Princeton Follows NYU’s Bitcoin lead, Unofficially

Princeton Follows NYU’s Bitcoin lead, Unofficially

www.google.com/+EricAu118

NYU was the pioneer of this movement to teach the students more about Bitcoin in the Fall 2014 semester. Princeton University has now joined the ranks of the learned for Spring 2015. In response, almost 400 students have already signed up for the course, again, highlighting heightened demand, especially amongst the savvy American youth.

This course seems focused on the technical side, and will address questions to the novice such as:

How does Bitcoin work? What makes Bitcoin different? How secure are your Bitcoins? How anonymous are Bitcoin users? What determines the price of Bitcoins? Can cryptocurrencies be regulated? What might the future hold for Bitcoin?

Princeton’s course creators make the following claims to those who complete the 11-week course:

After this course, you’ll know everything you need to be able to separate fact from fiction when reading claims about Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies. You’ll have the conceptual foundations you need to engineer secure software that interacts with the Bitcoin network. And you’ll be able to integrate ideas from Bitcoin in your projects. Note: this is not an official Princeton University course.

Also read: A Day in NYU’s Course on Cryptocurrencies

Not sure what the last sentence means since it will be for Princeton students at Princeton facilities, taken in lieu of other Princeton courses. Probably some legal semantics is involved. Princeton administrators must have signed off on the course and the campus location, so semantics aside, Princeton will start teaching Bitcoin with one video course per week beginning February 16th, 2015.

In addition, each week there will be a Google Hangout with that week’s lecturer. Plus, there will be five “programming assignments” where students will be asked to build various components of “simplified Bitcoin-like cryptocurrencies”. Sounds like Make-your-own-Altcoin week is coming soon.

The official name of the course that is not an official Princeton course is “BTC-Tech: Bitcoin and Cryptocurrency Technologies.” The lecturers include Arvind Narayanan, Joseph Bonneau, Edward Felten (Princeton University), and Andrew Miller (University of Maryland).

Images from Shutterstock.

What do think of the new wave of major schools offer Bitcoin tutelage? Share above and comment below.

Loonie tumbles as Canada's shrinking economy fuels rate speculation

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Richard Blackwell, The Globe and Mail
7:27 AM, E.T. | January 30, 2015
Canadian

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EXTENDED COVERAGE

Lower loonie fallout: Taking stock of the winners and losers

The Canadian dollar reached the weakest level in almost six years as a report showed the economy shrank in November, bolstering speculation the central bank will cut interest rates again.
The currency headed for a 10th weekly decline, the longest losing stretch since 2000, as the government reported gross domestic product declined 0.2 percent from October. The Bank of Canada unexpectedly lowered borrowing costs last week for the first time since 2009, saying the move was meant to provide insurance as the slump in crude oil, the nation’s biggest export, weighed on the economy.
“It really looks like the economy is slowing,” Bipan Rai, director of foreign-exchange strategy at CIBC World Markets Inc., said by phone from Toronto. “It has implications for whether or not the bank will ease again in March, and right now I’m seeing a greater-than 60 percent probability we could see that.”
The loonie depreciated 1.2 percent to 78.28 U.S. cents at 8:54 a.m. in Toronto, the weakest since March 2009. It has slid 2.7 percent this week.
The Canadian currency has dropped 8.9 percent since Dec. 31 in a fifth consecutive monthly loss.
U.S. ECONOMY
The economy of the U.S., Canada’s biggest trade partner, expanded less than forecast in the fourth quarter, the Commerce Department reported in Washington. GDP grew at a 2.6 percent annualized rate, data showed, versus a forecast of 3 percent in a Bloomberg survey of economists. The economy advanced 5 percent in the third quarter.
The median forecast in a Bloomberg survey for Canada’s monthly GDP was for little change after 0.3 percent growth in October.
The Bank of Canada reduced the benchmark interest rate on Jan. 21 to 0.75 percent, from 1 percent, where it had been since September 2010.
Crude has dropped by more than 50 percent since June, when it reached a 2014 high of $107.73 a barrel in New York. It traded at $44.63 Friday.

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New Greek government opposes Canadian gold mine

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Angeliki Koutantou
8:29 AM, E.T. | January 30, 2015
International

Tags: Greece

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Greece’s new left-wing government will cancel plans to sell the state natural gas utility and is firmly opposed to a Canadian gold mine that is among the biggest foreign investment projects in the country, the energy minister told Reuters on Friday.
The comments by Panagiotis Lafazanis further reinforces early signs that the government is sticking to campaign pledges that have chilled investment and unnerved financial markets.
The gold mine operated by Vancouver-based Eldorado Gold in northern Greece was the flagship project of the last government’s foreign investment drive and considered a test case that would reveal whether Greece could protect foreign investors despite local opposition.
“We are absolutely against it and we will examine our next moves on it,” Lafazanis, the 63-year-old former Communist told Reuters at his new ministerial office, declining to say if the government would try to block the project from going ahead.
The new minister was even more categorical on gas utility DEPA, saying the planned sale of a 65 per cent stake would be scrapped. “In no way will we privatise gas utility DEPA and sell it to anyone, no matter who the interested party is,” Lafazanis said.
But he struck a more moderate tone on the 400-million-euro ($452-million) sale of Greek natural gas grid operator DESFA to Azerbaijan’s state oil firm SOCAR, a deal agreed in 2013.
He said the government would act on the project only after the European Commission, which is investigating whether the deal violates competition rules, makes it decision later this year.
“We will wait for the EU Competition Commission’s decision and then we will decide our own moves,” he said.

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Greek government set for first talks with eurozone partners

Greece's new anti-austerity government is set to hold its first talks on Friday with its eurozone partners about its ambitions to secure a reduction in the massive debts linked to its 240-billion-euro (S$364 billion) international bailout. 

PHOTO: REUTERS   www.google.com/+EricAu118

30 Jan12:26 PM

[ATHENS] Greece's new anti-austerity government is set to hold its first talks on Friday with its eurozone partners about its ambitions to secure a reduction in the massive debts linked to its 240-billion-euro (S$364 billion) international bailout.

But the talks come hot on the heels of a warning by the European Union and Germany that there is little support for reducing the debts, which the radical new government is hoping to cut in half.

Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras is set to meet Jeroen Dijsselbloem, the current head of the eurozone group of finance ministers, which Athens said would mark the start of Greece's negotiations on revising the conditions of its bailout deal.

Ahead of the meeting, Greek bank stocks rebounded on Thursday after plunging the day before on concerns about the dramatic first moves of Tsipras's radical new administration.

European Parliament chief Martin Schulz on Thursday became the first foreign dignitary to meet Tsipras' government, and said the prime minister had assured him that Greece would seek "common ground" with its EU peers.

Schulz added that Tsipras had assured him Athens would not seek a "unilateral solution" to the renegotiation of its multi-billion-euro bailout.

Elected on Sunday, the new government has already begun to roll back years of austerity measures demanded by the EU and the International Monetary Fund in return for the huge bailout granted to avoid a financial meltdown in 2010, and says it will negotiate to halve the debt.

But European Commission chief Jean-Claude Juncker said a reduction of the 315-billion-euro debt linked to the bailout "is not on the radar".

"I don't think there's a majority in the Eurogroup... for a reduction of the debt," he told Germany's ARD television, referring to the eurozone's finance ministers.

Sigmar Gabriel, Germany's vice-chancellor and also its economy minister, said he expected Greece to "stick to its commitments" for fiscal and economic reform made in exchange for the bailout.

He was critical of a decision by the new government to scrap the privatisation of major ports and power companies, decisions which have also drawn a rebuke from China.

Greece said negotiations would start in earnest with Dijsselbloem's visit on Friday, with the finance ministry saying it hoped talks could lead to "a viable, comprehensive agreement to rebuild our social economy".

Dijsselbloem, the Dutch finance minister, will meet Tsipras and his outspoken Finance Minister Yanis Varoufakis, a maverick economist who regularly shares his thoughts on his personal blog.

Varoufakis will ramp up Greece's efforts to rally support for a renegotiation when he visits Britain, France and Italy next week.

Greek bank stocks rebounded by nearly 13 per cent on Thursday after plunging by more than a quarter a day before.

The Athens market had taken fright after the new government announced it was abandoning the privatisation of the major ports of Piraeus and Thessaloniki, main electricity provider PPC and petroleum refiner HELPE.

China, which already has a major investment in the Piraeus port, said it was "highly concerned" after Tsipras's government abandoned plans to put the privatisation of the docks - one of Europe's busiest - out to tender.

The Athens market closed 3.16 per cent higher on Thursday, driven by the banks' partial recovery.

The Greek central bank said 4.0 billion euros in private deposits had been withdrawn from banks in December.

Daniele Nouy, head of the European Central Bank's Supervisory Board, said despite the post-election turbulence, Greek lenders were "pretty strong".

Tsipras' government was also embroiled in its first foreign policy row after it complained to Brussels over allegedly not being consulted when the EU threatened new sanctions against Russia over the war in Ukraine.

EU foreign ministers eventually overcame Greece's reluctance and agreed Thursday to extend the sanctions against Russia.

Tsipras' Syriza party has been seen as pro-Russian, with Moscow's ambassador becoming the first foreign official to be received by the prime minister after his election victory. Many of the party's members have deep leftist roots.

Tsipras, who ousted the conservatives of former prime minister Antonis Samaras, has said Greece is no longer prepared to bow to the "politics of submission", in a clear swipe at its international creditors.

Finance Minister Varoufakis has said the government wants "a pan-European New Deal" to encourage growth and help the continent deal with Greece's crisis.

AFP

      

MORE

• Greek banks rebound as Athens clarifies remarks
• Greece needs a debt service holiday
• Greek government reverses austerity policies, stocks hit
• Greek PM Tsipras freezes privatisations, markets tumble
• Greece won't bow to 'politics of submission'
• Greek PM Tsipras names anti-austerity cabinet, port sale halted

  

US Senate approves controversial Keystone pipeline 

PUBLISHED ON JAN 30, 2015 5:21 AM

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Republican Senator Lisa Murkowski speaks while flanked by Majority Leader Mitch McConnell on Jan 29, 2015 at the US Capitol in Washington, DC. The US Senate on Thursday approved the immediate construction of the controversial Keystone XL oil pipeline, a Republican priority that faces the threat of a presidential veto.  -- PHOTO: AFP www.google.com/+EricAu118

WASHINGTON (AFP) - The US Senate on Thursday approved the immediate construction of the controversial Keystone XL oil pipeline, a Republican priority that faces the threat of a presidential veto.

The Republican Bill passed with 62 votes to 36, with support from eight Democrats who defied President Barack Obama, after weeks of fierce debate.