Coinbase
FTX US hits $8BN valuation after securing $400M in Series A funding round
The exchange intends to use the funds to expand its workforce by hiring more experts FTX US, the US affiliate arm of global exchange FTX, has concluded its first funding round, netting $400 million. The fundraising drew support from several huge names, including SoftBank Group, blockchain-focused venture capital firm Paradigm and Singapore-based investment company Temasek. Other participants that featured include Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan Board, Multicoin Capital, Greenoaks Capital, Lightspeed Venture Partners, Tribe Capital, and Steadview Capital. The exchange is now valued at $8 billion, making it one of the biggest players in the US cryptocurrency sector. This new valuation is at par with the target set by FTX chief executive Sam Bankman-Friend last December. FTX previously c...
How to use UniSwap: A step-by-step beginner’s guide
The Uniswap decentralized exchange (DEX) is the most popular DEX built on the Ethereum blockchain. For users wondering, “What is Uniswap?,” this article provides an overview of what it is and how it works as well as several ways users can get started using the Uniswap DEX. With Uniswap, users can swap crypto tokens without having to rely on an intermediary. Not having to rely on a third party leads to next to no economic rents being collected. Instead, Uniswap relies on smart contracts to execute trades. Smart contracts are algorithms that self-execute once certain preset conditions are met. How does Uniswap work? Because Uniswap is an open-source protocol, many DEXs with the suffix “swap” have been released into the market. These protocols are essentially copies of...
Crypto Biz: Microsoft enters the metaverse, Jan. 14–20
This week’s Crypto Biz explores Microsoft’s Activision purchase, the new partnership between Coinbase and Mastercard and the latest funding news from the world of crypto. For a comprehensive breakdown of business developments over the last week, register for the full newsletter below. Microsoft enters the Metaverse with Activision purchase It’s no secret that Microsoft has been eyeing its entry into the Metaverse ever since Zuckerberg rebranded Facebook to Meta. The company found its perfect entry this week by acquiring gaming giant Activision Blizzard for $68.7 billion. Satya Nadella, who has served as Microsoft’s CEO since 2014, described video games as playing a “key role in the development of metaverse platforms.” Activision is behind some of the world’s most iconic gaming franch...
Coinbase seals partnership deal with Mastercard to facilitate NFT purchases
The exchange announced its upcoming NFT marketplace last year, and its waiting list has already accumulated over 2.5 million users US-based cryptocurrency platform Coinbase, on Tuesday, announced it is working with multinational financial services firm Mastercard to allow users to buy NFTs using cards. Most of the existing NFT marketplaces currently only support crypto payments for the collectables and digital items they host. The Coinbase-Mastercard partnership aims to simplify things for users of the former’s upcoming NFT platform by allowing them to complete purchases using the latter’s cards. By making the experience of purchasing NFTs suitable for novice users, the pair hopes to reach a broad market. “As an important step in this mission, we’re excited to annou...
Propy rallies 227% as real estate NFTs become reality and PRO lists at Coinbase
Nonfungible tokens (NFTs) skyrocketed in popularity over the course of 2021 as the wider public became enthralled with projects like the Bored Ape Yacht Club and CryptoPunks, but these one-of-a-kind digital images are only scratching the surface of what NFT technology is capable of. One project focused on expanding the functionality of NFTs beyond the digital art space is Propy, a protocol focused on the integration of blockchain technology with the real estate sector by automating the closing process of home buying to make the entire process faster, simpler and more secure. Data from Cointelegraph Markets Pro and TradingView shows that after hitting a low of $1.12 on Jan. 12, the price of PRO moved 227% higher to hit a daily high at $3.67 on Jan. 14 as its 24-hour trading volume spi...
UK advertiser ASA continues crypto ad banning spree
The United Kingdom’s Advertising Standards Authority, or ASA, has approved an official ban on two mobile application advertisements from popular trading platform Crypto.com that promoted the ease of purchasing cryptocurrencies, such as Bitcoin, as well as earning yield rewards on digital assets. Gaining notoriety within the industry for their strict legislation on the proposed implications of a cryptocurrency advert, the ASA flagged the marketing material for breach of a number of financial watchdog rules, including not effectively stating the risk potential of the investment, abusing consumers’ lack of market understanding and not specifying the limitations of purchasing crypto with credit cards. Crypto.com removed the advert voluntarily once the concern was raised, but debated the ...
Solana hit with another network incident causing degraded performance
The Solana blockchain has suffered a third incident in just a few months that clogged the network and caused transactions to fail, with users debating whether it was caused by another DDos attack or if it was just network issues. The scale and nature of the incident is hard to ascertain, with Coinbase, Wu Blockchain and Redditors reporting there had been an incident causing the network to slow and transactions to fail. However Solana Labs co-founder Anatoly Yakovenko denied there had been a DDoS on this occasion. The latest incident comes less than a month after a previous attack which saw reports the network was clogged with mass botting due to another Initial DEX offering (IDO) on Solana-based decentralized exchange platform Radium. According to Wu Blockchain, the Solana network went dow...
Coinbase exec says major Ethereum scaling improvements coming soon
Coinbase Chief Product Officer Surojit Chatterjee is the latest to publish his predictions for the crypto industry in 2022 and he foresees major advances in the scaling of Ethereum. Industry leaders, analysts, and investors are sharing their 2022 predictions for the crypto ecosystem, and Coinbase’s Surojit Chatterjee is confident that Ethereum will be at the forefront of Web3 and the crypto-economy as it scales. The CPO shared his predictions in a company blog post on Jan. 4 in which he stated that Ethereum scalability will improve but alternative layer 1 networks will also see traction. “I am optimistic about improvements in Eth scalability with the emergence of Eth2 and many L2 rollups.” He added that newer layer 1 networks focused on gaming and social media will also emerge. Chatterjee ...
Bitcoin sees ‘non-stop’ end-of-year buying as 10K BTC leaves Coinbase in a single day
Almost 10,000 Bitcoin (BTC) left major United States-based exchange Coinbase on Dec. 30 in a sign that investor appetite is returning to the sphere. Data from on-chain monitoring resource Coinglass shows Coinbase’s professional trading arm, Coinbase Pro, shedding 9,925 BTC in the 24 hours to New Year’s Eve. Binance adds 66,000 BTC in December The buy-in, which runs in contrast to rising or flat balances on other major exchanges, marks a conspicuous short-term trend shift. The latter half of December has been characterized by platforms such as Binance and OKEx seeing increased inflows of BTC — something commentators feared could be a forewarning of a sell-off. While such a mass sale of BTC has not yet occurred, not everyone believes that it will stay that way. At the same time, the ex...
Bitcoin’s $6.1 billion options expiry was not enough to break the bearish sentiment
Bitcoin’s (BTC) price has been ranging between $46,000 and $52,000 for 26 days. Despite the large nominal $6.1 billion year-end options expiry, the bullish and bearish instruments were evenly balanced between $44,000 and $49,000. Therefore, it was no surprise that the $47,175 price at 8:00 am UTC on Dec. 31 brought little change to the price structure. Even the 3% rally to $48,500 following the event failed to sustain itself, signaling that bears are unwilling to cede their upper hand. Bitcoin/USD price on Coinbase. Source: TradingView Bulls might have interpreted the 9,925 BTC leaving Coinbase in 24 hours as a positive trigger, considering fewer coins are available on exchanges for newcomers. Besides, the first week of the year has been positive for the past four years, averaging 18...
Sequoia China leads $25M equity round for DeFi wallet DeBank
DeBank, a cryptocurrency wallet focused on decentralized finance (DeFi) solutions, has closed new funding led by major venture capital firm Sequoia China. The firm announced Tuesday on Twitter that it raised $25 million, bringing DeBank’s total valuation to $200 million. Apart from Sequoia China, the funding round featured major crypto investment firms like Dragonfly, Hash Global and Youbi. The raise also included strategic funding from Coinbase Ventures, Crypto.com exchange, stablecoin provider Circle and hardware wallet maker Ledger. DeBank is a cryptocurrency wallet designed to track DeFi data, including decentralized applications or exchanges (DEX) and DeFi interest rates. It also lets users navigate and manage various DeFi assets and projects. The platform includes analytics for decen...
Arsenal football club in dispute with ASA over ‘irresponsible’ crypto ad
The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA), a body that oversees advertising in the United Kingdom, is cracking down on non-compliant crypto advertisements. Earlier this year, Arsenal became one of the many football clubs to collaborate with blockchain firm Chiliz and launch a fan token. On Aug. 12 this year, the club promoted its fan token AFC on its official Facebook page, which the ASA has banned for allegedly violating its advertising rules. The agency stated that the post did not highlight the risks involved in the investment. In a different event, as per a BBC report, the monitor claims that the topic of content on Arsenal’s official website — particularly, a page published on Aug. 6, 2021, with the title “$AFC Fan Token: Everything you need to know” — was violating advertising ...
