🥊 SEC's Crypto Crusade: Are the Tables Turning?
Also today: 🎙️ New episode on Friend.tech, 🎯 Stake's $40 billion debacle, 🤯 Tether's treasury bill empire, 📊 dYdX's transition, and more!
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What’s Poppin’?
The SEC’s Next Key Courtroom Battles With the Crypto Industry
by Kollen Post
Several recent victories in court against the beat cop of Wall Street have fired up an industry that is otherwise still stuck deep in winter.
Crypto Casino Stake Loses Over $40 Million in ‘Suspicious Transactions
by Kari McMahon
Betting platform Stake is suspected of being the target of an exploit, as on-chain sleuths report $40 million lost in “suspicious” withdrawals.
Tether Holds More US Treasury Bills Than Mexico, Australia, Spain and UAE
by Samyuktha Sriram
The USDT issuer is one of the world’s largest buyers of U.S. Treasury bills, with $72.5 billion worth of exposure.
DYDX Token to Become the Native Asset for dYdX Chain on Cosmos
by Kari McMahon
Last year, decentralized exchange dYdX decided to move from Ethereum to its own chain on Cosmos.
On the Pod…
Friend.tech, a decentralized social media platform in which you can buy and sell “keys” in your friends on X (formerly known as Twitter) whose value can go up and down, has become a viral sensation, racking up as many as 100,000 users since launching on August 10.
Should keys be considered securities and thus regulated by the SEC? How should gains and losses be taxed? And how private should users assume their communications and transactions on the platform are? Securities and banking law professor at George Mason Law School JW Verret, and tax partner and co-head of the Digital Assets and Blockchain Practice at Fried Frank Jason Schwartz, share their thoughts.
Daily Bits…✍️✍️✍️
🏛️ The DOJ highlighted potential evidence ambiguity in Sam Bankman-Fried's upcoming fraud trial, referencing Larry David's FTX Superbowl ad and the blurred lines between FTX's U.S. and international operations.
🚪 Binance witnessed another high-level exit with Global Product Lead Mayur Kamat leaving, adding to the growing list of departing executives.
📊 Crypto exchange Bitfinex maintains a portion of its trading fee earnings in bitcoin, reinforcing its long-term commitment to the cryptocurrency and supporting developments in Bitcoin Layer 2 networks, as stated by CTO Paolo Ardoino.
📰 Opposition Senator Andrew Bragg's crypto regulation bill was dismissed by Australia's Senate Committee due to concerns about potential adverse industry outcomes.
💼 Crypto infrastructure provider Qredo cut approximately 50 positions, including senior roles, to streamline operations and focus on core protocol and web3 custody business.
📉 The recent bitcoin price dip put short-term holders at a disadvantage, as indicated by a decrease in the Short Term Holder Spent Output Profit Ratio (STH-SOPR), potentially leading to a cycle of falling prices.
🤝 BitGo entered a strategic agreement with South Korea's Hana Bank to collaborate on security solutions and potentially establish a joint venture, focusing on developing custody services by the latter half of 2024.
Today in Crypto Adoption...
⌚ Casio teamed up with Polygon Labs to unveil virtual G-SHOCK watch NFTs on the Polygon blockchain.
The $$$ Corner…
💰 Swiss fintech firm GenTwo secured $15 million in a Series A funding round spearheaded by Steve Cohen's Point72 Ventures, aiming for international expansion and further development of its financial engineering platform.
🚀 Cronos Labs initiated the hunt for eight startups to join its $100 million accelerator program, focusing on nurturing early-stage crypto projects with an emphasis on artificial intelligence.
What Do You Meme?
Recommended Reads
Fidelity: Ethereum Investment Thesis
Autism Capital on Sam Bankamn-Fried in prison
📈 Your Market Update 📉
BTC is down .7%, trading at $25,739
ETH is down .2%, trading at $1,631
BTC dominance: 46.33%
Crypto market cap: $1.08 trillion
*All data as of today, 7:10 am ET
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