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📣 Voyager Witnesses $250M worth of crypto Net Asset Outflow Post Withdrawal Restart
Voyager has experienced a significant net outflow of $250 million worth of crypto assets since reopening withdrawals to users on June 23. The reopening of withdrawals on Voyager was met with a surge in users seeking to move their crypto assets off the platform. The net outflow of $250 million reflects a significant movement of funds, indicating users’ preference for storing their assets elsewhere or potentially taking advantage of other trading platforms.
As of now, the platform holds approximately $176 million worth of crypto assets, with a Clean Asset ratio (excluding VGX) of 96.15%. Notable assets on the platform include 2,287.4 BTC, 27,363.7 ETH, 18,558,340 USDC, 2,060 trillion SHIB, and more. The current amount of $176 million worth of crypto assets on the Voyager platform signifies the assets still under their custody. While the net outflow is substantial, the platform continues to hold a considerable sum of cryptocurrencies. The Clean Asset ratio, which stands at 96.15%, represents the proportion of assets excluding VGX, Voyager’s native token, and implies that the majority of the remaining assets on the platform are free from encumbrances or liabilities.
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💰 Grayscale makes Lido the second-heaviest component in its DeFi Fund
Digital asset manager Grayscale added the Lido protocol's LDO token to its DeFi Fund, making it the second-heaviest component. Grayscale's DeFi Fund is now weighted to include Uniswap (UNI) at 45.46%, Lido (LDO) at 19.04%, Aave (AAVE) at 11.53%, MakerDAO (MKR) at 10.82%, Curve DAO Token (CRV) at 7.03% and Synthetix (SNX) at 6.12%. Lido is a decentralized liquid staking protocol that allows users to keep staked tokens liquid via a stand-in token, or stToken.
"In accordance with the CoinDesk DeFi Select Index methodology, Grayscale has adjusted the DeFi Fund’s portfolio by selling certain amounts of the existing Fund Components in proportion to their respective weightings, and using the cash proceeds to purchase Lido (LDO)," Grayscale said in a company release. "No tokens were removed from the DeFi Fund." Lido is a decentralized liquid staking protocol that allows users to keep staked tokens liquid via a stand-in token, or stToken. LDO’s weight in the fund sits at 19.04%, second only to Uniswap’s UNI at 45.46%. Grayscale redefines the composites of its funds quarterly.
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🇰🇷 South Korea’s FSC Now Requires Employees Must Disclose Virtual Asset Holdings
The South Korean Financial Services Commission (FSC) defines the criteria for internal workers who must declare virtual asset holdings. The report’s target audience is public servants who are now performing virtual asset-related activities and workers who have performed such duties in the last six months. The tasks include developing and executing virtual asset rules or regulations, investigating and analyzing criminal cases involving virtual assets, administering and regulating virtual currency exchanges, support and management, and virtual asset technology development, among other things.
According to Asia Economic Report, the FSC issued a revised draft of the “Code of Conduct for Public Officials,” requiring employees with virtual asset responsibilities not to invest using relevant undisclosed information while performing their duties and requiring internal employees to report details of virtual asset holdings. A new form for the “Report on Virtual Assets Possession” has also been introduced, which requires the kind of virtual asset owned, date of purchase, quantity, and amount to be recorded. In addition, the definition of virtual assets under the ‘Specified Financial Information Act’ was incorporated in response to the Anti-Corruption and Civil Rights Commission’s request to amend the code of conduct for each institution.
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💰 Crypto comeback pushes ProShare's AuM for bitcoin futures ETF over $1 billion
The crypto market rally kicked off by BlackRock's surprise spot bitcoin exchange-trade fund filing has brought tens of millions of new inflows into a futures-based fund managed by ProShares. ProShare's BITO fund saw an additional $14.9 million of inflows on June 29 and $11.9 million of inflows on July 3, bringing its total assets under management to $1.04 billion, according to ETF.com. By way of comparison, the fund's AuM on June 15 — the day on which BlackRock's ETF application was submitted — stood at $822 million.
ProShare's futures-based fund made its market debut in late 2021. There's a long list of issuers vying to launch a spot bitcoin ETF, which could bring further legitimacy to bitcoin as well as its underpinning market structure. The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission has historically denied such a product because of a lack of proper surveillance across spot trading venues. As noted by European asset manager CoinShares, the crypto fund space has benefited from the excitement around a spot bitcoin ETF coming to market. Weekly inflows into crypto asset management products were strong for the second week in a row, with CoinShares reporting $125 million coming into the industry last week. That brought total inflows into such products to $334 million over the past two weeks, according to the European asset manager.
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💰 Arrington recently filed with the SEC for an XRP-based Hedge Fund
Patrick L. RileyReaper Financial CEO hints at an exciting development for XRP. Arrington Capital, a digital asset management firm in blockchain-based capital markets founded in 2017, recently filed with the SEC for an XRP-based hedge fund, he said on Twitter. Riley added one piece of good news: “Hopefully everything turns out well.” Reaper CEO tweeted, “Arrington recently filed with the SEC for an XRP-based hedge fund. Looks like everything is expected to go well.”
Hedge funds pool investors’ money and invest it in the hope of positive returns. Typical investors include institutional investors such as pension funds and insurance companies, and wealthy individuals. Some hedge fund managers may not be required to register or file public reports with the SEC, depending on the number of assets in the hedge fund advised by the manager. Digital asset investment products saw the largest single-weekly inflows since July 2022, totaling $199 million, correcting nearly half of outflows for the past nine consecutive weeks, according to CoinShares, a digital asset investment firm that trades with cryptocurrency exchanges. Offers Exchange Traded Products (ETPs).
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🏦 Coinbase Defies The SEC In Landmark Lawsuit Showdown
According to a recent court ruling, the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) will respond to Coinbase’s first legal defense on July 13. This timing is surprising since Coinbase used a “creative” defense strategy by delivering its initial answer 40 days before the August 7 deadline. The SEC was supposed to respond to the exchange’s argument by July 3, but owing to the July 4 holiday weekend, they asked for a three-day extension, which the court granted.
Coinbase said in a letter filed just before midnight on Wednesday in Manhattan federal court that the SEC lacks the power to pursue civil claims against it because the assets traded on its platform are not “investment contracts” and hence not securities. In addition, the pre-trial meeting has been renamed a pre-motion conference and has been shifted from August 24 to July 13 at 14:00 UTC. Coinbase has maintained in its response to the SEC’s complaint that many of the coins referenced in the lawsuit are outside of the Commission’s purview. On June 6, the SEC filed a lawsuit against Coinbase, alleging that it gained billions of dollars as a middleman, including by trading at least 13 crypto assets, or tokens, such as Solana, Cardano, and Polygon, that should have been registered as securities.
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📣 Horizen’s ZenIP 42204 Causes Privacy Features Removal from ZEN Coin
Horizen has made a groundbreaking announcement regarding the approval of ZenIP 42204. The decision signifies a significant change as all privacy features of ZEN will be removed at the consensus level. In a blog post on their official website, Horizen highlighted that this move aims to eliminate technical debt and proactively address potential regulatory threats. Consequently, ZEN will no longer retain its status as a privacy coin. The forthcoming deprecation of the ZEN Coin mainchain shielded pools marks a fundamental shift in ZEN Coin’s.
The decision to remove privacy features at the consensus level underscores Horizen’s commitment to streamlining its technology stack and aligning with evolving regulatory standards. By doing so, the platform seeks to address concerns surrounding privacy coins and establish a solid foundation of transparency and accountability. While the removal of privacy features may come as a surprise to some ZEN coin holders and privacy advocates, Horizen emphasizes that this strategic change will enable the platform to better manage technical debt and allocate resources towards further innovation and growth. The company remains committed to the long-term sustainability and development of the Horizen ecosystem.
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📣 Banking Giants Crédit Agricole, Santander Seek to Provide Crypto Custody Under French Registration
A subsidiary co-owned by Crédit Agricole and Santander has registered as a digital asset service provider in France. The registration of Caceis, a company that specializes in offering financial services to institutional investors, allows the two major European banks to tap into the crypto market. The registration, granted by the AMF earlier this week, will allow the entity, Caceis, to provide custody services for digital assets, including cryptocurrencies.
The move adds a major traditional financial services group to the growing number of crypto companies registered by the French watchdog, Reuters noted in a report. The DASP list already includes subsidiaries of other big players in the French financial market such as Societe Generale and AXA. Caceis was established in 2005 through the merger of the asset management activities of Crédit Agricole and Caisse d’Epargne, a French cooperative banking group. With a 69.5% stake, Crédit Agricole is its majority owner while Santander has a 30.5% stake. France has been open towards the crypto industry. Among the companies it registered as DASPs is Binance, the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange.
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📣 MUFG To Issue Global Stablecoins Backed By Foreign Currencies Via Progmat Blockchain
Japan’s Biggest Bank, MUFG, is in talks to issue global stablecoins. The nation’s legislation on stablecoins took effect on June 1. MUFG has its Progmat blockchain platform for minting tokens. According to Bloomberg, Japan’s stablecoin law became effective on June 1, and only licensed banks, registered money transfer agents, and trust companies can issue the tokens. MUFG plans to issue stablecoins tied to foreign currencies, including the US dollar, for use globally. The bank is also working on security tokens for third parties.
Tatsuya Saito, the Vice President of Product at MUFG, said that inquiries for stablecoin projects are coming in from overseas financial groups and that Japan could become a global hub for stablecoin issuance. This is a great opportunity for Japan, as Prime Minister Fumio Kishida’s agenda for reinvigorating Japan’s economy includes support for the growth of Web3 firms, which refer to a vision of a decentralized internet built around blockchains, crypto’s underlying technology. Japan’s legislation promotes tokens that are fully backed by fiat cash in a matching currency. This makes using stablecoins safer for issuers and users alike. The fact that stablecoins can be denominated in dollars.
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📣 Crypto Scam in Texas Led to Lawsuit Between a Bitcoin ATM Operator and a Local Sheriff: Report
Sheriff McNamara supposedly remained unfazed by the legal battle started by Bitcoin Depot, saying the company “can go to hell.” Lux Vending – doing business as Bitcoin Depot – has reportedly filed a lawsuit against the sheriff’s office of McLennan County, Texas, accusing it of unlawfully seizing $15,000 from a BTC automated teller machine (ATM). The authorities confiscated the amount to compensate an elderly victim who had become a victim of a cryptocurrency scam.
According to local coverage, the whole drama started at the end of April when an 82-year-old Crawford woman was browsing the Internet for a cooking recipe. While online, she received an email stating she had accidentally activated a “Ransomware” computer virus. The woman contacted “customer support,” where she was redirected to a specially-designated “fraud investigator.” The latter claimed all her personal data had been compromised, adding that someone had written a $15,000 check to a mysterious construction firm using her details. The wrongdoer advised the victim to make a $15K cash withdrawal from her bank and deposit the money into a bitcoin ATM in Waco, Texas.
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🪙 Ethereum core devs confirm April 12 date for Shapella upgrade
The Shapella network upgrade will be activated on the Ethereum mainnet on April 12, following an official consensus reached by core developers. The Shapella upgrade will happen at network epoch 194,048, according to a blog post by the Ethereum Foundation on Tuesday. An epoch in Ethereum is a bundle of 32 blocks on the network and this epoch is expected to happen at 6:27 pm EDT on April 12.
Shapella is a portmanteau of Shanghai and Capella. These are two network upgrades that will happen simultaneously. The Shanghai upgrade is for the consensus layer and Capella is for the execution layer. The Shapella upgrade as a whole will introduce EIP-4895 to the Ethereum network. This EIP will enable the withdrawal of staked ether for the first time ever. Shapella also has other network improvements aimed at optimizing transaction fees for certain activities. These upgrades have been tested on multiple testnets. Tuesday’s upgrade confirmation also stated that the bug bounty program for Shapella vulnerabilities will run until April 5.
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💰 Terraform Labs Co-Founder At Risk Of Arrest Amidst $60 Billion Crypto Wipeout
South Korean prosecutors have recently made a fresh effort to arrest Daniel Shin, a financial technology entrepreneur who played a significant role in co-founding the Terraform Labs crypto project, as per Bloomberg. This move comes after the recent arrest of Do Kwon, the other founder of Terraform Labs, while he was in Montenegro. Both South Korea and the US are currently seeking Kwon’s extradition.
Shin’s lawyers have previously indicated that he split from Terraform Labs in 2020 and has not been involved in its operations since. Despite this, prosecutors in Seoul are renewing their efforts to detain Shin. In December, a South Korean court rejected an earlier effort by prosecutors to obtain an arrest warrant for Shin, citing that it was difficult to believe he posed a flight risk or would destroy evidence. However, prosecutors in Seoul indicated last year that Shin faced charges, including fraud, breach of duty, violation of capital-markets law, and illegal fund-raising. This event sparked a wave of crises in the crypto market.
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🔵 Xapo Bank Partners With Circle to Integrate USDC Payment Rails
Bitcoin custodian and licensed private bank Xapo announced partnering with the fintech firm Circle to integrate USDC payment rails. Xapo has become the first licensed bank in the world to add outrails to its existing USDC on-ramps. The new feature is expected to allow members to bypass costly and time-consuming SWIFT payments and instead deposit and withdraw via the stablecoin. The bank will not charge any fees for the service.
According to the official press release, Xapo will be offering a 1:1 conversion rate from USDC to US Dollar. With all the stablecoin deposits automatically converted to USD, the depositors of the bank will be able to rake in benefits from a 4.1% annual interest rate return. The announcement stated that Xapo is a fully licensed and regulated bank and a member of the Gibraltar Deposit Guarantee Scheme (GDGS), which protects depositors’ dollar deposits up to $100,000. The bank further clarified that it is not involved in staking activities of any crypto deposits, nor does it have any exposure to the crypto markets since all deposits are automatically converted to USD held by the bank.
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🔵 Arbitrum Transaction Count Breaks All-Time High Ahead Of Token Airdrop
Arbitrum, a layer 2 scaling solution built on Ethereum, has seen a significant increase in activity ahead of the planned airdrop of its native token, ARB. The airdrop will distribute just over 1 billion ARB tokens to eligible wallets, with a fixed total supply of 10 billion. This distribution is aimed at boosting adoption and is a common way of introducing new tokens to the market.
According to data from Arbiscan, the number of daily transactions on Arbitrum reached a new record high of 1,312,052 on Wednesday, surpassing the previous peak of 1,103,398 on Feb. 21. In comparison, the Ethereum mainnet processed around 1.08 million transactions. This increase in daily transactions can be attributed to the announcement of the token airdrop a week ago, which has led to an over 50% increase in the project’s tally. The airdrop will distribute just over 1 billion ARB tokens to eligible wallets, with a fixed total supply of 10 billion.
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📣 Euler Finance Will To Negotiate With Exploiter For $197 Million Stolen Funds
Euler Finance may be taking steps to reach an agreement with the exploiter who attacked the platform last week, causing more than $190 million in damage when he started communicating with the project. The exploiter stated in an on-chain message to Euler Finance on March 20, days after delivering cash to a red-flagged North Korean address, that they now wish to reach a deal with Euler.
The project also requires the exploiter to refund 90% and retain 10% as a payment, which amounts to approximately $20 million. But, since the exploiter did not respond, the community was forced to step in, offering a $1 million prize to anybody who could locate the answer. When the exploiter sent 100 ETH to the famous hacker group Lazarus Group, it prompted concerns about North Korea’s support for hacking groups. As of March 18, Euler attackers had started returning funds, and 3,000 ETH has been returned so far. The Euler Financial attack underlines the continued security problems in the DeFi industry.
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🏦 Crypto.org blockchain validator penalized, loses over $25,500 in CRO
The information was shared on Twitter by IcyCRO, a validator and a Cosmos InterBlockchain Communication (IBC) relayer of tokens like cosmos (ATOM). According to IcyCRO, Moonnode got compromised, and the hacker double-signed, which led to the validator being “tombstoned.” The slashing mechanism within the Crypto.org chain is different from other projects within the Cosmos ecosystem. While many other Cosmos chains impose penalties for downtime, the Crypto.org chain implements an extended jail time of 24 hours.
MoonNode is a validator service that allows users to stake CRO and earn rewards. The service is operated by a company called Emrit. MoonNode had approximately 9 million CRO staked. With the 5% penalty implemented for double signing, the validator lost roughly 450k CRO, which was burned. Notably, MoonNode’s largest delegator, who had around 1 million CRO staked, lost 50k CRO from their stake. Validators need to trigger a manual transaction known as an “unjail” transaction to rejoin the validation process after the jail period of 10 minutes elapses. During this jail time, the validator cannot participate in transaction validation or earn rewards, resulting in a massive cost of opportunities lost.
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📣 Gemini Files Lawsuit Against DCG For Fraud Conspiracy, DCG Calls It A “Publicity Stunt”
Gemini has sued DCG and Barry Silbert for a fraud conspiracy against Genesis creditors. DCG calls it a “publicity stunt”. Mediation process is ending. Gemini, the cryptocurrency exchange founded by Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss, has sued Digital Currency Group (DCG) and its founder Barry Silbert. Gemini alleges that Silbert and DCG were involved in fraud against creditors of Genesis, a cryptocurrency lending platform that filed for bankruptcy last year.
According to the complaint, Silbert and DCG conspired with Genesis to create false financial reports to hide the fact that Genesis was insolvent. DCG responded to the lawsuit by calling it a “publicity stunt” by Cameron Winklevoss to deflect blame from himself and Gemini. The mediation process is coming to an end, and the case is expected to be handled under Chapter 11 bankruptcy law. Gemini claims that Silbert and DCG were involved in a carefully crafted fraud against creditors of Genesis. When Genesis notified Gemini that it would terminate the Earn program in October 2022, Silbert reached out to set up a meeting to induce Gemini to continue to Earn. He did this knowing that Genesis was massively insolvent. Silbert claimed that Genesis faced only a timing issue, but this was a lie that hid the gaping hole in Genesis’s balance sheet.
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💰 Cardano Total Value Locked In DeFi Hit All-Time High
Cardano (ADA) is seeing its positive growth towards decentralized finance (DeFi), while the current price movement remains largely unchanged. According to data from the DeFiLlama aggregator, ADA Total Value Locked (TVL) across DeFi ecosystems has risen to an all-time high, with the increase being maintained steadily from the start of 2023 to present. At the present time, TVL on DeFi platforms reaches over $210 million, representing 2% of the current total supply of ADA. It is still one of the coins with the highest market capitalization in the crypto market.
Although this amount is not being supplemented in Dollar terms because of the token’s price drop, it does demonstrate how much interest investors have in the Cardano DeFi universe. If the measure just tracked the number of mentions, a thread with a high number of mentions may boost the count on its own, even if mentions were low elsewhere on social media. As a result, to gain a more accurate reflection of the trend in the larger market, the social volume only takes into account unique postings. However, in terms of macro factors, Cardano is facing unfavorable factors from the US authorities, namely the U.S. The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has designated ADA as a security token in its lawsuits with US exchanges, which caused its price to plummet in early June.
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📊 AzukiDAO’s Lawsuit With Founder Zagabond To Recover 20,000 ETH Get Support
Jeremy Cahen (Twitter nickname PAULY), founder of NFT marketplace Not Larva Labs, said he would happily help the Azuki community take legal action against co-founder Azuki Zagabond. Jeremy Cahen also said that Zagabond and his team fraudulently appropriated more than $100,000,000 from the community. Jeremy would love to testify in court about all this, and I have full personal information about many of the team members involved in these scams.
Not Larva Labs founder’s endorsement of AzukiDAO after the community proposed hiring an attorney to assist the community in recovering 20,000 ETH from Zagabond and suing it yesterday. Specific content includes: hiring a lawyer to file a lawsuit against Zagabond, the founder of Azuki, accusing the organization of having many Rug projects; withdrawing 20,000 ETH issued by Elementals from the team and distributing it to the DAO to promote the growth of the entire Azuki community and provide rewards and incentives for artists, content creators, and builder. So far, the vote has exceeded the majority to pass it.
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🏦 Kraken Is Requested By The IRS For Customer Information From $20,000
According to The Block, Kraken was ordered by a judge on Friday to provide certain user information to the Internal Revenue Service (IRS). The IRS wants the exchange to identify accounts with more than $20,000 in crypto transactions annually between 2016 and 2020. Kraken has previously objected to the IRS subpoena partly because its concerns will create a great burden. The exchange called the agency’s summons an “irrational treasure hunt,” arguing that it crossed the line.
Kraken will have to disclose information such as name, date of birth, physical address, phone number, and tax identification number. Friday’s ruling in favor of the government comes amid a deepening US crackdown on cryptocurrencies. The Securities and Exchange Commission this month filed a lawsuit accusing Coinbase of operating an illegal exchange and alleging that Binance.US mishandled customer funds, misled investors and agencies’ regulatory authorities as well as violations of securities rules. Kraken is a leading cryptocurrency exchange with a daily trading volume of around $650 million globally, according to CoinMarketCap. The company did not immediately respond to an email request for comment on the ruling.
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🇺🇸 President Joe Biden Pledges To Eliminate The Loopholes For Crypto
According to the Daily Mail, US President Joe Biden gave a key economic policy address in Chicago on Wednesday, threatening to target crypto traders and hedge fund managers but also encouraging all billionaires to pay more taxes to finance economic development. The speech was touted as an effort to propose a roadmap for American middle-class prosperity. “Bidenomics” is the new term for a strategy to tax the wealthy in order to invest in important national security industries such as semiconductors.
Earlier in May, the White House was rumored to be contemplating putting a punitive tax on encryption mining firms, with a ratio of 30% of encryption mining companies’ energy expenses, an extraordinary industry-specific penalty that might endanger such companies’ earnings. According to the White House Council of Economic Advisers (CEA), crypto mining corporations do not now have to pay the full expenses they generate, such as local environmental damage, higher energy prices, and the effect of increasing greenhouse gas emissions on the climate. Although other energy-intensive enterprises would not be taxed in the same way, the CEA claims that crypto mining does not produce the same local and national economic advantages as comparable electricity-consuming firms.
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💰 Terra Classic Revival Plans Continue as 6 Engineers Aim to Revive LUNC Ecosystem
Six engineers calling themselves the “Six Samurai” are proposing a Terra Classic ecosystem revival plan for the blockchain as some community members try their best to break away from the shackles of disgraced founder Do Kwon and rebuild the project. Terra Classic is the original network created by Terraform Labs. It has continued as an independent blockchain rather than Terra 2.0, which is a forked version that was created in the wake of Terra's collapse. Its LUNC tokens are valued at $580 million as of Monday.
The engineers, co-led by “Bilbo Baggins” and “Solid Snake,” proposed a $116,000 three-month spend from the Terra Classic community in a governance proposal over the weekend, claiming they would work part-time on the project if approved. “LUNC has limitless upside potential, and we want to help realize it by leveraging our skills to bring value to the blockchain and all its investors in order to accomplish a true revival of the ecosystem,” Samurai Six said.“We're here to provide value to the ecosystem on its road to revival, and we see ourselves as contributors to the Terra Classic blockchain, both as developers and long-time community members/investors,” the team added.
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🇧🇷 Brazil’s Largest Exchange Mercado Bitcoin Added To Country’s CBDC Pilot
Brazil’s central bank has authorized Mercado Bitcoin, the largest local crypto exchange, to participate in the country’s CBDC pilot project. Meanwhile, Brazil’s state-owned Caixa Bank was also approved to participate in the project on the same day. “Our participation validates the Central Bank’s intention to bring innovation to the financial system with those who have already been working with this technology and not just with the incumbents who have appropriated it,” said Fabricio Tota, director of new business at Mercado Bitcoin, Valor added.
Mercado Bitcoin officially became a payment institution on June 2, a week after the pilot participants were identified. As previously reported, in May this year, the Central Bank of Brazil selected 14 institutions to participate in the CBDC pilot project, including large local private banks such as Bradesco, Nubank, and Itaú Unibanco, as well as such as Brazil’s largest bank Banco do Brasil and domestic securities companies B3. Multinational companies such as Visa and Microsoft were also selected to participate in the project. Brazil’s central bank aims to launch the digital currency by 2024 after a closed pilot program next year with financial institutions, bank president Roberto Campos Neto said on Tuesday time adding that the project has received international attention.
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💰 Bitcoin Dominance Now Reaches 50%, Highest In 2 Years
While maintaining largely stable in recent days, Bitcoin dominance has risen to more than 50% for the first time in more than two years. According to TradingView data, Bitcoin’s market capitalization has surpassed that of all other cryptocurrencies combined. This comes as the majority of the larger-cap alts have been seeing slight daily losses. All eyes were on the United States as the CPI data and the Fed’s next FOMC meeting, both of which were due to be revealed and held this week.
The inflation numbers, which were released on Wednesday, showed a small decrease. Yet, this had little impact on BTC’s price movement. On Thursday, the Federal Reserve, rather predictably, chose to stop its monetary strategy of rising interest rates. Bitcoin’s dominance last approached 50% in June 2022, when the whole crypto market crashed due to consistently rising inflation in the United States, prompting the Federal Reserve to tighten monetary policy aggressively. Interestingly, Bitcoin’s market domination has increased by more than 10.5% since November 27, 2022, owing mostly to investors seeking a safe haven in the aftermath of the FTX crisis and rising governmental scrutiny of crypto assets in the United States.
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📣 CFTC's complaint against Binance seeks permanent trading and registration bans, and other details
The Commodity Future Trading Commission on Monday filed a civil complaint in U.S. federal court against crypto giant Binance, its founder and CEO Changpeng "CZ" Zhao, and executive Samuel Lim. The complaint largely focuses on allegations of unregistered commodities trading in the U.S., but could have broader implications for both Binance and the digital asset industry. As part of its suit, the CFTC wants injunctions that could effectively bar Binance.
The CFTC cites a number of private communications and company documents throughout the complaint to support its argument. "The complaint filed by the CFTC is unexpected and disappointing as we have been working collaboratively with the CFTC for more than two years," a Binance spokesperson said in a separate statement provided to The Block. "We have made significant investments over the past two years to ensure we do not have U.S. users active on our platform, including increasing compliance personnel from "approximately 100" to "around 750 core and supporting compliance personnel today," the spokesperson said.
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📣 Indian Woman Loses $30K in Crypto Scam to Man She Met on Matrimonial Site: Report
The ‘US-based engineer’ and prospective husband stopped communicating when she tried to withdraw her money. A 60-year-old Indian woman lost nearly $30,000 in a crypto investment scam after she was approached on the matrimonial site where she had registered herself to look for a life partner. The con man told her that he was a US-based engineer and can make her earn quick profits.
According to media reports, the Mumbai woman, who is a retired executive from a private company, registered on a matrimonial website in early 2022. Soon, she was approached by a person on the site, and the two exchanged their phone numbers and started calling and chatting regularly. Between April 2022 and December 2022, the woman invested nearly $30,000 (INR2.4 million) in cryptocurrencies through “the guide.” At one point of time when she had $62,000 in her virtual account, she asked “the guide” to help her withdraw the money. They told her that she would need to pay a currency conversion fee.
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📣 BlockFi Raises Almost $5 Million By Selling Mining Assets
The sale of mining equipment and other physical assets by BlockFi, a crypto asset lending firm in bankruptcy proceedings, was permitted by a US bankruptcy court for $4.7 million. According to a report by The Block, BlockFi’s lawyer said that a portion of the assets would be sold to a company named US Farms after an auction in which there was a lot of interest in the actual equipment that would be disposed of.
According to the firm, there were five offers for the complete set of mining assets and seven bids for a part of the assets prior to the purchase decision. In November 2022, BlockFi filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in the United States Bankruptcy Court. A Chapter 11 bankruptcy is a corporate reorganization effort that minimizes debt while the company continues to function. To maximize the recovery of creditors’ assets, the property of a bankrupt corporation may be sold to a third party and divided among creditors. It is worth mentioning that the corporation gained permission to hold the aforementioned auction at the end of January.
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⚪️ Sui Network To Launch Mainnet In Q2, No Official Plans For Airdrop
The public blockchain Sui Network stated that the mainnet would be launched in the second quarter of this year to promote the Web3 development community on the protocol more. Moreover, from now until the mainnet, the project will host The Wave to Mainnet event. This is a series of events designed to introduce consumers to Sui and help them grasp the potential of this project with promising technology and unique solutions.
Web3 initiatives on Sui have lately grown in scope, with Mysten Labs and Battlemon Partner launching the top NFT, DeFi, and gaming hubs, as well as an open universe of diverse on- and off-chain games. Sui and Aptos are both blockchain initiatives created by the former Diem team, a blockchain fostered by Meta. Although Aptos has already distributed hundreds of millions of dollars to its customers in late 2022, Sui Network’s airdrop is still unknown. The Sui Foundation, on the other hand, established a campaign to provide the community early access to SUI tokens. This initiative enables members of the community to buy SUI tokens at an early stage in a fair and decentralized way.
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📣 Venezuela’s Crypto Authority Wanted With $5 Million Bounty
In a decree published on March 17, Venezuela’s president, Nicolás Maduro, ordered the reform of the National Superintendency of Crypto Assets. According to Venezuelan media, Ramírez has subsequently been detained and is being investigated for his involvement in a conspiracy to steal from Venezuela’s oil activities. Joselit Ramírez, Venezuela’s highest authority on cryptocurrency regulations.
A new board of directors will oversee the reorganization, led by Anabel Pereira Fernández, a lawyer who formerly served as president of the Fondo de Garantia de Depositos y Protección Bancaria, Venezuela’s equivalent of the US Federal Deposit Insurance Corp (FDIC). Héctor Andrés Obregón Pérez, Luis Alberto Pérez González, and Julio César Mora Sánchez are among the other directors. Ramírez was detained by the National Anticorruption Police after a request for legal proceedings was filed against a series of citizens of people who might be implicated in major crimes of administrative corruption and fund theft.
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