Crypto Sale

2022-08-19 20:00:10 ​​US lawmakers urge EPA to consider the potential benefits of crypto mining.

“Digital assets, and their related mining activities, are essential to the economic future of the United States," said the group of 14 lawmakers.

A group of 14 United States senators and House representatives have signed a letter to the Environmental Protection Agency extolling what they believe are the benefits of crypto mining.

In a Thursday letter, many U.S. lawmakers including pro-Bitcoin Senator Cynthia Lummis and Representative Tom Emmer addressed EPA administrator Michael Regan, requesting the government agency analyze the potential impact of crypto mining in an effort to balance innovation with environmental concerns. The group of 14 senators and representatives claimed mining could have a “substantial stabilizing effect on energy grids” and cited examples of mining operations using flared gas and renewable energy sources.

“Digital assets, and their related mining activities, are essential to the economic future of the United States," said the letter.

“Favoring one technology over another, including proof-of-work versus proof-of-stake, can stifle innovation, erode future economic gains, and limit affiliated efficiencies.”

In addition to Lummis and Emmer, the lawmakers who signed the letter were all members of the Republican Party, including Senators Bill Hagerty, Kevin Cramer, and Steve Daines. House Representatives Patrick McHenry, Pete Sessions, Bill Posey, Bill Huizenga, Andy Barr, Anthony Gonzales, Brian Steil, William Timmons, and Ralph Norman also approved the message to EPA administrator Regan.

The Republicans’ request to Regan stood in contrast to an April letter to the EPA from a bipartisan group of 22 lawmakers. They raised “serious concerns” around crypto firms operating in the United States, claiming that the companies contributed to greenhouse gas emissions and were not operating in accordance with either the Clean Air Act or the Clean Water Act.

“Cryptocurrency mining is poisoning our communities,” said the April letter to Regan. “The rapidly expanding cryptocurrency industry needs to be held accountable to ensure it operates in a sustainable and just manner to protect communities.”

In May, the Bitcoin Mining Council responded to the April letter with one of its own, alleging many of the lawmakers’ claims on mining were inaccurate. Open / Comment

2022-08-17 14:36:16 ​Crypto Exchange Coinify Obtains Regulatory Approval to Operate in Italy

Cryptocurrency exchange Coinify has obtained regulatory approval to operate in Italy, according to the Italian financial regulator’s website.

The Danish digital asset brokerage, currently licensed to operate in over 180 countries and territories, will offer its crypto trading and payments services in Italy after registering with the Organismo Agenti e Mediatori (OAM) on Aug. 12.

Italy has been significantly increasing its roster of crypto firms licensed to operate within the country. Just last month, Bitgo and Bitstamp all registered with OAM to offer their products and services in the country. And crypto exchanges Binance, Kraken and Bitpanda and brokerage Trade Republic have also registered recently.

Last August, crypto lender Voyager Digital acquired Coinify in an $84 million sale in stocks and cash, to bolster its crypto payments services. This past July, Voyager filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy amidst the crypto credit crisis.

Neither Coinify nor Voyager responded to requests for comment by press time. Open / Comment

2022-08-14 16:30:00 ​Crackdown on Tornado Cash Was Just Round 1

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This week the U.S. government shook the entire crypto world to its core.

The Treasury Department sanctioned the crypto mixer Tornado Cash as well as several crypto wallet addresses associated with the service. That means the protocol and its associated smart contracts are now blacklisted, making them illegal for Americans to use.

Tornado is a privacy tool that lets users obfuscate where their funds have been and where they’re going. Basically, it turns the transparency of blockchain technology into a black box, hiding your crypto activity.

Treasury backed the move by indicating that the Lazarus Group, a hacker group with ties to North Korea, had been using the service to launder stolen crypto (most notably, $96 million the group nabbed from the recent Harmony bridge attack).

In total, the Treasury said that the service “has been used to launder more than $7 billion worth of virtual currency since its creation in 2019.” Not all of that money was technically laundered, though, according to crypto sleuthing company Elliptic.

Roughly $7.6 billion worth of crypto has indeed passed through Tornado, but only $1.5 billion of those funds were illegally obtained (and, thus, laundered), Elliptic said in a report.

Chainalysis, another blockchain monitoring firm, also reported that nearly half of that $7.6 billion sum came from DeFi (none of which, according to Chainalysis, is necessarily illicit). Open / Comment

2022-08-12 15:51:31 ​ Only 394 Million SHIB Burned This Week, Here's Why Mechanism Is Not Effective

The Shibburn portal, which reports on the number of SHIB that have been burned, has once again announced that 30.43 million SHIB have been burned in the last 24 hours. Normally, such news is greeted with joy by optimistic Shiba Inu fans, because the burning, especially of millions of SHIBs, is meant to reduce the number of coins in circulation and, through deflation, increase the price of SHIB.

Nevertheless, six-figure burning amounts do not work in the case of Shiba Inu, because 30 million SHIB is only $370, which is literally 0.0005% of the project's capitalization. Moreover, if you look at the statistics of SHIB burning for the last five days since the end of last week, it turns out that during this period 394 million SHIB were burnt, which in turn does not even exceed $5,000. Open / Comment

2022-08-09 12:30:01 ​Central Bank of Thailand to Get More Powers In New Overhaul of Crypto Rules

On one hand, as Thailand prepares for the launch of its central bank digital currency (CBDC), it is simultaneously working to tighten crypto rules. The government of Thailand is looking to tighten the regulatory oversight on crypto platforms.

As a result, it is also planning to give more powers to the Thai central bank in an attempt to overhaul the crypto rules. Currently, only the Thailand SEC has had the sole mandate to supervise the industry since 2018. Of course, the SEC will be taking the lead further to overhaul the crypto rules.

However, new amendments to crypto regulations will “bring the central bank to be part of it,” said Finance Minister Arkhom Termpittayapaisith. Explaining further, Arkhom added:

“Right now, the central bank has no room to enter into the regulatory framework except for notifying that cryptos are not a legal means of payment for goods and services. So the framework is not clear enough to regulate the industry.”

The recent move comes after the country’s licensed crypto exchange Zipmex suspended withdrawals for a brief period of time. However, Zipmex has started to release the freeze on transactions. It is also seeking a temporary moratorium to raise more funds and avoid any lawsuits. Open / Comment

2022-08-07 14:00:07 ​Crypto Winter Sees Hyper-Centralization of Blue-Chip NFT Collections

For the first time since last June, the market failed to hit $1 billion in trades. NFT users have now resorted to liquidating their investments, anticipating better market prospects.

A new report by DappRadar, shared with CryptoPotato, suggests that this trend of “trading blocking” will continue till the crypto winter has passed. But during this turmoil, Yuga Labs has managed to retain its hold over the space.

In fact, four projects owned by the NFT giant: CryptoPunks, Bored Ape Yacht Club, Mutant Ape Yacht Club, and Otherdeed for OtherSide, alone represented over $160 million traded in July.

Yuga Labs had a little over 20% of the entire NFT market during the total trading volume of July 2022.
DappRadar’s latest blockchain industry report highlighted the hyper-centralization of activity in blue-chip NFT collections that continue to retain most of their value.

The document showed that the NFT market is currently contracting, with its trading volumes decreasing by 25% MoM.

Additionally, the number of traders has also declined by 8% MoM despite registering modest gains of 40% from July 2021.
Despite the entry of new competitors, OpenSea remains the dominant marketplace.

Its market share, however, has fallen from 84% in May to the current 58.6% measured in July. The diminishing volume is not surprising as the NFT market matures.

Solana’s Magic Eden, and Ethereum’s Foundation are some of the rivals witnessing increased volume.

According to DappRadar, these platforms are not only focusing on surviving the bear market but are also keen on maintaining or increasing their market share. Open / Comment

2022-08-05 20:00:11 In the Ultrade ecosystem, the ULTR token powers all functionality and fees.

You get paid with ULTR for referrals, liquidity providers, and market makers;
Stake ULTRs in the white label Ultrade Trading Suite - the more you stake, the higher the fee;
Traders can stake their ULTR for lower trading fees, while builders pay microfees in ULTR;
By staking ULTR, you'll be able to participate in project governance.

Plus, the community is awesome! Let's get together at Ultrade, https://t.me/+kAc_HgEmobliNjFh! Open / Comment

2022-08-04 12:00:14 ​ Starbucks Teases Web3 Updates to Its Popular Rewards Program

Web3 will play a part in the future of Starbucks' popular rewards program, Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz said.

"We have been working on a very exciting new digital initiative that builds on our existing industry-leading digital platform in innovative new ways, all centered around coffee and—most importantly—loyalty," Schultz said during the company’s Q3 2022 earnings call on Tuesday.

According to Schultz, the company will unveil the new digital initiative on Sept. 13, during its annual Investor Day event in Seattle.

The initiative will allow Starbucks to build on its current rewards engagement model while also introducing new methods of emotionally engaging customers, Schultz said, expanding its "digital third place community" approach and offering a broader set of rewards.

'Third place’ is a sociological term describing a community space between home and work.

The CEO says these rewards include one-of-a-kind experiences and Starbucks-branded digital collectibles as both a reward and a community-building element.

"This will create an entirely new set of digital network effects that will attract new customers and be accretive to existing customers in our core retail stores," he said.

Starbucks' relationship with Web3 initiatives has not been met with enthusiasm from employees, however. In May, during a presentation that included a section on NFTs—unique blockchain tokens that signify ownership over an asset, an employee who only gave the first name "Mark" and who described himself as a technologist voiced his disagreement with the company's plans, citing the environmental impact of NFTs.

"Blockchain, whether it's proof of stake or proof of work, is not planet positive... it is going to destroy the planet... and it makes me, as a technologist, and I'm not the only one, very worried about that, that this company would go in that direction,” he said, “I don't want to feel this way about Starbucks."

Mark also argued that NFTs are more exclusive than inclusive. Open / Comment

2022-08-03 11:00:08 Just a few weeks ago, I was looking for a replacement for my exchange, which I used on a regular basis.

While I was looking for a new exchange, I met a trader working with Bitswap.

He recommended it to me, I was skeptical about it at first, but then I tried it and I liked it very much.

I tell you what I liked:
1) Simple intuitive design.
2) Responsive support.
3) Several types of trading bots.

A few words about bots, there are grid, DCA, futures, I used all except DCA, I was very pleased with the result.

I want to emphasize that this is not an advertisement, but a personal recommendation

Below I leave a link to this project, I advise you to register, you will not regret it!

Bitsgap.com Open / Comment

2022-08-02 15:00:09 ​Singaporean financial watchdog to consult public on stablecoin regulation

The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS), a city-state’s principal financial regulator, assesses the merits of a regulatory regime toward stablecoins. Current guidelines focus on know-your-customer and anti-money laundering (KYC/AML) issues and do not reflect the specific risks to which the stablecoins are entitled.

On August 1, the MAS official portal published a written response by the regulator’s head, Tharman Shanmugaratnam, to a question posed by one of Singapore’s members of parliament. The question inquired if there is data on the extent of Singaporeans’ exposure to the recent collapse in the value of the TerraUSD (UST) stablecoin and the Luna token and whether the MAS is actively considering measures to tackle similar crises.

Shanmugaratnam acknowledged that the Terra collapse illustrates the high risks of the crypto investment but insisted that the turmoil hasn’t affected the mainstream financial system and the economy significantly.

In the majority of his answer, the official revealed MAS’ current plans for stablecoins. He claimed that MAS is actively reviewing its approach to the regulation of stablecoins, as the existing framework, in which stablecoins, alongside other cryptocurrencies, are being considered digital payment tokens (DPTs), doesn’t cover the specific risks.

Hence, MAS “is assessing the merits of a regulatory regime” tailored to the specific characteristics of stablecoins. It shall focus on such aspects as regulating the reserve requirements and the stability of the peg. As the response specifies, MAS intends to consult the public on the possible guidelines in the upcoming months. Open / Comment