question,answer,references Aave contemplates fee distribution in DeFi shake-up,"A proposal may be in the works at the decentralized lending platform Aave as deliberations about the activation of a “fee switch” to distribute fees to holders is set to get underway, according to Aave Chan Initiative founder Marc Zeller. Zeller said, “Temp check to activate ‘fee switch’ next week,” after noting that Aave DAO — the community-driven decentralized autonomous organization (DAO) behind the Aave platform — current net profits total about $60 million per year. Aave is a crypto lending platform primarily based on Ethereum. It allows borrowers to take out loans in one cryptocurrency and depositing another as collateral. It is governed by holders of the Aave (AAVE) token, who collectively form the Aave DAO. In a prior post on X, Zeller hinted at the possibility of implementing fees for Aave stakers. On March 16, he wrote, “A new iteration of the safety module will suggest distributing fees to stakers.” A “fee switch” typically refers to a feature or mechanism within a system or platform that allows for activating or deactivating specific fees or charges. In decentralized finance (DeFi) protocols like Aave, a fee switch might enable the distribution of fees collected from transactions or other activities to tokenholders or participants. Related: Restaking could introduce ‘hidden risks’ to Ethereum — Coinbase The fee switch will allow governance to control and adjust fee-related policies based on the platform’s needs and objectives. Aave DAO recently greenlit alterations to staking fees for its stablecoin GHO to maintain the token’s peg. If Aave DAO proceeds with fee activation, it will emulate Frax Finance, which recently endorsed a proposal to reintroduce its fee switch. However, on April 5, the AaveDAO discussed Dai (DAI) collateral restrictions. Risk management advisers from Chaos Labs presented a fresh proposal advocating a 12% decrease in Dai loan-to-value ratios (LTV) against Marc Zeller’s proposed 75% reduction. Prior to this, Aave launched a new proposal to set DAI’s loan-to-value ratio to 0% across all Ave deployments. Additionally, the proposal recommends removing sDAI incentives from the Merit program starting from Merit Round 2 and onward. The move counters MakerDAO’s rapid D3M plan, raising the DAI credit line to about 600 million DAI a month. Meanwhile, decentralized exchange Uniswap is in the final stages of preparation for its own fee switch proposal, expected to come in mid-April following a successful temperature check. Magazine: ‘Crypto is inevitable’ so we went ‘all in’ — Meet Vance Spencer, permabull","Zeller said, “Temp check to activate ‘fee switch’ next week,” after noting that Aave DAO — the community-driven decentralized autonomous organization (DAO) behind the Aave platform — current net profits total about $60 million per year. It is governed by holders of the Aave (AAVE) token, who collectively form the Aave DAO. In decentralized finance (DeFi) protocols like Aave, a fee switch might enable the distribution of fees collected from transactions or other activities to tokenholders or participants. If Aave DAO proceeds with fee activation, it will emulate Frax Finance, which recently endorsed a proposal to reintroduce its fee switch. However, on April 5, the AaveDAO discussed Dai (DAI) collateral restrictions." Biden signs ‘terrifying’ bill giving US agencies more spying power,"United States President Joe Biden has signed off on a controversial bill that expands the surveillance powers granted to U.S. government agencies, which critics worry could severely impact the privacy of American citizens. On April 20, the U.S. Senate voted 60–34 in favor of passing legislation that reauthorizes, extends and amends Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) for an additional two years. President Biden signed it into law a day later. Champions of the bill, including President Biden and a swathe of members from both sides of the aisle, said the bill was essential in aiding counter-terrorism efforts and preserving the national security interests of the United States. “Allowing FISA to expire would have been dangerous. It’s an important part of our national security toolkit and helps law enforcement stop terrorist attacks, drug trafficking, and violent extremism,” said Democrat Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, speaking on the Senate floor. The bill’s critics, however, said that the reauthorization and amendment of FISA would usher in a new era of surveillance and vastly expand spying powers afforded to government agencies, including the National Security Agency (NSA), Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). In an April 20 post to X, Elizabeth Goitein, co-director of the Liberty and National Security Program at the Brennan Center for Justice, lashed out at members who voted in favor of the bill, saying they had “sold out American civil liberties.” “The provision effectively grants the NSA access to the communications equipment of almost any U.S. business, plus huge numbers of organizations and individuals. It’s a gift to any president who may wish to spy on political enemies, journalists, ideological opponents,” wrote Goitein. “This is a shameful moment in the history of the United States Congress.” Related: NSA ’just days from taking over the internet’ warns Edward Snowden Currently, U.S. agencies such as the NSA can force internet service providers such as Google and Verizon to hand over sensitive data concerning their targets. Now that the bill has been signed into law by President Biden, the U.S. government will be able to go far beyond its current scope of surveillance and force a swathe of companies and individuals providing internet-related services to assist with surveillance. The bill initially received strong pushback from privacy-conscious Republicans and Democrats alike but was passed through the House of Representatives on April 13. An amendment to the bill — requesting that the security agencies require a warrant for all internet-based surveillance — was also shot down by a slim margin in the House. NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden said the reauthorization of FISA section 702 meant that America had “lost something important” and described the legislation as being unconstitutional. On April 13, Senator Ron Wyden described the bill as one of the most “dramatic and terrifying expansions of government surveillance authority in history.” Magazine: Creating ‘good’ AGI that won’t kill us all — Crypto’s Artificial Superintelligence Alliance","United States President Joe Biden has signed off on a controversial bill that expands the surveillance powers granted to U.S. government agencies, which critics worry could severely impact the privacy of American citizens. President Biden signed it into law a day later. Champions of the bill, including President Biden and a swathe of members from both sides of the aisle, said the bill was essential in aiding counter-terrorism efforts and preserving the national security interests of the United States. It’s an important part of our national security toolkit and helps law enforcement stop terrorist attacks, drug trafficking, and violent extremism,” said Democrat Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, speaking on the Senate floor. An amendment to the bill — requesting that the security agencies require a warrant for all internet-based surveillance — was also shot down by a slim margin in the House." FTX saga ends as Sam Bankman-Fried gets 25 years in prison: Law Decoded,"Judge Lewis Kaplan of the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York sentenced Sam “SBF” Bankman-Fried to a total of 25 years in prison following his conviction on seven felony charges. SBF is the first person tied to FTX and Alameda Research to face prison time following the collapse of the exchange in November 2022. “Kaplan weighed all of the sentencing factors, including the magnitude of the crime, his conclusion that SBF lied on the witness stand and tampered with a witness, and handed down a serious sentence,” Mark Bini, a former assistant U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of New York, told Cointelegraph. “While less than the prosecutors’ request for 40–50 years, it is a very significant sentence and sends a message that people convicted of crimes in the crypto space will face serious consequences.” Gary Wang, Caroline Ellison, Nishad Singh and Ryan Salame — four other individuals associated with FTX and Alameda charged in the same case as SBF — pleaded guilty and accepted deals. Salame, the former co-CEO of FTX Digital Markets, was the only one who did not testify at Bankman-Fried’s criminal trial. He will likely be the next to face sentencing on May 1. Immediately following the New York courtroom announcement, crypto users jumped onto social media to express their thoughts. Many suggested that 25 years wasn’t enough prison time, given longer sentences for seemingly less severe crimes. Philippines will block Binance The financial regulator of the Philippines will block local user access to Binance, the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange, citing concerns over the firm’s unlicensed operations in the country. The country’s Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) said it received the assistance of the National Telecommunication Commission to block access to Binance’s website and online trading platform. The Philippines’ financial watchdog alleges that Binance offers investment products such as leveraged trading services and crypto savings accounts without the required licenses, which violates the Securities Regulation Code. According to the SEC, the ban will take effect within three months to allow investors to exit their positions held through Binance. The agency also asked Google and Meta to block Binance-related advertising from showing up on their platforms for Filipino users. Continue reading Worldcoin blocked for three months in Portugal The Portuguese data regulator, the National Data Protection Commission (CNPD), announced the decision to temporarily limit Worldcoin’s biometric data collection through its Orb devices within the country. According to the CNPD, the decision was made to protect the rights of its citizens, particularly minors. The measure will take effect immediately and until the conclusion of an investigation. The CNPD said these measures were taken after receiving “dozens of reports” on the collection of data from minors without the proper authorization of parents or legal authorities. Continue reading Coinbase Wallet wins over SEC in court Crypto lawyers are hailing a recent decision by a United States judge to dismiss allegations against Coinbase Wallet as a win for self-custody wallets and decentralized finance (DeFi) apps. U.S. District Judge Katherine Failla denied Coinbase’s bid to dismiss a Securities and Exchange Commission’s (SEC) lawsuit, finding the SEC “sufficiently pleaded” Coinbase was unlicensed and its crypto staking offering was unregistered securities. The judge also determined the SEC failed to allege that Coinbase conducted brokerage activity through Coinbase Wallet, its self-custody crypto wallet app that gives users full control of their assets. Continue reading","Judge Lewis Kaplan of the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York sentenced Sam “SBF” Bankman-Fried to a total of 25 years in prison following his conviction on seven felony charges. SBF is the first person tied to FTX and Alameda Research to face prison time following the collapse of the exchange in November 2022. Salame, the former co-CEO of FTX Digital Markets, was the only one who did not testify at Bankman-Fried’s criminal trial. Many suggested that 25 years wasn’t enough prison time, given longer sentences for seemingly less severe crimes. The judge also determined the SEC failed to allege that Coinbase conducted brokerage activity through Coinbase Wallet, its self-custody crypto wallet app that gives users full control of their assets." BlackRock could open the door to US-regulated stablecoins,"Wall Street firms’ escalating involvement in the stablecoin market could speed up the development of regulations in the United States, creating a private alternative to a central bank digital currency (CBDC). According to crypto investor Ryan Sean Adams’ analysis, the recent launch of off-ramps in USD Coin (USDC) for BlackRock's tokenized fund is just another step in the ongoing integration of traditional finance and stablecoin providers. “Stablecoins will happen in the U.S. because BlackRock and the banks want them to happen. This could not be more obvious,” Adams said on X. Circle, the issuer of the USDC stablecoin, announced on April 11 the launch of functionality that enables holders of BlackRock's USD Institutional Digital Liquidity Fund (BUIDL) to transfer their shares to Circle in exchange for USDC. In other words, the functionality allows investors in the tokenized fund to convert their shares into stablecoins 24 hours a day, thus enhancing shareholder liquidity. BlackRock is a major investor in Circle. In April 2022, the companies announced a strategic partnership that included BlackRock investing in Circle’s $400 million funding round. BlackRock also manages the Circle Reserve Fund, a government money market fund in which Circle is the only eligible investor. “The new BlackRock BUIDL fund on Ethereum is a high bandwidth pipeline between U.S. Treasuries and USDC,” Adams noted, adding that Circle’s planned initial public offering (will also help stablecoins integrate with traditional markets. “The banks will backdoor themselves into stablecoins - by acquiring/partnering/controlling crypto native companies - and they’ll lobby for stablecoin legislation and make it happen along the way. The US does not have the political will to build a central bank digital currency. They're create one defacto through private bank issued stablecoins on public crypto networks like Ethereum.” BlackRock is already one of the biggest players in the crypto industry. The asset manager is behind the iShares Bitcoin Trust spot Bitcoin ETF, worth $18.5 billion as of April 10. The company recently launched its tokenized fund, BUIDL, enabling investors to buy tokens that represent shares in a fund investing in assets like U.S. Treasury bills. Magazine: Inside Pink Drainer — Security analyst defends his crypto scam franchise","“Stablecoins will happen in the U.S. because BlackRock and the banks want them to happen. In other words, the functionality allows investors in the tokenized fund to convert their shares into stablecoins 24 hours a day, thus enhancing shareholder liquidity. In April 2022, the companies announced a strategic partnership that included BlackRock investing in Circle’s $400 million funding round. BlackRock also manages the Circle Reserve Fund, a government money market fund in which Circle is the only eligible investor. The company recently launched its tokenized fund, BUIDL, enabling investors to buy tokens that represent shares in a fund investing in assets like U.S. Treasury bills." Blockchain fraud group shifts $1M to Blast for new schemes,"A group with a history of blockchain fraud on platforms like Magnate, Kokomo, and Lendora is launching new schemes on Blast. They have recently moved around $1 million in laundered funds to finance their fraudulent activities. According to on-chain detective ZachXBT, the funds were initially moved from an Ethereum address linked to previous scams to another address on the Polygon network. Later, the assets were converted into Wrapped ETH (wETH) and moved across multiple blockchain networks via bridging services like Orbiter and Bungee. Eventually, they were used on the Blast platform to purchase LEAP tokens, increasing liquidity in what appears to be another setup for unsuspecting victims. At the same time, ZachXBT suggests that the same individuals are probably responsible for another ongoing project called ZebraLending on the Base platform, boasting a current total value locked (TVL) of around $311K. This group has a history of launching numerous projects that attract significant TVL but later abscond with the funds. Their tactics often involve fabricating Know Your Customer (KYC) documents and collaborating with less reputable auditing firms to give an appearance of legitimacy. This group has targeted a range of platforms, including Base, Solana, Scroll, Optimism, Arbitrum, Ethereum, and Avalanche, showcasing their operational flexibility and extensive presence in the blockchain sphere. Related: Base hits $4B TVL as monthly txs outstrip Ethereum and Arbitrum The repeated occurrence of these ripoffs creates the need for vigilance within the blockchain neighborhood. Investors are encouraged to exercise increased caution, specifically with new initiatives on platforms like Blast involving significant fund transfers. Verifying project qualifications, examining audit experiences, and comprehending the channels of fund transactions are vital steps people can take to safeguard their investments. In addition, local community customers are inspired to share data and guide each other in determining suspicious actions to avert further victimization. A nonfungible token (NFT) game called Munchables, built on Blast, suffered a $ 62 million exploit on March 26. Munchables announced it had been compromised and said it was tracking the exploiter’s movements and “attempting to stop the transactions.” Around $400 million in Ether (ETH) was taken out of the Ethereum layer-2 network Blast after the launch of its mainnet on Feb. 29, unlocking nearly $2.3 billion in staked crypto previously locked up on the network. Blast crossed $2.1 billion in total value locked (TVL) just days ahead of its newly announced mainnet launch — slated for the end of this month. Magazine: NFT Collector, DCinvestor: Is this the best NFT collection in the world?","A group with a history of blockchain fraud on platforms like Magnate, Kokomo, and Lendora is launching new schemes on Blast. Later, the assets were converted into Wrapped ETH (wETH) and moved across multiple blockchain networks via bridging services like Orbiter and Bungee. Investors are encouraged to exercise increased caution, specifically with new initiatives on platforms like Blast involving significant fund transfers. A nonfungible token (NFT) game called Munchables, built on Blast, suffered a $ 62 million exploit on March 26. Blast crossed $2.1 billion in total value locked (TVL) just days ahead of its newly announced mainnet launch — slated for the end of this month." Biden’s 44.6% capital gains tax proposal likely a ‘nothing burger’,"United States President Joe Biden’s proposal to increase the capital gains tax rate to 44.6% for certain people — the highest rate in U.S. history — will likely be a “nothing burger” for the average crypto investor. Matthew Walrath, founder of Crypto Tax Made Easy, told Cointelegraph that Biden’s latest tax promises probably wouldn’t affect most people in crypto, even if they did end up being signed into law. “For 99.9% of people, it’s a big, fat nothing burger because it’s essentially just a proposal.” The suggested tax rate — as well as an additional proposal to impose a 25% tax on unrealized gains — has garnered massive attention across social media despite the information being public for more than a month. The now widely referenced 44.6% figure was introduced in a March 11 Department of Treasury explanation document, which outlined that the figure would only come into effect if two separate proposals — one aimed at increasing the top ordinary tax rate and the other aimed at increasing the investment income tax rate — were approved. The proposal was suggested in a separate document from the budget. Source: Department of Treasury “The proposal essentially says they want to raise the long-term capital gains tax rate for people earning over $1 million a year to 44.6%,” said Walrath. “Really high-income earners could potentially — if this budget proposal goes through — face a much higher long-term capital gains tax rate. But for the most part, it’s unlikely that it’s going to affect the average crypto user.” Echoing Walrath’s position, pseudonymous crypto accountant SqueezeTaxes said the backlash toward the proposal was just another “headline catfish” before breaking down what the proposed policies mean for U.S. citizens. SqueezeTaxes explained that the proposals were centered around bringing the highest federal tax bracket to 39.6% and increasing the Net Investment Income Tax (NIIT) to a 5% rate. Combined, the figure evens out to 44.6%. “The average income earner will not be affected by this. Biden’s tax proposals are targeting high-income earners, at least $400,000 or more on one end, and $1 million or more on another end,” SqueezeTaxes told Cointelegraph. According to data from crypto payment firm TripleA, the annual income for the average crypto investor internationally stands at around $25,000. This figure, however, includes income data from countries with lower average incomes than the United States. Is Biden coming for unrealized gains? Notably, Biden’s Federal Budget proposal also included a 25% tax on unrealized gains for ultra-high-net-worth individuals. In an April 25 post to X, Bitcoin commentator Jason Williams described the 25% tax proposal as “insane,” adding that it could “singlehandedly crush the economy.” Related: IRS releases draft of 2025 digital asset reporting form for US taxpayers However, Biden’s proposed 25% tax targeting unrealized gains would only apply to individual taxpayers with more than $100 million in net assets, per a report from tax analysts at taxation advisory firm Grant Thornton. “It’s the same with the unrealized capital gains tax rate. It’s for ultra-high-net-worth individuals. If it were to go through, it’s not going to affect pretty much anybody on Crypto Twitter,” Walrath jested. Ultimately, Walrath said that Biden’s tax proposals could be seen as political “posturing” designed to curry favor with a lower-income voter base. “It’s more of a posturing political play. The Democratic Party has kind of made an enemy out of wealthy people, and that’s one of the ways that they play to a low-income, low-education base.” Magazine: Lazarus Group’s favorite exploit revealed — Crypto hacks analysis","United States President Joe Biden’s proposal to increase the capital gains tax rate to 44.6% for certain people — the highest rate in U.S. history — will likely be a “nothing burger” for the average crypto investor. Source: Department of Treasury“The proposal essentially says they want to raise the long-term capital gains tax rate for people earning over $1 million a year to 44.6%,” said Walrath. “Really high-income earners could potentially — if this budget proposal goes through — face a much higher long-term capital gains tax rate. Notably, Biden’s Federal Budget proposal also included a 25% tax on unrealized gains for ultra-high-net-worth individuals. Ultimately, Walrath said that Biden’s tax proposals could be seen as political “posturing” designed to curry favor with a lower-income voter base." ChatGPT removes another barrier to human-AI interaction,"Artificial intelligence (AI) giant OpenAI has eliminated the requirement for users to create an account in order to access its widely used generative AI tool, ChatGPT3.5. OpenAI announced on April 1 that it would no longer require ChatGPT users to sign up to make it “easier to experience the potential of AI.” However, users without accounts will not be able to store their history of previous interactions. The feature will be rolled out in gradual phases for all countries, starting with the United States. While overall public sentiment cheered the supposed democratization of AI, Simon Willison, co-creator of the Python-based web framework Django, questioned OpenAI’s capability to prevent data scrapers from “abusing” the free ChatGPT-3.5 API. OpenAI removes sign up mandate from ChatGPT 3.5. Source: OpenAI AI developers see the removal of ChatGPT’s sign-up mandate as a catalyst for developing newer large language models (LLM). However, many others raise concerns about the surrounding use cases. OpenAI estimates that ChatGPT has a weekly active user base of more than 100 million people across the globe. The number is set to increase, considering that a number of people who were previously reluctant to share personal information with a corporation like OpenAI can now use ChatGPT with relative anonymity. It is important to note that while ChatGPT-3.5 is not the most powerful “free” generative AI tool on the market currently, BuzzFeed data scientist Max Woolf believes the move is OpenAI’s attempt to keep people from using competitors. Ranking of various generative AI models. Source: Hugging Face According to data from Hugging Face, ChatGPT-3.5 ranks 16th globally in terms of its capability. Some other free generative AI tools that perform better include Anthropic’s Claude S and Gemini Pro by Google DeepMind. Related: Can the future of music be decentralized, community-focused and AI-friendly? Recently, a generative AI robot landed a teaching job at a school in Kerala, India. AI teacher greets high school students in India. Source: Makerlabs on Instagram The AI teacher, Iris, was developed in partnership with e-learning provider Makerlabs as part of the Atal Tinkering Lab project by NITI Aayog, an Indian government agency. The humanoid can speak three languages and respond to complex questions. “By adapting to each student’s needs and preferences, IRIS empowers educators to deliver engaging and effective lessons like never before,” the company said. Magazine: Creating ‘good’ AGI that won’t kill us all: Crypto’s Artificial Superintelligence Alliance","Artificial intelligence (AI) giant OpenAI has eliminated the requirement for users to create an account in order to access its widely used generative AI tool, ChatGPT3.5. Ranking of various generative AI models. Some other free generative AI tools that perform better include Anthropic’s Claude S and Gemini Pro by Google DeepMind. Recently, a generative AI robot landed a teaching job at a school in Kerala, India. AI teacher greets high school students in India." ICP’s Schnorr integration ushers in Bitcoin DeFi era,"The Internet Computer Protocol (ICP) plans to use advanced threshold cryptography to unlock decentralized finance capabilities and smart contract functionality on Bitcoin’s base layer. Speaking to Cointelegraph during Paris Blockchain Week, Dfinity senior research scientist Aisling Connolly outlined how ICP’s integration of threshold-Schnorr signatures will enable the protocol’s smart contracts to obtain addresses and authorize transactions directly to the Bitcoin blockchain. Schnorr signatures are a specific type of digital signature named after mathematician Claus Schnorr. They work like a secret handshake between two parties, proving that one person has signed off on something without revealing their secret code. Related: Unpacking Schnorr Signatures: Blockstream’s MuSig to Improve Bitcoin Transactions? The implementation will allow ICP smart contracts to sign Schnorr signatures to etch Bitcoin Runes, inscribe Ordinals in a decentralized manner, send, receive and bridge BRC-20 tokens directly on the Bitcoin base layer, sign taproot transactions and re-inscribe Ordinals. ICP anticipates the full implementation of threshold-Schnorr to be launched midway through 2024. ICP integrates the core implementation of threshold-Schnorr-BIP340, which enables smart contracts to derive addresses and authorize native Bitcoin transactions. “Schnorr allows extra functionality, like batching transactions. It also allows for new use cases that are developing on Bitcoin. You see people inscribing Ordinals over the last year, it will help do this without any tweaks and from other chains,” Connolly explains. The researcher added that the ability to inscribe Ordinals or etch Runes following the Bitcoin halving generally requires using Schnorr signatures. Connolly said Schnorr signatures are similar to ECDSA signatures that Bitcoin uses to control its ownership, but the former is “simpler, faster and more secure.” She said: “If you have Schnorr as a native thing, then it allows smart contracts to directly write or etch runes on the Bitcoin blockchain. This is pretty special. I don’t know anyone who’s doing this at the moment.” The hope is that combining Schnorr signatures with ICP’s protocol-level integration with the Bitcoin network will open possibilities for decentralized applications (DApps) and services that can leverage the liquidity and security of Bitcoin without relying on centralized bridges. Connolly highlighted a handful of working use cases that are already being explored and built by ecosystem developers. “One use case is ICP serving as this orchestration layer. Let’s say you have an existing DApp on Ethereum, and you want to leverage Bitcoin. You can have an ICP smart contract that works alongside it to talk and write to Bitcoin,” Connolly explains. Others are building applications from scratch using ICP. Connolly highlighted Taler DAO, an algorithmic Bitcoin-backed stablecoin, as an example of new experiments using the infrastructure. Related: Bitcoin Core Devs Reveal How Schnorr Signatures Can Help Scale Bitcoin Another consideration is how the integration will be received by the wider Bitcoin community. “OG” Bitcoiners are typically skeptical of integrations and solutions that promise to bridge the preeminent cryptocurrency and its underlying blockchain to other chains. Connolly said conversations with Bitcoin proponents suggest that there is an open attitude toward infrastructure that broadens the utility of Bitcoin: “Some of the work that we’re doing is being picked up by Bitcoiners and in the BitVM Telegram chat, they're discussing the stuff that we're doing and how it can be used.” The researcher believes the Bitcoin community is generally open to exploring and considering using tools like decentralized exchanges on ICP that supports noncustodial wallets. Connolly said this would allow DeFi capabilities like staking Bitcoin without relinquishing control of a user’s private keys. “If Bitcoin is the kind of de facto store of value in a digital currency like cryptocurrency, why can it not be the sort of de facto like hyper-secure compute platform as well?” ICP now has over 300 developers building Bitcoin-enabled DApps in the field of DeFi, NFTs, gaming and social media. ICP introduced Bitcoin integration in 2022. Using chain key cryptography removed the need to use bridges for cross-chain functionality, allowing ICP smart contracts to hold, send and receive Bitcoin. Magazine: Big Questions: How can Bitcoin payments stage a comeback?","Schnorr signatures are a specific type of digital signature named after mathematician Claus Schnorr. The researcher added that the ability to inscribe Ordinals or etch Runes following the Bitcoin halving generally requires using Schnorr signatures. You can have an ICP smart contract that works alongside it to talk and write to Bitcoin,” Connolly explains. Related: Bitcoin Core Devs Reveal How Schnorr Signatures Can Help Scale BitcoinAnother consideration is how the integration will be received by the wider Bitcoin community. ICP introduced Bitcoin integration in 2022." Here’s what happened in crypto today,"Asset manager BlackRock has confirmed it did not play an active role in the tokenization of its $22 billion money market fund on Hedera, which caused a slight dip in the token’s price. Meanwhile, miners have seen a sharp decline in revenues in recent days and Nigeria’s central bank said it would issue a directive instructing banks and financial institutions to hand over details of users of several crypto exchanges and for the banks to block transactions. It later denied the story. BlackRock has ‘no commercial relationship’ with Hedera, HBAR sinks 32% BlackRock has confirmed it has “no commercial relationship” with Hedera and that it did not choose the Hedera Hashgraph to tokenize any BlackRock funds, including shares of its $22 billion money market fund. Hedera’s token (HBAR) rallied over 100% on Tuesday following the HBAR Foundation’s announcement on X stating that blockchain firms Archax and Ownera tokenized BlackRock’s ICS U.S. Treasury Fund on Hedera. $HBAR Recently Went Up 100% In A SINGLE Day Before Correcting After news that @BlackRock's ICS Money Market Fund would be tokenized on @hedera I had @Grodfather on, CEO/Co-Founder at @ArchaxEx (The people that tokenized BlackRock's MMF on Hedera to explain this all!) pic.twitter.com/wVp0J7n6jj — Jesus Martinez (@0xJesusMartinez) April 24, 2024 Some misinterpreted the post to suggest BlackRock played an active role in the tokenization effort, but a BlackRock spokesperson has confirmed to Cointelegraph that was not the case. “BlackRock has no commercial relationship with Hedera nor has BlackRock selected Hedera to tokenise any BlackRock funds.” “As we have in the past, BlackRock will communicate directly with the public on the evolution of our digital asset strategy,” the spokesperson added. As of the time of writing, HBAR has fallen 32.8% in the past 24 hours to $0.118 since it peaked at $0.176 at 5:00am UTC on April 24, according to CoinGecko. Bitcoin mining profits get squeezed post-halving Faced with a high network hash rate and lower revenues, Bitcoin miners could be in for a rough couple of months as the market adjusted to the quadrennial halving. According to crypto analytics firm CryptoQuant, miners’ hash price has declined from nearly 12 cents in early April to 7 cents post-halving. The hash price peaked at 19 cents on halving day, with mining revenue reaching $107 million. In Bitcoin mining, the hash price refers to mining revenues generated on a per tera-hash basis. Despite seeing lower revenues, CryptoQuant said overall market conditions remained stable. “Although it is still too early to see any long-term effects of the halving on the network hashrate, miners seem to be running operations at the same rate as before the halving,” the firm said in a report. Nigeria’s central bank forced to deny claims of crypto account freeze The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has been forced to deny a report saying it issued a directive requiring all banks and financial institutions to identify individuals or entities engaging in transactions with cryptocurrency exchanges and to ensure that such accounts are put on Post No Debit (PND) instruction for six months. A “Post No Debit” instruction is a directive issued by a bank or financial institution to restrict certain transactions on a customer’s account. When a PND instruction is in place, the account holder is prohibited from making debit transactions, meaning they cannot withdraw funds or make payments using the affected account. Confusion occurred when the central bank denied the story on X but then deleted the denial. Some hours later they claimed the allegations were indeed false. In December 2023, the central bank lifted a comprehensive ban on banks engaging with digital currencies allowing them to facilitate transactions for crypto exchanges. However, due to the swift devaluation of the naira and the subsequent inflation rate of 29.9%, the government shifted its attention to platforms offering cryptocurrency services. It disabled websites associated with crypto trading that had gained notoriety for setting informal valuations for the naira. This article does not contain investment advice or recommendations. Every investment and trading move involves risk, and readers should conduct their own research when making a decision. Additional reporting by Geraint Price, Sam Bourgi and Felix Ng.","According to crypto analytics firm CryptoQuant, miners’ hash price has declined from nearly 12 cents in early April to 7 cents post-halving. In Bitcoin mining, the hash price refers to mining revenues generated on a per tera-hash basis. Confusion occurred when the central bank denied the story on X but then deleted the denial. In December 2023, the central bank lifted a comprehensive ban on banks engaging with digital currencies allowing them to facilitate transactions for crypto exchanges. It disabled websites associated with crypto trading that had gained notoriety for setting informal valuations for the naira." Abra settles with fifth state as US operations may be winding down,"Cryptocurrency platform Abra and its CEO William Barhydt reached a settlement with the Oregon Division of Financial Regulation, under which it will return assets held by Oregon users on the platform and cease and desist from offering unregistered securities in the state. This is the latest step in the United States-based company’s withdrawal from the U.S. market. Oregon is at least the fifth state to take action against the companies that make up the Abra ecosystem. The state of Oregon charged Abra with violations of state securities laws in connection with its interest-bearing crypto depository accounts Abra Earn and Abra Boost. It required Abra to advise all account holders in the state to remove their crypto assets from the platform. If it succeeds in returning all assets to Oregon customers by April 25, it will not be subject to a monetary penalty. In Oregon, 167 Abra customers have $32,387.14 on the platform. The state of Iowa settled with Abra and its CEO in February, and Abra agreed to return $6,426.90 to its approximately 39 customers in that state. It would avoid a penalty of $461,610.14 by fulfilling the conditions of the settlement by March 6. Related: SEC and CFTC Fine Crypto Investment App for Offering Synthetic Assets Maryland took action against Abra in September 2023 on behalf of 162 Marylanders with balances totaling $700,000. Maryland Attorney General Anthony Brown stated in the announcement: “Maryland has been participating in a working group of state securities regulators focused on interest-bearing crypto asset accounts.” This past January, Abra agreed in a settlement with the Texas State Securities Board to repay state residents their balances on the platform. That was the second action Texas had taken against Abra. In a June 2023 enforcement action, the Texas agency found that Abra had approximately 1,600 state residents on its platform with a balance of $1.8 million. It also claimed that Abra has been insolvent since March of that year, which was during the height of the banking crisis. Source: Bill Barhydt The California Commissioner of Financial Protection and Innovation issued a consent decree in April 2023 requiring Abra to close out Californians’ Earn accounts, worth $19 million. Abra said in a blog post in July that it was ending retail operations in the United States. Magazine: Home loans using crypto as collateral: Do the risks outweigh the reward?","Oregon is at least the fifth state to take action against the companies that make up the Abra ecosystem. The state of Oregon charged Abra with violations of state securities laws in connection with its interest-bearing crypto depository accounts Abra Earn and Abra Boost. It required Abra to advise all account holders in the state to remove their crypto assets from the platform. If it succeeds in returning all assets to Oregon customers by April 25, it will not be subject to a monetary penalty. The state of Iowa settled with Abra and its CEO in February, and Abra agreed to return $6,426.90 to its approximately 39 customers in that state." Hong Kong’s in-kind ETF creation could be a significant market opportunity: Analysts,"Hong Kong’s financial regulators aim to offer in-kind creation models for spot Bitcoin exchange-traded funds (ETFs). This could be a significant market opportunity, which could considerably increase assets under management (AUM) and trading volume for Bitcoin ETF issuers in the region, according to a research note by Bloomberg ETF analyst Rebecca Sin, shared in a March 26 X post by Eric Balchunas: “Hong Kong is aiming for in-kind creation of the ETF, unlike the US, where the transaction is cash only — in the US, it’s cash in, Bitcoin ETF out, while Hong Kong aims for Bitcoin in, ETF out. This could be an opportunity for the market.” Hong Kong ETFs chart. Source: Eric Balchunas Hong Kong’s approach is in contrast with the model of the United States Securities and Exchange Commission, which only allows cash creation models for spot Bitcoin ETFs. Related: TradFi Wall Street firms pushing for Ether ETF approval, says former Binance Labs head The U.S. Bitcoin ETFs have amassed a total of $11.28 billion worth of flows since launch, with a net negative of $1.07 billion in net flows last week, before starting to pick up on March 25. After five consecutive days of negative outflows last week, the spot Bitcoin ETFs saw over $15 million worth of flows on March 25, the same day Bitcoin (BTC) price recorded its highest daily close of above $69,000 in the past 10 days. Bolstered by the ETF inflows, Bitcoin price reclaimed $70,000 on March 25. As investors have resumed accumulating BTC off exchanges, BTC supply on Coinbase reached a nine-year low of 344,856 BTC on March 18. Last week’s negative spot Bitcoin ETF inflows aren’t a long-term concern for Bitcoin holders and price actio, Bitfinex analysts told Cointelegraph: “Even though negative ETF outflows featured heavily last week, all of it is from the Grayscale Bitcoin Trust (GBTC), as investors both switch out of the higher fees demanded by GBTC and also take profit, especially as many of these investors are long-term holders who entered during the bear market. GBTC investors are not the only sellers in the market. Whale wallet activities have also indicated significant profit taking.” Related: Over $6B worth of BTC moved by 5th-richest Bitcoin whale","Hong Kong’s financial regulators aim to offer in-kind creation models for spot Bitcoin exchange-traded funds (ETFs). This could be a significant market opportunity, which could considerably increase assets under management (AUM) and trading volume for Bitcoin ETF issuers in the region, according to a research note by Bloomberg ETF analyst Rebecca Sin, shared in a March 26 X post by Eric Balchunas:“Hong Kong is aiming for in-kind creation of the ETF, unlike the US, where the transaction is cash only — in the US, it’s cash in, Bitcoin ETF out, while Hong Kong aims for Bitcoin in, ETF out. Source: Eric BalchunasHong Kong’s approach is in contrast with the model of the United States Securities and Exchange Commission, which only allows cash creation models for spot Bitcoin ETFs. Bolstered by the ETF inflows, Bitcoin price reclaimed $70,000 on March 25. Whale wallet activities have also indicated significant profit taking.”Related: Over $6B worth of BTC moved by 5th-richest Bitcoin whale" "$250K Bitcoin? Tim Draper says halving, Bitcoin ETFs will drive demand","Renowned venture capitalist Tim Draper sees Bitcoin tripling in value in 2024 due to inflows into spot exchange-traded funds (ETFs) and the looming Bitcoin halving. Speaking to Cointelegraph during Paris Blockchain Week, Draper reiterated his belief that Bitcoin (BTC) would drastically increase in value considering several factors in 2024. “If I had to predict, maybe we could see $250,000 by the end of the year; I mean, it’s looking pretty good,” Draper said as he reflected on his previous price prediction for 2022. The approval of spot Bitcoin ETFs in the United States has been a critical driver of renewed interest and capital inflows into the Bitcoin ecosystem. Draper believes the investment products have opened up a new avenue for Bitcoin-curious investors that might be daunted by the prospect of holding BTC in self-custody and also serve as a hedge against devaluing fiat currencies: “I think that it gives people an opportunity to buy some Bitcoin and hold on to it so that they can take care of themselves when there’s a run on the dollar or the euro.” He also highlighted the appeal for investors who want their respective fund managers to continue managing their portfolios. Access to a Bitcoin ETF allows investors to continue working with Fidelity or JPMorgan and have this new asset class managed as part of their wider investments. $250,000 for $BTC by the end of this year? During #ParisBlockchainWeek, we had the pleasure of meeting @TimDraper, who shared insights into the future of #Bitcoin. “The future I see is one where if you don’t have some Bitcoin to take care of yourself when the dollars become… pic.twitter.com/67F6xxmjFU — Cointelegraph (@Cointelegraph) April 10, 2024 Draper said that Bitcoin’s finite supply and increasing adoption as a payment option for goods or services would increase its appeal to the masses. At the same time, fiat currencies grapple with inflation and decreased purchasing power. “I don’t really need to hold on to any fiat currency that decreases in value over time because of political whims or government spending, or politicians that just decide they’re going to spend more money and inflate your money,” Draper said. The venture capital investor added that Bitcoin remains a “place of great security” against inflation. “I think I’ve actually started to see the lines cross. People feel more comfortable with their Bitcoin than they do with their dollars.” The fourth Bitcoin halving is also set to have a significant impact on market dynamics. The event, earmarked for April 20, is one that investors should not underestimate, as Draper explains: “If you’re an investor in the stock market, they say don’t bet against the Fed [U.S. Federal Reserve]. If you’re a Bitcoin buyer, don’t bet against the halving. It changes everything. The supply shrinks, the demand increases and the price goes up. That’s natural economics — supply and demand,” Draper said. The venture capitalist also reiterated his belief that having single digit percentage exposure to Bitcoin is becoming a more attractive means of hedging against rising concerns over bank failures and devaluing sovereign currencies. Magazine: Bitcoin ETFs make Coinbase a ‘honeypot’ for hackers and governments: Trezor CEO","Renowned venture capitalist Tim Draper sees Bitcoin tripling in value in 2024 due to inflows into spot exchange-traded funds (ETFs) and the looming Bitcoin halving. Speaking to Cointelegraph during Paris Blockchain Week, Draper reiterated his belief that Bitcoin (BTC) would drastically increase in value considering several factors in 2024. The approval of spot Bitcoin ETFs in the United States has been a critical driver of renewed interest and capital inflows into the Bitcoin ecosystem. People feel more comfortable with their Bitcoin than they do with their dollars.”The fourth Bitcoin halving is also set to have a significant impact on market dynamics. Magazine: Bitcoin ETFs make Coinbase a ‘honeypot’ for hackers and governments: Trezor CEO" Web3 developer Community Labs pledges $35M for Arweave ecosystem accelerator,"Community Labs, a company specializing in Web3 software development, is set to launch a 10-week incubator program called AO Ventures focusing on the Arweave ecosystem, with an initial investment of $35 million. The program, scheduled to begin on April 23, aims to support projects within the decentralized storage network by providing access to funding, mentorship and technical workshops. This initiative is backed by venture capitalists such as Factor and Distributed Global, among others. It offers selected Web3 entrepreneurs the opportunity to engage with industry veterans and potentially pitch their projects to prominent VCs after the program concludes. Source: AO Ventures A notable aspect of the program is its inclusivity, as participation is open to all projects that utilize the AO Computer, a decentralized computing service leveraging the Arweave blockchain. The AO Computer is highlighted for its ability to address common vulnerabilities found in centralized systems, such as data breaches and censorship, by facilitating parallel processing. This feature enables the support of numerous processes running simultaneously, enhancing scalability. Furthermore, it allows interaction with the Arweave network to power decentralized applications across various sectors, including artificial intelligence and gaming. Arweave’s token, AR, has gained over 250% in the past year as part of the ongoing bull market, although the token is still well below its 2021 all-time highs. Last December, an unofficial Arweave forking plan drew controversy after its prominent layer-2 network Irys proposed to “drop the data set and reset the token supply.” The network stores a wide range of data, from web pages to gaming data and nonfungible token (NFT) metadata, totaling approximately 57.64 pebibytes (about 64.9 million gigabytes). Arweave is the brainchild of Sam Williams and William Jones from the University of Kent, who wanted to tackle the issue of data being removed from the internet, known as data impermanence, so that information, websites and applications are available for an indefinite period of time. It uses a unique blockchain variant called Blockweave, whose interwoven structure provides much greater scalability and efficient storage options than traditional blockchains, making it ideal for storing large volumes of data. Related: NFTs, gaming and storage: The key to Filecoin and Arweave accruing value?","Community Labs, a company specializing in Web3 software development, is set to launch a 10-week incubator program called AO Ventures focusing on the Arweave ecosystem, with an initial investment of $35 million. The program, scheduled to begin on April 23, aims to support projects within the decentralized storage network by providing access to funding, mentorship and technical workshops. It offers selected Web3 entrepreneurs the opportunity to engage with industry veterans and potentially pitch their projects to prominent VCs after the program concludes. Furthermore, it allows interaction with the Arweave network to power decentralized applications across various sectors, including artificial intelligence and gaming. Related: NFTs, gaming and storage: The key to Filecoin and Arweave accruing value?" Coinbase to list BRC-20 token ORDI and Worldcoin perpetual futures,"Institutional clients on the Coinbase International Exchange will soon have access to BRC-20 token Ordinals (ORDI) and Worldcoin (WLD) perpetual futures. In an April 5 post to X, Coinbase International Exchange announced it would list perpetual futures products for ORDI and WLD as soon as April 11, making them available to institutional investors on both Coinbase International and Coinase Advanced. ORDI and WLD have witnessed significant price action and trading volumes in recent months. ORDI soared 1,640% from a price of $5 on Nov. 1, 2023, to a high of $87 on March 5 as a frenzy for Ordinals-related assets took off late last year. The ORDI token is not officially affiliated with the Bitcoin Ordinals deployer or any of the Ordinals team. It is a separate BRC-20 token that merely derives its namesake from the Ordinals protocol. Meanwhile, Worldcoin rapidly became one of the top tokens for crypto investors looking to gain exposure to the AI industry, surging from a price of $2.20 on Feb. 7 to as high as $11.70 on March 10, per CoinGecko data. Worldcoin surged from $2.20 to $11.70 in one month. Source: CoinGecko WLD is the native token of Worldcoin, a digital identity project that offers cryptocurrency in exchange for users minting their biometric data for a digital ID. Related: Coinbase secures restricted dealer license in Canada Friday’s announcement adds to a slew of new perpetual futures contracts being added to the international arm of the Coinbase institutional-targeted exchange. Perpetual futures, also known as perpetual swaps or perpetuals, are a type of derivative contract that allows traders to speculate on the future price of an asset without an expiration date. The regulatory approval process for perptetuals futures depends on the product being offered. On April 4, Coinbase International Exchange added futures contracts for Wormhole’s native W (W) token, which was launched alongside an $850-million airdrop to early users of the cross-chain bridge. Meanwhile, on March 21, Coinbase also quietly made plans to list futures contracts for Litecoin (LTC) as well as the memecoin Dogecoin (DOGE), saying that it had “transcended its origins” as an online joke and had established itself as a legitimate digital asset. Notably, Coinbase explained that it would invoke the “self-certification” method to launch the futures contracts before receiving any official approval from the Commodity Futures Trading Commission — so long as they followed the regulatory guidelines laid out by the agency. Magazine: ‘SEAL 911’ team of white hats formed to fight crypto hacks in real time","Institutional clients on the Coinbase International Exchange will soon have access to BRC-20 token Ordinals (ORDI) and Worldcoin (WLD) perpetual futures. In an April 5 post to X, Coinbase International Exchange announced it would list perpetual futures products for ORDI and WLD as soon as April 11, making them available to institutional investors on both Coinbase International and Coinase Advanced. Related: Coinbase secures restricted dealer license in CanadaFriday’s announcement adds to a slew of new perpetual futures contracts being added to the international arm of the Coinbase institutional-targeted exchange. Perpetual futures, also known as perpetual swaps or perpetuals, are a type of derivative contract that allows traders to speculate on the future price of an asset without an expiration date. On April 4, Coinbase International Exchange added futures contracts for Wormhole’s native W (W) token, which was launched alongside an $850-million airdrop to early users of the cross-chain bridge." Here are the next biggest crypto court cases with the SBF saga over,"The cryptocurrency “trial of the century” wrapped up a week ago with the 25-year sentencing of FTX co-founder Sam Bankman-Fried, but there’s plenty of crypto action still to come throug the United States courts. At the end of this month, Binance co-founder Changpeng “CZ” Zhao will know what jail time, if any, he’ll serve. Bankman-Fried may also appeal his sentence at some point, which his lawyers said was in the works since he was found guilty last November. His 25-year sentence on March 28 now allows that to happen. Here are some of the other cases where crypto and its key executives will face U.S. courts: Former Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao Ex-Binance boss Zhao pled guilty to money laundering last year alongside Binance.US and Binance’s $4.3 billion settlement with the U.S. on charges including operating an illegal exchange and having an ineffective Anti-Money Laundering program. He’s facing up to 18 months behind bars at his April 30 sentencing date in a Seattle federal court, but prosecutors have made it clear they could argue up to a maximum of 10 years. Is former Binance boss CZ a flight risk? U.S. prosecutors think so. Dive into our latest short video for the full scoop. What implications could this have for the crypto sphere? #CZ #Binance #CryptoNews pic.twitter.com/m26biWyQdr — Cointelegraph (@Cointelegraph) November 25, 2023 Zhao’s bond conditions leave him stuck in the U.S. as the government is worried he won’t come back if he goes home to his family in the United Arab Emirates — something he’s repeatedly asked the court if he can do. The Securities and Exchange Commission is still chasing charges against Binance, its U.S. arm and Zhao, alleging they sold unregistered securities and commingled customer assets. FTX execs and more court for SBF FTX co-founder Zixiao “Gary” Wang, engineering lead Nishad Singh and Alameda Research ex-CEO Caroline Ellison will be sentenced in New York at some point for their roles in the massive fraud carried out at the exchange. Wang, Singh and Ellison are respectively facing up to 50, 75 and 110 years in prison, but their jail time may not be as much as their former boss since they made deals to plead guilty and provide evidence against him for a reduced sentence. FTX Digital Markets’ former co-CEO Ryan Salame — who didn’t testify against Bankman-Fried but did take a plea deal — will be sentenced on May 1 after he admitted to making unlawful political contributions and conspiring to operate an unlicensed money-transmitting business. With Bankman-Fried’s criminal trial over, paused lawsuits from the SEC and Commodity Futures Trading Commission charging him with securities and commodity law violations are set to also resume soon. Terraform Labs' Do Kwon In March last year, the U.S. lumped Terraform co-founder Do Kwon with a string of fraud and market manipulation charges after his crypto ecosystem tied to an algorithm-backed stablecoin ended up not being very stable. The U.S. has tussled with Kwon’s native South Korea to extradite him from Montenegro. Kwon won an appeal to stop his extradition to the U.S., and he’s free in Montenegro while its Supreme Court deliberates on U.S. and South Korea’s extradition requests. The SEC has a suit against Kwon for allegedly selling unregistered securities in a New York federal court, and that’s gone to trial even though he’s not there. “Highly profitable trading” strategist Avi Eisenberg Avraham “Avi” Eisenberg, the $117 million alleged exploiter of DeFi protocol Mango Markets exploiter who said it was just “a highly profitable trading strategy,” will face a trial for commodities fraud, manipulation and wire fraud charges on April 8. Eisenberg has claimed everything he did was legal and permitted on Mango Markets’ smart contract. The CFTC and SEC have sued him on market manipulation and anti-fraud charges, but they’re on pause until the criminal trial wraps up. Tornado Cash devs Roman Storm and Semenov Crypto mixer Tornado Cash developer Roman Storm’s trial is set for September on charges he conspired to commit money laundering, operated an unlicensed money transmitting business and violated the International Economic Emergency Powers Act. The charges carry a combined maximum sentence of 45 years, and Storm has pleaded not guilty and asked they be dismissed as he said there was little he could do to stop U.S.-sanctioned entities using the tool. His co-developer, Roman Semenov, is at large and is believed to be in Russia. Celsius founder and former CEO Alex Mashinsky Bankrupt crypto lender Celsius founder Alex Mashinsky has his criminal trial set for Sept. 17 on seven charges relating to various fraud and market manipulation, totaling a maximum sentence of 115 years. Mashinsky’s seven charges. Source: Department of Justice He’s pleaded not guilty and asked for two of the charges to be dismissed and that information about Celsius’ bankruptcy not be included in the case. Mashinsky faces SEC and CFTC lawsuits too — paused for his criminal case — which claims he sold unregistered securities and operated an unregistered commodity pool. SafeMoon boss Karony U.S. prosecutors pinned SafeMoon CEO Braden John Karony on securities, wire fraud and money laundering conspiracy in November — charges carrying a maximum of 45 years in jail. He’s pleaded not guilty, is out on bail and has struggled to pay for legal services. SafeMoon creator Kyle Nagy and chief technology officer Thomas Smith were also charged alongside Karony. Nagy remains at alrge and Smith is angling for a plea deal. After their criminal trial, Karony, Smith and Nagy will face an SEC lawsuit for unregistered securities sales and misappropriating funds. KuCoin and co. Last month, the U.S. charged the crypto exchange KuCoin and founders Chun “Michael” Gan and Ke “Eric” Tang for failing to keep an anti-money laundering program and conspiring to run an unlicensed money transmitting business. Gan and Tang — both Chinese nationals — each face a maximum of a decade in prison, but both are at large. Related: Hospitality worker caught with $2.5B Bitcoin found guilty of money laundering The CFTC has also sued KuCoin for “multiple violations of the Commodity Exchange Act.” SEC vs. (almost) everyone Besides the SEC lawsuits already mentioned, the agency is suing no less than eight other crypto firms — pinning most on the allegation they sold unregistered securities and operated unlicensed. Coinbase, Kraken, Tron, and Gemini are facing the regulator in court — all pinned for selling unregistered securities, among other charges, and all are fighting the SEC’s allegations. Ripple is also still in its yearslong court biff with the regulator, though that will soon come to an end. The SEC also sued the claimed crypto mining and development firm Green United for the same reason, which the mining firm has asked to be dismissed. Magazine: Inner City Press says ‘less flashy’ Mashinsky set for less jail time than SBF: X Hall of Flame","The Securities and Exchange Commission is still chasing charges against Binance, its U.S. arm and Zhao, alleging they sold unregistered securities and commingled customer assets. Mashinsky faces SEC and CFTC lawsuits too — paused for his criminal case — which claims he sold unregistered securities and operated an unregistered commodity pool. After their criminal trial, Karony, Smith and Nagy will face an SEC lawsuit for unregistered securities sales and misappropriating funds. Coinbase, Kraken, Tron, and Gemini are facing the regulator in court — all pinned for selling unregistered securities, among other charges, and all are fighting the SEC’s allegations. Ripple is also still in its yearslong court biff with the regulator, though that will soon come to an end." Blockchain data-availability protocol Avail announces 600M token airdrop,"Avail, a Web3 infrastructure layer built using Polygon’s software development kit, will be airdropping 600 million of its native AVAIL tokens to users. “The Unification Drop is a unifying force bringing different communities together, rewarding developers, governance contributors, technical educators, rollup users, stakers, and other valuable contributors from across multiple blockchain communities,” Avail said in an April 18 statement. Founded in 2020, Avail consists of three segments: Nexus, Fusion and DA. Avail DA improves base-layer transactions further by scaling rollups via methods such as KZG commitments and data availability sampling. Data availability enables nodes to verify bundled transactions without having to download all data for a block. Meanwhile, KZG commitments, common in zero-knowledge protocols, allow for the verification of underlying data without revealing private information. At the same time, Avail Nexus provides a cross-chain bridge for users to transact or swap for assets on multiple blockchains. Finally, Avail Fusion allows the liquid staking of assets on Ethereum, Bitcoin and others. According to its developers, AVAIL is used to “obtain Avail DA services, secure the unification layer via staking, and take part in governance.” Tokens are airdropped based on a user’s total time, depth and impact of their commitments to the ecosystem. A total of 354,605 wallet addresses will receive the airdropped AVAIL token upon mainnet launch. Out of the 600 million token airdrop supply, 90 million are allocated to blockchain ecosystem developers, 49.5 million to testnet users, 380 million to rollup users on various blockchains such as Arbitrum One, 70 million to Polygon stakers and 10.5 million to community contributors. The airdrop is not exclusive to users of the Avail or Polygon ecosystems. “Unification of Web3 requires unification to happen at the most fundamental level,” Avail wrote. “This [airdrop] includes Bitcoin, Ethereum, Solana, Cosmos, Avalanche, Near, and others who have each made unique contributions to the blockchain ecosystem.” Many in the Polygon community spoke highly of the airdrop. “Oooh, looks like a massive airdrop is upon @0xPolygon community,” commented Polygon co-founder Sandeep Nailwal, in relation to the news. Avail was spun off from Polygon Labs on March 16, 2023. At the time, developers explained that the move was due to Polygon shifting its attention to more Ethereum-native data availability efforts. “Avail as a standalone layer will be better positioned to play a leading role in bringing modular blockchain architectures to market and enabling any Web3 project to scale,” Polygon Labs said in a statement. Related: Polygon CEO says L3s are taking value away from Ethereum, sparking debate","Avail, a Web3 infrastructure layer built using Polygon’s software development kit, will be airdropping 600 million of its native AVAIL tokens to users. Avail DA improves base-layer transactions further by scaling rollups via methods such as KZG commitments and data availability sampling. The airdrop is not exclusive to users of the Avail or Polygon ecosystems. “Unification of Web3 requires unification to happen at the most fundamental level,” Avail wrote. “Oooh, looks like a massive airdrop is upon @0xPolygon community,” commented Polygon co-founder Sandeep Nailwal, in relation to the news." BNB Chain puts up $1M reward to attract memecoin devs,"Smart contract blockchain BNB Chain is attempting to attract memecoin developers amid the explosive growth of meme tokens within the crypto ecosystem. In an announcement sent to Cointelegraph, BNB Chain said it is allocating up to $1 million to reward eligible developers deploying their memecoin projects in the network. The company highlighted that this was part of its efforts to “accelerate the growth of the memecoin landscape” within BNB Chain. Interested developers can apply to participate in the network’s “Meme Innovation Campaign” and deploy their tokens on the network during the campaign period, which will last from April 10 to May 9. According to BNB Chain, the competition allows its community members to innovate creatively. It wrote: “Taking place at the intersection of creativity, Web3 culture, and innovation, the campaign is about empowering creators, both seasoned developers and newcomers, to use blockchain technology to bring their ideas to life.” While the competition seems simple, some requirements may be challenging to achieve. Participants need a minimum trading volume of $2 billion for their memecoins to qualify for the lowest reward. Meanwhile, memecoins with over $30 billion in trading volume can qualify for the $1 million prize. Reward distribution structure for the memecoin competition. Source: BNB Chain In addition, there are other eligibility requirements, including completing at least one security audit and open-sourcing the project on BNB Smart Chain’s blockchain explorer, BscScan. The number of valid new tokenholders must also be above 1,000 and the project must also be on social media platforms, including Telegram and Discord. Related: Solana memecoin craze continues with Biden parody token reaching $250M market cap BNB Chain’s memecoin efforts come as meme-focused tokens surged within the crypto space. On April 1, the total market capitalization jumped to $70 billion. This was driven by pumps in newly-launched tokens like Dogwifihat (WIF) and Book of Meme (BOME), and other older meme tokens like Pepe (PEPE) and Bonk (BONK). Apart from BNB Chain, other blockchain networks have also started to encourage the development of memecoins within their ecosystems. On March 22, the Avalanche Foundation continued its memecoin push by offering a $1 million reward for memecoin liquidity providers. Those who provide liquidity to selected memecoins are eligible to get a chunk of the rewards. Magazine: Creating ‘good’ AGI that won’t kill us all: Crypto’s Artificial Superintelligence Alliance","Smart contract blockchain BNB Chain is attempting to attract memecoin developers amid the explosive growth of meme tokens within the crypto ecosystem. In an announcement sent to Cointelegraph, BNB Chain said it is allocating up to $1 million to reward eligible developers deploying their memecoin projects in the network. The company highlighted that this was part of its efforts to “accelerate the growth of the memecoin landscape” within BNB Chain. According to BNB Chain, the competition allows its community members to innovate creatively. On March 22, the Avalanche Foundation continued its memecoin push by offering a $1 million reward for memecoin liquidity providers." Nvidia eyes Indonesia for $200M AI center amid global AI scramble,"Nvidia, one of the world’s leading semiconductor producers for artificial intelligence (AI), announced a plan alongside the Indonesian government and telecom provider Indosat Ooredoo Hutchison to build a new AI center in the country. On April 4, Budi Arie Setiadi, the country’s communication minister, said the center will be worth $200 million and will be located in Surakarta city in the Central Java region. Setiadi said the AI center will host either telecommunication infrastructure or a human resource center. Construction is expected to begin in 2024. According to the mayor of Surakarta, Gibran Rakabuming Raka, the city was chosen because of its readiness with human resources and 5G infrastructure. Nvidia signed a memorandum of understanding with the Indonesian government in January 2022, through which it pledged to train lecturers and over 20,000 university students in AI skills over five years in an effort to boost the nation’s AI talent pool. This was prior to the AI frenzy that ensued after OpenAI released its groundbreaking ChatGPT chatbot in November 2022. Since the memorandum was signed, the AI market has nearly doubled from $134.89 billion in 2022 to $241.80 billion in 2023, according to recent data. Cointelegraph reached out to Nvidia for additional information on the development in Indonesia. Related: Nvidia CEO’s simple solution to AI hallucination could upend crypto — but only if it works Nvidia’s push in Indonesia follows a trend of trying to broaden its influence in the Southeast Asia region after it made record-breaking revenues from increasing demand for generative AI tools. In Singapore, local telecom company Singtel also partnered with the chipmaker for a new data center, and Nvidia and the Singapore Institute of Technology have also collaborated on a new AI center. Major AI developers such as Google and Microsoft have also been pouring billions of dollars into AI initiatives across the globe, creating data centers and training programs for local communities in places like Germany, France and Spain. This frenzy for companies and countries to get their hands on capable AI models even extends into the crypto space after Tether — the blockchain and cryptocurrency firm behind the Tether (USDT) stablecoin — announced an expansion of its AI focus and recruitment efforts for “top-tier” AI talent. Magazine: AI will build the metaverse says Alien Worlds, Eric Wall vs Bittensor: AI Eye","Nvidia, one of the world’s leading semiconductor producers for artificial intelligence (AI), announced a plan alongside the Indonesian government and telecom provider Indosat Ooredoo Hutchison to build a new AI center in the country. Setiadi said the AI center will host either telecommunication infrastructure or a human resource center. Since the memorandum was signed, the AI market has nearly doubled from $134.89 billion in 2022 to $241.80 billion in 2023, according to recent data. In Singapore, local telecom company Singtel also partnered with the chipmaker for a new data center, and Nvidia and the Singapore Institute of Technology have also collaborated on a new AI center. Magazine: AI will build the metaverse says Alien Worlds, Eric Wall vs Bittensor: AI Eye" "Second phase of crypto bull market about to start, says on-chain analyst","The crypto bull market is about to transition into its second and final phase, which will be characterized by euphoria and sharp price movements, according to James Check, lead on-chain analyst at Glassnode. “We are transitioning from the enthusiastic bull, which is below the all-time high, generally speaking, into the euphoric bull,” he said in an exclusive interview with Cointelegraph. According to Check, the enthusiastic bull phase started in October 2023 and concluded after Bitcoin (BTC) reached an all-time high earlier in March. Check said the next phase will be marked by people getting “more and more excited,” which will be accompanied by higher volatility. “Increased coverage of Bitcoin in the news will lead to increased demand,” he said. “The price will rise until supply comes back on the market to satisfy it,” he stated. Check noted that the current bull market has been among the strongest in Bitcoin’s history, given the smaller corrections throughout the rally. “The market just seems to find support very quickly and this is obviously a good sign,” he said. To find out more about what on-chain analysis can tell us about the next phase of Bitcoin’s bull market, check out the full interview on Cointelegraph’s YouTube channel — and don’t forget to subscribe!","The crypto bull market is about to transition into its second and final phase, which will be characterized by euphoria and sharp price movements, according to James Check, lead on-chain analyst at Glassnode. “We are transitioning from the enthusiastic bull, which is below the all-time high, generally speaking, into the euphoric bull,” he said in an exclusive interview with Cointelegraph. According to Check, the enthusiastic bull phase started in October 2023 and concluded after Bitcoin (BTC) reached an all-time high earlier in March. Check noted that the current bull market has been among the strongest in Bitcoin’s history, given the smaller corrections throughout the rally. To find out more about what on-chain analysis can tell us about the next phase of Bitcoin’s bull market, check out the full interview on Cointelegraph’s YouTube channel — and don’t forget to subscribe!" Bitcoin halving hype breaks week-long ETFs outflow streak,"Bitcoin (BTC) investments in the United States exchange-traded funds (ETFs) market recorded a net positive inflow right before the Bitcoin halving day following five consecutive days of drain. Anticipating an increase in market value post-halving, investment strategies worldwide recommended adding Bitcoin to existing portfolios. The Bitcoin ETF market followed through with the strategy while putting an end to an outflow streak dating back to April 12. Spot Bitcoin ETF net flows. Source: Farside According to Farside data, the U.S. Bitcoin ETF ecosystem recorded outflows for five straight days between April 12 and 18, owing to a lack of contribution from most players. The outflows are majorly attributed to the Grayscale Bitcoin Trust ETF (GBTC), which has been shedding investments since January when the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) approved spot Bitcoin ETFs. However, on April 19, five of the 10 approved ETFs recorded positive inflows that overshadowed the GBTC outflows, bringing in a total of $30.4 million to the market. Negating cumulative outflows of $47.6 million from GBTC ($45.8 million) and Fidelity Wise Origin Bitcoin Fund (FBTC) ($1.8 million), Fidelity Wise Origin Bitcoin Fund (FBTC) brought in $54.8 million right before the Bitcoin halving event commenced. Other inflow contributors include Bitwise Bitcoin ETF (BITB) at $4.9 million, ARK 21Shares Bitcoin ETF (ARKB) at $12.5 million, Invesco Galaxy Bitcoin ETF (BTCO) at $3.9 million and Franklin Bitcoin ETF (EZBC) at $1.9 million. Bitcoin price between two halving events. Source: TradingView The previous Bitcoin halving took place on May 11, 2020, when the asset had a market value of roughly $8,500. However, the subsequent reduction in BTC issuance appreciated its value to roughly $65,000 in four years, according to data from Cointelegraph Markets Pro and TradingView. Related: Bitcoin mining stocks saw spikes across the board ahead of halving event The Bitcoin block 840,000, which triggered the fourth-ever Bitcoin halving event on April 20, at 12:09 am UTC, momentarily spiked the network fees due to high demand. Users spent $2.4 million in fees to inscribe runes and rare satoshis on the first halving block. Source: Mempool.space As a result, Bitcoin users have spent a staggering 37.7 BTC in fees — worth just over $2.4 million at current prices — to nab their share of limited space on the fourth-ever Bitcoin halving block. Magazine: Get Bitcoin or die tryin’: Why hip hop stars love crypto","Bitcoin (BTC) investments in the United States exchange-traded funds (ETFs) market recorded a net positive inflow right before the Bitcoin halving day following five consecutive days of drain. The Bitcoin ETF market followed through with the strategy while putting an end to an outflow streak dating back to April 12. Other inflow contributors include Bitwise Bitcoin ETF (BITB) at $4.9 million, ARK 21Shares Bitcoin ETF (ARKB) at $12.5 million, Invesco Galaxy Bitcoin ETF (BTCO) at $3.9 million and Franklin Bitcoin ETF (EZBC) at $1.9 million. Source: TradingViewThe previous Bitcoin halving took place on May 11, 2020, when the asset had a market value of roughly $8,500. Related: Bitcoin mining stocks saw spikes across the board ahead of halving eventThe Bitcoin block 840,000, which triggered the fourth-ever Bitcoin halving event on April 20, at 12:09 am UTC, momentarily spiked the network fees due to high demand." DEX adoption needs greater capital efficiency — PancakeSwap product lead,"Decentralized finance (DeFi) needs greater capital efficiency to increase the market share of decentralized exchanges (DEXs), according to PancakeSwap. Chef Momo, the pseudonymous product manager of the DEX, told Cointelegraph: “Such initiatives promoting capital efficiency and composability will be pivotal in expanding the market share of DEXs.” PancakeSwap is a popular multichain DEX that launched concentrated liquidity automated market maker (CLAMM) options trading on Arbitrum on April 8 by merging the DEX platform with Stryke’s options trading protocol. CLAMM options will introduce a new approach for building on-chain liquidity in DeFi, based on supply and demand mechanics, according to Chef Momo: “The scarcity of options liquidity persists as a significant challenge not only in DeFi but CeFi [centralized finance] as well. DEXs serve as the fundamental liquidity infrastructure in DeFi. Leveraging this liquidity for option writing presents a substantial opportunity for bolstering on-chain options liquidity.” The new options are live for the ARB/USDC, ETH/USDC, and wBTC/USDC trading pairs. CLAMM options aim to offer more intricate options trading features for crypto investors along with new opportunities for liquidity providers. According to Chef Momo: “Liquidity Providers can capitalize on their existing liquidity in v3 pools on PancakeSwap to write options and earn premiums boosting their overall returns.” PancakeSwap is currently the 10th-largest DEX, with a 3.37% market share on PancakeSwap V2 and a 2.92% market share on PancakeSwap v3, according to CoinMarketCap data. Top DEXs by market share. Source: CoinMarketCap Related: Paradigm leads $225M funding round for new ‘Solana killer’ L1 DeFi needs greater capital efficiency Initiatives similar to CLAMM that promote greater capital efficiency and composability in DeFi will be pivotal in growing the market share of DEXs, according to Chef Momo. “In TradFi, the options markets dominate the derivatives sector, but its presence in crypto is minimal, presenting considerable growth opportunities. Options bring significant value to DeFi, including hedging investment portfolios and generating income.” DEXs are far outpaced by their centralized counterparts. Binance, the world’s largest CEX, currently boasts a daily trading volume of $26.4 billion. In comparison, Uniswap only boasts $1.44 billion in 24-hour trading volume as the world’s largest DEX, according to CoinMarketCap. Looking at individual traders, Binance averages over 21 million weekly visits, while Uniswap, the largest DEX, was only used by 733,930 unique active wallets during the past week, according to DappRadar. Uniswap’s weekly volume of $25.5 billion is still short of Binance’s daily trading volume. Related: 10 days until halving: Bitcoin mining profitability won’t necessarily fall","Decentralized finance (DeFi) needs greater capital efficiency to increase the market share of decentralized exchanges (DEXs), according to PancakeSwap. CLAMM options aim to offer more intricate options trading features for crypto investors along with new opportunities for liquidity providers. Top DEXs by market share. Source: CoinMarketCapRelated: Paradigm leads $225M funding round for new ‘Solana killer’ L1DeFi needs greater capital efficiencyInitiatives similar to CLAMM that promote greater capital efficiency and composability in DeFi will be pivotal in growing the market share of DEXs, according to Chef Momo. In comparison, Uniswap only boasts $1.44 billion in 24-hour trading volume as the world’s largest DEX, according to CoinMarketCap." "Coinbase shares slump, but Base revenue signals it’s undervalued — Analyst","Coinbase (COIN) shares have plummeted 16% over the past five days, mirroring broader volatility in the crypto and stock markets, though one analyst suggests that investors may not be seeing the potential buying opportunity. “The street isn’t really pricing in the crypto native revenue that I think a lot of the crypto natives understand,” crypto analyst Will Clemente said in a recent Unchained Crypto podcast. “I think Coinbase is the biggest kind of venture-style bet in public markets since maybe Tesla about five years ago,” Clemente added. Clemente claimed that traditional investors still view Coinbase “purely as an exchange” despite it making many changes to its business structure over the past 12 months. “Throughout the bear market, they made a lot of strategic pivots to shift toward what I’m calling a crypto super app,” he declared. In particular, he noted Coinbase’s Ethereum layer-2 network, Base, which now has a total value locked (TVL) of $5.35 billion and oversees 30.81 daily transactions per second. “Over the last 30 days, Base has done $30 million of top-line revenue for Coinbase just based on the sequencer fees, which annualizes out to like $360 million a year,” he explained while suggesting that traditional investors are overlooking the significant activity taking place on-chain. “The street doesn’t even know what Base is, and they’re definitely not extrapolating out the potential of a ton of activity taking place there and the sequencer fees that Coinbase may benefit from that.” At the time of publication, COIN is currently trading at $218.08, down almost 16% over the past five days, per Google Finance data. COIN has plummeted 15.96% over the past five days. Source: Google Finance Coinbase is expected to release its earnings report for the first quarter of 2024 in the next few weeks. Over the past five days, the S&P 500 is down 3.12%, while Bitcoin (BTC) has declined approximately 4.67%. Meanwhile, more downside is expected for both markets as geopolitical tensions escalate in the Middle East after there were reports of explosions at Isfahan airport in central Iran. Related: Coinbase cleared in lawsuit over crypto transactions The news comes amid Cathie Wood’s ARK Invest continuing its selling spree of COIN. On April 15, it was reported that ARK sold 3,689 COIN shares worth approximately $824,000. It was only a month ago that ARK sold off a staggering amount of the stock amid its price seeing a year-to-date increase at the time of approximately 54%. On March 21, Cointelegraph reported that ARK sold 199,526 Coinbase shares from its exchange-traded funds. Magazine: Get Bitcoin or die tryin’: Why hip hop stars love crypto","Coinbase (COIN) shares have plummeted 16% over the past five days, mirroring broader volatility in the crypto and stock markets, though one analyst suggests that investors may not be seeing the potential buying opportunity. “The street isn’t really pricing in the crypto native revenue that I think a lot of the crypto natives understand,” crypto analyst Will Clemente said in a recent Unchained Crypto podcast. On April 15, it was reported that ARK sold 3,689 COIN shares worth approximately $824,000. It was only a month ago that ARK sold off a staggering amount of the stock amid its price seeing a year-to-date increase at the time of approximately 54%. On March 21, Cointelegraph reported that ARK sold 199,526 Coinbase shares from its exchange-traded funds." Crypto users react to Sam Bankman-Fried’s 25-year sentence,"More than 500 days after the collapse of cryptocurrency exchange FTX, users have an answer for the number of years former CEO Sam “SBF” Bankman-Fried will face in prison: 25. In a March 28 hearing, Judge Lewis Kaplan sentenced the former FTX CEO to 300 months in prison for his conviction related to misusing customer funds. Prosecutors had suggested up to 50 years in prison for SBF, while his defense attorneys requested the judge be lenient and only impose up to 6.5 years. The judge added the former CEO had committed perjury and intimidated witnesses. Immediately following the announcement in the New York courtroom, crypto users jumped onto social media to express their thoughts. Many suggested that 25 years wasn’t enough time given longer sentences handed down for seemingly less serious crimes. “[The judge] gave him less than Chelsea Manning (35 years) for a waaaaay worse crime,” said Edward Snowden on X, referring to Manning’s 2013 conviction for violations of the Espionage Act. Though the sentencing guidelines allowed Judge Kaplan to put SBF in prison for more than 100 years, many pointed out before the hearing that this outcome was unlikely. Several legal experts speculated Bankman-Fried would serve between 10 and 30 years, and others suggested it may be an effective deterrent for figures in the crypto space. “Judge Kaplan weighed all of the sentencing factors, including the magnitude of the crime, his conclusion that SBF lied on the witness stand and tampered with a witness, and handed down a serious sentence,” Mark Bini, a former Assistant U.S. Attorney in the Eastern District of New York, told Cointelegraph. “While less than the prosecutors’ request for 40-50 years, it is a very significant sentence and sends a message that people convicted of crimes in the crypto space will face serious consequences.” Swan Bitcoin Managing Director Terrence Yang largely disagreed, telling Cointelegraph “justice is not served” and 25 years was “too light” based on the number of suicides in the wake of the collapse of FTX, SBF’s perjury, and the misuse of user funds. “The damage SBF did was permanent and severe,” said Yang. “He ruined a lot of families and lives with his felonious acts and put salt in the deep wounds with his total lack of remorse. I get that he has ADHD and ADHD families filed a statement with the court asking for leniency but SBF is the only person with ADHD in the world who stole billions of dollars in customer funds and destroyed or hurt millions of lives.” Related: What to expect at Sam Bankman-Fried’s sentencing hearing Bankman-Fried was taken out of court on March 28 to the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn, where he has been since Judge Kaplan revoked his bail in August 2023. Ryan Salame, the former co-CEO of FTX Digital Markets, will likely be the next figure in the case to face sentencing on May 1. Gary Wang, Caroline Ellison and Nishad Singh — other former executives associated with FTX and Alameda Research — have already pleaded guilty and accepted deals. Magazine: ‘Less flashy’ Mashinsky set for less jail time than SBF: Inner City Press, X Hall of Flame Update (March 28 at 6:20 pm UTC): This article has been updated to include a statement from the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York.","More than 500 days after the collapse of cryptocurrency exchange FTX, users have an answer for the number of years former CEO Sam “SBF” Bankman-Fried will face in prison: 25. In a March 28 hearing, Judge Lewis Kaplan sentenced the former FTX CEO to 300 months in prison for his conviction related to misusing customer funds. Immediately following the announcement in the New York courtroom, crypto users jumped onto social media to express their thoughts. Though the sentencing guidelines allowed Judge Kaplan to put SBF in prison for more than 100 years, many pointed out before the hearing that this outcome was unlikely. Ryan Salame, the former co-CEO of FTX Digital Markets, will likely be the next figure in the case to face sentencing on May 1." Binance sued in Canada for securities law violations,"Cryptocurrency exchange Binance has been slapped with a new class-action lawsuit in Canada, with plaintiffs alleging that the firm has violated local securities laws. Ontario’s Superior Court of Justice published a certification motion on April 19 for a class-action lawsuit against Binance alleging that it sold crypto derivative products to retail investors without registration. According to plaintiffs represented by Christopher Lochan and Jeremy Leeder, Binance sold crypto derivatives products in violation of the Ontario Securities Act (OSA) and federal law. Source: Ontario’s Superior Court of Justice The lawsuit seeks damages and rescission of unlawful derivatives trades. The plaintiffs argued that tens of thousands of Canadian users of the Binance website invested in its cryptocurrency derivatives products. “It is noteworthy here that cryptocurrency derivatives traders include a great many retail investors,” the certification motion reads, adding that more than 50% of Canadian crypto owners have at least $5,000 in the market, according to the Ontario Securities Commission (OSC). Binance is a major global cryptocurrency exchange accounting for 58% of the total spot trading volumes among centralized exchanges as of March 2024. Apart from its leading position as a major spot crypto trading venue, Binance also operates the biggest derivatives market among other exchanges like Bybit and OKX. According to data from Bybit, the derivatives market for centralized exchanges (CEXs) is “almost entirely dominated” by Binance, OKX and Bybit. Trading volumes changes of Binance, OKX, Bybit and other platforms between October 2023 and March 2024. Source: Bybit The latest class action against Binance comes a few years after the crypto exchange announced in June 2021 plans to cease operations in Ontario after the OSC approached the firm with a warning. Related: SEC seeks $5.3B judgment against Terraform Labs and Do Kwon “As a result of its failure to adhere to this announced cessation of sales, in early 2022, the OSC notified the defendants of its intention to seek a cease trade order,” the new court document reads. Even after Binance announced departure from Canada in May 2023, local authorities have continued to crack down on the exchange. “The OSC’s investigation into the defendants is ongoing,” the court motion reads. Cointelegraph approached Binance for a comment regarding the class action lawsuit in Ontario but did not receive a response at the time of publication. Magazine: Bitcoin Halving will pump games, Shrapnel’s ‘simple’ secret revealed: Web3 Gamer","Cryptocurrency exchange Binance has been slapped with a new class-action lawsuit in Canada, with plaintiffs alleging that the firm has violated local securities laws. According to plaintiffs represented by Christopher Lochan and Jeremy Leeder, Binance sold crypto derivatives products in violation of the Ontario Securities Act (OSA) and federal law. The plaintiffs argued that tens of thousands of Canadian users of the Binance website invested in its cryptocurrency derivatives products. Binance is a major global cryptocurrency exchange accounting for 58% of the total spot trading volumes among centralized exchanges as of March 2024. Even after Binance announced departure from Canada in May 2023, local authorities have continued to crack down on the exchange." YouTuber Logan Paul argues CryptoZoo ‘isn’t a scam’ in new documentary,"YouTuber Logan Paul has argued that his infamous CryptoZoo project, which resulted in many investors losing money, was not a scam. In a new documentary, 5 Months with Logan Paul, journalist Graham Bensinger sat down with Paul to get his side of the story on the CryptoZoo nonfungible token (NFT) gaming project. The duo spoke about the many allegations hurled at the internet celebrity, with Bensinger reiterating the point that the exposure brought by Paul “led people to lose money.” Logan Paul answering questions about CryptoZoo. Source: YouTube Paul admitted that there’s an element of truth to the statement. However, the YouTuber argued it was not a scam. Paul added: “Everything you just said has an element of truth to it. Here’s the problem. What you just described isn’t a scam. I took on a project that I was simply incapable of handling at the time.” Paul argued that he also lost money in the project, seemingly implying he was also a victim. “I didn’t make any fucking money, bro. I’ve lost half a million dollars on this. Where is the scam?” The YouTuber also said in the documentary that he’s had suicidal thoughts because of the CryptoZoo project. “For the first time in my life, I was having suicidal thoughts. I was just spiraling,” he said. Related: YouTuber KSI faces pump-and-dump allegations from ZachXBT and Coffeezilla Apart from attempts to counter allegations, Paul also said in the documentary that he’s going to “take care” of the people who made CryptoZoo look like it was a scam perpetuated by him. He said: “The CryptoZoo saga is far from over because it was a one-sided story. He [Coffeezilla] told it how he wanted to tell it and told it a certain way that made me look like the captain of the ship.” This isn't the first time Paul has promised to act against those who have reported about CryptoZoo. In January 2023, Paul threatened to take legal action against YouTube journalist Stephen Findeisen — also known as Coffeezilla — after Findeisen published a piece on the project. However, Paul quickly backtracked on the threats and apologized to Findeisen days later. In the same month, Paul unveiled a $1.5 million recovery plan for those affected by the failed project. However, it took a year and a class-action lawsuit before the buyback plan was implemented. In February 2023, disgruntled investors filed a class-action lawsuit against CryptoZoo and Paul, alleging that the venture performed a rug pull. The plaintiffs alleged that Paul and the project stole millions of dollars through the venture. On Jan. 5, Paul announced that the buyback program would begin. However, it included a catch: Users could only get a refund if they waived any current or future claims against the YouTuber. Magazine: ‘Am I sorry? No’ — 3AC founder. $6B BTC laundered for fast food worker: Asia Express","YouTuber Logan Paul has argued that his infamous CryptoZoo project, which resulted in many investors losing money, was not a scam. In a new documentary, 5 Months with Logan Paul, journalist Graham Bensinger sat down with Paul to get his side of the story on the CryptoZoo nonfungible token (NFT) gaming project. However, the YouTuber argued it was not a scam. Where is the scam?”The YouTuber also said in the documentary that he’s had suicidal thoughts because of the CryptoZoo project. In February 2023, disgruntled investors filed a class-action lawsuit against CryptoZoo and Paul, alleging that the venture performed a rug pull." Vitalik Buterin shares the next steps for Ethereum Purge,"Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin has shared the next steps for protocol simplification and node resource load decreases, known as the Purge. The Purge is a key stage in the Ethereum transition that involves the removal of old and excess network history and simplifying the network over time. Aside from reducing historical data storage, this stage also significantly lowers the hard disk requirements for node operators and the technical debt of the Ethereum protocol. Ethereum roadmap. Source: Vitalik Buterin Buterin noted that introducing Ethereum improvement proposal (EIP)-6780 during the Dencun hard fork eliminated most of the “SELFDESTRUCT” code functions, which simplified the protocol by removing complexity and adding new security guarantees. Buterin said that after the EIP-6780 implementation, each Ethereum block would have a higher number of storage slots due to the clearance of certain SELFDESTRUCT functions. Buterin hopes that a new EIP will completely eliminate the SELFDESTRUCT code in the future. Related: Vitalik Buterin is cooking up a new way to decentralize Ethereum staking The Purge will introduce history expiration via EIP-4444 to limit the amount of historical data stored. As a result, nodes will have the option to prune historical blocks that are over a year old. The historical data will only be required when a peer has to synchronize with the head of the chain or when specifically asked for it. Thus, when fresh blocks are confirmed, a fully synced node won’t require historical data that is more than 365 days old. Buterin said that EIP-4444 can greatly increase Ethereum’s node decentralization. “Potentially, if each node stores small percentages of the history by default, we could even have roughly as many copies of each specific piece of history stored across the network as we do today.” The Ethereum co-founder also shared that Geth has recently deleted thousands of lines of code by dropping support for pre-Merge (PoW) networks. He added that post-Dencun, an 18-day storage window for blobs will reduce the node data bandwidth to 50 gigabytes. Buterin also discussed the need to purge precompile Ethereum contracts. The precompile contracts are used to implement complex forms of cryptography that cannot be implemented by the Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM). However, in recent times, the demand for the contract function has declined, and it has become a “key source of consensus bugs and a huge source of pain for new EVM implementations,” said Buterin. Magazine: ‘Account abstraction’ supercharges Ethereum wallets: Dummies guide","Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin has shared the next steps for protocol simplification and node resource load decreases, known as the Purge. Aside from reducing historical data storage, this stage also significantly lowers the hard disk requirements for node operators and the technical debt of the Ethereum protocol. Related: Vitalik Buterin is cooking up a new way to decentralize Ethereum stakingThe Purge will introduce history expiration via EIP-4444 to limit the amount of historical data stored. The historical data will only be required when a peer has to synchronize with the head of the chain or when specifically asked for it. Thus, when fresh blocks are confirmed, a fully synced node won’t require historical data that is more than 365 days old." Crypto investment products see outflows for second consecutive week — CoinShares,"Investments in digital asset funds have declined for the second consecutive week, with $206 million in withdrawals between April 15-19, according to data from digital asset investment firm CoinShares. Bitcoin (BTC) funds led outflows over the past week, with $192 million exiting the market ahead of the halving event. Ether (ETH) investment products also experienced outflows of $34 million, marking their sixth consecutive week of negative flow. Investment in blockchain equities has also been declining, with the sector recording its 11th consecutive week of outflows, totaling $9 million. Digital Assets Outflows. Source: CoinShares According to CoinShares, the downtrend is likely a result of investors’ concerns about rising interest rates in the United States, which can make less risky financial instruments more attractive compared to volatile assets such as cryptocurrencies. The Federal Reserve anticipated easing its monetary policy in mid-2024 if economic conditions aligned, but recent inflation data have dampened those hopes. The annual Consumer Price Index in March increased by 3.5%, exceeding expectations for the third consecutive month and indicating that lower rates may not become a reality until 2025. The federal funds rate currently sits between 5.25% and 5.50%. “The data suggests appetite from ETP/ETF investors continues to wane, likely off the back of expectations that the FED is likely to keep interest rates at these high levels for longer than expected.” Trading volume for Bitcoin exchange-traded funds (ETFs) declined slightly to $18 billion over the week. Bitcoin fund outflows, however, were not seen as an opportunity to short the cryptocurrency. According to CoinShares, the trend indicates that while investors are stepping away from volatility, they are not necessarily expecting Bitcoin price to crash anytime soon. “These volumes represent a lower percentage of total Bitcoin volumes (which continue to rise) at 28%, compared to 55% a month ago,” the report said. Inflows into Bitcoin ETFs have significantly slowed since their peak in March. Meanwhile, BlackRock's iShares Bitcoin Trust (IBIT), the largest ETF in terms of assets managed, maintained a steady level of investor interest this month, drawing $1.4 billion in positive flows as of April 19. Magazine: 1 in 6 new Base meme coins are scams, 91% have vulnerabilities","Investments in digital asset funds have declined for the second consecutive week, with $206 million in withdrawals between April 15-19, according to data from digital asset investment firm CoinShares. Bitcoin (BTC) funds led outflows over the past week, with $192 million exiting the market ahead of the halving event. Ether (ETH) investment products also experienced outflows of $34 million, marking their sixth consecutive week of negative flow. Investment in blockchain equities has also been declining, with the sector recording its 11th consecutive week of outflows, totaling $9 million. The annual Consumer Price Index in March increased by 3.5%, exceeding expectations for the third consecutive month and indicating that lower rates may not become a reality until 2025." TikTok parent company explores on-chain possibilities for Web3 gaming,"BytePlus — the enterprise technology arm of ByteDance, TikTok’s parent company — has announced a move into Web3 through a strategic partnership with Mysten Labs, the developers behind the Sui layer-1 blockchain. In a statement on April 17, BytePlus explained how it plans to use its existing knowledge and experience in data warehousing to empower the Sui ecosystem, with a particular focus on Web3 gaming and SocialFi projects. The partnership will see BytePlus integrate its cutting-edge solutions, including ByteHouse — a cloud-native data warehouse — with Sui’s full-node data. According to the announcement, a BytePlus integration could potentially boost Sui’s analytics capabilities by enabling infinite scalability and real-time data processing. Mysten Labs will benefit from the high-performance, low-maintenance nature of ByteHouse, which could ultimately accelerate data delivery for users on the Sui network. Evan Cheng, the co-founder and CEO of Mysten Labs, said the partnership could “revolutionize” data analytics in the Web3 sphere. ""Integrating cutting-edge content recommendation and generation solutions into Sui signifies a leap toward enhancing user experience within Web3 game platforms and SocialFi projects.” Li Long, the general manager MEA of BytePlusAs, told Cointelegraph that the move comes after observing trends of the rise of new social and gaming platforms built on blockchain and web3. He said their aim is to ""elevate the web3 social experience, build close knit communities and more immersive engagements."" Related: Can blockchain revolutionize digital securities management for stock exchanges? This is not the first instance of ByteDance exploring Web3 technology. In 2019, it was reported that the company launched a joint venture with a state-owned Chinese media group to develop business arms directed at blockchain and AI. In June 2020, ByteDance sought out a virtual banking license in Singapore in an effort to enter the digital finance scene. Sui, on the other hand, is a newer layer-1 network introduced by Mysten Labs in March 2022. However, development in the ecosystem has greatly accelerated over the last few months with new partnerships. In February, the Sui Foundation partnered with a university in the United Arab Emirates to launch a blockchain academy. A month later, it was revealed that the Greek stock exchange, ATHEX, would deploy its new fundraising mechanism via the Sui blockchain ecosystem. Magazine: Is measuring blockchain transactions per second (TPS) stupid in 2024? Big Questions","BytePlus — the enterprise technology arm of ByteDance, TikTok’s parent company — has announced a move into Web3 through a strategic partnership with Mysten Labs, the developers behind the Sui layer-1 blockchain. Mysten Labs will benefit from the high-performance, low-maintenance nature of ByteHouse, which could ultimately accelerate data delivery for users on the Sui network. Evan Cheng, the co-founder and CEO of Mysten Labs, said the partnership could “revolutionize” data analytics in the Web3 sphere. Sui, on the other hand, is a newer layer-1 network introduced by Mysten Labs in March 2022. A month later, it was revealed that the Greek stock exchange, ATHEX, would deploy its new fundraising mechanism via the Sui blockchain ecosystem." "Samourai Wallet mixer co-founders arrested on AML, licensing charges","The co-founders of cryptocurrency mixer Samourai Wallet have been arrested on charges of money laundering brought by the United States Justice Department (DOJ) and other agencies. Samourai Wallet CEO Keonne Rodriguez and chief technology officer William Hill will each face one count of conspiracy to commit money laundering, with a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison, and one count of conspiracy to operate an unlicensed money transmitting business, with a maximum sentence of five years in prison. Rodriguez was arrested on the morning of April 24 in Pennsylvania, and Hill was arrested the same day in Portugal. According to a statement released by the United States Attorney’s Office of the Southern District of New York, the United States will seek Hill’s extradition. The company’s servers and domain were also seized in Iceland, and a warrant has been served to stop downloads of the company’s app from the Google Play Store. The app has been downloaded more than 100,000 times. Screenshot of the Samourai Wallet homepage. Source: doj.gov The U.S. Internal Revenue Service and Federal Bureau of Investigation also took part in the investigation. According to the DOJ statement, Samourai Wallet: “Executed over $2 billion in unlawful transactions and facilitated more than $100 million in money laundering transactions from illegal dark web markets, such as Silk Road and Hydra Market; a web-server intrusion; a spearphishing scheme; and schemes to defraud multiple decentralized finance protocols.” Samourai Wallet offered its Whirlpool crypto mixing service and Ricochet service, which created additional, unnecessary transactions to further muddy users’ crypto paths. They allegedly made $4.5 million from fees. Related: Arbitrum DAO votes on $1M fund for Tornado Cash devs’ legal defense The U.S. government has become increasingly aggressive toward crypto mixers. The Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Asset Control (OFAC) sanctioned Blender.io in May 2022 after the Axie Infinity hack. The OFAC added addresses associated with the Tornado Cash mixer to its list of Specially Designated Nationals in October 2022, effectively banning U.S. residents from using the service. That decision survived a court challenge. The three co-founders of Tornado Cash had all come under arrest by August 2023. In October 2023, the Treasury’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network proposed designating crypto mixers as a “primary money laundering concern” after the Hamas attack on Israel. Magazine: Tornado Cash 2.0: The race to build safe and legal coin mixers","The co-founders of cryptocurrency mixer Samourai Wallet have been arrested on charges of money laundering brought by the United States Justice Department (DOJ) and other agencies. According to a statement released by the United States Attorney’s Office of the Southern District of New York, the United States will seek Hill’s extradition. Related: Arbitrum DAO votes on $1M fund for Tornado Cash devs’ legal defenseThe U.S. government has become increasingly aggressive toward crypto mixers. The three co-founders of Tornado Cash had all come under arrest by August 2023. Magazine: Tornado Cash 2.0: The race to build safe and legal coin mixers" Bitcoin hodlers moved $1.7B into ‘accumulation’ wallets during the BTC dip,"Hardcore Bitcoin (BTC) holders added a record $1.7 billion worth of BTC to ‘accumulation’ wallet addresses in a single day as the price of Bitcoin fell below $63,000 earlier this week. More than 27,700 BTC — worth $1.75 billion at current prices — was sent to accumulation addresses in a single 24-hour period between April 16 to 17, a new daily record for Bitcoin, per the latest data from CryptoQuant. The previous record — where 25,500 BTC was sent to accumulation addresses in a single day — was notched on March 23 this year, when the price of Bitcoin was also hovering around the $63,500 mark. A record number of Bitcoin was sent to ‘accumulation addresses’ in 24 hours. Source: CryptoQuant This data shows that there has been an elevated level of motivated buying around the $63,000 range — suggesting that large, dedicated investors maintain their confidence in accumulating and holding Bitcoin for the long term. An accumulation address is a Bitcoin wallet that shows no previous withdrawals and holds a balance of over 10 BTC. These addresses have been screened to exclude wallets known to be affiliated with Bitcoin miners and crypto exchanges. These addresses must have also been active at some point in the last seven years. Related: Is Bitcoin’s negative futures funding rate a sign of an upcoming BTC price crash? Several market analysts including pseudonymous trader Rekt Capital have suggested that the first few months of this year may be the last time investors can pick up Bitcoin at “bargain prices” before a post-halving rally event. In an April 17 post to their 453,000 X followers, Rekt Capital said that Bitcoin price action was currently playing out in a similar pattern to previous halving cycles. Rekt explained that the recent dip — which has seen BTC tumble more than 14% from its all-time high of $73,600 on March 13 — was an expected part of a “pre-halving retrace.” They predicted that Bitcoin could enter into a “re-accumulation phase” following the halving event — currently slated for April 20. “Once Bitcoin breaks out from the re-accumulation area breakout into the parabolic uptrend.” “Historically, this phase has lasted just over a year (~385 days) however with a potential Accelerated Cycle occurring right now, this figure may get cut in half in this market cycle,” added Rekt. Web3 Gamer: Bitcoin Halving will pump games, Shrapnel’s ‘simple’ secret revealed","Hardcore Bitcoin (BTC) holders added a record $1.7 billion worth of BTC to ‘accumulation’ wallet addresses in a single day as the price of Bitcoin fell below $63,000 earlier this week. A record number of Bitcoin was sent to ‘accumulation addresses’ in 24 hours. An accumulation address is a Bitcoin wallet that shows no previous withdrawals and holds a balance of over 10 BTC. Related: Is Bitcoin’s negative futures funding rate a sign of an upcoming BTC price crash? Web3 Gamer: Bitcoin Halving will pump games, Shrapnel’s ‘simple’ secret revealed" Bitcoin ETF demand turns negative around BTC halving,"Demand for the newest Bitcoin investment products is slowing down as the world’s first cryptocurrency went through its fourth “halving” event. Spot Bitcoin exchange-traded funds (ETFs) became a benchmark for institutional investments in Bitcoin (BTC) after launching in January 2024. The 11 spot Bitcoin ETFs approved by United States regulators in January collectively managed over $13 billion in inflows within a couple of months of launching. Gold ETFs took years to accomplish the same feat. At their peak, spot BTC ETFs saw up to $1 billion in daily net inflows — the result of institutional investors reallocating investments from the Grayscale Bitcoin Trust (GBTC) to the new ETFs. The Bitcoin halving is considered an important event in the Bitcoin timeline, which occurs roughly every four years and reduces the block reward for miners by half. Thus, the amount of new BTC added to the market daily is reduced by half. The halving has now reduced the block reward from 6.25 BTC to 3.125 BTC. Reduced rewards and high demand for BTC via ETFs led many market pundits to predict a supply shock after the April 20 halving. However, after weeks of consecutive net positive inflows to Bitcoin ETFs, demand for the products appears to be slowing down. Are geopolitics to blame for BTC ETF outflows? While many market analysts predicted that GBTC outflows would soon dry up as institutions ran out of GBTC shares to sell, inflows to ETFs have now turned negative. Ahead of the Bitcoin halving, spot BTC ETFs recorded several consecutive days of net outflows ranging in the hundreds of millions of dollars. However, despite the current downturn, Jag Kooner, head of derivatives at Bitfinex, believes the demand for ETF will catch up after the halving. “The reduction in inflows and significant outflows is not correlated to the halving event but rather to the current SPX and Nasdaq decline and geopolitical tensions. Bitcoin ETFs are an ‘alternate investment’ or a smaller part of large TradFi [traditional finance] investment portfolios. The current situation is likely a product of rebalancing risk on those portfolios and reducing exposure to high-risk assets,” he said. Recent: Bitcoin halving puts focus on crypto education initiatives Kooner added that BTC’s impressive rally since January 2024 was thanks not only to ETF approvals but also to market participants speculating on the impact of spot ETFs on the Bitcoin price. Thus, “we expect a stabilization of flows to result in a return of speculation on a bullish tipping of flows while we return to bullish trending market conditions.” Bitcoin supply shock theory takes a backseat The first three months of spot BTC ETF inflows ranged from three to 10 times the daily mining supply of 900 BTC. The high ETF demand and heavy buying from institutional giants such as MicroStrategy led many market analysts to predict a post-halving supply shock. A Bybit report predicted that BTC reserves on exchanges could dry up within nine months of the BTC halving, while other analysts predicted a six-month time frame. According to data shared by crypto analytics firm CryptoQuant, BTC supply on centralized exchanges fell to a three-year low of 1.94 million BTC by April 16. Ki Young Ju, CEO of CryptoQuant, made a similar prediction, saying BTC could face a severe supply shock “within six months” of the halving. But, by the third week of April, ETF demand has slowed to consecutive net daily outflows. The demand for ETFs stagnated at the end of March when BTC saw its first week of net outflows. Bitcoin ETF historical netflow. Source: CryptoQuant Young stated that the demand for ETFs may rebound if the BTC price approaches critical support levels where new whales — mainly ETF buyers — have a $56,000 on-chain cost basis. The cost basis of an investment is the total amount initially invested plus any commissions or fees involved in the purchase. Kooner added that people often ignore the long-term holders with a significant amount of supply. He said that there could also be a major distribution from long-term holders during the later stages of the current cycle, explaining: “The demand for spot Bitcoin ETFs is unprecedented by all accounts, but a single metric cannot measure demand for BTC itself. However, the market decline is evidence enough that the demand doesn’t currently outstrip BTC supply on an absolute basis.” While ETF demand has slowed, open interest in BTC options has increased, implying that buy-and-hold investors are waiting on the sidelines while volatility-focused investors are taking their place. Josef Tětek, Bitcoin ambassador at hardware wallet maker Trezor, told Cointelegraph that ETFs don’t necessarily signify institutional demand. Recent: Memecoin sector’s continued growth hinges on long-term utility Under U.S. regulation, ETFs are available to both institutions and retail investors. Thus, It’s impossible to speculate on the impact and relative influence of various demand drivers in the short term. “Taking a longer-term view and turning away from U.S. markets, there is rising demand for Bitcoin in countries across the globe as fiat currencies fail as a reliable store of value and even in some countries as a viable medium of exchange.” The post-halving supply shock notion was prevalent for most of February and March owing to heavy inflows into the spot ETFs despite GBTC outflows and new BTC price highs. However, just days before the halving, the ETF flows turned passive, and the BTC price also slid nearly 10% from all-time highs, prompting many to reconsider their supply shock theory in the short term. However, some experts are optimistic that BTC ETF demand will reach new highs as market conditions improve after the halving.","Spot Bitcoin exchange-traded funds (ETFs) became a benchmark for institutional investments in Bitcoin (BTC) after launching in January 2024. The Bitcoin halving is considered an important event in the Bitcoin timeline, which occurs roughly every four years and reduces the block reward for miners by half. However, after weeks of consecutive net positive inflows to Bitcoin ETFs, demand for the products appears to be slowing down. Ahead of the Bitcoin halving, spot BTC ETFs recorded several consecutive days of net outflows ranging in the hundreds of millions of dollars. However, some experts are optimistic that BTC ETF demand will reach new highs as market conditions improve after the halving." Blockchain for Good Alliance launches at Blockchain Life Dubai,"The Blockchain for Good Alliance (BGA) announced its official launch on April 15, at the Blockchain Life Dubai event. Describing itself as a “collaborative network of organizations, projects, and individuals committed to leveraging blockchain technology to solve global social, environmental, and economic challenges,” the BGA has partnered with blockchain-based organizations of nearly every stripe. These include Bybit Web3, Solana Foundation, Aptos, Moledao, Harvard Blockchain Club, ICP.Hub UAE, American University of Sharjah (AUS), Coineasy, Libera, Edu3Labs, Alchemy Pay, Bu Zhi DAO and XueDAO. The newly launched organization will work as an incubator for blockchain tech, according to its website. It’ll provide networking opportunities connecting builders with mentors, resources, and events. A spokesperson named Abbie, a representative of the Harvard Blockchain Club, said in a statement that: ""We are thrilled to be a part of the Blockchain for Good Alliance (BGA) launch. Through our commitment to exploring university initiatives such as establishing a blockchain publication repository and supporting BGA's impactful projects, we aim to foster a culture of innovation and collaboration within our academic community.” Blockchain social platform Moledao, a BGA partner, described the alliance as a path towards mass adoption in a YouTube video posted on April 14. The concept of “blockchain for good” was recently studied by Italian researcher Silvia Semenzin, at the GRASIA Research Group, Institute of Knowledge Technology, Complutense University of Madrid, in a research article posted to Sage Journals. According to Semenzin, many initiatives to “do good” through the use of blockchain technology are either motivated by profit seeking or largely ignorant to the realities of disparate class financial relativities. The Blockchain for Good Alliance will operate as a non-profit, something that should largely assuage the typical concerns associated with tech-based endeavors to do good. Related: Over half of U.S. charities now accept cryptocurrency donations Lily Liu, President of Solana Foundation, said in a statement that this collaboration “enhances our commitment to harnessing blockchain for global benefit.” She added that the platform would drive “impactful change,” by joining the partners together: “This has opened doors for innovative public infrastructure projects such as Helium and Hivemapper, where users not only contribute but also earn from their participation. Moreover, Solana's technology facilitates accessible cross-border remittances and new financial products, making it a pivotal player in creating a more inclusive financial system.”","The Blockchain for Good Alliance (BGA) announced its official launch on April 15, at the Blockchain Life Dubai event. Describing itself as a “collaborative network of organizations, projects, and individuals committed to leveraging blockchain technology to solve global social, environmental, and economic challenges,” the BGA has partnered with blockchain-based organizations of nearly every stripe. A spokesperson named Abbie, a representative of the Harvard Blockchain Club, said in a statement that:""We are thrilled to be a part of the Blockchain for Good Alliance (BGA) launch. According to Semenzin, many initiatives to “do good” through the use of blockchain technology are either motivated by profit seeking or largely ignorant to the realities of disparate class financial relativities. The Blockchain for Good Alliance will operate as a non-profit, something that should largely assuage the typical concerns associated with tech-based endeavors to do good." Etherscan ads behind massive phishing campaign,"Several Ethereum blockchain explorer Etherscan advertisements have been identified as part of a major phishing campaign targeting Etherscan users. On April 8, X community member McBiblets identified some advertisements on Etherscan as wallet drainers, warning users against being redirected to phishing websites when clicking on such advertisements. Further investigations revealed that the phishing advertisements appearing on Etherscan were also displayed on various known phishing websites. Picking up on McBiblets’ lead, Web3 anti-scam platform Scam Sniffer found that the phishing advertisements spread beyond Etherscan and were showing up on popular search engines such as Google, Bing, DuckDuckGo, as well as social media platform X. Scam Sniffer suspected the lack of oversight from advertisement aggregators as the root cause of the large-scale phishing campaign: “Etherscan aggregates ads from platforms like Coinzilla and Persona, where insufficient filtering could lead to exposure to phishing attempts.” The wallet drainer scam involves luring users to fake websites and prompting them to link their crypto wallets. Once linked, the scammer can withdraw funds into their personal wallet addresses without user authentication or permission. Blockchain security firm SlowMist’s chief information security officer, 23pds, also issued a warning about the phishing advertisements on Etherscan: “Be careful, there are phishing ads on etherscan.” The infamous and seasoned cyber phishing organization Angel Drainer is suspected of running the phishing attack campaign against Etherscan users. However, no concrete evidence about the scammers’ identity has yet been discovered. Read Cointelegraph’s guide to learn more about phishing attacks and how to prevent them. Related: Crypto phishing attacks reached ‘alarming levels’ — CertiK co-founder In 2023 alone, crypto phishing scams stole nearly $300 million from over 324,000 victims through wallet drainers. Notable wallet drainers active in 2023. Source: Scam Sniffer Scam Sniffer also reported that even when drainers close down, “phishing gangs” just take their business elsewhere, as there seems to be no lack of platforms providing services for scammers. Magazine: AI didn’t kill the metaverse, it will build it — Alien Worlds, Bittensor vs Eric Wall: AI Eye","Several Ethereum blockchain explorer Etherscan advertisements have been identified as part of a major phishing campaign targeting Etherscan users. On April 8, X community member McBiblets identified some advertisements on Etherscan as wallet drainers, warning users against being redirected to phishing websites when clicking on such advertisements. Further investigations revealed that the phishing advertisements appearing on Etherscan were also displayed on various known phishing websites. Blockchain security firm SlowMist’s chief information security officer, 23pds, also issued a warning about the phishing advertisements on Etherscan:“Be careful, there are phishing ads on etherscan.”The infamous and seasoned cyber phishing organization Angel Drainer is suspected of running the phishing attack campaign against Etherscan users. Related: Crypto phishing attacks reached ‘alarming levels’ — CertiK co-founderIn 2023 alone, crypto phishing scams stole nearly $300 million from over 324,000 victims through wallet drainers." Tether completes ‘gold standard’ security audit,"Tether has announced the successful completion of a System and Organization Controls 2 (SOC) audit — the highest level of security compliance that an organization can demonstrate. The audit was developed by the American Institute of Certified Accountants (AICPA). The audit underscored Tether’s commitment to offering a secure user experience, according to Paolo Ardoino, the CEO of Tether, who wrote in an April 1 announcement: “This compliance measure assures our customers that their assets and data are managed in an environment meeting the highest standards for data protection and information security. This independent validation of security controls is vital for Tether, demonstrating our commitment to being the world’s most trusted and compliant stablecoin.” Tether has committed to undergoing annual SOC 2 audits to ensure its security practices remain consistent with the standards. The firm aims to achieve the SOC 2 Type II certification by the end of 2025, which assesses the effectiveness of Tether’s internal controls over a period of 12 months. Related: Tether boosts Bitcoin reserves with latest acquisition Tether issues the largest stablecoin, Tether (USDT), which has a current market capitalization of over $104 billion, according to CoinMarketCap data. Tether’s USDT reached a record $100 billion market cap on March 4, posting 9% year-to-date growth. This makes Tether the third-largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization behind Ether (ETH) and Bitcoin (BTC). Its closest competitor, Circle’s USD Coin (USDC), is the seventh-largest crypto, with a $32.5 billion market cap. Related: Tether launches recovery tool to migrate USDT between blockchains Tether aims to overtake 1% of BTC mining in 2024 Tether is also expanding into new venues beyond stablecoins. The firm is planning to spend around $500 million on the construction of Bitcoin mining facilities in Uruguay, Paraguay and El Salvador. The firm aims to grow its computing power to 1% of the Bitcoin mining network, Tether’s Ardoino told Bloomberg in an interview on Nov. 16, 2023. The new sites would have a capacity of between 40 and 70 megawatts (MW) and include the $610 million debt financing facility extended to German miner Northern Data Group. Tether also aims to amp up its direct mining operations to 450 MW by the end of 2025. The firm is also considering a 300 MW facility and is setting up its facilities inside containers that can be moved when electricity prices change, Ardoino said in the interview: “Mining for us is something that we have to learn and grow over time. We are not in a rush to become the biggest miner in the world.” Related: Tether expands AI operations with global recruitment drive for top-tier talent","Tether has announced the successful completion of a System and Organization Controls 2 (SOC) audit — the highest level of security compliance that an organization can demonstrate. Related: Tether boosts Bitcoin reserves with latest acquisitionTether issues the largest stablecoin, Tether (USDT), which has a current market capitalization of over $104 billion, according to CoinMarketCap data. Tether’s USDT reached a record $100 billion market cap on March 4, posting 9% year-to-date growth. The firm is planning to spend around $500 million on the construction of Bitcoin mining facilities in Uruguay, Paraguay and El Salvador. Tether also aims to amp up its direct mining operations to 450 MW by the end of 2025." Arkham accuses competitors of spreading ‘false rumors’ amid token sell-off,"Blockchain analytics firm Arkham has accused its fellow competitors of “spreading false rumors” in an effort to create fear, uncertainty and doubt (FUD) after questions arose regarding the firm’s transfer of its native ARKM tokens. Although Arkham did not name the dissenting competitors, just a few days prior, a post published by fellow blockchain analytics firm Nansen claimed that Arkham “moved over 25.2m ARKM (>$56m) over the past 2 days” to unlabeled wallets and cryptocurrency exchange Binance. “Let’s take a look at what’s going on because they won’t show you,” wrote Nansen, noting that the ARKM was sent to different Binance addresses with no prior activity, as well as to a fresh wallet address. Meanwhile, Arkham replied in its April 9 post that the ARKM movements “are of unlocked tokens as per the published tokenomics.” In its first transfer, 20 million ARKM were sent to a novel wallet address as per an approved protocol proposal titled “Deploy ARKM-secured Chainlink DON for Intel Verification; Add Support for Solana; Establish Treasury Pool I; Implement Bounty Joining.” At the same time, Arkham stated that 5 million ARKM sent from its ecosystem fund were unlocked as per its tokenomics. When questioned regarding the discrepancy between the number of tokens in its vesting wallets versus the stated number in its tokenomics paper, Arkham explained that vesting wallets will be “deployed overtime” as it receives addresses from non-crypto investors and as new hires are made. “There have been no early unlocks and all team and investor tokens remain fully locked and trackable using the top holders feature on our platform,” the firm stated. At the time of publication, ARKM’s fully diluted market cap is $2.047 billion. Despite a spectacular run-up over the past year, in part due to hype surrounding the firm’s use of artificial intelligence in its blockchain analytics, ARKM has lost nearly 40% of its value in the past month. The firm received an undisclosed investment sum from Binance Labs last November. Related: Arkham Intelligence identifies MicroStrategy Bitcoin holdings pooled with Fidelity","Blockchain analytics firm Arkham has accused its fellow competitors of “spreading false rumors” in an effort to create fear, uncertainty and doubt (FUD) after questions arose regarding the firm’s transfer of its native ARKM tokens. Although Arkham did not name the dissenting competitors, just a few days prior, a post published by fellow blockchain analytics firm Nansen claimed that Arkham “moved over 25.2m ARKM (>$56m) over the past 2 days” to unlabeled wallets and cryptocurrency exchange Binance. Despite a spectacular run-up over the past year, in part due to hype surrounding the firm’s use of artificial intelligence in its blockchain analytics, ARKM has lost nearly 40% of its value in the past month. The firm received an undisclosed investment sum from Binance Labs last November. Related: Arkham Intelligence identifies MicroStrategy Bitcoin holdings pooled with Fidelity" Bitcoin halving searches on Google is at its highest point ever,"The level of interest in the Bitcoin halving on Google has soared to its highest point of all time, with predicted data pegging it at more than double that of the last halving in 2020. Search interest for the term “Bitcoin halving” has already reached a score of 45, according to Google Trends data, with Google predicting it will reach an estimated score of 100 by the end of this month. Google Trends notes that a value of 100 translates to “peak popularity” for the term. Search interest for the Bitcoin Halving’has has hit record levels. Source: Google Trends The Bitcoin (BTC) halving refers to when the rewards paid to miners are halved. The 2024 Bitcoin halving will reduce block rewards from 6.25 BTC to 3.125 BTC. The halving is currently slated to occur around 4:00 am UTC on April 20, according to the Cointelegraph countdown timer. Google Trends shows that the Bitcoin halving is seeing the most interest from Nigeria, the Netherlands, Switzerland and Cyprus. Search interest in the Bitcoin halving was highest in Nigeria. Source: Google Trends Related: Bitcoin bull Pompliano says BTC will be bigger than gold and ‘the leader in the recovery’ Record levels of interest in the halving event may not come as a surprise following Bitcoin’s banner performance over the last few months. Bitcoin began the year at a price of $42,200 and soared 74% to reach a new all-time high of $73,600 on March 13, according to CoinMarketCap data. Bitcoin’s price action has since cooled off and has traded consistently lower since mid-May. At the time of publication, Bitcoin is changing hands for $61,078 — down 17% from its all-time high. Despite souring sentiment from market participants, several market commentators have pointed to the historical patterns of Bitcoin price action to suggest that Bitcoin could rally significantly in the months following the halving. Web3 Gamer: Bitcoin Halving will pump games, Shrapnel’s ‘simple’ secret revealed","The level of interest in the Bitcoin halving on Google has soared to its highest point of all time, with predicted data pegging it at more than double that of the last halving in 2020. Google Trends notes that a value of 100 translates to “peak popularity” for the term. Source: Google TrendsThe Bitcoin (BTC) halving refers to when the rewards paid to miners are halved. Google Trends shows that the Bitcoin halving is seeing the most interest from Nigeria, the Netherlands, Switzerland and Cyprus. Web3 Gamer: Bitcoin Halving will pump games, Shrapnel’s ‘simple’ secret revealed" Ethereum ‘BlobScriptions’ lift off and it’s taking Blob fees with it,"A viral new method for minting data to the Ethereum blockchain dubbed “BlobScriptions” is pushing up the price of Blob fees — the amount required for a blob to be included in an Ethereum block. BlobScriptions were introduced on March 27 by a protocol called Ethscriptions, allowing users to inscribe data — from JPEGs to text — directly onto “blobs,” which were introduced to the Ethereum network as part of the network’s Dencun upgrade on March 13. Less than five hours after the introduction of BlobScriptions, the gas fees for Blobs soared as high as 585 gwei — equivalent to roughly $18, according to data from Ultrasound.money. This was a far cry from the average gas price for minting data on a blob before BlobScriptions, which averaged around one wei, equivalent to a tiny fraction of $0.01. Blob fees soared following the introduction of BlobScriptions. Source: Ultrasound.money However, Blob fees have since fallen considerably from its newly notched high. At the time of publication, blob fees are running at 35.8 gwei, equivalent to $1.20, per Coinbrain conversion data. Meanwhile, users have made over 4,500 inscriptions on blobs since the introduction of BlobScriptions, according to Dune Analytics data. In a March 27 post to X, Ethscriptions founder Tom Lehman — who goes by the alias Middlemarch — noted the spiking cost of “blobspace,” and urged users to mint BlobScriptions via the official blobscription protocol. Much in a similar way to the early days of Bitcoin Ordinals, Ethereum users are opting to mint small pieces of text and seemingly random assortments of images to blobs, with the most recent activity on blobscription.io showing hundreds of new images added in the last few hours. Ethereum users are flooding the protocol to mint data on blobs. Source: BlobScriptions Notably, blob data is only stored on Ethereum nodes for around 18 days meaning that after that period, BlobScriptions data will be removed from the network. However, Lehman added that the Ethscriptions indexer would store the data “indefinitely.” Related: Starknet targets increased throughput, lower fees with parallel transactions in 2024 Blobs were introduced by way of EIP-4844 — a core data-saving feature of Ethereum’s Dencun upgrade — which was focused primarily on reducing transaction costs on layer-2 networks by a significant margin. Transaction fees on Ethereum L2s fell drastically following the Dencun upgrade, with swap fees on Arbitrum plunging from around $1.25 to below $0.02, while Polygon fees fell by a similar amount. As a way of lauding the decreased fees that came with blobs, one developer Ethereum managed to mint the entire script of the Bee Movie on an Ethereum blob less than 15 minutes after the upgrade went live all for less than $13 in ETH gas fees. Magazine: 5 dangers to beware when apeing into Solana memecoins","A viral new method for minting data to the Ethereum blockchain dubbed “BlobScriptions” is pushing up the price of Blob fees — the amount required for a blob to be included in an Ethereum block. Blob fees soared following the introduction of BlobScriptions. Source: Ultrasound.moneyHowever, Blob fees have since fallen considerably from its newly notched high. At the time of publication, blob fees are running at 35.8 gwei, equivalent to $1.20, per Coinbrain conversion data. Source: BlobScriptionsNotably, blob data is only stored on Ethereum nodes for around 18 days meaning that after that period, BlobScriptions data will be removed from the network." $2.7T general insurance industry meets tokenized RWAs: Nayms joins Cointelegraph Accelerator,"Cointelegraph has announced that Nayms, an on-chain insurance marketplace that matches brokers and underwriters with crypto capital providers, has joined the Cointelegraph Accelerator program. The insurance industry is a major market that can benefit from the blockchain revolution. Faced with many challenges, including costs, discerning customers and fraud, the insurance sector has immense potential for a blockchain-powered disruption. Blockchain’s potential to revolutionize insurance According to reports, blockchain can pave the way for a $32.9 billion market for the insurance world by 2031. The distributed and transparent nature of the technology enables a comprehensive, secure and interoperable repository of insurance-related information. This is where the idea of a blockchain-based digital insurance marketplace came to life in Nayms. Nayms facilitates the connection between capital providers and brokers by utilizing segregated accounts established by third-party Sponsors to tailor specific insurance solutions. Sponsors submit detailed business plans, which, upon approval, lead to the issuance of participation tokens. Participation tokens represent a contractual interest in the assets and liabilities of a segregated account and are sold only in Nayms’ matching market, allowing investors to fund the accounts with crypto. The capital raised supports the underwriting of blockchain-specific risks, with insurance contracts crafted using Nayms’ Policy Builder. Nayms oversees the management of claims against these accounts, including via designated third-party administrators, ensuring adherence to underwriting guidelines and policy wordings. Nayms streamlines the process, securely linking capital providers to insurance risks via smart contracts, which automate transactions while maintaining transparency and compliance. Tokenization to democratize insurance Tokenization facilitates easy entry and exit for investors, increasing liquidity and enabling a broader base of participants to share in the risk and rewards. Additionally, Nayms targets blockchain-specific risks, such as those associated with cryptocurrency exchanges, custodians and DeFi smart contracts, which represent billions in uninsured value. Offering crypto-based policies minimizes currency risk for blockchain and crypto businesses while providing traditional coverage types like directors and officers against governance-related liabilities and errors and omissions insurance for professional mistakes. Nayms operates under the regulatory framework of the Bermuda Monetary Authority (BMA), the financial watchdog in Bermuda, which was one of the first places to implement a regulatory framework for digital assets. Nayms holds both a Class F license under the Digital Asset Business Act 2018 and a Class IIGB license under the Insurance Act 1978. Registered as a segregated accounts company, Nayms utilizes the legal structure to issue segregated accounts for different risk pools — each insulated from others — allowing for precise risk management and operational efficiency. The platform integrates the NAYM governance token to align incentives among marketplace participants, enhancing the ecosystem’s functionality by linking rewards to marketplace performance through staking. While the token incentivizes participation and governance within the platform, it’s distinct from participation tokens used for capitalization in insurance operations. NAYM token offers benefits like staking and voting on governance issues related to the Nayms Liquidity Facility (NLF), which provides primary capital to and liquidity for the secondary market on the Nayms marketplace. The model allows Nayms to blend decentralized finance (DeFi) elements with traditional regulatory compliance, ensuring a secure and innovative insurance marketplace. Using blockchain tokenization, Nayms is working with over 20 partners and a global team with the aim of bringing liquidity to insurance as an asset class, enabling over $1 trillion of alternative capital in digital assets to access this risk.","Cointelegraph has announced that Nayms, an on-chain insurance marketplace that matches brokers and underwriters with crypto capital providers, has joined the Cointelegraph Accelerator program. This is where the idea of a blockchain-based digital insurance marketplace came to life in Nayms. Nayms facilitates the connection between capital providers and brokers by utilizing segregated accounts established by third-party Sponsors to tailor specific insurance solutions. Registered as a segregated accounts company, Nayms utilizes the legal structure to issue segregated accounts for different risk pools — each insulated from others — allowing for precise risk management and operational efficiency. The model allows Nayms to blend decentralized finance (DeFi) elements with traditional regulatory compliance, ensuring a secure and innovative insurance marketplace." Van Eck heir to launch new USD stablecoin with $12M VC backing,"Nick van Eck, the son of investment management maestro Jan van Eck, is set to launch a new United States dollar-backed stablecoin after closing a $12-million funding round. Crypto veterans Drake Evans and Joe McGrady joined with van Eck in October to build Agora, which will launch the Agora digital dollar with the ticker AUSD, according to an April 2 Bloomberg report. Nick van Eck will serve as CEO. AUSD will be fully backed by cash, U.S. Treasury bills and overnight repo agreements, while $90-billion asset management firm VanEck — where Jan van Eck is CEO — will manage a fund for Agora’s reserves. “There is a need to have transparent and trustworthy institutions managing the assets of these digital dollars,” said VanEck director of digital assets Kyle DaCruz. The $12-million seed funding round was led by digital asset VC firm Dragonfly, with additional investments coming from Robot Ventures, Wintermute, Breed and General Catalyst — where van Eck previously worked as a partner. Evans previously served as head of lending at decentralized finance firm Frax Finance, while McGrady was the director of operations at digital asset management firm Galaxy Digital. Agora’s parent company is incorporated in Delaware, and its stablecoin issuer is based in the British Virgin Islands. For the time being, it will only serve select markets outside the United States. “Until there’s federal legislation for stablecoins in the U.S., we’re going to focus primarily on customers outside of the U.S.,” van Eck told Bloomberg. Van Eck expects places such as Argentina and Southeast Asia will benefit most from a digital dollar. Agora enters a fierce stablecoin market, led by Tether (USDT) and Circle (USDC), which boast market capitalizations of $104.3 billion and $32.5 billion, respectively, according to CoinGecko. The next six largest stablecoins all have market caps above $500 million. Related: Cardano finally gets fiat-backed stablecoin USDM after huge delays However, van Eck believes there’s still room for a newcomer. Agora will focus on establishing strong partnerships with all industry players, from cryptocurrency exchanges and custodians to decentralized applications and trading firms. Van Eck said AUSD holders wouldn’t receive income like holders of the TerraClassicUSD (USTC) did before it completely collapsed in May 2022. “I think especially post what happened last cycle, we were losing the narrative and I want to build a company that I think brings this industry forward.” Agora did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Magazine: Unstablecoins: Depegging, bank runs and other risks loom","Nick van Eck, the son of investment management maestro Jan van Eck, is set to launch a new United States dollar-backed stablecoin after closing a $12-million funding round. Nick van Eck will serve as CEO. “Until there’s federal legislation for stablecoins in the U.S., we’re going to focus primarily on customers outside of the U.S.,” van Eck told Bloomberg. Related: Cardano finally gets fiat-backed stablecoin USDM after huge delaysHowever, van Eck believes there’s still room for a newcomer. Van Eck said AUSD holders wouldn’t receive income like holders of the TerraClassicUSD (USTC) did before it completely collapsed in May 2022." "‘FOMO’ once drove GameFi funding, but VCs say it’s different this time","Venture capital firms haphazardly piled into blockchain gaming projects during the last bull run but are taking a much more mature and sustainable approach this time, according to industry executives. “[It was] insane,” Shi Khai Wei, founder of cryptocurrency-focused VC firm LongHash Ventures, told Cointelegraph, adding that some GameFi projects were receiving up to $100 million valuations with only a few team members and some lofty promises. Keiran Warwick, founder of GameFi studio Illuvium, who recently raised $12 million in VC funding, said he saw the same thing, with much of the investor fervor then driven by a fear of missing out (FOMO). Illuvium confirmed it secured a $12 million Series A funding round on March 26. Source: Illuvium.io “If someone’s speaking to you and they pitch a game that four or five other firms have invested in, you think, well, they’ve done their due diligence, and they know what they’re doing, so we’re just going to follow suit,” said Warwick, adding: “You get this FOMO and traction purely because people don't want to miss out and they think, well, others are in, so we're in.” But VCs have since expanded their checklists and want to see gameplay, artists, developers, security audits and much more, Warwick noted. “The amount of scrutiny that VCs are putting projects under now versus then is huge.” Wei attests to this and says a longer checklist actually helps his firm weed out the not-so-legitimate projects. LongHash has been more invested in GameFi this time as the top-tier projects have launched or are close to launching and are priced at much more reasonable valuations, Wei explained. His firm has invested in Yield Guild Games, Saga, Guildfi, Overworld and Moonveil. Wei said GameFi has become a focus area for LongHash Ventures in recent months and hopes the firm will be 6-12 months ahead of the curve when the next wave of FOMO kicks in. Why #web3? Network effects are the true underlying force of web3 and it also leads to cross-game collaborations. “#Gaming, art, and decentralized finance all connect together [in web3],” Robby Yung (@viewfromhk), our CEO of investments, said to @lloydWahed from @manasearchuk. pic.twitter.com/JzUVndu60I — Animoca Brands (@animocabrands) April 15, 2024 Gabby Dizon, co-founder of Yield Guild Games, told Cointelegraph that VCs are now also more aware of the “cyclicality” of cryptocurrency markets, as many of them hamstrung themselves by investing at the peak of the last bull market. Related: Crypto VC funding breaks 2-year downturn in Q1 2024 It comes as Warwick’s Illuvium.io secured $12 million in a Series A funding round in late March, led by King River Capital, Arrington Capital, and Animoca Ventures. Among the other GameFi projects to have received funding in recent months are Helika Games, Parallel Studios and Elixer Games in $50 million, $35 million and $14 amounts, respectively. More than $2 billion was invested into GameFi projects in Q4 2021, but funding amounts fell for six consecutive quarters after the first quarter of 2022, according to RootData. However, the trend was finally bucked in the third quarter of that year, and the GameFi sector has seen three consecutive quarterly increases since then, including the last quarter, which tallied $268 million. Source: RootData Magazine: Web3 Gamer: Games need bots? Illivium CEO admits ‘it’s tough,’ 42X upside","Keiran Warwick, founder of GameFi studio Illuvium, who recently raised $12 million in VC funding, said he saw the same thing, with much of the investor fervor then driven by a fear of missing out (FOMO). Illuvium confirmed it secured a $12 million Series A funding round on March 26. His firm has invested in Yield Guild Games, Saga, Guildfi, Overworld and Moonveil. Among the other GameFi projects to have received funding in recent months are Helika Games, Parallel Studios and Elixer Games in $50 million, $35 million and $14 amounts, respectively. More than $2 billion was invested into GameFi projects in Q4 2021, but funding amounts fell for six consecutive quarters after the first quarter of 2022, according to RootData." Biden administration takes action to safeguard public from AI risks,"The White House has unveiled its inaugural comprehensive policy for managing the risks associated with artificial intelligence (AI), mandating that agencies intensify reporting on AI utilization and tackle potential risks posed by the technology. According to a March 28 White House memorandum, federal agencies must, within 60 days, appoint a chief AI officer, disclose AI usage and integrate protective measures. This directive aligns with United States President Joe Biden’s executive order on AI from October 2023. On a teleconference with reporters, Vice President Kamala Harris said: “I believe that all leaders from governments, civil society and the private sector have a moral, ethical and societal duty to make sure that artificial intelligence is adopted and advanced in a way that protects the public from potential harm while ensuring everyone can enjoy its full benefits.” The latest regulation, an initiative by the Office of Management and Budget (OMB), aims to guide the entire federal government in safely and efficiently utilizing artificial intelligence amid its rapid expansion. While the government seeks to harness AI’s potential, the Biden administration remains cautious of its evolving risks. As stated in the memo, certain AI use cases, particularly those within the Department of Defense, will not be mandated for disclosure in the inventory, as their sharing would contradict existing laws and government-wide policies. By Dec. 1, agencies must establish specific safeguards for AI applications that could affect the rights or safety of Americans. For instance, travelers should have the option to opt out of facial recognition technology used by the Transportation Security Administration at airports. Related: Biden administration announces key AI actions after executive order Agencies unable to implement these safeguards must discontinue using the AI system unless agency leadership can justify how doing otherwise would heighten risks to safety or rights or hinder critical agency operations. The OMB’s recent AI directives align with the Biden administration’s blueprint for an “AI Bill of Rights” from October 2022 and the National Institute of Standards and Technology’s AI Risk Management Framework from January 2023. These initiatives emphasize the importance of creating reliable AI systems. The OMB also seeks input on enforcing compliance and best practices among government contractors supplying technology. It intends to ensure alignment between agencies’ AI contracts and its policy later in 2024. The administration also unveiled its intention to recruit 100 AI professionals into the government by the summer, as outlined in the October executive order’s “talent surge.” Magazine: Real AI use cases in crypto: Crypto-based AI markets, and AI financial analysis","The White House has unveiled its inaugural comprehensive policy for managing the risks associated with artificial intelligence (AI), mandating that agencies intensify reporting on AI utilization and tackle potential risks posed by the technology. According to a March 28 White House memorandum, federal agencies must, within 60 days, appoint a chief AI officer, disclose AI usage and integrate protective measures. While the government seeks to harness AI’s potential, the Biden administration remains cautious of its evolving risks. By Dec. 1, agencies must establish specific safeguards for AI applications that could affect the rights or safety of Americans. It intends to ensure alignment between agencies’ AI contracts and its policy later in 2024." Bitcoin 5% flash crash leads to $165M in leveraged crypto liquidations,"A sudden 5% drawdown in the price of Bitcoin (BTC) on Tuesday has seen traders with leveraged exposure to Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies rack up over $165 million in losses in less than two hours. Bitcoin plunged 5% from $69,450 to as low as $65,970 in less than 30 minutes in early hours on March 2 UTC, per TradingView data. Bitcoin tumbled over 5% in a sudden tumble on April 2. Source: TradingView According to data from Coinglass, Bitcoin’s sharp wick down saw more than $165 million in leveraged positions wiped out, with just over $50 million in Bitcoin longs and more than $40 million in Ether (ETH) longs accounting for the bulk of that figure. Roughly $6 million in long positions on Dogecoin (DOGE) and $4 million in Solana’s SOL (SOL) were liquidated, trailing BTC and ETH. Bitcoin’s sudden drawdown caused a $165million leverage flush. Source: CoinGlass Around the same time as the drawdown, Bitcoin exchange-traded funds (ETFs) posted a net outflow of $86 million, breaking a four-day positive inflow streak, per FarSide data. BlackRock’s ETF stood as the best-performing fund, whose net inflows reached $165.9 million, while Fidelity came in second with $44 million. Related: Memecoin madness is breaking the Bitcoin halving cycle However, the inflows were weighed down by Grayscale’s GBTC posting $302 million in outflows, bringing the net daily outflows for all the funds to $85.7 million. Tether wobbles from its peg At the same time as the Bitcoin flash crash, the value of the United States dollar-pegged stablecoin Tether (USDT) also wobbled around 1%, briefly falling from its $1 peg to $0.988, according to data from CoinGecko. Tether experienced a brief wobble on some price tracking sites. Source: CoinGecko It’s unclear if the USDT wobble was an error in the API of certain data trackers or if the value of the currency suffered a sudden loss; however, the brief depeg did not appear on other price trackers. Cointelegraph contacted Tether but did not receive an immediate response. Magazine: ‘SEAL 911’ team of white hats formed to fight crypto hacks in real time","A sudden 5% drawdown in the price of Bitcoin (BTC) on Tuesday has seen traders with leveraged exposure to Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies rack up over $165 million in losses in less than two hours. Bitcoin plunged 5% from $69,450 to as low as $65,970 in less than 30 minutes in early hours on March 2 UTC, per TradingView data. Bitcoin’s sudden drawdown caused a $165million leverage flush. Source: CoinGlassAround the same time as the drawdown, Bitcoin exchange-traded funds (ETFs) posted a net outflow of $86 million, breaking a four-day positive inflow streak, per FarSide data. BlackRock’s ETF stood as the best-performing fund, whose net inflows reached $165.9 million, while Fidelity came in second with $44 million." Scammers exploit Google platform to promote phishing site,"Google appears to be promoting a malicious crypto website that directs users to a phishing website clone that drains users’ crypto through Google Ads, an online advertising platform enabling businesses to showcase ads on Google’s search engine results pages. According to a report by BleepingComputer, threat actors have discovered a method to advertise a counterfeit version of Whales Market, an over-the-counter (OTC) cryptocurrency platform facilitating the trading of airdropped tokens. The report indicates that the fake version is being advertised as a sponsored link at the top of Google search results. Cointelegraph has verified that Google is currently promoting the counterfeit Whales Market as an advert. Although it displays a seemingly genuine domain address on the search results page, users are rerouted to [www.whaels.market] instead of the authentic [www.whales.market] upon clicking. Fake version of Whales Market promoted by Google Ads Source: Google BleepingComputer also notes that the malicious actors have reportedly registered multiple domains mimicking Whales Market, including [www.whaless.market], which is already inactive. The fake version replicates the interface of the authentic Whales Market site, deceiving users into connecting their digital wallets. However, malicious scripts are activated upon doing so, siphoning crypto from victims’ wallets. This incident contributes to similar events where scammers have used Google’s platform to advertise deceptive services. An example is the nearly $900,000 worth of crypto drained from one of the hot wallets belonging to billionaire investor and Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban by an unidentified hacker. Related: Scam crypto projects using stolen funds for liquidity disappear In December 2023, Scammers used a wallet-draining service called “MS Drainer” to siphon approximately $59 million in crypto from victims over the past nine months. The scammers used Google Ads to target victims with fake versions of popular crypto sites, including Zapper, Lido, Stargate, DefiLlama, Orbiter Finance and Radient. While the individuals responsible for this recent phishing campaign are still unknown, Google appears to be taking action against scammers. In April, Google filed a lawsuit against Chinese nationals Yunfeng Sun and Hongnam Cheung for deceiving individuals with counterfeit crypto investments through the Google Play store. Wallet drainers have become a major problem in the Web3 ecosystem. In November 2023, the developer of the “Inferno” drainer claimed to be retiring after successfully stealing more than $80 million from victims during the software’s lifetime. In March, the developer of “Monkey Drainer,” which had successfully stolen an estimated $13 million up to that point, also announced their retirement. Magazine: Google sues crypto app scammers, Crypto.com in Korea","Google appears to be promoting a malicious crypto website that directs users to a phishing website clone that drains users’ crypto through Google Ads, an online advertising platform enabling businesses to showcase ads on Google’s search engine results pages. Cointelegraph has verified that Google is currently promoting the counterfeit Whales Market as an advert. Fake version of Whales Market promoted by Google Ads Source: GoogleBleepingComputer also notes that the malicious actors have reportedly registered multiple domains mimicking Whales Market, including [www.whaless.market], which is already inactive. The fake version replicates the interface of the authentic Whales Market site, deceiving users into connecting their digital wallets. The scammers used Google Ads to target victims with fake versions of popular crypto sites, including Zapper, Lido, Stargate, DefiLlama, Orbiter Finance and Radient." Bitcoin trades above $69K following largest quarterly options expiry in history,"The Bitcoin (BTC) price remained above the $69,000 mark on March 29 despite the market experiencing the biggest quarterly Bitcoin futures options expiry event in history. Hao Yang, the global head of derivatives trading at Bybit exchange, told Cointelegraph: “We have experienced the largest option expiration in history for Bybit and Deribit as well. People may roll over or unwind their hedging position during the expiration time, and the action of unwinding may have a small impact on the price movement in the very short term.” Over $15.1 billion worth of cryptocurrency futures options expired on Deribit on March 29 at 8:00 am UTC, according to a March 28 X post by Deribit. Of the $15.1 billion, $9.53 billion represented the notional value of Bitcoin options expiring at a put/call ratio of 0.84, with a “max pain” price potential of $51,000. BTC options: Open interest by strike price. Source: Deribit While options expiry can lead to heightened volatility, the max pain price point doesn’t offer an accurate reflection of Bitcoin’s long-term price potential, which is still tied to its fundamental values, Yang explained: “Just as a fancy gaming PC case doesn’t directly impact the performance of the hardware inside, max pain is an indicator that provides some insight but ultimately has limited influence on the actual price movement of Bitcoin.” Related: Max pain $51K? Bitcoin options worth over $9.4B set to expire Friday Despite the expiry, the price impact was minimal, said Andrey Stoychev, project manager at Nexo’s prime brokerage division. He told Cointelegraph: “With the current scenario where calls are substantially in the money while puts are converging to zero, delta hedging has largely concluded, and we anticipate minimal price impact from the expiry. However, the pivotal question remains: will the call profits be reinvested into new contracts, and if so, what strikes and maturities will be favored?” The pre-halving Bitcoin correction may be over Bitcoin price fell 0.7% in the 24 hours leading up to 10:35 am UTC to trade at $69,924, according to CoinMarketCap data. The world’s first cryptocurrency is up over 11.9% on the monthly chart. BTC/USDT/ 1-day chart. Source: CoinMarketCap Bitcoin’s historic pre-halving retracement occurred in line with previous historical retraces. The current pre-halving correction may be over if Bitcoin price can flip its old all-time high of $69,000 into support, said Rekt Capital in a March 26 video analysis: “Bitcoin is now peaking beyond this old all-time high, potentially positioning itself for this pre-halving retracement to be over.” Related: Bitcoin Halving: Latest News and Full Coverage by Cointelegraph","The Bitcoin (BTC) price remained above the $69,000 mark on March 29 despite the market experiencing the biggest quarterly Bitcoin futures options expiry event in history. Hao Yang, the global head of derivatives trading at Bybit exchange, told Cointelegraph:“We have experienced the largest option expiration in history for Bybit and Deribit as well. Of the $15.1 billion, $9.53 billion represented the notional value of Bitcoin options expiring at a put/call ratio of 0.84, with a “max pain” price potential of $51,000. Bitcoin options worth over $9.4B set to expire FridayDespite the expiry, the price impact was minimal, said Andrey Stoychev, project manager at Nexo’s prime brokerage division. He told Cointelegraph:“With the current scenario where calls are substantially in the money while puts are converging to zero, delta hedging has largely concluded, and we anticipate minimal price impact from the expiry." Solana validators pass ‘Timely Vote Credits’ plan to speed up transactions,"Solana validators have voted in a proposal aimed at decreasing the latency of consensus “votes” — which could speed up transactions on the blockchain. The proposal calls for a “Timely Vote Credits” mechanism on Solana and was passed on April 9 with 98% votes in favor. It would change how validators are incentivized to make “votes” — a key part of Solana’s consensus mechanism that confirms transactions. Solana Timely Vote Credits voting results. Source: Dune Analytics According to Solana Labs, up until now, validators are given a flat one vote credit whenever they submit a consensus vote on a block that becomes finalized by the network. Over time, validators have found they can maximize earnings by delaying their votes just long enough to ensure they’re voting on the correct fork — at no penalty. The proposal, floated on March 14 by “zantetsu” from Solana validator Shinobi Systems, would implement a variable number of vote credits that are awarded for votes — with more credits given to votes that have less latency. “This will discourage intentional ‘lagging,’ because delaying a vote for any slots decreases the number of credits that vote will earn,” Solana Labs explained. Solana users have raised concerns with the vote credit system in the past. Source: Reddit Currently, Solana Compass shows the blockchain is producing approximately 1,000 “non-vote,” or user transactions per second and nearly 2,000 “vote” transactions per second. Related: Paradigm leads $225M funding round for new ‘Solana killer’ L1 It’s not yet known what the impact of the new mechanism will be, as it’s expected to be implemented sometime after Solana’s v1.18 upgrade slated this month — which includes patches to fix priority fees and network congestion issues on the chain. Meanwhile, Solana has been battling a string of failed transactions which has been blamed on an “implementation bug” from QUIC, a Google-developed data transfer protocol that loops all nodes in on the current state of the network. A bug fix — which involves a reconfiguration for QUIC — is now slated for April 15, should no additional issues come about in testing. Magazine: Is measuring blockchain transactions per second (TPS) stupid in 2024? Big Questions","Solana validators have voted in a proposal aimed at decreasing the latency of consensus “votes” — which could speed up transactions on the blockchain. The proposal calls for a “Timely Vote Credits” mechanism on Solana and was passed on April 9 with 98% votes in favor. It would change how validators are incentivized to make “votes” — a key part of Solana’s consensus mechanism that confirms transactions. Solana Timely Vote Credits voting results. Source: RedditCurrently, Solana Compass shows the blockchain is producing approximately 1,000 “non-vote,” or user transactions per second and nearly 2,000 “vote” transactions per second." Bitcoin fees crash after record daily average of $128 on halving day,"The average fees paid on Bitcoin have sharply fallen just a day after reaching a record average of $128 on April 20 — the day of the fourth Bitcoin halving. As of April 21, Bitcoin (BTC) fees have fallen to an average of $8–$10 for medium-priority transactions, according to mempool.space. Average daily transaction fee on Bitcoin over the last five years. Source: Y Charts Only one day before, Bitcoin clocked $78.3 million in total fees, beating Ethereum by over 24 times, according to Crypto Fees. The day included a staggering 37.7 BTC ($2.4 million) paid to Bitcoin miner ViaBTC in the Bitcoin halving block at block height 840,000 — making it the most sought-after piece of digital real estate in the network’s 15-year history. Much of the demand at block 840,000 came from memecoin and nonfungible token enthusiasts competing to inscribe and etch rare satoshis via the Runes protocol, a new token standard that launched at the halving block. 3,050 transactions were included in that block, meaning the average user paid a little under $800. Largest fees by blockchains and decentralized finance projects on April 20. Source: Crypto Fees The higher-than-normal block fees continued until about block 840,200, according to mempool.space; however, block fees have since fallen to around 1–2 BTC. Related: Bitcoin halving 2024: How to keep BTC mining efficient as rewards decrease The large block fee payouts to miners throughout on halving day meant they weren’t initially impacted by the block subsidy halving from 6.25 BTC to 3.125 BTC. But that’s no longer the case now that the average block fee is well below 3.125. Total fees for block 840,266 came out at 1.64 BTC. With the new block subsidy of 3.125, total rewards came out at 4.76 BTC. Source: mempool.space Meanwhile, fees on Bitcoin have now topped Ethereum for six consecutive days between April 15 and 20, with its seven-day fee average now at $17.8 million. The halving event didn’t have a material impact on Bitcoin’s price, which is up 1.5% since then to $64,840, according to CoinGecko. Magazine: Get Bitcoin or die tryin’: Why hip hop stars love crypto","The average fees paid on Bitcoin have sharply fallen just a day after reaching a record average of $128 on April 20 — the day of the fourth Bitcoin halving. As of April 21, Bitcoin (BTC) fees have fallen to an average of $8–$10 for medium-priority transactions, according to mempool.space. Source: Y ChartsOnly one day before, Bitcoin clocked $78.3 million in total fees, beating Ethereum by over 24 times, according to Crypto Fees. Source: Crypto FeesThe higher-than-normal block fees continued until about block 840,200, according to mempool.space; however, block fees have since fallen to around 1–2 BTC. But that’s no longer the case now that the average block fee is well below 3.125." Reversing layoffs of 2022? Crypto exchanges are adding staff members,"Crypto.com CEO Kris Marszalek reportedly said the exchange has been adding people to its staff in a move that could increase the number of employees by roughly 1,400. According to an April 16 Bloomberg report, Crypto.com, Binance, Coinbase, Gemini, and Kraken have been hiring team members as cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin (BTC) rally ahead of the blockchain’s halving. Many major crypto and technology companies announced significant layoffs in 2022 and early 2023 amid a market downturn, resulting in firms including FTX, Celsius, BlockFi, and others filing for bankruptcy. Marszalek reportedly said Crypto.com had already hired 700 staff members since November 2023 and planned to onboard another 700 for customer service and corporate positions. The CEO said the addition of the staff was aimed at “slowly, thoughtfully, and strategically” supporting plans to increase its number of registered users. According to data from Layoffs.fyi surveying ​​255 companies in the tech industry, there were 7,322 layoffs in March 2024 — a more than 80% decrease compared with 37,963 layoffs in March 2023. Related: Coinbase to cut another 20% of its workforce in second wave of layoffs At the time of publication, Coinbase listed 215 open positions on its website. Kraken listed 81, Gemini listed 80, and Binance listed 347. Many crypto firms reduced their headcounts by up to 20% in 2023 amid regulatory scrutiny and falling token prices. Some of these changes seem to be on their way to reversing amid an all-time high BTC price and approval of spot Bitcoin exchange-traded funds in 2024. However, many firms in the U.S. still face civil lawsuits brought by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission and other regulatory concerns at the state and federal levels. Magazine: ‘AI has killed the industry’: EasyTranslate boss on adapting to change","Crypto.com CEO Kris Marszalek reportedly said the exchange has been adding people to its staff in a move that could increase the number of employees by roughly 1,400. Many major crypto and technology companies announced significant layoffs in 2022 and early 2023 amid a market downturn, resulting in firms including FTX, Celsius, BlockFi, and others filing for bankruptcy. Marszalek reportedly said Crypto.com had already hired 700 staff members since November 2023 and planned to onboard another 700 for customer service and corporate positions. Related: Coinbase to cut another 20% of its workforce in second wave of layoffsAt the time of publication, Coinbase listed 215 open positions on its website. Many crypto firms reduced their headcounts by up to 20% in 2023 amid regulatory scrutiny and falling token prices." Tokenized asset market could hit $16T on public blockchains — RippleX VP,"Traditional finance (TradFi) firms have warmed up to the idea of tokenizing financial assets on public blockchains as the race toward blockchain-based tokenization heats up. According to RippleX senior vice president Markus Infanger, TradFi players are finally bringing financial assets on-chain as they look to deploy for production and solve pain points in various value chains. Speaking exclusively to Cointelegraph during Paris Blockchain Week, Infanger said that TradFi’s use of blockchain is finally becoming tangible. “We’re starting a paradigm shift for blockchain technology, moving beyond the hype and into real utility. It’s starting to unfold,” Infanger said. TradFi wants holistic blockchain solutions The executive said that research estimates pin the future value of tokenized markets at $16 trillion, which is eight times bigger than the total market capitalization of the entire cryptocurrency sector. “A couple of years ago, many of us in this space were envisioning that. It’s getting closer to reality, and it’s happening on public blockchains. At some point, it looked like it would only happen on JPMorgan Coin or IBM.” Infanger said that advanced conversations with various financial institutions are ongoing, and they are exploring tokenization projects to issue assets on the XRP Ledger. These firms already have distribution lined up and can articulate use cases and how they want to use the underlying blockchain. A tangible example of this was HSBC partnering with Ripple-owned technology firm Metaco to allow institutional investors to hold tokenized securities on its new custody platform in November 2023. Infanger added that Ripple’s business is becoming more holistic by combining various solutions that make use of XRPL. While Ripple is widely viewed as “a payments-first company” providing a blockchain-based payment solution to solve economic and financial friction, recent developments are broadening its appeal to both TradFi and decentralized finance (DeFi) players. “We have a custody arm, a payments arm and our contributions to the XRP Ledger. The combination is a holistic digital asset infrastructure value proposition for traditional finance and developers who want to solve DeFi problems,” Infanger explained. Ripple’s stablecoin Ripple’s recently announced plans to issue its own United States dollar-pegged stablecoin on XRPL and Ethereum will complement its offering to institutions. Cointelegraph previously spoke to Ripple chief technology officer David Schwartz about the details of the stablecoin. Infanger added further detail to the impetus behind Ripple’s stablecoin, highlighting that the stablecoin market could reach $2.8 trillion in five years given that there are some $22 trillion that are off-chain. “Right now, we’re at $130 billion, so there’s clear demand, and there’s an expected trajectory of enormous growth. We’re really still at the early days,” Infanger said. Another key driver was constant requests from developers in the XRPL ecosystem for a tier-one stablecoin offering like USD Coin (USDC) or Tether (USDT). Infanger said Ripple had used stablecoins in small-scale experimentation alongside XRP (XRP) and its payment product. “We really envision our institutional DeFi use case, on one hand, tokenization on XRPL and then in our payments product for optionality and some use cases alongside XRP using the stablecoin and for the XRP ecosystem as a whole.” Ripple has not yet confirmed when it will launch its stablecoin or what it will call the XRPL and Ethereum-based token.","Traditional finance (TradFi) firms have warmed up to the idea of tokenizing financial assets on public blockchains as the race toward blockchain-based tokenization heats up. According to RippleX senior vice president Markus Infanger, TradFi players are finally bringing financial assets on-chain as they look to deploy for production and solve pain points in various value chains. Speaking exclusively to Cointelegraph during Paris Blockchain Week, Infanger said that TradFi’s use of blockchain is finally becoming tangible. Ripple’s stablecoinRipple’s recently announced plans to issue its own United States dollar-pegged stablecoin on XRPL and Ethereum will complement its offering to institutions. Infanger said Ripple had used stablecoins in small-scale experimentation alongside XRP (XRP) and its payment product." "Token2049 Dubai preview — tuxedos optional, lifejackets obligatory","Token2049, the annual Web3 conference, opens its doors on Thursday, April 18, but those doors may well be barricaded with sandbags as the desert city has been inundated with a wall of water. The city, which typically gets just 9.5 centimeters (about 4 inches) of rain in a year, has seen close to 15cm (about 6 inches) fall in just 24 hours between Monday and Tuesday evening, throwing the tinder-dry metropolis into chaos. Social media is awash with videos and clips of the unlikely situation, with streets turned to rivers, cars submerged, planes spraying water on flooded runways, and tales of diverted flights and visitors to the conference trapped in their hotels. The city’s international airport, the second busiest in the world with 87 million passengers, told travelers this morning not to come — a first for the desert nation. Source: Dubai International Airport The event itself is still scheduled to go ahead despite the inconveniences visitors are experiencing. The hope is that the return of the kind of weather the Emirates expects for this time of year — blue skies and temperatures around 30 degrees Celsius — will be sufficient to get the city back on its feet and wheels again. Cointelegraph's reporter Ezra Reguerra is in Dubai to report on the event and has sent some eye-popping videos of the city after the storms. TOKEN2049 will run from April 18-19, 2024, at the Madinat Jumeirah Hotel in Dubai. Considered by some as one of tthe leading global Web3 and crypto community events of the year, 2024 marks the first time the event is taking place in Dubai. Tickets sold out well in advance, and 10,000 attendees are expected over the two days. It will bring together founders, executives, and decision-makers from over 4,000 companies and 100 countries. The agenda will cover a range of topics, including decentralized AI, Web3 gaming, DeFi, and blockchain scalability. And, as one would expect from the city of Dubai, the event will be accompanied by exhibitions, live DJ sets, and high-class hospitality. TOKEN2049 actually began on April 15, with a week-long series of meetups, workshops, and parties. The second TOKEN2049 event of the year will take place in Singapore in September.","Source: Dubai International AirportThe event itself is still scheduled to go ahead despite the inconveniences visitors are experiencing. Cointelegraph's reporter Ezra Reguerra is in Dubai to report on the event and has sent some eye-popping videos of the city after the storms. TOKEN2049 will run from April 18-19, 2024, at the Madinat Jumeirah Hotel in Dubai. And, as one would expect from the city of Dubai, the event will be accompanied by exhibitions, live DJ sets, and high-class hospitality. The second TOKEN2049 event of the year will take place in Singapore in September." AMPL depositors complain of frozen funds on Aave,"Depositors of Ampleforth’s AMPL stablecoin are complaining of frozen funds on popular decentralized finance (DeFi) borrowing and lending protocol Aave due to a lending pool shortfall. The issue, which has left AMPL depositors unable to withdraw their assets from Aave, has persisted since December 2023. Other DeFi pools on Aave are not affected by the problem. AMPL is a stablecoin designed to track the 2019 value of the U.S. dollar adjusted for inflation. The protocol increases or decreases the number of tokens available based on whether its price matches its dollar target. In November 2022, Aave became the victim of an alleged market manipulation attack against its Curve (CRV) pool. The attack failed to net any profits for the attacker, but it led to $1.6 million of bad debt for the protocol. In response, AaveDAO voted on Nov. 2, 2022 to freeze deposits and borrows for 17 different tokens, including AMPL. The freezing did not prevent old depositors from withdrawing at that time, only blocking new deposits and borrows. However, in a December 2023 post on the AaveDAO forums, Bored Ghost Developing Labs (BGD Labs), a development team contributing to the Aave protocol, claimed to have discovered an additional problem preventing withdrawals. According to it, a bug in the pool contract had allowed it to be drained of funds, which meant there was no longer enough liquidity to process withdrawals. In response to the issue, an Ampleforth representative suggested that AaveDAO should purchase AMPL tokens and distribute them to users as compensation, but Aave developers have countered with their own proposal to pay out stablecoins instead of AMPL. Aave developers have also asked the Ampleforth team to provide 40% of the compensation package from its own funds. At the time of publication, the Ampleforth team has not confirmed whether it will provide these funds, but it has stated it will continue to offer support to help resolve the problem. On March 31, BGD Labs proposed paying depositors $300,000 worth of USD Coin (USDC). It claimed this was merely an initial distribution and that the remaining amount could potentially be paid out after further debate. Despite not completely resolving the debate, the proposal passed on April 5, with over 99.9% of votes in favor. BGD Labs’ proposal for $300,000 in compensation. Source: AaveDAO, Snapshot Related: Aave purchases 2.7M CRV to clear bad debt following failed Eisenberg attack Aave developers discover liquidity problems for AMPL According to Aave’s GitHub documents, when tokenholders deposit funds into the lending pool, they should receive an equivalent amount of “aTokens” in exchange. These aTokens essentially function as deposit receipts. As the pool receives interest payments, depositors should receive additional aTokens representing their share of these interest payments. However, BGD Labs claimed that the AMPL pool contract is not working as intended: It has a flaw that is causing it to pay out more AMPL aTokens (aAMPL) than the amount of underlying AMPL available. As a result, there is not enough AMPL in the pool to allow depositors to withdraw. BGD Labs stated: “The aToken supply of the asset appeared to be way more than it should, bigger than the sum of the variable debt plus available liquidity. [...] The aAMPL supply is currently not representative of the claims over AMPL underlying. [...] As the utilisation is 100%, no withdrawals can be executed, only repayments and liquidations.” BGD Labs claimed that Ampleforth developers designed and wrote the contract, not AaveDAO contractors. It claimed to have reached out to the Ampleforth team and asked it to determine how much AMPL was owed to each depositor. BGD Labs asked depositors to be patient while the Ampleforth team attempted to come up with a solution to the problem. Ampleforth proposes token buyback by Aave collector On Jan. 31, Ampleforth developer Ahmed Naguib Aly, known simply as “Naguib” on the Aave governance forum, said the team was aware of the problem and working to solve it. “We have been coordinating with [AaveDAO risk managers] Chaos labs and Gauntlet to get to an effective resolution,” he wrote. On March 8, Naguib gave a detailed assessment of the problem and proposed a solution. According to him, the pool was facing a shortfall because some depositors had withdrawn before the excessive interest payments were detected. As a result, these early withdrawals had drained the pool of funds: “More interest was credited to depositors than was charged from borrowers. This discrepancy has led to situations where some depositors were able to withdraw more than what should have been possible under normal circumstances. As a direct consequence, we’re now facing a liquidity shortfall, preventing current depositors from withdrawing their funds.” According to Naguib, Ampleforth was unable to determine the proper amount of AMPL that should be paid out to each depositor at that time. However, he expected the team to determine these values by March 22. Naguib noted that the Aave protocol owns some tokens within its “Aave collector” contract. Once the correct amounts of AMPL owed to each depositor became known, these tokens could be used to reimburse users, he suggested. An “upper bound” of 715,335 AMPL (approximately $1.3 million at the March 8 price) would be needed to fully compensate users. Naguib proposed that AaveDAO purchase AMPL on the open market using these reserves, which should then be distributed to depositors through a contract to be built in the future. On March 17, Naguib withdrew his proposal, stating BGD Labs had disagreed with it. “BGD labs reached out to us that they don’t find the proposal to swap AMPLs and release it to holders to be an effective method to resolve the situation and they want to propose a different resolution,” he stated. Aave developers propose stablecoin compensation On March 21, BGD Labs and Aave risk management consultant Chaos Labs introduced a joint proposal to compensate depositors. The two teams estimated the shortfall at 533,973 AMPL (approximately $1 million at the March 21 price). According to them, this amount of AMPL represented over 30% of the circulating supply. Buying this much AMPL would “be inefficient, given its relatively illiquid status and effectively altering the underlying economics of the asset.” Instead, they proposed that depositors should be compensated based on the average U.S. dollar value of AMPL over the four-month period that has passed since the Nov. 22 freeze. This would equate to $1.198 per AMPL or $639,700 total, which could be paid out in stablecoins such as USDC. Chaos Labs and BGD Labs also suggested that Ampleforth should provide 40% of the funds to compensate depositors, with AaveDAO footing the bill for the other 60%: “Considering that the problem is on a contract of Aave, but that the implementation was done by the Ampleforth team, we propose a 60% (Aave) 40% (Ampleforth) split on the total to be deposited on the smart contract for the distribution.” This new proposal was criticized by many of the forum participants. Some critics claimed that it was unfair for depositors to receive stablecoins as compensation. “Aspects of the proposed resolution include paying aAMPL holders a below market rate amount of USDC instead of actual AMPL,” user Fiddlekins stated in a post. This is unreasonable, they claimed, because “repaying them [depositors] in USDC just transfers the burden of price impact to them if they wish to then rebuy AMPL with it, and denies them the ability to sell the asset they should have for its current elevated price if they don’t.” Fiddlekins mentioned that AaveDAO sold 283,500 aAMPL of its reserves on Jan. 23, receiving $363,000 in exchange, which the user considered to be inconsistent with the view that AMPL is too high of a price to buy back. “Put bluntly: the DAO seems happy to sell low but not to buy high, and argues that lenders should bear the brunt of that,” they said. Other critics took issue with the idea of a 60%/40% funding split between AaveDAO and Ampleforth. “Why would Forth DAO pay out it if there are issues on AAVE’s smart contract?” RomanPope asked. In response, QuantumEvolver argued that both sides were to blame. “The AMPL developers made a mistake in the smart contract from start, and they still cannot determine what exactly the mistake was. And AAVE is also responsible since they should have audited the smart contract before integrating it into the AAVE platform to make sure it would work fine.” Related: Aave deploys DeFi protocol on BNB Chain BGD Labs proposes $300,000 compensation plan On March 31, BGD Labs made a new proposal: AaveDAO would pay out $300,000 in stablecoins to depositors, which it would obtain from its reserves held in the Aave collector contract. It said the proposal was necessary because “we don’t have any type of news from the Ampleforth team.” If Ampleforth wants to contribute to the compensation plan at a later date, “we expect communication in this forum,” BGD Labs stated, adding that such a contribution “technically will be perfectly doable.” The proposal was confirmed by a vote of over 99% on April 5. In its post revealing the proposal, BGD Labs claimed that the amount owed to depositors “will be more than 300’000 USD,” implying that even after passage, at least one more distribution will be needed to make depositors whole. Ampleforth’s response On April 7, Naguib posted a statement that attempted to explain Ampleforth’s position on the matter. He claimed the team became aware of the incorrect interest payments in May 2022. However, at that time, “the discrepancy was small, well below the AMPL reserve balance.” Aave was also planning to transition to Aave version 3 at the time, and the two teams agreed that the pool should be frozen until this transition was completed. According to Naguib, they also agreed that AaveDAO should use its AMPL reserves to cover any shortfalls if it becomes insolvent before all depositors withdraw. After this discussion, deposits and borrows were frozen for the AMPL pool on Nov. 22, 2022. But on Nov. 25, deposits were reenabled, leading to a greater shortfall for the pool over time. Then, AaveDAO sold its AMPL reserves on Jan. 23, 2023, which made covering the shortfall much more difficult for AaveDAO. According to Naguib, Ampleforth was initially unaware of both of these events. When the Ampleforth team became aware that the shortfall had grown much larger, it suggested what it saw as a “simple and non-controversial resolution,” which was “to pick a date before the discrepancy started growing exponentially, and assume lenders were holding AMPL since that point.” This calculation would have allowed a compensation package to be produced quickly, and it could have been covered by some combination of AaveDAO reserves and Ampleforth funds. Naguib claimed that this proposal was made privately to the BGD Labs team. BGD Labs reportedly rejected Ampleforth’s suggestion and instead asked it to calculate the amount owed based on off-chain simulations of AAVE platform behavior. This simulation process took longer but eventually led to the Ampleforth team’s March 8 proposal for AaveDAO to buy back AMPL to repay depositors. Naguib stated that the Ampleforth team “will continue offering the necessary support for investigation and for BGD Labs in reaching a proposal that satisfies the community,” but also argued that BGD Labs should “take the lead to a resolution,” as the team believes “they [BGD Labs] are best positioned to perform this work.”","Depositors of Ampleforth’s AMPL stablecoin are complaining of frozen funds on popular decentralized finance (DeFi) borrowing and lending protocol Aave due to a lending pool shortfall. The issue, which has left AMPL depositors unable to withdraw their assets from Aave, has persisted since December 2023. Aave developers have also asked the Ampleforth team to provide 40% of the compensation package from its own funds. Aave developers propose stablecoin compensationOn March 21, BGD Labs and Aave risk management consultant Chaos Labs introduced a joint proposal to compensate depositors. After this discussion, deposits and borrows were frozen for the AMPL pool on Nov. 22, 2022." GameFi ecosystem makes a comeback amid surging crypto prices,"After a dormant 2022 and much-muted 2023, GameFi projects are making a comeback as the bull market rages. This week, move-to-earn protocol StepN announced it would partner with Adidas for a 1,000 Genesis Edition nonfungible tokens (NFT) drop on Solana. The launch is part of an ongoing one-year partnership between the two firms that will see a mixture of NFTs and wearable sneaker releases in the future. Each NFT sneaker from Genesis Edition will be valued at 10,000 GMT ($2,200). Created by FSL in 2021, StepN allows users to earn rewards for walking, jogging, or running. Rewards are available after users purchase a virtual Sneaker NFT and link their smartphones. By interacting with the app, users earn GMT tokens, which have an inflationary mechanism, a supply cap of 6 billion and a current diluted market capitalization of $1.2 billion. ""Partnership between the most widely used lifestyle app and a global brand like Adidas are now a reality indicates the direction lifestyle rewards are going,” commented Shiti Manghani, CEO of StepN. Last week, the move-to-earn protocol also announced a $30 million airdrop for its loyal users. StepN's NFT sneaker mechanics For other protocols, it's more about the hardware. Earlier this month, Ordz Games revealed its first Web3 handheld gaming device, “BitBoy One.” Inspired by the first-generation Nintendo GameBoy from 1989, the device allows players to earn Bitcoin (BTC) via retro-style games. “Through BitBoy’s native applications connected to the Bitcoin blockchain, users can play a wide variety of video games that are forever inscribed on the Bitcoin blockchain as ordinals,” wrote Ordz Games staff. “Choices range from HTML games to on-chain emulators and ROM,” they added. Both Bluetooth and WiFi are supported for multiplayer activity. In addition, every BitBoy device comes bundled with a one-to-one 3D rendering of the physical device in the form of ordinal inscriptions, which can then be viewed on a VR device such as Apple Vision Pro. The device saw its official unveiling at Paris Blockchain Week. The BitBoy One game device (X) Other projects have shifted their attention to video games. ARPG Seraph: In the Darkness, built on Arbitrum and developed by Seraph Studio, recently achieved sales of over 11,000 Ether (ETH) through multiple in-game NFT sales consisting of heroes, priority passes, gear, and others. Seraph Studio is backed by Korean gaming giant Actoz Soft. Set for pre-season launch on April 19, the game features a dark medieval setting where players can customize their heroes, battle monsters, and earn loot. The game has teased upcoming features in its pre-season that allow players to rent their in-game NFT equipment to earn rewards as well as discoverable treasure NFTs. Seraph: In the Darkness has been in development since 2021, with a total of $8 million spent on operations and research. During this time, developers have also been incorporating new technologies, with features such as multiplayer AI companionship available in the final release. The game is scheduled for launch on PC, iOS, and Android. In the Darkness blockchain gameplay As per data from DappRadar, the number of unique active wallets in GameFi has more than doubled over the past year to 2.54 million. Last December, gaming studio founders Yat Siu and Johnson Yeh predicted that “tens of millions” of players would enter Web3 gaming this year. Despite their enthusiasm, GameFi projects have also been criticized for prioritizing the “finance” aspect of gaming over fun, with several notable collapses in the past year. Related: Is GameFi subject to the same market forces as the traditional game industry?","Each NFT sneaker from Genesis Edition will be valued at 10,000 GMT ($2,200). Created by FSL in 2021, StepN allows users to earn rewards for walking, jogging, or running. Rewards are available after users purchase a virtual Sneaker NFT and link their smartphones. By interacting with the app, users earn GMT tokens, which have an inflationary mechanism, a supply cap of 6 billion and a current diluted market capitalization of $1.2 billion. StepN's NFT sneaker mechanicsFor other protocols, it's more about the hardware." Chainlink aims to bolster cross-chain security via Transporter,"Chainlink’s newly launched cross-chain messaging app aims to solve the pressing security concerns around cross-chain crypto transfers, a Chainlink spokesperson told Cointelegraph: “Chainlink CCIP, which underpins Transporter, is the only cross-chain protocol that achieves level-5 security, a defense-in-depth design to give users true peace of mind."" Chainlink announced the launch of Transporter, a cross-chain messaging app for bridging tokens, on April 11. Built on Chainlink’s Cross-Chain Interoperability Protocol (CCIP), Transporter aims to foster more secure cross-chain crypto transfers with a beginner-friendly app interface. Cross-chain bridges help users facilitate transactions between different blockchain networks. They represent some of the most significant points of vulnerability in crypto. In 2022, Axie Infinity’s Ronin Bridge was drained for more than $600 million worth of cryptocurrency, as one of the largest crypto exploits in history. The exploit targeted a private key multi-signature scheme, a security measure that ultimately proved inadequate. Transporter enables users to track their cross-chain transactions in real-time through Chainlink’s CCIP Explorer, without charging additional transaction fees beyond the CCIP service provider fee. It currently supports the Arbitrum, Avalanche, Base, BNB Chain, Ethereum, Optimism, Polygon, and WEMIX blockchain networks. Related: Funds hacked in 2024 increased by 15.4% vs. the same period in 2023 — Immunefi Cross-chain vulnerabilities account for 50% of DeFi hacks Since 2016, decentralized finance (DeFi) protocols have been hacked for a total of $5.85 billion worth of cryptocurrency. Cross-chain bridges account for over 48%, or $2.83 billion of the total value lost to exploits, according to DeFiLlama data. Total Value Hacked. Source: DeFiLlama Transporter aims to reduce these vulnerabilities by facilitating safer cross-chain transfers for both institutions and retail users: “Transferring crypto across chains has historically been a risky activity, with bridge hacks accounting for nearly 50% of all value hacked in Web3. Transporter leverages Chainlink CCIP’s unmatched levels of security, which include an independent Risk Management Network that continuously monitors and validates the behavior of every cross-chain transaction over CCIP.” While the amount of cross-chain exploits has fallen since the beginning of the year, hackers are still looking to exploit blockchain bridge vulnerabilities. At the beginning of January, Orbit Chain was hacked for $81 million worth of digital assets, due to a cross-chain bridge vulnerability. Related: Binance Labs shifts investment focus to Bitcoin DeFi","Chainlink’s newly launched cross-chain messaging app aims to solve the pressing security concerns around cross-chain crypto transfers, a Chainlink spokesperson told Cointelegraph:“Chainlink CCIP, which underpins Transporter, is the only cross-chain protocol that achieves level-5 security, a defense-in-depth design to give users true peace of mind."" Chainlink announced the launch of Transporter, a cross-chain messaging app for bridging tokens, on April 11. Built on Chainlink’s Cross-Chain Interoperability Protocol (CCIP), Transporter aims to foster more secure cross-chain crypto transfers with a beginner-friendly app interface. Total Value Hacked. At the beginning of January, Orbit Chain was hacked for $81 million worth of digital assets, due to a cross-chain bridge vulnerability." Dmail co-founder says email must be decentralized and protect data sovereignty,"The crypto market is hot, and prices have been in “up only” mode since the start of the year, but looking at the developments beyond Bitcoin and memecoins, the industry’s focus on decentralization remains intact, and for good reason. Just this week, multiple news outlets reported on a lawsuit against Meta claiming the tech giant allegedly gave Netflix access to Facebook users’ direct messages in exchange for Netflix agreeing to spend up to $150 million in ads in 2017. A separate incident, brought to light on March 30, involves United States telecom giant AT&T automatically resetting millions of customer account passwords after acknowledging a data seller published 73 million AT&T customer records from a data breach that occurred in 2019. As usual, the list of data breaches and instances of misuse of customer and user data goes on and on. Just do a quick Google search to see for yourself. On episode 33 of The Agenda podcast, hosts Ray Salmond and Jonathan DeYoung sit down with Dmail co-founder Daniel James to discuss why everyone needs everything to be decentralized, including email. Decentralize it! Spam, phishing emails, and the risk of having one’s personal data either deleted or sold are common concerns shared among email users, and James says that “blockchain really enhances security” as “there’s no central point of failure that hackers can target.” James added that Dmail prioritizes privacy by encrypting every email, which makes it “harder for attackers to compromise email accounts and intercept communications.” The decentralized nature of the service also gives users data sovereignty. “It’s a battle world. It’s a more moral world where you are not the product. You are actually gaining something from this platform. And that’s really what attracts most people into Web3 initially, is that you do have data sovereignty. For me, the foray into Web3 was mostly about Big Tech essentially becoming the arbiters of truth and really overstepping the mark, getting political and censoring certain things. To me, that’s not the job for Big Tech, regardless of your political affiliation. That should not be happening.” James explained that “email solves these kinds of problems, but it also brings something completely different to the table. It brings the Web3, the blockchain layer, and the possibilities are endless.” When asked how Dmail or any decentralized platform could supplant Gmail’s dominance, James suggested that the ultimate objective is not to replace Gmail but rather to “replicate” their “fantastic user experience and user interface” while circumventing the “ethical concerns.” Related: Google’s inclusion of Bitcoin wallet balances sparks privacy debate James said: “I think it’s a beautiful product, the way that it’s built. And if we can replicate the UI [user interface] and UX [user experience], that’s great. But there are ethical concerns. There is the fact that you can be bombarded with unsolicited emails. Your data is not your own. Your storage is not fully decentralized. The revenue streams are essentially the only trickle-down within the company itself. So, that’s a very good example of centralization. And so I think that with Gmail, the value proposition is altogether different. You own your own data, you own your own drive, everything is your own as well as the data autonomy.” To hear more — including James’ crypto origin story and future plans for Dmail — listen to the full episode on Cointelegraph’s podcasts page, Apple Podcasts or Spotify. And don’t forget to check out Cointelegraph’s full lineup of other shows! Magazine: Creating ‘good’ AGI that won’t kill us all: Crypto’s Artificial Superintelligence Alliance This article is for general information purposes and is not intended to be and should not be taken as legal or investment advice. The views, thoughts, and opinions expressed here are the author’s alone and do not necessarily reflect or represent the views and opinions of Cointelegraph.","As usual, the list of data breaches and instances of misuse of customer and user data goes on and on. On episode 33 of The Agenda podcast, hosts Ray Salmond and Jonathan DeYoung sit down with Dmail co-founder Daniel James to discuss why everyone needs everything to be decentralized, including email. And that’s really what attracts most people into Web3 initially, is that you do have data sovereignty. That should not be happening.”James explained that “email solves these kinds of problems, but it also brings something completely different to the table. And if we can replicate the UI [user interface] and UX [user experience], that’s great." Binance to return to India after paying $2M fine for non-compliance: Report,"Binance crypto exchange is set to return to India after a four-month ban by paying a $2-million fine for non-compliance, according to a report published in The Economic Times. Binance will be the second overseas exchange after KuCoin to mark a return to the country after India’s financial regulatory body blocked access to crypto exchanges for non-compliance. The Indian Ministry of Finance’s Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU) blocked access to nine foreign crypto exchange’s URLs and mobile applications, including Binance, in the first week of January for failing to adhere to the country’s Anti-Money Laundering Act. Binance reportedly accounted for more than 90% of Indian crypto trading volume before its ban in January earlier this year. Indian users flocked to foreign crypto exchanges like Binance to bypass the severe tax impositions, which prompted the government to ban overseas exchanges not registered with FIU. Now, with FIU registration, foreign crypto exchanges like Binance have to adhere to the same rules and regulations as Indian exchanges. KuCoin has started a 1% tax deduction at source (TDS), and other foreign crypto exchanges looking to mark an entry into India will have to follow the same. Related: Taxman: India’s new tax policies could prove fatal for crypto industry A person with knowledge of the matter told The Economic Times that it is “unfortunate that it took (Binance) more than two years to realize there is no room for negotiations, and (that) no global powerhouse can command special treatment, especially at the cost of exposing the country’s financial system to vulnerabilities,” reported ET. Binance has a long history in India. It was believed to have acquired the local crypto exchange WazirX in 2019 but later claimed the deal never went through. Binance claimed it only provided wallet services for WazirX as a tech solution and that WazirX was responsible for all other aspects of the exchange, including user sign-up, Know Your Customer (KYC), trading and initiating withdrawals. While KuCoin and Binance have decided to become FIU-registered entities in India, OKX, another leading crypto exchange among the nine blocked crypto exchanges, shut its operations completely, citing the regulatory burden. Cointelegraph has approached Binance for comment but has yet to hear back. Magazine: Bitcoin Halving will pump games, Shrapnel’s ‘simple’ secret revealed: Web3 Gamer","Binance crypto exchange is set to return to India after a four-month ban by paying a $2-million fine for non-compliance, according to a report published in The Economic Times. Binance will be the second overseas exchange after KuCoin to mark a return to the country after India’s financial regulatory body blocked access to crypto exchanges for non-compliance. Binance reportedly accounted for more than 90% of Indian crypto trading volume before its ban in January earlier this year. Now, with FIU registration, foreign crypto exchanges like Binance have to adhere to the same rules and regulations as Indian exchanges. It was believed to have acquired the local crypto exchange WazirX in 2019 but later claimed the deal never went through." Tokenization’s next phase requires real-world data integration — Chainlink,"Researchers from the blockchain oracle platform Chainlink believe asset managers have a “sizable” opportunity to jump into tokenization as financial asset infrastructures continue to go digital. In an industry report titled “Beyond Token Issuance,” blockchain oracle platform Chainlink explained where the opportunity lies and how interoperability and real-world data could unlock the value of tokenized assets. Industries and markets that could benefit from tokenization. Source: Chainlink The report laid down the potential benefits of tokenization for asset managers. This includes unlocking dormant capital, giving assets greater availability and creating novel revenue models. Apart from these, Chainlink said that asset managers could also create unified client portfolios, differentiate their service offerings, and improve their risk management as tokenization allows for more automated risk assessment. Within the report, Chainlink also argued that blockchains continued to evolve into an “integral component of the existing financial ecosystem.” In addition, the company highlighted that traditional and blockchain-based assets are already merging into a single financial ecosystem. The researchers believe this resulted from continued digitization, as blockchains offered superior infrastructure for asset storage and transactions. Related: New crypto users shouldn’t ‘rush into DeFi’ — Security firms Ryan Lovell, director of capital markets at Chainlink Labs, told Cointelegraph that tokenization has been in a research and development phase for several years. Lovell explained that institutions were bringing simple account balances on-chain and were trying to figure out the potential impact of tokenization for their businesses only at a basic level. Lovell said: “This was kind of like building a concept car without an engine or interior — just a basic shell of what the future will hold.” However, the executive believes that the next phase for tokenization will be more about building foundational infrastructure. This is necessary to make tokenized assets composable and programmable across traditional systems and private and public chains. Meanwhile, the Chainlink executive believes that enhancing tokens with real-world data and letting them become interoperable across blockchains and traditional systems could unlock powerful applications. Lovell said these use cases would feature more transparency, lower costs and more streamlined administrative processes than traditional finance infrastructure. “We’re actively working on several exciting initiatives at the moment to enable institutions to go beyond mere token issuance, manage tokenized assets throughout their entire lifecycle, and transact across the cross-chain economy,” Lovell added. Magazine: ChainLinkGod was in High School when he started the account! X Hall of Flame","Researchers from the blockchain oracle platform Chainlink believe asset managers have a “sizable” opportunity to jump into tokenization as financial asset infrastructures continue to go digital. In an industry report titled “Beyond Token Issuance,” blockchain oracle platform Chainlink explained where the opportunity lies and how interoperability and real-world data could unlock the value of tokenized assets. Source: ChainlinkThe report laid down the potential benefits of tokenization for asset managers. This is necessary to make tokenized assets composable and programmable across traditional systems and private and public chains. Meanwhile, the Chainlink executive believes that enhancing tokens with real-world data and letting them become interoperable across blockchains and traditional systems could unlock powerful applications." Elizabeth Warren supports enhanced US sanction options for stablecoins,"United States Senator Elizabeth Warren has sent a letter to Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen commenting on Deputy Treasury Secretary Wally Adeyemo’s testimony before the Senate Banking Committee on April 9. She pursued the same line of thought as she did during the hearing — Anti-Money Laundering and Combating the Financing of Terrorism (AML/CFT). Warren expressed her support in the letter for the legislative adoption of more comprehensive AML/CFT measures for stablecoins. Adeyemo appeared at the Senate hearing to discuss Treasury proposals for expanding its sanctions powers to blockchain validator node operators, among other measures. The Treasury listed its enhanced enforcement goals in response to gaps in current regulation in a document Warren calls a “letter to Congress” dated November 2023. Warren wrote: “Those authorities must be adopted into any legislation Congress advances to create a new regulatory framework around the $157 billion stablecoin market.” Warren was apparently not referring to the stablecoin bill introduced in the Senate by Senators Kirsten Gillibrand and Cynthia Lummis on April 17, the day after the date of her letter. The 179-page Lummis-Gillibrand bill makes almost no mention of AML/CFT. Related: Elections may swing Senate Banking Committee toward crypto, Sen. Lummis says Rather, it seems Warren had in mind a bill that is expected to come out of the House of Representatives from Finance Committee Chair Patrick McHenry and ranking member Maxine Waters. Warren sent them a letter on April 8 voicing much of the same concerns as in her letter to Yellen. Warren concluded her letter to the treasury secretary by saying: “Stablecoin legislation […] must include the full suite of AML tools that Treasury requested in its November 2023 letter to Congress as necessary to effectively combat that threat [of terrorism financing].” Digital Chamber Senior Policy Associate Taylor Barr commented on X, possibly with the Lummis-Gillibrand bill in mind: “Would love Sen. Warren’s take on the new bill’s increased consumer protection language, added receivership text, or the Fed/OCC’s enforcement power. All this is conveniently left out of her talking points...” Magazine: Unstablecoins: Depegging, bank runs and other risks loom","United States Senator Elizabeth Warren has sent a letter to Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen commenting on Deputy Treasury Secretary Wally Adeyemo’s testimony before the Senate Banking Committee on April 9. She pursued the same line of thought as she did during the hearing — Anti-Money Laundering and Combating the Financing of Terrorism (AML/CFT). Warren expressed her support in the letter for the legislative adoption of more comprehensive AML/CFT measures for stablecoins. The Treasury listed its enhanced enforcement goals in response to gaps in current regulation in a document Warren calls a “letter to Congress” dated November 2023. Warren sent them a letter on April 8 voicing much of the same concerns as in her letter to Yellen." X payments details released: App to become your bank account,"X users will one day be able to use the platform to send money to other users, purchase goods from stores, and even earn interest on the money in their accounts as one would do with a bank account, said the head of payments at X. In an April 22 post, X payments chief information security officer Christopher Stanley said the payment capabilities of X would go beyond “just tipping” and expand to include an in-app wallet capable of storing and sending money to any other X users. “Think Venmo at first. Then, as things evolve, you can gain interest, buy products, eventually use it to buy things in stores (think Apple Pay),” said Stanley. Stanley added that the “end goal” of payments on X was to create a fully functioning financial ecosystem where users never have to withdraw funds to conduct typical transactions. “The end goal is if you ever have any incentive to take money out of our system, then we have failed, you shouldn’t ever need to take money out because you should be able to do anything you need on our platform.” Stanley’s comments come just three days after X secured a money transmitter license in the state of Tenessee on April 19. With the latest license secured, X has now received money-transmitting licenses in 25 states in the United States, according to the Nationwide Multi-State Licensing System (NMLS). X has been approved for money transmitter licenses in 25 states. Source: NMLS On Dec. 21, 2023, X’s executive chairman, Elon Musk, told ARK Invest CEO Cathie Wood that he plans to launch in-app payment services on X midway through 2024. Related: X launches dedicated payments account, crypto community speculates At the time, he said he’d hoped to launch financial services on the app sooner but had been “weighed down” by bureaucratic processes. Several commentators have shared that X’s upcoming payments feature will initially only offer support for fiat currencies; however, Musk has reportedly instructed developers at X to build the platform’s payments system in such a way that crypto functionality can be added in the future. Despite Musk showing a high level of enthusiasm for cryptocurrency in the past, with Tesla still holding 9,720 Bitcoin (BTC) on its books and Dogecoin (DOGE) being an accepted currency in the electric car company’s merchandise store, Musk has splashed cold water on any hopes of crypto integration on X. In December, he told Wood that he spends “hardly any time” thinking about cryptocurrency. Since then, he has not made any statements confirming that crypto would be used for X payments. Magazine: How to get better crypto predictions from ChatGPT, Humane AI pin slammed: AI Eye","X users will one day be able to use the platform to send money to other users, purchase goods from stores, and even earn interest on the money in their accounts as one would do with a bank account, said the head of payments at X. In an April 22 post, X payments chief information security officer Christopher Stanley said the payment capabilities of X would go beyond “just tipping” and expand to include an in-app wallet capable of storing and sending money to any other X users. Stanley added that the “end goal” of payments on X was to create a fully functioning financial ecosystem where users never have to withdraw funds to conduct typical transactions. Related: X launches dedicated payments account, crypto community speculatesAt the time, he said he’d hoped to launch financial services on the app sooner but had been “weighed down” by bureaucratic processes. Since then, he has not made any statements confirming that crypto would be used for X payments." Ethereum layer 2s to hit $1T market cap by 2030: VanEck,"Ethereum’s layer 2 scaling networks will hit a $1 trillion market capitalization in six years and will be made up of thousands of use case-specific chains, according to analysts from investment manager VanEck. Layer-2 blockchains are set to capitalize on Ethereum’s “primary challenge” — its “limited capacity to process, store, and compute data,” VanEck’s senior digital assets investment analyst Patrick Bush and digital assets research head Matthew Sigel said in an April 3 report. Busha and Sigel reached their $1 trillion market cap prediction by estimating Ethereum would take up 60% of the market share across all public blockchains and then estimating the volume of assets within the Ethereum ecosystem. There are currently 46 Ethereum L2s with $39 billion total value locked, the largest being Arbirtum with $18 billion, according to L2BEAT. “Ethereum’s dominance in smart contracts faces a critical hurdle: scalability,” the analysts wrote. “While the network offers unparalleled security and decentralization, transaction fees and processing times soar when usage intensifies.” Ethereum’s development is now focused on bettering its ability to process its layer-2’s transaction data, they said — evident in its recent Dencun update which helped to lower L2 transaction fees through the specialized data-saving feature, “Blobs.” Data publishing costs per L2 network to Ethereum in terms of Ether (ETH). Source: VanEck The analysts said there was future potential for “substantially more” revenues to be generated on L2s over the base Ethereum network. “We expect L2 revenues to exceed Ethereum’s because Ethereum cannot match the transaction throughput or user experience of L2s.” The “cutthroat competition,” however, left Bush and Sigel “generally bearish” on the long-term value for a majority of L2-related tokens. They noted the top seven Ethereum L2 tokens already have a $40 billion fully diluted valuation and “many strong projects” launching over the next 18 months will swell that to $100 billion. “It seems a bridge too far for the crypto market to absorb even limited amounts of that supply without massive discounts,” they added. Related: ‘No bridges or wrapping’ — dWallet and Avail are building native Bitcoin rollups The analysts forecasted a “future of thousands of use-case-specific” L2s with just “a few major players” part of the general-purpose L2 market. These thousands of use-specific networks would be “segmented by sector, application, or function” with some chains built for a specific purpose, like a decentralized social media-specific L2 with accompanying apps. The handful of general-purpose chains will be due to the network effect — where those blockchains become more valuable because there are more users, the analysts said. “It is also clear that most roll-ups will eventually move towards the zero-knowledge framework (ZKU) due to its many advantages,” they added. Magazine: Is measuring blockchain transactions per second (TPS) stupid in 2024? Big Questions","Ethereum’s layer 2 scaling networks will hit a $1 trillion market capitalization in six years and will be made up of thousands of use case-specific chains, according to analysts from investment manager VanEck. Busha and Sigel reached their $1 trillion market cap prediction by estimating Ethereum would take up 60% of the market share across all public blockchains and then estimating the volume of assets within the Ethereum ecosystem. There are currently 46 Ethereum L2s with $39 billion total value locked, the largest being Arbirtum with $18 billion, according to L2BEAT. Source: VanEckThe analysts said there was future potential for “substantially more” revenues to be generated on L2s over the base Ethereum network. They noted the top seven Ethereum L2 tokens already have a $40 billion fully diluted valuation and “many strong projects” launching over the next 18 months will swell that to $100 billion." 2 on-chain metrics suggest Bitcoin at its ‘best moment to buy’,"Bitcoin could be entering into an attractive buy zone according to two popular metrics used by cryptocurrency analysts to track on-chain trading activity. The market value to realized value (MVRV) and open interest (OI) weighted funding rate metrics could suggest Bitcoin (BTC) is at an attractive entry point for traders. “This is the best moment to buy Bitcoin,” pseudonymous trader Mister Crypto told his 94,100 X followers in an April 23 post on X. Bitcoin’s price is $64,230 at the time of publication. Source: CoinMarketCap Bitcoin’s OI weighted funding rate — which represents the cost of holding Bitcoin futures positions — breached positive territory on April 24 after 24-hours in the negative zone, posting 0.0093%, according to CoinGlass data. Despite the upswing, it is still significantly lower than the 0.0714% recorded at the beginning of April, a correction that analysts view as favorable for the market. “One of the healthiest market resets I have seen in a long time,” on-chain analyst Checkmate declared in an April 24 post. “Rates holding strong. Bitcoin ready for liftoff,” Crypto Banter host Kyle Doops added in an April 24 post. Related: $1M Bitcoin price still in play amid ‘macro liquidity surge’ — Arthur Hayes The higher funding rates signal increased interest in long trades, reflecting a more bullish sentiment in the market. The last time Bitcoin’s OI-weighted funding rate peaked significantly in early March, Bitcoin reached an all-time high of $69,200 on the same day. Just a week later, on March 14, it surpassed that milestone again, climbing to $73,835, per CoinMarketCap data. However, founder of the Capriole Investments fund, Charles Edwards, told Cointelegraph that while funding rates are a good indicator “broadly speaking,” it no longer carries the same level of certainty as it did a few years ago. “2018 through 2020 and 2021, that sort of three-year window, it wasn’t talked about much. It wasn’t understood, and it was a hundred percent hit rate metric, where if it went negative, it was almost a hundred percent guaranteed; if you went long, you would make money.” Although now there are “so many more parties involved, it’s a bit more of a complex metric to consider,” according to Edwards. Bitcoin’s OI-weighted funding rate has declined significantly since the start of April. Source: CoinGlass Meanwhile, the MVRV indicator — which aims to identify when Bitcoin is over or undervalued relative to its fair value — also suggests Bitcoin has headed further into favorable buying conditions. At the time of publication, Bitcoin’s MVRV score is 2.32, down 6.45% since the start of April, according to LookIntoBitcoin data. An MVRV score above 3.5 suggests that the market is almost at its peak, whereas a score below one indicates that it has bottomed out. Bitcoin’s MVRV score has dropped 6.45% since the start of April. Source: LookIntoBitcoin Edwards pointed out that the current MVRV levels indicate “we’ve got quite a bit of leeway over the next year.” However, he explained that the current buying opportunity is far less lucrative compared to those available as recently as two years ago. “It’s not a deep value opportunity that it was a year ago or two years ago when it was way lower. But it’s also not screaming ‘overvaluation,’ which is four or five or six.” Magazine: Get Bitcoin or die tryin’: Why hip hop stars love crypto This article does not contain investment advice or recommendations. Every investment and trading move involves risk, and readers should conduct their own research when making a decision.","Bitcoin could be entering into an attractive buy zone according to two popular metrics used by cryptocurrency analysts to track on-chain trading activity. The market value to realized value (MVRV) and open interest (OI) weighted funding rate metrics could suggest Bitcoin (BTC) is at an attractive entry point for traders. The last time Bitcoin’s OI-weighted funding rate peaked significantly in early March, Bitcoin reached an all-time high of $69,200 on the same day. At the time of publication, Bitcoin’s MVRV score is 2.32, down 6.45% since the start of April, according to LookIntoBitcoin data. An MVRV score above 3.5 suggests that the market is almost at its peak, whereas a score below one indicates that it has bottomed out." Japan’s Sony Bank tests yen-backed stablecoin for gaming and sports IP payments,"Japan’s Sony Bank — the financial business unit of the Sony Group Corporation — said it has begun experimenting with issuing its own stablecoin pegged to fiat currencies, such as the Japanese yen. According to a report from local media outlet Nikkei on April 4, the trial is set to occur on the Polygon blockchain and in collaboration with the Belgium-based blockchain company SettleMint. The reports were confirmed by Jun Watanabe, the president and representative director of Sony Network Communications, in a post on X. Sony Bank said it will assess any legal issues that may be tied to transferring yen-backed stablecoins. It anticipates these experiments will stretch out over the next few months. The banking firm said by utilizing stablecoins, it could potentially take advantage of lower fees for individuals when sending money and making payments. It also said it would consider it as a form of payment for businesses that use intellectual property (IP) owned by the Sony Group, including games and sports. The Sony Group has recently been experimenting with incorporating other Web3 technologies in its operations, as its video game division filed a patent in March 2023 to adopt nonfungible tokens (NFTs) in an initiative it called “NFT framework for transferring and using Digital Assets between game platforms.” This move was in an effort to provide its gamers with more opportunities associated with their in-game assets. Related: Sony developed an AI system to create fantasy NPC personas from dialogue In September 2023, Sony Network Communications entered into a venture with Singapore-based Web3 infrastructure developer Startale Labs to build Sony’s own blockchain network. At the time, Watanabe said the company aspires to create a global infrastructure that “underpins the Web3 era” and drives innovation across existing industries. The blockchain is anticipated to launch sometime in 2024. In a post on X on April 5, Watanabe said that the fastest way to onboard “billions” into Web3 is to work with existing assets. Japan, Sony’s home country, has also been leaning into the Web3 community in the last year. In February, the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry said that it is aiming to increase strategic domestic investments into Web3 startups by allowing limited partnership firms to acquire and hold crypto assets. Magazine: Google sues crypto app scammers, Crypto.com in Korea: Asia Express","Japan’s Sony Bank — the financial business unit of the Sony Group Corporation — said it has begun experimenting with issuing its own stablecoin pegged to fiat currencies, such as the Japanese yen. The reports were confirmed by Jun Watanabe, the president and representative director of Sony Network Communications, in a post on X.Sony Bank said it will assess any legal issues that may be tied to transferring yen-backed stablecoins. The banking firm said by utilizing stablecoins, it could potentially take advantage of lower fees for individuals when sending money and making payments. It also said it would consider it as a form of payment for businesses that use intellectual property (IP) owned by the Sony Group, including games and sports. Related: Sony developed an AI system to create fantasy NPC personas from dialogueIn September 2023, Sony Network Communications entered into a venture with Singapore-based Web3 infrastructure developer Startale Labs to build Sony’s own blockchain network." US senators introduce new stablecoin bill,"United States Senators Kirsten Gillibrand and Cynthia Lummis have introduced legislation establishing a regulatory framework for payment stablecoins. In an April 17 announcement, the two U.S. Senators said they had introduced the Lummis-Gillibrand Payment Stablecoin Act, a bill the lawmakers had been drafting for months and expected to make public in 2024. According to Gillibrand and Lummis, the legislation prohibited “unbacked, algorithmic stablecoins” — likely a nod at TerraUSD (UST) depegging from the U.S. dollar in 2022 — required one-to-one reserves for issuers, created state and federal regulatory regimes for firms and prevented illicit uses of stablecoins. “Passing a regulatory framework for stablecoins is absolutely critical to maintaining the U.S. dollar’s dominance, promoting responsible innovation, protecting consumers and cracking down on money laundering and illicit finance,” said Senator Gillibrand. “To draft the strongest bill possible, our offices worked closely with the relevant federal and state agencies and I’m confident this legislation can earn the necessary support in the Senate and the House.” According to the text of the 179-page bill, state non-depository trust companies would be allowed to issue up to $10 billion in payment stablecoins, with authorized institutions able to issue stablecoins “up to any amount” under a limited-purpose state charter. The legislation also aimed to uphold the current system of state and federal charters and established rules on custody for non-depository trust companies. “Proper custody practices for issuers are essential, especially in light of FTX,” said a one-page document explaining the bill. In October 2023, Senator Lummis called for the Justice Department to take action against stablecoin issuer Tether for allegedly facilitating funds Hamas used following the terrorist group’s attack on Israel. She has previously worked with Senator Gillibrand to introduce crypto-focused legislation, including one bill to establish a comprehensive framework clarifying the roles of the Securities and Exchange Commission and Commodity Futures Trading Commission in regulating digital assets. Related: Is a US stablecoin bill just around the corner? Law Decoded Lummis and Gillibrand had been teasing the legislation amid concerns from many lawmakers and industry leaders about establishing guardrails for stablecoin issuers in the United States. The House of Representatives took one such bill, the Clarity for Payment Stablecoins Act, out of committee in July 2023. Though the legislation appears to be ready for a full floor vote, it has seen little if any, movement in months. Senator Sherrod Brown, who chairs the Senate Banking Committee, reportedly said on April 16 that a stablecoin bill would be one of his goals in the legislative session, provided his concerns were addressed. He did not specifically mention Lummis’ or Gillibrand’s efforts at the time. Magazine: Lawmakers’ fear and doubt drives proposed crypto regulations in US","United States Senators Kirsten Gillibrand and Cynthia Lummis have introduced legislation establishing a regulatory framework for payment stablecoins. Senators said they had introduced the Lummis-Gillibrand Payment Stablecoin Act, a bill the lawmakers had been drafting for months and expected to make public in 2024. Related: Is a US stablecoin bill just around the corner? The House of Representatives took one such bill, the Clarity for Payment Stablecoins Act, out of committee in July 2023. Senator Sherrod Brown, who chairs the Senate Banking Committee, reportedly said on April 16 that a stablecoin bill would be one of his goals in the legislative session, provided his concerns were addressed." Why Bitcoin ETFs with ‘zero flows’ don’t mean what you think,"Bitcoin (BTC) exchange-traded funds (ETFs) having days of zero inflows is completely normal and shouldn’t be misinterpreted as a failure of the products themselves, said Bloomberg ETF analyst James Seyffart. On most days, the “vast majority” of all United States ETFs post zero inflows — something completely normal for any ETFs in a given sector, Seyffart said in an April 16 X post. “On any given day, the vast majority of ETFs will have a flow number of ZERO — this is very normal. There are ~3,500 ETFs in the U.S. Yesterday 2,903 of them had a flow of exactly zero.” Several market commentators voiced concerns about the low inflows into U.S.-based Bitcoin ETFs. BlackRock’s Bitcoin ETF was the only one to see inflows for two consecutive trading days this week — between April 12 and April 15. BlackRock was the only fund to see inflows between April 12 and 15. Source: Farside Investors Seyffart said the flows were no cause for concern and were typical for most ETFs due to how new inflows are recorded. For an ETF to record new inflows or outflows, there has to be a significant enough mismatch between supply and demand to justify making or destroying new fund shares, which are issued in “creation units,” Seyffart explained. “This ONLY happens when there is a mismatch in supply [and] demand. And that mismatch has to be large enough to justify tapping the underlying market and a ~bigger mismatch than a creation unit,” Seyffart added. Creation units are the “lots” in which ETF shares are created and redeemed. “Every ETF can have a different-sized creation unit. In the case of the spot Bitcoin ETFs they are blocks of shares ranging from 5,000 shares to 50,000 shares,” he said. Related: Bitcoin Halving will pump games, Shrapnel’s ‘simple’ secret revealed: Web3 Gamer Four of the last six trading days have seen all 10 U.S. spot Bitcoin products witness net outflows, with selling from the Grayscale Bitcoin Trust (GBTC) far outpacing inflows into the new funds. On April 16, Bitcoin ETFs posted $58 million in net outflows, according to data from Farside Investors. The outflows were led by GBTC, which saw $79.4 million in outflows and $12.9 million from ARK 21Shares Bitcoin ETF (ARKB). BlackRock iShares Bitcoin ETF (IBIT) saw the largest inflows, generating $25.8 million. Four of the funds, including those from Bitwise and Invesco Galaxy, saw zero new inflows. April 14 and 15 saw all combined ETFs post net outflows of $55.1 million and $36.7 million, respectively. Outflows from GBTC have outpaced inflows into new funds. Source: Farside Investors The recent net outflows for the Bitcoin ETFs follow several days of subpar price action for Bitcoin, which is down 7.8% on the week to $63,723, per TradingView data. Traders and market pundits have pointed to escalating geopolitical tensions in the Middle East as well as the upcoming Bitcoin halving event — currently slated for April 20 — as primary causes of volatility. Magazine: The real risks to Ethena’s stablecoin model (are not the ones you think)","Yesterday 2,903 of them had a flow of exactly zero.”Several market commentators voiced concerns about the low inflows into U.S.-based Bitcoin ETFs. In the case of the spot Bitcoin ETFs they are blocks of shares ranging from 5,000 shares to 50,000 shares,” he said. On April 16, Bitcoin ETFs posted $58 million in net outflows, according to data from Farside Investors. The outflows were led by GBTC, which saw $79.4 million in outflows and $12.9 million from ARK 21Shares Bitcoin ETF (ARKB). Source: Farside InvestorsThe recent net outflows for the Bitcoin ETFs follow several days of subpar price action for Bitcoin, which is down 7.8% on the week to $63,723, per TradingView data." Bitcoin halving shows new users that ‘code is ultimately the law’ in crypto,"As the Bitcoin halving marked another major milestone in the crypto space, leaders in the crypto community shared different perspectives on how the event would affect the different areas of crypto. On April 20, the Bitcoin network successfully went through the fourth halving event after the 840,000th block was mined. The occasion reduced mining rewards from 6.25 Bitcoin (BTC) per block to 3.125 BTC, worth about $200,000 at the time of writing. At the Token2049 event in Dubai, Cointelegraph spoke with community members to get their thoughts on the Bitcoin halving and its potential impact on the crypto space. Attendees of the recent Token2049 event in Dubai. Source: Cointelegraph Crypto space could grow tenfold Avalanche founder Emin Gün Sirer shared two different perspectives regarding the halving. From a technological standpoint, Gün Sirer argued that the halving was not great. He explained: “As a technologist at my core, I see Bitcoin halving as not a great thing. Why? Because it’s a discrete event. All of a sudden the rewards going to miners go down by half. And suddenly, the security budget of the Bitcoin system goes down by half.” The executive believes that the halving leads to “hundreds of millions” being paid to miners going down. Gün Sirer argued that this means less money secures the network. The Avalanche founder believes that the Bitcoin creator was still “alive,” the Bitcoin halving might change. He explained: “I think if Satoshi were alive today, he would change the way the halvening is happening, not from a discrete function, from a sudden point function to a more continuous function, so that the rewards go down more gradually.” While the executive thinks that the halving could improve from a tech perspective, Gün Sirer also recognized that the event has had a good effect on crypto. “This creates a lot of speculation, a lot of buying into the space, a lot of people taking a position in Bitcoin, which in general has been great for the rest of the space as well,” he added. Gün Sirer explained that it’s also great for renewed interest in crypto and predicted that the space is on its way to growing tenfold. “I see the crypto space growing by at least another factor of 10, if not more so. Bitcoin has a lot of growth ahead of it, in my view.” No immediate impact While Gün Sirer highlighted the potential long-term growth of the crypto space, Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino told Cointelegraph that the halving might not immediately affect the price. Ardoino explained: “I think the halving is something that is iconic, is something that is there, but not necessarily will affect immediately the Bitcoin price.” Even though the executive thinks the halving might not affect the BTC price, Ardoino remains bullish on the potential impact of spot Bitcoin exchange-traded funds (ETFs). “I don’t expect it. Maybe it will happen, maybe it will not. But I think that the Bitcoin halving was priced already. What was not necessarily priced was the enormous interest in the Bitcoin ETF,” he added. Related: Here’s how crypto game Notcoin onboarded over 30M users — founder Ardoino explained that the biggest hedge funds didn’t tap into the Bitcoin ETF yet. When pension funds and other hedge funds start investing, the executive said, “We’ll see big moves.” Code is law in crypto With the ETFs bringing in new players to the crypto space, the halving shows how code works as the law in crypto, according to Justin Hyun, the director of investments at The Open Network (TON) Foundation. Hyun believes that those experiencing the Bitcoin halving for the first time will see how the crypto space works. He explained: “It’ll be a further validation of. The way that the code is ultimately the law in crypto, as in this thing that was pre-designed from the get-go, takes place without anybody having to push a button.” The executive hopes that when the larger community outside crypto sees this, they will become more curious about different networks and how they interact with the code and users. Magazine: Get Bitcoin or die tryin’: Why hip hop stars love crypto","As the Bitcoin halving marked another major milestone in the crypto space, leaders in the crypto community shared different perspectives on how the event would affect the different areas of crypto. On April 20, the Bitcoin network successfully went through the fourth halving event after the 840,000th block was mined. At the Token2049 event in Dubai, Cointelegraph spoke with community members to get their thoughts on the Bitcoin halving and its potential impact on the crypto space. The Avalanche founder believes that the Bitcoin creator was still “alive,” the Bitcoin halving might change. Hyun believes that those experiencing the Bitcoin halving for the first time will see how the crypto space works." Ordinals drive ‘positive momentum’ in Bitcoin innovation — Franklin Templeton,"Asset manager Franklin Templeton’s digital assets division published a note to its investors briefly introducing Bitcoin-based nonfungible tokens (NFTs). Franklin Templeton Digital Assets said that the Bitcoin Ordinals protocol primarily drove positive momentum in innovation within Bitcoin. The asset manager said there has been a “renaissance in activity” on Bitcoin in the past year because of Ordinals. The asset manager also mentioned new fungible token standards like BRC-20 and Runes, Bitcoin-based layer-2 networks and Bitcoin decentralized finance (DeFi) primitives as contributors to driving Bitcoin innovation. The asset manager also recognized that activities within the Bitcoin NFT space are accelerating. Franklin Templeton pointed out the increase in dominance for Bitcoin within the entire NFT ecosystem. The company wrote: “Bitcoin Ordinals have seen a surge in trading volume over the past several months. This is reflected in an increase in dominance starting in December of 2023 when it surpassed ETH in trading volume.” Furthermore, the asset manager highlighted several Bitcoin Ordinals collections starting to “dominate” the NFT space in trading volume and market capitalization. This included NodeMonkes, Runestone, Bitcoin Puppets, Ordinal Maxi Biz and Bitmap. 30-day NFT sales volume by blockchain. Source: CryptoSlam While the asset manager seemed optimistic about Ordinals, it also highlighted in the note that these assets may lose value and have no bank guarantee. FOLLOW BITCOIN HALVING COVERAGE IN FULL here Franklin Templeton also noted that Ordinals assets are not insured by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation. In addition, the asset manager reminded its investors that “all investments involve risks, including the loss of capital.” The firm wrote that digital assets are subject to risks because of their “immature” and rapidly developing technology and their vulnerabilities. Related: Ordinals trader gets Bitcoin back after fat-fingered NFT purchase Franklin Templeton has been introducing its investors to multiple niches within the crypto space. On March 14, the firm went “full degen” by publishing an investor note on memecoins. The company recognized the potential of memecoins to produce quick profits but also noted that they had “no inherent value.” Franklin Templeton was one of exchange-traded fund (ETF) issuers that launched a spot Bitcoin ETF in the United States earlier this year. The firm has also participated in the race for a spot Ether (ETH) ETF. On Feb. 12, the company submitted an S-1 filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. Magazine: NFTs are like nightclubs, crypto is a volatile religion: NFTStats, NFT Collector","Asset manager Franklin Templeton’s digital assets division published a note to its investors briefly introducing Bitcoin-based nonfungible tokens (NFTs). Franklin Templeton Digital Assets said that the Bitcoin Ordinals protocol primarily drove positive momentum in innovation within Bitcoin. The asset manager said there has been a “renaissance in activity” on Bitcoin in the past year because of Ordinals. The asset manager also recognized that activities within the Bitcoin NFT space are accelerating. FOLLOW BITCOIN HALVING COVERAGE IN FULL hereFranklin Templeton also noted that Ordinals assets are not insured by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation." On-chain data — The missing link in Web3 advertising,"On-chain wallet data promises to be a game-changer for companies looking to target Web3 users, developers and traders — but this hinges on infrastructure connecting wallets to social media profiles. Cointelegraph spoke to Addressable chief technology officer Asaf Nadler during Paris Blockchain Week, who unpacked details of a new partnership with mobile analytics platform AppsFlyer to improve marketing campaigns for Web3 applications. Nadler said the company is looking to solve user acquisition challenges in the cryptocurrency ecosystem. Conversations with more than 300 marketers over the past two years have centered around reaching a target audience based on on-chain activity. Related: TON continues to attract Web3 firms as Telegram Ad Platform goes live “They’re looking for traders, for developers that deploy smart contracts on blockchains, for NFT collectors, for gamers playing blockchain games,” Nadler explained. Addressable’s platform allows advertisers to target specific Web3 wallets from different EVM chains. Source: Addressable Nadler gave Cointelegraph a first-hand demo of the Addressable platform, showing how users could filter and target wallets from different Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM chains to build a targeted advertising campaign. The process is similar to adding filters like gender, age and geographic location in conventional advertising platforms. Addressable’s data visualization includes a geographical breakdown of Web3 wallets in a global format. Source: Addressable Considering that most Web3 wallets are alphanumeric and anonymous, many advertising platforms cannot target wallet owners. Addressable’s infrastructure combines conventional Web2 information with blockchain data to target a niche but growing sector of the internet: “We’re connecting wallet owners to social profiles so companies can run targeted advertisement campaigns on Twitter [now X] and display ads to a group of wallets.” The platform is specifically aimed at serving Web3 companies and clients. Conventional advertising platforms provide customizable targeting, but Nadler said that cryptocurrency-related products and services are typically not relevant to a broad audience on social media platforms like X or Facebook: “The thing about crypto is most products aren’t a commodity. My mother wouldn’t understand most crypto products. So a tweet on X just flies by anybody who is not native and doesn’t understand that.” Addressable currently supports seven different Ethereum EVM chains, including BNB, Polygon, Arbitrum, Optimism and Avalanche. “The key is that we’re able to collect the data to build wallet profiles and associate them to real-world data so that they’re targetable,” Nadler said. Related: Telegram channels eligible for 50% ad revenue, but there’s a catch Addressable’s integration with AppsFlyer provides more utility for the targeted advertising platform. Clients can tap into data from Web3 mobile platforms and target users of these mobile applications. Nadler said the integration includes data sharing from their platform so that mobile advertisers can get more utility than just an increase in application downloads: “They can optimize for what drives the wheels into their protocol, what drives people that are spending more crypto on their wallets, on their apps, on their games. It’s an industry milestone.” AppsFlyer is a specialist mobile marketing tool used by TikTok, Disney, Binance and Crypto.com. It aims to optimize mobile app marketing campaigns with granular attribution data. The partnership is touted to allow Addressable to reach a significant percentage of Web3 mobile applications. Magazine: 1 in 6 new Base meme coins are scams, 91% have vulnerabilities","On-chain wallet data promises to be a game-changer for companies looking to target Web3 users, developers and traders — but this hinges on infrastructure connecting wallets to social media profiles. The process is similar to adding filters like gender, age and geographic location in conventional advertising platforms. Source: AddressableConsidering that most Web3 wallets are alphanumeric and anonymous, many advertising platforms cannot target wallet owners. Clients can tap into data from Web3 mobile platforms and target users of these mobile applications. The partnership is touted to allow Addressable to reach a significant percentage of Web3 mobile applications." "Crypto miners face energy refusal, restriction in Canadian provinces","The Canadian province of Manitoba has extended a moratorium on new requests to the government-owned Manitoba Hydro agency for electrical service for cryptocurrency operations. British Columbia (BC) had a similar suspension of service in place and has chosen a different but also restrictive path forward. The Manitoba pause extension applies to crypto miners’ newrequests and “requests for electric service which have not resulted in the execution of an agreement to construct infrastructure.” In November 2022, the provincial government paused electrical connections to crypto-mining operations for 18 months. Now the pause will last through April 30, 2026. At that time, the province plans to prepare a long-term solution, it said in an announcement, adding: ""Manitoba Hydro continues to expect unprecedented demand for electricity from new or expanding cryptocurrency operations. That demand has the potential to drastically increase our total electrical load.” In 2022, then-CEO of Manitoba Hydro Jay Grewal said, “If we connected every cryptocurrency operator who’s shown interest in the last 16 months, we’d increase our total electrical load by 4,600 megawatts.” The organization’s total capacity at the time was 6,100 megawatts. Source: HYDROVISION International Hydro-Québec proposed reducing electricity provision to crypto operations temporarily in November 2022. New Brunswick banned the provision of electricity to new crypto operations in November 2023. Related: Bitcoin miner Hut 8 takes stoush with Ontario power supplier to court In December 2022, British Columbia announced it would stop making connections to new crypto miners for 18 months. That decision impacted 21 projects. On April 11, the BC government said it had introduced amendments to its Utilities Commission Act to regulate electricity service to cryptocurrency miners. Provincial Energy Minister Josie Osborne said: “We’re working with BC Hydro to ensure we have the electricity we need […] and that includes regulating electricity service for energy-intensive cryptocurrency miners that create very few local jobs.” The new amendments would make it possible for the BC government to prohibit, restrict or regulate service to crypto miners. BC has some of the lowest commercial and industrial electricity rates in North America. Magazine: Crypto City: The ultimate guide to Vancouver","The Canadian province of Manitoba has extended a moratorium on new requests to the government-owned Manitoba Hydro agency for electrical service for cryptocurrency operations. Source: HYDROVISION InternationalHydro-Québec proposed reducing electricity provision to crypto operations temporarily in November 2022. New Brunswick banned the provision of electricity to new crypto operations in November 2023. Related: Bitcoin miner Hut 8 takes stoush with Ontario power supplier to courtIn December 2022, British Columbia announced it would stop making connections to new crypto miners for 18 months. On April 11, the BC government said it had introduced amendments to its Utilities Commission Act to regulate electricity service to cryptocurrency miners." 2 theories why GBTC sticks to high fees despite bleeding billions,"Grayscale may be sticking to high fees for its spot Bitcoin (BTC) exchange-traded fund to keep “stuck” holders from cashing out while betting that Bitcoin’s price will continue to rocket upward, according to one market analyst. The Grayscale Bitcoin Trust (GBTC) has seen daily outflows since its launch on Jan. 11 — totaling over $14 billion as of March 25. Many, including Bianco Research founder and former Wall Street analyst Jim Bianco, have pointed to GBTC’s fees as “the problem.” In a March 25 X post, he speculated at least half of GBTC outflows were those moving to lower-fee ETFs. Chart showing GBTC net outflows from Jan. 11 up to March 22. Source: Jim Bianco/X Grayscale’s ETF charges a 1.5% per year management fee, five times that of the 0.30% average of the other spot Bitcoin ETFs. Bianco said two possible reasons why Grayscale doesn’t drop the fee. Firstly, it could be a bet that GBTC holders won’t leave as the asset manager “analyzed its holders’ tax bill [...] And concluded they are ‘stuck’ as it is too costly to leave until they need the money.” GBTC wields assets under management of nearly $24.7 billion as of March 25, per YCharts data. Bianco also believes Grayscale’s firmness on its fees could result from optimism that Bitcoin’s price “will moon well over $100k in the next year or two.” “Under this scenario, [Grayscale] are betting the price of BTC will rise enough to increase their assets (for which they charge a fee) to “offset” most or all their outflows,” Bianco wrote. If BTC falls, he added, “then this strategy could prove disastrous” as GBTC selling could ramp up “and ‘stuck’ tax bill holders find these bills shrink enough that they can leave and never return to GBTC again.” “Expect GBTC to be a constant selling source until it’s held by dead people, those who forgot they owned it, or those “trapped” with giant tax bills if they sell it.” Bloomberg ETF analyst Eric Balchunas posted in response to Bianco’s theory that “there may never be an inflow to GBTC ever.” “My guess is we see a few more big outflow days and then a slow trickle into eternity,” Balchunas added. “If BTC price goes up [...] They’ll be just fine revenue-wise.” Why sue the SEC just to bleed? United States spot Bitcoin ETFs only came about due to Grayscale winning a lawsuit against the Securities and Exchange Commission last year which forced it to review Grayscale’s bid to convert GBTC to an ETF. “Why did GBTC spend all the time and effort to sue the SEC to allow it to convert to an ETF and only manage it like this (so that it will slowly bleed out)?” Bianco asked. Answering, Balchunas speculated that Grayscale maybe knew that even if GBTC were to “bleed out every last investor,” the ETF hype would “pump BTC enough” to offset the losses, and its assets under management would remain stable. Related: BlackRock’s ETF could flip GBTC in Bitcoin holdings within 3 weeks Grayscale had also long said it would convert GBTC, so it “had to follow through” and didn’t lower fees as it’s “TOUGH to kill 80% of your revenue stream in one shot,” Balchunas added. Grayscale likely “underestimated just how brutally competitive” the U.S. ETF market is, Balchunas said, and maybe wasn’t expecting the cutthroat fee war issuers started in a bid to gain market share. Bloomberg ETF analyst James Seyffart postulated another reason could be that Grayscale was acting to try to help bankrupt crypto lender Genesis — both are subsidiaries of crypto conglomerate Digital Currency Group (DCG). Genesis had over 62 million GBTC shares used to collateralize loans made by Gemini Earn users and the two companies were in a long legal fight over them. “There was 100% a selfish interest in just being able to get out of those positions at [net asset value],” said Seyffart. Magazine: Bitcoin ETFs make Coinbase a ‘honeypot’ for hackers and governments — Trezor CEO","Grayscale may be sticking to high fees for its spot Bitcoin (BTC) exchange-traded fund to keep “stuck” holders from cashing out while betting that Bitcoin’s price will continue to rocket upward, according to one market analyst. The Grayscale Bitcoin Trust (GBTC) has seen daily outflows since its launch on Jan. 11 — totaling over $14 billion as of March 25. Many, including Bianco Research founder and former Wall Street analyst Jim Bianco, have pointed to GBTC’s fees as “the problem.” In a March 25 X post, he speculated at least half of GBTC outflows were those moving to lower-fee ETFs. Chart showing GBTC net outflows from Jan. 11 up to March 22. “If BTC price goes up [...] They’ll be just fine revenue-wise.”Why sue the SEC just to bleed?" IRS releases draft of 2025 digital asset reporting form for US taxpayers,"The United States Internal Revenue Service (IRS), the country’s tax service, has released a draft of its new Form 1099-DA “Digital Asset Proceeds from Broker Transactions” for reporting income from digital asset transactions. The form is expected to come into use in 2025 for reporting in 2026. A broker will prepare Form 1099-DA for every customer who sells or exchanges digital assets. Brokers include kiosk operators, digital asset payment processors, hosted wallet providers, unhosted wallet providers and others, per the form. Copies of the 1099-DA will be sent to customers and the IRS, which will use them for verification purposes. The 2025 draft 1099-DA IRS reporting form. Source: IRS.gov The form asks for token codes, wallet addresses, and blockchain transaction locations. Under the rule proposed in August 2023, cryptocurrencies, nonfungible tokens and stablecoins are reportable. The rule stated: “With third party information reporting that specifically identifies digital asset transactions, the IRS could more easily identify taxpayers with digital asset transactions that are otherwise difficult to discover.” The crypto community weighed in on the proposed reporting requirements after they were announced. The Blockchain Association said the rule contains “fundamental misunderstandings about the nature of digital assets and decentralized technology.” Coinbase chief legal officer Paul Grewal said the proposed rules would set a “dangerous precedent for surveillance of the everyday financial activities of consumers by requiring nearly every digital asset transaction — even the purchase of a cup of coffee — to be reported.” Commenters were no happier with the reporting rules for 2024. Related: Study claims 99.5% of crypto investors did not pay taxes in 2022 Tax experts have also posted their comments on the web. According to crypto tax and accounting service Ledgible, reporting decentralized finance, where there may not be an intermediary to fulfill the reporting requirements, will be especially challenged by the new rule. It could also significantly increase brokers’ administrative burden, as many process very large numbers of transactions. Source: Peter Van Valkenburgh In addition, brokers will be forced to exchange information on digital asset transfers to determine the cost basis (initial value or purchase price) accurately, according to Gordon Law. They have no mechanism in place for such data sharing. Furthermore, there is no way to differentiate between self-transfers and taxable transfers if a crypto owner transfers assets between exchanges. Taxpayers who underreported their crypto income in previous years may be caught when they report their taxes in 2025. Users of foreign exchanges that formally do not serve U.S. citizens will not submit the form, but the IRS may be able to detect the offshore activity if the taxpayer transfers assets to a U.S. exchange. The IRS is continuing to accept comments on the draft form. Magazine: Crazy outcomes when current laws applied to NFTs and the metaverse","The United States Internal Revenue Service (IRS), the country’s tax service, has released a draft of its new Form 1099-DA “Digital Asset Proceeds from Broker Transactions” for reporting income from digital asset transactions. A broker will prepare Form 1099-DA for every customer who sells or exchanges digital assets. Brokers include kiosk operators, digital asset payment processors, hosted wallet providers, unhosted wallet providers and others, per the form. The 2025 draft 1099-DA IRS reporting form. The rule stated:“With third party information reporting that specifically identifies digital asset transactions, the IRS could more easily identify taxpayers with digital asset transactions that are otherwise difficult to discover.”The crypto community weighed in on the proposed reporting requirements after they were announced." "Lower ETF demand, unrealized gains may weigh on BTC selling pressure post-halving","A slowdown of inflows to spot Bitcoin exchange-traded funds (ETFs) combined with a high volume of unrealized gains from traders could lead to bearish pressure on the Bitcoin price after the upcoming halving event. According to Julio Moreno, head of research at CryptoQuant, unrealized profits from Bitcoin’s recent rally are driving up selling pressure. An eventual slowdown of inflows to spot Bitcoin ETFs in the coming months could result in further pressure on Bitcoin (BTC) prices. CryptoQuant’s net unrealized profit and oss (NUPL) indicator supports the analysis. The indicator’s warning sign is the 0.7 mark, indicating that Bitcoin investors may be ready to take profits, further driving prices down and increasing selling pressure. On March 17, the NUPL indicator reached 0.606, up 0.41% from the previous 24 hours, despite recent BTC price corrections. “For a bearish outlook for price: 1. Slowdown in ETF Bitcoin purchases and 2. Getting into the halving at a high level of unrealized profits for traders, as highly likely traders would sell to take profits,” Moreno said about possible price-depressing events. NUPL indicator. Source: CryptoQuant The Bitcoin ETFs recorded one of their lowest net inflow days on March 14, with just $132 million in net activity, their lowest level in eight trading sessions and an 80% decline from the previous days. A possible downward trend, however, may not be as severe as previous bear markets, as institutional investors typically engage in portfolio rebalancing strategies, which could temper volatility rather than increase it, James Butterfill, head of Research at CoinShares, told Cointelegraph. “Volatility in the last bull market in 2021 was 120%. It is now only 45%, and prices have risen above all-time highs. We believe this is due to the dampening effect of portfolio rebalancing,” he said. Bitcoin ETFs have so far been in high demand. The cumulative net inflows into the crypto products surpassed the $12 billion mark on March 15, while industry insiders anticipate further demand as brokerage firms speed up due diligence to offer clients Bitcoin ETFs. Miners brace for impact Capital flowing through Bitcoin ETFs is counteracting the negative price effects of miners sales ahead of the halving — Bitcoin’s deflationary mechanism. The halving cuts the reward for mining new blocks by 50%, thus reducing the rate at which new Bitcoin are generated. This year’s reduction will slash Bitcoin miner rewards from 6.25 BTC to 3.125 BTC per block. The cost of mining, however, remains the same or may even increase as miners usually improve operations to remain profitable after the event. CoinShares anticipates the average cost of production post-halving for crypto miners to be at $37,856. “Looking at price performance of the miners year to date highlights investor concerns for the miners around the halving, but I believe many are being tarred with the same brush, so to speak, as average costs to mine Bitcoin vary greatly, but those with higher costs to seem to have been hit harder,” said Butterfill. Miners cost production per Bitcoin post-halving. Source: CoinShares. Historically, miners have sold more of their BTC reserves before the halving to maximize profits, and 2024 is no exception. Data from CryptoQuant shows miner reserves at their lowest level in two years, with 1.81 million Bitcoin held by miners on March 15. The Bitcoin halving takes place every four years, with the next expected to happen around April 19, 2024. Magazine: This is your brain on crypto — Substance abuse grows among crypto traders","According to Julio Moreno, head of research at CryptoQuant, unrealized profits from Bitcoin’s recent rally are driving up selling pressure. An eventual slowdown of inflows to spot Bitcoin ETFs in the coming months could result in further pressure on Bitcoin (BTC) prices. CryptoQuant’s net unrealized profit and oss (NUPL) indicator supports the analysis. On March 17, the NUPL indicator reached 0.606, up 0.41% from the previous 24 hours, despite recent BTC price corrections. The Bitcoin halving takes place every four years, with the next expected to happen around April 19, 2024." BIS and 7 central banks to explore asset tokenization through Project Agora,"The Bank for International Settlements (BIS) has teamed up with the central banks of France, Japan, South Korea, Mexico, Switzerland, the United Kingdom and the United States Federal Reserve Banks to explore asset tokenization within the monetary system alongside private financial institutions. Dubbed “Project Agora,” the initiative will build on a unified ledger concept proposed by BIS that bridges tokenized commercial bank deposits and tokenized wholesale central bank money. “This could enhance the functioning of the monetary system and provide new solutions using smart contracts and programmability while maintaining its two-tier structure,” BIS wrote, adding: “This major public-private partnership will seek to overcome several structural inefficiencies in how payments happen today, especially across borders, which add a layer of challenges: different legal, regulatory and technical requirements, operating hours and time zones.” Specific instructions and requirements will be issued in due course, with a grace period for private banks to sign up for the partnership. Hyun Song Shin, BIS' economic adviser and head of research, commented that “tokenization combines the record-keeping function of a traditional database with the rules and logic that govern transfers” within a central bank framework. Meanwhile, Cecilia Skingsley, head of BIS Innovation Hub, spoke of a “common payment infrastructure” that allows payment systems, accounting ledgers, and data registries to be interoperable across digital currencies. BIS has taken a keen interest in recent crypto innovations tied to financial centralization. On Jan. 23, the BIS Innovation Hub added six new projects exploring the issues of cybersecurity, fighting financial crime, central bank digital currencies and green finance. Another area of exploration is the organization’s Project Promise, which is a collaboration between BIS, the Swiss National Bank, and the World Bank to build a proof-of-concept platform for tokenized promissory notes. Related: BIS, EU central banks building data platform to track crypto, DeFi flows","The Bank for International Settlements (BIS) has teamed up with the central banks of France, Japan, South Korea, Mexico, Switzerland, the United Kingdom and the United States Federal Reserve Banks to explore asset tokenization within the monetary system alongside private financial institutions. Dubbed “Project Agora,” the initiative will build on a unified ledger concept proposed by BIS that bridges tokenized commercial bank deposits and tokenized wholesale central bank money. Hyun Song Shin, BIS' economic adviser and head of research, commented that “tokenization combines the record-keeping function of a traditional database with the rules and logic that govern transfers” within a central bank framework. On Jan. 23, the BIS Innovation Hub added six new projects exploring the issues of cybersecurity, fighting financial crime, central bank digital currencies and green finance. Related: BIS, EU central banks building data platform to track crypto, DeFi flows" Advocacy groups warn of ‘adverse repercussions’ for crypto in case against Tornado Cash co-founder,"Representatives of three United States-based cryptocurrency advocacy organizations have filed amicus briefs in support of a motion to dismiss the charges against Tornado Cash co-founder Roman Storm. In April 5 filings in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, the Blockchain Association, Coin Center and DeFi Education Fund argued that Tornado Cash did not have control of the funds or messages users sent through the cryptocurrency mixer. The advocacy groups separately claimed that the three felony counts Roman faces should be dismissed, citing First Amendment issues regarding the Tornado Cash co-founder allegedly violating sanctions and the U.S. government “misunderstand[ing] the basic relationship between smart contract protocols and their developers” regarding allegations of money laundering. “Adoption of the government’s legal theory would not only have adverse repercussions for the digital asset industry but also raise serious concerns regarding fintech more generally,” said Blockchain Association Head of Legal Marisa Coppel. “We urge the court to hold the government up to its burden and dismiss the unfounded charges, safeguarding both the defendants’ rights and the integrity of the burgeoning digital asset sector.” The U.S. Justice Department announced charges against Storm and co-developer Roman Semenov in August 2023. Storm pleaded not guilty to all three charges and is free on a $2 million bond, largely restricted from traveling. Semenov’s whereabouts were unknown at the time of publication, but Storm is set to go to trial in September. Related: Here are the next biggest crypto court cases with the SBF saga over In the Netherlands, Tornado Cash developer Alexey Pertsev was arrested in August 2022 but released after roughly nine months in jail. Dutch authorities alleged he played a role in North Korean hacking groups using the crypto mixer to launder roughly $1 billion in illicit funds. All three cases are connected to the U.S. Treasury’s Office of Foreign Asset Control adding crypto addresses associated with Tornado Cash to its list of Specially Designated Nationals — sanctioned entities. The decision prompted some crypto advocates to sue the U.S. Treasury, but both cases await appeal after losing summary judgment motions. Magazine: Lawmakers’ fear and doubt drives proposed crypto regulations in US","Representatives of three United States-based cryptocurrency advocacy organizations have filed amicus briefs in support of a motion to dismiss the charges against Tornado Cash co-founder Roman Storm. Related: Here are the next biggest crypto court cases with the SBF saga overIn the Netherlands, Tornado Cash developer Alexey Pertsev was arrested in August 2022 but released after roughly nine months in jail. Dutch authorities alleged he played a role in North Korean hacking groups using the crypto mixer to launder roughly $1 billion in illicit funds. All three cases are connected to the U.S. Treasury’s Office of Foreign Asset Control adding crypto addresses associated with Tornado Cash to its list of Specially Designated Nationals — sanctioned entities. The decision prompted some crypto advocates to sue the U.S. Treasury, but both cases await appeal after losing summary judgment motions." 90% of Bitcoin ETF inflows are still retail — VanEck CEO,"Bitcoin exchange-traded funds (ETFs) have attracted significant amounts of capital in 2024, but traditional banks and institutional investment have yet to enter the fray. Speaking exclusively to Cointelegraph at Paris Blockchain Week, VanEck CEO Jan van Eck said the retail sector has primarily been responsible for inflows into spot Bitcoin (BTC) ETFs in the United States. Van Eck said that the initial success of the ETFs, which have on some days seen billions of dollars of inflows since their launch, surpassed his expectations. However, he believes the inflows have not come from significant investments from traditional finance (TradFi) players. Jan van Eck on stage at Paris Blockchain Week. Source: Gareth Jenkinson “I was surprised, but I don’t think it’s traditional investors yet. I still think 90% of the flows are retail. You’ve had some Bitcoin whales and some other institutions move some assets in, but they were already exposed to Bitcoin,” van Eck said. Related: $250K Bitcoin? Tim Draper says halving, Bitcoin ETFs will drive demand The CEO of the investment management firm added that no U.S. banks have officially approved or allowed their financial advisers to recommend Bitcoin to date. Van Eck said that the next month could see the arrival of some major institutional investments from banks and traditional firms but that the Bitcoin ETF landscape was still in its infancy: “There’s a lot of maturation to happen. A lot of technology will be developed on-chain, so there’s a long way to go.” Cointelegraph also asked why investors would prefer to invest in a Bitcoin ETF over directly buying and managing BTC themselves. Van Eck said convenience was a major reason, as investors look to fund managers to handle their entire portfolios. “Convenience, safety and affordability. You had 2% spreads on many centralized exchange platforms like Coinbase. We have single-digit spreads for the ETFs and no fees or low fees. It’s easier just to do a buy ticket than anything else,” Van Eck said. Following in his father’s footsteps VanEck was founded in 1955 by John van Eck, who would make his name by starting the first gold fund in the United States in 1968 when gold was fixed against the dollar. Van Eck said his father’s fund boomed as inflation soared in the 1970s. Van Eck said that his tendency to be a “paranoid business person” has kept him alert to any emerging assets that could contend with gold: “In 2017, we said Bitcoin will not replace gold, but it will significantly complement it in people's portfolios.” Van Eck said his firm’s “big picture” approach to investing is driven by the understanding that political, economic and technological trends will drive financial markets. Up until the 2010s, there had not been an emerging asset until Bitcoin rose to prominence. Related: ‘Unsustainable’ deficit, inflation means more demand for Bitcoin: Grayscale “I started looking at Bitcoin. I’m not like super in love with it or anything. I just think that, at times, you really want to have a store of value in your portfolio. And that’s what I care about, people’s investment savings,” Van Eck explained. The CEO added that there’s an argument for Bitcoin being a better store of value than gold in contemporary times. He also said that the U.S. has “big budget deficit problems” that it must tackle in the coming year and that market movements are reflecting anticipation of this reality. While much has been made of the impact of Bitcoin ETFs and the price appreciation of the preeminent cryptocurrency in 2024, Van Eck said their impact might be overstated: “What I’d like to point out is that it’s not the most earth-shattering thing. The Bitcoin market is more global and much deeper than just being influenced by the ETFs.” Van Eck pointed to a sharp rise in price in early April that did not occur during U.S. trading hours, which is indicative of the influence of Asian markets. Magazine: Big Questions: How can Bitcoin payments stage a comeback?","Speaking exclusively to Cointelegraph at Paris Blockchain Week, VanEck CEO Jan van Eck said the retail sector has primarily been responsible for inflows into spot Bitcoin (BTC) ETFs in the United States. Jan van Eck on stage at Paris Blockchain Week. Source: Gareth Jenkinson“I was surprised, but I don’t think it’s traditional investors yet. You’ve had some Bitcoin whales and some other institutions move some assets in, but they were already exposed to Bitcoin,” van Eck said. It’s easier just to do a buy ticket than anything else,” Van Eck said." Paradigm leads $225M funding round for new ‘Solana killer’ L1,"Crypto-focused venture capital (VC) firm Paradigm is leading a $225 million funding round into a new layer-1 blockchain network, which is set to compete for market share with Solana and other top networks. Monad Labs completes the funding round, which aims to build a new layer-1 smart contract network with faster speed and lower costs than Ethereum. The funding round was announced after two years of development, according to Keone Hon, the founder of Monad Labs, who told Fortune in an interview: “We’re emerging from roughly two years of development […] At a time when a lot of the research community was focused on roll-up, data availability, and other directions of scaling, Monad basically went really deep on the pure execution side.” The new L1 will be 100% compatible with the Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM), capable of up to 10,000 transactions per second (TPS), according to a March 14 X post by Monad. Despite being the home of decentralized finance (DeFi), Ethereum has significant shortcomings, including notoriously high gas fees during network congestion. Monad Labs aims to improve on its shortcomings with its execution-focused L1. Hon told Fortune: “We realized there was a huge need for a more performant EVM, and that in spite of this need, no one was really working on this problem.” Related: With 10 days to the halving, analysts predict $150K Bitcoin top Crypto VC funding continues to rise The new investment round was announced during a period of increased VC interest in crypto firms. Bitcoin layer-2 network Mezo announced the completion of a $21 million Series A funding round led by Pantera Capital on April 9. Mezo enables investors to earn yield based on the time they hold their tokens. They describe it as a “Bitcoin Economic Layer.” On April 3, reports emerged about Paradigm negotiating to raise up to $850 million for a new fund, which would make it the largest raise in the crypto industry since May 2022, when Silicon Valley-based VC firm Andreessen Horowitz raised a record-setting $4.5 billion. Crypto VC funding turned positive in the first quarter of 2024, breaking a two-year slump, with the funds invested rising 38% compared to the previous quarter, according to data analysis platform Crypto Koryo. Related: Frax Finance dives into DeFi liquidity with $250M USDe allocation","Crypto-focused venture capital (VC) firm Paradigm is leading a $225 million funding round into a new layer-1 blockchain network, which is set to compete for market share with Solana and other top networks. Monad Labs completes the funding round, which aims to build a new layer-1 smart contract network with faster speed and lower costs than Ethereum. Monad Labs aims to improve on its shortcomings with its execution-focused L1. Bitcoin layer-2 network Mezo announced the completion of a $21 million Series A funding round led by Pantera Capital on April 9. Crypto VC funding turned positive in the first quarter of 2024, breaking a two-year slump, with the funds invested rising 38% compared to the previous quarter, according to data analysis platform Crypto Koryo." Changpeng Zhao could serve time in the same facility as ‘crypto-anarchist’ Jim Bell,"Former Binance CEO Changpeng “CZ” Zhao has requested that a federal judge sentence him to probation after pleading guilty to violating money laundering laws. His legal team has filed several declarations in support of his recommendation, including one suggesting he could serve time at the Federal Detention Center (FDC) SeaTac, Washington. In an April 23 filing in U.S. District Court for the Western District of Washington at Seattle, Robert Palmquist said it was “highly probable” that, if given prison time, Zhao would serve his sentence at FDC SeaTac. Palmquist, who served as warden of the Washington facility from 2003 to 2009, described it as having “little natural light” with the prison understaffed, given the number of inmates. “If Mr. Zhao is incarcerated [...] his wealth and status as a public figure would expose him to a risk of threats to his physical and mental health, including but not limited to theft and extortion,” said Palmquist. “Mr. Zhao would encounter offenders of all security levels and potentially be prey to predators with high security designations due to his naivety concerning prison experiences and his financial resources.” FDC Seatac, based directly south of the Seattle-Tacoma International Airport and containing 794 inmates according to its website, has previously housed a Proud Boys member charged in connection with the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol and Jim Bell, a ‘crypto-anarchist.’ Bell, released in 2012, was charged with tax evasion in the 90s related to ‘Assassination Politics’: promoting anonymous payments for individuals to order the killing of government officials. Zhao’s lawyers filed several letters from friends, family members and business leaders supporting a lenient sentence for the former CEO. Under U.S. sentencing guidelines, a judge has the authority to put CZ in federal prison for up to 10 years, but there is a recommended sentence of 12 to 18 months for his specific charge. Prosecutors have requested three years in prison and a $50 million fine. Related: What to expect at Changpeng Zhao’s sentencing on April 30 After the conviction and sentencing of former FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried, CZ will be one of the most high-profile figures in the crypto space to enter a federal courtroom and learn whether a judge will decide to grant probation or send him to prison. Former Celsius CEO Alex Mashinsky, facing seven securities and commodities fraud charges, will go to trial in January 2025. CZ has largely not publicly commented on the charges since his guilty plea as part of a $4.3 billion settlement between U.S. authorities and Binance in November 2023. In a letter to Judge Richard Jones dated Feb. 2, Zhao apologized for his “poor decisions” regarding Binance and said he was prepared to accept responsibility for his actions. The former Binance CEO is scheduled to return to court on April 30 for sentencing. Since November, he has been free to travel within parts of the U.S. on a $175 million bond. Magazine: ‘Less flashy’ Mashinsky set for less jail time than SBF: Inner City Press, X Hall of Flame","Former Binance CEO Changpeng “CZ” Zhao has requested that a federal judge sentence him to probation after pleading guilty to violating money laundering laws. His legal team has filed several declarations in support of his recommendation, including one suggesting he could serve time at the Federal Detention Center (FDC) SeaTac, Washington. Zhao’s lawyers filed several letters from friends, family members and business leaders supporting a lenient sentence for the former CEO. Former Celsius CEO Alex Mashinsky, facing seven securities and commodities fraud charges, will go to trial in January 2025. The former Binance CEO is scheduled to return to court on April 30 for sentencing." Base asset tokenization protocol loses $1.7M due to private key leak,"Real-world asset tokenization protocol Grand Base (GB), which operates on Coinbase’s native layer-2 blockchain, has suffered $1.7 million in losses after a private key compromise. “On April 15 at 03:01:27 AM +UTC, an exploit happened on our contracts,” wrote an admin in the protocol’s Telegram chat. “For this specific reason, we urge all our community members to stay away from this contract as it is not safe anymore.” According to blockchain analytics firm PeckShield, the private key leak resulted in the theft of $1.7 million in tokens from its liquidity pools, which have since been swapped on-chain for Ether (ETH) and sent to an external address. Simultaneously, the protocol’s native token lost 99% of its value in the past 24 hours due to the incident. The Grand Base Telegram admin reiterated that “this token contract is NOT safe anymore and you should NOT swap or interact with it, stay safe. We will update you asap on the next step.” In a follow-up analysis by blockchain analytics firm CertiK, it appears that the hacker gained control of Grand Base deployer contracts and subsequently minted an excess number of GB tokens without authorization before withdrawing them. A subsequent post from Grand Base staff claims that developers have “tracked all the wallets of the hacker” and are awaiting the next move. “We are in talks with CEXs [centralized exchanges] to freeze any funds that he might move,” Grand Base staff added. Grand Base’s description of the attack. Source: Telegram Users were not impressed with the news of the Monday hack. “I’m very sorry for everyone involved here,” one user wrote in Grand Base’s Telegram chat. “Please, don’t lose more money here. Abandon this and don’t deposit a single dollar more into this thing, whatever happens.” “There are hidden loopholes in this contract,” another user alleged. “The total balance does not show any changes, and it belongs to hidden loopholes. Do you know if it was intentional by dev or not?” they added. Before the minting attack, Grand Base had a maximum GB token cap of 50 million. The Grand Base tokenization protocol was launched less than five months ago. It allowed users to deposit collateral to mint real-world assets in the form of ERC-20 tokens and provided liquidity for the tokenized assets to earn rewards. Related: This platform aims to make seamless RWA tokenization possible","Real-world asset tokenization protocol Grand Base (GB), which operates on Coinbase’s native layer-2 blockchain, has suffered $1.7 million in losses after a private key compromise. A subsequent post from Grand Base staff claims that developers have “tracked all the wallets of the hacker” and are awaiting the next move. “We are in talks with CEXs [centralized exchanges] to freeze any funds that he might move,” Grand Base staff added. Before the minting attack, Grand Base had a maximum GB token cap of 50 million. The Grand Base tokenization protocol was launched less than five months ago." BTC halving to fuel ‘raging firesale of crypto assets’ — Arthur Hayes,"April’s Bitcoin halving, combined with a “bag of tricks” from the United States Federal Reserve and the Department of the Treasury, will “add propellant to a raging firesale of crypto assets” and depress the crypto market for weeks, says BitMEX co-founder Arthur Hayes. In an April 8 blog post, Hayes wrote he believed the Bitcoin halving would “pump prices in the medium term” but warned crypto prices “directly before and after could be negative.” “The narrative of the halving being positive for crypto prices is well entrenched. When most market participants agree on a certain outcome, the opposite usually occurs,” he wrote. Hayes believes that the halving is also coming at a time when “dollar liquidity is tighter than usual” and outlined his theory on how the U.S. Federal Reserve and Treasury policies impact the markets. “That is why I believe Bitcoin and crypto prices in general will slump around the halving [...] It will add propellant to a raging firesale of crypto assets.” “Could the market defy my bearish inclinations and continue higher? Fuck yeah,” he wrote. “I’m perennially long as fuck crypto, so I welcome being wrong.” Hayes noted the second half of April would be a “precarious period for risky assets,” as U.S. tax payments remove liquidity, the Fed starts quantitative tightening, decreasing the money supply, and the Treasury’s general account (TGA) — basically, the government’s checking account — is yet to be used. Hayes wrote: Excerpt from Hayes’ blog post discussing the Fed and Treasury’s “bag of tricks.” Source: Arthur Hayes After May 1, following the Fed’s meeting on the same day, Hayes said he expects it to reduce the pace of money supply tightening, and the Treasury will release from the TGA “most likely, an additional $1 trillion of liquidity into the system, which will pump markets.” Related: Bitcoin needs to hold above $80,000 to keep mining profitable post-halving Hayes said the halving and the Fed and Treasury’s “bag of tricks” is why he’s decided to “abstain from trading until May.” Bitcoin (BTC) is up over 61% year-to-date, climbing from around $42,200 to trade at $71,170, according to Cointelegraph Markets Pro. The market sentiment measuring Crypto Fear and Greed Index has also climbed since Jan. 27, remaining in the “Greed” zone above a score of 50 out of 100. The score for April 9 showed “Extreme Greed,” with a score of 80, up from 76 the day prior. A three-month chart of the index’s score starting Jan. 11. Source: alternative.me It started the year at a score of 65, meaning “Greed,” but hit a high of 90 on March 5 — its highest in two years. Hayes wrote that if the liquidity scenarios he theorized come true, it would give him “much more confidence to ape into all manner of dogshit.” “If I miss a few percentage points of gains but definitely avoid losses for my portfolio and lifestyle, that is an acceptable outcome,” he added. Magazine: How to protect your crypto in a volatile market — Bitcoin OGs and experts weigh in","April’s Bitcoin halving, combined with a “bag of tricks” from the United States Federal Reserve and the Department of the Treasury, will “add propellant to a raging firesale of crypto assets” and depress the crypto market for weeks, says BitMEX co-founder Arthur Hayes. In an April 8 blog post, Hayes wrote he believed the Bitcoin halving would “pump prices in the medium term” but warned crypto prices “directly before and after could be negative.”“The narrative of the halving being positive for crypto prices is well entrenched. “That is why I believe Bitcoin and crypto prices in general will slump around the halving [...] It will add propellant to a raging firesale of crypto assets.”“Could the market defy my bearish inclinations and continue higher? The score for April 9 showed “Extreme Greed,” with a score of 80, up from 76 the day prior. Magazine: How to protect your crypto in a volatile market — Bitcoin OGs and experts weigh in" Fake Ethena Labs token exploited for $290K on Binance Launchpool,"Update March 29, 09:50 am UTC: This article has been updated to clarify the token in question is a fake bearing the same name as Ethena Labs' ENA token. A fake token with the same name as Ethena Labs's ENA token has been exploited for 480 BNB (BNB) tokens worth $290,000 on the Binance launch pool for farming. The vulnerability behind the exploit is still unknown. On-chain security firm PeckShield reported the incident at 8:31 am UTC on March 29 in an X post, mistaking the fake token for the real ENA token. Ethena Labs’s ENA token was announced on the Binance Launchpool on March 29. The exploit of the fake token, which is unrelated to Ethena Labs, occurred a few hours after the announcementing listing, causing widespread confusion. Ethena Labs launched its USDe synthetic dollar on the public mainnet on Feb. 19. Ethena became the highest-earning decentralized application (DApp) in crypto on March 8, when it offered investors an annual percentage yield (APY) of 67%. In terms of total sum, the exploit is on the smaller side of crypto hacks. The attack occurred a day after the over-$11-million Prisma Finance hack on March 28. Crypto hacks are a long-standing issue in the industry, eroding investor trust. Over $200 million worth of crypto has been lost to hacks and rug pulls in 2024 across 32 individual incidents up to Feb. 29, according to blockchain security firm Immunefi. The over-$200-million loss represents a 15.4% increase compared to January and February 2023, when $173 million of digital assets were stolen. A total of $1.8 billion was lost to crypto hacks and scammers in 2023, 17% of which can be attributed to the North Korean Lazarus Group, according to a Dec. 28 report by Immunefi. Related: Funds hacked in 2024 increased by 15.4% vs. the same period in 2023 — Immunefi Amount of crypto funds stolen fell 54% in 2023 The biggest year for crypto hackers was 2022, which saw over $3.7 billion in funds stpo, a decrease of 54.3% to $1.7 billion in 2023, according to the “2024 Crypto Crime Report” by Chainalysis. Despite the value of funds falling, the number of incidents grew from 219 in 2022 to 231 in 2023. Total value hacked. Source: Chainalysis Chainalysis attributed the significant yearly drop to a decrease in decentralized finance (DeFi) hacking, according to the report: “Hacks of DeFi protocols largely drove the huge increase in stolen crypto that we saw in 2021 and 2022, with cybercriminals stealing more than $3.1 billion in DeFi hacks last year. But this year, hackers stole just $1.1 billion from DeFi protocols. This amounts to a 63.7% drop in the total value stolen from DeFi platforms year-over-year.” Related: Marc Andreessen, Galaxy Digital, Accolade, back new $75 million crypto fund: Report","Update March 29, 09:50 am UTC: This article has been updated to clarify the token in question is a fake bearing the same name as Ethena Labs' ENA token. A fake token with the same name as Ethena Labs's ENA token has been exploited for 480 BNB (BNB) tokens worth $290,000 on the Binance launch pool for farming. On-chain security firm PeckShield reported the incident at 8:31 am UTC on March 29 in an X post, mistaking the fake token for the real ENA token. Ethena Labs’s ENA token was announced on the Binance Launchpool on March 29. The exploit of the fake token, which is unrelated to Ethena Labs, occurred a few hours after the announcementing listing, causing widespread confusion." "Munchables reworks multisig, contracts and dev hiring after $68M theft","Days after nonfungible token (NFT) game Munchables lost and recovered nearly $63 million from a rogue in-house developer, the platform said it has devised a plan to avoid making the same mistake again. On March 26, Ethereum-based NFT game Munchables was robbed of over 17,400 Ether (ETH) from a hacker, who was later identified as a Munchables developer. The situation de-escalated shortly after the developer decided to return the stolen funds without demanding a ransom. While Munchables narrowly escaped what would have been an eye-watering loss, the developer announced it is now implementing a number of changes to “upgrade the security of the project’s funds and smart contracts.” One of the strategies involves onboarding investment firm Manifold Trading, market maker Selini Capital and blockchain investigator ZachXBT as new multisig signers to ensure the safe return of users’ funds. Munchables announced that developers from Manifold Trading and Selini Capital will also reaudit and upgrade to new contracts and oversee Munchables’ dev hiring process going forward. Ethereum infrastructure firm Nethermind is set to further audit the refreshed contracts before Munchables goes live again. After its relaunch, returning gamers will become eligible for higher rewards in the game. The platform has also pledged to provide financial support to the entities involved in the recovery process. “Finally, we will send ETH and future MUNCH donations to those who were involved in the recovery process of keeping our users safe.” The company also warned users against interacting with websites to claim a refund, as the company will send the refunds directly to their wallets. Related: Andreessen Horowitz to invest $30M in tech-fueled gaming startups The month of March saw nearly $100 million in digital assets stolen, according to blockchain security firm PeckShield. Total hack losses in 2024 by month. Source: PeckShield In the month alone, the crypto ecosystem witnessed over 30 hacking incidents, which accounted for $187 million in funds lost. On the bright side, 52.8% of the hacked funds were returned. The top five security incidents in terms of the value lost include the Munchables incident. The Curio hack, the Prisma Finance incident, the NFPrompt hack and the WOOFi exploit also made it to the list. Magazine: Creating ‘good’ AGI that won’t kill us all: Crypto’s Artificial Superintelligence Alliance","Days after nonfungible token (NFT) game Munchables lost and recovered nearly $63 million from a rogue in-house developer, the platform said it has devised a plan to avoid making the same mistake again. On March 26, Ethereum-based NFT game Munchables was robbed of over 17,400 Ether (ETH) from a hacker, who was later identified as a Munchables developer. Munchables announced that developers from Manifold Trading and Selini Capital will also reaudit and upgrade to new contracts and oversee Munchables’ dev hiring process going forward. Ethereum infrastructure firm Nethermind is set to further audit the refreshed contracts before Munchables goes live again. Source: PeckShieldIn the month alone, the crypto ecosystem witnessed over 30 hacking incidents, which accounted for $187 million in funds lost." Web3 needs player-centric games for mass adoption — Websea exec,"Web3 gaming needs more player-centric projects with smooth onboarding to bolster mainstream adoption, according to Herbert Sim, chief operating officer of the hybrid cryptocurrency exchange Websea. He told Cointelegraph in an exclusive interview: “GameFi projects need to put players at the forefront. At Websea Labs, we’re looking at projects enhancing user experience and gameplay, with eSports being the biggest thing in the market, even within crypto.” Web3 games have been widely criticized for their lack of gameplay and user experience. Many previous Web3 games have grown in popularity simply based on their promised economic incentives for users despite having poor overall user experience. However, today’s Web3 games will need to have both a sustainable economic model and a user-centric approach, according to Sim: “Building sustainable economics is very important for the longevity of projects. So we only invest in projects that have longevity and put players at the forefront.” Both the GameFi and decentralized finance (DeFi) sectors are seeing increased institutional interest, according to Sim, which will bolster mainstream user adoption: “We’re focused on GameFi and DeFi because all the institutions are looking at this. Capital is flowing in along with a lot of technological innovation that are crucial for driving market growth and maturity in these sectors.” Websea’s ecosystem investment institution, Websea Labs, launched a $100 million fund focused on incubating GameFi and DeFi projects at the end of March. Websea Labs was launched in October 2023. According to Sim, the growing list of institutional participants will bolster the adoption of both sectors: “More institutional involvement [in GameFi] helps raise awareness and credibility. So with this, more users and developers are joining the games […] we see this happening for both GameFi and DeFi.” Related: Google sues alleged China crypto app racketeers: Report Web3 games are becoming “playable” An array of AAA-grade Web3 games are emerging from stealth in 2024, offering a combination of gameplay-focused user experience with high-quality graphics for the first time. Among the most anticipated games is Solana-based space exploration role-playing game (RPG) Star Atlas, built on the popular Unreal Engine 5. While Star Atlas is still in development, over 335,000 X followers are anticipating the game’s release, which will come in separate modules over the next five years. Star Atlas Surge trailer. Source: Star Atlas Showcasing the interest in Web3 games, Web3 RPG game Big Time generated over $100 million in revenue within the first six months of its pre-season without selling a single token, according to a March 28 X post by Mario Nawfal. He wrote: “This is a game-changer, proving that Web3 Gaming is not just the future — it’s inevitable. After all these years of traveling the world talking about the use cases around Web3 Gaming, I’m glad it’s all finally coming to fruition!” Related: Bitcoin’s 2028 halving price target is $435K, historical data suggests","Web3 gaming needs more player-centric projects with smooth onboarding to bolster mainstream adoption, according to Herbert Sim, chief operating officer of the hybrid cryptocurrency exchange Websea. Many previous Web3 games have grown in popularity simply based on their promised economic incentives for users despite having poor overall user experience. However, today’s Web3 games will need to have both a sustainable economic model and a user-centric approach, according to Sim:“Building sustainable economics is very important for the longevity of projects. Websea Labs was launched in October 2023. Source: Star AtlasShowcasing the interest in Web3 games, Web3 RPG game Big Time generated over $100 million in revenue within the first six months of its pre-season without selling a single token, according to a March 28 X post by Mario Nawfal." OKX launches Ethereum layer-2 network for lower fees & interoperability,"Cryptocurrency exchange OKX has joined the likes of Coinbase in launching an in-house Ethereum-based layer-2 network to provide lower fees and interoperability for users interacting with decentralized applications. OKX’s launched the public mainnet of X Layer, its zero-knowledge proof powered network, on April 15. The network was built using Polygon’s chain development kit (CDK) and enables shared state and liquidity across multiple blockchain networks using the Ethereum scaling protocol’s Aggregation Layer. An announcement shared with Cointelegraph notes that X Layer provides faster, cheaper transaction capabilities when interacting with on-chain applications. The network uses ZK-proofs, the underlying technology used by various Ethereum layer-2 networks for improved security and scalability. Related: Ethereum layer 2s to hit $1T market cap by 2030: VanEck X Layer is EVM-compatible, allowing developers to launch or migrate Ethereum-based decentralized apps (DApps) without having to rewrite the underlying code. A statement from OKX chief marketing officer Haider Rafique notes that X Layer and other layer-2 networks are set to become integral infrastructure for an interconnected Web3 ecosystem. “We are building an ecosystem that is as seamless and interoperable as possible. We think X Layer has limitless potential thanks to our strong community and its connectivity with other Ethereum-based networks,” Rafique said. OKX launched the mainnet beta of X Layer in November 2023, which attracted more than 50 Web3 DApps to launch on the testnet. OKX notes that DApps including the Graph, Curve, LayerZero, QuickSwap, Galaxy and Timeswap are in the process of deploying on its proprietary layer-2 network. X Layer will allow OKX users to transfer assets, deposit and withdraw cryptocurrencies on OKX and access nearly 200 DApps offering token swaps, staking and smart contract functionality. OKX’s native OKB token acts as X Layer’s native token and is used to pay gas fees on the network. Related: Ethereum ecosystem needs a major mindset shift for global impact, says Vitalik Buterin Polygon CDK is touted to provide symbiotic benefits for OKX, X Layer and other chains connected to Polygon’s AggLayer. X Layer essentially connects to other chains built on Polygon CDK through the AggLayer, which allows for the transition of liquidity between these chains. According to Polygon CEO Marc Boiron, this creates an interconnected network of liquidity across different blockchain protocols “X Layer’s connection to the AggLayer solves the fragmentation of liquidity and users across chains on the AggLayer so they can all grow together. OKX’s 50 million users now have an easy path to onboarding to X Layer and all the other chains connected to the AggLayer.” Investment management firm VanEck estimates that Ethereum layer-2 networks could exceed $1 trillion in market capitalization by 2030. These networks have become integral to helping Ethereum achieve scale, powering low-fee, secure and decentralized transactions and applications. Magazine: 1 in 6 new Base meme coins are scams, 91% have vulnerabilities","Cryptocurrency exchange OKX has joined the likes of Coinbase in launching an in-house Ethereum-based layer-2 network to provide lower fees and interoperability for users interacting with decentralized applications. OKX’s launched the public mainnet of X Layer, its zero-knowledge proof powered network, on April 15. An announcement shared with Cointelegraph notes that X Layer provides faster, cheaper transaction capabilities when interacting with on-chain applications. The network uses ZK-proofs, the underlying technology used by various Ethereum layer-2 networks for improved security and scalability. OKX notes that DApps including the Graph, Curve, LayerZero, QuickSwap, Galaxy and Timeswap are in the process of deploying on its proprietary layer-2 network." Degen Chain L3 now tops the TPS charts within the Ethereum ecosystem,"Degen Chain, a new Ethereum layer-3 network, has recorded the highest transaction per second (TPS) count in the Ethereum ecosystem over the last 24 hours. Degen’s TPS count increased 62% over the last day to notch 35.7 TPS — beating out the blockchain it was built on, Base, at 29.7 TPS, according to L2BEAT. Arbitrum One, Ethereum and zkSync Era rounded out the top five. TPS by Ethereum-based blockchain over the last 24 hours. Source: L2BEAT Multiplying Degen’s 35.7 TPS by 86,400 seconds in a day means the memecoin chain processed 3.08 million transactions over that timeframe. But Degen Chain has only notched $819,600 in trading volume over the last day, placing it 35th out of 44 blockchains tracked by CoinGecko. This means the average value per transaction was a mere $0.27 — which is much lower compared to Ethereum and Base at $1,867 and $170 respectively. While TPS is widely used to measure a blockchain’s scalability limits, several industry leaders say it is a flawed metric — as it fails to consider the computational size of each transaction. “[It] is a bit like counting the number of bills in your wallet but ignoring that some are singles, some are twenties, and some are hundreds,” explained Steven Goldfeder, a founder at Offchain Labs who recently spoke with Cointelegraph Magazine. Related: Memecoin sector’s continued growth hinges on long-term utility The memecoin turned chain is powered by the Degen (DEGEN) token, which initially started out as a tipping token for users interacting with Degen’s channel on Farcaster — a decentralized social media platform. This is a textbook example of how a memecoin can actually accrue social value, according to Thomas Tang, a vice president of investments at cryptocurrency venture capital firm Ryze Labs. “It’s gained massive mass popularity because everyone’s tipping each other, and everyone holds it,” Tang told Cointelegraph. “So they built a layer 3, based on that.” Ian Lee of blockchain infrastructure firm Syndicate believes Degen Chain is paving the way for applications on layer 3s. Source: Ian Lee There is currently $4.1 million in total value locked on Degen Chain, while the three-month-old DEGEN token boasts a market capitalization of $326 million, according to CoinGecko. Degen Chain is considered an ultra-low-cost, application-specific layer 3 blockchain which was built with Arbitrum Orbit and leverages the settlement layer of Base, an Ethereum layer-2 scaling solution. Magazine: Is measuring blockchain transactions per second (TPS) stupid in 2024? Big Questions","Degen Chain, a new Ethereum layer-3 network, has recorded the highest transaction per second (TPS) count in the Ethereum ecosystem over the last 24 hours. Source: L2BEATMultiplying Degen’s 35.7 TPS by 86,400 seconds in a day means the memecoin chain processed 3.08 million transactions over that timeframe. But Degen Chain has only notched $819,600 in trading volume over the last day, placing it 35th out of 44 blockchains tracked by CoinGecko. Source: Ian LeeThere is currently $4.1 million in total value locked on Degen Chain, while the three-month-old DEGEN token boasts a market capitalization of $326 million, according to CoinGecko. Degen Chain is considered an ultra-low-cost, application-specific layer 3 blockchain which was built with Arbitrum Orbit and leverages the settlement layer of Base, an Ethereum layer-2 scaling solution." SEC seeks $5.3B judgment against Terraform Labs and Do Kwon,"The United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has filed a motion requesting billions of dollars in disgorgement and civil penalties against Terraform Labs and its co-founder Do Kwon following a verdict in its civil case. In an April 19 filing in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, the SEC requested Kwon and Terraform pay roughly $4.7 billion in disgorgement and prejudgment interest after the civil case ruling, as well as a combined $520 million in civil penalties — $420 million from Terraform and $100 million from Kwon. The commission, Terraform and Kwon filed their briefs for potential remedies in the civil case simultaneously, with the crypto firm suggesting a maximum civil penalty of $3.5 million and Kwon proposing only $800,000. In addition to the monetary judgment, the SEC proposed barring Kwon from serving as an officer or director of a securities issuer and providing complete details of his accounts and assets. If approved, Terraform would also have a “conduct-based injunction” imposed on the firm to prevent “engaging in essentially the same behavior that led to the massive fraud.” The proposed remedies and civil judgment have yet to be ruled on by a judge. “Defendants have not shown remorse for their conduct, nor can there be any doubt that they are in position where additional violations are not only possible but likely are already occurring,” said the SEC filing. “The Court should send an unequivocal message that this sort of brazen misconduct, and Defendants’ misbegotten attempt to excuse their behavior by crafting new rules and standards of behavior for crypto markets in contravention of the federal securities laws [...] will not be tolerated.” On April 5, a jury found Terraform and Kwon liable for defrauding investors regarding statements over the offer and sale of TerraUSD (UST), Luna (LUNA) and wLUNA. A Terraform spokesperson said at the time that the firm was “carefully weighing [its] options and next steps.” Cointelegraph reached out to Terraform regarding the April 19 filing but did not receive a response at the time of publication. Related: Terraform Labs was ‘built on lies’ — SEC at trial The SEC trial went forward without the presence of Kwon, who is currently embroiled in court proceedings in Montenegro. The Terraform co-founder was arrested in March 2023 for using falsified travel documents while attempting to leave the country. Though later released and allowed to travel within Montenegro, the question of Kwon’s extradition to either the U.S. or South Korea remained unanswered at the time of publication. He faces potential criminal charges in both countries. Magazine: The real risks to Ethena’s stablecoin model (are not the ones you think)","The United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has filed a motion requesting billions of dollars in disgorgement and civil penalties against Terraform Labs and its co-founder Do Kwon following a verdict in its civil case. The commission, Terraform and Kwon filed their briefs for potential remedies in the civil case simultaneously, with the crypto firm suggesting a maximum civil penalty of $3.5 million and Kwon proposing only $800,000. In addition to the monetary judgment, the SEC proposed barring Kwon from serving as an officer or director of a securities issuer and providing complete details of his accounts and assets. “Defendants have not shown remorse for their conduct, nor can there be any doubt that they are in position where additional violations are not only possible but likely are already occurring,” said the SEC filing. Related: Terraform Labs was ‘built on lies’ — SEC at trialThe SEC trial went forward without the presence of Kwon, who is currently embroiled in court proceedings in Montenegro." South Korean party bets on US Bitcoin ETF access for votes,"Leading political parties in South Korea are promising crypto-related incentives to secure voters’ support ahead of the country’s upcoming parliamentary elections. According to a Bloomberg report on April 5, the opposition Democratic Party has vowed to remove restrictions on domestic and international exchange-traded funds (ETFs) directly holding crypto tokens, including United States-based spot Bitcoin (BTC) ETFs. Following the approval of Bitcoin ETFs in January, South Korea’s securities regulator warned that local distribution of these ETFs could violate domestic laws. “We’re going to allow the ETFs, whether domestic or overseas,” the Democratic Party’s Hwanseok Choi told Bloomberg, citing the group’s manifesto. Also hoping to capitalize on crypto voters, President Yoon Suk Yeol’s People Power Party pledged to delay taxes on digital assets’ profits, scheduled to take effect in 2025. According to government statistics, nearly six million South Koreans traded crypto via registered exchanges in the first half of 2023, representing 10% of the country’s population. A total of 7% of election candidates own cryptocurrencies, according to official disclosures. Related: Crypto.com expands in South Korea despite increasing regulatory scrutiny Data from Korea Securities Depository shows crypto users have invested over $200 million in shares of U.S.-listed firm MicroStrategy. The company’s massive exposure to Bitcoin has led some analysts to label it as “essentially a leveraged Bitcoin ETF.” Despite politicians’ promises, South Koreans are bracing for tighter regulations on crypto assets. Local financial authorities plan to release new rules for token listings on centralized exchanges in the coming weeks. According to local media reports, domestic exchanges will be prohibited from listing digital assets affected by hacking incidents until their root causes are determined. In addition, foreign digital assets will be listed on domestic exchanges only if a white paper or technical manual is available for local investors. Furthermore, South Korea’s upcoming Virtual Asset Users Protection Act prohibits the use of “undisclosed important information” about crypto, market manipulation and illegal trading. The crypto law will come into force on July 19. In February, the government issued an update to the act, imposing significant fines and criminal penalties for violations, including a fixed-term imprisonment sentence of more than one year or fines of three to five times the amount of illegal profits. Magazine: Inside Pink Drainer — Security analyst defends his crypto scam franchise","Leading political parties in South Korea are promising crypto-related incentives to secure voters’ support ahead of the country’s upcoming parliamentary elections. Following the approval of Bitcoin ETFs in January, South Korea’s securities regulator warned that local distribution of these ETFs could violate domestic laws. The company’s massive exposure to Bitcoin has led some analysts to label it as “essentially a leveraged Bitcoin ETF.”Despite politicians’ promises, South Koreans are bracing for tighter regulations on crypto assets. According to local media reports, domestic exchanges will be prohibited from listing digital assets affected by hacking incidents until their root causes are determined. In addition, foreign digital assets will be listed on domestic exchanges only if a white paper or technical manual is available for local investors." "Wormhole’s huge airdrop attracts scammers, spoof tokens and a $3B valuation","Crypto scammers, hackers and memecoiners have flocked to a massive $850-million airdrop event from cross-chain bridging platform Wormhole, which released its native governance W (W) token on Thursday. In an April 3 post to X, independent blockchain sleuth ZachXBT noted that Wormhole’s official post announcing the airdrop was targeted by “tons” of convincing scam accounts, many of which sported “gold checkmarks.” The official X account of the Wormhole founder Robinson Burkey also suffered an attack that saw the founder begin posting malicious links to suspected wallet drainers several hours after the airdrop was announced. Burkey’s account has since been made private. Source: Robinson Burkey The W token officially launched on April 3 at a price of $1.66 on the Solana-based decentralized exchange (DEX) OpenBook, commanding a total market capitalization of $2.98 billion at launch. The token’s price has since fallen 19.5% and is currently trading at $1.34. The bridging protocol set aside 674 million tokens — 6.75% of the total supply — for the airdrop, meaning that the current total value of the airdrop stands at $896 million for users who met the protocol’s eligibility requirements. Wormhole token price action since launch. Source: CoinGecko Related: Largest Ethena airdrop recipient gets nearly $2M Wormhole’s W token is currently only available on the Solana network; however, the project has shared that it will soon be made available on the Ethereum network as an ERC-20 token and other layer-2 networks at a later date. Spoof “Warmhole” memecoin takes off The wormhole airdrop event didn’t escape the gaze of opportunistic memecoin developers, with one parody token dubbed “Warmhole” being launched immediately following the announcement of the airdrop. The Warmhole memecoin rapidly shot from a market cap of around $100,000 at launch to a peak value of $8.3 million — an approximate gain of 83,000% in less than six hours. One user jested that if Wormhole airdrop recipients had immediately traded their new W tokens for the Warmhole memecoin, they would have become billionaires. Magazine: ‘SEAL 911’ team of white hats formed to fight crypto hacks in real time","Crypto scammers, hackers and memecoiners have flocked to a massive $850-million airdrop event from cross-chain bridging platform Wormhole, which released its native governance W (W) token on Thursday. The token’s price has since fallen 19.5% and is currently trading at $1.34. Wormhole token price action since launch. Spoof “Warmhole” memecoin takes offThe wormhole airdrop event didn’t escape the gaze of opportunistic memecoin developers, with one parody token dubbed “Warmhole” being launched immediately following the announcement of the airdrop. One user jested that if Wormhole airdrop recipients had immediately traded their new W tokens for the Warmhole memecoin, they would have become billionaires." HKVAEX withdraws Hong Kong license application post-deadline,"Update March 29, 11:00 am UTC: This article has been updated to add that Binance refutes SCMP’s claim of HKVAEX being part of the Binance group. HKVAEX, a Hong Kong-based crypto exchange allegedly tied to Binance, withdrew its license application from the Securities and Futures Commission of Hong Kong (SFC) on March 28. The SFC had set a deadline of Feb. 29 for all crypto exchanges to apply for operational licenses in the region. HKVAEX, a crypto exchange that, according to Chinese state media SCMP, shares technical and other resources with Binance, applied for the Hong Kong license on Jan. 4. List of all crypto exchanges that withdrew license applications with the Securities and Futures Commission of Hong Kong (SFC). Source: sfc.hk The SFC website confirms that HKVAEX withdrew its license application nearly three months after the filing. Following the application withdrawal, HKVAEX must wind up its operations in Hong Kong on or before May 31. The Hong Kong SFC shared deadlines for crypto license applications. Source: sfc.hk Speaking to Cointelegraph, Binance denied any links to the Hong Kong-based crypto exchange and stated: ""HKVAEX is not part of Binance group. Please reach out to HKVAEX."" Three other virtual asset trading platforms have withdrawn their operational license applications in 2024 for reasons that were not made public, including the prominent global crypto exchange Huobi. Crypto Twitter community member Wu Blockchain speculated that the reasons for the withdrawal may involve a variety of reasons, including a request to change the audit company or provide more information. At the time of its launch, HKVAEX was confused with VAEX, a different crypto exchange in Hong Kong tied to KuCoin. At the time, an HKVAEX representative told Cointelegraph, “VAEXC is another applicant, and they have nothing to do with us.” Related: Binance executive reportedly escapes detention as Nigeria files tax evasion charges CommEx, a Russian crypto exchange with strong ties with Binance, officially announced it is shutting down operations and has halted deposits on March 25. “We have to announce the gradual suspension of operations on the CommEX platform,” the firm said, recommending users to withdraw their assets immediately to third-party wallets. Binance had previously hinted at exiting Russia in early September 2023 as top local executives, including vice president of Eastern Europe Gleb Kostarev, stepped down. Subsequently, CommEx emphasized that it operated independently of Binance but admitted that some of its core members were former Binance staff. Magazine: Creating ‘good’ AGI that won’t kill us all: Crypto’s Artificial Superintelligence Alliance","HKVAEX, a Hong Kong-based crypto exchange allegedly tied to Binance, withdrew its license application from the Securities and Futures Commission of Hong Kong (SFC) on March 28. List of all crypto exchanges that withdrew license applications with the Securities and Futures Commission of Hong Kong (SFC). Following the application withdrawal, HKVAEX must wind up its operations in Hong Kong on or before May 31. The Hong Kong SFC shared deadlines for crypto license applications. At the time of its launch, HKVAEX was confused with VAEX, a different crypto exchange in Hong Kong tied to KuCoin." Solana project launches delayed due to extended network congestion,"Intermittent congestion on the Solana blockchain has forced several crypto projects to postpone their launches. Solana developers say they are working on a fix by April 15. Users of the Solana blockchain reported increasing issues around network congestion and transaction errors over several weeks. New projects, especially those planning token launches, decided to hold off until the technical difficulties were resolved. Some Solana projects that waited for a congestion resolution included a nonfungible token (NFT) project, Suit Up, altcoin project DuckCoin and Solana staking rewards platform Surge Finance. On April 6, Anza, a Solana-focused software development shop, laid out its plan to address the network congestion on its Solana validator client implementation, Agave. Initial investigations pointed to issues around QUIC implementation, a general-purpose transport layer network protocol, as the root cause. The developers said: “Anza engineers, with other core contributors, have been working around the clock to diagnose and remedy bottlenecks and increase network performance. Expect more improvements and changes to roll out over the coming months.” At the time of writing, users have reported experiencing delayed sends for Solana’s SOL (SOL) tokens on the crypto exchange Coinbase. According to the incident report, Solana has been investigating the issue for over eight hours. However, the issues do not impact the trading and fiat withdrawal and deposit functionality. Solana incident report for Coinbase. Source: status.coinbase.com Solana co-founder Raj Gokal previously said that “the failed transactions on Solana blockchain have nothing to do with scalability.” Related: Solana struggles: Record 75% of user txs are failing... or are they? Amid growing criticism around transaction failures, Fantom network creator Andre Cronje has expressed support for the Solana network. According to Cronje, the ongoing congestion on Solana stems from the ecosystem’s rapid growth, which has increased demand for block space. Cronje stated that performance issues are technical challenges, not consensus mechanism flaws. Cronje referred to the Solana network as a victim of success. The uptick in transaction failures was followed by a recent uproar from Solana users on social media, who complained of failed transactions and a degraded user experience. Magazine: 1 in 6 new Base memecoins are scams, 91% have vulnerabilities","Intermittent congestion on the Solana blockchain has forced several crypto projects to postpone their launches. Users of the Solana blockchain reported increasing issues around network congestion and transaction errors over several weeks. Some Solana projects that waited for a congestion resolution included a nonfungible token (NFT) project, Suit Up, altcoin project DuckCoin and Solana staking rewards platform Surge Finance. On April 6, Anza, a Solana-focused software development shop, laid out its plan to address the network congestion on its Solana validator client implementation, Agave. Amid growing criticism around transaction failures, Fantom network creator Andre Cronje has expressed support for the Solana network." SEC can proceed with Coinbase lawsuit: Court ruling,"A United States court has denied Coinbase’s motion to dismiss the United States Securities and Exchange Commission’s case against the exchange. The decision, made by U.S. District Judge Katherine Failla, allows the SEC to pursue its lawsuit against Coinbase. The SEC alleges that the exchange operates as an unregistered exchange, broker and clearing agency, according to March 27 court documents, which state: “The Court finds the SEC has sufficiently pleaded that Coinbase operates as an exchange, as a broker, and as a clearing agency under the federal securities laws, and through its Staking Program engages in the unregistered offer and sale of securities.” The SEC sued Coinbase in June 2023, saying the crypto exchange violated federal securities laws by listing 13 tokens it alleged were securities. The firm was seeking an order to drop the case, questioning the SEC’s authority over crypto exchanges. Related: Coinbase asks court to reject SEC’s ‘empty chair’ securities judgment Coinbase argued that the transactions facilitated on its platform do not qualify as financial securities and thus fall outside the SEC’s purview. However, the regulator argues that at least some of those transactions constitute investment contracts: “At least some of the transactions on Coinbase’s platform and through related services constitute ‘investment contracts,’ which the federal securities laws have long recognized as securities. The parties readily acknowledge that the viability of enforcement action hinges on this difference of opinion.” The court denied Coinbase’s motion to dismiss the case, arguing that similar transactions have previously been considered securities transactions: ""As explained herein, the ‘crypto’ nomenclature may be of recent vintage, but the challenged transactions fall comfortably within the framework that courts have used to identify securities for nearly eight years.” The court also cited Coinbase’s lack of registration with the securities regulator: “The Court concludes that because the well-pleaded allegations of the Complaint plausibly support the SEC’s claim that Coinbase operated as an unregistered intermediary of securities, Defendants’ motion must be denied.” The two parties were ordered to submit a “proposed case management plan” by April 19, according to the court documents. Related: SEC will ask for $2B in fines and penalties — Ripple chief legal officer","A United States court has denied Coinbase’s motion to dismiss the United States Securities and Exchange Commission’s case against the exchange. The decision, made by U.S. District Judge Katherine Failla, allows the SEC to pursue its lawsuit against Coinbase. The firm was seeking an order to drop the case, questioning the SEC’s authority over crypto exchanges. Related: Coinbase asks court to reject SEC’s ‘empty chair’ securities judgmentCoinbase argued that the transactions facilitated on its platform do not qualify as financial securities and thus fall outside the SEC’s purview. Related: SEC will ask for $2B in fines and penalties — Ripple chief legal officer" Bitcoin clings to $65K — More losses ahead for BTC price?,"Bitcoin’s (BTC) price fell over 7.1% during the past day, slipping below the $65,000 mark for the first time since March 24. The current week, or the 14th week of the year, is historically one of the worst weeks for Bitcoin’s price performance. BTC price fell an average of 8.33% on the 14th week of the year, according to Coinglass data. Bitcoin price must sustain $65,000 Bitcoin price fell over 6% in the past 24 hours, reaching a daily low of $64,610 at 1:35 pm (UTC), while trading volume for the world’s largest cryptocurrency rose over 75% during the day to $46 billion, according to CoinMarketCap data. BTC/USDT, 1-day chart. Source: CoinMarketCap Bitcoin failed its post-breakout retest, and the price momentum will continue slowing down as the Bitcoin halving approaches, argued popular crypto analyst Rekt Capital in an April 2 X post: “Bitcoin has failed its post-breakout retest. Bitcoin could still technically recover above the old all-time high of ~$69,000 before the new weekly candle close is in.” BTC/USD, 1-week chart. Source: Rekt Capital Bitcoin’s price needs to be sustained above the $65,600 weekly range low to avoid further losses, added Rekt Capital. Over $249 million worth of long leveraged positions would be liquidated across all exchanges, if Bitcoin price fell to to the $65,000 mark, according to Coinglass data. Bitcoin Exchange Liquidation Map. Source: Coinglass Following the correction, Bitcoin has reset multiple key metrics that previously suggested the price was overheated, including the relative strength index (RSI), which fell to 48 on the daily timeframe, suggesting that Bitcoin is no longer overbought, according to TradingView. Related: Over $6B worth of BTC moved by 5th-richest Bitcoin whale The RSI is a popular momentum indicator used to measure whether an asset is oversold or overbought based on the magnitude of recent price changes. BTC/USD, 1-day chart. Source: Tradingview Bitcoin’s price correction can be mainly attributed to newcomers who ha entered the Bitcoin market in the past two months since the approval of the United States' spot Bitcoin exchange-traded funds (ETFs), according to Andrey Stoychev, the head of Prime Brokerage at Nexo. He told Cointelegraph: “For fresh adopters, Bitcoin’s move from $40,000 then to the current $65,000 potentially signifies an over 50% return in as little as 60 days – a sure profit-taking signal in the investment world. It's important to remember that market corrections are part of every market dynamic.” Stoychev expects a short-term correction thanks to new latecomers who want to invest in Bitcoin. He said: “Bitcoin bull markets have come with returns, as three out of the first four cycles have surpassed previous highs. Looking back at 2020, Bitcoin surged 250% in just four months after breaking a new all-time high, suggesting a potential trajectory toward $231,000 if history repeats itself in this cycle.” Traders should be watching the $64,000 mark, with over $17.21 million worth of Bitcoin futures liquidation leverage on Binance, the world's largest exchange. An additional $9.92 million worth of BTC stands to be liquidated at the $63,500 mark, according to Coinglass data. Binance BTC/USDT liquidation heatmap. Source: Coinglass Bitcoin long liquidations reach $109M as holders start selling Over $152.5 million worth of leveraged Bitcoin positions were liquidated in the past 24 hours, with $109.11 million worth of long positions, according to Coinglass data. Bitcoin’s sudden drawdown caused over $165 million of leveraged crypto liquidations in less than two hours on April 2. Crypto liquidation heatmap. Source: Coinglass Meanwhile, the dormant Bitcoin supply has reawakened. Long-term holder (LTH) supply declined by 900,000 BTC since the peak of 14.91 million BTC in December 2023, with Grayscale accounting for a third, or 286,000 BTC, according to an April 2 report by Glassnode. The report noted: “Conversely, the Short-Term Holder Supply has increased by +1.121M BTC, absorbing the LTH distribution pressure, as well as acquiring an additional 121k BTC from the secondary market via exchanges.” Bitcoin: Long/short-term holder threshold. Source: Glassnode This article does not contain investment advice or recommendations. Every investment and trading move involves risk, and readers should conduct their own research when making a decision.","Bitcoin’s (BTC) price fell over 7.1% during the past day, slipping below the $65,000 mark for the first time since March 24. BTC price fell an average of 8.33% on the 14th week of the year, according to Coinglass data. Over $249 million worth of long leveraged positions would be liquidated across all exchanges, if Bitcoin price fell to to the $65,000 mark, according to Coinglass data. An additional $9.92 million worth of BTC stands to be liquidated at the $63,500 mark, according to Coinglass data. Long-term holder (LTH) supply declined by 900,000 BTC since the peak of 14.91 million BTC in December 2023, with Grayscale accounting for a third, or 286,000 BTC, according to an April 2 report by Glassnode." Web3 game Wilder World gets Epic Game Store listing during alpha testing,"Web3 game Wilder World has been given a listing on the Epic Games Store ahead of its as-of-yet unscheduled launch. Wilder World is being described as “the ultimate game” by the publisher, also known as Wilder World. Per a press release seen by Cointelegraph, the game features “a free-roam virtual world that begins in Wiami, a metaverse city to explore, race, socialize, and much more.“ All items, equipment, land, and avatars in the world will be “tradable digital assets on the Wilder World marketplace.” According to Frank Wilder, Co-founder of Wilder World: “We’re honoured to be listed on the Epic Games store, setting the pace for next-gen gaming in the metaverse. Our mission is to create a novel experience using cutting-edge technology, offering players a virtual space for gaming, socializing, and earning.” The Wilder World team claims that the game will “combine leading game genres into a single immersive experience” to overcome what they say are the shortcomings of traditional AAA games such as Grand Theft Auto and Cyberpunk. Per the team’s roadmap, Wilder World will combine the genres of racing, mining, first-person-shooter, into a single comprehensive game. Wilder World is being built on a proprietary blockchain. According to the press release the team is “working with Polygon and Celestia to build a custom, scalable blockchain to keep its fees low; as well as working with Metagravity to power virtual worlds with thousands of players.” The creators behind the game also claim that it will eventually run on a proprietary cloud gaming system. Per a blog post on the Wilder world website “with the use of NVIDIA GPUs, we are in active development of our own cloud gaming service that provides increased reliability and hardware guarantees, as well as optimization for metaverse and web3 gaming.” However, the post notes that this is an early venture and goes on to say that at launch, Wilder World will be available on Nvidia’s streaming gaming service Geforce NOW. The team’s roadmap indicates that limited functionality will be launched to players over the next 12-18 months with the “racing” portion of the game available during what they’re calling “Act I” and the “combat” portion available with “Act III.”","Web3 game Wilder World has been given a listing on the Epic Games Store ahead of its as-of-yet unscheduled launch. Wilder World is being described as “the ultimate game” by the publisher, also known as Wilder World. Per the team’s roadmap, Wilder World will combine the genres of racing, mining, first-person-shooter, into a single comprehensive game. Wilder World is being built on a proprietary blockchain. The team’s roadmap indicates that limited functionality will be launched to players over the next 12-18 months with the “racing” portion of the game available during what they’re calling “Act I” and the “combat” portion available with “Act III.”" Hong Kong spot Bitcoin ETF approval draws praise and caution from industry players,"The much-anticipated approval of spot Bitcoin (BTC) exchange-traded funds (ETFs) in Hong Kong earlier this week represents a significant industry milestone for some experts. However, others warn that greater market forces, such as persistent inflation and geopolitical risk, could overshadow the bullish event. “We are delighted to witness the historic moment of the launch of Asia’s first Bitcoin spot ETF and the world’s first Ethereum spot ETF,” said Livio Wang, chief operating officer of Hong Kong-based HashKey Group, in a statement. “This will serve as a significant milestone for traditional financial institutions in Hong Kong to enter the market and provide retail users with a more convenient purchasing gateway.” At the same time, Wang explained that, unlike U.S. spot Bitcoin ETFs, which were approved in January, Hong Kong spot Bitcoin ETFs have several unique features, such as subscription and redemption both via fiat money and via Bitcoin and stablecoins themselves. In addition, Wang spoke highly of Hong Kong regulators approving a spot Ether (ETH) ETF, which has seen greater regulatory hurdles in the U.S. Similarly, Patrick Pan, CEO and chairman of OSL Exchange, told Cointelegraph that “the initiation of these ETFs is expected to significantly boost capital inflow into the digital asset market in Hong Kong.” Pan also praised Hong Kong spot ETFs’ ability to allow in-kind settlement, explaining that such a structure will result in ""uninterrupted trading flows"" and ""enhanced market liquidity."" Crypto exchange eToro is also bullish on the prospects of Hong Kong spot ETFs. ""Hong Kong would become the first Asian jurisdiction to have a bitcoin spot ETF, positioning itself as a rising crypto hub in Asia, as well as potentially paving the way for other neighboring countries and jurisdictions to follow suit with their own ETFs,"" the exchange wrote in a statement, continuing: ""More potential investors and integrations into the traditional financial system could bode well for the bitcoin price."" However, eToro also noted after the Hong Kong ETF news, all eyes now rest on Bitcoin's Halving event. ""The question on every Bitcoin investor’s mind now is if we will see the price rally again to fresh all-time highs given the immediate supply shock from the halving, or will the price fall even lower, with the halving becoming a sell-the-news event after all the build-up, similar to the Bitcoin spot ETF approval earlier this year?” the exchange stated. Others are not as enthusiastic about the prospects of the Hong Kong spot Bitcoin ETF. ""Mainland China investors probably won’t be eligible to buy Hong Kong-listed spot bitcoin and ether ETFs as they are barred from buying virtual assets,"" commented Bloomberg ETF analyst Eric Balchunas. Due to such demand constrictions, Balchunas predicts that Hong Kong spot Bitcoin ETFs will only attract ""$1 billion within two years,"" far less than the approximately $50 billion currently managed by U.S. spot Bitcoin ETFs. Meanwhile, Markus Thielen, founder of Singaporean blockchain analytics firm 10x Research, said that the firm “sold everything last night,” just one day after Hong Kong spot ETFs were approved. “Our growing concern is that risk assets (stocks and crypto) are teetering on the edge of a significant price correction,"" wrote Thielen, adding: ""The primary trigger is the unexpected and persistent inflation. With the bond market now projecting less than three cuts and 10-year Treasury Yields surpassing 4.50%, we may have arrived at a crucial tipping point for risk assets."" Bitcoin has lost nearly 20% of its value since achieving its all-time high of $73,750 apiece last month. On April 13, the digital asset took a nose-dive due to escalating tensions in the Middle East. Source: Eric Balchunas (X). Related: 'China is about to start bidding' — Will Hong Kong Bitcoin ETFs spark the halving rally?","The much-anticipated approval of spot Bitcoin (BTC) exchange-traded funds (ETFs) in Hong Kong earlier this week represents a significant industry milestone for some experts. Crypto exchange eToro is also bullish on the prospects of Hong Kong spot ETFs. Others are not as enthusiastic about the prospects of the Hong Kong spot Bitcoin ETF. Due to such demand constrictions, Balchunas predicts that Hong Kong spot Bitcoin ETFs will only attract ""$1 billion within two years,"" far less than the approximately $50 billion currently managed by U.S. spot Bitcoin ETFs. Related: 'China is about to start bidding' — Will Hong Kong Bitcoin ETFs spark the halving rally?" Visa Token Service reaches 1B tokens served in Asia-Pacific market,"Visa announced on March 26 that its payment services in the Asia-Pacific region have served more than 1 billion tokens while bringing an “uplift” to the market of more than $2 billion last year. Visa Token Service (VST), launched in 2014, serves as a bridge between traditional banking account information and digital payment services such as Google Pay and Apple Pay. Essentially, VST replaces the traditional 16-digit credit/debit card number used by consumers to make purchases with a secure numeric token. This allows consumers to share financial information without exposing their private details or banking information. VST operates on VisaNet, the company’s proprietary network that, according to company documentation, is capable of handling more than 56,000 transaction messages a second. One of the more common use cases for tokenized payment methods is for cross-border payments and international travel. Exchanging cash or conducting wire transfers across currency types comes with myriad friction points. The use of tokenized assets such as cryptocurrency or tokenized payment services such as VST can avoid much of the hassle involved in these transactions. A recent study by Visa found that 97% of travelers to the Asia-Pacific region prefer to make payments by means other than cash. In 2023, this led to an average spend of $2,525 per trip. The “tokenization” of traditional assets into digital currencies and payment facilitators has grown significantly in the wake of COVID-19. As travel continues to flourish as the world recovers from the pandemic, the need for international payment methods with low fees and friction has become increasingly cited by consumers as driving factors in how and where they make purchases. Visa’s head of products and solutions for the Asia-Pacific region, TR Ramachandran, said in a press release that tokens “pave the way for the future of commerce.” “The innovation possibilities are immense with tokenised payment credentials that can unlock new and more personalised consumer experiences beyond physical Visa cards. We continue to build on the capabilities that modern credentials offer, together with our partners, to bring more value to the entire payment ecosystem.” Previn Pillay, head of merchant sales and acquiring for Asia Pacific at Visa, added that the company encourages “more merchants to adopt tokenised payments as this technology can make a direct impact to their top and bottom lines."" Related: Visa, Mastercard could be key drivers for crypto in the year ahead","Visa announced on March 26 that its payment services in the Asia-Pacific region have served more than 1 billion tokens while bringing an “uplift” to the market of more than $2 billion last year. Visa Token Service (VST), launched in 2014, serves as a bridge between traditional banking account information and digital payment services such as Google Pay and Apple Pay. One of the more common use cases for tokenized payment methods is for cross-border payments and international travel. The use of tokenized assets such as cryptocurrency or tokenized payment services such as VST can avoid much of the hassle involved in these transactions. A recent study by Visa found that 97% of travelers to the Asia-Pacific region prefer to make payments by means other than cash." USA to forge AI partnership with Nigeria for economic growth,"The United States of America (U.S.A) and Nigeria are poised to engage in discussions on the digital economy, emerging technology, and the advancement of artificial intelligence (AI) to explore potential partnership opportunities. During the closing ceremony of a four-day Workshop on National Artificial Intelligence Strategy in Abuja, Mr. Arthur Brown, the Deputy Chief of Mission at the U.S. Embassy, revealed this information. Brown stated that within two weeks, senior officials from the U.S. government would convene in Abuja for a conference organized by the U.S.-Nigeria Bi-National Commission. Providing further details on the upcoming meeting, the deputy chief of mission said the United States aims to capitalize on the momentum generated by a four-day workshop by organizing an AI conference in Lagos. The partnership aims to strengthen economic ties and ensure that AI deployment is safe, secure, transparent, and trustworthy. Through its diverse agencies, Brown expressed that the United States is prepared to collaborate with Nigeria as equitable partners to advance initiatives spanning talent development, infrastructure, research, and innovation. He lauded Nigeria for endorsing a significant United Nations resolution on AI and committed to the ongoing partnership between the U.S. government and Nigeria regarding the economy. Addressing the workshop’s conclusion, Dr. Bosun Tijani, the Minister of Communications Innovation and Digital Economy, emphasized the importance of African governments and leaders taking decisive action to support their aspirations and strategies. According to a PricewaterhouseCoopers study, artificial Intelligence could contribute $15.7 trillion to the global economy by 2030, with approximately $3 trillion attributed to enhanced productivity and $9.1 trillion arising from novel goods and services. Related: Mark Zuckerberg says Meta wearables that read brain signals are coming soon Speaking on anticipated revenue generation and job creation, Tijani emphasized that rather than prioritizing revenue, Nigeria should focus on establishing effective governance for AI, recognizing it as a critical tool to enhance productivity across sectors. In partnership with the National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA) and the Nigeria Communications Commission (NCC), the Ministry orchestrated a four-day Artificial Intelligence workshop to craft a collaborative framework for implementing AI in the nation. The four-day artificial intelligence workshop led to the launching of Nigeria’s first Multilingual large language model (LLM) as the country pushes forward to take a leadership position in artificial intelligence development in Africa. In August 2023, the Nigerian government invited scientists of Nigerian heritage, as well as globally renowned experts who have worked within the Nigerian market, to collaborate in formulating its National Artificial Intelligence Strategy. Magazine: How to get better crypto predictions from ChatGPT, Humane AI pin slammed: AI Eye","The United States of America (U.S.A) and Nigeria are poised to engage in discussions on the digital economy, emerging technology, and the advancement of artificial intelligence (AI) to explore potential partnership opportunities. The partnership aims to strengthen economic ties and ensure that AI deployment is safe, secure, transparent, and trustworthy. He lauded Nigeria for endorsing a significant United Nations resolution on AI and committed to the ongoing partnership between the U.S. government and Nigeria regarding the economy. The four-day artificial intelligence workshop led to the launching of Nigeria’s first Multilingual large language model (LLM) as the country pushes forward to take a leadership position in artificial intelligence development in Africa. Magazine: How to get better crypto predictions from ChatGPT, Humane AI pin slammed: AI Eye"