Cryptocurrency news by Protos

BBC chair and crypto investor Richard Sharp has asked the BBC board to review any possible conflicts of interest in his current role, stemming from claims that he helped to secure former prime minister Boris Johnson an £800,000 loan guarantor right before he appointed Sharp as chair. The former prime minister told Sky News this morning that Sharp “knows absolutely nothing about my personal finances — I can tell you that for one hundred percent ding dang sure.” However, Johnson doesn’t deny that discussions about the loan took place. Sharp, a former Goldman Sachs banker, maintains that he was fairly appointed. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Banks in the US are under increasing pressure to sever ties with cryptocurrency firms, as unfavorable media scrutiny, public sentiment, and regulatory measures against the industry grow. Not a single US regulatory body, like the Federal Reserve or the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), looks at the crypto industry favorably today, according to a banking exec at a crypto-friendly American bank.In an exclusive talk with Protos, the banking exec spoke on-background about the regulatory hurdles facing the industry and what it means for crypto’s future in America. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Since Justin Sun of Tron (TRX) fame became a Huobi Global Advisory Board member, the exchange has been embroiled in a number of controversies. Among them is the fact that, for months, Huobi refused to say exactly how Sun was involved in its acquisition by the opaquely-named About Capital Management.As you’d expect, rumors swirled that Sun backed the acquisition, which would have explained his quick appointment to Huobi’s Global Advisory Board. Huobi remained quiet about the situation until a statement issued on January 19, 2022, confirmed that he had indeed assumed a leadership role in the company. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Late Thursday night, Genesis Global announced it voluntarily filed for chapter 11 bankruptcy, along with its crypto lending arm Genesis Global Capital and lending unit Genesis Asia Pacific. In a press release, Genesis used every buzzword it could think of to frame the move in a positive light.Genesis initiates process to achieve global resolution to maximise value for all clients and stakeholders and strengthen its business for the future, the headline to announce its bankruptcy reads. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Yuga Labs, the company behind the Bored Ape Yacht Club (BAYC) NFT collection, is struggling with an investigation by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), a hack of its Mailchimp account, and a flurry of lawsuits flying back and forth. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The Federal Home Loan Bank (FHLB) system is suddenly finding itself bailing out numerous cryptocurrency-friendly banks, such as Silvergate and Signature. Estimates suggest they received over $15 billion in advances from the network combined.FHLBs were established in the wake of the great depression, designed to provide funds to any residential housing finance member, or to “any community financial system” for small businesses and farms. FHLBs don’t receive taxpayer funding, are privately owned, and don’t follow the majority of their initial guidelines. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

On Tuesday, Binance was named as one of the three largest counterparties for crypto exchange Bitzlato, in a US Treasury order that prevents any covered financial institution from sending funds to the relatively unknown firm.Bitlatzo’s majority owner, Anatoly Legkodymov or “Gandalf”, was arrested and indicted by the Department of Justice (DoJ) on Tuesday in the Eastern District of New York. He’s charged with operating an unlicensed money transmission business.The Treasury has indicated that he’s a “primary money laundering concern” with connections to Russian illicit finance. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Bitcoiners might be able to program long-term savings vaults into code, on-chain — an exciting development for Bitcoiners who keep the cryptocurrency as a long-term investment, known as ‘hodling’ (holding on for dear life).Despite the roller coaster-like swings in bitcoin’s value, many people believe Bitcoin is a durable store of value. So, as the Bitcoin community increasingly seeks programmability regarding long-term investment practices, Bitcoin Core developers are now considering the addition of hard-coded “vaults” into Bitcoin’s software through a soft fork. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Crypto miners involved in dubious crypto startup Green say they’re easier targets for hackers, after their personal data was unintentionally leaked by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).The commission, which has increasingly enforced regulations on crypto firms as industry scandals continue to erupt, reportedly leaked 650 names and emails of Green users earlier this month. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Heather Morgan, AKA Razzlekhan, AKA The Crocodile of Wall Street has reportedly found a new job despite still being under house arrest for her alleged role in 2016’s $4.5 billion Bitfinex hack.As reported by the New York Post, the world’s foremost crypto rapper will be working three days a week as a ‘growth marketing and business development specialist’ for an unnamed tech company in New York City. A judge has agreed to modify the terms of her house arrest to allow her to base herself at the company’s office. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Barry Silbert’s Digital Currency Group (DCG) has suspended shareholder payouts as it struggles to ride out a “wave of unprecedented fraud and criminal behavior” plaguing the industry.As reported by CoinDesk, in a letter to shareholders on Tuesday, Silbert explained that the company was “focused on strengthening our balance sheet by reducing operating expenses and preserving liquidity.” Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Crypto-friendly bank Silvergate posted a loss of $949 million for the final three months of 2022. Massive losses in the past few weeks have forced the company to lay off 40% of its staff. It expects to part ways with $8.1 million in restructuring costs, such as severance packages.Customers withdrew a record-breaking $8 billion from Silvergate during the quarter. The bank’s largest customers, FTX and Alameda Research, filed for bankruptcy protection in November. As Silvergate liquidated assets to satisfy an avalanche of customers’ withdrawal requests, the bank lost hundreds of millions of dollars by selling bonds and other illiquid securities prior to their intended maturities. Silvergate will also pay a $134 million impairment charge for securities that it plans to prematurely sell during the first quarter of 2023. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Yuga Labs has announced its first Bored Ape-themed video game… And trying to understand it feels like digging through shit to find a key.The game: Dookey Dash. The premise: One of Yuga Labs’ apes got so drunk at a party that it swallowed a very important key. The rules: very complicated. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Criminals behind a UK-based bitcoin scam bribed authorities, bought luxury properties with suitcases full of cash, and handed out thousands of pounds to people in the street after making “more money than they could spend.”The gang was jailed this week for between six years and 18 months after exploiting a loophole in an Australian crypto exchange to steal $26.9 million in bitcoin. However, before they were arrested, they enjoyed extremely lavish lifestyles thanks to the ill-gotten crypto. Police reportedly recovered 445 bitcoin, luxury watches, cars, property, designer goods, and a £600 wine cooler. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

On September 13, roughly four months after the collapse of algorithmic stablecoin terra and crypto token luna, South Korean authorities issued a warrant for founder Do Kwon’s arrest. Lo and behold, he was nowhere to be found.In December, Kwon was spotted by authorities in Serbia after appearing in Dubai, leaving some wondering why he chose to go there. Only, Serbia is a much more likely place for a crypto fugitive like Kwon to ensure they remain hidden. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Former UK prime minister Boris Johnson has reportedly received a record-breaking £1 million ($1.2 million) donation from a Thailand-based cryptocurrency investor and Bitifinex/Tether parent company shareholder.Friday’s updated register of interests reveals how Christopher Harborne made the record gift to Boris Johnson LTD, the former PM’s political office that funds his activities. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Since the collapse of disgraced Sam Bankman-Fried’s crypto empire, liquidators have been attempting to consolidate the crypto holdings of both FTX and Alameda Research, with the aim of eventually returning some value to creditors.Despite the lack of risk mitigation procedures at Alameda, it appears that those in charge of liquidating the remaining assets may be just as gung-ho as the previous leadership.On-chain evidence of repeated errors paints a worrying picture for those hoping to one day recoup some of their funds. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Waves DEX users have been complaining that they can’t withdraw USDT or USDC from the exchange. On the Waves blockchain explorer, withdrawals of USDT and USDC seem to be working normally but users are struggling to get their transactions actioned in reality.When looking at the Waves DEX Ethereum bridge, it seems that it’s been depleted of all its USDC and USDT. Users took to Twitter to ask Sasha Ivanov, founder of Waves and the administrator of the Waves DEX to ask about their balances but received no replies. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Since the president made bitcoin legal tender in 2021, he’s struggled to prove the move makes any kind of sense for the country — El Salvador has sparred with major international players in the financial industry, like the International Monetary Fund.With the passage of the country’s new Digital Assets Issuance Law, El Salvador is one step closer toward finally being ready to sell its Volcano Bonds for some bitcoin and USD — but especially, Tether.Here’s what you need to know. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Approximately 800 victims of the BitConnect crypto investment scam will get back at least some of their funds after a San Diego Federal court ordered that $17 million be distributed to investors in over 40 different countries.BitConnect managed to con thousands of investors out of a collective $2.4 billion by fraudulently pitching BitConnect’s ICO and crypto exchange as a sound investment. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

After the collapse of FTX, Binance enjoyed several weeks of glowing press coverage about its commitment to spend $1 billion on helping the crypto industry. However, it appears that the wallet in question still holds nearly $1 billion BUSD and hasn’t spent anything.In its initial announcement on November 24, 2022, Binance claimed that 150 companies had applied to this so-called Industry Recovery Initiative so it’s possible that Binance is still evaluating applicants and will disburse funds sometime in the future. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Bulgarian authorities have raided the Sofia offices of crypto lender Nexo amid claims of a number of violations, including tax offenses and computer fraud.Police targeted more than 15 sites across the city on Thursday as part of what prosecutors called “a pre-trial investigation aimed at neutralizing an illegal criminal activity,” (via Reuters). Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) has requested that a federal judge impose a default judgement against Ooki DAO after it failed to respond to a lawsuit that alleged it violated federal commodities laws.Ooki DAO -- formerly known as bZeroX -- is a decentralized crypto lending and borrowing protocol that offers users margin trading through loaned funds in order to increase trading exposure. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

A second group of Genesis creditors says they were misled by the lender into thinking that their money would be safe, and are now out hundreds of millions of dollars. The group is made up of individuals who were direct clients of Genesis, rather than investors who came in through Gemini or another intermediary.At least one member of the group pulled all of his money out of Genesis in late spring, following news that the lender had significant losses tied to Three Arrows Capital (3AC), the multi-billion-dollar hedge fund that went bankrupt in May.However, the creditor, who declined to give his name because he is still in active negotiations with Genesis, ended up putting more than $10 million back into the company in the second half of last year. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Bitcoin is currently rallying after a brutal 2022 that saw 65% slashed from its price. But how long can the upturn last? Is it even a real rally? And why do bitcoin’s ups and downs over the past 12 months appear to be so closely tied to the fortunes of traditional stocks?Here, Protos takes a look at bitcoin’s price history and some current activity to try and understand what’s going on in both markets. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Crypto.com is in the process of de-listing Tether (USDT) for Canadian users, effective from the end of this month.A Crypto.com spokesperson says this decision was made “in accordance with instructions from the Ontario Securities Commission (OSC) as part of our pre-registration undertaking for a restricted dealer license.” Crypto.com filed its pre-registration with the OSC at the beginning of August 2022. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

A massive tranche of ether (ETH) is unlocking soon. During a meeting on December 8, Ethereum developers decided to make staked ETH on Ethereum’s Beacon Chain available for withdrawal with the Shanghai update as early as March 2023. The meeting was ratified last week.The Beacon Chain holds $21 billion (over 15.9 million ETH) staked within Ethereum’s Proof-of-Stake system. Additional ETH is voluntarily staked into the Beacon Chain daily and cannot be withdrawn until Shanghai activates. So, by the time March arrives, the Beacon Chain will far exceed 16 million ETH. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In what was called crypto’s first-ever insider trading case, the brother of a former Coinbase employee has been sentenced to 10 months in prison for conspiracy to commit wire fraud.As reported by Reuters, Nikhil Wahi, confessed last year to making trades using confidential information passed to him by his brother Ishan, a product manager at the San Francisco-based exchange. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Coinbase chief Brian Armstrong has hinted that the spectacular implosion of Sam Bankman-Fried’s rival exchange FTX last year proves that his company has chosen the right strategy for long-term success. However, despite this foresight, the company has announced that it’s set to fire nearly 1,000 employees.Armstrong broke the news early Tuesday in a message to Coinbase’s employees.“Coinbase is well capitalized, and crypto isn't going anywhere. In fact, I believe recent events will ultimately end up benefiting Coinbase greatly (a large competitor failing, emerging regulatory clarity, etc.), and they validate our long-term strategy,” wrote Armstrong. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The US Justice Department has launched a webpage that allows any US resident who believes they’re a victim of fraud by Sam Bankman-Fried to file an official report. It specifies 10 rights that federal crime victims have under US law, including United States Code Title 18 Section 3771. The site also provides official FTX contact information from the US government.FTX disintegrated in November 2022 and, according to bankruptcy filings, could have more than one million creditors. It owes its top 50 creditors more than $3 billion and the US government’s bankruptcy overseer assigned a creditors’ committee to its bankruptcy case. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Both of Justin Sun’s stablecoins, one of which Protos has previously reported on, are struggling to maintain their promised $1.00 peg.At the time of writing, USDD is hovering around $0.97, and USDJ is trading at $1.09. Curiously, this means that one of Sun’s stablecoins is melting down while the other is melting up. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Silvergate marketed itself as a crypto-friendly banking services provider but, unsurprisingly, it ended up providing financial services to firms that were once the world’s second-largest crypto exchange and market-maker: FTX and Alameda Research.As the world discovers the reality behind Silvergate’s business, investors have progressively sold off shares as they dropped from their $238 November 2021 heights to under $13 today. Not only that, even Senators are probing Silvergate regarding inappropriate transfers of FTX customer funds into Sam Bankman-Fried’s trading fund, Alameda.With Silvergate's reckoning still playing out, here is a timeline of events that led up to and hastened the company's collapse. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The New York Attorney General (NYAG) has brought a suit against Alex Mashinsky, formerly CEO of the now-bankrupt Celsius Network, for securities fraud, failure to register, repeated and persistent fraud, and repeated and persistent illegality.In the complaint, the NYAG alleges a variety of misrepresentations that Mashinsky made. Here is a summary of the specific misrepresentations they allege. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Accurately accounting for Tether’s reserves is a challenge, even (or perhaps especially) for Tether itself. Twitter user Jay Pinho recently published a website that attempts to track the value of the assets backing Tether to gain some insight into their solvency. It also allows you to tweak the composition to see how that affects the performance.However, due to Tether’s commitment to remaining as opaque as possible, accurately making this assessment can really only be done by someone with full access to its books. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Binance has previously undercollateralized its stablecoin, BUSD, on its own blockchain, according to on-chain data revealing that the wallet backing the BUSD bridged from Ethereum’s blockchain onto Binance’s blockchain did not consistently equal one dollar’s worth of assets for each Binance-pegged BUSD.Investigative reporter Jonathan Reiter of Data Finnovation collaborated with Patrick Tan of Novum Alpha to initially publicize the shortfall. Reiter has published five scholarly articles and specializes in stablecoin research. Both firms are based in Singapore. Their joint analysis shows insufficient backing of BUSD trading on BNB Chain for several months. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Moonstone Bank chief legal officer Joseph Vincent, a former top banking regulator, has left the financial firm, after being with the bank for just eight months.Vincent joined Moonstone, one of the smallest banks in the country, which gained national attention late last year for its ties to FTX, in May 2022. Moonstone heralded Vincent’s hire in a post on LinkedIn. “We are delighted to share this exciting news,” Moonstone wrote.Prior to joining Moonstone, Vincent spent 18 years as a top official in Washington’s Department of Financial Institutions, which is the state’s banking regulator. Vincent is also an adjunct legal professor at Seattle University School of Law, according to the school’s website. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In a text message to Reuters, Huobi’s advisor Justin Sun confirmed that the crypto exchange plans to dismiss 20% of its employees this quarter.“The planned layoff ratio is about 20%, but it is not implemented now. With the current state of the bear market, a very lean team will be maintained going forward,” a Huobi spokesperson told The Block.Tron founder Sun sits on Huobi’s global advisory board. For the past few days, he’s been battling rumours of Huobi’s insolvency on Twitter.  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Tate’s a pretty popular guy in the crypto world. In addition to having many fans in the space, he’s been interviewed – and in some cases even defended -- by various popular influencers, including Anthony Pompliano and Laya Heilpern.But, for those who haven’t had the dubious pleasure of coming across him already, Tate is a former world champion kickboxer and now online influencer who’s amassed millions of fans and followers by claiming to teach young men how to “stop being losers.”Known for peddling online courses that promise to show how to ‘escape the Matrix,’ the cigar-smoking supercar enthusiast also has a history of shilling crypto. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

A growing number of associates of former billionaire Sam Bankman-Fried are choosing to cooperate with authorities, who are working to prosecute the FTX co-founder for a slew of criminal fraud charges.Last month, former Alameda Research chief Caroline Ellison pleaded guilty to defrauding investors. She agreed to cooperate fully with investigators, which spelled bad news for Bankman-Fried. He pleaded not guilty to a series of fraud charges on Tuesday. Now, reports indicate that FTX’s former top lawyer Daniel Friedberg has been cooperating for months. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Larry Summers, the Harvard professor and former top financial advisor during the Obama administration, has cut ties with troubled crypto conglomerate Digital Currency Group (DCG). Summers joined DCG as a senior advisor in 2016, a year after DCG was formed. It’s not clear when Summers resigned his role -- through a spokesperson, Summers told Protos he left DCG several months ago.However, the former US Secretary of the Treasury was listed on DCG’s website as a member of the company’s advisory board as recently as November. That information has since been removed from DCG’s website. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Coinbase has agreed to cough up a total of $100 million to bring an end to an investigation into failures of its anti-money laundering (AML) and know-your-customer (KYC) measures.The exchange announced on Wednesday that it will pay $50 million to the New York Department of Financial Services (NYDFS) and will invest the same amount in bringing these programs up to standard. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

December meant only one thing: ’tis the season for media outlets to churn out articles wherein crypto ‘experts’ share their bitcoin and ethereum price predictions for the upcoming year. “$250,000!” one cries out. “No, $500,000!” another ‘analyst’ boldly bellows.Hark! Thou art all mistaken. For last December, the cryptocurrency market was sharply falling from an unprecedented all-time high. Bitcoin price had peaked at $69,000 on November 10, and began falling rapidly to under $50,000 by early December.By scouring last year’s articles about price predictions, it’s clear that a steep drop in just a month wasn’t enough to keep the loudest voices in crypto quiet. Predicting bitcoin and ethereum’s price is a fool’s errand. Here’s what those who did it anyway had to say. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

On New Year’s Day, the market capitalization of crypto assets totaled $2.4 trillion. At press time, it has declined 64% to $845 billion.Plenty of events dragged everything down this year. Here are the top crypto headlines of 2022. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

There was a time when it was easy to be seen as brilliant in crypto. All you had to do was find someone with a great idea -- preferably someone who didn't like to pay attention in meetings -- and throw a bunch of money at them. If you were really brilliant, you would even work out a deal where they'd eventually give you all of that money back. In business, this is called synergy.Nowadays, things aren't so simple. Pesky people want to know what your 'due diligence' process is, and ask how you failed to recognize the billions of dollars of fraud happening in the company you owned a big chunk of. Many investors tend to act as though they were caught unawares -- but perhaps we must consider that it's just an act.If it's not an act, at the very least it's a dereliction of responsibility. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Popular streamer and serial NFT project founder DNP3 has admitted to using investor funds to fuel his gambling addiction.In a statement issued on January 3, the streamer revealed that over the past year, he’s become addicted to gambling and has pumped “every dollar he could find” into the Stake crypto casino. The social media star has over one million followers and subscribers across Twitter, Twitch, Instagram, and YouTube and is particularly well-known for highly-publicized acts of generosity, including handing out huge sums of money to other streamers. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

On Monday, Gemini co-founder Cameron Winklevoss published an open letter to fellow billionaire Barry Silbert, the chief exec of Digital Currency Group (DCG), explaining Gemini’s side of an ongoing dispute with DCG and its subsidiary, Genesis Global Trading.In the letter, Winklevoss gave Silbert a short deadline to publicly commit to resolving the situation that led to Gemini Earn suspending withdrawals. The famous twin accused Silbert of ignoring previous attempts to work together, claiming the DCG chief hoped that it would “just magically go away.”He claims Silbert agreed to meet to discuss a proposal and then never followed through when Gemini submitted two. Now, Winklevoss demands that Silbert commit to finding common ground by January 8. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

A crypto advocate and US political consultant named Samuel Armes has said he helped form key strategies later outlined in the ‘1776 Returns’ document -- a crucial file in the Proud Boys conspiracy case.An interview between Armes and the US House Select Committee investigating the January 6 insurrection was released among a raft of transcripts last week. It shows that Armes had ties to the Proud Boys through his connections in the crypto industry. However, the links go further back. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Sam Bankman-Fried, the founder of now-bankrupt FTX and Alameda Research, is reportedly expected to plead not guilty at his arraignment for eight charges including wire fraud, conspiracy to commit money laundering, and conspiracy to break campaign finance laws.Several alleged co-conspirators, including Caroline Ellison, former CEO of Alameda Research, and Gary Wang, FTX co-founder, have already pleaded guilty to charges related to the same scheme. There are also ongoing CFTC and SEC civil suits being brought against Bankman-Fried which allege both commodities fraud and securities fraud. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

2022 has been rough year for bitcoin news as a series of industry implosions have sent the coin’s price tumbling by around 63% year-to-date. (To be fair, Bitcoin performed no worse than the broader crypto sector, which declined from $2.3 trillion to $846 billion this year. Even the NASDAQ stock market declined -29%.)Fortunately, several big events advanced the Bitcoin network and put it on a firmer footing for the future. Of course, many challenges remain.Here is a quick round-up of the major headlines telling the story of bitcoin’s 2022. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The special agent heading up the Internal Revenue Service’s Criminal Investigation division (IRS-CI) says that crypto companies will need to work closely with federal agencies if they want to build legitimacy.Speaking to the Wall Street Journal (WSJ), New York-based special agent Thomas Fattorusso also claimed that the only way forward for agencies trying to regulate and fight crime within the space is to work hand-in-hand with those operating in it.“Cryptocurrency is here to stay,” said Fattorusso (via WSJ). Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.