“Hey, Alexa! Are You Trustworthy?”

 

Adam Zewe | MIT News
Office

A family gathers around their kitchen island to unbox the digital assistant they just purchased. They will be more likely to trust this new voice-user interface, which might be a smart speaker like Amazon’s Alexa or a social robot like Jibo, if it exhibits some humanlike social behaviors, according to a new study by researchers in MIT’s Media Lab.

The researchers found that family members tend to think a device is more competent and emotionally engaging if it can exhibit social cues, like moving to orient its gaze at a speaking person. In addition, their study revealed that branding — specifically, whether the manufacturer’s name is associated with the device — has a significant effect on how members of a family perceive and interact with different voice-user interfaces.

When a device has a higher level of social embodiment, such as the ability to give verbal and nonverbal social cues through motion or expression, family members increase their interaction. They also interacted with one another more frequently while engaging with the device as a group.

These results could help designers create voice-user interfaces that are more engaging and more likely to be used by members of a family in the home, while also improving the transparency of these devices. The researchers also outline ethical concerns that could come from certain personality and embodiment designs.

“These devices are new technology coming into the home and they are still very under-explored,” says Anastasia Ostrowski, a research assistant in the Personal Robotics Group in the Media Lab, and lead author of the paper. “Families are in the home, so we were very interested in looking at this from a generational approach, including children and grandparents. It was super interesting for us to understand how people are perceiving these, and how families interact with these devices together.”

“The human-centered insights of this work are relevant to the design of all kinds of personified AI devices, from smart speakers and intelligent agents to personal robots,” says Breazeal.

Investigating Interactions

This work grew out of an earlier study where the researchers explored how people use voice-user interfaces at home. At the start of the study, users familiarized themselves with three devices before taking one home for a month. The researchers noticed that people spent more time interacting with a Jibo social robot than they did the smart speakers, Amazon Alexa and Google Home. They wondered why people engaged more with the social robot.

To get to the bottom of this, they designed three experiments that involved family members interacting as a group with different voice-user interfaces. Thirty-four families, comprising 92 people between age 4 and 69, participated in the studies.

The experiments were designed to mimic a family’s first encounter with a voice-user interface. Families were video recorded as they interacted with three devices, working through a list of 24 actions (like “ask about the weather” or “try to learn the agent’s opinions”). Then they answered questions about their perception of the devices and categorized the voice-user interfaces’ personalities.

In the first experiment, participants interacted with a Jibo robot, Amazon Echo, and Google Home, with no modifications. Most found the Jibo to be far more outgoing, dependable, and sympathetic. Because the users perceived that Jibo had a more humanlike personality, they were more likely to interact with it, Ostrowski explains.

 

An Unexpected Result

In the second experiment, researchers set out to understand how branding affected participants’ perspectives. They changed the “wake word” (the word the user says aloud to engage the device) of the Amazon Echo to “Hey, Amazon!” instead of “Hey, Alexa!,” but kept the “wake word” the same for the Google Home (“Hey, Google!”) and the Jibo robot (“Hey, Jibo!”). They also provided participants with information about each manufacturer. When branding was taken into account, users viewed Google as more trustworthy than Amazon, despite the fact that the devices were very similar in design and functionality.

“It also drastically changed how much people thought the Amazon device was competent or like a companion,” Ostrowski says. “I was not expecting it to have that big of a difference between the first and second study. We didn’t change any of the abilities, how they function, or how they respond. Just the fact that they were aware the device is made by Amazon made a huge difference in their perceptions.”

Changing the “wake word” of a device can have ethical implications. A personified name, which can make a device seem more social, could mislead users by masking the connection between the device and the company that made it, which is also the company that now has access to the user’s data, she says.

In the third experiment, the team wanted to see how interpersonal movement affected the interactions. For instance, the Jibo robot turns its gaze to the individual who is speaking. For this study, the researchers used the Jibo along with an Amazon Echo Show (a rectangular screen) with the modified wake word “Hey, Computer,” and an Amazon Echo Spot (a sphere with a circular screen) that had a rotating flag on top which sped up when someone called its wake word, “Hey, Alexa!”

Users found the modified Amazon Echo Spot to be no more engaging than the Amazon Echo Show, suggesting that repetitive movement without social embodiment may not be an effective way to increase user engagement, Ostrowski says.

 

Fostering Deeper Relationships

Deeper analysis of the third study also revealed that users interacted more among themselves, like glancing at each other, laughing together, or having side conversations, when the device they were engaging with had more social abilities.

“In the home, we have been wondering how these systems promote engagement between users. That is always a big concern for people: How are these devices going to shape people’s relationships? We want to design systems that can promote a more flourishing relationship between people,” Ostrowski says.

The researchers used their insights to lay out several voice-user interface design considerations, including the importance of developing warm, outgoing, and thoughtful personalities; understanding how the wake word influences user acceptance; and conveying nonverbal social cues through movement.

With these results in hand, the researchers want to continue exploring how families engage with voice-user interfaces that have varying levels of functionality. For instance, they might conduct a study with three different social robots. They would also like to replicate these studies in a real-world environment and explore which design features are best suited for specific interactions.

 

This article originally appeared in MIT News on January 14, 2022 and has been Shared by Permission. Coauthors include Vasiliki Zygouras, a recent Wellesley College graduate working in the Personal Robotics Group at the time of this research; Research Scientist Hae Won Park; Cornell University graduate student Jenny Fu; and senior author Cynthia Breazeal, professor of media arts and sciences, director of MIT RAISE, and director of the Personal Robotics Group, as well as a developer of the Jibo robot. The paper is published in Frontiers in Robotics and AI.

 

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	Source: MIT Researchers

Study Reveals Plunge in Lithium-ion Battery Costs

 

David L. Chandler | MIT News Office

 

The cost of the rechargeable lithium-ion batteries used for phones, laptops, and cars has fallen dramatically over the last three decades and has been a major driver of the rapid growth of those technologies. But attempting to quantify that cost decline has produced ambiguous and conflicting results that have hampered attempts to project the technology’s future or devise useful policies and research priorities.

Now, MIT researchers have carried out an exhaustive analysis of the studies that have looked at the decline in the prices of these batteries, which are the dominant rechargeable technology in today’s world. The new study looks back over three decades, including analyzing the original underlying datasets and documents whenever possible, to arrive at a clear picture of the technology’s trajectory.

The researchers found that the cost of these batteries has dropped by 97 percent since they were first commercially introduced in 1991. This rate of improvement is much faster than many analysts had claimed and is comparable to that of solar photovoltaic panels, which some had considered to be an exceptional case. The new findings are reported today in the journal Energy and Environmental Science, in a paper by MIT postdoc Micah Ziegler and Associate Professor Jessika Trancik.

While it’s clear that there have been dramatic cost declines in some clean-energy technologies such as solar and wind, Trancik says, when they started to look into the decline in prices for lithium-ion batteries, “we saw that there was substantial disagreement as to how quickly the costs of these technologies had come down.” Similar disagreements showed up in tracing other important aspects of battery development, such as the ever-improving energy density (energy stored within a given volume) and specific energy (energy stored within a given mass).

“These trends are so consequential for getting us to where we are right now, and also for thinking about what could happen in the future,” says Trancik, who is an associate professor in MIT’s Institute for Data, Systems and Society. While it was common knowledge that the decline in battery costs was an enabler of the recent growth in sales of electric vehicles, for example, it was unclear just how great that decline had been. Through this detailed analysis, she says, “we were able to confirm that yes, lithium-ion battery technologies have improved in terms of their costs, at rates that are comparable to solar energy technology, and specifically photovoltaic modules, which are often held up as kind of the gold standard in clean energy innovation.”

It may seem odd that there was such great uncertainty and disagreement about how much lithium-ion battery costs had declined and what factors accounted for it, but in fact, much of the information is in the form of closely held corporate data that is difficult for researchers to access. Most lithium-ion batteries are not sold directly to consumers — you can’t run down to your typical corner drugstore to pick up a replacement battery for your iPhone, your PC, or your electric car. Instead, manufacturers buy lithium-ion batteries and build them into electronics and cars. Large companies like Apple or Tesla buy batteries by the millions, or manufacture them themselves for prices that are negotiated or internally accounted for but never publicly disclosed.

In addition to helping to boost the ongoing electrification of transportation, further declines in lithium-ion battery costs could potentially also increase the batteries’ usage in stationary applications as a way of compensating for the intermittent supply of clean energy sources such as solar and wind. Both applications could play a significant role in helping to curb the world’s emissions of climate-altering greenhouse gases. “I can’t overstate the importance of these trends in clean energy innovation for getting us to where we are right now, where it starts to look like we could see rapid electrification of vehicles and we are seeing the rapid growth of renewable energy technologies,” Trancik says. “Of course, there’s so much more to do to address climate change, but this has really been a game-changer.”

The new findings are not just a matter of retracing the history of battery development but of helping to guide the future, Ziegler points out. Combing through all of the published literature on the subject of the cost reductions in lithium-ion cells, he found “very different measures of the historical improvement. And across a variety of different papers, researchers were using these trends to make suggestions about how to further reduce costs of lithium-ion technologies or when they might meet cost targets.” But because the underlying data varied so much, “the recommendations that the researchers were making could be quite different.” Some studies suggested that lithium-ion batteries would not fall in cost quickly enough for certain applications, while others were much more optimistic. Such differences in data can ultimately have a real impact on the setting of research priorities and government incentives.

The researchers dug into the original sources of the published data, in some cases finding that certain primary data had been used in multiple studies that were later cited as separate sources or that the original data sources had been lost along the way. And while most studies have focused only on the cost, Ziegler says it became clear that such a one-dimensional analysis might underestimate how quickly lithium-ion technologies improved; in addition to cost, weight and volume are also key factors for both vehicles and portable electronics. So, the team added a second track to the study, analyzing the improvements in these parameters as well.

“Lithium-ion batteries were not adopted because they were the least expensive technology at the time,” Ziegler says. “There were less expensive battery technologies available. Lithium-ion technology was adopted because it allows you to put portable electronics into your hand, because it allows you to make power tools that last longer and have more power, and it allows us to build cars” that can provide adequate driving range. “It felt like just looking at dollars per kilowatt-hour was only telling part of the story,” he says.

That broader analysis helps to define what may be possible in the future, he adds: “We’re saying that lithium-ion technologies might improve more quickly for certain applications than would be projected by just looking at one measure of performance. By looking at multiple measures, you get essentially a clearer picture of the improvement rate, and this suggests that they could maybe improve more rapidly for applications where the restrictions on mass and volume are relaxed.”

Trancik adds the new study can play an important role in energy-related policymaking. “Published data trends on the few clean technologies that have seen major cost reductions over time, wind, solar, and now lithium-ion batteries, tend to be referenced over and over again, and not only in academic papers but in policy documents and industry reports,” she says. “Many important climate policy conclusions are based on these few trends. For this reason, it is important to get them right. There’s a real need to treat the data with care, and to raise our game overall in dealing with technology data and tracking these trends.”

“Battery costs determine price parity of electric vehicles with internal combustion engine vehicles,” says Venkat Viswanathan, an associate professor of mechanical engineering at Carnegie Mellon University, who was not associated with this work. “Thus, projecting battery cost declines is probably one of the most critical challenges in ensuring an accurate understanding of adoption of electric vehicles.”

Viswanathan adds that “the finding that cost declines may occur faster than previously thought will enable broader adoption, increasing volumes, and leading to further cost declines. … The datasets curated, analyzed and released with this paper will have a lasting impact on the community.”

 

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Voyager Digital CEO Withdraws Automatic Securities Disposition Plan

Research, News, and Market Data on Voyager Digital

 

Voyager Digital Ltd. (“Voyager” or the “Company”) (TSX: VOYG; OTCQB: VYGVF; FRA: UCD2) one of the fastest-growing, publicly traded cryptocurrency platforms in the United States, today announced that Stephen Ehrlich, CEO and Director, has withdrawn the automatic securities disposition plan (“ASDP”) that was previously announced on December 31, 2021. No shares have been sold under the plan. The ASDP will, in accordance with its terms, terminate 30 days from the date of this press release.
 
Commenting on the withdrawal, Mr. Ehrlich noted, “Despite having a floor significantly above the current stock price, I felt it was in the best interest of the investors to withdraw the plan.” Ehrlich continued, “Based on our key financial metrics, including revenues for the quarter ended December 31, 2021 as disclosed in our press release issued January 5, 2022, I believe Voyager is undervalued and am excited about our product growth and expanded capabilities planned for 2022, including our NFT offering, debit card rollout, international expansion and more.
 
About Voyager Digital Ltd.

Publicly traded Voyager Digital Ltd.’s (TSX: VOYG) (OTCQB: VYGVF) (FRA: UCD2) US subsidiary, Voyager Digital, LLC, is a fast-growing, cryptocurrency platform in the United States founded in 2018 to bring choice, transparency, and cost efficiency to the marketplace. Voyager offers a secure way to trade over 70 different cryptocurrency assets using its easy-to-use mobile application and earn rewards up to 12% annually on more than 35 cryptocurrencies. Through its subsidiary Coinify ApS, Voyager provides cryptocurrency payment solutions for both consumers and merchants around the globe.

To learn more about the company, please visit https://www.investvoyager.com.

The TSX has not approved or disapproved of the information contained herein.

SOURCE Voyager Digital, Ltd.

Press Contacts

Voyager Digital, Ltd.

Michael Legg
Chief Communications Officer
(212) 547-8807
mlegg@investvoyager.com

Voyager Public Relations Team
pr@investvoyager.com

 

Voyager Digital CEO Withdraws Automatic Securities Disposition Plan

Research, News, and Market Data on Voyager Digital

 

Voyager Digital Ltd. (“Voyager” or the “Company”) (TSX: VOYG; OTCQB: VYGVF; FRA: UCD2) one of the fastest-growing, publicly traded cryptocurrency platforms in the United States, today announced that Stephen Ehrlich, CEO and Director, has withdrawn the automatic securities disposition plan (“ASDP”) that was previously announced on December 31, 2021. No shares have been sold under the plan. The ASDP will, in accordance with its terms, terminate 30 days from the date of this press release.
 
Commenting on the withdrawal, Mr. Ehrlich noted, “Despite having a floor significantly above the current stock price, I felt it was in the best interest of the investors to withdraw the plan.” Ehrlich continued, “Based on our key financial metrics, including revenues for the quarter ended December 31, 2021 as disclosed in our press release issued January 5, 2022, I believe Voyager is undervalued and am excited about our product growth and expanded capabilities planned for 2022, including our NFT offering, debit card rollout, international expansion and more.
 
About Voyager Digital Ltd.

Publicly traded Voyager Digital Ltd.’s (TSX: VOYG) (OTCQB: VYGVF) (FRA: UCD2) US subsidiary, Voyager Digital, LLC, is a fast-growing, cryptocurrency platform in the United States founded in 2018 to bring choice, transparency, and cost efficiency to the marketplace. Voyager offers a secure way to trade over 70 different cryptocurrency assets using its easy-to-use mobile application and earn rewards up to 12% annually on more than 35 cryptocurrencies. Through its subsidiary Coinify ApS, Voyager provides cryptocurrency payment solutions for both consumers and merchants around the globe.

To learn more about the company, please visit https://www.investvoyager.com.

The TSX has not approved or disapproved of the information contained herein.

SOURCE Voyager Digital, Ltd.

Press Contacts

Voyager Digital, Ltd.

Michael Legg
Chief Communications Officer
(212) 547-8807
mlegg@investvoyager.com

Voyager Public Relations Team
pr@investvoyager.com

	Image Credit: Duncan Rawlinson (Flickr)

The Metaverse is Money and Crypto is King – Why You’ll be on a Blockchain When Your Virtual-World is Hopping

 

You may think the metaverse will be a bunch of interconnected virtual spaces – the world wide web but accessed through virtual reality. This is largely correct, but there is also a fundamental but slightly more cryptic side to the metaverse that will set it apart from today’s internet: the blockchain.

In the beginning, Web 1.0 was the information superhighway of connected computers and servers that you could search, explore, and inhabit, usually through a centralized company’s platform – for example, AOL, Yahoo, Microsoft and Google. Around the turn of the millennium, Web 2.0 came to be characterized by social networking sites, blogging and the monetization of user data for advertising by the centralized gatekeepers to “free” social media platforms, including Facebook, SnapChat, Twitter and TikTok.

Web 3.0 will be the foundation for the metaverse. It will consist of blockchain-enabled decentralized applications that support an economy of user-owned crypto assets and data.

Blockchain? Decentralized? Crypto-assets? As researchers who study social media and media technology, we can explain the technology that will make the metaverse possible.

Owning Bits

Blockchain is a technology that permanently records transactions, typically in a decentralized and public database called a ledger. Bitcoin is the most well-known blockchain-based cryptocurrency. Every time you buy some bitcoin, for example, that transaction gets recorded to the Bitcoin blockchain, which means the record is distributed to thousands of individual computers around the world.

This decentralized recording system is very difficult to fool or control. Public blockchains, like Bitcoin and Ethereum, are also transparent – all transactions are available for anyone on the internet to see, in contrast to traditional banking books.

Ethereum is a blockchain like Bitcoin, but Ethereum is also programmable through smart contracts, which are essentially blockchain-based software routines that run automatically when some condition is met. For example, you could use a smart contract on the blockchain to establish your ownership of a digital object, such as a piece of art or music, to which no one else can claim ownership on the blockchain — even if they save a copy to their computer. Digital objects that can be owned – currencies, securities, artwork – are crypto assets.

Items like artwork and music on a blockchain are nonfungible tokens (NFTs). Nonfungible means they are unique and not replaceable, the opposite of fungible items like currency – any dollar is worth the same as, and can be swapped with, any other dollar.

Importantly, you could use a smart contract that says you are willing to sell your piece of digital art for US$1 million in ether, the currency of the Ethereum blockchain. When I click “agree,” the artwork and the ether automatically transfer ownership between us on the blockchain. There is no need for a bank or third-party escrow, and if either of us were to dispute this transaction – for example, if you claimed that I only paid $999,000 – the other could easily point to the public record in the distributed ledger.

What does this blockchain crypto-asset stuff have to do with the metaverse? Everything! To start, the blockchain allows you to own digital goods in a virtual world. You won’t just own that NFT in the real world, you’ll own it in the virtual world, too.

In addition, the metaverse isn’t being built by any one group or company. Different groups will build different virtual worlds, and in the future these worlds will be interoperable – forming the metaverse. As people move between virtual worlds – say from Decentraland’s virtual environments to Microsoft’s – they’ll want to bring their stuff with them. If two virtual worlds are interoperable, the blockchain will authenticate proof of ownership of your digital goods in both virtual worlds. Essentially, as long as you are able to access your crypto wallet within a virtual world, you will be able to access your crypto stuff.

 

Don’t Forget Your Wallet

So what will you keep in your crypto wallet? You will obviously want to carry cryptocurrencies in the metaverse. Your crypto wallet will also hold your metaverse-only digital goods, such as your avatars, avatar clothing, avatar animations, virtual decorations, and weapons.

Avatars, like this representation of El Salvador President Nayib Bukele, are cartoonlike animations that people inhabit in the metaverse. AP Photo/Salvador Melendez

What will people do with their crypto wallets? Among other things, shop. Just as you likely do on the web now, you will be able to purchase traditional digital goods like music, movies, games, and apps. You’ll also be able to buy physical-world items in the metaverse, and you’ll be able to view and “hold” 3D models of what you are shopping for, which could help you make more informed decisions.

Also, just like you can use ye old leather wallet to carry your ID, crypto wallets will be linkable to real-world identities, which could help facilitate transactions that require legal verification, such as buying a real-world car or home. Because your ID will be linked to your wallet, you won’t need to remember login information for all the websites and virtual worlds that you visit – just connect your wallet with a click and you are logged in. ID-associated wallets will also be useful for controlling access to age-restricted areas in the metaverse.

Your crypto wallet could also be linked to your contacts list, which would allow you to bring your social network information from one virtual world to another. “Join me for a pool party in FILL IN THE BLANK-world!”

 

 

At some point in the future, wallets could also be associated with reputation scores that determine the permissions you have to broadcast in public places and interact with people outside of your social network. If you act like a toxic misinformation-spreading troll, you may damage your reputation and potentially have your sphere of influence reduced by the system. This could create an incentive for people to behave well in the metaverse, but platform developers will have to prioritize these systems.

 

Big Business

Lastly, if the metaverse is money, then companies will certainly want to play too. The decentralized nature of blockchain will potentially reduce the need for gatekeepers in financial transactions, but companies will still have many opportunities to generate revenue, possibly even more than in current economies. Companies like Meta will provide large platforms where people will work, play, and congregate.

The full metaverse doesn’t exist yet, but that hasn’t stopped a land rush as people and businesses grab virtual real estate.

Major brands are also getting into the NFT mix, including Dolce & Gabbana, Coca-Cola (COKE), Adidas (ADDYY) and Nike (NKE). In the future, when you buy a physical world item from a company, you might also gain ownership of a linked NFT in the metaverse.

For example, when you buy that coveted name-brand outfit to wear to the real-world dance club, you might also become the owner of the crypto version of the outfit that your avatar can wear to the virtual Ariana Grande concert. And just as you could sell the physical outfit secondhand, you could also sell the NFT version for someone else’s avatar to wear.

These are a few of the many ways that metaverse business models will likely overlap with the physical world. Such examples will get more complex as augmented reality technologies increasingly come into play, further merging aspects of the metaverse and physical world. Although the metaverse proper isn’t here yet, technological foundations like blockchain and crypto assets are steadily being developed, setting the stage for a seemingly ubiquitous virtual future that is coming soon to a ‘verse near you.

 

This article was republished with permission from The Conversation, a news site dedicated to sharing ideas from academic experts. It represents the research-based findings and opinions of Rabindra Ratan Associate Professor of Media and Information, Michigan State University. Dar Meshi Assistant Professor of Communication Arts and Sciences, Michigan State University.

 

Suggested Reading:

Why the Metaverse Matters

Companies are Choosing the Metaverse for their Business Address

NFT Fractional Ownership and Metaverse Museums

Blockchain 2022 – What’s Next?

 

Stay up to date. Follow us:

	Image Credit: Duncan Rawlinson (Flickr)

The Metaverse is Money and Crypto is King – Why You’ll be on a Blockchain When Your Virtual-World is Hopping

 

You may think the metaverse will be a bunch of interconnected virtual spaces – the world wide web but accessed through virtual reality. This is largely correct, but there is also a fundamental but slightly more cryptic side to the metaverse that will set it apart from today’s internet: the blockchain.

In the beginning, Web 1.0 was the information superhighway of connected computers and servers that you could search, explore, and inhabit, usually through a centralized company’s platform – for example, AOL, Yahoo, Microsoft and Google. Around the turn of the millennium, Web 2.0 came to be characterized by social networking sites, blogging and the monetization of user data for advertising by the centralized gatekeepers to “free” social media platforms, including Facebook, SnapChat, Twitter and TikTok.

Web 3.0 will be the foundation for the metaverse. It will consist of blockchain-enabled decentralized applications that support an economy of user-owned crypto assets and data.

Blockchain? Decentralized? Crypto-assets? As researchers who study social media and media technology, we can explain the technology that will make the metaverse possible.

Owning Bits

Blockchain is a technology that permanently records transactions, typically in a decentralized and public database called a ledger. Bitcoin is the most well-known blockchain-based cryptocurrency. Every time you buy some bitcoin, for example, that transaction gets recorded to the Bitcoin blockchain, which means the record is distributed to thousands of individual computers around the world.

This decentralized recording system is very difficult to fool or control. Public blockchains, like Bitcoin and Ethereum, are also transparent – all transactions are available for anyone on the internet to see, in contrast to traditional banking books.

Ethereum is a blockchain like Bitcoin, but Ethereum is also programmable through smart contracts, which are essentially blockchain-based software routines that run automatically when some condition is met. For example, you could use a smart contract on the blockchain to establish your ownership of a digital object, such as a piece of art or music, to which no one else can claim ownership on the blockchain — even if they save a copy to their computer. Digital objects that can be owned – currencies, securities, artwork – are crypto assets.

Items like artwork and music on a blockchain are nonfungible tokens (NFTs). Nonfungible means they are unique and not replaceable, the opposite of fungible items like currency – any dollar is worth the same as, and can be swapped with, any other dollar.

Importantly, you could use a smart contract that says you are willing to sell your piece of digital art for US$1 million in ether, the currency of the Ethereum blockchain. When I click “agree,” the artwork and the ether automatically transfer ownership between us on the blockchain. There is no need for a bank or third-party escrow, and if either of us were to dispute this transaction – for example, if you claimed that I only paid $999,000 – the other could easily point to the public record in the distributed ledger.

What does this blockchain crypto-asset stuff have to do with the metaverse? Everything! To start, the blockchain allows you to own digital goods in a virtual world. You won’t just own that NFT in the real world, you’ll own it in the virtual world, too.

In addition, the metaverse isn’t being built by any one group or company. Different groups will build different virtual worlds, and in the future these worlds will be interoperable – forming the metaverse. As people move between virtual worlds – say from Decentraland’s virtual environments to Microsoft’s – they’ll want to bring their stuff with them. If two virtual worlds are interoperable, the blockchain will authenticate proof of ownership of your digital goods in both virtual worlds. Essentially, as long as you are able to access your crypto wallet within a virtual world, you will be able to access your crypto stuff.

 

Don’t Forget Your Wallet

So what will you keep in your crypto wallet? You will obviously want to carry cryptocurrencies in the metaverse. Your crypto wallet will also hold your metaverse-only digital goods, such as your avatars, avatar clothing, avatar animations, virtual decorations, and weapons.

Avatars, like this representation of El Salvador President Nayib Bukele, are cartoonlike animations that people inhabit in the metaverse. AP Photo/Salvador Melendez

What will people do with their crypto wallets? Among other things, shop. Just as you likely do on the web now, you will be able to purchase traditional digital goods like music, movies, games, and apps. You’ll also be able to buy physical-world items in the metaverse, and you’ll be able to view and “hold” 3D models of what you are shopping for, which could help you make more informed decisions.

Also, just like you can use ye old leather wallet to carry your ID, crypto wallets will be linkable to real-world identities, which could help facilitate transactions that require legal verification, such as buying a real-world car or home. Because your ID will be linked to your wallet, you won’t need to remember login information for all the websites and virtual worlds that you visit – just connect your wallet with a click and you are logged in. ID-associated wallets will also be useful for controlling access to age-restricted areas in the metaverse.

Your crypto wallet could also be linked to your contacts list, which would allow you to bring your social network information from one virtual world to another. “Join me for a pool party in FILL IN THE BLANK-world!”

 

 

At some point in the future, wallets could also be associated with reputation scores that determine the permissions you have to broadcast in public places and interact with people outside of your social network. If you act like a toxic misinformation-spreading troll, you may damage your reputation and potentially have your sphere of influence reduced by the system. This could create an incentive for people to behave well in the metaverse, but platform developers will have to prioritize these systems.

 

Big Business

Lastly, if the metaverse is money, then companies will certainly want to play too. The decentralized nature of blockchain will potentially reduce the need for gatekeepers in financial transactions, but companies will still have many opportunities to generate revenue, possibly even more than in current economies. Companies like Meta will provide large platforms where people will work, play, and congregate.

The full metaverse doesn’t exist yet, but that hasn’t stopped a land rush as people and businesses grab virtual real estate.

Major brands are also getting into the NFT mix, including Dolce & Gabbana, Coca-Cola (COKE), Adidas (ADDYY) and Nike (NKE). In the future, when you buy a physical world item from a company, you might also gain ownership of a linked NFT in the metaverse.

For example, when you buy that coveted name-brand outfit to wear to the real-world dance club, you might also become the owner of the crypto version of the outfit that your avatar can wear to the virtual Ariana Grande concert. And just as you could sell the physical outfit secondhand, you could also sell the NFT version for someone else’s avatar to wear.

These are a few of the many ways that metaverse business models will likely overlap with the physical world. Such examples will get more complex as augmented reality technologies increasingly come into play, further merging aspects of the metaverse and physical world. Although the metaverse proper isn’t here yet, technological foundations like blockchain and crypto assets are steadily being developed, setting the stage for a seemingly ubiquitous virtual future that is coming soon to a ‘verse near you.

 

This article was republished with permission from The Conversation, a news site dedicated to sharing ideas from academic experts. It represents the research-based findings and opinions of Rabindra Ratan Associate Professor of Media and Information, Michigan State University. Dar Meshi Assistant Professor of Communication Arts and Sciences, Michigan State University.

 

Suggested Reading:

Why the Metaverse Matters

Companies are Choosing the Metaverse for their Business Address

NFT Fractional Ownership and Metaverse Museums

Blockchain 2022 – What’s Next?

 

Stay up to date. Follow us:

Voyager Digital Announces Key Hire as it Expands Crypto Payment Solutions in the US

 

Research, News, and Market Data on Voyager Digital

 

Tim Mund joins as Head of US Payment Sales

Voyager Digital Ltd. (“Voyager” or the “Company”) (TSX: VOYG; OTCQB: VYGVF; FRA: UCD2) one of the fastest-growing, publicly traded cryptocurrency platforms in the United States, is pleased to announce Tim Mund has joined the Company as Head Of US Payment Sales.
 
In the newly-created role of Head of US Payment Sales, Tim will be responsible for the sales and go-to-market strategy for Voyager’s payment solutions and for building the customer pipeline with payment service providers (PSPs) and key merchants to integrate Voyager’s technology with their payment networks and systems.
 
“Voyager’s recent acquisition of Coinify enables consumers to transact using cryptocurrencies with fiat settlement,“ said Steve Ehrlich, CEO and co-founder of Voyager. “With the addition of a top sales executive like Tim, we are positioned to expand our payments product line in the US and help PSPs accept crypto, reduce transaction costs, and increase efficiency across the entire payment chain, adding significant value for merchant and end user buyers.”
 
“I’ve been following Voyager’s growth since the beginning and am excited to lead the integration of Voyager’s technology into the payment service provider networks.  I believe that owners of cryptocurrency around the world will be able to make everyday purchases from groceries and shoes, to cars and airline tickets,” stated Tim Mund. “Merchants will be able to tap into crypto assets to grow revenue.  I’m excited to be part of the Voyager leadership team to help bring in the next generation of financial services and crypto for all.”
 
Tim Mund spent the last 20 years in enterprise sales and leadership roles at fintech and communications firms such as Recognia, Kinetix, 29West, CenturyLink and RingCentral.

About Voyager Digital Ltd.

Publicly traded Voyager Digital Ltd.’s (TSX: VOYG) (OTCQB: VYGVF) (FRA: UCD2) US subsidiary, Voyager Digital, LLC, is a fast-growing, cryptocurrency platform in the United States founded in 2018 to bring choice, transparency, and cost efficiency to the marketplace. Voyager offers a secure way to trade over 70 different crypto assets using its easy-to-use mobile application and earn rewards up to 12 percent annually on more than 35 cryptocurrencies. Through its subsidiary Coinify ApS, Voyager provides crypto payment solutions for both consumers and merchants around the globe. To learn more about the company, please visithttps://www.investvoyager.com.

The TSX has not approved or disapproved of the information contained herein.

SOURCE Voyager Digital, Ltd.

Press Contacts

Voyager Digital, Ltd.

Michael Legg
Chief Communications Officer
(212) 547-8807
mlegg@investvoyager.com

Voyager Public Relations Team
pr@investvoyager.com

Voyager Digital Announces Key Hire as it Expands Crypto Payment Solutions in the US

 

Research, News, and Market Data on Voyager Digital

 

Tim Mund joins as Head of US Payment Sales

Voyager Digital Ltd. (“Voyager” or the “Company”) (TSX: VOYG; OTCQB: VYGVF; FRA: UCD2) one of the fastest-growing, publicly traded cryptocurrency platforms in the United States, is pleased to announce Tim Mund has joined the Company as Head Of US Payment Sales.
 
In the newly-created role of Head of US Payment Sales, Tim will be responsible for the sales and go-to-market strategy for Voyager’s payment solutions and for building the customer pipeline with payment service providers (PSPs) and key merchants to integrate Voyager’s technology with their payment networks and systems.
 
“Voyager’s recent acquisition of Coinify enables consumers to transact using cryptocurrencies with fiat settlement,“ said Steve Ehrlich, CEO and co-founder of Voyager. “With the addition of a top sales executive like Tim, we are positioned to expand our payments product line in the US and help PSPs accept crypto, reduce transaction costs, and increase efficiency across the entire payment chain, adding significant value for merchant and end user buyers.”
 
“I’ve been following Voyager’s growth since the beginning and am excited to lead the integration of Voyager’s technology into the payment service provider networks.  I believe that owners of cryptocurrency around the world will be able to make everyday purchases from groceries and shoes, to cars and airline tickets,” stated Tim Mund. “Merchants will be able to tap into crypto assets to grow revenue.  I’m excited to be part of the Voyager leadership team to help bring in the next generation of financial services and crypto for all.”
 
Tim Mund spent the last 20 years in enterprise sales and leadership roles at fintech and communications firms such as Recognia, Kinetix, 29West, CenturyLink and RingCentral.

About Voyager Digital Ltd.

Publicly traded Voyager Digital Ltd.’s (TSX: VOYG) (OTCQB: VYGVF) (FRA: UCD2) US subsidiary, Voyager Digital, LLC, is a fast-growing, cryptocurrency platform in the United States founded in 2018 to bring choice, transparency, and cost efficiency to the marketplace. Voyager offers a secure way to trade over 70 different crypto assets using its easy-to-use mobile application and earn rewards up to 12 percent annually on more than 35 cryptocurrencies. Through its subsidiary Coinify ApS, Voyager provides crypto payment solutions for both consumers and merchants around the globe. To learn more about the company, please visithttps://www.investvoyager.com.

The TSX has not approved or disapproved of the information contained herein.

SOURCE Voyager Digital, Ltd.

Press Contacts

Voyager Digital, Ltd.

Michael Legg
Chief Communications Officer
(212) 547-8807
mlegg@investvoyager.com

Voyager Public Relations Team
pr@investvoyager.com

	Image Credit: Z z (Pexels)

What is 5G? An Electrical Engineer Explains

 

5G has been in the news recently as the FAA has asked cellular phone companies to alter their plans to roll out the upgraded communication technology. We’ve all heard the term, and we’re told we should be looking forward to it becoming broadly available. But what is it exactly, and how does it compare to the current 4G most of us now rely on. What follows is a short read that defines 5G and its complexity and capabilities in easy-to-understand language. It was written by Prasenjit Mitra, Professor of Information Sciences and Technology, Penn State.

 

5G stands for fifth-generation cellular network technology.

It’s the technology that enables wireless communication – for example, from your cellular phone to a cell tower, which channels it to the internet. 5G is a network service provided by telecommunications carriers and is not the same thing as the 5 GHz band on your Wi-Fi router.

5G offers an order of magnitude – 10 times – more bandwidth than its predecessor, 4G. The greater bandwidth is possible because over and above low and medium frequency radio waves, 5G uses additional higher-frequency waves to encode and carry information.

Bandwidth is analogous to the width of a highway. The broader the highway, the more lanes it can have and the more cars it can carry at the same time. This makes 5G much faster and able to handle many more devices.

5G can deliver speeds of around 50 megabits per second, up to more than 1 gigabit per second. A gigabit per second connection allows you to download a high-definition movie in less than a minute. Does this mean no more bad cell connections in crowded places? The increased bandwidth will help, but just as increasing the number of lanes on highways does not always reduce traffic jams, as more people use the expanded highways, 5G is likely to carry a lot more traffic than 4G networks, so you still might not get a good connection sometimes.

In addition to connecting your phone and cellular-enabled laptop, 5G will be connecting many other devices ranging from photo frames to toasters as part of the Internet of Things revolution. So even though 5G can handle up to a million devices per square kilometer, all that bandwidth could be quickly used up and require more – a future 5.5G with even more bandwidth.

Flavors
of 5G

5G can use low-, mid-and high-band frequencies, each with advantages and disadvantages. Lower-frequency waves can travel farther but are slower. Higher-frequency waves travel faster but can go only limited distances. Higher-frequency 5G can achieve gigabit-per-second speeds, which promises to render ethernet and other wired connections obsolete in the future. Currently, however, the higher frequency comes at a higher cost and thus is deployed only where it’s most needed: in crowded urban settings, stadiums, convention centers, airports and concert halls.

A type of 5G service, Ultra-Reliable and Low-Latency Communications can be used where data needs to be transmitted without loss or interruption in service – for example, controlling drones in disaster areas. One day, after the technology is more robust, it could even be used for remote surgery.

 

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The Computer Chip Shortage, Where We Are Now

Can Market Strength Last into 2022?

Can 5G and Airport Safety Coexist?

History Being Made in Net-Zero Passenger Flights

 

 

 

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	Image Credit: Element5 (Pexels)

How Cybercriminals Turn Paper Checks Stolen from Mailboxes into Bitcoin

 

This article was republished with permission from The Conversation, a news site dedicated to sharing ideas from academic experts. It represents the research-based findings and opinions of David Maimon, Associate Professor of Criminal Justice and Criminology, Georgia State University.

 

While cybercrime gets a lot of attention from law enforcement and the media these days, I’ve been documenting a less high-tech threat emerging in recent months: a surge in stolen checks.

Criminals are increasingly targeting U.S. Postal Service and personal mailboxes to pilfer filled-out checks and sell them over the internet using social media platforms. The buyers then alter the payee and amount listed on the checks to rob victims’ bank accounts of thousands of dollars. While the banks themselves typically bear the financial burden and reimburse targeted accounts, criminals can use the checks to steal victims’ identities, which can have severe consequences.

I founded and now direct Georgia State University’s Evidence Based Cybersecurity Research Group, which is aimed at learning what works and what doesn’t in preventing cybercrime. For the past two years, we’ve been surveilling 60 black market communication channels on the internet to learn more about the online fraud ecosystem and gather data on it in a systematic way in order to spot trends.

One thing we didn’t expect to see was a surge in purloined checks.

 

An Old Threat Returns

In general, bank check theft is a type of fraud that involves the stealing and unauthorized cashing of a check.

It’s hardly a new phenomenon. Criminals were committing check fraud as soon as the first modern checks were cut in the 18th century in England – and the authorities were already looking for ways to prevent it.

While there’s little historical data on this type of fraud, we do know it became particularly problematic in the 1990s as the internet made finding willing buyers of illicit items easier than ever. For example, financial institutions estimated they lost about US$1 billion to check fraud from April 1996 to September 1997.

But what may seem a little surprising is that its resurgence now at a time when the vast majority of transactions are conducted electronically and check use continues to wane.

 

What Check Fraud Looks Like

Broadly speaking, the check scams we’ve been tracking look something like this:

Someone breaks into a mailbox that stores letters waiting to be sent and grabs some of them in hopes they’ll contain a check that’s been filled in. Often, the crime scene where the theft occurs is the victim’s own mailbox, but it can also be one of those blue USPS boxes you pass on the street.

Criminals can access those with a stolen or copied mailbox key, which we have seen on sale for as much as $1,000.

Thieves may deposit or cash the checks themselves or sell them on to others via a marketplace of illicit items, such as fake IDs and credit cards. Prices are typically $175 for personal checks and $250 for business ones – payable in bitcoin – but always negotiable and cheaper in bulk, based on our observations and direct interactions with the sellers.

Buyers then use nail polish remover to erase the intended payee’s name and the amount displayed on the check, replacing those details with their own preferred payee – such as a retailer – and amount, usually a lot higher than the original check. A buyer might also simply cash the check at a location like Walmart using a fake ID.

In some cases we believe criminals are using the checks to steal the victim’s identity by using their name and address to manufacture fake driver’s licenses, passports and other legal documents. Upon taking over someone’s identity, a criminal may use it to submit false applications for loans and credit cards, access the victim’s bank accounts and engage in other types of online fraud.

 

Tracking Black Market Chat Rooms

To better understand how cybercriminals operate, my team of graduate students began monitoring 60 online chat room channels where we knew people were trafficking in fraudulent documents. Examples of these types of channels are group chats on messaging apps like WhatsApp, ICQ and Telegram, in which users post pictures of items they wish to sell. Some of the channels we are monitoring are public, while others required an invitation, which we managed to procure.

After we noticed a rise in stolen checks on sale, we began systematically gathering data from those channels about six months ago in order to track the trend. We downloaded the images, coded them and then aggregated the data so we could spot trends in what was being sold.

In our observations, we came across an average of 1,325 stolen checks being sold every week in October 2021, up from 634 per week in September and 409 in August. Although little historical data on this practice exists, a one-week pilot study we conducted in October 2020 places these numbers in some perspective. Back then, we observed only 158 stolen checks during that period.

Furthermore, these figures likely only represent a small fraction of the number of checks actually being stolen and sold. We focused on only 60 markets, when in fact there are thousands currently active.

In dollar amounts, we found that the face value of the checks, as written, was $11.6 million in all of October and $10.2 million in September. But again, these values likely represent a small share of the actual amount of money being stolen from victims because criminals often rewrite the checks for much higher amounts.

 

 

Using the victims addresses, which appeared on the left top corner of the checks, and focusing on the data we collected in the month of October 2021, we found New York, Florida, Texas and California were the top sources.

How to Protect Yourself

The best advice I can give consumers who want to avoid falling victim to these schemes is to avoid mailing checks, if you can.

Bank checking accounts usually offer customers the option to send money electronically, whether to a friend or a company, for free. And there are many apps and other services that allow you to make digital payments from bank accounts or via credit card. While there are risks with these methods as well, in general they are a lot safer than writing a check and sending it in the mail.

Still, some types of businesses may require a physical check for payment, such as landlords, utilities and insurance companies. Moreover, as a matter of personal preference, some people – myself included – prefer to pay their bills using checks rather than other methods of payment.

To avoid the risk, I make sure to drop off all my letters containing checks inside my local post office. That’s generally your best bet for keeping them out of the hands of criminals and ensuring they reach their intended destination.

The United States Postal Inspection Service, the agency responsible for preventing mail theft, also offers tips to stay protected.

As for enforcement, the inspection service works with the police and others to crack down on mail-related crime. These efforts result in the arrest of thousands of mail and packages thieves every year. However, for every arrest, there are many more criminals who go undetected.

And when we informed officials of our findings, they were also surprised by what we discovered but planned to step up monitoring of these types of black market communication channels.

Our research suggests much more systematic data on this type of fraud is needed in order to better understand how it works, crack down on the activity and prevent it from occurring in the first place.

 

Suggested Reading:

After a Big Year for Cryptocurrencies, What’s on the Horizon in 2022?

Threats to Your Personal Information

Is a Zero Trust Architecture Enough?

Robinhood Will Be Adopting More Traditional Investment Programs

 

 

 

Stay up to date. Follow us:

	Image Credit: Element5 (Pexels)

How Cybercriminals Turn Paper Checks Stolen from Mailboxes into Bitcoin

 

This article was republished with permission from The Conversation, a news site dedicated to sharing ideas from academic experts. It represents the research-based findings and opinions of David Maimon, Associate Professor of Criminal Justice and Criminology, Georgia State University.

 

While cybercrime gets a lot of attention from law enforcement and the media these days, I’ve been documenting a less high-tech threat emerging in recent months: a surge in stolen checks.

Criminals are increasingly targeting U.S. Postal Service and personal mailboxes to pilfer filled-out checks and sell them over the internet using social media platforms. The buyers then alter the payee and amount listed on the checks to rob victims’ bank accounts of thousands of dollars. While the banks themselves typically bear the financial burden and reimburse targeted accounts, criminals can use the checks to steal victims’ identities, which can have severe consequences.

I founded and now direct Georgia State University’s Evidence Based Cybersecurity Research Group, which is aimed at learning what works and what doesn’t in preventing cybercrime. For the past two years, we’ve been surveilling 60 black market communication channels on the internet to learn more about the online fraud ecosystem and gather data on it in a systematic way in order to spot trends.

One thing we didn’t expect to see was a surge in purloined checks.

 

An Old Threat Returns

In general, bank check theft is a type of fraud that involves the stealing and unauthorized cashing of a check.

It’s hardly a new phenomenon. Criminals were committing check fraud as soon as the first modern checks were cut in the 18th century in England – and the authorities were already looking for ways to prevent it.

While there’s little historical data on this type of fraud, we do know it became particularly problematic in the 1990s as the internet made finding willing buyers of illicit items easier than ever. For example, financial institutions estimated they lost about US$1 billion to check fraud from April 1996 to September 1997.

But what may seem a little surprising is that its resurgence now at a time when the vast majority of transactions are conducted electronically and check use continues to wane.

 

What Check Fraud Looks Like

Broadly speaking, the check scams we’ve been tracking look something like this:

Someone breaks into a mailbox that stores letters waiting to be sent and grabs some of them in hopes they’ll contain a check that’s been filled in. Often, the crime scene where the theft occurs is the victim’s own mailbox, but it can also be one of those blue USPS boxes you pass on the street.

Criminals can access those with a stolen or copied mailbox key, which we have seen on sale for as much as $1,000.

Thieves may deposit or cash the checks themselves or sell them on to others via a marketplace of illicit items, such as fake IDs and credit cards. Prices are typically $175 for personal checks and $250 for business ones – payable in bitcoin – but always negotiable and cheaper in bulk, based on our observations and direct interactions with the sellers.

Buyers then use nail polish remover to erase the intended payee’s name and the amount displayed on the check, replacing those details with their own preferred payee – such as a retailer – and amount, usually a lot higher than the original check. A buyer might also simply cash the check at a location like Walmart using a fake ID.

In some cases we believe criminals are using the checks to steal the victim’s identity by using their name and address to manufacture fake driver’s licenses, passports and other legal documents. Upon taking over someone’s identity, a criminal may use it to submit false applications for loans and credit cards, access the victim’s bank accounts and engage in other types of online fraud.

 

Tracking Black Market Chat Rooms

To better understand how cybercriminals operate, my team of graduate students began monitoring 60 online chat room channels where we knew people were trafficking in fraudulent documents. Examples of these types of channels are group chats on messaging apps like WhatsApp, ICQ and Telegram, in which users post pictures of items they wish to sell. Some of the channels we are monitoring are public, while others required an invitation, which we managed to procure.

After we noticed a rise in stolen checks on sale, we began systematically gathering data from those channels about six months ago in order to track the trend. We downloaded the images, coded them and then aggregated the data so we could spot trends in what was being sold.

In our observations, we came across an average of 1,325 stolen checks being sold every week in October 2021, up from 634 per week in September and 409 in August. Although little historical data on this practice exists, a one-week pilot study we conducted in October 2020 places these numbers in some perspective. Back then, we observed only 158 stolen checks during that period.

Furthermore, these figures likely only represent a small fraction of the number of checks actually being stolen and sold. We focused on only 60 markets, when in fact there are thousands currently active.

In dollar amounts, we found that the face value of the checks, as written, was $11.6 million in all of October and $10.2 million in September. But again, these values likely represent a small share of the actual amount of money being stolen from victims because criminals often rewrite the checks for much higher amounts.

 

 

Using the victims addresses, which appeared on the left top corner of the checks, and focusing on the data we collected in the month of October 2021, we found New York, Florida, Texas and California were the top sources.

How to Protect Yourself

The best advice I can give consumers who want to avoid falling victim to these schemes is to avoid mailing checks, if you can.

Bank checking accounts usually offer customers the option to send money electronically, whether to a friend or a company, for free. And there are many apps and other services that allow you to make digital payments from bank accounts or via credit card. While there are risks with these methods as well, in general they are a lot safer than writing a check and sending it in the mail.

Still, some types of businesses may require a physical check for payment, such as landlords, utilities and insurance companies. Moreover, as a matter of personal preference, some people – myself included – prefer to pay their bills using checks rather than other methods of payment.

To avoid the risk, I make sure to drop off all my letters containing checks inside my local post office. That’s generally your best bet for keeping them out of the hands of criminals and ensuring they reach their intended destination.

The United States Postal Inspection Service, the agency responsible for preventing mail theft, also offers tips to stay protected.

As for enforcement, the inspection service works with the police and others to crack down on mail-related crime. These efforts result in the arrest of thousands of mail and packages thieves every year. However, for every arrest, there are many more criminals who go undetected.

And when we informed officials of our findings, they were also surprised by what we discovered but planned to step up monitoring of these types of black market communication channels.

Our research suggests much more systematic data on this type of fraud is needed in order to better understand how it works, crack down on the activity and prevent it from occurring in the first place.

 

Suggested Reading:

After a Big Year for Cryptocurrencies, What’s on the Horizon in 2022?

Threats to Your Personal Information

Is a Zero Trust Architecture Enough?

Robinhood Will Be Adopting More Traditional Investment Programs

 

 

 

Stay up to date. Follow us:

Thursday, January 06, 2022

Voyager Digital (VYGVF)(VOYG:CA)
Preliminary 2Q22 Revenues Exceed Estimate

Voyager Digital Ltd through its subsidiary, operates as a crypto asset broker that provides retail and institutional investors with a turnkey solution to trade crypto assets. The company offers investors execution, data, wallet and custody services through its institutional-grade open architecture platform.

Joe Gomes, Senior Research Analyst, Noble Capital Markets, Inc.

Joshua Zoepfel, Research Associate, Noble Capital Markets, Inc.

Refer to the full report for the price target, fundamental analysis, and rating.

Preliminary Revenues. Voyager announced preliminary revenues for the fiscal second quarter ended December 31st of $165 million, compared to $81.5 million in the fiscal first quarter, and $3.6 million a year ago. We had projected revenue of $141 million for the quarter. Merchant services revenue increased to $15 million in the quarter, compared to $14 million in the September quarter.


Key Metrics.  Total verified users grew to 3.2 million at December 31st, up from 2.15 million on September 30th, while totaled funded accounts rose to 1.075 million from 860,000 over the same period. Total funded to total verified fell to .336 from .400. We expect a portion of this reflects the hugely successful Mavericks promotion. Net new deposits in the fiscal second quarter totaled $1.04 …

This Company Sponsored Research is provided by Noble Capital Markets, Inc., a FINRA and S.E.C. registered broker-dealer (B/D).

*Analyst certification and important disclosures included in the full report. NOTE: investment decisions should not be based upon the content of this research summary.  Proper due diligence is required before making any investment decision. 

Voyager Digital Announces Estimated Revenue of Approximately USD$165MM For the Quarter Ended December 31, 2021

 

Research, News, and Market Data on Voyager Digital

 

Preliminary revenues for the calendar year ended December 31, 2021 are expected to exceed USD$415 million

 

Voyager Digital Ltd. (“Voyager” or the “Company”) (TSX: VOYG; OTCQB: VYGVF; FRA: UCD2), one of the fastest-growing, publicly traded cryptocurrency platforms in the United States, today announced preliminary revenue and user metrics for the fiscal 2022 second quarter ended December 31, 2021 and is pleased to provide commentary on the Company’s calendar 2022 growth plans.
 
“Voyager had outstanding growth in the quarter ended December 31, 2021, with preliminary revenue anticipated to be approximately $165 million, up from $3.6 million for quarter ended December 31, 2020, and with funded accounts surpassing one million, up from just 43,000 at the beginning of the year.  We remain focused on positioning our platform as one of the leading players in digital assets for consumers and expect continued customer growth in 2022,” said Steve Ehrlich, Voyager’s CEO and Co-founder.  “In 2021, we scaled our technology to accommodate rapid growth as mainstream crypto adoption accelerated. Now, with our platform and technological capabilities enhanced, 2022 marks the next phase of Voyager’s growth through product and geographic expansion, alongside marketing efforts to reach new customers.”
 
The Company is pleased to announce the following Financial and Operational Key Metrics for
fiscal 2022 second quarter ended December 31, 2021:

• Preliminary total revenue for the fiscal 2022 second quarter ended December 31, 2021 is estimated at $165 million, compared to $81.5 million for the fiscal 2022 first quarter ended September 30, 2021 and $3.6 million for fiscal 2021 second quarter ended December 31, 2020.   
• Preliminary total revenue for the calendar year 2021 is estimated to exceed $415 million vs $6.6 million for the calendar year 2020.  This includes preliminary estimated revenue from merchant services of $29 million.
• Preliminary revenue from merchant services, which is included in total revenue, is estimated to be $15 million for the fiscal 2022 second quarter ended December 31, 2021 vs $14 million for the fiscal 2022 first quarter ended September 30, 2021.
• Total Verified Users grew to 3.2 million as of December 31, 2021, up from 2.15 million on September 30, 2021 and 159,000 on December 31, 2020.
• Total Funded Accounts grew to 1.075 million as of December 31, 2021, up from 860,000 on September 30, 2021 and 43,000 on December 31, 2020.
• Net new deposits for the fiscal 2022 second quarter ended December 31, 2021 were approximately $ 1.04 billion, compared to the $827 million for the fiscal 2022 first quarter ended September 30, 2021.
   
   

Steve Ehrlich continued, “We’ve rapidly grown our employee base by more than 7x, from 35 employees at January 1, 2021 to over 250 at the end of 2021.  We expect to continue to grow our team in 2022 as we expand into NFT’s, the Metaverse, and our own custody solution. Also, we look forward to beginning our rollout in Europe and Canada, launching our debit card, and adding credit products and equity trading. Further, Voyager will continue to build out our payment processing capabilities as we add merchant payment systems to our already established payment system. As we look ahead, we remain committed to driving sustainable long-term customer growth and executing on our strategic priorities, and will accelerate our growth through M&A when appropriate.”
 
Voyager will be announcing the results of its fiscal 2022 second quarter ending December 31st on or about February 14th. Voyager will also be participating in Eight Capital’s innoVIII: Riding the Digital Rails Virtual Conference on January 26th.
 
For more information about investor events that Voyager will be participating in, please visit www.investvoyager.com/investorrelations/events.
 
All amounts are in US Dollars unless otherwise indicated.
 
About Voyager Digital Ltd.
Publicly traded Voyager Digital Ltd.’s (TSX: VOYG) (OTCQB: VYGVF) (FRA: UCD2) US subsidiary, Voyager Digital, LLC, is a fast-growing, cryptocurrency platform in the United States founded in 2018 to bring choice, transparency, and cost efficiency to the marketplace. Voyager offers a secure way to trade over 70 different crypto assets using its easy-to-use mobile application and earn rewards up to 12 percent annually on more than 35 cryptocurrencies. Through its subsidiary Coinify ApS, Voyager provides crypto payment solutions for both consumers and merchants around the globe. To learn more about the company, please visit https://www.investvoyager.com.
 
Financial Disclaimer:
The preliminary estimated financial results and other data for the three and six months ended December 31, 2021 set forth above are subject to the completion of the Company’s financial closing procedures. This data has been prepared by, and is the responsibility of, the Company’s management and audit committee. Voyager’s independent registered public accounting firm, Marcum LLP, does not express an opinion or any other form of assurance with respect thereto. The Company currently expects that its final results of operations and other data for the interim period ended December 31, 2021 will be consistent with the estimates set forth above, but such estimates are preliminary and Voyager’s actual results of operations and other data could differ materially from these estimates due to the completion of its quarterly review procedures, final adjustments, and other developments that may arise between now and the time such unaudited consolidated financial statements for the three and six months ended December 31, 2021 are released.
 
Forward Looking Statements

Certain information in this press release, including, but not limited to, statements regarding future growth and performance of the business, momentum in the businesses, future adoption of digital assets, and the Company‘s anticipated results may constitute forward looking information (collectively, forward-looking statements), which can be identified by the use of terms such as “may,” “will,” “should,” “expect,” “anticipate,” “project,” “estimate,” “intend,” “continue” or “believe” (or the negatives) or other similar variations. Forward-looking statements involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors that may cause Voyager’s actual results, performance or achievements to be materially different from any of its future results, performance or achievements expressed or implied by forward-looking statements. Moreover, we operate in a very competitive and rapidly changing environment. New risks emerge from time to time. It is not possible for our management to predict all risks, nor can we assess the impact of all factors on our business or the extent to which any factor, or combination of factors, may cause actual results to differ materially from those contained in any forward-looking statements we may make. In light of these risks, uncertainties, and assumptions, the future events and trends discussed in this press release may not occur and actual results could differ materially and adversely from those anticipated or implied in the forward-looking statements. Forward looking statements are subject to the risk that the global economy, industry, or the Company’s businesses and investments do not perform as anticipated, that revenue or expenses estimates may not be met or may be materially less or more than those anticipated, that trading momentum does not continue or the demand for trading solutions declines, customer acquisition does not increase as planned, product and international expansion do not occur as planned, risks of compliance with laws and regulations that currently apply or become applicable to the business and those other risks contained in the Company’s public filings, including in its Management Discussion and Analysis and its Annual Information Form (AIF). Factors that could cause actual results of the Company and its businesses to differ materially from those described in such forward-looking statements include, but are not limited to, a decline in the digital asset market or general economic conditions; changes in laws or approaches to regulation, the failure or delay in the adoption of digital assets and the blockchain ecosystem by institutions; changes in the volatility of crypto currency, changes in demand for Bitcoin and Ethereum, changes in the status or classification of cryptocurrency assets, cybersecurity breaches, a delay or failure in developing infrastructure for the trading businesses or achieving mandates and gaining traction; failure to grow assets under management, an adverse development with respect to an issuer or party to the transaction or failure to obtain a required regulatory approval. In connection with the forward-looking statements contained in this press release, the Company has made assumptions that no significant events occur outside of the Company’s normal course of business and that current trends in respect of digital assets continue. Readers are cautioned that Assets Under Management and trading volumes fluctuate and may increase and decrease from time to time and that such fluctuations are beyond the Company’s control. Forward-looking statements, past and present performance and trends are not guarantees of future performance, accordingly, you should not put undue reliance on forward-looking statements, current or past performance, or current or past trends. Information identifying assumptions, risks, and uncertainties relating to the Company are contained in its filings with the Canadian securities regulators available at www.sedar.com. The forward-looking statements in this press release are applicable only as of the date of this release or as of the date specified in the relevant forward-looking statement and the Company undertakes no obligation to update any forward-looking statement to reflect events or circumstances after that date or to reflect the occurrence of unanticipated events, except as required by law. The Company assumes no obligation to provide operational updates, except as required by law. If the Company does update one or more forward-looking statements, no inference should be drawn that it will make additional updates with respect to those or other forward-looking statements, unless required by law. Readers are cautioned that past performance is not indicative of future performance and current trends in the business and demand for digital assets may not continue and readers should not put undue reliance on past performance and current trends.
The TSX has not approved or disapproved of the information contained herein.
 
SOURCE Voyager Digital, Ltd.

Press Contacts
 
Voyager Digital, Ltd.
Michael Legg
Chief Communications Officer
(212) 547-8807
mlegg@investvoyager.com

Voyager Public Relations Team
pr@investvoyager