A Bosnian immigrant that lives in Washington has been sentenced to seven years in prison for receiving Bitcoin in return for illegally modified guns as we are reading further in the bitcoin news.The authorities say that Hany Veletanlic 36, sent weapons to violent extremists in Sweden thus violating the Arms Export Control act. The Bosnian immigrant eventually admitted to engaging in illegal gun sales in 2017 and was found later to be in possession of banned items such as silencers. The police are now concerned about the use of cryptocurrency for terrorist financing and the issue is of course, not new but as crypto gets into the mainstream, agencies are now trying to find other methods to trace transactions and to identify users.Earlier this month, the US House Financial Services Committee held hearings to address the topic and the members of the committee were quick to draw ties between Bitcoin and terrorist supporters such as Hamas. The lawmakers in other countries such as Israel, India, Britain, and others, shared their concerns. The large-scale use of crypto for transactions was connected to Silk road which is an online marketplace that was known for drug sales that shut down in 2013 and it is not surprising that Bitcoin has a reputation in use of illicit activities. The studies also showed that the cryptocurrency is no more likely to be used for illegal activities than cash.On the contrary, there’s a lot of evidence that shows that cryptocurrency plays a huge role in helping people that are affected by political and economic disruptions, for example, Venezuela, has been a safe haven that was used to protect assets from increasing by the inflation. The same phenomenon has been seen in Iran, Lebanon, and Argentina as well. The image of crypto being used in criminal activities is mostly pressed by the anti-crypto advocates and often those with ties to the industry that are likely to be disrupted by blockchain technology.Law enforcement has vested a lot of interest in stopping illegal gun sales, tracking blockchain transactions which will not be an easy task. Decentralized ledger technology is designed to operate in a pseudonymous and anonymous manner. Going forward, preventing criminals from using bitcoin, the policymakers will have to recognize the revolutionary nature of the blockchain technology and to create new laws that will work with further crypto adoption.

John McAfee goes after bitcoin again years after he made the bold prediction that Bitcoin will reach $1 million by the end of 2020 so let’s see what he had to say further in the bitcoin news now.The founder of the most popular antivirus software company said that Bitcoin is the true shitcoin and that the future of cryptocurrencies is only with the alternative coins. After comparing the largest digital asset with the oldest model of Ford T card because of its ‘’ancient technology’’, John McAfee goes after bitcoin again. He believes that Bitcoin is an ancient technology that cannot provide the capabilities that other cryptocurrencies and networks can do.If we reconsider, bitcoin is slower compared to some of the other networks and is facing the scalability issues as well. There are solutions for that and a lot of people are working hard on handling it. The lightning network is one of the best ideas as Bitcoin’s off-chain scaling solutions but there’s still a lot to be done. However, Bitcoin is not lacking security. The network is the most secure among the other coins and now with the hashrate charting new all-time highs on a regular basis, the blockchain becomes harder to attack and to take control over.The data shows that there’s no mining organization that is coming close to controlling 51% of the hash rate which only suggests that mining is currently decentralized. He outlined that Bitcoin is ancient technology a few months ago and he noted that ‘’as a store of value and cryptocurrency, it’s the standard and it’s still going to be worth a fortune.’’ John McAfee has been controversial and has a weird relationship with the cryptocurrency space, mainly with bitcoin.He was most famous in the community with the $1 million prediction to which he stood firmly many times. It may have all been a show for him as he later clarified that his words were only ‘’ a ruse to onboard new users.’’ His belief in crypto was outlined when he launched his own ‘’no-restrictions’’ decentralized exchange which runs on the Ethereum blockchain but the platform still doesn't support Bitcoin.

The city of Zermatt, known for the ski resort and the wonderful Matterhorn is now the second location in Switzerland where taxpayers can use Bitcoin (BTC) to pay their taxes. The Bitcoin news now also show that in order to unlock the new tax payment option, the authorities of Zermatt have partnered with Switzerland's major crypto financial services company, Bitcoin Suisse.An official announcement by Bitcoin Suisse shows that Zermatt started accepting Bitcoin as a means of payment for local taxes and transactions starting from January 28, 2020. By partnering with BTC Suisse, the authorities in Zermatt will now be able to convert taxpayers' Bitcoin into Swiss francs through the intermediary - which will then transfer the amount in fiat currency to the bank account of the municipality.Local taxpayers in the city of Zermatt, Switzerland will now be able to pay their taxes in Bitcoin through a point-of-sale tool which is installed in the Zermatt town hall or an online payment portal. In order to pay taxes with Bitcoin online, however, the taxpayers will have to apply directly to the Zermatt Tax Office for a payment solution as the announcement notes.According to the mayor of Zermatt, Romy Biner-Hauser, the new tax payment option aims to meet increased demand for Bitcoin based tax payments.

“An innovative, pioneering spirit is one of the trademarks of Zermatt, which is why we are happy to support residents in providing them with the solutions they require,” he noted.

As you may know from our crypto news before, the city of Zug became the first city in Switzerland to accept Bitcoin payments in 2016 as Bitcoin Suisse announced. The capital of the "Crypto Valley" in Switzerland started accepting Bitcoin payments for certain city services such as public utilities in May 2016. The payment was reportedly signed at 200 CHF worth of BTC.The city of Zermatt is now next in the news, as one of the most innovative cities which expand their crypto financial services industry in terms of Bitcoin powered tax payments. In the rest of the world, we can see that many global authorities deem such an option too risky due to Bitcoin's high volatility.

A lot of Bitcoin analysts are featured in the latest cryptocurrencies news now for following the recent price action and the latest Bitcoin surge which took the cryptocurrency to new heights of $9,300. As findings from one statistic resource named Skew Markets show, if BTC breaks through $9,500, this quarter (Q1 2020) will be the best one in the past six years.Moreover, Q1 tends to be an underwhelming period for Bitcoiners from what we saw so far. In 2014, there were 39% losses, while 2015 and 2016 saw BTC/USD drop by 24% and 3%, respectively.Only 2017 and 2019 managed to produce some positive moves. However, at around 11%, neither performance comes close to this year's. In 2011 and 2013, we saw that the Q1 returns were strongest at 165% and 570% accordingly, as the BitInfoCharts price index shows.All of these impressive stats show that Bitcoin has a long-term potential and many analysts expect the Bitcoin price news this year to again go viral in the mainstream world, proving that the cryptocurrency is not dead and can again visit its all-time highs.The aggregate open interest across futures products is also impressive - and if BTC breaks through new levels, it is expected to be much higher. What Skew Markets recorded so far is a total of around $3.7 billion as of January 28 which is the volume across futures products.

"Volume tells all,” says the trader Scott Melker as he expects more progress for the dominant coin versus the volume in 2020.

In contrast to this, a lot of regular consumers appear only a little interested in Bitcoin and its recent price rise over $9,000. According to what we see in the latest Google search results, the search requests for "Bitcoin" remain flat now.However, we can see many good news on the horizon. The higher price is also subject to a lot of speculation from commentators. An analysis shared on Tuesday showed the trader Tone Vays demanding the $9,000 level hold for at least several days before he considered a bull market in effect.Another indicator called the Bitcoin Fear & Greed Index which charts Bitcoin and its likely price trajectory based on investor sentiment, which is flashing bearish. Currently, with a score of 57, this metric is slanted towards suggesting that the market is "due for a correction."