⛏️ Bitcoin Miners' Profitability Squeeze? 📉
In today’s edition: 💼 $4M stolen from Solana wallets, 🚀 Bitwise leads ETF debut, 📊 Stablecoin shift signals risk, and more!
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What’s Poppin’?
by Sage Young, Brandy Betz, and Sam Sriram
Only A Handful of Bitcoin Miners Will Be Profitable After Halving: Report
Analysts believe Riot, TeraWulf and Cleanspark will be the Bitcoin miners best positioned for the upcoming halving event, which will likely make breaking even a more difficult task.
$4 Million Stolen by Solana Wallet Drainers In One Month
Rainbow Drainer and Node Drainer were the two most profitable wallet drainers behind the phishing campaigns that stole millions of crypto from over 3,000 users.
Spot Bitcoin ETF Inflows Topped $625 Million on First Day in ‘Phenomenal’ Debut, Led by Bitwise
The first day of trading also included outflows for the Grayscale Bitcoin Trust (GBTC), but these were largely expected.
Diminishing Stablecoin Holdings of ‘Smart Money’ Traders Show Rising Risk: Nansen
Not since Jan. 2022 have the most adept on-chain traders held such a low percentage of their holdings in stablecoins, says the blockchain research firm.
Unless you’ve been living under a rock, you probably heard that spot Bitcoin ETFs were finally approved by the SEC this week. That set the stage for 11 such offerings from the likes of BlackRock, Fidelity, and ARK 21Shares to begin trading on Thursday. On this episode of Unchained, Nate Geraci, president of the ETF Store; Eric Balchunas, senior ETF analyst at Bloomberg Intelligence; and James Seyffart, research analyst at Bloomberg Intelligence discussed the initial record trading volumes, the mechanics of how the funds work, the botched roll-out process, the pointed commentary from SEC commissioners, the potential for future Ethereum spot ETFs and predictions for total inflows. Plus, they explain why brokerage firms like Vanguard, Merrill and others were blocking customer access to the ETFs.
Listen to the episode on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Fountain, Overcast, Podcast Addict, Pocket Casts, Pandora, Castbox, Google Podcasts, Amazon Music, or on your favorite podcast platform. Or watch it on YouTube.
Daily Bits…✍️✍️✍️
🚨 In the Netherlands, a young law student is suspected of orchestrating a multi-million Euro crypto fraud, possibly involving up to €10 million.
💰 Genesis Global Trading settled a lawsuit in New York by paying $8 million and ceasing its operations in the state amid fraud and compliance issues.
💻 In a thwarted exploit attempt on Bitfinex, billions in XRP were falsely indicated as moved, causing brief market unrest due to the large sum involved.
🔚 Venezuela reportedly concluded its Petro cryptocurrency project, initially launched in 2018 to bolster its national currency amidst economic challenges.
Bitcoin ETFs:
🛑 The SEC addressed the false Bitcoin ETF approval message circulated from its hacked social media account, clarifying no breach of its systems occurred. Meanwhile, 🏛 Senators Wyden and Lummis requested an investigation into the SEC's security compromise.
💹 Bitwise and Fidelity witnessed notable inflows, while Grayscale experienced a relatively smaller outflow in recent tallies.
💲 Franklin Templeton significantly reduced its ETF fees, making it the cheapest option among similar investment products.
🌐 BlackRock CEO Larry Fink showed support for an Ether ETF, indicating a potential new direction for the asset management giant towards tokenization.
🤝 CoinShares exercised its option to acquire Valkyrie's ETF unit.
🔁 Bitcoin miner outflows reached a six-year peak, possibly in preparation for increased costs and the upcoming halving event.
🕹️ GameStop announced the shutdown of its NFT marketplace, citing ongoing regulatory uncertainty in the crypto space.
Today in Crypto Adoption...
🪙 Mercado Bitcoin, Brazil's top crypto exchange, introduced Tronix (TRX) and other TRON-based tokens to its digital asset range.
What Do You Meme?
Recommended Reads
Blockworks: The worst kind of decentralization is none at all by Nassim Eddequioua
CoinDesk: What other crypto firms could go public this year by Daniel Kuhn
Unchained: What Are Sandwich Attacks in Crypto? A Beginner's Guide
📈 Your Market Update 📉
BTC is down .3%, trading at $42,609
ETH is up .7%, trading at $2,534
BTC dominance: 47.38%
Crypto market cap: $1.76T
*All data as of today, 06:00 am ET. Source: CoinGecko
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