The latest digital currency shows that after hitting a 300-day high in crypto volume, the market is hitting new records and a massive upward thrust. Today, the crypto trading volume recorded a high of $33.85 billion thanks to the surge that was led by Ethereum and Bitcoin and saw the top 20 surging over the past 24 hours. The volume of the crypto asset trading spiked during the first week of January last year accounted for a market cap of $814.31 billion and a 24-hour trading volume of $44.07 billion. In comparison, the recent surge of the current trading volumes shows that there is a great deal of action on the market. In more details, the current market cap is now closer to the $140 billion mark while the last major peak was recorded on May 5th 2018 with a market cap of $466.72 billion and a 24-hour volume of $25.34 billion after which the crypto space has failed to recover. At press time, the market cap of the entire cryptosphere was recorded at $139 billion and the 24-hour volume is over $27 billion.

The top twenty cryptocurrencies are mostly in the red in today's crypto news, putting Bitcoin in focus of the market with a new surge that made it go above $4,100 while the other altcoins remained stable. Bitcoin is up by more than 3% and now has a $72 billion market cap. Speaking of, the entire market cap is now close to the $140 billion mark. Ethereum (ETH) has also been surging by more than 5% over the past 24 hours and is now at $156, while Ripple (XRP) is with a 2% increase that put it to $0.32. Among the other altcoins, we are seeing surges for EOS, Litecoin, Bitcoin Cash, Stellar, Tron, Binance Coin etc. In fact, the entire top 20 is in the green besides Tether (USDT) whose value is pegged to the value of the US dollar. The most notable price action was reported by NEO which surged by 7.24% and proved that it is a serious contender for the 16th position on the market list. No one knows if this trend is going to continue. However, it is certain that over the past week, we have been seeing a bullish breakout and a new trend which finally puts Bitcoin and the other altcoins in the green.  

Two companies based in Ohio, United States, have officially paid their taxes using cryptocurrencies according to the State Treasurer Robert Sprague’s announcement on a forum that we are reading more into in today’s crypto news. Ohio is the first state to allow paying taxes with cryptocurrency since November 2018. Sprague explained that the Treasury has collected only two tax payments in cryptocurrency but he didn’t say the amount of the paid taxes. He made clear that the Ohio State Treasury doesn’t manage the cryptocurrencies themselves and they do not accept any other currency than the US dollar explaining that the crypto tax payments are conducted to a specialized crypto platform:

 “We will never accept won or renminbi or francs or cryptocurrency, or any other currency. You have to relieve your debts to the state of Ohio with U.S. dollars. That’s what we’re currently accepting. This platform just allows for that exchange, basically before that debt is settled to the state of Ohio.”

Sprague pointed out that the treasury is reviewing how the program can be expanded and they are looking into the potential risks that can come up by using this method of tax payments. Ohio is working hard to attract blockchain-related businesses to the state. The state has already passed a law allowing businesses to pay taxes in crypto but the State Treasurer Josh Mandel stated that the legislation ‘’pants a flag’’ in Ohio regarding cryptocurrency adoption. Two days ago, the County Auditors’ Association of Ohio announced the gathering of a group that will work to explore the benefits of blockchain in real estate and transfer of land titles.

One of the largest tech conglomerates in the world Samsung announced that its new S10 smartphone will have a built-in cryptocurrency wallet and in our latest blockchain news we find out more about the new Galaxy phone. With the new S10 Galaxy phone, millions of users around the world will be able to store their cryptocurrency securely which will eventually pave the way for mass adoption of cryptocurrencies. In 2018 in Q4 alone, Samsung managed to ship more than 70 million smartphones around the world. The phone is built with high-level defense grade Samsung Knox and secure storage. The sprawling international reach of Samsung’s smartphone market will ensure that millions of new users around the globe will have the ability to securely store their own cryptocurrencies, which could provide further inroads toward the mass adoption of digital assets. In Q4 2018 alone, the company shipped more than 70 million smartphone units around the globe. The new models will start selling from $749.99 to $999.99. The built-in wallet comes after Samsung filed three crypto patents with the Intellectual Property Office of the European Union last year in December. Samsung also published a blog post named ‘’Why smartphones Have The Best Security For Blockchain And Cryptocurrency’’ in which the company explains how smartphones are ideal to store spendable cryptocurrency. However, having a built-in wallet for smartphones doesn’t mean an end to hardware wallets like Trezor and Ledger since their offerings are still perfect for offline holdings. There is massive competition in this area since Huawei had its own pre-installed BTC.com wallet for their smartphones last year.