Our latest update on the digital currency industry… check out crypto the best performer at the starting of the new year …
:: Blockchain::
- Blockchain startup Conflux has received over $5 million research grant from the Shanghai Science and Technology Committee and Changning District government, which is part of the city’s municipal government.
- Binance teamed up with blockchain project Orbs to work on a new service for the DeFi sector. This new addition is DeFi dot org, an upcoming DeFi accelerator that will support new projects.
- German housing company–issued a $24 million digital bond. It uses Stellar blockchain to facilitate an easy transfer of ownership rights to real assets.
- Fireblocks lets institutional investors profit from staking. Fireblocks has partnered with Blockdaemon and Staked to bring staking services to institutional investors.
::Bitcoin::
- Grayscale has sold all of its XRP holdings to purchase bitcoin, ether, and other crypto assets.
- Chaos on capitol hill pushes BTC ever further. As protestors stormed the Capitol building on Wednesday, Bitcoin’s price reached new ATH.
- Finish Customs have decided to sell bitcoins worth $75 million, after pondering should they sell or destroy them for years. After an unplanned four-year holding of nearly 2,000 bitcoins, Finland’s Customs has decided to sell them now.
- Bitcoin’s market value now exceeds that of Facebook. The explosive surge in the rise of the price of bitcoin has propelled the market value of the leading cryptocurrency past that of social media giant Facebook.
- Social Capital CEO Chamath Palihapitiya sees bitcoin eventually expanding into a six-digit price territory. The former Facebook executive also doubled down on his belief that BTC is an insurance policy that will thrive in the current times of economic uncertainty.
- Morgan Stanley boosts over 10% Stake in Bitcoin-backer MicroStrategy. Even the strong Bitcoin critics aka banking institutions are considering exposure to the world’s third-largest asset class in one or the other way.
- Bitcoin mining firm Bit Digital now has a market value above $1 billion, up from $6.2 million a year ago.
- XLM re-enters top-10 coins by market cap after surging nearly 30%. Stellar Lumens saw major price action after the Stellar Development Foundation signed an agreement with the Ukrainian government.
- Bitcoin surges a day after Grayscale reopens deposits, and it is not a coincidence. The price of Bitcoin has recovered strongly overnight, rising from around $34,000 to $38,500.
- New Bitcoin ETP launches on Swiss Stock Exchange SIX. The BTCetc bitcoin ETP tracks the price of bitcoin and is physically backed.
- Bitcoin has only taken 2% of the gold market cap, new data suggests. Getting to 10% of gold’s market cap would mean that each bitcoin costs $154,000.
- Christine Lagarde wants global regulation of Bitcoin. The ECB President termed Bitcoin as a speculative asset and said that BTC has conducted some funny business.
- Bitcoin Startup Ramp expands to US and Canada. Residents of the United States and Canada now can buy Bitcoin, Ethereum, USDC, and DAI via Ramp’s platform.
:: Crypto ::
- Kyrgyzstan’s central bank opens up crypto draft laws to public discussion. The central bank of The Kyrgyz Republic has drafted regulations that recognize cryptocurrency exchanges in the country for the first time.
- $1 Trillion cryptocurrency economy is here. The total market cap of cryptocurrencies inches closer to $1 trillion after Bitcoin jumped above $36,000.
- Unicas, a crypto bank by Cashaa, has entered into a joint venture with Bitbns, an Indian cryptocurrency exchange. This partnership aims to provide Indian crypto traders with more advanced banking services and facilities through Unicas help.
- The Kenya Revenue Authority is expecting to earn up to $45.5M during the first half of 2020 from a new tax that targets cryptocurrency exchanges and other online services, according to a top KRA official.
- South Korea plans to implement 20% tax on cryptocurrency profits in 2023. The Government is planning a 20% tax on cryptocurrency investors making an annual income of more than 2.5 million Won.
- Coinbase acquires trading execution platform Routefire. The exchange seeks to improve its Prime suite of brokerage tools for institutions.
- Jim Cramer says money is ‘all going to crypto’ as gold crashes. The host of CNBC’s Mad Money responds to gold’s surprising underperformance this week.
- Crypto-exchange Deribit adds Bitcoin options with $300K strike. This move is hugely bullish for Bitcoin, as traders who enter this position believe that the price of the cryptocurrency will exceed $300K at the end of the year.
- Shinhan Bank is looking to offer digital asset custody services. A major commercial bank in South Korea is entering the crypto business by allocating an equity investment in the Korea Digital Asset Trust.
- Derivatives trading volumes in the cryptocurrency space hit a new all-time high of $1.43 trillion in December, after rising 8.6% when compared to the previous month.
- Cameron Winklevoss bitcoin price predictions has materialized. Back in 2013, the Gemini co-founder and long-term BTC supporter said that the cryptocurrency will reach a price tag of $40,000 faster than anyone imagines.
- Cryptocurrency market loses $170 Billion in 24 hours. Bitcoin dropped below $34,000 as the total cryptocurrency market cap reached $940 billion, down from $1.1 trillion on Sunday.
- HSBC blocks transactions from crypto exchanges. Crypto traders and investors in the U.K. can no longer transfer their funds from digital asset exchanges to HSBC bank.
- International payments giant PayPal has doubled its previous crypto volume record, with $242 million worth of crypto changing hands on the platform during January 11th.
- Blockstream expands Liquid Federation, but LBTC adoption remains slow. Six prominent crypto firms have joined the federation.
- Winklevoss Gemini considers going public. After Coinbase and Bakkt, Gemini’s co-creators the Winklevoss twins said they are looking into going public with their crypto exchange.
- Insured Finance is partnering with the leading and most well-known incubator DuckDao to carry out its Public Sale on 15th January, 2021. 625,000 INFI will be allocated to the public sale. The sale will be carried out as a farmcubation.
- BC Group, the Hong Kong-listed company that operates the crypto exchange OSL, has completed the issuance of new stocks.
- Sushiswap reveals an ambitious 2021 roadmap. In a reveal that set crypto twitter ablaze, Sushiswap lays the foundation for a strong 2021
:: Digitals yuan ::
- State-owned Chinese bank rolls out ATMs for digital yuan. The Agricultural Bank of China has launched an ATM pilot program that enables citizens to convert cash and savings to and from the digital yuan.
- The People’s Bank of China have green-lighted a physical card-wallet pilot to test its digital yuan.
:: Ethereum ::
- Ethereum bursts into list of top 100 assets in the world by market cap. ETH’s recent gains saw it join Bitcoin on an exclusive list among the world’s biggest movers and shakers.
:: Others ::
- Italian Banking Association launches experimental digital euro project. The Italian Banking Association, ABI, is conducting digital euro tests as the European Central Bank is yet to make a clear decision on a central bank digital currency.
- The U.K. financial regulator Financial Conduct Authority ban on the sale of derivatives and exchange-traded notes passed in October went into effect Wednesday.
- YouTube star Mr. Beast, with 50M subscribers, becomes a verified Brave browser publisher. Mr. Beast, joins almost 1 million other verified Brave publishers, potentially exposing some of his subscribers to Brave browser and its native BAT token.
- U.S. President Donald Trump has been permanently banned from Twitter.
- South Korean gaming conglomerate Nexon denies plans to acquire Bithumb. Reports last week had claimed that Nexon was poised to acquire the exchange at an evaluated price of roughly $460 million.
