Crypto
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Celsius denies allegations on Alex Mashinsky trying to flee US
Troubled crypto lending firm Celsius is putting their best foot forward to recover operations alongside CEO Alex Mashinsky, who currently stays in the United States, the company has claimed. A spokesperson for Celsius has denied rumors that the company’s CEO tried to flee the U.S. last week amid the ongoing liquidity crisis of the Celsius Network. The representative told Cointelegraph on Monday that the firm continues working on restoring liquidity, stating: “All Celsius employees — including our CEO — are focused and hard at work in an effort to stabilize liquidity and operations. To that end, any reports that the Celsius CEO has attempted to leave the U.S. are false.” Celsius’ statement came shortly after Mike Alfred, co-founder of the crypto analytics firm Digital Assets Data, took to T...
Uzbekistan warms up to Bitcoin mining, but there’s a catch
The National Agency of Prospective Projects (NAPP) in Uzbekistan announced its demands toward crypto mining operators. It would only allow the companies that use solar energy to mine Bitcoin (BTC) or other cryptocurrencies. The normative act on the government page, dated June 24, describes the confirmation of “Guidelines on the registration of the crypto assets mining,” and sets the finalization date on July 9. The second article of the document offers an uncompromising wording: “Mining is being carried out only by the legal entity with the use of electric energy, provided by a solar photovoltaic power plant.” As a further complication, the miners should own the solar photovoltaic power plant that they will use for energy. The executive order also obliges any mining operator to obtai...
Not the best week for crypto lending: Law Decoded, June 20-27
Due to Celsius Network’s withdrawal suspension in mid-June, the very topic of crypto lending made its entryway to the acute issues list for the regulators. Last week, lawmakers and officials continued to raise the question of necessary action, with significant utterance belonging to one of the key European crypto skeptics, Christine Lagard. European Central Bank president got so impressed with the Celsius crisis that she coined the term “MiCa II,” referring to the main regulatory package for crypto in the European Union. Lagarde believes the new MiCa should include separate crypto-asset staking and lending guidelines. It’s not necessary to be a civil servant to discern the flaws of the current lending model, though. A hardcore Bitcoin (BTC) maximalist and Swan Bitcoin CEO...
3 charts showing this Bitcoin price drop is unlike summer 2021
Bitcoin (BTC) bear markets come in many shapes and sizes, but this one has given many reason to panic. BTC has been described as facing “a bear of historic proportions” in 2022, but just one year ago, a similar feeling of doom swept crypto markets as Bitcoin saw a 50% drawdown in weeks. Beyond price, however, 2022 on-chain data looks wildly different. Cointelegraph takes a look at three key metrics demonstrating how this Bitcoin bear market is not like the last. Hash rate Everyone remembers the Bitcoin miner exodus from China, which effectively banned the practice in one of its most prolific areas. While the extent of the ban has since come under suspicion, the move at the time saw huge numbers of network participants relocate — mostly to the United States — in a matter of week...
Institutional crypto asset products saw record weekly outflows of $423M
Digital asset investment products saw record outflows totaling $423 million last week, with institutional investors from Canada representing nearly all of the carnage. According to the latest edition of CoinShares’ weekly “Digital Asset Fund Flows” report, Canadian investors offloaded a whopping $487.5 worth of digital asset products between June 20 and June 24. The total outflows for the week were partially offset by $70 million worth of inflows from other countries, with U.S.-based investors accounting for more than half of the inflows with $41 million. Outside of the U.S., investors from Germany and Switzerland accounted for inflows totaling $11 million and $10.4 million apiece. In comparison, Brazilians and Australians also pitched in with minor inflows of $1.6 million and $1.4 million...
Harmony hacker sends stolen funds to Tornado Cash mixer
The funds from Harmony’s Horizon Bridge have begun to move into the Tornado Cash Ethererum mixer, signaling that the attacker has no intention of accepting the $1 million bounty offered. The decision to obfuscate the ill-gotten gains answers questions about whether the Harmony team’s offer of just 1% of the $100 million in crypto funds stolen on June 24 would be enough to convince the exploiter to return them. #PeckShieldAlert ~6k $ETH (~$7.1m) into @TornadoCash from @harmonyprotocol exploiters Intermediary address: 0x432…47ae pic.twitter.com/AR9dmJRQet — PeckShieldAlert (@PeckShieldAlert) June 27, 2022 A total of 18,036.3 ETH worth about $21 million was moved out of the Horizon Bridge exploiter’s primary wallet at 03:10 am ET on June 28. These funds were then divided equally three w...
Community reacts after SEC’s Gensler affirms BTC’s commodity status
Securities and Exchange Commission Chairman Gary Gensler riled up Crypto Twitter on Monday after affirming that Bitcoin (BTC) is a commodity. Questions were raised about its impact on Grayscales’ proposed Bitcoin ETF and why Ethereum wasn’t mentioned. Speaking to Jim Cramer on CNBC’s Squawk Box on Monday, June 27, the SEC chair said while many crypto-financial assets have the key attribute of a security, Bitcoin is the “only one” that he was comfortable publicly labeling as a commodity. “Some, like Bitcoin — and that’s the only one I’m going to say because I’m not going to talk about any one of these tokens, but my predecessors and others have said they’re a commodity.” Grayscale Bitcoin ETF The remarks kicked up chatter about Grayscale’s application to convert its Bitcoi...
Unizen ‘CeDeFi’ smart exchange secures $200M investment from GEM
Cryptocurrency exchange Unizen has scored a $200 million investment from private equity group Global Emerging Markets (GEM) which it will use to expand its business and its ecosystem. Rather than receiving the $200 million in funding all at once, Unizen noted on June 27 that the investment will come in the form of a “capital commitment’, with part of the funding released upfront and the rest will be provided later based on achieved milestones. Unizen did not disclose what particular criteria it had to achieve to receive the funding. Unizen calls itself a “CeDeFi” exchange mixing features of both centralized exchanges (CEXs) and decentralized exchanges (DEXs), it runs on the BNB Chain, formerly called the Binance Smart Chain. It aims to attract both retail and institutional investors by fin...
Terra’s LUNA2 skyrockets 70% in nine days despite persistent sell-off risks
The price of Terra (LUNA2) has recovered sharply nine days after falling to its historic lows of $1.62. On June 27, LUNA2’s rate reached $2.77 per token, thus chalking up a 70% recovery when measured from the said low. Still, the token traded 77.35% lower than its record high of $12.24, set on May 30. LUNA2’s recovery mirrored similar retracement moves elsewhere in the crypto industry with top crypto assets Bitcoin (BTC) and Ether (ETH) rising by approximately 25% and 45% in the same period. LUNA2/USD four-hour price chart versus BTC/USD. Source: TradingView LUNA2 price rally could trap bulls The recent bout of buying in the LUNA2 market could trap bulls, given it has come as a part of a broader correction trend. In detail, LUNA2 appears to be forming a “bear flag&#...
Price analysis 6/27: BTC, ETH, BNB, XRP, ADA, SOL, DOGE, DOT, SHIB, AVAX
Bitcoin’s (BTC) current bear market is one of the worst, according to a report by on-chain analytics firm Glassnode. This was the first time in history that the Mayer Multiple slipped below the previous cycle’s low. Bitcoin’s fall below $20,000 on June 18 also marked the biggest loss ever booked by investors in a single day at $4.23 billion. Considering the above factors and a few other events, Glassnode believes that the capitulation in Bitcoin may have started. Bitcoin whales seem to have started their purchasing, suggesting that the bottom may be close and on June 25, analytics resource “Game of Trades” highlighted that demand from whales holding 1,000 to 10,000 Bitcoin witnessed a sharp spike in demand. Daily cryptocurrency market performance. Source: Coin360 Another sign t...
Grayscale reports 99% of SEC comment letters support spot Bitcoin ETF
Digital asset manager Grayscale reported overwhelming support in public comments for its application to launch a spot Bitcoin exchange-traded fund. In a Monday letter to investors, Grayscale said that of the more than 11,400 letters the United States Securities and Exchange Commission, or SEC, had received in regards to its proposed Bitcoin (BTC) investment vehicle, “99.96 percent of those comment letters were supportive of Grayscale’s case” as of June 9. According to Grayscale, roughly 33% of the letters questioned the lack of a spot BTC ETF in the U.S., given the SEC had already approved investment vehicles linked to Bitcoin futures, as was the case for ProShares and Valkyrie. “The SEC’s actions over the past eight months […] have signaled an increased recognition of and comfort wi...
Bitcoin’s short-term price prospects slightly improved, but most traders are far from optimistic
A mild sense of hope emerged among Bitcoin (BTC) investors after the June 18 drop to $17,600 becomes more distant and an early ascending pattern points toward $21,000 in the short-term. Bitcoin 12-hour USD price at FTX. Source: TradingView Recent negative remarks from lawmakers continued to curb investor optimism. In an interview with Cointelegraph, Swiss National Bank (SNB) deputy head Thomas Muser said that the decentralized finance (DeFi) ecosystem would cease to exist if current financial regulations are implemented in the crypto industry. An article published in The People’s Daily on June 26 mentioned the Terra (LUNA), now renamed Terra Classic (LUNC), network’s collapse and local blockchain expert Yifan He referring to crypto as a Ponzi scheme. When asked by Cointelegraph...
