carolina.I don't complain about his port dredging skills, but he is a professional at war declarations, he and the McCain guy. Erdogan should hire him, give the guy a map; and then Ergodan can spend his day without the hassle of constant war declarations.
But ships are getting bigger, and if the port is not dredged soon, Senator Lindsey Graham says the port could die.
FRIDAY MORNING IS prime time for some casual news reading, tweeting, and general Internet browsing, but you may have had some trouble accessing your usual sites and services this morning and throughout the day, from Spotify and Reddit to the New York Times and even good ol’ WIRED.com. For that, you can thank a distributed denial of service attack (DDoS) that took down a big chunk of the Internet for most of the Eastern seaboard.
CalWatch: In 2011, Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa (pictured) won a hard-fought deal with the Los Angeles police and firefighters unions that targeted “pension spiking” — late-career maneuvering that allowed individuals to push up their final pay and thus their annual pensions. It also reduced the minimum pension available after 20 years of service.All employee unions also made concessions reducing retirement benefits for newly hired workers that year. And after the 2011 contracts, all new hires had to share in the costs of health care benefits. Taxpayers had previously covered the whole tab.
I’m always interested in free speech cases when they make their way through the court system, but this one is particularly unique. In a small town in upstate New York a beauty salon ran into a problem a couple of years ago. They listed their prices up front based on the cash price for services, providing a note saying that there would be an extra fee applied if the customer paid by credit card. They were advised by an attorney to take the sign down or change the wording because they were in violation of the law. That may sound fairly crazy, but it turns out the lawyer was correct and they wound up going to court, claiming that their right of free speech was being impinged. (Route Fifty)
The owners of Expressions Hair Design in Vestal, along with other New York businesses that have sued the state over the law, say their freedom of speech is being impinged on because they can’t explain to customers how credit card fees affect their bottom line.Their case, Expressions Hair Design v. Schneiderman, is slated to come before the U.S. Supreme Court early next year. A decision in the case also is likely to be felt in nine states with similar laws (California, Colorado, Connecticut, Florida, Kansas, Maine, Massachusetts, Oklahoma and Texas). And, given the reach of big retailers and the growth of online sales, it could influence how merchants in other states do business, too.“All these laws are really doing is regulating speech in a way that favors credit card companies because it masks the costs of credit to consumers,” said Deepak Gupta, the consumer rights lawyer representing Expressions, where his mother gets her hair done. Under the laws, he said, “you can say the glass is half full, but you can’t say it’s half empty.”
Tech Insider: Hackers have broken into a high-end European bank and are blackmailing its customers.
Customers of Valartis, a Chinese-owned Liechenstein bank, are being told by unknown blackmailers they must pay 10% of their life savings or face having account details sent to finance authorities and the media, German-language newspaper Bild reports.
Hill: Senate GOP members are instructing the Appropriations Committee to begin working on a stopgap that would fund the government through March, according to a Senate aide.
The effort shows that Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) is going along with the plan laid down by Trump and House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) to move the short-term measure, even if the Senate GOP hasn’t completely bought in on the strategy.
Michael Regan interviewed Vanguard Group founder Jack Bogle for Bloomberg Markets last week, and I suppose it would be tempting to be like "so, Jack Bogle, index funds are pretty good, right?" "Yup, pretty good." "Thanks for your time." I mean, it is pretty straightforward. And there's a little of that -- "the math is the math, and I think the mathematics are inarguable," says Bogle -- but they also get into some of the more abstruse critiques of indexing.
Matt Levine: Here is the NASDAQ Stock Market LLC's rule filing for its proposed "Extended Life Priority Order Attribute," which would give priority to orders that promise to stay in force for at least one second. We have talked about this order type before, and I was fond of it; it seems like a good rough way to segment "customers" from "dealers," and to give some priority to the customers:
In some loose approximate sense, if a customer shows up and wants to buy stock, then she should get priority over a dealer who also wants to buy that stock, because, you know, she actually wants to buy the stock. The dealer is just churning inventory for a few milliseconds.
Christie a Tough Sell on Legal Marijuana: New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie (R) said tax revenue from legal marijuana would be “blood money,” citing it as a gateway to other drugs. He pledged to resist any legalization effort in his state until he leaves office. (NJ.com)
Paris (AFP) - President-elect Donald Trump's big-spending plan and tax cuts are expected to help double the US economic growth rate by 2018, the OECD said Monday.The Trump bump may be over, the conservatives are coming back to town.
The US economy will grow by 2.3 percent in 2017 and 3.0 percent in 2018, said the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development, revising its earlier forecast.
That compares to gross domestic product growth of 1.5 percent this year, according to the OECD.
The Republican property tycoon's team has said he will devote $550 billion to rebuilding decrepit infrastructure.
The incoming president also campaigned on promises for major corporate tax cuts as part of a wide-ranging blueprint for the limping US economy.
| Rank | State | Market Pension Debt/Household |
| 1 | Alaska | $113,137 |
| 2 | Illinois | $77,822 |
| 3 | California | $77,700 |
| 4 | Connecticut | $72,862 |
| 5 | Hawaii | $61,156 |
| 6 | Massachusetts | $60,652 |
| 7 | New Jersey | $58,409 |
