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We post daily the best Bitcoin, Cryptocurrency & Blockchain News. Admin: @LevoBNTG
🏦 Coinbase unveils its Ethereum Layer 2 network that won't have a token
Coinbase is officially jumping into the Layer 2 game. The crypto exchange giant unveiled Base, a testnet version of its new Ethereum Layer 2 network, at ETHDenver. Modeled on Ethereum's Goerli testnet, it is designed to eventually connect to the main Ethereum network, according to Jesse Pollack, Coinbase's senior director of engineering.
“Our goal with Base is to launch a platform that makes it really easy for developers to build apps that users actually want to use and then plug that into the Coinbase product suite to make it really easy for users to use those apps,” Pollack said. Base is built on the open-source OP Stack, a blueprint for compatible blockchain Layer 2 networks that was created by the Ethereum Layer 2 network Optimism. Coinbase will also be joining Optimism as a core developer for the OP Stack. Notably, Pollack told The Block that Base won't sport its own dedicated token.
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🚨 Hope Finance Appears Rug Pull, Scammers Transferred $1.86 Million ETH To Tornado Cash
Hope Finance, a decentralized finance (DeFi) protocol, lost about $2 million in cryptocurrency assets on February 20 to a hacker who also claimed ownership of the whole genesis protocol. Some crypto community members have claimed that the protocol was a rug pull.
According to monitoring by AegisWeb3, a rug pull occurred in Hope Finance. The scammers have transferred ETH to the Ethereum blockchain through Celer and Uniswap and used 3 addresses to transfer 1095 ETH (approximately $1.86 million) to Tornado Cash. According to a representative from its auditor Cognitos, the malevolent player used a different smart contract from the one Hope Finance had examined. Markuu, a DeFi enthusiast, said it is possible that the doxing* scammer.
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🇺🇸 U.S. Congress may hold inquiry into Binance.US
U.S. Congress should hold an inquiry into Binance.US over its connection to Merit Peak, according to statements from a senator quoted by Reuters on Feb. 17. On Feb. 16 it was reported that Binance.US sent $400 million from an account at Silvergate Bank to the trading firm Merit Peak in 2021.
Binance.US additionally said that it does not and will not trade or lend out customer funds. The company distanced itself from high-profile company collapses caused by co-mingling of funds — presumably an allusion to the failure of FTX and Alameda Research. It asserted that only Binance.US employees have access to company bank accounts. It also said that external market makers like Merit Peak must compete fairly and transparently for rebates.
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📣 Wyoming Prohibits Courts From Forcing Individuals To Disclose Private Keys From July 1
The US Wyoming House of Representatives approved a measure that would forbid state courts from requiring citizens to provide private keys to their digital assets. public key is unavailable or details of the digital asset, digital identity or other interests or rights cannot be disclosed.
W.S. 34-29-107, the new statute, is titled Production of private keys; prohibition. Private keys for digital assets, one’s digital identity, and any other interests or rights that the private key confers are all included. It will be illegal for state courts to order someone to provide their private digital asset keys. On February 15, just one day after passing 31-0 in the Wyoming Senate, the measure was approved by a vote of 41-13 in the Wyoming House of Representatives. The law will go into effect on July 1 if Mark Gordon, the governor of Wyoming, approves it. On July 1, 2023, the law will go into effect.
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📊 Blur Token Reaches $500M Trading Volume After Airdrop
In less than 24 hours following its much-publicized airdrop, Blur tokens, an NFT marketplace, have already seen more than $500 million in trade volume. The value of all the tokens on the Blur marketplace increased by $10 million during the course of the last day.
Airdrops, which are typically employed as a user acquisition strategy, are the uninvited release of a cryptocurrency token or coin, usually for free, to various wallet addresses. Users of the Blur marketplace received airdropped BLUR tokens, with the quantity of each airdrop based on the platform’s overall activity, network volume, and individual users’ transactions. According to Twitter, this meant that some individuals acquired as many as 128,000 BLUR tokens. Etherscan, a blockchain tool, also reveals that consumers received anywhere from 25 and hundreds of thousands of BLUR.
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🏦 Coinbase CEO Announcing To Happily Defend His Exchange’s Staking In Court
After Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong used a Twitter thread to warn about what he said would be a “terrible path” for the U.S. The CEO has now increased the defense of his bitcoin exchange’s staking services.Coinbase’s staking services are not securities, and “we will happily defend this in court if needed.
Armstrong’s comments over the weekend came after rival exchange Kraken resolved a dispute with the US Securities and Exchange Commission earlier this week. Kraken agreed to pay a $30 million punishment for failing to register its “crypto asset staking-as-a-service program” offer and sale. Besides, a Twitter account known as Jason Gottlieb has expressed his sense of disapproval about the SEC. According to him, the SEC’s “all crypto projects have to do is come in and register” line is unbelievably insulting. Chief Legal Officer Paul Grewal stated that Coinbase’s staking services are different than Kraken’s.
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💰 SushiSwap Acquires Derivatives Trading Platform Vortex Protocol With Plan To Launch In Q2
SushiSwap reported that it had acquired Vortex Protocol for an undisclosed sum. The on-chain exchange will be a new product under the SushiSwap brand and be built on Sei Network, a blockchain employing Cosmos’ infrastructure, according to the Decrypt report.
Unreleased decentralized derivatives exchange Vortex Protocol will provide customers with 10x margin trading on a range of assets. In Q2 2023, Sei Network, a brand-new Layer 1 blockchain that focuses exclusively on decentralized trading apps, and Sushi’s recently purchased Vortex Protocol will both go live on the mainnet. This is also part of SushiSwap’s plan announced in January, although it’s not the foundation that Sushi built in the first place. The on-chain trading platform will be a new product that will fall under the DEX brand.
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🏦 Kraken Is Being Investigated For Potential Securities Crimes
The United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) is apparently looking into whether cryptocurrency exchange Kraken broke any rules regarding the selling of securities. LBRY Credits (LBC) in the secondary market, however, does not constitute a security, the SEC recently conceded during a Jan. 30.
The investigation relates to specific offerings that Kraken has made to clients in the United States, according to a Bloomberg story from February 8. According to a source with knowledge of the situation, the investigation is far along and a resolution may be reached soon. In December 2022, Gensler stated that his main objective for regulating cryptocurrency throughout 2023 was to bring crypto exchanges and lending platforms into compliance. He claimed that this could be done by having businesses register with the SEC or by taking enforcement action. Gary Gensler, the chairman of the SEC, has asserted numerous times.
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🪙 Tech giant Dell joins Hedera’s governing council
Technology giant Dell will join the likes of Google, FIS and Abrdn on the governing council of the enterprise network Hedera, a distributed ledger technology that uses a hashgraph consensus mechanism. “And for us, it becomes more and more serious for us to pay attention and focus on this.”
The node was actually part of the learning exercise we're going through,” Frattura said. “We’re doing this to understand policy implications, processes. What does it take to be a part of a permissioned public ledger and then, for our IT, how do we actually operationalize this? I can go into all the glorious details, but it takes a lot. “As far as any use case, I think it's a little premature,” Frattura said. “As we get our steam rolling, maybe later this year we'll see some more, but right now, let's just get on the council.”. the Hedera network within applications, but that’s still early days.
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📣 London Tops Global Rankings For Crypto Hubs With The Second-Highest Number Of Crypto Businesses
Over 800 crypto-based businesses are active in London, the most populated city in the UK, making it one of the top 3 crypto centers along with Dubai and New York. Recap’s annual list of the top crypto hub cities for 2023 considers important factors like tax status, quality of life index.
In order to determine its rankings, Recap’s annual list of the top crypto hub cities for 2023 considers important factors like tax status, quality of life index, and the overall number of crypto enterprises and professionals in a certain metropolitan region. The biggest number of persons employed in the sector was discovered in London, where there were an estimated 2,173 crypto-related workers. DeFi economy to take root in the Gulf nation, which is home to several crypto entrepreneurs like Marcello Mari of Singularity.
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💰 Shibarium Launch May Be Delayed Again
Shibarium, the eagerly anticipated Layer 2 protocol, could see yet another delay. While the Shiba Inu team plays about with the Shibarium concept, several platforms have already begun putting this Layer 2 protocol’s debut into motion. Kusama is known for his love of cryptic comments and hints.
Now that the text has been removed, the space is vacant. It’s unclear whether the entrance of Shibarium will now be delayed once more or if Shytoshi has made way for the next round of audience warming. However, this time, the action’s cancellation rather than the action itself raised questions. Then Kusama deleted a comment he had previously made in his account’s bio promising to “place Shiba in a heart-shaped box with a bow.” Many have interpreted this message to indicate that the introduction of Shibarium will occur on February 14, Valentine’s Day.
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⚡️ CME's crypto derivatives reach new highs as traders seek safe port in storm
Derivatives trading giant CME Group has clocked a record high in volume and open interest for bitcoin options as traders flock to the venue in the wake of the FTX meltdown. Bitcoin options volumes on CME hit $1.1 billion on Tuesday, and more than $736 million in open interest, according to data from The Block Research.
Caution among institutional trading firms in the wake of Sam Bankman-Fried's FTX bankruptcy could be one force behind the surge in activity on CME, said Steven Zheng, research director at The Block Research. CME Group, which launched bitcoin futures in May 2021, offers crypto trading in options and futures in bitcoin and ether. Given the collapse of FTX, Zheng said, institutional crypto traders are a lot more cautious of trading on unregulated and semi-regulated platforms, adding that "CME appears to be the beneficiary of this cautiousness.".
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🆘 Monkey Drainer Scammers Steal $4.3M Unintentionally Unidentified During Argument
Blockchain security team CertiK believes they have discovered the true identity of at least one of the Monkey Drainer scammers suspected of being involved in the $4.3 million scam. Reportedly, Monkey Drainer scammers uses intelligent contracts to steal NFTs.
CertiK said it had discovered online messages between two scammers related to the recent $4.3 million Porsche NFT scam and possibly linked one of the scammers to the Telegram account involved in the sale of Monkey Drainer – stylish scam kits. One of the messages shows a person claiming to be “Zentoh” and calling the person who stole the NFT “Kai”. Zentoh seems unhappy that Kai didn’t send some of the stolen money. A message from Zentoh instructs Kai to send the stolen money to their address. they recently mentioned their pseudonyms during a blockchain messaging debate.
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🆘 Ban on Crypto Mining in Residential Areas Proposed in Russia
Advisors to the Kremlin have suggested that home crypto mining should be banned in Russia, or in some of its regions. The stated motive for the proposal is to prevent fires in residential buildings. Amateur miners have been blamed for high loads on the grid causing breakdowns and blackouts.
The Energy Committee of the State Council, an advisory body to the Russian president, has recommended imposing a ban on the minting of digital currencies in residential areas. Its members believe the measure will reduce fire hazards, local media reported. The idea is to completely prohibit the production of cryptocurrencies in apartment blocks and houses in the country, or at least in parts of Russia experiencing energy deficits.
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💰 Right-Wing Arizona Senator Pushes to Recognize Bitcoin as Legal Tender
Arizona State Senator has introduced a bill to make Bitcoin legal tender in The Grand Canyon State. Wendy Rogers, a Republican and enthusiastic supporter of former President Donald Trump, yesterday put forward a proposal to amend the definition of legal tender.
The bill was introduced as one of a bundle of changes suggested by the State Senator, which included another bill preventing local authorities from taxing the use of blockchain technology. Rogers, a self-professed member of the far-right militia group the Oath Keepers, has tried to make Bitcoin legal tender before. She introduced a similar bill almost exactly a year ago, but it was not adopted. Rogers’ Republican colleagues Jeff Weninger and J.D. Mesnard co-sponsored the bills.
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🏦 Bithumb’s Biggest Shareholder Targeted In Embezzlement Probe
According to a Korean source report, the largest shareholder of Bithumb Holdings, ‘Vident,’ is being subjected to a search and seizure by the prosecution due to suspicions of embezzlement of affiliated companies of Bithumb. The Seoul Southern District Prosecutor’s Office Financial Investigation Division 2 has dispatched.
Mr. Kang has already been arrested and indicted for the embezzlement case of Bithumb affiliates on the 20th. The charges against him include breach of trust and embezzlement under the Act on the Aggravated Punishment of Specific Economic Crimes and fraudulent and illegal transactions under the Capital Markets Act. He is suspected of conspiring with his sister, Kang Ji-yeon, of diverting company funds or manipulating stock prices and trade convertible bonds (CB) under borrowed names to evade disclosure obligations.
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📣 Elizabeth Warren Does Not Speak for the Left on Crypto
Politicians like Elizabeth Warren have helped create a reputation of the political Left as the enemies of crypto. The truth is far more complicated. Its worldview shares many similar ideas to crypto. Namely, individual liberty and minimal interference by the government in economic affairs.
In the U.S., crypto’s most determined enemy has been the Senator from Massachusetts, Elizabeth Warren. She has waged a years-long campaign to restrict its use. She has said that crypto “has created opportunities to scam investors, assist criminals and worsen the climate crisis.”. In recent months, she has been organizing a bipartisan effort to heavily regulate the technology. Crypto advocates have pushed back, claiming that it poses an unconstitutional threat to privacy.
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📣 Sony Cooperates With Astar Network To Explore Blockchain Technology And Web3
Astar Network and Sony Network Communications have partnered to develop a Web3 incubation program for initiatives that emphasize the value of non-fungible tokens (NFTs) and decentralized autonomous organizations (DAOs). Sony Network Communications is a commercial branch of The Sony Group.
Astar Network CEO Sota Watanabe launched the Singapore-based Web3 tech company Startale Labs, which will administer the Web3 incubation program from mid-March through mid-June of this year. The program’s application period begins on February 17 and ends on March 6.According to the press release, the goal of the program organized by Sony Network Communications is to explore how blockchain technology can solve problems in their industry. In addition, projects in the program can also be considered for investment by Sony Network Communications.
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📣 CleanSpark buys 20,000 miners from Bitmain, bringing bear market tally to 46,500
Bitcoin miner CleanSpark bought 20,000 more mining machines, bringing the total count of its bear market spending-spree purchases to over 46,500. The company expects to pay $32.3 million for the new generation Antminer S19j Pro+ units after discounts from manufacturer Bitmain.
The company is adding to the over 26,500 units it bought last year at discounted prices, leveraging the bear market. The new units will be shipped in batches to be delivered by the end of May. CleanSpark said last week during its earnings call that it plans to keep buying new machines and sites as it looks to reach its end-year guidance of 16 EH/s — which it cut from 22.4 EH/s in December. We believe the tides are starting to shift and locking in prices for large orders will begin to be part of our strategy in the coming months.
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📣 Paxos Says It's 'Prepared to Vigorously' Fight SEC Lawsuit
Paxos confirmed Monday it received a Wells Notice from the Securities and Exchange Commission, stating it’s prepared to take on the agency and any enforcement actions related to stablecoin Binance USD. A Wells Notice is an official letter from the SEC that informs recipients the agency is preparing.
Paxos disagreed with the SEC’s belief that its Binance USD token is a security, stating that it is prepared to “vigorously litigate” the disagreement if it's forced to.“Paxos categorically disagrees with the SEC staff because BUSD is not a security under the federal securities laws,” the company said in a statement. “To be clear, there are unequivocally no other allegations against Paxos.”. The statement from Paxos comes as the company announced it would stop minting any new BUSD.
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📉 Coinbase Claims its Staking Products Are Not Securities as COIN Slumps 22% Weekly
All eyes in the crypto community have been on the SEC and its decision to pursue certain crypto staking offerings in the States.After Kraken, many believe Coinbase will be next to have to settle with the regulator, which is why the largest US-based exchange decided to address the matter.
The exchange’s Chief Legal Officer, Paul Grewal, asserted in the blog post that the company’s staking services do not meet the Howey test criteria, which is why they should not be considered securities. The SEC uses four characteristics to determine whether an investment asset falls under Howey’s securities category – efforts of other parties, investment of money, expectations of profit, and common enterprise. It’s not an investment of money because the customers retain full ownership of the crypto funds, and “they own exactly the same thing they did before.”
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🥇 New York Fed says Bitcoin shares most features of ‘a store of value’
The Federal Reserve Bank of New York said in a Feb. 9 report that Bitcoin performs more kin to a precious metal like gold but warns that it can never replace the US dollar due to volatility. Using a quantitative methodology known as principal components analysis.
The Fed analyzed the reaction of Bitcoin’s price over 30-minute and 1-hour intervals in comparison to leading fiat currencies such as the Japanese Yen (JPY), Euro (EUR), US Dollar (USD), and British Pound (GBP) during significant macroeconomic news events. Interestingly, the Fed found that Bitcoin is not influenced by monetary or macroeconomic news. However, the Fed acknowledged the need for further research to understand the disconnect between Bitcoin.
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💰 Argo Blockchain mined 14% more bitcoin in January than December
Argo Blockchain's bitcoin mining production increased 14% in January, producing 168 BTC, compared to 147 BTC in December 2022. The increase in BTC mined was primarily due to fewer curtailment hours in January compared to December, when a severe winter storm impacted much of the United States.
The company's total bitcoin holdings stood at 115 BTC as of Jan. 31. Its total hashrate capacity, or computational power, continues to be 2.5 exa hashes per second (EH/s). Argo will stop publishing monthly mining updates due to change in ownership of its Helios facility. Last month, Argo sold Helios to Galaxy Digital for $65 million. Argo said it will, however, continue to provide mining updates on a quarterly basis and in its financial statements. Argo added that it "refutes all of the allegations and believes that this class action lawsuit is without merit."
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🚨 Crypto Exchanges Made up 84% of Job Cuts Last Month: CoinGecko
January 2023 has been the second worst month for crypto layoffs as a new wave of redundancies hit the industry, with as many as 2,806 people losing their jobs, according to a new CoinGecko report. The overall number of layoffs the crypto industry saw last month may also put 2023 on track to surpass last year’s.
Of those January figures, centralized crypto exchanges accounted for most of the job cuts with 84% of all layoffs, with the researchers citing lower trading volumes and declining revenues as key reasons behind the layoffs. For some of them, last month was not the first wave of redundancies, with the likes of Coinbase and Crypto.com first slimming their workforce in June 2022. Major crypto exchanges that announced reductions in headcount in January included Huobi, Coinbase, Blockchain.com, Crypto.com, and Luno.
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📣 Render Token's RNDR Up Over 90% on the Week as New Tokenomics Model Passes DAO
RNDR, the token for blockchain-based distributed rendering service Render Network, has increased by over 90% in the past week, according to CoinGecko. Render has surged over over 300% in the last 30 days to reach around $1.69, alongside the launch of a new foundation.
On January 20, the project announced the Render Network Foundation, a not-for-profit organization that is “dedicated to maintaining the core Render Network protocol and growing its community and ecosystem.”. Additionally, the project voted 100% in favor this week to adopt a new tokenomics model, called burn-and-mint equilibrium, which appears to have incentivized market participants to accumulate RNDR in the near term. Render Network offers artists a distributed network of GPUs to render their 3D designs.
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🆘 Crypto Attacks Cause $3.8 Billion In Damage In 2022 By North Korea Groups
Chainalysis, a U.S.-based blockchain analytics company, claimed in a study on Wednesday that last year was the worst on record for crypto attacks, with hackers taking as much as $3.8 billion, driven by attackers linked to North Korea who made more money than ever before.
According to research released on Wednesday, total cryptocurrency losses jumped from $3.3 billion lost in 2021. Hacking organizations that US officials have connected to the North Korean government are expected to steal $1.7 billion in 2022, up from around $400 million the previous year. In 2022, the cryptocurrency industry struggled as risk-taking decreased, and several crypto businesses went under. Regulators increased requests for more consumer protection as a result of the significant losses suffered by investors.
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✖️ dYdX users traded $466 billion in crypto derivatives during 2022
dYdX, the largest crypto derivatives trading exchange, recorded $466.3 billion in cumulative transaction volume and generated $137.8 million in fee revenue in 2022, according to a dYdX Foundation report. The platform's cumulative volume rose 140% year-over-year (YoY) compared to $322 billion in 2021.
Trading volumes on dYdX trended upward even though the total value of tokens locked on the platform fell in 2022 — dropping to about $400 million after peaking at 1.1 billion in October 2021. This suggests that dYdX's users remained active and continued to use the platform. Despite strong fundamentals, the inflation of dYdX native tokens had emerged as a source of concern among speculators. This stemmed from the team's plan to release 150 million tokens, valued at more than $280 million, to investors and employees in February 2023.
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📣 Bitcoin And Ethereum Adoption Increase 27% Despite Poor Market Performance
Despite the bad market environment and the failure of multiple cryptocurrency companies, Bitcoin and Ethereum adoption over the previous year increased. BTC and ETH appear to have shaken off 2022’s poor performance, rising by over 30% over the past month.
Addresses holding 0.1 BTC (approximately $1000) increased throughout this time, from 3.40 million on January 1 to 4.20 million as of December 31. On the other hand, within the same period, the number of addresses with 1 ETH (minimum value of $1000) increased from 1.41 million to 1.73 million. Even if the value of the two leading digital currencies fell by more than 60% in 2022, crypto investors continued to make sizeable investments in them. The analysis states that in 2022, there were 27% more addresses holding either crypto asset worth at least $1,000.
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⚡️ Matter Labs fixes security issues in zkSync Layer 2 after OpenZeppelin audits
OpenZeppelin, a provider of smart-contract security solutions, has released the results of its latest security audits on zkSync, a zero-knowledge, proof-based scaling solution developed by Matter Labs. The audits reportedly uncovered a number of issues, most of which have been fixed.
Of the 45 issues found in OpenZeppelin's two previous audits, 40 have been resolved by the Matter Labs team, including two critical and two medium-severity issues, OpenZeppelin said in a statement shared with The Block. The most recent audit, which concluded in December, focused on zkSync's system called "bootloader" as well as three more Layer 2 system smart contracts with corresponding interfaces and one library. The alpha variant of its second version "zkSync 2.0" was released on Oct. 28.
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💰 Bitcoin May Face Sell Pressure As Its Current Price Increases
According to market intelligence firm Glassnode, Bitcoin (BTC) may soon encounter sell-side pressure from short-term holders (STHs) anxious to capitalize on the king cryptocurrency’s current price increase. Besides, miners are also selling Bitcoin as a result of the recent price increase.
As stated in a new analytics analysis from Glassnode, Bitcoin’s recent run above $23,000 placed 97.5% of its short-term investors into the green at one point during the week, which hasn’t happened since the biggest crypto asset by market cap reached its all-time high in November 2021. Glassnode indicated the fact that historically 97.5% of STHs have had unrealized gains indicates that sell pressure is imminent. Therefore, the sustainability of the current rally can be considered a balance between inflowing and newly deployed demand.
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