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🪙 Hamas, Hezbollah Now Prefer Tron to Bitcoin: Reuters
The Tron blockchain has overtaken Bitcoin as the cryptocurrency network most favored by groups such as Hamas and Hezbollah, which are designated as terror organizations by the U.S., U.K. and other jurisdictions, Reuters reported on Monday. Israel has made 87 such seizures from Tron wallets this year, two-thirds of the total number going back to July 2021. These include 39 from wallets the country said in June were owned by Lebanon-based Hezbollah and 26 in July from Hamas ally Palestinian Islamic Jihad.
There has been a sharp rise in cryptocurrency seizures from Tron wallets since 2021 and a decline in those from Bitcoin wallets, Reuters' analysis found. Almost two-thirds of Israel's Tron seizures were in 2023, including 39 from wallets Israel said in June were owned by Lebanon's Hezbollah and 26 in July from Hamas ally Palestinian Islamic Jihad. "Earlier it was Bitcoin and now our data shows that these terrorist organizations tend to increasingly favor Tron," Mriganka Pattnaik, CEO of blockchain analysis firm Merkle Science, said. In response to the research, Tron spokesperson Hayward Wong told Reuters all technologies could "in theory be used for questionable activities," adding that Tron did not have control over those using its network.
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🟠 Binance faces aggressive CFTC action: “Access to US customers is a privilege, not a right.”
Binance faces aggressive CFTC action when the CFTC Commissioner says, “Access to US customers is a privilege, not a right.” The last couple of years have been tough for the crypto industry and its leading figures. And it’s not likely there will be relief for the sector anytime soon. At least, that’s what policymakers are signaling. This week, Binance chief Changpeng Zhao joined his former industry rival Sam Bankman-Fried in making headlines for charges against him and his crypto exchange, which included breaching US anti-money-laundering laws.
On Tuesday, Zhao pleaded guilty and left his role as CEO. Binance is set to pay over $4.3 billion in fines, $50 million of which will be paid by the former CEO himself. As part of Binance faces aggressive CFTC action, A statement made by CFTC Commissioner Christy Goldsmith Romero read: “There are no pirate ships in US markets” and that “access to US customers is a privilege, not a right.” Goldsmith added that the CFTC plans to continue its aggressive pursuit of crypto exchanges that violate trade laws. The commissioner noted that there will be no tolerance for using VPNs, or any other actions that could circumvent KYC rules, including pop-up questions that merely ask users to attest that they aren’t based in the US.
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🟠 Binance Will Retain Its International Dominance After U.S. Settlement: Bernstein
Binance experienced minor outflows of less than $1 billion following the news of the settlement with the U.S. government, there was no major panic from customers, and it remains the dominant crypto exchange internationally, with $67 billion of customer funds under custody, broker Bernstein said in a research report Wednesday. “Binance’s reputation with retail non-U.S. customers has remained strong through the crisis,” analysts led by Gautam Chhugani wrote.
Binance will remain a “material entity in non-U.S. markets,” but Bernstein says it expects increased competition from the likes of listed rival Coinbase (COIN) and new exchanges in regulated markets such as Hong Kong and Singapore. Bernstein says the crypto exchange has adequate funds to settle the $4.3 billion fine while maintaining healthy operations. “Binance’s complete exit from the U.S would mean continued dominance of onshore and incumbent exchanges in the U.S.,” the authors wrote, noting that asset managers who have filed exchange-traded fund (ETF) applications are already working with exchanges such as Coinbase for prime broking and custody.
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🔴 Avalanche's AVAX token leads price rally among Ethereum rivals
AVAX, the native token of the Avalanche blockchain, is spearheading a rally among Layer 1 alternatives to Ethereum. In the past month, blockchain platforms that are considered Layer 1 alternatives to Ethereum have seen their native tokens make gains of over 100%, compared to a 22% increase in the value of ether. AVAX has surged nearly 130% in the last 30 days, according to CoinGecko data, while Solana's price increased by 113% and the native token of the Near protocol has risen by 110%.
In an illustration of the increased activity on these alternative Layer 1s, data from The Block's dashboard shows the number of daily transactions on the Near blockchain has reached an all-time high of 1.68 million. "Avalanche's collaborations with heavyweight institutions like JP Morgan and Citi are indicative of a growing institutional inclination towards high-performance layer 1 alternatives to Ethereum," said Jeff Feng, co-founder of Sei Labs, which supports the high-performance Sei blockchain. "These developments highlight the financial industry's active search for scalable blockchain solutions," he added.
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🇺🇸 Sen. Elizabeth Warren points to dangers of crypto scams targeting older investors in latest call to pass her legislation
Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., criticized cryptocurrency's role in schemes targeting older investors while pushing for her bill that she says would bring scammers to a halt during a recent Senate hearing. "The anonymity is terrific," said Steve Weisman, a senior lecturer at Bentley University. "You have people looking for the privacy and of course that is something with crypto mixers where your account gets mixed in with others and becomes very difficult to trace."
Weisman said in the ransomware attack against Colonial Pipeline, which provides fuel on the U.S. east coast, the government was able to trace the accounts, but said once funds are funneled into mixers, that crSen. Elizabeth Warreneates a problem. "There is a legitimate privacy concern that people may have, but it does not come anywhere near to the scammers," Weisman continued. Warren said her bill, called the Digital Asset Anti-Money Laundering Act, would make it easier for regulators to track suspicious activity around crypto and shut down those scammers. "I think Americans are sick and tired of these crypto crimes, and it’s long past time that we get some regulation in place to deal with this," Warren said.
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🏦 NPS Buys Coinbase Shares For A Total Of $19.9 Million, Signaling Crypto’s Rise
The world’s third-largest pension fund, NPS buys Coinbase shares in Q3, marking its first venture into the crypto industry. This year alone, the pension fund acquired 282,673 shares of Coinbase Global. According to the latest holdings report submitted to the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), the NPS bought $19.9 million worth of shares in the digital asset company during the third quarter. This year alone, the pension fund acquired 282,673 shares of Coinbase Global.
The acquisition marks the first time NPS has included any crypto-related security as part of its investment option. With over $755 billion in assets under management, it is not common for investors like NPS to directly invest in digital assets. Instead, they typically enter the industry through company investments, as seen in this case with Coinbase. Coinbase, with its position at the forefront of the industry, is well-positioned to take advantage of this growing interest. It is expected that similar moves by other investors will emerge in the coming months, signaling the continued development and potential of the crypto market. The fact that NPS, a traditional finance and investment entity, has shown interest in purchasing Coinbase shares highlights.
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🔻 Ex-Polygon Veteran Wyatt Joins Optimism Foundation Unit in Growth Role
Optimism Foundation has hired Ryan Wyatt as as chief growth officer, just four months after he departed rival Polygon Labs in a management shakeup. As CGO of Optimism Unlimited Ltd., an operating subsidiary of the Optimism Foundation, Wyatt will be responsible for supporting blockchain development, and helping developers build across the Optimism ecosystem. The Optimism Foundation is tasked with supporting the broader community of companies and developers committed to Optimism's technology.
Earlier this year, when the U.S. crypto exchange Coinbase launched its Base blockchain, the project relied on technology from OP Labs, the primary developer behind Optimism. He has a wealth of experience in gaming from his time at Polygon as well as in a prior role at YouTube, where he first started exploring non-fungible tokens (NFTs) and digital ownership. “I really do think that Optimism is the best team in crypto, hands down,” Wyatt told CoinDesk in an interview. “I loved my time at YouTube, I loved my time at Polygon. I'm super happy with the work that I did at both of those places. I'm so eager about what Optimism can do and what they've already done.”
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📣 JPMorgan Adds Programmable Payments to JPM Coin
Users of JPMorgan's (JPM) blockchain-based settlement token, JPM Coin, can now program their accounts to make payments automatically according to preset conditions. The financial giant is allowing clients to plug in conditions for funds to be moved to cover overdue payments or margin calls, according to an email on Friday. Previously, they had to set standing orders for payments to take place at a particular time, whereas now they can program them to kick in when the relevant criteria are met.
JPMorgan introduced JPM Coin in 2019 to enable institutional clients to make wholesale payments on a blockchain. Last month it reached the milestone of handling $1 billion of transactions daily, though this remains a trivial figure compared with the $10 trillion the bank moves every day in total. "This new feature helps clients to respond dynamically to events, which is ever more important as 24x7 payment infrastructure proliferates, and responding to volatility becomes vital," the bank said. Previously clients would need to set standing orders for payments to take place at a particular time; now they can program them to kick in when the relevant criteria are met. whereas now they can program them to kick in when the relevant criteria are met.
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🪙 Aave pauses V2 on Ethereum, freezes certain assets on V3 due to reported issue
DeFi lending protocol Aave has paused some operations as a temporary protection measure following reports of an issue, the protocol announced in a post on X. No funds are at risk, the protocol added. The protocol has paused Aave V2 operations on Ethereum, along with freezing certain assets on Aave V3 on Polygon, Arbitrum, and Optimism. The protocol announced service will be restarted following the approval of a forthcoming proposal to restart the paused operations.
The protocol clarified that V3 remains live on Ethereum, Base, and Metis, and V2 operations on Polygon and Avalanche are unaffected. Aave did not respond immediately to a request from comment from The Block. The protocol has paused Aave V2 operations on Ethereum, along with freezing certain assets on Aave V3 on Polygon, Arbitrum, and Optimism. The protocol announced service will be restarted following the approval of a forthcoming proposal to restart the paused operations, and that a postmortem explaining the issue will be released "once the issue is fully resolved." No user funds are currently at risk, the protocol added.
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🪙 Tether extends debt financing to Northern Data capped at $610 million
Northern Data Group, a German data center operator, has secured a debt financing facility of up to €575 million ($610 million) from Tether Group, the stablecoin issuer, to expand its Bitcoin mining, AI, and data center operations. “Northern Data Group entered into a loan agreement with a company of the Tether Group, under which it secured a €575 million debt financing facility,” Northern Data wrote in a statement. “The facility is unsecured, at standard market conditions and has a term until Jan. 1, 2030.”
Northern Data Group to continue capitalizing on the market opportunities within each sector of our three subsidiaries, Taiga Cloud, Ardent Data Centers and Peak Mining," Northern Data CEO Aroosh Thillainathan added. "We’re excited for the further innovation we will achieve through this raise as we drive further progress in the AI, ML and Generative AI industries.”. Peak Mining is the group’s mining business, with the financing being used to scale its Bitcoin mining operations via purpose-built MicroBT liquid-cooling mining technology. Liquid-cooled mining offers more efficient heat management and potentially higher hardware performance compared to traditional air-cooled mining. However, it typically involves higher setup costs and more complex maintenance.
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🇬🇧 UK confirms plans to regulate crypto industry with formal legislation
The U.K. government on Monday confirmed plans to regulate the cryptocurrency industry, announcing in a consultation paper that it will look to bring in formal legislation for crypto activities by 2024. The government published its response to a consultation paper issued earlier this year, which outlined recommendations on regulating the crypto industry. In the Monday paper, the government said it intends to bring a number of cryptoasset activities under the same regulations that govern banks and other financial services firms.
The government’s proposals include stricter rules for exchanges, custodians that store crypto on behalf of clients, and crypto lending companies. The U.K. also proposes stricter regimes for market abuse and cryptoasset issuance and disclosures. The government aims to introduce laws for the crypto industry before Parliament by 2024, according to the paper. The EU set out a clear framework for digital assets with its MiCA (Markets in Crypto-Assets) regulation, including a licensing process for crypto firms. The U.K. is further ahead in the process than other tech leading nations. Numerous bills are going through Congress, but the U.S. is far behind others when it comes to bringing about formal federal laws for the crypto industry.
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📣 JPMorgan Settles Transactions for $1 Billion Daily Using JPM Coin
JPMorgan has reported that jpm coin, the cryptocurrency created by the financial giant, is being used to settle $1 billion daily. According to statements from JPMorgan’s Global Head of Payments Takis Georgakopoulos, the bank plans to expand on jpm coin’s usage in the future, widening adoption. Jpm coin allows making transactions denominated in dollars and recently in euros using the Qorum blockchain, a distributed ledger created by the bank in 2016 and sold to the Ethereum software company Consensys in 2020.
Announced in 2019 by JPMorgan and beginning to be used commercially in 2020, jpm coin is one of the few blockchain applications being used by banks to reach this level of adoption, even if the amount pales in comparison to the $10 trillion transacted using JPMorgan’s traditional banking solutions, according to Bloomberg. Georgakopoulos hinted at a possible application of deposit tokens for retail purposes. Deposit tokens, which JPMorgan considers an evolution of stablecoins, represent a claim on a deposit at a regulated financial institution, like a bank. More recently, in September, sources stated the bank was developing a platform that would use deposit token technology to bring quick settlements and payments to its institutional customers.
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📉 GBTC Discount Shrinks To Two-Year Low of 7.5%
GBTC shares are approaching BTC parity as negotiations between Grayscale and the SEC move apace. Shares for the Grayscale Bitcoin Trust (GBTC) – the world’s largest Bitcoin fund – are nearly back to parity with Bitcoin (BTC)’s price after trading deeply underwater for the past two years. Their rising value reflects market confidence that Grayscale’s efforts to convert its fund into a Bitcoin spot ETF will prove successful. GBTC’s discount to NAV ratio shrank as low as 8.6%, according to Bloomberg ETF analyst Eric Balchunas.
The discount reflects the difference between the market cap of GBTC’s shares versus the total value of all BTC held by the trust. According to the most recent figures from Grayscale’s website, the fund holds $33.75 in BTC per share, compared to a market price of $31.21 right now – a mere 7.5% discount as of Friday. At the time, separate memos from the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) showed that executives from Grayscale, BlackRock, and others held meetings with the SEC’s Division of Trading and Markets on Monday to discuss their respective ETF applications. Major investors like Cathie Wood and Mike Novogratz – who themselves govern funds sponsoring separate ETF applications – have noted increased engagement from the SEC in helping to sharpen their products before they reach the market.
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🪙 Justin Sun Confirms HTX, Heco Chain Exploited After $100M in Suspicious Transfers
Crypto exchange HTX and blockchain protocol Heco Chain were hacked for a cumulative $97 million in various tokens earlier Wednesday, Justin Sun, one of the investors at the exchange, confirmed in a post. Sun said HTX will fully compensate for any losses originating from the exchange. Deposits and withdrawals are temporarily suspended while the remaining funds are secure. Once we complete the investigation and identify the cause, we will resume services,” Sun said.
Blockchain security firm Cyver flagged suspicious transfers to the tune of $85 million earlier Wednesday. It said in a message to CoinDesk that the attack was due to a suspected private key leak, which allowed their holders to access the Heco bridge, which lets users transfer tokens between Heco Chain and Ethereum. Heco Chain was set up by HTX, which continued to be one of its maintainers. A HTX spokesperson told CoinDesk that HTX and Heco Chain operate independently. The incident follows a smaller $8 million exploit of HTX in October, where hackers were able to steal 500 ether from the exchange. All losses were fully covered in the days following the incident.
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🟠 BNB price spikes amid report of possible Binance deal with DOJ
The price of BNB rose Monday after a report the U.S. Department of Justice is seeking $4 billion from Binance as part of a deal that could end its ongoing investigation. BNB has increased by over 5% in the past 24 hours and was changing hands for $254.51 at 1:50 p.m. in New York, according to CoinGecko. It had surged as high as $258.05, the highest price since June 9. According to a Bloomberg report on Monday, the DOJ is seeking over $4 billion from Binance Holdings Ltd.
The DOJ has been investigating the world's largest cryptocurrency exchange over alleged money laundering, bank fraud and sanctions violations, according to the Bloomberg report. Negotiations include the possibility that Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao could face criminal charges in the U.S. as part of an agreement to resolve the probe, the report added. The report said investors are stalling, with risk-off sentiment returning to a previously buoyant market. This is despite the latest indications on FedWatch that reveal an almost 98.8% probability that the U.S. central bank will maintain its target rate within the current range of 5.25% to 5.50% at its next meeting on December 13.
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📣 Sam Altman remains at Worldcoin's developer while he may return to OpenAI
Sam Altman, ousted CEO of OpenAI, appears to be keeping his job at Tools for Humanity, the company behind Worldcoin, as negotiations regarding his return to OpenAI reportedly continue. Tools for Humanity's website lists Altman as the co-founder and chairman of the project, and a spokesperson confirmed that the website remains a current indicator of his position. Worldcoin's WLD token initially fell upon the news of Altman's ouster from OpenAI, though its price has recovered from $1.83 to $2.40.
Worldcoin aims to build a global network by distributing tokens to participants who agree to have their retinas scanned by an orb-like device, thus verifying, in theory, that each person on the planet has one and only one Worldcoin account. Since launch, nearly 40 million WLD tokens have been distributed to users, according to data from Worldcoin. Tools for Humanity raised $100 million in March 2022 at a $3 billion valuation and a further $115 million in May 2023. Worldcoin's WLD token initially fell upon the news of Altman's ouster from OpenAI, though its price has recovered from $1.83 to $2.40, according to The Block's Price Page.
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✖️ dYdX Chain trading goes live, enters beta mainnet stage following governance vote
The standalone Cosmos-based Layer 1 dYdX Chain has entered its beta mainnet stage, enabling active trading to go live for the first time following a decisive governance vote. Transitioning from its alpha stage, dYdX Chain’s beta launch occurred at 8:45 a.m. EST on Monday, according to a blog post by the dYdX Operations subDAO, which leads decentralized infrastructure for dYdX Chain. The launch followed a community vote to change trading on all markets from post-only to active, which garnered over 99% support.
Users can now engage in trading across more than 33 perpetual markets via the dydx.trade platform, offering up to 20x leverage. No trading rewards will be distributed during this stage, but validators and stakers will accrue trading fees, according to the post. “The beta stage serves as the critical testing phase for active trading environments,” the subDAO wrote. The alpha mainnet for dYdX version 4, along with the debut of its Cosmos-based blockchain, was launched on Oct. 26, signaling a notable transition for the leading decentralized derivatives platform to become a standalone Layer 1 on Cosmos after previously relying on Ethereum Layer 2 scaling solution StarkEx in version 3.
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📣 Onecoin 'Compliance' Head Pleads Guilty to Wire Fraud and Money Laundering Charges
Irina Dilkinska, the one-time head of legal and compliance at Onecoin, has pleaded guilty to “wire fraud and money laundering charges,” Damian Williams, the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, has said. In a Nov. 9 press release, Williams said the charges against Dilkinska relate to her role in organizing the transfer of $110 million in fraudulently obtained funds to a Cayman Islands entity.
Founded in 2014 by Ruja Ignatova, aka Cryptoqueen, and Karl Sebastian Greenwood, Onecoin operated as a multi-level marketing (MLM) network which encouraged members to recruit others to purchase cryptocurrency packages. As previously reported by Bitcoin.com News, Onecoin generated billions of dollars for founders like Ignatova but left many investors worse off. “As Onecoin’s so-called ‘Head of Legal and Compliance’ Irina Dilkinska accomplished the exact opposite goal of her position. As she has now admitted, Dilkinska facilitated the laundering of millions of dollars of illicit profits Onecoin accrued through its multi-level marketing scheme.”
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🆘 DeFi platform Raft pauses minting of its stablecoin after acknowledging 'security vulnerability'
DeFi platform Raft paused further minting of its stablecoin known as R on Friday after it acknowledged what it said was a "security vulnerability." Users on social media pointed to onchain data that showed a presumed hacker had burnt millions worth of ether in the apparent exploit. Wintermute Head of Research Igor Igamberdiev said 6.7 uncollateralized R stablecoin had been minted and then converted into ether.
"The twist is that they converted them into ETH, which was sent to the null address," he wrote on X, detailing an apparent coding mistake. "Instead of sending ETH to the attacker, coins went to the null address, which has no private key, oops." The R stablecoin depegged from its typical price of $1, falling to as low as $0.18 before recovering somewhat. It was trading for $0.78 at 6:34 p.m. ET, according to CoinGecko. "We are currently investigating and will provide an update as soon as we can," it wrote on X. "Existing users are still able to repay their positions and receive their collateral."Instead of sending ETH to the attacker, coins went to the null address, which has no private key, oops." Raft did not immediately respond to a request for comment from The Block.
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🔵 Circle releases v2.2 for USDC and EURC stablecoins with improvements to account abstraction, security, and lower gas fees
Stablecoin issuer Circle launched its v2.2 upgrade for USDC and EURC. The new features for the two stablecoins include decreased gas costs, better support for account abstraction and increased security for transactions on EVM blockchains, according to a company statement. The last time Circle unveiled upgrades to USDC was in early 2021, the firm added. There will be six new changes to the USDC and EURC smart contracts and they'll be implemented through a single v2.2 upgrade.
The upgrade is fully backwards-compatible, does not introduce any breaking changes to existing integrations, and requires no action from developers or users," Circle wrote in the release. Further updates include enabling signature validations from smart contract wallets, improvements to checking blocklists, better resilience against forks, removing blocklist checking from functions that don't move funds, skipped timestamp check when deadline is set to maximum amount, and a one-time rename for the EURC symbol from EUROC, the firm added. Circle will begin rolling out the v2.2 upgrades on Nov. 9 and plans to finish the updates "the next few months."
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💰 Ether is now slightly outperforming bitcoin, whose dominance is declining
Ether has made a small advancement over the last week in terms of its performance relative to bitcoin, according to data from CoinShares. "Over the last week, ether has outperformed bitcoin by about 4.55%," CoinShares Research Associate Luke Nolan told The Block. However, Nolan added that a closer look at the ETH/BTC trading pair shows ether's recent gains are more of a technical bounce than an indication of a pickup of interest in Ethereum itself.
Nolan shared ETH/BTC ratio data with The Block that showed that ether had recently dipped into technical lows against bitcoin that were last seen in June 2022. However, the data revealed ether has bounced back above these lows over the past few days. zkLink Co-Founder Vince Yang put forward some possible reasons for the recent ether uptick. "The upcoming Cancun upgrade has resulted in increasing interest and demand. We believe the driving factor of ETH is the development of the technology and ecosystem. The demand and the price of ETH will continue to rise, at some point, likely to overturn bitcoin which has no real business use case other than value storage and transaction," Yang told The Block.
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🔴 Ava Labs lays off 12% of staff to ‘reallocate resources,’ CEO says
Ava Labs, the main developer of the Avalanche blockchain, laid off 12% of its workforce, its chief said today. Emin Gün Sirer, founder and CEO of Ava Labs, said in a post on X that the staff cuts allow the firm. “This reduction in force affected 12% of Ava Labs…Bear markets are difficult to navigate,” Sirer wrote. “Ava Labs is fortunate to have significant runway and resources at our disposal, and we will be focusing those resources on advancing the Avalanche ecosystem for years to come.”
Sirer did not specify which company divisions had to reduce their headcounts, but Garrison Yang, Ava Labs’ VP of Growth and Strategy said today in a LinkedIn post that the company has laid off employees in the marketing team. “Today was the last day at Ava Labs for many people on our world class marketing team,” Yang said in the post. “These are the people who [brought] Avalanche's gaming brand from zero to top of the pack in less than a year… These people have helped Avalanche navigate multiple industry blow ups, a bear market, and countless other challenges.”. The layoff comes after the company said last month that it had hired two Polygon and OKX employees.
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🏦 Coinbase 'Ready to Hit the Ground Running' on Bitcoin ETF Approval, Says COO
Cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase is prepared to move quickly if a spot Bitcoin ETF is approved soon, Coinbase COO Emilie Choi said during an earnings call Thursday with investors and analysts. “We are ready to hit the ground running,” Choi said. “They should add credibility to the market, and we should see increased liquidity and market stability, as we've seen with other asset classes, such as a gold ETF.” The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has hesitated to approve one thus far.
Crypto moguls, such as the Winklevoss twins, have pursued ETF-like products that let investors gain Bitcoin exposure in a brokerage account for more than a decade. The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has hesitated to approve one thus far. However, the hype has hit new levels this year, in light of Grayscale’s courtroom victory and several financial giants, such as BlackRock and Fidelity, that have thrown their weight into the mix of ETF hopefuls. JP Morgan analysts think it’s “most likely” that a spot Bitcoin ETF is approved within the next three months. As a spot Bitcoin ETF makes it easier for institutional investors to trade Bitcoin—without needing to worry about self-custody.
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🔵 Circle Mint Account Closure for Individual Customers, Institutions Only Now Supported
Circle, a well-known company in the cryptocurrency world, particularly for issuing stablecoins, has announced that it is currently in the process of discontinuing support for consumer Circle Mint accounts. This strategic decision, which has been communicated directly to individual consumers, is designed to streamline operations solely for consumer accounts. Importantly, this change will not affect business or institutional accounts, which will continue to operate as usual.
Circle Mint Account Closure for users with zero balances in their accounts because support will soon end. The closure of these consumer accounts is currently scheduled for the end of November. This means that users who wish to mint Circle stablecoins, such as the widely-used USDC and the Euro-based EURC, will need to look for alternative platforms on which to conduct these activities. In addition, Allaire highlighted the strong partnerships that Circle has built with various global retail entities. This includes their strategic partnership with Coinbase, a leading cryptocurrency exchange. These partnerships have allowed for comprehensive retail access to USDC at no additional fees while also maintaining a 1:1 exchange rate.
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💰 Solana-Based Products Lead with 74% AUM Increase in October: CCData
October witnessed significant advancements in the industry owing to the launch of six ETH Futures ETFs, offering investors a chance to delve into Ether futures. Bitcoin responded positively to the developments. Further gains were fueled by speculations about BlackRock’s application approval of a spot BTC ETF in the United States. As a result, the total assets under management (AUM) for digital asset products surged by 6.74%, reaching $31.7 billion in October. This represented the first upturn since July 2023.
Despite affiliation to FTX and its disgraced founder, Sam Bankman-Fried, as well as its own share of outages, Solana has managed to recover this year. This is evident by the continued inflow streak over the past several weeks. Meanwhile, the assets under management (AUM) for Bitcoin-based products also surged by 11.1%, reaching $23.2 billion and commanding a 73.3% market share. This signifies a rise from 70.5% in September. Ethereum-based products, however, witnessed a decrease despite the introduction of new ETFs. These products collectively experienced a 5,45% decline, lowering their AUM to $6,35 billion, and their market share dropped to 20.1%. This marks a down from 22.6% in September. Basket-based products, on the other hand, saw a 2,10% increase, reaching $1,19 billion and capturing 3,75% of the market.
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🇹🇼 Taiwan officially proposes crypto bill with first reading passed at parliament
Taiwan officially proposed a draft crypto act for first reading today. "After the first reading of the bill, discussions on the regulatory framework for the virtual asset industry have progressed to the next stage," Yung-Chang Chiang, a member of the Legislative Yuan who jointly proposed the special act, told The Block. A proposal to regulate crypto assets passed the first reading at the Legislative Yuan, Taiwan’s parliament, according to official records.
Taiwan’s FSC last month released guidelines for the crypto sector to form its own self-supervisory rules through a potential industry association, such measures lack legal enforceability, the lawmaker said. “In this case, under the authority of this special law, regulatory authorities can impose administrative penalties on operators who violate these self-regulation rules. Without such a special law, the regulators would lack the ability to impose penalties,” Chiang told The Block earlier this month at a parliament hearing. The special crypto law, proposed by Chiang and 16 other lawmakers, would require all crypto platforms operating in Taiwan to apply for a permit. If they failed to, regulators could order them to cease operations.
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