Skip to main content

Posts

Showing posts from April 26, 2021

MLB Team Washington Nationals Partners With Terra Blockchain Community, Ballpark Plans to Accept UST

On February 9, the American professional baseball team based in Washington, D.C., the Washington Nationals, announced the team has partnered with Terra, the open-source blockchain platform and decentralized autonomous organization (DAO). The Washington Nationals detail that the team is a “leading innovator” and is “consistently introducing new technologies to enhance the fan experience.” Washington Nationals Ink Long-Term Deal With Terra Major League Baseball (MLB) team the Washington Nationals has partnered with the blockchain platform and DAO Terra, according to an announcement published by the team on Wednesday. The deal with Terra follows a slew of sports-related deals with crypto firms, but the MLB team will be the first to partner with an open-source blockchain project. In addition to the partnership, the algorithmic stablecoin UST that’s issued on the Terra blockchain will be “accepted as a payment method at Nationals Park as early as next season.” “The Nationals continue t...
Post a Comment
Read more

Employees of Korea’s financial regulator ordered to report crypto holdings

Korea is strengthening its crypto regulations, imposing reporting requirements on all employees of its Financial Services Commission. Korean Financial Services Commission (FSC) Chairman Eun Sung-soo has ordered FSC officials who hold crypto to file reports on their investments by May 7. The FSC employees subject to reporting are those who manage virtual currency tech developments, those responsible for drafting and applying virtual currency laws, and those who report on and manage crypto exchanges. An article from the Korea Times noted the comparative lack of regulation surrounding FSC officials’ investments in crypto when compared to traditional financial products. While FSC employees are expected to notify chairman Sung-soo if they have speculated on crypto, and are prohibited from making investments using information they have gained ahead of the public through their privileged position, Korea Times reporter, Lee Kyung-min, noted soft penalties for policy violations: “These m...
Post a Comment
Read more

The Global Economy Comes Before Savers: ECB President Christine Lagarde Defends Negative Interest Rates

The European Central Bank President Christine Lagarde is keeping the central bank’s monetary easing policies unchanged according to her statements from a press conference last Thursday. Moreover, the central bank’s Twitter account recently shared a video of Lagarde defending negative interest rates, as the bank’s President stresses that they “support companies and people in the eurozone.” ECB President Christine Lagarde Wants to Preserve Favorable Financing Since well before Covid-19, a great number of central banks started to initiate monetary easing practices and pushing interest rates down to zero or below. On Thursday, Lagarde spoke during a press conference after the European Central Bank (ECB) decided to keep policies the same after keeping rates below zero and issuing lots of fiat. Lagarde says that the financing conditions must be maintained to fend off the economic effects of the global pandemic. “Preserving favorable financing conditions over the pandemic period remains ...
Post a Comment
Read more

mStable launches on Polygon, hopes to attract defi users 'priced out' of ETH

mStable has launched its savings account, stablecoin, and swap services on Polygon to reduce fees. Defi-yield protocol mStable has become the latest to embrace second-layer scaling solutions, announcing its deployment on Polygon (formerly known as Matic) today.  mStable’s interest-generating savings account, two of its “risk minimized meta-stablecoins,” and asset swapping features are now live on Polygon, offering its users reduced fees when compared to its Ethereum mainnet deployment. 1/ mStable has launched on Polygon @mstable_ offers @0xPolygon users another source of USD and BTC liquidity, a DeFi-native savings account and two risk minimised meta-stablecoins. Get started: https://t.co/aLx10WWwEN Learn more / Guide: https://t.co/e5G36VBJip — mStable (@mstable_) April 26, 2021 Polygon is a layer-two network that processes transactions on its sidechain before bundling them together into the next block produced by the Ethereum mainnet. In an April 27 announcement , m...
Post a Comment
Read more

Aave v2 launches liquidity mining program targeting stablecoin borrowers

Aave has launched its v2 liquidity mining program, offering roughly $880,000 worth of governance token rewards to users daily until July 15. Aave has launched liquidity mining incentives for its v2 protocol, paying out governance token rewards exceeding 20% to users who borrow stablecoins.  At the time of writing, users who deposit stablecoins into the protocol can earn an addition yield of between 4.78% and 13.49% on top of their regular gains in the form of staked AAVE (stkAAVE) tokens. Wrapped Bitcoin deposits are also paying an extra 4.59%, while Ether deposits are garnering 2.11% in rewards. However, the highest rewards appear to be going to stablecoin borrowers, who are currently receiving rewards of between 5.15% and 22.05% AIP-16 received overwhelming ‘yea’ votes from the community and has officially been executed. This proposal, created by @paraficapital , introduces liquidity mining incentives for Aave V2 ⛏️️ https://t.co/ewa2Yvlc3w pic.twitter.com/s7xgz21eZ8 — Aa...
Post a Comment
Read more

‘I have not sold any of my Bitcoin’: Elon Musk

Tesla may have realized some of its Bitcoin profits, but CEO Elon Musk continues to hodl. Billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk has taken to Twitter to assure the crypto community that he has not sold any of his personal BTC stash, despite his company Tesla realizing profits from its recent Bitcoin buys. Musk’s comments came in response to accusations from comedian Dave Portnoy that the Tesla CEO had profited from a Bitcoin pump and dump engineered through his public statements supporting the cryptocurrency. Rejecting Portnoy’s assertion, Musk stated that “Tesla sold 10% of its holdings essentially to prove liquidity of Bitcoin as an alternative to holding cash on balance sheet,” adding: “I have not sold any of my Bitcoin.” No, you do not. I have not sold any of my Bitcoin. Tesla sold 10% of its holdings essentially to prove liquidity of Bitcoin as an alternative to holding cash on balance sheet. — Elon Musk (@elonmusk) April 26, 2021 As reported by Cointelegraph, Tesla Inc. sol...
Post a Comment
Read more

Iran Authorizes Banks and Currency Exchangers to Use Cryptocurrencies to Pay for Imports

The Central Bank of Iran has authorized banks and currency exchangers to use cryptocurrencies mined by licensed crypto miners in the country to pay for imports. Meanwhile, a bill is being drafted to provide regulatory clarity regarding crypto-related activities. Using Cryptocurrencies to Pay for Imports The Central Bank of Iran (CBI) has announced that banks and licensed currency exchangers can use cryptocurrency mined by licensed crypto miners in Iran to pay for imports, the Financial Tribune reported on Saturday. The publication described: The central bank says that lenders and licensed currency exchange offices have been notified about the regulatory framework for crypto payment. In October last year, the Iranian government amended its cryptocurrency regulation to enable the country’s central bank to fund imports with bitcoin legally mined in the country. Licensed crypto miners are required to sell their coins directly to the central bank. The measure was proposed by the CB...
Post a Comment
Read more

Irish crypto firms must comply with money laundering laws for the first time

It is now a criminal offense to operate a crypto firm in Ireland without registering with the Central Bank of Ireland. Ireland’s crypto businesses have become subject to regulatory oversight for the first time, with local digital asset firms now observing anti-money laundering guidelines set out by the European Union, or EU. The EU’s Fifth Anti-Money Laundering Directive, or 5AMLD, was transposed into Irish Law on April 23, via the Criminal Justice Money Laundering and Terrorist Financing Amendment Act of 2021. The legislation requires firms that operate with crypto assets and custodial wallet providers — dubbed Virtual Asset Service Providers, or VASPs — and the businesses that service VASPS, abide by the same regulatory standards of mainstream financial firms. Irish VASPs must now register with the Central Bank of Ireland within the next three months, and carry out due diligence on their clients — including identification, accounting for the origin and destination of their cry...
Post a Comment
Read more

All 200 Cryptocurrency Exchanges Could Be Shut Down Under New Regulation in South Korea, Regulator Warns

The chairman of South Korea’s top financial regulator, the Financial Services Commission (FSC), Eun Sung-soo, has warned that all of the cryptocurrency exchanges in the country could be shut down. South Korea currently has about 200 cryptocurrency exchanges, he said. All Crypto Exchanges Could Be Shut Down in South Korea At the general meeting of the National Assembly’s Political Affairs Committee last week, The Korea Times quoted Chairman Eun as saying: All of the nation’s 200 cryptocurrency exchanges could be shut down after September once a special financial law takes effect. Chairman Eun explained that cryptocurrency exchanges are required to be registered with the FSC under the revised Special Funds Act (Act on Reporting and Using Specified Financial Transaction Information). “We are now accepting applications for them to officially register their business by the timeline, but no exchange operators have applied to date,” he revealed. Since no companies have been registered,...
Post a Comment
Read more

Tether Market Cap Swells Past $50 Billion, USDT Stablecoin Gets Listed on Coinbase Pro

The blockchain stablecoin issuer Tether Operations Limited has recently surpassed a $50 billion market valuation after seeing exponential growth during the last few years. Furthermore, the stablecoin tether has launched on the trading platform Coinbase Pro this week marking the San Francisco-based exchange’s first time supporting the dollar-pegged token. Tether Market Cap Increases by 170% in 6 Months The blockchain company has reached a milestone this week as the firm’s dollar-pegged token USDT has surpassed a $50 billion market capitalization. Back in November 2020, Bitcoin.com News reported on how USDT towered over the stablecoin competition, as the market cap grew by 2 million percent in four years. At that time, records had shown tether’s ( USDT ) market valuation was around $18.5 billion. At $50 billion today, the USDT market valuation increased by 170.27% since November. Tether Operations Limited says that the skyrocketing market cap stems from a myriad of use cases incl...
Post a Comment
Read more

Ethereum and Tezos connected via blockchain bridge

Wrapped Ethereum is now available on Tezos. The cryptocurrency space just became a little bit more interconnected after developers created a cross-chain bridge between the Ethereum and Tezos blockchains. Following the launch of the WRAP Protocol, created by Bender Labs, Ethereum-based ERC-20 and ERC-721 tokens can be made Tezos-compatible, allowing ETH holders to interact with the Tezos ecosystem. Token wrapping has become a common way of connecting the users of disparate blockchain platforms, and is perhaps best exemplified by Wrapped Bitcoin (WBTC), which is an ERC-20 version of Bitcoin ( BTC ) running on Ethereum. The WRAP Protocol wraps Ethereum-based tokens in the Tezos’ FA2 token standard, meaning they can be used as 1:1 representations without technical difficulties or price differences. Like Ethereum, Tezos has its own decentralized finance ecosystem. Unlike Ethereum, which will have to wait around a year before it shifts to a Proof-of-Stake consensus algorithm, staki...
Post a Comment
Read more

NFL wunderkind Trevor Lawrence inks crypto endorsement deal with Blockfolio

The NFL draft prospect has already received the first part of his bonus payment in crypto. Trevor Lawrence, the presumptive number-one pick in the upcoming National Football League draft, has signed an endorsement deal with crypto portfolio-tracking platform Blockfolio. According to a report on Monday by the New York Times, the quarterback prodigy has already received a signing bonus from the Blockfolio endorsement deal in crypto. Commenting on the deal,  Sam Bankman-Fried , CEO of Blockfolio parent company FTX, said that Lawrence “was excited about crypto.” According to Bankman-Fried, Lawrence’s positive disposition toward cryptocurrencies is what drew the company to the NFL prodigy, adding that FTX was looking to promote its business to mainstream audiences. Indeed, FTX recently secured a 19-year naming rights deal for the home arena of the National Basketball Association franchise team theMiami Heat. The $135 million deal will see the American Airlines Arena renamed the ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Showcase Listing on AscendEX

PRESS RELEASE. AscendEX, formerly BitMax, an industry-leading digital asset trading platform built by Wall Street quant trading veterans, has announced the listing of the Showcase Token (SHO) under the pair USDT/SHO on Apr 28 at 1:00 p.m. UTC. Showcase is an NFT mobile application designed to empower micro-influencers and fans. It provides a platform for content creators to create and sell limited edition tradeable non-fungible tokens backed by their brand. These NFTs allow for decentralized ownership, transfer, provenance, and proof of authenticity for digital assets. Showcase as a platform focuses on mobile-first design, fiat integration, lower-priced NFTs, beyond rare art NFTs, user experience, and social media integration. On the Showcase platform, creators can design and edit custom artwork in the app, which is then attached to a unique NFT or “Badge.” Limited edition badges are listed for sale, and fans may purchase them, and Showcase will pay revenue to the creators. B...
Post a Comment
Read more

Demand for PayPal’s crypto offering exceeded all expectations, CEO says

In the next five to 10 years, there will be more changes in the financial system than over the past two decades, PayPal's CEO predicted. The demand for cryptocurrency exceeded PayPal’s initial expectations after the firm launched crypto trading in late 2020, according to the company’s CEO. “Demand on the crypto side has been multiple-fold to what we initially expected. There’s a lot of excitement,” PayPal president and CEO Dan Schulman said in a Sunday interview with Time magazine. Schulman said that existing financial infrastructure needs modernization because it’s “inefficient today” due to overly expensive and slow international transactions. The CEO predicted that the financial system is poised to see more changes in the next five to 10 years than it has experienced over the past two decades. “Ten years from now, you will see a tremendous decline in the use of cash. All form factors of payment will collapse into the mobile phone. Credit cards as a form factor will go aw...
Post a Comment
Read more

Ethereum creator donates 100 Ether and Maker to Indian COVID-19 relief

Vitalik Buterin made the donation after the co-founder of Polygon set up a charity drive to aid COVID-19 relief amid India's second wave. Ethereum creator Vitalik Buterin has contributed 100 Ether ( ETH ) and 100 Maker ( MKR ) tokens to a COVID-19 relief fund, as the country finds itself embroiled in the virus’ second wave. Buterin contributed to a "crypto-COVID" relief fund set up on the cryptocurrency custodian platform, Gnosis Safe. Public transactions on the Ethereum blockchain show two transactions coming from one of Buterin’s wallets on April 24. The Ethereum creator sent 100 ETH and 100 MKR to the relief fund, representing dollar values of $220,000 and $400,000 respectively. The donation drive was set up by Polygon (MATIC) co-founder Sandeep Nailwal. On April 24, Nailwal’s Twitter feed exploded after he sent out a rallying cry to help the COVID-19 situation in India. The Polygon co-founder tweeted : “Can't take this sitting down anymore, I am going to ru...
Post a Comment
Read more

Bitmain Reveals New Antminer E9 Ethereum Miner, ASIC Device Commands 3 GH/s Hashrate

The cryptocurrency mining rig and ASIC chipmaker Bitmain revealed a new digital currency mining device that’s dedicated to mining ethereum. While the Ethereum network is slowly transitioning from proof-of-work (PoW) to a proof-of-stake (PoS) system, Bitmain’s new Antminer E9 aims to be one of the fastest ether miners on the open market. Antminer E9 Mining Rig to Command 3 GH/s of Hashpower Two days ago on April 24, the application-specific integrated circuit (ASIC) manufacturer Bitmain published a teaser video about a new ether mining rig. The device is not for sale yet and E9 prices have not been announced. However, speculative estimates assume the machine could be around $20k per unit or upwards of $30k per machine. The company revealed the new Antminer E9 specs on Twitter with the accompanying teaser video published to Youtube. “[The] Antminer E9 ethereum miner. Equivalent to 32 – 3080 graphics cards, Equipped with a hashrate of 3 GH/s, power efficiency of 0.85 J/M, and power...
Post a Comment
Read more

Ibiza without Ibiza: Virtual Amnesia dancefloor launches on Decentraland

Virtual partygoers will be able to enjoy an Ibiza club experience in the metaverse thanks to a partnership between Decentral Games and veteran club Amnesia. The coronavirus pandemic has boosted the virtual entertainment industry and provided an opening for blockchain-based ventures to tie leisure to the expanding market for nonfungible tokens, or NFTs.   On April 26, community-owned metaverse casino Decentral Games and veteran Ibiza club Amnesia announced their new partnership and launch of two virtual Amnesia dancefloors, dubbed "Amnesia Experience" and "Amnesia Hype."  The partners expect they will generate at least $10 million this year from the venture, largely from sales of tickets, NFTs and advertising revenue. Each will take 45% of the earnings, allocating the remaining 10% to an unnamed event organizer, with whom negotiations are ongoing. Ibiza clubbing without Ibiza taps in to a trend that has brought other monetizable leisure, including casinos and ga...
Post a Comment
Read more

Chinese online retail giant JD.com adopts digital yuan for salary payments

Chinese e-commerce company JD.com has upped its support for the country’s central bank digital currency. JD.com has been using China’s Digital Currency Electronic Payment, or DCEP, system to pay the salaries of some employees since January. The e-commerce firm revealed  the news on Sunday while announcing its participation in the one-year DCEP trial show at the fourth Digital China Summit in Fuzhou slated for April 25 and 26. Commenting on its digital yuan adoption journey, the company stated that apart from paying staff salaries, JD has also utilized the DCEP in business-to-business payments to partner firms as well as cross-bank settlements. As previously reported by Cointelegraph, JD Technology and Digital Currency Research Institute — the company’s fintech arm — has been a DCEP development partner with the People’s Bank of China since September 2020. In December, the online retailer began accepting the digital yuan as a payment method on its website. According to a prev...
Post a Comment
Read more

Mercurial on crypto: Will India’s latest stance lead to positive regulation?

Indian officials are switching their stance on crypto, but the country’s regulatory environment may have additional bottlenecks in store. For most of the last decade, India’s stance on cryptocurrencies has been uncertain, to say the least. The current soft ban is hurting the country’s potential every day, but recent reports suggest the country is having second thoughts. In March this year, a notification published by the Ministry of Corporate Affairs stated that companies dealing in cryptocurrencies would have to disclose their holdings to the government in financial statements. Crypto-holding companies will also have to disclose total profits and losses, as well as any deposits or advances received from other traders and investors. Just two weeks earlier, there was a report that cryptocurrencies were expected to be criminalized under an upcoming legislative bill, including their trading, mining, issuance and possession. So, why the sudden change of heart? And does anyone really ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Bitcoin bulls respond with a $150M short squeeze above $53K — Can BTC go higher?

Bitcoin saw $150 million worth of short contracts obliterated within hours. Roughly $150 million worth of shorts were liquidated within a span of hours as the price of Bitcoin ( BTC ) rose from around $47,000 to over $53,000 on April 26. The cryptocurrency market as a whole saw a strong short squeeze, as Ether ( ETH ), Binance Coin ( BNB ), and other major cryptocurrencies also rose by around 15% in the same period. Following Bitcoin's 12% recovery within a single day, the futures market has completely reset, with funding rates hovering at neutral levels. Why today's Bitcoin short squeeze is bullish A short squeeze in trading refers to when short-sell orders in the futures market are liquidated in a short period. When shorts are liquidated, short-sellers are forced to buy back their positions, ironically causing the buyer demand in the market to increase. Hence, the number of shorts rapidly declines, and long contracts or buy orders begin to dominate the market. When ...
Post a Comment
Read more

South Korean Prime Minister nominee to look into controversial crypto tax law

South Korea’s crypto tax law continues to face significant opposition from cryptocurrency proponents in the county. Kim Boo-kyum, recently nominated as Prime Minister by South Korea’s President Moon Jae-in, has said he will look into the country’s crypto tax law. According to a report by KBS World, the Prime Minister nominee is keen to ensure that there are no victims of the crypto tax law coming into effect in January 2022 . Kim’s comments come amid growing opposition to the incoming crypto tax regime. Tensions were further stoked after Eun Sung-soo, chairman of South Korea’s Financial Services Commission,  argued  that cryptocurrencies did not have any intrinsic value. Eun’s comments, a common refrain among crypto critics, came during an appearance before the National Policy Committee earlier in April. The FSC chairman dismissed the need for nuanced crypto regulations, adding “If you start protecting investments that have the ability to soar up to 20% a day, more and m...
Post a Comment
Read more

Blockchain Object Storage Company Filebase Raises $2M, Aims to Incorporate Filecoin and Arweave Networks

Filebase, a blockchain-based object storage company built on top of the Sia network has revealed the business has closed an initial seed round gathering $2 million from investors. Interest in decentralized storage networks has blossomed in recent months and Filebase expects the growth of global data to surpass 175 Zettabytes by 2025. The project is currently working with three distributed storage projects and plans to expand to Arweave and Filecoin by the end of 2021. Filebase Raises $2 Million In the future, blockchain advocates believe that distributed ledger networks will help bolster decentralized storage rather than leveraging centralized clouds and API services used today. In 2021, there are a number of blockchain projects dedicated to data-storage solutions and a company called Filebase utilizes a number of the most-used decentralized storage systems. Essentially, Filebase is a multi-tenant, S3-compatible API service that is built with the Sia network. However, Filebase de...
Post a Comment
Read more