cryptocurrencies
Amber Group ditches expansion plans after denying insolvency: Report
Cryptocurrency trading firm Amber Group is putting its expansion plans on hold despite the FTX contagion having “no disruption” to its daily operations, according to a senior executive. Amber has scrapped plans to expand in Europe and the United States as a consequence of exposure to the now-defunct exchange FTX and will focus on institutional clients in Asia, according to managing partner Annabelle Huang. Huang also said that Amber has been forced to deprioritize its new metaverse project due the FTX contagion, the Financial Times reported on Dec. 9. Apart from ditching its expansion plans, the firm has reportedly been cutting its headcount recently. After reportedly laying off up to 40% of staff in September, the firm continued to lay off employees again in December. According to Huang, ...
Turkey has an obsession with crypto — Specifically Dogecoin: Study
The crypto market slump doesn’t mean interest in crypto is also down. A new study from the cryptocurrency education platform CryptoManiaks revealed that many countries are still scouring the internet, hungry for crypto-related information. According to the study, the Netherlands and Turkey take the top two spots, with 8.2% and 5.5% of the population, respectively, searching for crypto-related terms. Turkey particularly accounted for 4.7 million searches, leading the searches with sheer numbers. The study analyzed the combined number of searches for a select set of popular cryptocurrencies into a percentage of the population for each country in order to calculate the percentage of locals searching each month. While it was in second for overall searches, Turkey came in first place ...
FTX reportedly gets 3 more months to stop all operations in Japan
The Japanese subsidiary of the now-defunct cryptocurrency exchange FTX has received approval from local regulators to continue sorting out issues with withdrawals until next year. The Kanto Local Finance Bureau, a local financial regulator running under the Ministry of Finance of Japan, has issued a statement regarding FTX Japan operations, Reuters reported. The Japanese authority has postponed FTX’s business suspension deadline until March 9, 2023, extending the original time limit by three months. In mid-November, Japan’s Financial Services Agency (FSA) initially requested FTX Japan to suspend business orders by Dec. 9. According to the announcement, the Kanto Local Finance Bureau has ordered the extension of the deadline because FTX Japan has so far failed to return assets from custody ...
US lawmakers question federal regulators on banks’ ties to crypto firms
Two members of the United States Senate have called on the heads of federal financial regulators to address “ties between the banking industry and cryptocurrency firms” in the wake of FTX’s collapse. In letters dated Dec. 7 to Federal Reserve chair Jerome Powell, acting Comptroller of the Currency Michael Hsu, and Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation acting chair Martin Gruenberg, Senators Elizabeth Warren and Tina Smith — both on the Senate Banking Committee — acknowledged that the crypto industry was not so “deeply integrated” with traditional financial institutions to severely impact markets after FTX’s bankruptcy filing. However, the two lawmakers pointed to reports suggesting ties between FTX and the Washington-based Moonstone Bank as well as stablecoin issuer Tether and the Bahamas-...
Ethereum developers target March 2023 for Shanghai hard fork
According to a discussion at the 151st Ethereum Core Developers Meeting on Dec. 8, core programmers have set a tentative deadline of March 2023 for Ethereum’s Shanghai hard fork. In addition, developers will aim for May or June 2023 to launch the Ethereum Improvement Protocol (EIP) 4844 upgrade that will introduce proto-danksharding to the network. Although the much-anticipated proof-of-stake Merge upgrade was completed on Sept. 15, staked Ether (stETH) is currently locked on the Ethereum Beacon Chain. The token is created by decentralized finance protocol Lido, with close to 3.5 million stETH ($4.48 billion) in circulation. After the Shanghai upgrade, stETH users can withdraw their funds along with any applicable staking rewards for validating network transactions. The Ethereu...
BlockFi employees were discouraged from describing risks in internal communications: Report
Following BlockFi’s Chapter 11 bankruptcy filing at the United States Bankruptcy Court for the District of New Jersey, reports have surfaced about the crypto lending company’s risk assessment and management culture. According to Forbes, as early as 2020, the company culture discouraged employees from “describing risks in written internal communications to avoid liability, “ as reported by a former employee at BlockFi. Although BlockFi claimed risk management was core to their DNA and central to their mission, reports surfacing paint a different picture of the company. BlockFi executives appear to have prioritized aggressive growth, while dismissing risk management professionals who attempted to do their job. According to a former employee, an internal team at BlockFi raise...
Bank of Russia wants to ban miners from selling crypto to Russians
The Russian central bank continues to maintain an extremely negative stance on cryptocurrencies, proposing to ban local miners from selling coins to local people. The Bank of Russia has supported the idea of legalizing cryptocurrency mining in Russia as part of a draft bill introduced in mid-November 2022. However, the Russian central bank wants to allow miners to sell their crypto only on foreign exchanges and to non-residents of Russia, the local news agency Interfax reported on Dec. 7. “We believe that cryptocurrency obtained as a result of mining can be sold exclusively using foreign infrastructure and only to non-residents,” the Bank of Russia’s press office reportedly said, adding: “In general, we adhere to the position on the inadmissibility of the circulation of digital currency on...
Proactive sanctions can help spare the ecosystem: Chainalysis exec
As many countries, entities and even individuals face international sanctions, the crypto industry seeks to find its place among increasing regulations. Digital currencies have often been mentioned as an avenue for those subject to sanctions to divert them, such as in the recent case of Russia. In such instances, exchanges and other industry players need to understand where they stand compliance-wise. Research out of Harvard even suggested that central banks can use Bitcoin (BTC) to fight off sanctions. Speaking to Cointelegraph’s managing editor Alex Cohen at the Israel Crypto Conference, Chainalysis head of sanctions Andrew Fierman said sanctions are nuanced depending on the many factors which surround the situation. “When you’re looking at countries like Iran and North...
‘Father of the iPod’ helps Ledger create new cold crypto wallet
Hardware wallet provider Ledger, known for its cold-storage devices, announced its seventh crypto wallet in collaboration with the creator of the original iPod. Tony Fadell, the inventor of the iconic iPod Classic model, has partnered with Ledger to help the company design its latest wallet device known as Ledger Stax. The company broke the news on Dec. 6 at Ledger’s bi-annual Web3 developer event, Ledger Op3n, in Paris. Ledger’s upcoming new hardware wallet is a credit card-size device that features a large E Ink display, capacitive touch, Bluetooth support, wireless charging and more. For the first time in Ledger’s product line, Stax contains a curved E Ink display which can be used to show the holder’s name or other wallet information, just like a book spine. The device is a...
Sushiswap chief says it only has 1.5 years of treasury runway left
According to a new proposal dated Dec. 6, Jared Grey, CEO of decentralized exchange Sushiswap (SUSHI), disclosed that the project’s Treasury has less than 1.5 years of runaway left, and the “significant deficit in the treasury threatens Sushi’s operational viability, requiring an immediate remedy.” Grey explained that Sushiswap’s annualized operating expenses amounted to roughly $9 million in October, however, that has since been reduced to around $5 million. “We made the reduction possible by renegotiating infrastructure contracts, scaling back underperforming or superfluous dependencies, and instituting a budget freeze on non-critical personnel and infrastructure.” To remedy the situation, Grey proposed setting Sushiswap’s “Kanpai,...
USDC issuer Circle terminates SPAC merger with Concord
Circle, the issuer of USD Coin (USDC), announced the mutual termination of its proposed merger with the special purpose acquisition company (SPAC) Concord Acquisition on Dec. 5. The deal was announced in July 2021 with a preliminary valuation of $4.5 billion and was then amended in February 2022 when Circle’s valuation ballooned to $9 billion. USDC is currently the second-largest stablecoin in circulation, with a market capitalization of $43 billion. Under the terms of the agreements, Concord had until Dec. 10 to consummate the transaction or seek a shareholder vote for an extension. However, it appears that Concord chose to have the time limit lapse instead. As told by Circle CEO Jeremy Allaire: “Concord has been a strong partner and has added value throughout this process, and we w...
Margin trading vs. Futures: What are the differences?
Margin trading aims to amplify gains and allows experienced investors to potentially get them quickly. They may bring dramatic losses, too, if the trader doesn’t know how they work. When trading on margin, crypto investors borrow money from a brokerage firm to trade. They first deposit cash into a margin account that will be used as collateral for the loan, a kind of security deposit. Then they start paying interest on the borrowed money, which can be paid at the end of the loan or with monthly or weekly installments, based on current market conditions. When the asset is sold, proceeds are used to repay the margin loan first. The loan is necessary to raise investors’ purchasing power and buy larger amounts of crypto assets, and the assets purchased a...
