Hackers:  Beaxy has announced the launch of its cryptocurrency trading platform on June 11 in a recent press release.  In the release, the company said it was now live in 43 States and 185 countries. According to Beaxy, an exclusive partnership with OneMarketData delivers trading capabilities across nine order types, with transaction speeds of 225,000 per second per trading pair.  The launch follows two years of development, and the platform says it has more than 60,000 pre-registered users.  Separately, in May, Beaxy CEO Artak Hamazaspyan had uploaded a statement to Twitter confirming that the exchange had been hacked on May 22.  Although the attackers attempted to steal valuable information, he claimed “no KYC data was compromised, no code was compromised, and no funds were stolen.” In a candid admission, he added:  “This was not the first attack on Beaxy, it will not be the last. For example, we were also attacked the day we opened beta.”  Despite the technical hiccups in May, Beaxy’s CEO, Artak Hamazaspyan, said:  “I couldn’t be happier with the product this incredible team has built. Through prioritizing user experience, security, regulatory guidance and seamless functionality, I am confident we’ve built a best-in-class trading platform.”

Bullish Key Players:   Bitcoin analyst and investor Oliver Isaacs believes that the cryptocurrency could reach $25,000 as early as the end of 2019.  In a recent interview, Isaacs pointed to recent geopolitical and regulatory events as “drivers” behind the resumption of Bitcoin’s rise.  “There are multiple drivers behind the recent resurgence. There are geopolitical, technological and regulatory drivers.  “The net effect of the trade war between the US and China has led to the sudden interest in bitcoin as a hedge on investments,” he said.  According to Naeem Aslam, Chief Market Analyst at ThinkMarkets, we won’t have to wait until the end of the year to see Bitcoin start to regain its momentum.  Citing a 5-year trailing high for June of 25.98%, Aslam is confident that we could see Bitcoin prices as high as $10,712 by the end of the month.  Aslam thinks that the unveiling of Facebook’s cryptocurrency, GlobalCoin, will be a key factor in Bitcoin’s growth.  Calling the social media giant’s crypto launch a “brand-new paradigm,” Aslam believes that “the Facebook event will be the catalyst for the Bitcoin price to move higher.”

Banks & Institutions:  Institutional cryptocurrency platform Bakkt will begin testing its first product, physically-delivered bitcoin (BTC) futures on July 22, the company announced in a blog post on June 13.  Bakkt, which has seen multiple delays over regulatory compliance since its original announcement in August 2018, will offer futures as the first in a series of offerings, full details of which remain unclear.  “On July 22, two days after Apollo 11’s 50th anniversary, Bakkt will initiate user acceptance testing for its bitcoin futures listed and traded at ICE Futures U.S. and cleared at ICE Clear US,” chief operating officer Adam White wrote in the blog post, adding:  “This is no small step. This launch will usher in a new standard for accessing crypto markets. Compared to other markets, institutional participation in crypto remains constrained due to limitations like market infrastructure and regulatory certainty.”

Adoption: For nearly a year now, the crypto space has been on its toes about Facebook’s involvement in this ecosystem. Last year, the company was revealed to have a blockchain team, led by former executives of PayPal and Instagram, including technologist David Marcus. But only until recently was the crypto community privy to Facebook Blockchain’s secrets.  The Silicon Valley giant has been hard at work on their own cryptocurrency, slated to be a stable coin backed by a “basket” of fiat currencies. Globalcoin is expected to be a digital medium of exchange for Facebook’s extensive ecosystem and will be available through physical automated tellers, exchanges, and through a purported reward system.  Not much is known more than that, however many have tried to postulate how the product, which is being worked on by 100 staffers, will affect Bitcoin and the broader crypto-economy