Crypto

There has been no shortage of people and institutions that woefully underestimated the potential of cryptocurrency. Among the ranks of once-were Bitcoin naysayers is Wired, which destroyed the private key to a Bitcoin (BTC) wallet holding 13.34623579 BTC back in 2013 in order to make the point the cryptocurrency was nothing more than an “abstraction”. The Bitcoin in the now inaccessible address is now worth $761,000. Author Robert McMillan (who now is a reporter with the Wall Street Journal) set up a Butterfy Labs Bitcoin mining rig in the corner of his office at Wired to see what all the fuss was about. And at the conclusion of his little experiment, he was far from impressed. Full marks for being early, null points for wise choices. “The world’s most popular digital currency really...

Bitcoin (BTC) started the new month in strength and Dec. 1’s run up to $59,053 suggests that bulls are beginning to shake off the fears stirred up by the Federal Reserve’s taper talks and the emergence of a new strain of COVID-19.  Altcoins also saw their prices lift off and early hopes of a potential “Santa Claus rally” are making the rounds on crypto Twitter. Top 7 coins with the highest 24-hour price change. Source: Cointelegraph Markets Pro Data from Cointelegraph Markets Pro and TradingView shows that the biggest gainers over the past 24-hours were Request Network (REQ), Bifrost (BFC) and SafePal (SFP). Request Network transactions hit an all-time high Request Network (REQ) is an Ethereum-based decentralized payment system that allows users to send an...

Ben McKenzie, the actor known for his roles on TV shows including Gotham and The OC, is speaking out against public figures endorsing projects in the crypto space without seemingly disparaging the technology, itself. Working with The New Republic staff writer Jacob Silverman, McKenzie made waves in early October after penning a Slate piece with his partner titled, “Celebrity Crypto Shilling Is a Moral Disaster.” The duo called attention to Kim Kardashian’s Instagram account promoting the token EthereumMax (EMAX) in early June, a project whose price gained 116,000% in just one week before shedding more than 99% of its value, leaving many in the red. “Celebrities are lending their names and promotional talents to everything from NFTs to crypto exchanges to their own custom coin offerings,” s...

Maxine Waters, the chair of the House Committee on Financial Services, has announced several chief executive officers at major crypto firms in the United States will speak at a hearing to discuss digital assets and the future of finance. According to a Wednesday announcement, Waters said Circle CEO Jeremy Allaire, FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried, Bitfury CEO Brian Brooks, Paxos CEO Chad Cascarilla, Stellar Development Foundation CEO Denelle Dixon, and Alesia Haas, the CEO of Coinbase Inc. and the chief financial officer of Coinbase Global, will be witnesses at a full House committee hearing held on Dec. 8. The hearing, named “Digital Assets and the Future of Finance: Understanding the Challenges and Benefits of Financial Innovation in the United States,” is the latest from Congress t...

Bitcoin (BTC) finished the month of November with a decline of about 7%. This was in sharp contrast to the prediction of the “worst-case scenario” of $98,000 by PlanB, the creator of the popular stock-to-flow model. Although the analyst described it as a “big miss,” he said he would give the floor model one more month. In its latest “Week on-chain” report, Glassnode analysts said that Bitcoin’s correction in November was the “least severe in 2021.” Analysts now expect Bitcoin to witness a Santa rally, similar to the 47% up-move in December 2020 or the sharper 80% surge that occurred in December of 2017. Daily cryptocurrency market performance. Source: Coin360 In another positive news for Bitcoin bulls, Bloomberg senior exchange-traded fund (ETF) analyst Eric Balchunas said that “Fide...

Major cryptocurrency wallet and data service Blockchain.com is expanding in Latin America by acquiring SeSocio, a major crypto company based in Argentina. One of the biggest investment platforms in Latin America, SeSocio will now merge with Blockchain.com to help them scale operations across the region, the firm officially announced Nov. 30. As part of the acquisition, 100 SeSocio employees will join Blockchain.com, immediately bringing its global headcount to 400 people. Together, the firms will focus on providing crypto-enabled financial services to the unbanked and underbanked not only in Argentina but also other countries where Blockchain.com operates, including Brazil, Chile, Colombia and Mexico. The United Kingdom-based company is also now planning to launch a physical presence in th...

Global blockchain security firm CertiK has concluded an $80 million investment round backed by some of crypto’s biggest venture funds, putting the company on track to reach the lofty $1 billion valuation mark in the foreseeable future.  The Series B2 investment round was led by Sequoia, a California-based venture fund, with additional participation from Tiger Global, Coatue Management and GL Ventures, CertiK announced Wednesday. In the startup world, Series B or B2 financing refers to the second round of funding for a business through either private equity or venture capital. CertiK has now raised over $140 million over the past four months, bringing its valuation closer to $1 billion, the company said. Blockchain security firm CertiK has raised substantial funds at a time when DeFi i...

Decentralized exchange aggregator 1inch Network has concluded a sizable Series B investment round, raising $175 million as part of a broader effort to expand protocol utility and increase access to liquidity within the decentralized finance, or DeFi, market.  The investment round vastly exceeded the initial target of $70 million amid active participation from leading venture funds, 1inch Network disclosed Wednesday. Crypto-finance unicorn Amber Group led the funding round, which comprised roughly 50 investors. VanEck, Jane Street, Fenbushi Capital, Alameda Research, Celsius, Nexo, Tribe Capital and Gemini Frontier Fund were among the investors. 1inch Network will use the funds to increase its capacity for addressing the ongoing regulatory changes impacting the DeFi market. The funding...

Konzum, the largest supermarket chain in Croatia, is keeping up with the times by debuting payments in cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin (BTC). The company officially announced on Dec. 1 that it now accepts nine cryptocurrencies for payment in its online store, allowing customers to use crypto to buy groceries, hygiene products and household supplies. According to the announcement, the supported cryptocurrencies include Bitcoin, Ether (ETH), Bitcoin Cash (BCH), EOS, Dai (DAI), XRP, Stellar (XLM), as well as stablecoins like Tether (USDT) and USD Coin (USDC). To enable the new crypto payment option, Konzum partnered with a local crypto payment processor Electrocoin to implement PayCek, a system that allows merchants to accept cryptocurrency payments. Taking into account the high volat...

Capital venture firm Borderless Capital has launched a fund worth $500 million to support projects building on the Algorand blockchain. According to a Nov. 30 announcement from the Miami-based company, the Borderless ALGO Fund II will aim to back digital assets powering the “next generation” of decentralized applications (DApps) on Algorand. We are excited to announce the launch of our $500M Borderless ALGO Fund II!https://t.co/EP0U6Ib8HV pic.twitter.com/okXf6GBFo8 — Borderless Capital (@borderless_cap) November 30, 2021 The firm highlighted nonfungible token (NFT) and decentralized finance (DeFi) projects in particular, noting that it is looking at opportunities to “disrupt the creators economy” with NFTs while accelerating the growth of funding into Algorand’s DeFi ecosystem. The move fr...

David Marcus, the head of Meta’s cryptocurrency and fintech unit Novi, will step down from his role by the end of 2021. Taking over from Marcus will be Stephane Kasriel, the former CEO of Upwork who has been at Meta, formerly known as Facebook, since August 2020. Marcus announced the decision via a Dec. 1 tweet, noting that he had made the “difficult decision” to leave the firm by the end of this year. The exec didn’t go into detail about what his next move would be, but hinted that it may be something “new and exciting” that he builds himself: “While there’s still so much to do right on the heels of launching Novi — and I remain as passionate as ever about the need for change in our payments and financial systems — my entrepreneurial DNA has been nudging me for too many mornings in a row ...

Ross Ulbricht, founder of defunct dark web marketplace Silk Road, has created a stir by announcing he will auction off his series of nonfungible tokens (NFT) starting Dec. 2. The imprisoned early Bitcoin adopter announced via his supporter operated Twitter account on Dec. 1 his plans to auction the Ross Ulbricht Genesis Collection on Superare NFT marketplace from Dec. 2-8. The collection consists of 11 works of art Ulbricht handmade, then his supporters minted into NFT form. The art was made in different stages of Ulbricht’s life from childhood up to his time in prison. The early works depict comic book characters and animals, while the later works depicts scenes from his court trial and inner feelings he has had since being imprisoned. Proceeds from the auction will help fund a trust to s...