Digital Assets Report 74
- Institutional activity in crypto remains significant as a16z raises a record-breaking $4.5bn crypto-fund, JP-Morgan considers tokenizing equity & Ethereum scaler Starkware raises $100m amongst more.
- The Ethereum Chain faced a seven-block reorganization as a valid transaction sequence was knocked off, which caused an 11% price correction in Ether & $160m worth of liquidations.
- BTC & ETH continue to trade sideways & are expected to drop another leg lower before recovering back according to Technical Analysis.
- The crypto-regulatory environment saw another active week as the SEC rejected a carbon-neutral BTC ETF, Portugal's parliament rejected two crypto tax proposals, FTX's SBF pitches the CFTC on direct clearing for derivatives & US Senator's draft a bill to ban the use of the Digital Yuan in US-based mobile apps amongst more.
Business
a16z Finalizes Record-Breaking $4.5B Crypto Fund
Andreessen Horowitz is allocating another $4.5 billion to crypto investments, more than doubling the amount assigned to its previous fund.
Timothy Craig
At Davos, Crypto Is No Longer on the Outside
Cryptocurrencies have taken a prominent role at the World Economic Forum’s annual meeting in Davos, despite the mainstream finance world’s apparent contempt for the sector.
Sandali Handagama and Helene Braun
Ethereum Beacon Chain experiences 7 block reorg: What’s going on?
Core dev Preston Van Loon suggested the reorg was due to a “non-trivial segmentation” of new and old client node software, with Vitalik Buterin labeling it as a “good hypothesis.”
Brian Quarmby
Banking Giant JPMorgan Considers Using Blockchain Technology To Tokenize Equities: Report - The Daily Hodl
Financial services behemoth JPMorgan is contemplating tokenizing equities and other traditional securities using blockchain technology.
Daily Hodl Staff
StarkWare Reaches $8B Valuation Following Latest $100M Funding Round
The blockchain scaling solution last raised funds in November at a $2 billion valuation.
Brandy Betz
Report: FTX CEO Says Crypto Exchange Is Ready to Spend Billions on Acquisition Deals – Bitcoin News
FTX co-founder Sam Bankman-Fried said the exchange aims to make a number of acquisitions and could spend up to $2 billion on such efforts.
News
Elliptic Announces Investment From J.P. Morgan to Accelerate Safer Participation in Crypto Markets
Elliptic today announced J.P. Morgan as an additional investor as part of its recent $60 million Series C funding round.
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Cryptosat’s first nanosatellite blasts off Wednesday on SpaceX rocket
The crypto-satellite company Cryptosat will launch a small blockchain module into low Earth orbit using a SpaceX rocket.
Jesse Coghlan
Coinbase Becomes First Bitcoin Company Among Fortune 500 - Decrypt
Coinbase ranked second overall in revenue growth among companies on the list, at 514%, trailing only Moderna.
Andrew Throuvalas
LUNA 2.0 price crashes 67% within hours casting doubt on the recovery path | Finbold
The LUNA 2.0 cryptocurrency suffered a significant price correction hours after its launch losing its value by over 60%.
Justinas Baltrusaitis
Japan’s Bitbank to set up a custody firm to facilitate institutional entry to local markets
Once established, JADAT will focus on crypto, security tokens on public blockchains, stablecoins and NFTs.
Ezra Reguerra
European Central Bank reveals 10% of Eurozone households own crypto
Research released on May 24 by the European Central Bank indicated that one in ten households in the Eurozone had purchased crypto-assets.
Jordan Major
Celsius Network’s crypto mining subsidiary SEC filing suggests plans for IPO
Celsius Network said its mining subsidiary had filed a Form S-1 draft registration statement with the SEC, suggesting the firm may be looking at an initial public offering by the end of 2022.
Turner Wright
Markets
Crypto Charts 68
BTC A break below $28k will signify a good entry opportunity ETH Look to sell at $1.94k-$1.99k before buying back around $1.54k level Bitcoin Last we said: BTC traded sideways in a corrective triangle that should be ending anytime. A break of the $27′200 level will
Bitcoin (BTC) Closes Ninth Successive Bearish Candlestick - BeInCrypto
Bitcoin RSI has turned bullish in the daily and weekly time frames, but the price action has yet to catch up with this trend reversal.
Valdrin Tahiri
Crypto Whales Ditched Tether for USDC After Stablecoin Panic
The UST failure prompted large investors on the Ethereum blockchain to leave USDT for the perceived safety of its biggest competitor.
Krisztian Sandor
Regulations
One River’s Carbon Neutral Bitcoin ETF Rejected by SEC
It’s the latest in the agency’s string of rejections of spot bitcoin ETF applications.
Michael Bellusci
Portugal’s Parliament rejects Bitcoin and crypto tax proposals
The Portuguese Parliament, rejected not one but two different proposals to tax Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies.
Jordan Major
FTX’s Bankman-Fried Pitches CFTC on Directly Clearing Customers’ Crypto Swaps
The crypto exchange’s founder and CEO made his case at a Washington, D.C., roundtable, while mainstream derivatives firms painted his ideas as dangerous.
Jesse Hamilton
Senators Draft Bill to Ban Use of Digital Yuan in US-Based Mobile Apps - Blockworks
The “Defending Americans from Authoritarian Digital Currencies Act” aims to curb China’s “direct control” on US soil, the senators said.
Sebastian Sinclair
Amid sanctions, Russia weighs crypto for international payments: Report
Russia appears poised to adopt crypto as part of a broader effort to stave off the impact of Western sanctions.
Sam Bourgi
S. Korea finance regulator to audit Terra and related exchanges
The Financial Supervisory Service (FSS) of South Korea will perform an on-site inspection of Terraform Labs and financial services linked to TerraUSD (UST) or LUNA. See related article: Are we heading for a post-Terra crypto winter? Fast facts The FSS said at an emergency National Assembly meeting o…
Former BitMEX CEO Arthur Hayes Sentenced to 2 Years Probation
Hayes pleaded guilty to one count of violating the Bank Secrecy Act (BSA) in February, and faced a sentence of up to 12 months in prison.
Cheyenne Ligon
Opinions
Christine Lagarde says crypto is worth nothing
Lagarde said she thinks crypto should be regulated to protect inexperienced investors.
JPMorgan Says Bitcoin Is Undervalued By 28%, Says Cryptocurrencies Are Now A ‘Preferred Alternative Asset’
Despite the crypto slump, banking giant JPMorgan says bitcoin is massively undervalued.
Nina Bambysheva
Billionaire Bill Miller calls Bitcoin ‘insurance’ against financial catastrophe
The billionaire investor commented on a recent remark by Buffett who said he wouldn’t take all the world’s Bitcoin for $25 rebutting “no one’s making you buy it, right? So ignore it.”
Jesse Coghlan
The Bitcoin-Stock Market Decoupling Isn’t Happening Yet, but It Totally Will
When Decoupling? Maybe soon (but probably not).
George Kaloudis