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2022-08-27 17:43:00 ​​ CEO Consilium: "State-owned cryptocurrencies will occupy an extremely narrow niche."

According to the U.S. center Atlantic Council, to date, 11 countries have already launched projects CBDC, 14 are in the testing phase, 26 - in development, and 47 countries are studying the possibility and prospects of public cryptocurrencies.

But according to Eddy Travia, national digital currencies are unlikely to take a broad niche and displace assets like bitcoin or ether from the market.

"States are exploring CBDC simply because such digital currencies can be controlled, defined and enforced.

I think states' cryptocurrencies have only a narrow niche to operate in a world where there are thousands of cryptocurrencies and tokens. After all, CBDC has no clear advantages," Travia said.

Consilium's CEO also commented on the digital yuan project. He stressed that the Chinese digital currency has been repeatedly tested, but has not yet gained much popularity.

The thing is that the already existing and popular payment systems Alipay and WeChat Pay offer absolutely the same functionality from the user side. Therefore, there is no point in using the digital yuan.

Earlier, Layah Heilpern, a podcast host about cryptocurrencies, said that anyone familiar with cryptocurrencies should shun government digital currencies, because they are subject to censorship. Open / Comment

2022-08-26 17:48:00 ​​ SBI Crypto severed cooperation with BitRiver

Japan's SBI Holdings, the parent company of the SBI Crypto miner, stopped cooperating with the Russian data center operator BitRiver, which is under U.S. sanctions. This was reported by CoinDesk, citing knowledgeable sources.

The SBI Crypto division had been deploying its mining machines at BitRiver's sites in Siberia.

BitRiver neither confirmed nor denied that SBI Holdings or its subsidiary were their customers.

"The SBI Group has already stopped all mining in Siberia. And we are not mining in the rest of Russia. As for any other information, I'm afraid I can't disclose it," an SBI Holdings representative responded to CoinDesk's inquiry.

Earlier in an interview with Bloomberg, SBI Crypto CFO Hideyuki Katsuchi said that they tried to sell their equipment in the country after the sanctions restrictions on Russia. However, he did not specify how this could be achieved without the involvement of their hosting company.

In April, OFAC announced that mining companies were helping Russia circumvent Western sanctions.

According to its latest quarterly financial report, financial conglomerate SBI Holdings maintains ties to Russia because it still has a bank branch in the country.

The company has rarely disclosed information about its mining business and has not previously mentioned a presence in Russia. In 2020, even references to the chips and ASIC miners produced by the division disappeared from its earnings reports.

A representative of SBI did not explain the reasons why this information became classified.

After the company left Russia, SBI Holdings lost 9.7 billion yen ($71 million) of pre-tax profit in the second quarter of 2022.

About 7.2 billion yen ($52 million) of that amount was due to "temporary factors," including falling cryptocurrency prices. As a result, 2.5 billion yen ($19 million) of losses can be attributed directly to the termination of cooperation with Russia.

As of June 30, SBI Holdings had total assets of 18.6 trillion yen (about $136 billion).

According to BTC.cöm, as of this writing, SBI Crypto ranks 11th among mining pools. Its hash rate is 1.26 EH/s. According to Blockchain.cöm, the pool's aggregate computing power on the bitcoin network has dropped by about a third since February.

As a reminder, in April, the U.S. Treasury Department imposed sanctions against BitRiver, a group of companies engaged in mining cryptocurrencies in Russia. Igor Runets, the company's founder, said in a commentary to ForkLog that he considers this move as unfair competition.

In the same month, bitcoin mining equipment and services provider Compass Mining decided to sell BitRiver-hosted equipment.

At the same time, the Russian data center operator continued to cooperate with the UAE-based mining company Phoenix Technology Consultants. In November 2021, BitRiver announced an agreement to supply Phoenix with 300 MW of hosting capacity by the end of 2022.

Phoenix CEO Munaf Ali did not comment on the relationship with BitRiver, adding only that "the company operates extensively in Russia." Open / Comment

2022-08-25 17:01:00 ​​ Law Commission for England and Wales urges caution about bitcoin

The Law Society of England and Wales advised its members to treat bitcoin like cash and be aware of potential money laundering risks when customers use BTC for transactions.

The legal group believes that buying real estate for the proceeds of a bitcoin investment requires members to identify the source of the money used to buy bitcoins.

"This is a cash transaction, so there is a high risk of money laundering. There is a significant risk in this transaction that bitcoin could be derived from criminal activity," the warning said.

The lawyers added that under Rule 33 of the Anti-Money Laundering, Counter-Terrorist Financing and Transfer of Funds Regulations of 2017, members must apply enhanced precautions dictated by the level of risk and commitment to the source of funds.

The commission's announcement is likely to have far-reaching implications for cryptocurrency investors, who will turn to lawyers to transact using the proceeds of cryptocurrency investments.

Last month, a member of the Law Commission for England and Wales said that British property laws should be extended to cryptocurrencies and non-transferable tokens (NFTs). Open / Comment

2022-08-24 16:35:00 ​​ LUNC and USTC rise after Do Kwon interview

Terra Classic cryptocurrency - LUNC and USTC - rose sharply in value after Do Kwon's interview. What did the founder of the platform talk about?

Two cryptocurrencies of the affected Terra Classic blockchain - Luna Classic (LUNC) and Terra USD Classic (USTC) - suddenly headed upward. On August 23, the USTC stabelcoin showed a daily growth of 8%.

The main blockchain currency - Luna Classic - added 42% in 24 hours. The exact reason for the rise is unknown.

But the rise followed an interview with Do Kwon, founder of Terraform Labs. In an interview for Coinage, the Korean developer said: there may have been a mole in the company.

If you're asking me if there was a mole at TFL, it's probably "Yes." Has anyone tried to take advantage of this particular opportunity, I would say the answer would be "Yes."

But if those opportunities existed, the fault lies with the person who presented those vulnerabilities in the first place. "I, and I alone, am responsible for any vulnerabilities that may have been presented for the short-seller to start locking in profits.

In addition to the growth of the classic coin, Terra Phoniex's newest blockchain network asset, the cryptocurrency LUNA, was up 9%. LUNA's trading volumes were half that of LUNC and USTC. Open / Comment

2022-08-23 18:38:00 ​​ Metaworld avatar platform raises $56 million

Representatives of Ready Player Me, the avatar platform for the Metaworld, announced it has raised $56 million in a Series B funding round.

It was led by the well-known venture company Andreessen Horowitz (a16z), while Konvoy Ventures, Collab Currency, Taavet Hinrikus, Sten Tamkivi Plural Platform, and Hartbeat Ventures took part. In addition, the startup was supported by angel investors - Roblox creator David Bazzuki, Twitch co-founder Justin Kahn, and others.

Jonathan Lai of a16z and Mr. Tamkivi of Plural joined the Ready Player Me board of directors. They said: the Ready Player Me project is for both users and developers.

Users can create avatars for virtual worlds for free, and programmers can integrate the platform into their apps.

Management of the digital platform said that the firm has more than 3,000 partners, including VRChat, Somnium Space and NFT RTFKT studio. All of them have integrated Ready Player Me functionality. Leading brands, such as Adidas and Dior, have also partnered with the organization, allowing their customers to create unique virtual avatars.

According to the board, the next step in development will be to create content tools for avatars. This will allow users to generate additional accessories for digital images and scale the idea.

The Ready Player Me startup will use the money it receives to expand the organization's staff.

Prior to that, the company has already held a fundraising round, during which it managed to raise $16 million for business development. Open / Comment

2022-08-22 17:08:00 ​​ Falling cryptocurrency market may bring it to a healthier state

The entrepreneur expects traders who focus only on price fluctuations of digital assets to leave the cryptocurrency market.

Kim Dotcom, a well-known entrepreneur currently living in New Zealand, believes that a big drop in the cryptocurrency market would be a good thing, because it would cause most of those investors who are only focused on making money from the price fluctuations of digital assets to leave the market.

In his opinion, the cryptosphere will get a "second wind" when digital assets are perceived by participants as financial instruments with great potential.

Dotcom's opinion sounded against the background of how at the end of last week bitcoin fell behind the level of 22 thousand dollars, in the moment falling to 21.13 thousand dollars, that is, to the lowest value in the last three weeks.

At the start of the last full week of August, the No. 1 cryptocurrency was bouncing back from its fall, rising to $21,34,000 in the first half of August 22, but went below $21,000 in the afternoon.

Despite the "dive" below $21,000, compared to the value of mid-June ($17,500), the bitcoin price is in the plus zone.

Dotcom also spoke out about the future of the global economy. In his opinion, the U.S. will not cope with the burden of its financial problems, and the U.S. dollar will greatly depreciate.

Another businessman, Robert Kiyosaki, agreed with Dotcom's opinion. He said that if the White House policy will continue in the same vein as it is now, he, as an investor, would react by buying more gold, silver and bitcoins. Open / Comment

2022-08-21 18:32:00 ​​ Is Solana losing its luster?

Several "Ethereum killers" gained enormous popularity last year, but the most famous was Solana, which promises enormous throughput and very low commissions.

However, recent events have raised questions about Solana's prospects.

Let's start at the end. This week the Wormhole crosschain bridge was hacked for $320M. Paradigm analysis showed that the incident happened because of a flaw in the Solana interface. Wormhole also reported that hackers took advantage of a contract signature verification vulnerability that was in Solana 1.8. It was fixed in Solana 1.9.4.

The Wormhole situation was resolved thanks to Chicago-based investment firm Jump Crypto, which gave enough ETH to offset the losses. However, this opened a new problem - the huge influence of venture capital on the project.

The distribution of SOL tokens is geared more toward professional investors than other crypto projects. The Information recently reported how Solana insiders made billions in 2021. There's also a video online of two venture capitalists laughing about how much SOL they have.

Retail investors are likely to be very surprised by the situation that will arise after the token lock-in period ends. Professionals can pour huge amounts of SOL into the open market.

At the same time, Solana also faces technical problems. Users are increasingly complaining about a severe drop in network performance due to spam. In September, Solana's network went down completely for 17 hours.

This is the situation that has arisen in the Solana ecosystem. However, it is still in great demand and growing. Do you believe in this "Ethereum killer"? Open / Comment

2022-08-20 17:09:00 ​​ BIT Mining report and the new Hut8 partnership

Established in 2021, BIT Mining, which became widely known with the acquisition of the BTC.cøm mining pool, published its report for the second quarter. The miner, like most corporations in this industry, showed a loss-making financial result at the level of $21 million.

Despite the growth of hash rate up to 0.14 EH/s, the company's income decreased by $101, 2 million compared to the first quarter for a number of objective reasons.

The management of BIT Mining complains about the fall of Bitcoin, as well as the increase in energy costs, which made the profit of $195.5 million in April-June. The company produced 97 BTC and 4,898 ETH during this period.

At the presentation, the miner outlined further plans - to continue building a mine in Ohio, to bring to market new models of ASIC miners to mine BTC, DOGE and LTC. They are developed and produced by Bee Computing, whose takeover deal was closed through a share swap.

Canadian miner Hut8 as part of a business diversification program, has entered into a partnership agreement with U.S. financial corporation Canaccord Genuity and investment bank Stifel. Both companies will act as agents for a $200 million stock sale.

Under the agreement, Hut8 securities will be sold through the U.S. exchange NASDAQ, where there is much more liquidity than on the Canadian stock market. The proceeds will be used to specifically cover operating expenses, used to fund acquisitions or to cover debt.

The agreement allows Hut8 to avoid credit expansion, ensures Miner's financial stability during the crypto-zine. According to a recently released Q2 report, the miner posted a net loss of C$88.1 million, despite an increase in hash rate and Bitcoin mining levels. Open / Comment

2022-08-19 16:27:00 ​​ The NFL will issue its own NFT tokens

Representatives of the U.S. National Football League (NFL) said they have partnered with renowned digital studio Dapper Labs in order to launch their own video platform.

Users will be offered to purchase non-exchangeable tokens (NFTs), which will contain clips of the most memorable moments in the history of the league and individual players in American soccer.

The developers assured that the service will offer sports fans a platform to buy and sell virtual collectibles. The first collection of tokens was called NFT all day. According to the organizers of the sports league, such a step was made because the businessmen were well aware of the prospects of cryptocurrencies and the web3 sector in professional sports.

The ambassador of this gathering was the famous soccer player Patrick Mahomes. Most of the items in the debut virtual collection will be centered around the career of the popular Kansas City Chiefs team player.

He has previously released his own personalized collection of NFT tokens based on the Ethereum blockchain.

The athlete assured: he has been following cryptocurrencies for a long time and has no doubt that NFT integration will help athletes and teams get closer to their fans.

It is extremely important for fans to have the rights to own items that are related to the lives of their idols. In his opinion, the launch of the new Web site will be a big and important step in the development of the NFL. Open / Comment

2022-08-18 17:09:00 ​​ Most of Ethereum's active nodes are in the hands of three major cloud solution providers

According to analytics company Messari, most of Ethereum's active nodes are in the hands of centralized web providers such as Amazon Web Services (AWS), which can "affect Ethereum through central nodes."

The three main cloud providers account for 69% of the hosted nodes on Ethereum's core network, with Amazon Web Services (AWS) accounting for over 50%, Hetzner for over 15% and OVH for 4.1%.

Ethernodes figures show that Oracle (4.1%), Alibaba (3.9%) and Google (3.5%) also provide web hosting services on Ethereum.

In its December 2020 report, Messari pointed out that the high cost of node infrastructure could make Ethereum vulnerable.

Now the analytics company is concerned about the situation around Solana. According to Messari, 72% of Solana's core nodes are in the hands of the same centralized web providers as Ethereum nodes.

According to Ethernode, the nodes are most geographically concentrated in the U.S. (46.4%) and Germany (13.4%), accounting for nearly 60% of distributed Ethereum nodes worldwide.

Thus, government intervention in one of these two countries could seriously impact Ethereum decentralization. Open / Comment