Bitcoin (BTC) hit a six-week high above $24,000 on July 29, extending its rally that picked up momentum after the United States Federal Reserve hiked rates by 75 basis points on July 27. If the rally sustains for the next two days, Bitcoin could be on target to close the month of July with gains of more than 20%, according to data from Coinglass. It is not only the crypto markets that have seen a post-Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) rally. The U.S. equities markets are on track for big monthly gains in July. The S&P 500 and the Nasdaq Composite are up about 8.8% and 12% in July, on track to their best monthly gains since November 2020. Daily cryptocurrency market performance. Source: Coin360 The crypto and equities markets have risen in the expectation that the pace of rate hikes ...
Elon Musk’s Tesla proved to be the ultimate paper hands after the electric vehicle maker sold 75% of its Bitcoin (BTC) holdings in the second quarter. I say, good riddance. The cult of personality isn’t good for Bitcoin, and neither is a technologist who treats the asset as his plaything. As far as we are aware, Musk hasn’t sold any of his personal Bitcoin stash and Tesla still has an estimated 10,800 BTC on its books. Still, the less we have to hear about Musk and Bitcoin, the better. In this week’s Crypto Biz, we chronicle Tesla’s sale of BTC, KuCoin’s fight against fake news and Cathie Wood’s sale of Coinbase stock. Tesla reports $64M profit from Bitcoin sale Tesla’s decision to sell most of its Bitcoin wasn’t as boneheaded as it appeared at first. The company scored a $64 million...
The United States House of Representatives passed the Chips and Science Act on Thursday by a vote of 243 to 187. The bill, which was introduced into the Senate over a year ago, provides grants and incentives to the semiconductor industry and encourages research. It also creates a blockchain and cryptocurrency specialist position in the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP). The bill passed the Senate on Wednesday. It has an overall price tag of $280 billion, which includes $52 billion in grants and incentives for U.S. semiconductor manufacturers who face fierce competition from China, and $170 billion in incentives for research. It is expected to contribute to the easing of supply chain issues in the industry as well. ️ Good news from DC: the Chips Bill just app...
The United States Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, or FDIC, has issued an advisory informing the public it “does not insure assets issued by non-bank entities, such as crypto companies.” In a Friday notice, the FDIC advised banks in the U.S. that they needed to assess and manage risks in third-party relationships with crypto firms. The government agency said that while deposits at insured banks were covered for up to $250,000, no such protections applied “against the default, insolvency, or bankruptcy of any non-bank entity, including crypto custodians, exchanges, brokers, wallet providers, or other entities that appear to mimic banks.” “Some crypto companies have misrepresented to consumers that crypto products are eligible for FDIC deposit insurance coverage or that customers are F...
Data from the United States commerce department suggests America has entered a technical recession, but market analysts have highlighted key metrics that suggest investors are optimistic. The American economy shrunk for the second consecutive quarter, according to government data released on July 28, fitting the criteria for a technical recession. The Biden Administration maintains that the U.S. is not in a recession, highlighting low unemployment rates and other metrics that counter the argument. Mati Greenspan, founder & CEO of Quantum Economics, addressed the topic in his latest QE newsletter, noting a paradoxical effect between the GDP drop and a surge in stocks and other risk assets. He attributed this move to the US Federal Reserve’s decision to raise interest rates by 0.75%, whi...
When the last Bitcoin (BTC) is finally mined, the livelihood of miners who rely on block rewards as a source of income will be affected. Despite this, the future of mining stays promising, according to an expert in space. In a Cointelegraph interview, Mohamed El Masri, the founder of mining solutions provider PermianChain, talked about new players jumping into mining, the future of mining and what happens to mine profitability after the 21 millionth BTC is minted. El Masri highlighted that efficiency is a very important focus that new players in the space must take into consideration. Because mining profit depends on how efficient a mining operation is, the executive noted that efficiency brings down the cost of energy to a minimum. [embedded content] When asked about the future of t...
The Ethereum blockchain is on the verge of one of the most crucial technical updates since its inception, moving from proof-of-work (PoW) to proof-of-stake (PoS), also called Ethereum 2.0, or Eth2. Ethereum devs gave Sept. 19 as the perpetual date for the merger of the current PoW chain to the PoS chain. The Merge is expected to be deployed on the Goerli testnet in the second week of August. After the successful integration of the Goerli testnet, the blockchain will initiate the Bellatrix update in early August and roll out the Merge two weeks later. The discussion around the transition began with a focus on scalability, so Ethereum developers proposed a three-phase transformation process. The transition itself is nearly two years in the making, starting on December 1, 2020, with the...
Finding real love starts with Bitcoin (BTC). That’s according to the founders of Bitcoiner dating service The Orange Pill App and LoveisBitcoin. The services join a growing list of ways in which Bitcoin enthusiasts can meet, chat and now fall in love “IRL” (in real life.) But first, why do people who love Bitcoin need to connect with others who are “orange-pilled?” For George Saoulidis, cofounder of LoveisBitcoin, Bitcoiners need a dating service because money shapes our lives more than we realize: “Issues can and do arise if time preferences diverge a lot. Part of the orange-pilling process makes you see through the marketing and the propaganda to distinguish what is truly valuable: Experiences, family, friendships.” Part of the Bitcoin ethos is having a lower time preference, and not suc...
Solana Spaces CEO Vibhu Norby said the new physical Solana stores will introduce up to 100,000 people per month to the Solana ecosystem, while also signalling plans to open a virtual storefront in the near future. Utilizing a grant from the Solana Foundation, the first Solana Spaces shop opened in the swanky Hudson Yards New York shopping center on July 28. Addressing the community in a impromptu Twitter AMA on launch day, Norby explained the store is meant to teach new users about how to use Dapps, and noted that it would be introducing thousands of people into the Solana blockchain. “I don’t think people realize this but we’re going to bring 50 to 100,000 people into Solana every month through these stores — and that’s just this year.” Speaking to Cointelegraph in a phone interview...
Celsius depositors should be on the lookout for phishing scams after the company revealed some of its customer data has been leaked in a third-party data breach. On July 26, Celsius sent an email to its customers informing them that a list of their emails had been leaked by an employee of one of its business data management and messaging vendors. According to Celsius, the breach came from an engineer at the Customer.io messaging platform who leaked the data to a third-party bad actor. “We were recently informed by our vendor Customer.io that one of their employees accessed a list of Celsius client email addresses,” said Celsius in its email to customers. The data breach is part of the same incursion that leaked OpenSea customer email addresses in June. Announcement from Celsius: “We ...
Cypto lender Voyager Digital has been directed to remove “false and misleading” statements that its user’s deposit accounts are FDIC insured. In a joint letter written on July 28 by Seth Rosebrockfrom & Jason Gonzalez, Assistant General Counsel at the Federal Reserve and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) to Voyager Digital, the authors said the representations “likely misled and were relied upon” by customers who placed funds with Voyager who now no longer have access to it. “These representations are false and misleading and, based on the information we have to date, it appears that the representations likely misled and were relied upon by customers who placed their funds with Voyager and do not have immediate access to their funds.” The Fed and FDIC allege that V...
Professional English soccer team Crawley Town F.C. have followed through on a community vote by fans and NFT holders who were recently given a voice on what type of player the team should recruit next. The vote, which took place on June 15, which was the first team decision opened up to fans, took place for verified NFTs hodlers via a temporary Discord channel. Votes were also taken from nearly 1,000 season ticket holders. Speaking with the Daily Mail on July 28, Crawley Town co-owner and former ESPN gambling analyst Preston Johnson emphasized the significance of being able to offer fans a stake in the club via NFTs: “A lot of NFT projects are just speculation with no real tangible spine, no real true story. Having a football club to root for every week? That’s a spine that peo...