What happened in crypto the past 2 weeks? Bitcoin went up nicely, ETH is trying to get its speed up, and Tether wants to buy the whole planet Earth. The SEC has been sued a lot lately. Hackers are getting better at stealing your money. What else? Read below:
- Bitcoin: The month started slowly, as the price initially dropped amid Middle East tensions, while gold surged by 1.4%. But then went up to $66K, and it stayed there, while some so-called experts are still saying that the bull market is not yet here. Wen $70K? Something happened, as $365M of positive inflows entered into the US Spot BTC ETFs in one single day, with a 6-day streak of positive inflows this week. Uptober is here. The ex-Chinese finance minister cautions about crypto as the US embraces spot BTC ETFs. The Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME) new Bitcoin Friday Futures - BFF - launched with a record-breaking debut, achieving the highest first-day trading volume ever seen in crypto futures. Despite a modest rise in price, September was the third consecutive month of falling revenue and profits for Bitcoin miners. Bitcoin remains the 2024's best-performing asset despite its challenges, says NYDIG. An HBO documentary suggested that the BTC creator may be the Canadian software developer Peter Todd. Bloomberg analysts predicted that Spot Bitcoin ETF options are likely to come in the first quarter of 2025. Mt.Gox creditor repayments are delayed one year, to October 31, 2025. Samara Asset Group plans to issue a $30M bond to increase its BTC holdings. Zack Bradford is already seeing a $200K BTC in the next 18 months.
- Ethereum: Uniswap is set to capture $368M+ in settlement fees from ETH validators with Unichain, a new layer2 blockchain, designed to enhance scalability for DEFI apps, later in 2024. Donald Trump's team is rolling out a DEFI platform on the Ethereum blockchain. We had $753M stolen in Q3, with 86 incidents and $387M lost on the Ethereum blockchain alone. Some bold move, a proposal from Ben Adams, EIP-7781, aims to cut ETH's slot time from 12 seconds to 8 seconds. More transactions, less waiting. This will help for now. Scroll is minting its native token, SCR, on October 22, potentially becoming an essential cog in the Ethereum machine.
- Altcoins and stablecoins: Digital Yuan transaction volume exceeded 7 trillion Yuan. MakerDAO completed its rebrand to Sky and introduced its new stablecoin, Sky Dollar (USDS) along with a governance token, Sky. On Monday, Bitwise filed an application to list a spot XRP ETF in the US. Canary Capital also filed for a Spot XRP ETF. Shortly after, the SEC moved to challenge the court's ruling on its ongoing case against Ripple Labs. Strange timing? Kraken plans to delist Monero from the European Economic Area due to regulatory pressure. The stablecoin market cap rose 1.5% to $172B last month, bringing us the twelfth consecutive monthly increase. PayPal recently completed its first business payment using its own stablecoin PYUSD. Coinbase will comply with the EU's Markets in Crypto Assets (MICA) regulations and delist unauthorized stablecoins in the EU by the end of the year. SUI's open interest in the centralized exchanges surged. RobinHood VP declared that there will be no stablecoin to be launched anytime soon. Hyperliquid hit a superb $1.39B in daily trading volume. Compare this with the next two top players, Jupiter with $699M and dYdX even lower than that. HYPE airdrop may start soon. Vitalik sold Moodeng and donated the money for airborne disease research. Maybe is not this move only, but he was also pitched for the Nobel Prize. Solana just hit $6B in TVL. FTM is surging too, and I have no idea why. I thought that was dead a long time ago.
- NFTs and blockchain games: On Splinterlands, the seventh round of Conflicts airdrop finished, and the last Legendary summoner is coming. Gods Unchained is launching a new expansion. The metaverse is coming back, supported by AI, and Facebook's Meta stock has increased six-fold since its 2022 lows. The tap-2-earn tokens got a reality check, with Hamster Kombar and Catizen losing more than half of their value (53% and 58%). Try "Off the Grid", the newest blockchain game on Epic Games Store, that aims to challenge Fortnite.
- Good news: Kucoin has a brilliant referral program if you are good at this stuff. Australian banking group ANZ partnered with Chainlink to explore blockchain interoperability. The SEC Enforcement Chief Gurbir Grewal steps down after years of targeting crypto firms, filing over 100 lawsuits against companies in the sector. Grayscale added AAVE Trust to its growing lineup of crypto investment funds. Visa launched a new blockchain platform enabling banks to issue fiat-backed tokens. Coinbase pushed for an interlocutory appeal in the SEC lawsuit, as Crypto.com filed a lawsuit against the SEC over the Agency's overreach. Bitnomial also sued the SEC accusing them of overreach on the XRP Futures regulation. In response to this, Ripple expanded crypto custody with new security features and XRPL (XRP Ledger) integration. But there are rumours about Dan Gallagher being the frontrunner for the SEC chair, and he is the Robinhood legal mastermind. A pro-crypto guy! The FTX customers are to receive full repayment after the court clears the $16.5B plan. Even the FTX token rose back from the deathbed, surging 70% to $2.70. Hong Kong's SFC is set to approve more crypto exchanges by the end of the year. CoinDesk announced today that it has acquired CCData and CryptoCompare, to bolster data offerings. Grayscale seeks the SEC's approval to turn its multi-token fund into a new crypto ETF. Elon is thinking that Polymarket is quite accurate in guessing the next president, as people are betting on who they really believe would win, skin in the game, right? Not really, it is just the user Fredi9999 who put a $7.8M bet on Trump, raising his odds to 53%. Palau's 18K citizens may be able to buy government bonds with their phones, thanks to the blockchain 'Palau Invest' program.
- Bad news: Mango Markets destroyed all the MNGO tokens following the SEC settlement. The Fed interest rate cuts are set to lead to a loss of $625M in annual interest income, do not forget that the top five centralized stablecoins hold nearly $125B in US Treasury bills. The crypto advocacy organization Coin Center president, Jerry Brito, decided to step down from his role at the end of the year. Federal prosecutors in the US are charging for the first time ever for crypto market manipulation, and we have the token issuers for Saitama, Robo Inu, VZZN and Lillian Finance, along with four crypto market makers, being accused of wash trading, executing fake trades to pump and dump and sell their own tokens at inflated prices. The SEC chair is making me laugh, as he doubts about crypto's role as a mainstream payment method, while we are already there. Ryan Salame, former co-CEO of FTX Digital, has officially begun to serve his 7.5-year prison sentence. There is a new phishing tool called AngelX, which launched over 300 phishing DApps in just 4 days, like a new one every 20 minutes. Someone lost $32M in Spark Wrapped ETH tokens. Always check twice. Well, a fake WalletConnect app was available in PlayStore for 4 months, siphoning over $70K from unsuspecting targets. Justin Sun has been elected Prime Minister in Liberland, a small nation squeezed between Croatia and Serbia. The whole election was done on the blockchain. Be careful with your online signature. Not-so-friendly people are not skipping the email phishing, coming straight to your door, to ask for your crypto wallet.
- Joke of the week: Swan Bitcoin has filed a lawsuit against several former employees and consultants, accusing them of stealing its Bitcoin business with help from its former partner, Tether. The employees resigned en masse before Swan went public, as Tether encouraged them to defect and continue their mining work elsewhere. Tether is now expanding its horizons by exploring lending opportunities in the commodities trading sector, with a double user base in just two years, a 24% surge in just the last 12 months. So, are they meddling around the world? Definitely. Meanwhile, in the UK, the British Olumide Olukoya pleaded guilty to illegally operating a crypto ATM network, consisting of 11 machines that processed over £2.6M between September 2021 and September 2023. He may be sentenced to up to 2 years in prison. The UK Financial Conduct Authority stated that no legal crypto ATMs currently operate in the UK. Well, tell that to my corner shop, mate!
All the best,
George
Why not...
...have fun and win rewards on my favourite blockchain games (Splinterlands- Hearthstone-like card game) (Mobox - GamiFI NFT platform) (Upland - real-life virtual land) (Holozing - Pokemon-like game)and (Rising Star - Music creators game)
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