Kryptovalutor introducerades för allmänheten genom Bitcoins lansering på marknaden 2009. Sedan dess har antalet kryptovalutor ökat explosionsartat och det finns idag flera tusen olika kryptovalutor. Vem som helst kan skapa och lansera en kryptovaluta till försäljning. Kryptovalutor erbjuder anonyma, krypterade transaktioner på en global marknad utan insyn av myndigheter, centralbanker och andra centraliserade institut. Kryptovalutors utformning och sättet de transfereras på innebär svårigheter för myndigheter att spåra transaktioner och koppla dessa till fysiska individer. Detta är egenskaper som utmanar rådande förutsättningar inom rätten, inte minst inom skatterätt.  Det finns i dagsläget ett stort antal användare av kryptovalutor, varav få deklarerar och betalar skatt för sina transaktioner. Det går från myndighetshåll inte att ta reda på hur många som handlar med kryptovalutor, uppgifter om antal baseras endast på självrapportering av användare och uppgifter från handelsplattformar om omfattningen på deras kundkrets, varför mörkertalet antas vara stort. Det innebär svårigheter i att fastställa både skattskyldiga och beskattningsunderlag. Reglering av kryptovalutor är ett rättsområde under utveckling. Idag saknas i Sverige specifika regler avseende kryptovalutor, istället tolkas olika aspekter av kryptovalutor utifrån befintliga regleringar för andra tillgångstyper och rättslig vägledning består till stora delar av Skatteverkets ställningstaganden, och i vissa fall saknas vägledning i sin helhet. Av den rättsliga vägledning som finns i form av praxis framkommer hur fenomenet kryptovalutor ska tolkas skatterättsligt i ett antal hänseenden, det framkommer också att det finns alternativa tolkningsmöjligheter som inte utforskats samt att aktuella tolkningar leder till ytterligare frågor som inte besvarats. Det innebär att det råder oklarheter dels kring hur vissa transaktioner ska beskattas, dels hur viss vägledning inom rättsområdet kommer te sig under rättslig prövning. Vad som är gällande rätt idag i Sverige avseende beskattning av kryptovalutor är därmed i vissa avseenden oklart och det kan rörande vissa transaktioner vara svårt att förutse de skatterättsliga konsekvenserna. Det finns i dagsläget små möjligheter för myndigheter att beivra brott och skatteflykt kopplat till kryptovalutor. Det faktum att kryptovalutor utgör en global standard och kan anonymt transfereras utan mellanhänder över nationsgränser gör det komplicerat ur ett nationellt perspektiv att reglera bruket av kryptovalutor. Internationellt samarbete för att tillse nationernas möjlighet att bedriva beskattningsverksamhet och fastställa beskattningsunderlag kommer vara nödvändigt. Vid sidan av regleringar kommer det vara av vikt med tekniska framsteg som ger förutsättningar att identifiera marknadsaktörer så att dessa kan regleras med en högre precision och effektivitet samt att kunna identifiera och spåra oönskade beteenden. En fortsatt effektiv och rättssäker nationell beskattning med möjlighet att fastställa beskattningsunderlag och beivra skatteflykt ställer krav på utveckling inom regleringsarbetet, internationellt samarbete och de tekniska förutsättningarna för myndigheter.

The work attempts to forecast the sign of the price change for cryptoasset time series through classification. The main purpose is to find evidence concerning market efficiency of the cryptoasset markets, potential trading strategies, and differences between the modelled assets. Supporting vector machines, random forests, and multilayer perceptron models are used. An additional model aggre- gates the results of the previous three. Bitcoin, Ether, XRP, and Binance Coin are the modelled cryptoassets. The input variables include transformed daily closing prices up to five lags, trading volumes, volatility, and moving averages. Random forest models perform the best, followed by supporting vector ma- chines, and multilayer perceptrons. Aggregation does not produce improved forecasting performance. The two older assets, Bitcoin and Ethereum, are found to be less forecastable than the newer, Binance Coin and XRP. Dif- ferences between the assets exist as exhibited through forecastability. Higher classification accuracies are not found to imply better trading performance. JEL Classification C15, C69, G13, G14, G17 Keywords cryptoassets, machine learning, forecasting, cryptocurrencies Title Predictive Power of Machine Learning in Cryp- toassets

Rising levels of uncertainty and distrust of governments and mass printing of fiat currencies in conjunction with pandemic-related events have led to a rotation into different assets such as cryptos. Without solid fundamentals, cryptocurrencies have spiked in price levels in the last few years; while popularity rises it remains heavily misunderstood. This study looks into the factors that specifically influence the cryptocurrency Ethereum's price volatility. According to previous literature and existing theories, it gathers seven explanatory variables that should impact the volatility and applies a GARCH (1,1) model. The study finds that the variables Google trends, hash rate, S&P 500, address count, and trade volume impacted the volatility. With only the hash rate and S&P 500 lowering the volatility. Both the ARCH and GARCH terms were significant, with the latter having the bigger coefficient, implying that the past volatility should be accounted for when forecasting future volatility. The findings within this study align with previous literature and other studies on different cryptos. It concludes that while Ethereum is still volatile and is in its growing phase it is headed in a positive direction in terms of stabilization. Further research or a repeated identical/similar study should be conducted again once the market has matured further.

The market for decentralised financial instruments, more commonly known as cryptocurrencies, has gained momentum over the past recent years and the application areas are many. Modern portfolio theory has for years demonstrated its applicability to traditional assets, such as equities and other instruments, but to some extent omitted the application of mathematical portfolio theory with respect for cryptocurrencies. This master's thesis aims to evaluate both traditional and DeFi assets from a modern optimization perspective. The focus area includes whichallocation structures that minimize the risk-adjusted return. The optimizations strategies are based on the risk measures, standard deviation, Conditional Value at Risk and First linear partial moment. The method has its structure in different scenarios where the outcome is optimized for traditional assets, DeFi assets and a hybrid set of these. The input data for the optimization methodology is based on weekly and adjusted price data for the assets. The output variables are weight-distribution, risk levels, return, maximum drawdown and graphic visualizations. Our results show that there is a value in incorporating parts of assets from the decentralized financial world in a portfolio provided that the risk-adjusted ratio increases through but through both higher returns and higher potential risk. These results are based on incorporation of certain parts of the new landscape where more established assets such as Bitcoin, Ethereum etc. have proven to perform well while other assets that are less traded shows a significantly worse result relative to risk. / Marknaden för decentraliserade finansiella instrument, mer känt som kryptovalutor, har tagit sin fart de senaste åren och applikationsområdena är många. Modern portföljteori har i åratal visat sin tillämpbarhet på traditionella tillgångar, såsom aktier och andra instrument, men till en viss grad utelämnat applicering av matematisk portföljteori med avseende på kryptovalutor. Denna master uppsats ämnar till att utvärdera både traditionella och DeFi tillgångar ur ett modernt optimerings-perspektiv. Fokusområdet innefattar vilka allokeringsstrukturer som minimerar den risk justerade avkastningen. Optimeringsstrategierna baseras på riskmåtten, standardavvikelse, Conditional Value at Risk samt First linear partial moment. Metodiken har sin grundstruktur i olika scenarion där man studerat optimerade utfall för traditionella tillgångar, DeFi tillgångar samt en hybrid uppsättning av dessa.  Ingångsdatan till optimeringsmetodiken baseras på veckovis och justerad prisdata för tillgångarna. Utgångsvariablerna är allkokeringsfördelning, risknivåer, avkastning, maximum drawdown samt grafiska visualiseringar.  Våra resultat visar att det finns det finns ett värde i att omstrukturera sin portfölj med delar av tillgångar från den decentraliserade finansvärlden under förutsättningarna att riskjusterade kvoten ökar genom men genom både högre avkastning och högre potentiell risk. Dessa resultat bygger på inkorporering av vissa delar av de nya landskapet där mer etablerade tillgångar som Bitcoin, Ethereum etc. har visat sig prestera bra medans andra tillgångar som är mindre omsatta visar ett avsevärt sämre resultat relativt risk.

Customers' use of digital banking has reshaped traditional banking, and senior level bank executives must know how to leverage this innovation to improve customer service to increase profitability. Using the technology acceptance model as the conceptual framework, the purpose of this multiple case study was to explore effective digital banking strategies that senior level executives used to improve customer service to increase profitability. The target population for this study included senior-level executives from 3 banks in Mauritius possessing successful development and implementation experience in digital banking strategies to improve customer service. Data were collected through semistructured interviews and organizational documents, which were analyzed in accordance with Yin's 5-phase data analysis process consisting of pattern matching, explanation building, time-series analysis, program logic models, and cross-case synthesis. The use of member checking and methodological triangulation increased the trustworthiness of data interpretations. Three themes emerged from the analysis of data: use of mobile strategies to migrate customers to digital banking, challenges to migrate customers to digital banking, and digital banking innovation. The implications of this study for positive social change include improving convenience to customers; promoting green banking; and providing easy access to banking to the poor, those with physical disabilities, and those living in remote and rural areas.

Cryptocurrencies has become a very hot topic recently, with Bitcoin being the most popular. The increase in interest has led to an incentive to create payment systems for the currency that makes it easier to use for day-to-day shopping. A lot of companies are inves- tigating possible solutions for credit cards that are used for cryptocurrencies. This thesis aims to present and perform a security analysis on an already created concept of a credit card payment system for Bitcoin. The security analysis is done in a systematical approach where the modules were analyzed with predetermined restrictions and assumptions. The restricitons and assumptions are then removed one-by-one to find potential threats in the system. The outcome of the analysis is then evaluated in an attempt to find possible im- plementation methods that would mitigate or prevent the discovered threats. The possible implementations are also evaluated in terms of how they would affect the system.

This diploma thesis analyzes the deep web environment with the use of business models from the surface web. In the indroduction part of the thesis summarize terms web, deep web and dark web, these terms are intermingle the entire thesis, also brings the concept on Onion routing with use of Tor software. An inseparable part is the comparsion of tools which can be used for access to the dark web. The main part of the thesis analyzes most used business models on the surface web including their methods of monetization and after that author tries to apply these models in the dark web environment. An importat part of this work is the analysis a type of services occuring on the dark web and mutual comparison of several sub-criteria of each service. In the final part the thesis presents project Turris on which is applied to create a relay node for the Tor network.

Money laundering is a non-violent crime, however when successfully executed it has a negative impact on society, as it tends to support other illicit activities, including terrorism. As was the case for other financial crimes, the internet opened the door for new tools that enable criminals to launder their illicit profits. One of these tools is cryptocurrency.This paper takes the form of a literature review, in order to find the most relevant and important work within the research topic, and to identify central issues associated with laundering money through cryptocurrencies. It aims to explain the crypto-laundering process, methods and features that make cryptocurrencies tempting to criminals when searching tools to launder their illicit profits.The findings of this literature review demonstrate that cryptocurrencies have more characteristics that appeal to launderers than deters them. The results also show the existence of different methods that are employed in crypto-laundering and how it mirrors traditional money laundering stages, making evident that crypto-laundering is a real threat. Due to these results, it is essential that the criminological community delve into financial crimes perpetrated in the online environment.

This research paper addresses the issue whether cryptocurrencies are protected investments under  bilateral investment treaties (BITs). Through BITs a host state has a responsibility to protect the investments of the nationals of the other contracting state to the treaty. This governing relationship however may introduce several requirements for an investment to comply with, such as territorial links, the use of language under BITs compliance requirements. With this, cryptocurrencies being a new of age asset class may find several future hurdles in qualifying as an investment under BITs. Especially with the on-going confusion on an international scale in regulating and defining cryptocurrencies.  In determining the afore-mentioned requirements, this research paper first identified a cryptocurrency and a comparison was first made in regards to money. Then, the research paper proceeded in comparing a cryptocurrency with the characteristics of digital assets. Followed by a general approach to the meaning of investment and an analysis to the definition of investment through past approaches taken by arbitral tribunals. Therefore, finally leading in deciding whether cryptocurrencies will qualify as an investment under BITs.

Cílem této práce je vytvořit platformu pro sběr a zobrazování metadat o kryptoměnových adresách z veřejného i temného webu. K dosažení tohoto cíle jsem použil technologie zpracování webu napsané v PHP. Komplikace doprovázející automatické zpracování webových stránek byly vyřešeny techonologí Apache Kafka a jejími schopnosti škálování procesů. Modularita platformy byla dosažena pomocí architektury microservices a Docker containerization. Práce umožňuje jedinečný způsob, jak hledat potenciální kriminální aktivity, které se odehrály mimo rámec blockchain, pomocí webové aplikace pro správu platformy a vyhledávání v extrahovaných datech. Vytvořená platforma zjednodušuje přidávání nových, na sobě nezávislých modulů, kde Apache Kafka zprostředkovává komunikaci mezi nimi. Výsledek této práce může být použit pro detekci a prevenci kybernetické kriminality. Uživatelé tohoto systému mohou být orgány činné v trestním řízení nebo ostatní činitelé a uživatelé, zajímající se o reputaci a kreditibilitu kryptoměnových adres.