Spot Bitcoin exchange-traded funds (ETFs) in the United States acquired the equivalent of around two months worth of the cryptocurrencys mining supply in the first week of June.

With inflows of approximately $1.83 billion, the 11 ETFs bought 25,729 Bitcoin (BTC)in the trading week between June 3 and 7 around eight times more than the 3,150 new BTC mined over the same time, according to data from HODL15Capital.

The amount of Bitcoin acquired in the week alone was almost as much as the entire of May, 29,592 BTC, per HODL15Capitals count, and is the biggest week of buying since mid-March when Bitcoin hit its current all-time high of $73,679.

The 11 ETFs have seen $15.69 billion in net inflows since their January launch, including the $17.93 billion in net outflows from Grayscales fund, with total assets under management (AUM) of around $61 billion.

Bitcoin proponents have long touted cryptocurrency as digital gold due to its built-in scarcity mechanism, which sees only 21 million BTC ever beingissued.

Related: Bitcoin ETF flows will send BTC price into parabolic run, traders say

ETF Store president Nate Geraci noted in a June 9 X post that Bitcoin ETF AUM is around 60% that of the countrys gold ETFs, despite gold ETFs being around for 20 years and Bitcoin ETFs for only five months.

Bitcoin touched a highof $71,093on June 5amid the surge of inflows to the U.S. Bitcoin ETFs, the first time the asset has been above $71,000 since May 21, according to Cointelegraph Markets Pro.

The cryptocurrency has struggled to pass its current high, as its price is more heavily influenced by macroeconomic factors and geopolitical events, crypto exchange co-founder Radar Bear told Cointelegraph on June 7.

Magazine: Bitcoin ETFs make Coinbase a honeypot for hackers and governments Trezor CEO

See more here:

Bitcoin ETFs sucked up 2 months of BTC mining supply in first week of June - Cointelegraph

Chinese scientists are one step closer to a future large-scale quantum computer after building the worlds largest quantum simulation machine based on the trapped-ion technique, praised by one academic journal reviewer as a milestone to be recognised.

The breakthrough was achieved under the leadership of Duan Luming, a quantum physicist renowned for his pioneering research, who returned to China in 2018 after 15 years of teaching in the United States.

Duan received his doctorate in 1998 from the University of Science and Technology of China, the countrys premier institute for quantum research, before joining the University of Michigan in the early 2000s.

Since his return, he has been a full-time professor at Tsinghua Universitys Institute for Interdisciplinary Information Sciences.

Duan and his colleagues, along with several research groups at universities and hi-tech companies around the world, have been chasing the trapped-ion approach to qubits.

Quantum bits, or qubits, are the building blocks of quantum computers, just as bits are in regular computers.

However, qubits are extremely difficult to harness in a controlled and repeatable way because of what is called their hazy nature.

Regular bits can be described as switches that are either on or off. But because uncertainty and probability hold sway in quantum physics, qubits can be both on and off at the same time, and also exist in a variety of in-between states.

Ions, or charged atomic particles, can be trapped and suspended in free space using electromagnetic fields. The qubits are stored in stable electronic states of each ion, and quantum information can be transferred through the collective motion of the ions in a shared trap.

But scalability remains a key challenge for this system.

This is where the trapped-ion approach comes in, as it offers one of the most promising architectures for a scalable, universal quantum computer.

Researchers earlier achieved quantum simulations with up to 61 ions in a one-dimensional crystal. Ion crystals are solids made up of ions bound together in a regular lattice the symmetrical three-dimensional structural arrangements of atoms, ions or molecules inside a solid.

But Duan and his teams quantum simulator was able to achieve the stable trapping and cooling of a two-dimensional crystal of up to 512 ions, in a first for science.

The feat holds great significance for the future of quantum computing, given that scalability is a major hurdle. The teams scaling up of the ions in a stable simulation system is seen as likely to pave the way to building more powerful quantum computers.

The findings of their study were published on Wednesday in the peer-reviewed journal Nature.

This is the largest quantum simulation or computation performed to date in a trapped-ion system, commented one reviewer.

Quantum simulators are devices that actively use quantum effects to answer questions about model systems and, through them, real systems. They are increasingly popular tools in the world of quantum computing for their role in advancing scientific knowledge and developing technologies.

Duan and his team also managed to perform a quantum simulation calculation using 300-ion qubits. They found the computational complexity of 300-ion quantum bits working simultaneously to be astronomical, far exceeding the direct simulation capability of classical computers.

Link:

US-returned Chinese physicist and team achieve world first in quantum computing - South China Morning Post

NEW YORK, NY; BROOMFIELD, CO; LEMONT, IL; MAY 29, 2024 - In a new paper in Science Advances on May 29, researchers at JPMorgan Chase, the U.S. Department of Energys (DOE) Argonne National Laboratory and Quantinuum have demonstrated clear evidence of a quantum algorithmic speedup for the quantum approximate optimization algorithm (QAOA).

This algorithm has been studied extensively and has been implemented on many quantum computers. It has potential applications in fields such as logistics, telecommunications, financial modeling, and materials science.

This work is a significant step towards reaching quantum advantage, laying the foundation for future impact in production, says Marco Pistoia, Head of Global Technology Applied Research at JPMorgan Chase.

The team examined whether a quantum algorithm with low implementation costs could provide a quantum speedup over the best-known classical methods. QAOA was applied to the Low Autocorrelation Binary Sequences (LABS) problem, which has significance in understanding the behavior of physical systems, signal processing and cryptography. The study showed that if the algorithm was asked to tackle increasingly larger problems, the time it would take to solve them would grow at a slower rate than that of a classical solver.

To explore the quantum algorithms performance in an ideal noiseless setting, JPMorgan Chase and Argonne jointly developed a simulator to evaluate the algorithms performance at scale. It was built on the Polaris supercomputer, accessed through the Argonne Leadership Computing Facility (ALCF), a DOE Office of Science user facility.The ALCF is supported by DOEs Advanced Scientific Computing Research program.

The large-scale quantum circuit simulations efficiently utilized the DOE petascale supercomputer Polaris located at the ALCF. These results show how high-performance computing can complement and advance the field of quantum information science, says Yuri Alexeev, a computational scientist at Argonne.

To take the first step toward practical realization of the speedup in the algorithm, the researchers demonstrated a small-scale implementation on Quantinuums System Model H1 and H2 trapped-ion quantum computers. Using algorithm-specific error detection, the team reduced the impact of errors on algorithmic performance by up to 65%.

Our long-standing partnership with JPMorgan Chase led to this meaningful and noteworthy three-way research experiment that also brought in Argonne National Lab. The results could not have been achieved without the unprecedented and world leading quality of our H-Series Quantum Computer, which provides a flexible device for executing error-correcting and error-detecting experiments on top of gate fidelities that are years ahead of other quantum computers, says Ilyas Khan, Founder and Chief Product Officer of Quantinuum.

Read the full research paperhere.

About JPMorgan Chase JPMorgan Chase & Co. (NYSE: JPM) is a leading financial services firm based in the United States of America (U.S.), with operations worldwide. JPMorgan Chase had $4.1 trillion in assets and $337 billion in stockholders equity as of March 31, 2024. With over 63,000 technologists globally and an annual tech spend of $17 billion, JPMorgan Chase is dedicated to improving the design, analytics, development, coding, testing and application programming that goes into creating high quality software and new products. Under the J.P.Morgan and Chase brands, the Firm serves millions of customers in the U.S., and many of the worlds most prominent corporate, institutional and government clients globally. Visit http://www.jpmorganchase.com/tech for more information.

About Argonne National Laboratory Argonne National Laboratory seeks solutions to pressing national problems in science and technology by conducting leading-edge basic and applied research in virtually every scientific discipline. Argonne is managed by UChicago Argonne, LLC for the U.S. Department of Energys Office of Science.

About Quantinuum Quantinuum,the worlds largest integrated quantum company, pioneers powerful quantum computers and advanced software solutions. Quantinuums technology drives breakthroughs in materials discovery, cybersecurity, and next-gen quantum AI. With almost 500 employees, including 370+ scientists and engineers, Quantinuum leads the quantum computing revolution across continents.

Quantinuum recently closed an equity fundraise anchored by JPMorgan Chase with additional participation from Mitsui & CO., Amgen and Honeywell, which remains the companys majority shareholder, bringing the total capital raised by Quantinuum since inception to approximately $625 million.

The Honeywell trademark is used under license from Honeywell International Inc. Honeywell makes no representations or warranties with respect to this service.

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JPMorgan Chase, Argonne National Laboratory and Quantinuum Show Theoretical Quantum Speedup with the ... - JP Morgan

The Superposition Guys Podcast, hosted by Yuval Boger, CMO at QuEra Computing

Nick Farina, CEO of EeroQ, is interviewed by Yuval Boger. They discuss EeroQs unique approach to building quantum computers using electrons on helium with a CMOS chip substrate, a technology researched for over 20 years but revisited by Farinas co-founder at Caltech. Farina outlines the companys journey from its founding in 2016, its strategic focus on hardware, and plans to release a functional prototype soon with a goal of achieving 10,000 qubits by 2026. They also explore the technical advantages, future plans, and the companys commitment to quantum ethics. Farina highlights challenges such as the funding climate and potential negative impacts of quantum technology, and endorses neutral atoms and silicon spin qubits as alternative modalities.

Listen on Spotify here

ere

Catherine Vollgraff Heidweiller, product manager at Google Quantum AI, is interviewed by Yuval Boger. Catherine describes the development of full-stack quantum computing, the importance of their 2019 quantum supremacy milestone, Googles product focus, and the early customers they work with. We discuss the evaluation of quantum usefulness, their error correction roadmap, the intersection of quantum computing and AI, the societal responsibilities of quantum development, and much more.

Yuval: Hello Nick, thank you for joining me today.

Nick: Thank you so much, I appreciate you having me on the show.

Yuval: So who are you and what do you do?

Nick: So my name is Nick Farina and I am the CEO of EeroQ. We were started in 2016, incorporated back in 2017. So weve been around for quite a while now in terms of quantum computing industry startups. We were originally spun out of Michigan State University. Weve been a little bit stealthy then and since.

But the first five years of the company was really a joint venture between myself working with some partners on providing investment funding to do sponsored research at Michigan State University. And ironically I came from a software background and our focus is 100% on hardware. So Im a lifelong entrepreneur, Im an angel investor and I came to quantum somewhat by accident.

Ill keep the story brief but I was on the board of directors of my co-founders wifes theater company in 2011 and I just became so fascinated. At the time he was a PhD student, later did a postdoc at Caltech and then got that professorship at MSU. But I became really enchanted by how magical quantum mechanics are and just not even thinking about quantum computing originally. I was just really mystified by the world of ultra low temperature experimental physics.

And then to keep the narrative rolling then in 2022 we felt that we were in a position to get to a 10,000 range quantum computer within five years. And Ill mention we had also brought on a CTO, Steve Lyon, who is a professor at Princeton. And Steve changed our trajectory in a few ways that we can discuss later but especially focusing on a CMOS compatible architecture. And the company itself does electrons on helium.

So there will be a lot to unpack there because on the one hand it sounds exotic and new. On the other hand its been in the literature since 1999. So its very old but also very new at the same time.

Yuval: So I understand that the company makes quantum computers or makes technology by which you can make quantum computers. Help me focus on that.

Nick: Absolutely. So we make quantum computers. So we are building a quantum computer that as with many other companies we envision having both on-prem offerings as well as cloud offerings.

There are as you know between seven to 10 different ways to build a quantum computer and electrons on helium using a CMOS chip as your substrate is a unique way out of those seven to 10. So one thing that makes EeroQ unique is that we are our only competitors. So electrons and helium has to work. And Im happy to describe how that system works in a minute. But we are our own lane.

And the reason that we chose this particular qubit modality is because its been researched theoretically and experimentally for over 20 plus years now. So we know a lot about the system. And similar to technologies like neutral atoms, its a next generation technology that is earlier stage in its development but at the same time offers some really compelling advances and advantages once someone is able to get it to work.

Yuval: I gather from the description of the CMOS substrate that the idea is that once you have this working as you describe then its easy to scale because CMOS chips are super well understood. There are so many places and you can make them and so the scaling part is almost solved. I know its far from solved but its almost solved once you have the basic building blocks in place. But Im curious, you mentioned that you are in your own lane. Is that because others are not aware of this technology? Is that because of IP protection? Why wouldnt you have additional competitors?

Nick: Thats a classic question to answer so Im happy to answer that one. But first Ill say that you did just give our sales pitch regarding CMOS which is essentially what we call it has been building a quantum computer in reverse. So no one has ever performed a two qubit gate with this system because we think thats actually the easier part and thats the part that were working in now.

But what weve done is the CMOS now has gone well beyond theory. So we work with a foundry called SkyWater up in Minnesota and SkyWater produced for us a chip where we can control ensembles of 2,432 electrons. So its similar to these large scale demonstrations in neutral atoms where you dont necessarily have 6,000 qubits but you have an array of atoms that can be controlled. So were at a similar stage there where weve proven the CMOS can work with the liquid helium. So were a scaling first company.

And the reason now to answer your other question is theres a few reasons that we are in our own lane. The first is that the way that quantum computing had developed in the United States very broadly is that in the early 2000s there was quite a bit of money provided by the government to fund different approaches. And some of these approaches were successful like superconducting circuits and ion traps at their very early stages. And then as a result, a lot of investment began to pour into those areas because they had shown promising early results.

Electrons and helium didnt work. So when there were attempts made in the early 2000s is when the experimental work began, we just didnt have the mastery of the properties of electrons and helium. We didnt have the equipment needed. So now for example, we can work with partners out there, vendors like Bluefors, like quantum machines that provide tools that were not available at all when this was first experiment I started.

So then what happened was because it wasnt a system that was able to get up and running quickly, there was a drought of funding for it. So it wasnt pursued as heavily as it might have been and therefore it lost some traction and ground. And then where we came in is during my co-founder Johannes time at Caltech, he basically put two and two together and dusted off an old paper. And he said, Well, at Caltech, everyones talking about quantum computing.

He got very familiar with the other modalities because he had been a condensed matter physicist generally at ultra-low temperatures, not focused on quantum computing until he went to Caltech. And there he said, Look, everyones talking about the pros and cons of these technologies, but I remember a paper in Science from 1999 that proposed electrons and helium, which is an expertise of his, that really wouldnt have any of these flaws where you could have exceptionally long coherence times, you could have all-to-all connectivity, you could have mobile qubits on the surface of the helium.

And the fun scientific fact is that electrons floating above helium are attracted to their own image beneath the helium surface. So the trapping is natural and this provides for immense potential for scalability and no requirement for modular interconnects. So for those reasons, we decided that even though this technology is really early, it needs to get the same type of shot that everyone else did because this could be a really compelling second generation technology.

And its taken a long time. Once we brought it back initially with some funding from myself and my friends and then later from venture capital. So our lead investors, B Capital Group, theyre the strategic venture arm of the Boston Consulting Group. And a few other reasons that we are able to stay in this lane is that its a very, very small field. So theres probably 10 or so people in the world who are truly experts at electrons on helium and about seven of them work at EeroQ.

So we were able to create a moat around talent, a moat with IP and a moat with a head start to actually build a scalable computer. And thats the reason why we have this very, very deep moat. Now that doesnt mean someone is not going to start one of these companies as we become more successful. But we do feel that we have a pretty strong moat around it.

Yuval: This is liquid helium, right? So this would be about four Kelvin and the electrons would swim around in the helium?

Nick: Yeah. So were running around 10 millikelvins, so quite cold. And what happens is, so its superfluid helium and you have your bottom layer is your CMOS chip. And then we put a layer of bulk helium at the bottom, which crawls the walls as superfluids do. And then that coats that CMOS chip and the electrodes on the chip. And then we use a tungsten filament, just basically a light bulb, to spray electrons into the system.

And then control and readout is done very similar to superconducting circuits using CQED. And thats what the system looks like. And if your listeners want to compare it to another technology that exists thats better known, it would be silicon spin qubits. The advantage being that the comparison being that were both using single electrons as qubits and were both a CMOS compatible system, but with electrons on helium, that little additional layer of helium provides a protective barrier so that the qubits dont get stuck in the silicon and are therefore exposed to all the defects of silicon like trapped charges, valley splitting, and so forth.

Yuval: When can I use one? How far are you from demonstrating or showcasing to the outside world this computer?

Nick: Well, watch this space over the next couple of months. Weve got some pretty exciting news coming out regarding the basics of the system. We have a functional prototype of the scaling system in our engineering facility. Were based in Chicago. When can you use it? I would say aggressively sometime next year. Were working on building a simulator for it as well. Being able to use it in a simulation environment, the answer would be much sooner.

But 2025 and 2026 are really when we see this system fully come online in working with both cloud vendors and potentially, depending on the demand, on-premise installations. One advantage Ill mention there is that because theres no need for modular interconnects, if someones looking for an on-prem quantum computer, all they need to do is get one chip from us and a Bluefors. Thats the entire setup. In that way, it has the ability to have a very small footprint, similar to neutral atoms in that way.

Yuval: Can you give us a hint on how many qubits?

Nick: Yes, I can. Our goal is going to be 10,000 qubits at some point in 2026. How exactly we distribute that, again, the split between on-prem and cloud remains to be seen. But the whole purpose of the system, as you already noted, is that we can go from our upcoming two-qubit gate to simply adding it to a scaling layer that we have already proven out works with liquid helium and with our system. So thats what enables us to leapfrog so quickly and scale so quickly.

And then from there, because its CMOS, in terms of going beyond 10,000, its just a matter of making more features in the CMOS.

Yuval: What can you tell us about coherence time or clock speed or anything that people use to measure the performance of existing systems?

Nick: Yeah, absolutely. I will note, of course, this is all theoretical because we have to build the system and have it out there. But the reasons that were excited about this system are that you can get well over 10 seconds of coherence time. Three nines in terms of key fidelities. We have all-to-all connectivity, which allows you, in addition to mobile qubits, both of which allow us to run the state of the art in error correction, whatever that may be.

Clock speed is something that will change due to variations. So we dont usually give a precise number on that. And lets see, I covered all-to-all connectivity. And the other key advantage in terms of metrics and benchmarking is that, well, this falls a little bit out of the scope and more into the advantages, is were able to control all the electrons with a single voltage. So in terms of actually being able to practically operate the machine in terms of wiring, youre able to do with far fewer wires than with some other systems.

Yuval: That point about fewer controls is also an important selling point of neutral atom systems. In neutral atom systems, the qubits move around with optical tweezers. How do they move around in your system?

Nick: So we use RF pulses. So again, its very similar, its sort of a mixture of superconducting circuits and silicon spin qubits in some ways. But we use a pretty standard circuit-quantum electrodynamics toolkit to control and read out the qubit states. And whats nice about the qubits, I keep mentioning mobility, but its a really important point.

The fact that theyre mobile on the surface allows us to, if we have any bad qubits, simply move them around and reconfigure. Because a lot of efforts having bad qubits and getting around them can be quite a challenge. So the mobility there is also something that is a significant part of the control of the qubits. And then the electrons themselves, before theyre moved into the operation zones, to the gates, we store them in little microchannels that are etched onto the chip.

And then theyre taken to the operation zones where we apply voltages and do computation in the very near future.

Yuval: Tell me more about the company. You mentioned when you were founded and how this started, you mentioned your lead investor. How many people are you and what are you looking for?

Nick: So were about 15 people now. We are very proud to be located in Chicago, which I think is, we had a national search for a headquarters, given that we were all over the place. We had people, of course, in Princeton, in New York City, and Michigan as well. So I was originally from Chicago, but we chose Chicago not because of that, but because of the talent pool there. So we moved into, we have about a 10,000 square foot engineering lab. And it was actually a fun challenge to find because we needed something very, very stable to avoid any fluctuations of the liquid helium. And as you mentioned, it can slosh around. So we are headquartered in an old locomotive headlight factory.

One thing that makes the company unique is that we have a pure 100% hardware focus. So we view ourselves as a fabless semiconductor company. And this allows us to be very capital efficient because at the end of the day, we dont need to build out our own fabrication, our own machinery around that. We simply are, we design the chips and then we can have them produced by third party foundries.

Now that being said, we dont have to wait around, I shouldnt say waste, but we dont have to wait around for wafers to come back in order to test and prototype new designs. So we do local fabrication here as well to test and iterate on a weekly basis on new chip designs.

One other thing that makes the company unique is that weve been focused on quantum ethics and responsibility since before it was cool. So back in 2018, we put out a white paper written by a PhD from MIT in philosophy about the ethics and governance of quantum computing and why we should get ahead of that at that time. So we stay very focused on hardware, but we also have a focus on policy and making sure that quantum computing is something that is a force for good in the world. As you know, its a dual use technology, so there are good and bad things you can do with it. And were definitely on our way to making a quantum computer and were pretty confident in our path now and we want to make sure now that it feels inevitable that its used properly.

Yuval: So all these hardware things, not bad for a software guy.And as an entrepreneur, what keeps you up at night? What are you worried about?

Nick: Well, as an entrepreneur, youre always up at night because theres an endless amount of things to worry about. But one thing I dont worry about is the quality of our team. I love the people that we work with and the technological effort. I certainly worry about the funding climate in general for quantum computing and where were going to see. Now this has begun to change because even though the general funding climate is in a bit of a downturn now, weve seen strong investment in quantum computing. So that keeps me up a little bit less.

We are not raising money now, but you always have to be thinking about that as a CEO. And finally, Ill say the potentially negative consequences of this technology do keep me up a little bit at night. Thinking about, again, because we have a very high level of confidence that were going to be able to build this computer. And we also have confidence in other pathways. And I dont even want to call them competing pathways because I think there will be room for multiple different qubit pathways to exist and to be successful.

So knowing that, having such a bullish perspective on us being able to achieve quantum advantage perhaps quicker than some folks think, that certainly keeps me up at night a little bit. But Im very proud of what were building here.

Yuval: Speaking of alternative modalities, so if there were no electrons on helium, which modality would you endorse?

Nick: I would endorse neutral atoms and silicon spin qubits. I would do a dual endorsement because I think they both have key advantages. Silicon spin qubits, they both have a lot of brilliant people working on them. And silicon spin qubits, you have the CMOS, with neutral atoms, you have a small footprint, and you have a system that seems like it can scale in a way that others cant.

Again, were focused 95% on scalability. The type of two qubit gates were working on are very well understood. So for us its about how we can make this scalable in addition to having high quality. But those are the two that I would, and Im not just saying this because youre involved in the neutral atom world, but were big fans of those two. But we want to see everyone succeed.

Yuval: One measure that we forgot to talk about is gate fidelity. What are you looking to achieve in the near term in terms of single or two-qubit gate fidelity?

Nick: We think three nines is something that we can get to. That will be the first design perhaps, but by the time within the period of two years or so, we think we can get there. Especially given that were the combination of using the spin state of the electron magnetic field there, as well as the intrinsic purity of the environment. So were not afraid to say that in terms of fidelities that we would predict that.

Yuval: And last hypothetical, so if you could have dinner with one of the quantum greats dead or alive, who would that be?

Nick: Thats a great question. I would say someone who I know from quantum Twitter, Jens Eisert. I dont even know if Im pronouncing his name correctly. Could be Jens. But Im going to give a shout out to him. A lot of the work that hes been doing lately has been really, really interesting, particularly at the conversion of quantum computing and artificial intelligence, which is something that I dont say lightly because I know we dont really know if there is a speed up there, but hes been doing really great work in that area and thats something I know very little about. And hes accomplished quite a bit. I would put him down actually.

Yuval: Nick, thank you so much for joining me today.

Nick: Thank you so much. It was really a pleasure and always appreciate the show.

To subscribe to the audio podcast, please Spotify here

Originally posted here:

Superposition Guy's Podcast -- Nick Farina - CEO of EeroQ The Superposition Guy's Podcast: Workforce Development - The Quantum Insider

Anthony Clark speaks Mandarin fluently, studied in Beijing, and taught tai chi and kung fu for more than 15 years. Students can pop into the Whitworth University professor's office anytime to practice Chinese calligraphy. As a historian of Chinese-Western exchange, Clark has dedicated his professional career and much of his personal life to learning Chinese culture.

But the key to his cross-cultural success? Acknowledging the differences between people, he says, in order to see them as they truly are.

This is the underlying motivation beneath Clark's recent work, Catholicism and Buddhism: The Contrasting Lives and Teachings of Jesus and Buddha. Unlike some of his other scholarly works, it is a short book for the general public that parses the deep-rooted differences between Catholicism and Buddhism.

Though outward expressions of each religion might look similar, the inward motivations of the two practices are separate and, at times, contradictory. While Christians seek to live aligned with a good, loving creator forever, Buddhists hope their kindness will eventually earn them the peace of extinction. Instead of conflating the two belief systems, understanding their differences is a way to respect our neighbors and their worldview, he says.

"Virginia Woolf once said something like, 'If you can't be honest about yourself, how can you be honest about others?'" Clark says. "This idea of being genuinely honest about what one thinks and believes, and what one's identity is, helps us to be more sympathetic."

Clark is a Catholic who teaches classes on China and Buddhism at a Protestant university. He knows what it is to sit in, and even seek out, disagreement. It's a lesson in patience and compassion that is not only helpful in religious discussions, but in any setting where disagreement could be uncomfortable.

"All of my Buddhist friends, especially Buddhist friends outside of the United States, were very adamant that we will understand each other better if we actually write down what we think, so that we can confront these differences and collaboratively work together," Clark says. "So it came about from this strong commitment to be honest, and then secondly, a strong commitment to how much we need to be together with that honesty."

You don't have to be a religious scholar to read Clark's book. It starts with a basic question that almost everyone asks at some point in their life: Is there a God?

"The fundamental difference between Christianity and Buddhism is the God question," Clark says. "The God question is an important one, no matter what religious tradition you're in. In terms of Christianity, we have this idea of a God, then we have this trinity with Jesus and this whole idea of redemption and being given grace and forgiveness. In Buddhism, there is no theology because there's no 'theos,' there's no God. That's crucially different."

Christianity is based on a relationship with the creator, Clark says, in which the human knows that they are loved. Buddhism doesn't worship a deity but is reliant on an impersonal justice system known as karma, where personal actions dictate future incarnations until one reaches the state called "nirvana."

"I like to think of Buddhism as an idea that we have something like a soul, and that soul could go through trillions or zillions of reincarnations," Clark says. "But at the end of one's reincarnated cycle, your soul ends. Now, what that end means is a debate within Buddhism. But you have multiple lives and an end of the soul. Christianity is the opposite. You have one life, but a soul that is eternal. That distinction inspires us to think differently about how we live."

Even though both religions value charity, compassion, peacefulness and self-understanding, the motivations for those virtues are different.

Clark says that Christians ought to live in the secure knowledge that everyone is loved by a creator God who knows and suffers with them. The end goal is for everyone to live together forever.

Buddhists, Clark says, see in every person the possibility that they are a spouse, friend or relative from a past or future life. Therefore, they must be treated respectfully in order to finally achieve the ultimate peace that is oblivion or annihilation.

There are other secondary distinctions that Clark discusses, but they can pretty much all be traced back to these separate foundations.

"The Dalai Lama once said, 'When people say that Christianity and Buddhism are the same, it's like putting a sheep's head on a yak's body,'" Clark says. "My research wants to tease those differences out so that someone doesn't go to Kmart and buy a Buddha statue but not understand the message of Buddhism, which is a beautiful, loving message. But it's good to know what that means. We talk so much in modern academics today about respecting and honoring the other part of that is actually listening to the other. That's part of the project. Celebrating the other requires knowing the other."

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Whitworth historian Anthony Clark's recent book helps Buddhists and Christians acknowledge their differences in order ... - The Inlander

Red Apple Group CEO John Catsimatidis reacts to the Trump verdict.

Prominent business executives have warned that more New York enterprises and their leaders may fall victim to "no rule of law" in the wake of Donald Trumps guilty verdict.

"If they can do this to a business person like Donald Trump, they could do it to anybody in New York and a lot of businesses. A lot of people are concerned that there is no rule of law," billionaire CEO John Catsimatidis said Friday on "Mornings with Maria."

"If they can do this to Donald Trump, a former president, regardless of how you feel about the politics, if they can do this to a former president, what can they do to Grant Cardone? What can they do to any other businessman?," the Cardone Capital founder also chimed in Friday on "Varney & Co."

"The city was shocked. The country was shocked. The world was shocked, and it was just mind-boggling. People texted me that they just got home and their wives were crying. We have to bring back the rule of law," Catsimatidis added in reaction.

BUSINESS LEADERS SPEAK OUT ABOUT TRUMP GUILTY VERDICT, WITH ONE IMMEDIATELY DONATING $300K

On Thursday, former President Trump was found guilty on all counts in his historic and unprecedented criminal trial, making him the first former president of the United States to be convicted of a crime.

American business leaders John Catsimatidis, left, and Grant Cardone, right, talk about the economic and legal impact of former President Trump's guilty verdict on FOX Business on Friday. (Fox News)

Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg charged Trump with 34 counts of falsifying business records in the first degree, though Trump pleaded not guilty to all counts.

Trump faces a maximum sentence of 136 years total, as each count carries a maximum prison sentence of four years. Additionally, trial attorney Mercedes Colwin reported that the NY v. Trump case carried an estimated taxpayer cost of $2 million over six weeks, with $50,000 per day being spent on safety precautions.

Cardone recently pulled his business out of the Empire State and cautioned that Trumps legal troubles including a previous $355 million fine in a New York civil fraud case in February would "wreak financial havoc" on the city.

"I have 15,000 investors with me at Cardone Capital. We've raised $1.3 billion. If I went to them today and said, I want to invest in New York City, they would not give me money to do that," the investor argued.

Cardone Capital founder Grant Cardone doubles down on his commitment to keep future investment out of the Empire State in the wake of Trump's guilty verdict.

"That's one of the greatest cities on planet Earth. And nobody wants to go there and do business," Cardone continued. "I blame the legal system. Clearly, the political system has been weaponized."

After the verdict was read Thursday, Catsimatidis, who is the chairman and CEO of Red Apple Group and United Refining Company, allegedly attended a private dinner with Trump and 15 others. The CEO claimed the 45th president appeared to be in "good spirits" despite the conviction.

"He went around, and I asked about who the next vice president should be. Everybody gave him advice," Catsimatidis detailed. "The one advice that has resonated amongst the friends that I told it to, I said, not only should you pick the right vice president, you should announce your entire Cabinet. Something that's never been done before. And run as a team. Because we've got to take back America."

"We have to change the world. And President Trump is the only one that has the courage, actually, to make a difference in the world," he added. "And that message has to go through."

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SlateStone Wealth chief market strategist Kenny Polcari joins 'Varney & Co.' to discuss whether Trump's guilty verdicts will have a long-term impact on markets.

In response to the guilty verdict, Cardone claimed his company has taken $500 million it planned to invest in New York and reallocated the capital into Florida real estate investments.

"You just have too many other risks that, as a fiduciary of other people's money, I can't raise the rents, I can't evict, I cannot predict the taxes," Cardone said. "As great a city as New York City is, I need stability in the marketplace. And right now you have problems picking up the trash."

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Fox News Brooke Singman contributed to this report.

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Billionaire CEO, real estate investor on impact of Trump verdict: 'Nobody wants to do business' in NYC - Fox Business

KEY POINTS

Bitcoin exchange-traded funds (ETFs) have come a long way just over four months since their approval by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) the ETFs collectively hold more than 1 million Bitcoins or 5% of the world's total BTC supply.

MicroStrategy founder and executive chairman Michael Saylor posted a chart Monday that showed a total of 32 global spot BTC ETFs hold 1,002,343 Bitcoins as of May 24. Most of the BTC are held by American spot Bitcoin ETF issuers, including BlackRock's popular IBIT and Fidelity's FBTC.

Decrypt has verified the data posted by Saylor based on public records and corroborated by data from Coinglass's BTC ETF dashboard. According to the chart, the total value of the Bitcoin ETFs' BTC holdings are at $69,161,667,000.

The chart notes that Grayscale's previously unpopular GBTC is the holder of 289,040 Bitcoins, while IBIT, which has been a top choice for many retail investors since the funds launched, holds 287,168 BTC. Outside the United States, Canadian Purpose's BTCC leads the way with over 27,000 BTC holdings, followed by ETC Group's BTCE that holds over 20,800 Bitcoins.

The Bitcoin community on X (formerly Twitter) are celebrating the major milestone. One user said Saylor has just "casually" dropped a "new naming convention for 1 million $BTC." The tech magnate referred to a million Bitcoins as "1 Nakamoto," seemingly a tribute to Satoshi Nakamoto, the creator of the world's first decentralized and largest digital asset by market value.

Another user said the holdings signal "institutional acceptance" and the "growing trust of the general public in Bitcoin" as they are now integrating the digital coin into their investment portfolios. Other users celebrated the journey BTC has had since its introduction to the world by Nakamoto in a 2008 white paper.

News of the massive milestone for BTC ETFs comes amid the digital currency's struggle in the past few days to shoot past the $70,000-mark, which it achieved last week, ahead of the approval of spot ETFs for Ether (ETH), Bitcoin's closest rival.

For some Bitcoiners, the approval of spot ETH ETFs may be a bane for the digital asset. However, Saylor recently said he thinks "it may be better" for the asset since the new Ether funds "can serve as another line of defense" for Bitcoin.

Meanwhile, institutional interest on BTC ETFs has been apparent in recent weeks. Some of the country's key traditional financial institutions have disclosed their Bitcoin ETF holdings during the 13F season, including Millennium Management, which leads the pack with a staggering $2 billion portfolio.

Investment banking giant Morgan Stanley also disclosed it has some $270 million worth of Grayscale's GBTC, while the State of Wisconsin's Investment Board (SWIB) disclosed it holds nearly $100 million worth of IBIT.

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Bitcoin ETFs Collectively Hold '1 Nakamoto' Worth Over $69.1 Billion - International Business Times

Bitcoins14% surge over the past week has convinced traders that it could be the real deal market pump with another correction not expected until it reaches $90,000.

I believe this is the real deal market pump as fundamentals and technicals are providing confluence, pseudonymous crypto trader Roman told Cointelegraph.

They explained Bitcoins price decline from its all-time high of around $73,738 to a 21% drop to $58,000 on May 2, was a much-needed correction for higher prices in the future.

Roman pointed to the bullish reversal pattern seen on the Bitcoin (BTC) price chart this week as a strong indicator that it wont drop into another consolidation period until it surpasses its March 12 all-time high of $73,679 by at least 20%.

I think we will move to at least $90,000 to $100,000 before we see another consolidation period or correction, they declared.

The bullish reversal pattern was signaled by a spinning top candlestick near the downtrends bottom on May 20, closing at $66,278, according to CoinMarketCap data.

Bitcoin was trading at $70,140 at the time of writing.

Bitcoins recent price spike comes amid heightened speculation the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC)could be moving to approve spot Ether (ETH) exchange-traded funds (ETFs), which analysts and the broader community have doubted over the past few weeks.

The market sentiment took a positive turn as a result, with the Crypto Fear and Greed Index shooting up by 12 points in just 24 hours, reaching an Extreme Greed score of 76 on May 21.

The positive sentiment spike came after reports the SEC had urged Ether ETF applicants to speed up their 19b-4 filings on May 20.

Ledn chief investment officer John Glover was surprised at how the speculation impacted Bitcoins price.

It makes complete sense that ETH jumped higher on this news; it is interesting to me that this brought BTC price up along with it as there should be zero impact on BTC demand from an SEC approval for ETH, Glover told Cointelegraph.

Related: Bitcoin shorts worth $1.4B at risk of liquidation if BTC price hits $74.3K

Glover anticipated there might be some volatility before reaching new record highs.

I would guess we see some profit taking in the market, which will push BTC prices down from the $71,000 level in the coming days as well, Glover said.

Despite the positive shift in market sentiment, crypto traders are bracing for a slight dip in Bitcoins price before it continues its upward trend, according to CoinGlass liquidation data.

Even a slight 1% spike to approximately $71,000 would wipe around $766.73 million in short position liquidations. On the flip side, a 1% drop to about $69,400 would clear $101.54 million in long positions.

Magazine: OpenAIs iPhone moment trumps Google, AI lies, porn and dating: AI Eye

This article does not contain investment advice or recommendations. Every investment and trading move involves risk, and readers should conduct their own research when making a decision.

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Bitcoin's recent price move is the 'real deal market pump' to $90K - Cointelegraph

4h30 3 min of reading by Luc Jose A.

The crypto market has just experienced a significant upheaval: while Bitcoin undergoes a sharp drop, puzzling many investors, Ether shows remarkable resilience, defying general expectations. How does ETH manage to hold its ground while the queen of cryptos falters? Lets analyze the forces at play that are currently shaping the crypto market.

Bitcoin fell below $68,000 this Thursday. This decline occurred in a context where the composite PMI index of the United States, which measures the economic health of the manufacturing and services sector, recorded an unexpected increase, reaching 54.4. This figure, the highest since April 2022, surpassed analysts forecasts, signaling a more robust economic recovery than anticipated.

The inverse correlation between the rise in the PMI and the drop in Bitcoin can be explained by market expectations regarding interest rates. Investors, reacting to positive economic data, anticipate rate hikes by the Federal Reserve to control inflation, which strengthens the dollar and exerts downward pressure on non-income-producing assets like Bitcoin.

Moreover, the increase in bond yields follows this economic data. Bonds thus become more attractive, draining capital that could otherwise have been invested in riskier assets like Bitcoin.

Unlike Bitcoin, Ether has shown notable resistance, maintaining its value around $3,790 despite economic fluctuations. By keeping its price around $3,790, Ether demonstrates relative stability even during economic turbulence. This resistance is even more evident when observing the ETHBTC ratio, which has seen an increase, indicating increased investor confidence in Ether compared to Bitcoin.

The analysis of the current situation suggests that investors are increasingly viewing Ether as a safe haven, expecting its performance to remain stable in the long term despite ongoing economic uncertainties. This perception is reinforced by the continuous advancements of Ethereum in blockchain technology. These factors contribute to solidifying Ethers position as an attractive and sustainable alternative for investors looking to diversify their crypto portfolios during periods of economic uncertainty.

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Diplm de Sciences Po Toulouse et titulaire d'une certification consultant blockchain dlivre par Alyra, j'ai rejoint l'aventure Cointribune en 2019. Convaincu du potentiel de la blockchain pour transformer de nombreux secteurs de l'conomie, j'ai pris l'engagement de sensibiliser et d'informer le grand public sur cet cosystme en constante volution. Mon objectif est de permettre chacun de mieux comprendre la blockchain et de saisir les opportunits qu'elle offre. Je m'efforce chaque jour de fournir une analyse objective de l'actualit, de dcrypter les tendances du march, de relayer les dernires innovations technologiques et de mettre en perspective les enjeux conomiques et socitaux de cette rvolution en marche.

DISCLAIMER

The views, thoughts, and opinions expressed in this article belong solely to the author, and should not be taken as investment advice. Do your own research before taking any investment decisions.

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Bitcoin stumbles, Ether resists and surprises! - Cointribune EN

Bitcoin (BTC) price rallied to the coveted $70,000 mark amid a noticeable surge in spot buying and spot BTC exchange-traded fund (ETF) purchasing, with the cryptocurrency community pondering whether the bull market is just beginning or nearing its peak.

Analyst ELI5 of TLDR suggested that the majority of on-chain indicators point to a nascent bull market, despite some showing topping patterns. The recent support bounce near $60,000 has sparked increased interest, with Farside Investors reporting approximately $950 million in inflows last week, a figure not seen since March.

Should this trend continue, BTC could potentially exceed expectations. Currently, BTC is trading within a few hundred dollars of $70,000, with the 20-day EMA at $64,371 and a positive RSI indicating that an upward breakout is more likely. Overcoming the $68,000 resistance suggests that BTC price is on the path to $73,777, though this level may trigger a strong bearish response.

Conversely, a break below the moving averages could signal a bearish downturn, with potential drops to $59,600 and $56,552.

In the broader economic context, Bitcoins 51% year-to-date gain is reflective of investors' anticipation of U.S. monetary expansion, which saw the M2 monetary base surpass $21.0 trillion in April 2024.

This increase in circulating money hints at rising inflationary pressures despite a period of spending hesitancy by companies and individuals. The United States Federal Reserves strategies to manage inflation and avoid a recession could impact the liquidity and, consequently, the attractiveness of scarce assets like Bitcoin.

Related:ETFs buy 3X new BTC supply 5 Things to know in Bitcoin this week

Adding to the bullish sentiment, exchange BTC reserves have plummeted to a seven-year low, with CryptoQuant data showing only 1,918,417 BTC available on major trading platforms as of May 19, a significant decrease from the previous year.

This scarcity, coupled with the recent halving event that has halved the potential new supply from miners, makes a bearish stance on Bitcoin increasingly difficult to justify.

This article does not contain investment advice or recommendations. Every investment and trading move involves risk, and readers should conduct their own research when making a decision.

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Bitcoin price hits $70K as spot and BTC ETF buying surges - Cointelegraph