While no longer part of the Ethereum Foundation, Anthony Di Iorio was one of the developers behind Ethereum when it launched in 2015. While he has since moved on to other ventures, he resurfaced this week, sharing concerns on ETH 2.0 in an interview. 

These concerns revolve about the level of centralization that Ethereum could reach now that the merge to Proof of Stake is complete.

Di Iorio's concern revolves around the possibility of major exchanges becoming an overwhelming number of the total validators on the network. 

At the root of the issue is the requirement to hold 32 ETH to launch a node -so exchanges holding thousands of ETH have an obvious advantage...

That's a little over $42,000 worth of Ethereum at the time of publishing - and it is reasonable to say this prices out the average person, who previously could have started mining for under $1000 if they were interested in contributing to the network. 

So\when the rule is "More ETH = more nodes" you immediately see the potential power major exchanges have by holding thousands of users Ethereum. Even many mid-size exchanges hold enough to launch hundreds of nodes.

However, users need to agree to use any ETH that they actually own, exchanges cannot decide how to allocate your holdings without permission.

So they're getting user permission by offering to share the profits - this factor is the reason many people see these nodes as decentralize.

More importantly, all these people have the power to pull out whenever they wish. 

Can these really be considered exchange-owned nodes if their users have the power to shut them down by collectively pulling out?

Still, ETH 2.0 is off to a more centralized start than many expected.  Last week nodes launched by just 2 addresses were validating 46% of total transactions.  One is a known pool, the other an 'unknown entity'... which nobody likes to hear. 

The move away from GPU mining is a double-edged sword when it comes to decentralization...

It may not be as simple as looking at who now has an easier entry to becoming a validator, but for a large number of people, Ethereum's update represents a door opening.

On that note, Di Iorio also acknowledged that the Proof of Stake model allows people from countries that have banned GPU mining to participate again (such as Algeria, Bangladesh, Bolivia, China, Colombia, Egypt, Indonesi and more) many of them pointing to the large amount of electricity consumed by miners as their reasoning, an issue the new Ethereum now solves.

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Author: Oliver Redding
Seattle Newsdesk  / Breaking Crypto News

 

British investors are turning to Bitcoin as a result of the recent decline in the value of the pound sterling (GBP) relative to the dollar, which has been driven by worries that the country's financial crisis will worsen.

The noticeable increase in bitcoin trading volume against pound reflects many investors view that Bitcoin offers an easily accessible place to move funds when they feel risk of inflation is high. Which is why the week began with Bitcoin trading volume of people buying with the British Pound hit a record high of GBP 840 million (valued at $881 million USD)

The average daily trade volume of bitcoin in pounds is seen in the chart below at slightly over $72 million. Making this an increase of approximately 1,150%...

This is an amount too large to brush off as anything but a deliberate direct response. 

"When a fiat currency is threatened, investors start to favor bitcoin." said James Butterfill, research director at coinshares.

GBP to BTC Volume via Coinshares

Gabor Gurbacs, digital asset/crypto investment strategist at investment giant VanEck explains “Given that the UK is now outside of the EU bureaucratic apparatus, it will get another chance to become a Bitcoin hub. I think UK leaders will use this opportunity reasonably well.”

However, a number of analysts have noted that a strong US dollar is partly to blame for the recent declines in the value of the British pound and the euro, and it is extremely likely that this factor is also in the way of a crypto market recovery.

Or to put it another way, we might not notice a significant rise in bitcoin and cryptocurrency ownership until the US dollar starts to lose its position as the strongest currency in the world.

Still, this is one of multiple recent stories giving crypto investors a strong indication that it isn't a matter of 'if' the market will come back, but 'when'... 

What does seem to now be proven is that investors globally are still interested in crypto, and willing to buy and trade it when they see an upside.

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Author: Mark Pippen
London News Desk 
Breaking Crypto News

There are more than 900,000 wallets with at east 1 full Bitcoin in them, according to data from the blockchain explorer Glassnode. 

In addition to this, wallets holding at least 0.1 BTC are also at an all-time high.

This is considered major long-term bullish indicator...

This reflects that investors are taking advantage of the current bear-market low prices, as they continue to accumulate Bitcoin with a plan to hold it for months, or even years.

Bitcoin's price is 72% below its historical maximum reached 10 months ago in November 2021, at almost USD 69,000.

If you believe Bitcoin will return to previous highs (as it always has), then you understand why someone would want to take advantage of the current price. 

Here's where things get weird...

In 2021, while Bitcoin's price was on the rise with heavy demand fueling price gains, the number of wallets holding 1 Bitcoin actually declined.

But as you can see from the chart, the amount of 1 or more Bitcoin has been steadily increasing throughout 2022... as the price dropped. 

Wallets Holding 1BTC or more on the rise (yellow) while price declines (black)

What does this mean?

These are the smart traders. Those with experience learn to buy at the bottom, and sell at the top. 

 As Wall Street traders continue to cross over into crypto, it's no surprise that we're seeing more experienced investors in the crypto market.  Where many see a 'crash' they see an 'entry point'.

Remember Warren Buffet's famous piece of advice - “Be Fearful When Others Are Greedy and Greedy When Others Are Fearful” - in other words, buy when everyone else is selling. 

But even with a record number of savvy traders, there isn't enough of them to move Bitcoin's price upwards, but they do probably deserve some credit for Bitcoin staying stable in its current $18k - $21k range.  So far, when Bitcoin has gone below $20k, it soon finds people ready to buy.  

A return to a bull market will be fueled by tens of thousands of people buying hundreds of dollars' worth of Bitcoin, not hundreds of people buying thousands worth. 

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Author: Justin Derbek
New York News Desk
Breaking Crypto News

Be glad you didn't bet against ETH. If you did, my condolences.

ETH's price surge began at a time a lot of people thought it would continue going down, now these leveraged positions are being liquidated at a rapid pace.

Total liquidations in the past 24 hours have reached close to $200 million...

Most occurred on Ethereum short positions, with more than than $110 million worth of liquidated assets. Notably, the largest in the overall market was a $2 million BTCUSD position that occurred on Bybit.

Other exchanges experiencing large liquidations include OKEx, Binance, ByBit, FTX, CoinEX, Huobi, and Bitmex, among others. OKEX reported up to 75% of short positions being liquidated for a total of $4.28 million, followed by Binance with $3.36 million in total liquidations.

The Ethereum community will likely prefer the upcoming update to a proof-of-stake system. Even as the Merge approaches, the price of the coin continues to fluctuate. Today's view is more optimistic, but the preceding days were not particularly inspiring.

From August 30 to September 5, the ETH price ranged between $1533 and $1577. It saw a slight increase above that threshold on September 6, however, that was the day when Bellatrix was upgraded. After the surge, the price fell to $1560 the following day, September 7, but ended at $1629.

It is not unexpected, given these price fluctuations, that liquidations are currently pushing the limits of the markets. A large portion of traders cannot maintain their positions, and exchanges are going to close them.

Things are abnormally unpredictable right now, play it smart...

While many would argue the smartest play is simply not using any leverage, the reality is that advice will be ignored by many people regardless.  So, at least meet in the middle, and perhaps use a bit less leverage than you normally would, and set stop losses so you always sell before you liquidate your positions. 

Even while many experts believe that the best move is to avoid using any kind of leverage at all, the fact of the matter is, many people are going to disregard that advice regardless.

At the very least, come to a compromise and consider using less leverage than you typically would. If you're not using stop losses so you always sell before you liquidate your positions, start using them now (you already should have been, in any market condition).

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Author: Adam Lee 
Asia News Desk / Breaking Crypto News

So it's confirmed - A group of developers are working behind the scenes with Ethereum miners to hard fork the Ethereum blockchain after next week’s merge. This means there will still be a version of the network running on the current Proof-of-Work (PoW) consensus mechanism while the 'official' Ethereum 2.0 blockchain transitions to Proof-of-Stake (PoS).

With that comes a separate and completely independent Ethereum token, currently being called 'ETHPoW' but the coin's official name is still undecided. 

All Ethereum holders will receive ETHPoW automatically, an amount equal to the regular Ethereum you hold...

Major exchanges Binance, MEXC Global, Gate.io, and FTX have already agreed to list and support trading of the forked token. Poloniex is even a step ahead of the rest, and has already listed a placeholder token that will be swapped for the real thing once it's live.

Coinbase and Kraken both say they're open to supporting it, but haven't yet made a full commitment, likely waiting to see if the coin will have any demand or value.

ETHPoW will join the two existing Ethereum tokens - the 'official' Ethereum (ETH) and Etherum Classic (ETC)...

The upcoming 2.0 fork won't be Ethereum's first, the previous fork ended with two coins and two versions of Ethereum - Ethereum and Ethereum Classic. 

To summarize what happened then - in 2016, hackers exploited a security hole in a project called 'The DAO' allowing them to steal about $50 million worth of ETH. A solution was proposed to re-launch Ethereum with the history of the hacked coins completely erased, like it never happened.

How they went about doing this caused a lot of controversy, it was all decided when the proposal was put to a short notice on-chain vote. Only 5.5% of potential voters participated, but since the majority of them voted 'yes', the fork happened.

Those in the Ethereum community who disagreed with the decision simply ignored the change and continued to participate on the original Ethereum network, which became known as Ethereum Classic. 

While Ethereum Classic is considered one of the most successful forked tokens, ETHPoW's Success is far from a 'sure thing'..

When Ethereum Classic started, its support, in large part, came from the controversy that created it.

Some in the community strongly disagreed with the idea of editing the 'true' history of the Ethereum blockchain, and Ethereum Classic kept that intact. Others disagreed with how the decision to fork the coin was made, saying they would support any decision that had over 50% of potential voters backing it, but the fork went ahead without even coming close.  

Ethereum Classic succeeded, and is still active today, because the people behind it truly believed in it.

But when it comes to Ethereum 2.0 - it isn't controversial, it doesn't violate the beliefs of a large portion of the community.  

The only segment of the community united against 2.0 are miners, because once Ethereum has fully moved to the 2.0 Proof-of-Stake consensus mechanism, miners are no longer needed to verify transactions. Their motivation to continue supporting the old version of Ethereum is entirely profit-based. These are the same miners who loved it when we couldn't send $1 on the Ethereum blockchain without paying a $75 fee.

That just doesn't sound like the beginning of a token that will have long term success.

Take a look at the two most successful forks in crypto's history - Ethereum Classic and Bitcoin Cash. All others have faded away, while these two remain in the top 50 because they're backed by a community of supporters who believe their existence is important. You can find their supporters making passionate arguments on where they think the 'official' version of the coin went wrong, and why these alternatives make things right.

This is why dumping ETHPoW as soon as possible may end up being the smartest move... 

There already is an Ethereum alternative for anyone who doesn't want to support the 'official' version - Ethereum Classic. It's already accomplished the hardest part - establishing itself among the small list of coins traders can trust to retain value, and can be found on every major exchange. 

There just isn't a good reason for another alternative - maybe the Ethereum brand is big enough where it finds support even if it isn't necessary. But even forks of Bitcoin that every Bitcoin holder received for free met a quick death, because people didn't believe they needed to survive. 

How to make sure you'll be able to access your ETHPoW as soon as it becomes available...

Typically the day forked coins go live, is the day they have the highest value, so if you're aiming to be among the first to trade yours, you'll want to transfer any Ethereum you own off of any exchanges and on to a wallet like Metamask, where you hold the private keys.  

Once it launches, you'll be credited an equal 1:1 amount of ETHPoW for any Ethereum you own, and will be able to access it in the same wallet that holds your regular Ethereum. You'll need to switch networks (blockchains) and we'll make sure to post the settings you'll need as soon as that becomes known. 

If your Ethereum is on an exchange they will need to take several additional steps to distribute each users portion, this is because they store multiple users coins together. In the past, some exchange users waited weeks or even months longer than those holding crypto in their own private wallets. 

Do you think ETHPoW has long term potential, or think odds are against it? Tweet us your thoughts @TheCryptoPress


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Author: Ross Davis
Silicon Valley Newsroom
GCP | Breaking Crypto News

In an interview before the Ethereum network finally migrates to the Proof-of-Stake (PoS) consensus mechanism, the co-creator of that protocol, Vitalik Buterin, criticized the Proof-of-Work (PoW) mechanism,he claimed to be "concerned" about the safety of Bitcoin in that regard.

THE COMPUTER SCIENTIST EXPLAINED THE "TWO REASONS" WHY HE IS WORRIED ABOUT BITCOIN'S FUTURE...

For that year, miners' earnings are expected to depend only on commissions. Thankfully, there's more than a century left before that.

His second issue revolves around the Proof-of-Work (PoW) mechanism used to verify transactions, he insists that it is less than what Proof-of-stake(PoS) can offer if measured per dollar spent in transaction fees. 

However, he clarified that he's aware there's no sign this will ever happen: "the migration of Bitcoin out of Proof of Work appears to be politically unfeasible," referring to those in the Bitcoin developer community who raised the possibility of Bitcoin one day changing from PoW to PoS were met with overwhelming resistance.

One of the main reasons the Bitcoin community is against changing to PoS, is that they believe PoS based tokens give too much power to large stakeholders...

Buterin addresses this, saying; "They are based on the misconception that PoW and PoS are governance mechanisms, when in fact they are consensus mechanisms. All they do is help the network agree on the correct chain. A block that violates the protocol rules (if it tries to print more coins than the protocol rules allow, for example) will not be accepted by the network, no matter how many miners or participants support it."

Ironically, he's sharing these opinions while Ethereum itself is on the verge of switching from PoW to PoS...

Perhaps this is a subtle way to address concerns some may have about Ethereum's upcoming change -  he's addressing them, but as a hypothetical Bitcoin migration to PoS. 

"The funny thing is that bitcoiners (who tend to be the most pro-PoW) should understand this well, as the Bitcoin civil wars in 2017 very well demonstrated that miners are quite powerless in the governance process," he suggested. "In PoS, it's exactly the same: the participants don't choose the rules, they just execute them and help order the transactions." 

However, Ethereum Developers faced virtually no resistance from the community when proposing the change to PoS, with the exception of miners whos concerns were based on their personal profits, not the overall wellbeing of the network. 

Ethereum makes the move from PoW to PoS later this month, maybe.  There's been too many delays to count, and I've learned Ethereum 2.0 is a "I'll believe it when I see it' thing now.

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Author: Justin Derbek
New York News Desk
Breaking Crypto News

The Iranian police force in the nation's capitol of Tehran have taken nearly 10,000 illegally running Bitcoin mining devices since March of this year.

The police action comes after Iranian officials ordered they crack down on Bitcoin miners due to the country's electrical infrastructure failing. Leaders there have blamed cryptocurrency mining leading to an increase in the demand for electricity as one of the causes for recent blackouts.

The most current Iranian government ruling on mining, which is still in effect, says that mining farms may only be powered by renewable energy sources, and not connected to the public grid.

The most recent amended version of the `law is more lenient than earlier versions, since it permits hiring power providers from other parts of Iran.

"Majority" Located in Schools and Mosques...

According to the director of the Tehran Electricity Distribution Company, majority of the seizures occurred in mosques and schools.

This is because most Mosques and Schools in the country are enrolled in incentive programs that give them free, or extremely discounted electricity.  Once you own the mining rigs the only expense miners  have to deal with are power costs, so taking advantage of locations like these makes mining an "all profit" venture.

Iran's mining industry has been on a wild ride full of ups and downs.  It's been allowed, it's been banned, and currently the rule is 'allowed, but with permission' which has miners needing to obtain the government's approval, and operate within government provided limitations.

We do not know if those who were found to be illegally mining will face any punishment beyond the loss of their hardware.

------- 

Author: Adam Lee 
Asia News Desk / Breaking Crypto News

We can now confirm that the Bellatrix upgrade is set for September 6th, with the Merge officially beginning on September 15.

The release of the 2.0 mainnet-ready clients just went live, those running 2.0 nodes are instructed to complete all required upgrades by Sept 6th, when the Bellatrix upgrade will happen.

After this, all that's left is the ACTUAL merge to Ethereum 2.0!

Out of all the milestones behind us, I have to say the the most impressive was seeing how the community came together to meet the requirement of 524,000 Ether deposited in the 2.0 contract in order to launch, and seeing that surpassed by over 400%. 

It's safe to say the crypto community is beyond ready for this to happen.

What do you need to do?

If you have no idea what any of the above means, you probably don't need to do anything.  

Everyone who is simply HODLing some Ethereum can relax, everything will happen automatically. 

If you do know what the above means, you probably don't need us to explain anything - the only thing I've seen some people unaware of is that you'll need to have BOTH an execution client (like Besu) and consensus client (like Teku) - so make sure you do, or you'll be pretty useless to the network post-merge.

The Upgrade After the Upgrade...

Once ETH2.0 is live, there's already one major change set to happen sometime in 2023...possibly 2024.

As mentioned already, a huge drop in the amount of computing power needed comes with the initial change to ETH 2.0, the following upgrade makes an equally drastic change to the amount of storage space needed.  

Combine these two factors, and the doors open for phones and various other low-power computers to run Ethereum.  The more devices participate, the more secure the network is. 

It's called 'sharding'. In simple terms, if you wanted to operate a node (which is basically the new way to mine Ethereum) it still requires downloading the entire Ethereum ledger, the database of all transactions in the history of Ethereum.  Thousands of computers maintaining this record is how 1 person trying to cheat immediately stands out, and fraudulent transactions are rejected.

Currently to mine Ethereum you'll need around 120GB disk space if running Windows, and half that if running Linux.   While not a huge amounts for a computer, it's more than most mobile devices.

But with sharding, the database gets split among all the computers on the network.  With a network the size of Ethereum, there's no additional security risk as a copy of every portion of the database will still exist on thousands of computers.

For those who want to get more involved...

With all the excitement around ETH 2.0, many people are looking to do more, like staking their coins and starting to earn more ETH for participating. 

As mentioned, nodes replace miners in ETH2.0 - and many people have an old laptop sitting in a box somewhere that is powerful enough to run one. Because they require significantly less computing power, they also use a significant less amount of electricity. Under the current system of miners, that same laptop probably wouldn't mine enough to cover the electricity costs.

You may be thinking "that sounds great" you may even have an old laptop in the closet collecting dust - well, the bad news is that in order to launch a node there's a requirement to own 32 ETH ($50,000 worth at time of publishing).

The upside is, you won't need to dust off that old laptop - you can participate in a pool.  This is where any number of people, dozens, hundreds, whatever, all contribute their ETH towards reaching the required 32 to launch node, with profits split depending on the total percentage someone contributes.  Many major exchanges will be running pools, some, like KuCoin are already accepting deposits and paying rewards. 

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Author: Justin Derbek
New York News Desk
Breaking Crypto News

The Mid-year Crypto Crime Update from blockchain analytics firm Chainalysis was just released, and shows some interesting data on how scammers handle the downturn.

Obviously, market conditions are quite different this year than last, so the total number of legitimate and scam transactions are down overall.

But scammers aren't as quick as as traders to take a step back, illicit transaction volume is down just 15%, compared to 36% for legitimate transactions.

"Total scam revenue for 2022 currently sits at $1.6 billion, 65% lower than where it was through the end of July in 2021, and this decline appears linked to declining prices across different currencies."

Get Rick Quick?  In Crypto? ...Right Now?

While the above data makes it look like it's 'business as usual' for scammers, one piece of data gives some very good news - less people are falling for scams now than in the last 4 years. 

"..he cumulative number of individual transfers to scams so far in 2022 is the lowest it’s been in the past four years."

Cannabis crowdfunding platform that was actually a ponzi scheme, JuicyFields, brought in the most revenue among scams so far this year, with over $1B of incoming transfers.  

The darknet marketplace also saw a decline in spending, with a large immediate decline happening alongside the takedown of Hydra Marketplace by German authorities. 

You can read the full report from Chainalysis here.


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Author: Ross Davis
Silicon Valley Newsroom
GCP | Breaking Crypto News

Update: Looks like our theory was correct (and while it could reverse course any time) currently CORZ is up 64.20% over the last 30 days.!

Original Article 6/15/2022:

S9 miners, extremely popular mining rigs with almost 8 years in the market, are operating at a loss to anyone located somewhere paying more than 2cents USD per kilowatt-hour in electricity costs. This is most US states.

Crypto companies daily income and net worth can change drastically, fast.  In the case of CORZ, which also holds 8000 BTC, Bitcoin returning to just $30,000 could happen over a single week - and would suddenly turn a company that was losing money into one that gained $80 million more in assets. 

These factors are prime examples why stocks for companies focused entirely on crypto are different than anything Wall Street has seen before. 

Figuring out the value of a mining company isn't as simple as a formula for their hashrate (mining power) = X BTC earned daily + BTC already owned = company value.  The price of Bitcoin isn't the only factor - even the weather can dramatically change profitability, as we covered last week how Texas based mining companies are having to power down during heatwaves. 

Wall Street Debates How To Trade Crypto-Company Stocks...

Because of the factors explained above, we saw Core Scientific with a stock price around $13 just 6 months ago, down to $2 today.

Browsing stock-focused online communities makes one thing clear - stock traders still aren't sure if this represents a company moving towards failure, or chance to buy something with a rare huge potential upsides. 

The Power Play, Where You Don't Buy Bitcoin... and Profits Are Potentially 200% Higher...

So here's what it all comes down to - if you believe Bitcoin will return to or pass $60k again, and believe a stock like Core Scientific will return to $13 when it does (the price it was last time Bitcoin was at $60k) - the stock represents a 5X return on investment when Bitcoin's price only does a 3X.

Which is huge, and seems realistic - but will it?

The same financial press publishing crypto doom and gloom stories currently, will of course, again, hype up 'Bitcoin's comeback' when things go the other way.

So it's safe to say the buzz outlets like Bloomberg, CNBC, and Wall Street Journal will create will bring a boost to crypto related stocks as well. The audience of these publications includes a segment of investors not comfortable enough with tech to ever own crypto, but is willing to buy stocks that allow them to capitalize on a trend.

Here's Why it Isn't as Simple as 'Bitcoin up = Crypto stock up'...

The benefits of Bitcoin's decentralization is highlighted here, these risks apply to stocks but are not a factor for Bitcoin. 

Actually, these risks apply to any company managed by humans. A company can be derailed a number of ways - an inexperienced CEO or Board of Directors, negligence or fraud in the accounting department, a company deciding to issue a large number of additional shares, or bringing in a new key investor and issuing them a large number of shares below market value - all of these can quickly bring a stock price down - but none of then can happen to Bitcoin. 

It's not even as simple as finding a company managed by trustworthy and experienced executives - note that not all of the factors mentioned above would be considered poor company management, some are just part of doing business.

I do not currently own shares of any crypto mining company stocks...

This caught my interest and I immediately wrote this article, haven't moved on anything and still unsure if I will.  The main reason for hesitating is this would mean canceling some of my current open positions to 'buy the dip' on Bitcoin and a couple other coins I'm confident will rise again. 

Share your thoughts on this with us on twitter @TheCryptoPress!

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Author: Ross Davis
Silicon Valley Newsroom
GCP | Breaking Crypto News

As the cryptocurrency market gains momentum, Dogecoin and Shiba Inu are poised for some potentially strong breakouts.

Officially the two most popular "meme coins," DOGE (Dogecoin) and SHIB (Shiba Inu) have a full week of building strength behind them, placing them on the radar of a larger number of traders.

DOGE's seven-day gain was 7.41%, while SHIB's seven-day run was an amazing 24.71%.

DOGE broke out of a symmetrical triangle and surpassed the $0.073 resistance level from a technical standpoint. As the Y-axis of the technical formation indicates a 34% goal, these developments could play a big impact in the price movement. If confirmed, Dogecoin might jump to $0.095 or possibly $10 per coin. The abrupt increase in upward pressure allowed it to overcome a crucial section of resistance. Currently, it appears that Dogecoin has the potential to advance further.

However, Dogecoin must maintain a price over $0.068 for the bullish view to be confirmed. If it breaks below this level, it may experience a sell-off that leads to a decline to $0.065 or $0.061.

While current market news largely focused on Ethereum's recent rise, SHIB outperformed ETH with gains of 24% - that's 3X higher than Ethereum's 7%!

The higher price movement of SHIB brought the price into the next area of resistance. As market sentiment improves, surpassing the current level is unquestionably within the realm of possibility.

Obviously, you should conduct your own research and make your own conclusions. - I'm not advocating for anyone to buy any coin, but rather advising you; "look into it".

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Author: Justin Derbek
New York News Desk
Breaking Crypto News

AUSD ' the stablecoin of Polkadot' took a dive just minutes ago, dropping as low as 0.77 cents on the coin's native platform, and 0.79 on KuCoin, the exchange with the highest volume usage of the coin  home of the decentralized stablecoin of Polkadot

The company tweeted: We have noticed a configuration issue of the Honzon protocol which affects aUSD. We are passing an urgent vote to pause operations on Acala, while we investigate and mitigate the issue. We will report back as we return to normal network operation.

However, users on the projects official discord are claiming this was hack, pointing to this wallet that is holding over $1 billion in AUSD.

Created by the Acala Network, AUSD stablecoin is not algorithmic, it is backed by collateral across a variety of blockchains and include DOT, KSM, ACA, KAR, BTC, and ETH.

So while we're not sure what exactly is happening, it is NOT the Terra UST/Luna situation repeating itself. 

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Author: Mark Pippen
London News Desk 
Breaking Crypto News

As a user myself, Hotbit is a fairly good exchange... when it's up.

But I would by lying if I said this wasn't getting annoying. For the second time now it appears users will be locked out for a potential extended period of time, possibly lasting weeks, or months.

Last time (see our coverage here) hackers gained access to their servers, but not access to withdraw any user funds.  It seems like this angered them, so they decided to destroy everything they did have access to - which was basically the entire exchange system.  They were down for weeks.

This time time it wasn't a security breach, but a much wilder explanation:

"The reason is that a former Hotbit management employee who left Hotbit in April this year was involved in a project last year(which was against Hotbit's internal principles and of which Hotbit was unknown) that law enforcement authorities now think is suspected of violating criminal laws. So, a number of Hotbit senior managers have been subpoenaed by law enforcement since the end of July and are assisting in the investigation. Furthermore, law enforcement has frozen some funds of Hotbit, which has prevented Hotbit from running normally.

Hotbit and the rest employees of Hotbit's management are not involved in the project and have no knowledge of the illegal information involved in the project. However, we are still actively cooperating with the law enforcement authorities in their investigations and are continuously communicating with them through our lawyers and applying for the release of the frozen assets. The assets of all users are safe on Hotbit."

As far as when users can access their funds, Hotbit clearly does not know, only saying "Hotbit will resume normal service as soon as the assets are unfrozen" whenever that may be. 

Funds are safe...

Last time I was ready to hear it was all another exit scam and that my funds were gone for good, then the site came back and everything was still in my wallet. So, with fingers crossed, I'm giving them the benefit of the doubt this time. 

According to Hotbit "All user’s assets and data on Hotbit are secure and correct" and they shared this link for more details on how user funds will be handled.  

There is mention of a 'compensation plan' for users, but no details on what that would be based on. 

Those with staked assets and investment product deposits will supposedly continue to earn like normal during this downtime. 

Users with concerns are invited to contact them here.

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Author: Adam Lee
Asia News Desk / Breaking Crypto News

 Coinbase posted a $1.1 billion second-quarter loss and lower-than-expected revenue as the largest US cryptocurrency exchange was battered by tumbling digital-asset prices. Shares slid on the news after the close. In this video Coinbase President and COO Emilie Choi speaks to Bloomberg.

Video courtesy of Bloomberg

By dividing a user's deposit into a random number of parts and distributing those pieces to other users, a cryptocurrency "mixer" essentially muddles up the transactions of individuals who make deposits to them. In exchange, you receive the same amount back (less fees) from other anonymous users.

Tracking stolen cryptocurrency becomes difficult since it may rapidly change hands from one person to dozens when 'mixed'.

Tornado.Cash joins Blender.io on the list of mixer websites that are now forbidden for US citizens to access after being sanctioned by the US Treasury today.

The US Treasury estimates that since Tornado's inception in 2019, more than $7 billion in virtual currency has been laundered on the platform.

However, it's the $455 million from the "Lazarus Gang," a hacker group supported by the North Korean government, is what officials find most upsetting.

The sanctions also covered 44 wallets, making it prohibited to receive or send money to any those addresses.

Tornado Cash made an effort to abide by the rules, but ultimately failed.

In attempts to comply with the US government but still function for it's users, Tornado Cash implemented improvements like a screening tool to stop money from travelling between it and bitcoin wallets that officials say are tied to illegal activity.

Despite that, the Lazarus Group and other hackers were still able to transmit money to Tornado Cash for money laundering, according to a law enforcement investigation of open cryptocurrency transactions, the official added.

“Despite public assurances otherwise, Tornado Cash has repeatedly failed to impose effective controls designed to stop it from laundering funds for malicious cyber actors on a regular basis and without basic measures to address its risks,” Under Secretary of the Treasury for Terrorism and Financial Intelligence Brian Nelson said in a statement. “Treasury will continue to aggressively pursue actions against mixers that launder virtual currency for criminals and those who assist them.”

Treasury officials added that they hope this motivates the private sector and partner nations to help in regulating illegal use of crypto.

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Author: Mark Pippen
London News Desk 
Breaking Crypto News

While sales of NFTs have slowed, they're far from dead.  The amount of NFT based transactions still happening in the current down market is proving to investors and businesses that NFTs are here to stay.  Platforms like Twitter and Instagram implementing them provides more evidence for this claim. 

What is almost completely gone is part of the NFT world, the stupid part where we saw this thing sell for $7 million. Most suspected this was a temporary phase that could only happen with something that was both new and exploding in popularity - they were right.

But many are still saying the NFT world still has huge room for growth, and there may be some truth here.

The argument that NFT's have just begun revolve around virtual reality (aka the Metaverse) as any object in a virtual world can become your tradeable and sellable property if turned in to an NFT. 

Brands like Nike believe the people wearing their shoes in the real world may want to be seen wearing them in the virtual world as well - same goes for those who line up outside of shoe stores in the middle of the night to be among the first there when it opens, and pay 2 to 3 times more for a 'limited edition' sneaker.

Sneakers that they don't need to buy the materials to make, pay for the labor to assemble, or ship from one location to another to sell - this is the dream that has major brands drooling. 

This is the thinking behind valuing NFTs.com at the selling price of $15 million...

An 'undisclosed buyer' finalized the purchase through Domainer, a domain marketplace operated by GoDaddy, with Escrow.com facilitating the transfer of funds. 

“It was a pleasure working with all parties involved at NFTS.com, an incredible opportunity for the buyer to acquire one of the best possible .coms, if not the best, in the entire web space3,” said Matt Holden of Domainer

For some perspective, Crypto.com sold for $3 million less.

Buyer Most Likely a Company...

With a price-tag this large odds are a company is behind the purchase.

With brands like the NBA, NFL, Visa, Coca-Cola, Dolce & Gabanna, Tommy Hilfiger, EA Games, Ubisoft, Gamestop, Nike, Adidas and so many looking to make their mark in the NFT space, there's a lot of cash flowing behind the scenes. 

Chainalysis estimated institutional investors accounted for 33% of all NFT related transactions in their report on Web3 earlier this year.

Waiting For The Mystery Buyer to Show themselves...

Now the NFT industry is waiting to learn who the buyer was, until then, all they can do is speculate.

Will NFT marketplaces have some new competition?  Whoever the buyer is, they have the funds needed to be a potential threat.

Could a single clothing or gaming company have snatched it up to use as a place to feature their NFTs exclusively?

Or, this could come to the most anticlimactic, but very possible ending of them all - someone from the domain industry who believes they can sit on for awhile and make a few million selling it again - perhaps just waiting for the market to recover from this most recent downturn. In other words... just HODLing it.

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Author: Ross Davis
Silicon Valley Newsroom
GCP | Breaking Crypto News

Billionare investor Carl Icahn is "not an investor yet" when it comes to crypto - but it has his attention.  

He is the founder and controlling shareholder of Icahn Enterprises, with $27.7 billion in assets.  He is also credited with creating the "Activist Investor'  investment strategy, which is now used by hedge funds around the world.  The strategy is basically that when a hedge fund owns 10% or more of a company, they can use the threat of selling their stock to pressure a company to change policy they disagree with.

Not Looking To 'Dabble' In Crypto...

He's not talking about getting his feet wet, he's someone who dives in.

 Icahn says he'd enter the market in "A big way for us, you know, a billion dollars, billion and a half dollars, something like that." refusing to be any more specific on the amount, he added "I'm not going to say exactly."

He Gets It..

Ichan says he disagrees with what he hears crypto's critics saying, saying he sees the value of some crypto assets clearer than the dollar, stating "The only value of the dollar really is because you can use it to pay taxes."

What Could He Buy?

He's done his homework, clearly, which makes me think his plan to invest isn't all talk. 

Bitcoin, in his opinion, is only practical as a store of value, whereas Ether can be used as a store of value and as a payment item - so he prefers Ethereum.

He elaborated, saying, "Ethereum is the underlying blockchain. So, Ethereum has two things you can use as a payment system or you can use the store of value." So, you need Ethereum, the blockchain, to assure you that you have something. You never had that before where you can buy a cryptocurrency and you can say, 'I’m safe' because you have the blockchain makes it very safe for you. I’m oversimplifying. " While not quite as clear as his other statements, I think I get where he was trying to go. He's saying that whether it be a token that uses the Ethereum blockchain, or an NFT, the ledger is a trustworthy tool to give an accurate account of your assets on that blockchain.

A Flood of Institutional Money Incoming?

Icahn is among other heavyweights such as Ray Dalio, Stanley Druckenmiller, and Paul Tudor Jones, all of whom have expressed recent interest in expanding their investments into the crypto market.

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Author: Oliver Redding
Seattle Newsdesk  / Breaking Crypto News

Sherrod Brown, chairman of the U.S. Senate Banking Committee, has asked Apple and Google CEOs Tim Cook and Sundar Pichai to explain why bitcoin (BTC) scams are so prevalent on their platforms.

Brown is requesting information regarding the processes that Google and Apple employ to approve the programs that they provide in their app stores, as many have turned out to be bogus apps meant to steal cryptocurrency from users. Brown further notes that once a scam has been identified, users who downloaded it do not receive notifications of illicit activities.

There have also been several instances of Google search results including 'sponsored results' that were actually decoy phishing sites; this is something we first heard about years ago and continue to hear about every few months.

Brown cites a Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) report that warns about the growth of fake mobile applications. Scammers have used this method to steal $42 million worth of cryptocurrencies over the past few months. The letter, posted on the official US Senate website reads:

“According to the FBI, in one case, cybercriminals defrauded at least two dozen investors by creating a mobile app that used the name and logo of a real trading platform. Investors downloaded the app and deposited cryptocurrencies into wallets. Ultimately, the app was fake and the victims of the scam were unable to withdraw funds from their accounts.”

In Apple's case, where their App Store is literally the only way to install any app to the iPad or iPhone, they defend this monopoly saying it's actually beneficial to the consumer, because they can screen and deny any potentially malicious apps.

Experts recommend always downloading crypto-related software from official websites. Take the time to read user ratings and comments when on Google Play or the App Store, especially for products with a low download volume.

The executives have until August 10 to respond, but it is unclear what consequences corporations may face if they do not comply with Senate inquiries.

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Author: Justin Derbek
New York News Desk
Breaking Crypto News

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