Crypto Briefing

PayPal Confirms Acquisition of First Crypto Firm

Mon, 08 Mar 2021 17:26:31 GMT

PayPal has confirmed its acquisition of the cloud-based digital asset custody firm, Curv.

PayPal Expanding Crypto Services

The payment giant closed the deal with Israeli firm Curv which provides cloud-based infrastructure for digital asset security to institutions.

Last Tuesday, the first report of the acquisition came out, with the estimated amount of the deal between $200M-$500M. While the press release did not disclose the amount, media reports suggest it is towards the predicted range’s lower limit.

PayPal noted that it wishes to “expand its initiatives to support cryptocurrencies and digital assets.” The company started supporting crypto trading activities in November 2020. Interviews with PayPal executives suggested that the firm has been looking to fund payments in cryptocurrencies.

Curv was founded in 2018 by CEO Itay Malinger and CTO Dan Yadlin. Curv has designed a new wallet infrastructure that uses cryptography to provide autonomy and ease of conducting transactions without using complex private signatures.

German insurer, Munich RE, secures the assets on Curv, giving Curv customers coverage up to $50 million of digital assets. The platform supports more than 200 tokens, including all ERC-20 tokens.

Currently, PayPal supports the buy and sell of only four cryptocurrencies: Bitcoin, Ethereum, Litecoin, and Bitcoin Cash.

Disclosure: The author held Bitcoin at the time of press.

Ethereum 2.0 Staking Protocol StakeWise Raises $2M, Announces Governance Token

Mon, 08 Mar 2021 17:10:42 GMT

DeFi protocol StakeWise today announced a successful $2 million private fundraise and the release of their governance token: $SWISE.

StakeWise Launches DeFi Token

Greenfield One and a network of private investors led a $2 million private round to help kick off StakeWise’s governance token launch.

StakeWise offers liquid ETH2 staking, allowing users to continue using their locked ETH in DeFi. The protocol is now seeking to democratize its governance by releasing its governance token.

The first 25,000 ETH deposited the StakeWise Pool will be eligible for a distribution of 2% of the $SWISE token supply. Users can claim $SWISE proportionally to how much ETH they deposit into the pool. Early stakers have already claimed roughly a third of the available $SWISE.

Ethereum 2.0 staking is quite competitive with major players such as Ankr, Rocketpool, MyEtherWallet, or Lido.

StakeWise has emphasized yield strategy optimization, ease of use, and transparent DAO governance to stand out. They have announced that DAO members would be responsible for the choice of oracles, node operators, and StakeWise’s fee structure.

“Our choice of tokenomics and governance principles reflect the community-first attitude we adopted from the outset,” said co-founder Dmitri Tsumak. “We’ve made StakeWise into a protocol where users can earn elevated yields and gain unparalleled control over their staked capital. Those who recognize this early will profit the most from staking with our network.”

Disclosure: The author held ETH at the time of press.

Bitcoin Tech Company NYDIG Raises $200 Million

Mon, 08 Mar 2021 15:12:54 GMT

NYDIG has announced a growth capital round led by Stone Ridge Holdings Group and Morgan Stanley.

Institutions Funding Bitcoin

NYDIG is a subsidiary of Stone Ridge, an alternative asset manager with $10 billion in AUM. Stone Ridge bought 10,000 Bitcoin last year for $100 million, now worth $500 million.

NYDIG itself manages $3 billion in assets and operates a platform designed for the institutional management and trade of Bitcoin, among other technology solutions. The firm also offers crypto custody, advisory services, and AML/KYC services.

NYDIG Company Offering. Source: NYDIG

Marathon Patent Services mining firm recently announced that it used NYDIG services to buy $115 million worth of Bitcoin, following suit with companies like MicroStrategy and Tesla swapping their cash balances for BTC.

The investment round was led by Stone Ridge, Morgan Stanley, New York Life, MassMutual, Soros Fund Management, and FS Investments. All of the above are long-term NYDIG partners, according to company CEO Robert Gutman. “These partnerships leave no doubt that institutional adoption of Bitcoin has arrived,” he said.

Institutional investment has seen a considerable uptick in the recent bull market. Grayscale reported a 900% increase in AUM in January, with inflows almost exclusively from institutions. $1 trillion investment giant BNY Mellon integrated Bitcoin this year, with all signs pointing to a new era of mainstream crypto adoption.

Disclosure: The author held Bitcoin at the time of press.

New IRS Operation Threatens Crypto Tax Dodgers With Jail

Mon, 08 Mar 2021 13:54:51 GMT

A newly launched IRS initiative called Operation Hidden Treasure was announced on Friday as part of a crackdown on widespread crypto tax evasion.

IRS Searching For Telltale Signs of Tax Evasion

Operation Hidden Treasure was announced at a Federal Bar Association presentation on fraud on March 05. The operation is specifically designed to root out people using crypto and virtual currency to evade taxes.

Carolyn Schenck of the IRS stated that the agency was looking for “tax evasion signatures.” These include structuring financial activity in blocks of $10,000 or less in order to fly under the radar of the IRS and its Form 8300 requirements.

While exchanges like Coinbase, for example, report tax information to the IRS with accounts over a certain transaction and balance threshold, the IRS is now training operatives to search for signs that crypto users are willfully avoiding detection.

Schenck stated that the IRS is using specialist vendors and trained agents to analyze and de-anonymize crypto transactions so that they can track and seize crypto in “both a civil and a criminal setting.”

Jail Time for Crypto Tax Dodgers

IRS Criminal Investigation Division Chief James Lee spoke at the presentation, outlining the consequences of tax evasion.

“People have to know there’s a consequence for being willfully noncompliant,” said Lee, “and that consequence is going to jail.”

If the government cannot prove that tax evasion was deliberate, there are still civil consequences including a 75% penalty on the understated tax.

Solicitor Steve Tosher stated that “We expect to see more referrals for criminal prosecution and assertions of the 75% civil fraud penalty.”

Of course, the crypto tax procedure is notoriously opaque, with many users unclear on how to pay crypto taxes.

@IRSnews @IRStaxpros @IRS_CI @RobinhoodApp @AskRobinhood It's 3/7 and Robinhood still has not provided me with my 1099 tax documents. I can’t file my taxes. This is crazy.

— Ted (@teddytux) March 7, 2021

For those with undisclosed crypto taxes, consulting a tax lawyer is perhaps the best option. Crypto users would do well to remember that they do not share attorney-client privileges with their accountants, and their accountants could be summoned to testify against them. This is not the case with tax lawyers.

The IRS recently stated that it’s not necessary to pay taxes on Bitcoin buys made in dollars, offering U.S. citizens a way to reduce their crypto taxes. However, the new operation may mark the dawn of a new era for crypto taxes.

The government has been slow to catch up with the crypto industry, but regulation has finally arrived.

“These transactions are not anonymous,” said Schenck. “We see you.”

Disclosure: The author held Bitcoin at the time of writing

Chinese Beauty App Meitu Adds $22M Ethereum to Balance Sheet

Mon, 08 Mar 2021 12:31:34 GMT

Meitu announced a $40 million investment in Bitcoin and Ethereum, making the Chinese company the first to disclose an Ethereum investment for its treasury.

Chinese App Meitu Invests In Crypto

The board of the company had previously planned to invest up to $100 million in cryptocurrencies. The company’s cash reserve will finance the latest $40 million purchase.

In the attached statement, the board insisted on diversifying the investment into the two major cryptocurrencies. $22.1 million will be invested in Ethereum, making Meitu the first to add ETH to its balance sheet. Previous corporate investments have only been in Bitcoin. This is the case of Tesla’s landmark $1.5 billion purchase and MicroStrategy’s regular investments, the last of which happened three days ago.

The company announced that this purchase was only the first foray into blockchain technology and that it planned on investigating opportunities for their service in the domain.

“The Board takes the view that blockchain technology has the potential to disrupt both existing financial and technology industries, similar to the manner in which mobile internet has disrupted the PC internet and many other offline industries.”

Disclosure: The author held BTC and ETH at the time of press.

Atari Crypto Casino Launching in Ethereum Metaverse

Mon, 08 Mar 2021 12:11:48 GMT

Decentral Games is launching an Atari Casino on Ethereum.

Atari Casino Coming to Ethereum

Atari Casino will form part of the virtual gaming world in Decentraland, the Ethereum-based game Atari announced a partnership with earlier this year.

According to a Decentral Games blog post, Atari Casino will encompass “a 20 parcel casino estate.” It will be part of Decentraland’s Vegas City and will launch this May.

The casino will feature Atari-themed games, and players will be able to earn Decentral Games’ DG token. The casino will accept three tokens: MANA, DAI, and ATRI. According to the blog post, the casino will benefit DG token holders, as 88% of the profits will be contributed to the DG DAO treasury.

Decentral Games says that Atari’s “nostalgic-inducing games [will be] brought back with a twist” and that there’ll be an “Atari special” game.

Decentral Games, which owns Atari Casino, is the world’s first community-owned crypto casino on Ethereum. It forms part of Decentraland, and is also the first DAO where virtual land is owned, governed and monetized. It’s working on Virtual Reality and has backing from Digital Currency Group, the investment giant that oversees Grayscale.

Gaming Titan’s Crypto Play

Decentraland and Atari first revealed details of their partnership in January. At the time, Decentraland’s Sam Hamilton told Crypto Briefing that players would be able to access Atari’s catalog of retro arcade games such as Pong and Break-Out!

The company then revealed it would be moving to Polygon, intending to jump on the NFT train and improve scalability.

Atari’s first steps into the cryptocurrency space started with the launch of ATRI, an ERC-20 token that runs on Ethereum.

Now, the pioneering video game company appears to be eyeing the gambling sector too. It’s thought that both the gaming and gambling sectors could benefit from leveraging crypto in similar ways; blockchains can potentially facilitate near-instant micropayments at a low cost. Though Ethereum is prone to high gas fees, using Layer 2 solutions like Polygon can help alleviate the costs. Ethereum is also the home of the NFT space, which appears to suit Atari’s plans.

NFTs will be available to purchase from the Decentral Games store, while DG holders will be able to stake their tokens to participate in DAO governance.

Though Atari Casino isn’t set to go live until May, a launch party will be announced next month, with prizes in the form of NFTs, ATRI, and DG. Platinum-selling artist Dillon Francis is also set to perform.

Atari is regarded as a pioneer of the video game industry. Launched in 1972, its early arcade games and video consoles set the path for other companies like Nintendo to enter the industry. The obvious move towards crypto, and specifically Ethereum, suggests that the company isn’t ready to stop pushing the space forward just yet.

Disclosure: At the time of writing, the author of this feature owned ETH, MATIC, and several other cryptocurrencies.

Ethereum NFT of Burned Banksy Piece Sells for $380,000

Mon, 08 Mar 2021 11:46:33 GMT

Burned Banksy hits six figures: the landmark NFT sold for just over $380,000 yesterday.

Burned Banksy Gets Tokenized

An NFT of Banksy’s “Morons” has sold for 228.69 ETH, worth around $382,000 at purchase.

The original artwork was acquired by a group of crypto enthusiasts and burned on a live stream in Brooklyn last week. The purpose of the burning was to tokenize the piece as an NFT. The video’s host, who also burned the piece, said they hoped to “inspire artists and explore a new medium of creative expression.”

A bidder using the moniker GALAXY bought the NFT on OpenSea yesterday afternoon.

The piece depicts an auction for an art canvas that reads, “I can’t believe you morons actually buy this shit.” Banksy produced the piece in 2006, and prints were initially sold at $500 each.

A 2007 edition of the piece sold for $84,494.79 (£60,480) in a Sotheby’s auction last year.

Source: Burnt Banksy

The piece was acquired by members of Injective Protocol and SuperFarm, who reportedly paid around $100,000. It came with a Certificate of Authenticity from Pest Control, Banksy’s official authenticator.

It’s the first time a genuine Banksy piece has appeared on-chain, as the NFT trend continues to snowball.

By tokenizing “Morons” on Ethereum, the group said they hoped to make a point that the art could live on even after destroying the physical copy. GALAXY is now the provable owner of the piece, and the record of their purchase is immutable. As the token is fungible, no-one else will be able to claim ownership until they decide to sell.

NFTs and Art Merge

The Banksy item is only the latest in a series of massive drops across the NFT space, which has now seen several major musicians making an entry.

EDM superstar Steve Aoki released his first collection on Nifty Gateway over the weekend, raking in around $3.4 million in the process. Last week, 3LAU raised a record-breaking $11.7 million from tokenizing his “Ultraviolet” album.

Kings of Leon also became the first band to release their album as an NFT this weekend. The event attracted a significant amount of press attention from the mainstream media and music world. Over 489 ETH has been traded on the collection with 16 hours to go. With ETH trading at almost $1,700 today, the sale is a lucrative move for U.S rock artists.

But arguably the biggest NFT event so far is the release of Beeple’s “The First 5,000 Days.”

The digital artist’s piece is on sale at Christie’s, with bidding at $3.75 million. The auction closes Thursday.

The hefty price tags that some NFTs fetch have led some to criticize the space. Many argue that the six-figure valuations are unsustainable. It’s difficult to say whether the bubble is about to burst. Still, NFTs offer provable scarcity in a similar way to Bitcoin, whose meteoric rise has stunned doubters time and again over the last decade.

If they go the same way, some early investors could be in for a windfall in years to come.

Disclosure: At the time of writing, the author of this feature owned ETH and several other cryptocurrencies. One or more members of Crypto Briefing’s management team owns INJ. The company (Decentral Media Inc.) owns INJ.

Delaware Court Dismisses Lead Investor’s Lawsuit Against Ripple

Sun, 07 Mar 2021 11:08:35 GMT

A Delaware court has rejected Tetragon’s appeal to pull out its equity in blockchain payments firm Ripple Labs.

Court Stands With Ripple

The Delaware Chancery Court court denied Tetragon’s appeal to redeem stock in Ripple as a result of its ongoing battle with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC)

The court dismissed the case, for the SEC has not yet officially determined XRP’s legal status.

In Jan. 2021, Tetragon sought a preliminary injunction in Delaware Chancery Court to redeem its investment share in Ripple.

In 2019, Ripple raised $200 million during the Series C funding round, with Tetragon as the lead investor. In the investment contract, there was a provision that if XRP is declared security on an official basis, then Tetragon had the right to request Ripple to redeem ownership shares in cash.

Tetragon contended that the SEC’s enforcement action against Ripple over XRP sales constituted an official securities violation, and therefore Ripple should return the funds.

The court sided with Ripple on the case and said a determination had not been made whether XRP is, in fact, an official security asset.

“But XRP is no more security after the SEC filed the enforcement action than it was before it,” the Delaware Court judge stated. “The enforcement action, by contrast, asks that question. The question is not yet resolved, so a determination has not yet been made. And when it is made, it will be made by the District Court.”

Rippe released a statement in which the company affirmed the Tetragon lawsuit was an “opportunistic move to take advantage of the SEC allegations”.

The statement added that the latest ruling should end the confusion that the SEC has not determined that XRP is a security.

Stellar XLM Edges Closer to a 35% Price Movement

Sat, 06 Mar 2021 12:42:15 GMT

Stellar’s price action suggests that volatility is about to strike back.

Stellar Primed for Volatility

XLM’s market value dropped by 50% after reaching a new yearly high of $0.61 on Feb. 13. The downswing seems to have been fueled by a market-wide correction that caused over $6.5 billion in liquidations.

While some altcoins managed to recover the losses incurred, Stellar entered a stagnation period.

The twelfth-largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization has been consolidating over the past two weeks, making a series of lower highs and higher lows along the way. When drawing a trendline around each pivot point, XLM’s price action formed a symmetrical triangle on its 4-hour chart.

XLM/USD on TradingView

Stellar is now edging closer towards the triangle’s apex, indicating that a volatile move is underway. A 4-hour candlestick close above $0.42 or below $0.39 would likely be followed by a 34.50% move in that direction.

This target is determined by measuring the height of the triangle’s y-axis and adding it to the breakout point.

Stiff Resistance Ahead

Despite the ambiguous outlook that Stellar presents, the odds seem to favor the bears.

The parabolic stop and reverse, or “SAR,” moved on top of XLM’s price in late February, which indicates that the trend changed from bullish to bearish. Until another flip over occurs, this trend-following indicator will remain bearish.

Only a 4-hour candlestick close above $0.43 will signal the downtrend’s exhaustion, based on the stop and reversal system. But a confluence of the short, mid, long-term moving averages around this price level suggests that it will take a significant amount of buying pressure to send Stellar higher.

XLM/USD on TradingView

Traders should wait for a decisive close outside of the $0.42-$0.39 before entering any trade because of the resistance ahead.

Disclosure: At the time of writing, this author owned Bitcoin and Ethereum.

Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey Receives $500,000 Bid for NFT Tweet

Sat, 06 Mar 2021 12:29:04 GMT

Jack Dorsey, the founder and CEO of Twitter, has started accepting bids on an NFT of the platform’s first-ever tweet.

Celebrities Flocking to NFTs

Tron founder Justin Sun the highest bidder at $500,000. Counter-offers need to be 10% increments of the highest bid or $1, whichever is higher. Therefore, a new bidder will have to bid at least $550,000 to get their bid accepted as the highest bid.

Valuables is an initiative by Cent that allows users to mint, buy, and sell their tweets in the form of a Non-Fungible Token (NFT). The NFT is a digitally signed and verified tweet that can only be minted once but can be sold and resold infinitely. Once a sale has been made, the seller receives 95% of the sale’s proceeds, while the remaining 5% is charged as fees by the platform.

Interestingly, Elon Musk’s tweet about Dogecoin received a bid of over $7,000. Currently, Musk’s taking Telsa private tweet has a bid of over $42,000. This tweet caused Musk to pay the SEC a fine of $20 million back in 2018.

In February, Shark Tank celebrity and owner of the Dallas Mavericks, Mark Cuban, sold one of his tweets on the Valuables platform for nearly $1,000.

The NFT craze is not showing any signs of slowing doing. Kings of Leon will release this upcoming album as an NFT, and video game heavyweight Ubisoft partnered up with the NFT-based gaming platform, Sorare.

A group that burned Banksy’s original artwork made the headlines this week took. The group not only burned Banky’s artwork but subsequently announced that they would create an NFT version of it. A portion of the proceeds from the sale of this NFT will go to charity.

The author didn’t hold crypto mentioned in this article at the time of press.

Hacker Peforms $3 Million Attack On Paid Network

Fri, 05 Mar 2021 21:49:26 GMT

The DeFi protocol Paid Network has been exploited via a vulnerability that allowed an attacker to create millions of new tokens.

Millions Dumped By Hacker

Around 18:10 UTC on Mar. 5, an unknown hacker exploited a token minting function and created over 59.4 million PAID tokens, worth $166 million at the time of the attack.

Soon, the hacker moved on to selling the illicitly-created tokens on Uniswap. He successfully sold about 2.5 million PAID tokens for approximately 2000 ETH (equivalent to $3 million).

The flood of new tokens into the market instantly crashed the price of the PAID token from $2.80 to $0.40. The hacker’s wallet address still contains more than 56 million PAID tokens, worth about $24 million.

Updates On the Way

Even though the development team has denied an “inside job,” critics in the community have speculated that a founder could have carried out the attack. To support that accusation, they allege that some functions can only be called by certain addresses.

To prevent any further damage, Paid Network has announced that it is pulling liquidity from the vulnerable contract. The team is also planning to create a new smart contract to restore token balances.

In another tweet, Paid Network has promised it will publish a detailed report on the hack soon.

Disclaimer: At the time of writing this author held Cosmos.

John McAfee Indicted by Department of Justice

Fri, 05 Mar 2021 21:24:13 GMT

Eccentric entrepreneur John McAfee is in more trouble with U.S. authorities over an alleged “pump and dump” scheme and ICO.

McAfee Charged With Fraud

McAfee has been indicted on charges of fraud and money laundering by the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ).

The United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York said in a statement today that McAfee was charged with “conspiracy to commit commodities and securities fraud, conspiracy to commit securities and touting fraud, wire fraud conspiracy and substantive wire fraud, and money laundering conspiracy offenses.”

McAfee allegedly used Twitter to promote altcoins in “pump and dump” schemes. McAfee was also charged with promoting ICOs without disclosing that he was paid to do so. Jimmy Watson, a member of McAfee’s crypto advisory team, has also been charged.

“As alleged, McAfee and Watson used social media to perpetrate an age-old pump-and-dump scheme that earned them nearly two million dollars,” FBI Assistant Director William F. Sweeney Jr. stated.

Additionally, Sweeney suggested that McAfee and Watson used the same social media to promote sales without disclosing the fact that they were compensated to do so.

McAfee Controversy Continues

McAfee is best known as the founder of the computer security firm McAfee Corp., but he has become infamous for his alleged ties to the drug trade and his zealous attitude toward cryptocurrency.

Last year, he was sued by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission for allegedly promoting crypto ICOs dishonestly. He was also charged with tax evasion by the DOJ.

He is currently in prison in Spain due to those charges.

Disclaimer: the author held BTC, ETH, UNI, DOT at the time of writing.

Bitcoin, Ethereum, XRP Poised to Resume Uptrend

Fri, 05 Mar 2021 20:34:40 GMT

Extreme volatility levels in the cryptocurrency market have led to massive liquidations over the past few weeks. Despite the significant losses incurred across the board, data shows that Bitcoin, Ethereum, and XRP are about to resume their respective uptrends.

Bitcoin Prime for New All-Time Highs

Bitcoin took a 12% nosedive in the past 36 hours after rising to $52,700. The downswing added credence to the thesis that BTC is creating an inverse head-and-shoulders pattern on its 4-hour chart.

Coincidentally, the Tom Demark (TD) Sequential indicator recently presented a buy signal within the same time frame. The bullish formation developed as a red nine candlestick, suggesting that Bitcoin is bound for a bullish impulse.

If validated, BTC could rise toward the head-and-shoulders neckline at $52,000 to complete this technical pattern’s right shoulder. A further spike in buying pressure around this resistance barrier could lead to a 17% breakout that sends Bitcoin to $61,000.

BTC/USD by TradingView

Microstrategy’s announcement that it once again bought the Bitcoin dip, adding another $10 million to its treasury, suggests that momentum is indeed building up for the uptrend to resume.

That notion is further validated by the rising number of new daily addresses joining the network. On-chain analyst Willy Woo maintains that Bitcoin’s user count is “growing at insane rates,” similar to trends seen during the 2017 bull market.

As long as Bitcoin continues to hold above $47,000, all of these fundamental developments will continue to push prices higher.

Rafael Schultze-Kraft, co-founder and CTO at Glassnode, maintains that this is a “very strong on-chain support” level, as roughly 500,000 BTC were moved at this price point. “[It is] important that we hold [$47,000], otherwise we could see low forties quickly before the next upwards movements,” said Schultze-Kraft.

Ethereum Ready to Resume Uptrend

Ethereum is back in the spotlight after core developers agreed to add the blockchain’s crucial EIP-1559 proposal to the London fork in July.

Research coordinator Tim Beiko told Crypto Briefing that EIP-1559 could be thought of as an “ETH buyback” proposal. The update will see a portion of the gas fees on every transaction get burned, reducing Ether’s supply and essentially making it a deflationary asset.

The announcement comes at a time when Ethereum has been consolidating within a symmetrical triangle on the 4-hour chart. If market participants were to buy the news, this cryptocurrency could rise towards the pattern’s upper trendline at $1,570.

A 4-hour candlestick close above this resistance barrier would be followed by a 21.50% move in the same direction, sending Ether to $2,000. This target is determined by measuring the height of the triangle’s y-axis and adding it to the breakout point.

ETH/USD by TradingView

Transaction history shows that Ethereum sits on top of a massive support zone while resistance is weak.

Based on IntoTheBlock’s “In/Out of the Money Around Price” (IOMAP) model, over 370,000 addresses previously purchased nearly 10 million ETH around $1,480. This demand wall could absorb any selling pressure, capping Ether’s downside potential.

Holders within this price range will likely do anything to keep their investments “In the Money”; they may even buy more tokens to allow prices to rebound.

In/Out of the Money Around Price by IntoTheBlock

On the flip side, the IOMAP cohorts show little to no resistance ahead. The only considerable hurdle lies at $1,570, where more than 730,000 addresses are holding 3.70 million ETH.

Such an insignificant supply wall suggests that the bulls will not have trouble driving Ethereum’s price higher.

XRP “Unaffected” by Legal Uncertainty

While market participants are concerned about XRP being deemed a security by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), Ripple continues to expand its services in Eastern markets, where there is reportedly more regulatory clarity.

“[The lawsuit] has hindered activity in the United States, but it has not really impacted what’s going on for us in Asia Pacific,” Garlinghouse told Reuters. He concluded that XRP is still traded on over 200 exchanges around the world, and that only “three or four” U.S. exchanges have halted trading.

While Garlinghouse remains positive about Ripple’s legal stability, XRP is on the brink of a major bullish impulse. The seventh-largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization seems to have developed an inverse head-and-shoulders pattern on its daily chart.

Although XRP is currently forming the right shoulder of the bullish formation, it can break out of that pattern. A spike in buying pressure that allows this altcoin to close above the pattern’s neckline at $0.66 could lead to a 74% upswing towards $1.16.

XRP/USD by TradingView

Traders must wait for a daily candlestick close above the $0.66 for the inverse head-and-shoulders pattern to be validated. Failing to do so could lead to a downswing to the $0.39 support level.

If XRP breaks below this critical support barrier, it will invalidate the bullish outlook and lead to a steep correction towards $0.20.

Disclosure: At the time of writing, this author held Bitcoin and Ethereum.

Ampleforth Removes Upgradeability, Decentralizes into Community

Fri, 05 Mar 2021 17:45:19 GMT

Ampleforth has lifted upgradeability from the protocol’s token contract, taking another step towards full decentralization. The protocol is now censorship-resistant and immune to outside influence.

But this wasn’t always the case.

Ampleforth’s Winding Road

Launched in 2019, Ampleforth was a unique crypto project.

It introduced rebasing, elastic supply and has inspired the recent wave of algorithmic stablecoins. These topics were still nascent and oftentimes misunderstood at that time.

The protocol’s native token, AMPL, is like a living organism that grows and shrinks in value according to supply and demand. It aims to maintain a $1 peg, but it does this much differently than Tether’s USDT or Maker’s DAI.

It also shouldn’t be confused with stablecoins; AMPL is extremely volatile. At times, the token has risen as high as $4 before a brutal crash.

If there is a circulating supply of 100,000 AMPL and the price increases from $1 to $2 due to buyer demand, the network will automatically redistribute an additional 100,000 AMPL and help return the peg to $1.

What’s more, these additional tokens would be distributed to AMPL holders proportionate to their current holdings. The inverse is true if the price falls below the $1 peg. Instead, the protocol burns a proportionate amount of AMPL tokens held in a wallet.

This is a simple unpacking of what is known as rebasing. It occurs once every 24 hours. So far, AMPL has successfully executed more than 600 rebases.

Ampleforth has also inspired myriad other projects, including Yam Finance, Empty Set Dollar, DeFi Dollar, and many others. Few, however, have enjoyed the same level of adoption.

The protocol has reached a total of 76,473 total addresses at press time. Over 30,000 are currently active.

The number of AMPL addresses. Source: Glassnode

The growing number of addresses has made it much more viable for the protocol to continue decentralizing. More addresses mean less centralization. The successful distribution of AMPL comes in part due to various incentives programs called “Geysers.”

For reference, there were less than 6,000 AMPL wallets when the first Geyser was launched.

Step-by-Step Decentralization

In June 2019, Ampleforth’s co-founder, Brandon Iles, wrote:

“We felt that upgradeability is something we needed to include in the beginning, given how quickly the crypto landscape changes. If it were ever possible, and safe to do so, we’d also prefer to remove this mechanism.”

Upgradeability refers to a project’s ability to make changes to the protocol once it’s live. It’s also a point of centralization, which became abundantly clear in the wake of the KuCoin hack.

In September 2020, the crypto exchange KuCoin was hacked for $150 million. The attackers made off with various tokens, including nearly $11 million in AMPL at that time. The Ampleforth team then executed a contract upgrade and froze the attacker’s address, preventing them from selling these tokens.

This has been the only time that the team has intervened in the protocol.

Now, with the removal of upgradeability, similar actions will be impossible. The community will now be the sole conductors of the project’s future. What’s more, all funds lost in the KuCoin hack will be returned to the victims.

All that’s left now is a governance framework, much of which is already in place.

Like many popular DeFi protocols and the Ethereum network, Ampleforth also has public proposals called AIPs and ACCPs. So far, there have a total of six proposals. Each proposal suggests different changes to the protocol as part of a broader governance scheme.

Still, discussions around these proposals are akin to Reddit upvotes and commentary; anyone, not just AMPL token holders, could participate and vote. For Iles, this has been enough as he wrote in the above-mentioned post that Ampleforth had no “plans to release a separate governance token.”

Today’s announcement does, however, leave some room for speculation.

According to the AmpleforthMedia team:

“Future protocol maintenance and upgrades will only be achievable through on-chain governance by the Ampleforth community. Further information on this will be announced by the Foundation in the near future.”

Disclosure: The author held Ethereum and several DeFi tokens via an index at the time of press. Ampleforth was a former sponsor of Crypto Briefing.

Crypto Briefing’s CB10 Index Yearly Returns Top Ethereum

Fri, 05 Mar 2021 17:18:01 GMT

Crypto Briefing’s CB10 experimental index was able to cushion the recent downtrend in ETH. This protection was thanks to diversification and disciplined investment in the top ten cryptocurrencies weighted by market capitalization on CoinGecko for U.S. investors.

Crypto Briefing CB10 Index Performance

The CB10 crypto index returned 44.4% in February.

A hypothetical $1,000 invested on Jan. 5 grew to $1,080 (yielding 8%) by month’S end and has risen by another $491 in February.

CB10 portfolio Update on Mar. 4 before rebalancing.

The cumulative return in CB10 since formation at the beginning of the year is 57.7%. In comparison, BTC has risen by 59.5% and ETH 27.5% year-to-date. The index’s performance closely tracked the alpha cryptocurrency’s price action.

CB10, Bitcoin and Ethereum Performance in February.

The rising gas fees on Ethereum showed cracks in ETH price as the market’s liquidity flew to alternative projects. Numerous DeFi projects in 1inch, Compound, The Graph, and others expanded their reach beyond Ethereum.

Ethereum’s competition in Binance Smart Chain and Cardano grabbed the market’s main attention as BNB and ADA gained 360% and 175% since Feb. 1.

BNB (blue), ADA (orange), DOT (light blue), and ETH (yellow) price comparison since Feb 1. Source: Trading View

In February, across crypto markets, another notable trend was the shift back to native Layer 1 tokens compared to DeFi governance tokens.

Rebalancing CB10 for March

The reconstitution of the CB10 portfolio was successful at 10: 20 am EST on Mar. 4. The updated distribution of hypothetical $1,000 can be found here.

Ethereum was the biggest loser in this month’s rebalancing at negative 3.43%, thanks to the rising popularity of Ethereum’s competition. BTC and ADA were this month’s biggest winners with a 0.96% and 1.67% increase in allocation.

While BNB’s extraordinary rise has brought mainstream DeFi discussion around it, still, it did not make it to Crypto Briefing’s index as the portfolio is U.S. based, and neither Kraken, Gemini, nor Coinbase Pro lists BNB.

CB10 March Update. Source: Google Sheets

Instead, Dogecoin entered the index during the reconstitution with 0.52% allocation, replacing AAVE at 0.44%. DOGE was eliminated last month due to extreme volatility in the token. However, DOGE holders have shown tremendous resilience in the last couple of weeks.

DOGE replaced AAVE; currently, the only DeFi governance token in the top ten crypto index is UNI.

The methodology for the rebalance was shared in last month’s update. Investors can opt for profit booking for the current month or reinvest proceeds yet again.

Disclosure: The author held Bitcoin at the time of press.

Ethereum "ETH Buyback” Update Scheduled for Summer 2021

Fri, 05 Mar 2021 16:48:59 GMT

Big news for Ethereum: the network’s major EIP-1559 update is happening this summer.

ETH Buyback Ready to Ship

EIP-1559 will go live in Ethereum’s London hard fork, expected to launch in July.

Tim Beiko, the coordinator for the various researchers working on the update, confirmed the news on Twitter today.

We're in agreement about 1559 and a difficulty bomb pushback going into London 🔥🎉

— Tim Beiko | timbeiko.eth (@TimBeiko) March 5, 2021

Beiko posted the update live from Ethereum’s latest AllCoreDevs call. He proposed implementing EIP-1559 as part of London, to which the other Ethereum developers on the call agreed to the update.

Beiko recently took to Github to finalize London’s launch date; he suggested it should go live on mainnet in July. It’s set to follow Ethereum’s Berlin fork, which is happening in April.

EIP-1559 is Ethereum’s most anticipated update since the launch of Serenity in December. It will see a portion of the gas fees on every transaction get burned, reducing the supply of ETH. Beiko told Crypto Briefing that EIP-1559 could be thought of as an “ETH buyback” proposal earlier this year. EIP-1559 could make ETH a deflationary asset.

Ethereum developer Justin Drake recently shared a post highlighting the impact EIP-1559 could have on ETH. He used the term “ultrasound money” to compare it to BTC’s popular “sound money” narrative.

🦇 pic.twitter.com/HYAMs1sS7u

— Justin Ðrake (@drakefjustin) March 1, 2021

Though EIP-1559 should solidify ETH’s economic proposition and the security of the network, it’s been a point of contention among various community members.

Certain miners have publicly opposed the update since it effectively hurts their source of revenue. SparkPool and Bitfly, two of Ethereum’s key mining pools, have regularly shared their concerns on Twitter. “We are sad to see many people only care about price now,” SparkPool said on Feb. 5.

Meanwhile, another of Ethereum’s biggest mining pools, F2Pool, has been supportive of the update. On Feb. 25, the team penned a blog post titled “Staying on the (b)right side of history.” In it, they wrote:

“The only counter arguments have been focused on short-term miner revenue loss. Therefore, for now, we are in full support of the proposal and will help move this effort forward.”

Disclosure: At the time of writing, the author of this feature owned ETH and several other cryptocurrencies.

Centra Co-Founder Sentenced to 8 Years Prison for Fake ICO Scam

Fri, 05 Mar 2021 14:02:05 GMT

Sohrab Sharma, Florida-based co-founder of cryptocurrency firm Centra, will serve eight years in connection to his leading role in a fraudulent Initial Coin Offering (ICO).

Jail Time for ICO Founder

The U.S. Attorney’s Office of Southern District of New York confirmed in a press release that an eight-year prison sentence was given to Sharma by a Manhattan federal court.

Sharma, along with two co-founders, made several material misrepresentations during the coin offering. They falsely claimed to acquire a money transmitter license in 38 U.S. states, and having business ties with Bancorp, Visa, and Mastercard, for a crypto-based debit card called Centra Card.

The co-founder even fabricated a fictional CEO named “Michael Edwards,” who had more than 20 years of experience in the banking industry and a Master’s degree from Harvard. They also hired celebrities, including professional boxer Floyd Mayweather Jr. and music producer DJ Khaled to promote the Centra ICO.

“Sharma’s most notable inventions were the fake executives, fake business partnerships, and fake licenses that he and his co-conspirators touted to trick victims into handing over tens of millions of dollars. We will continue to aggressively pursue digital securities frauds like this one,” Ilan T. Graff, the Attorney for the United States, said.

In July 2017, the Centra Tech ICO raised 100,000 ETH worth $25 million at the time in exchange for Centra (CTR) ERC20 tokens.

After the scheme was exposed, the U.S. Attorney’s Office and the Federal Bureau of Investigation cracked down on the firm and seized 100,000 ETH in 2018.

The United States Marshals Service sold the seized ETH for about $33.4 million earlier this year. As per the official release, the proceeds will be used to compensate the ICO victims.

Sharma was also ordered to forfeit over $36 million in illegitimate gains made post the Centra ICO.

Besides Sohrab Sharma, one other co-founder Robert Farkas was sentenced to a year in prison in December 2020 by the same Manhattan court.

Microstrategy Buys the Dip, Adds $10 Million Bitcoin

Fri, 05 Mar 2021 13:49:29 GMT

Microstrategy has again bought the Bitcoin dip. This time, the firm is adding another $10 million to its treasury.

Serial Bitcoin Buyers

This is only the latest investment in Bitcoin for serial buyers MicroStrategy. While this one is less substantial than the $1 billion investment on Feb. 24, it sends a clear message: The bull market is far from over.

Saylor isn’t alone either. Though Microstrategy has been a catalyst for institutional investment, many companies, including Tesla, have begun to add BTC to their balance sheet. Some even regret not having bought it earlier. This week, legendary investor Jim Rogers said that he “wished” he had bought BTC.

This brings the total Bitcoin holdings of MicroStrategy to an astronomical $2.2 billion. The company now holds over 90,000 BTC, purchased at an average price of $24,119.

Disclosure: The author held BTC at the time of press.

Mark Cuban’s Dallas Mavericks Will Accept Dogecoin

Thu, 04 Mar 2021 21:57:12 GMT

NBA pro basketball team The Dallas Mavericks will soon accept Dogecoin as payment, according to DealBook.

Jumping on the Doge-Wagon

Shark Tank investor Mark Cuban, who in January jumped on the NFT bandwagon, reportedly told DealBook that his NBA team will accept DOGE as payments for tickets and merchandise.

According to DealBook, Cuban said that the team has chosen to accept Dogecoin for the novelty of it: “Sometimes in business you have to do things that are fun,” he said.

He added that he “strongly encourages” parents to ask their teenagers about Dogecoin if they do not know what it is.

Dogecoin isn’t the only cryptocurrency that Mavericks fans can spend on the team; they can also spend BTC as well. Cuban was previously a Bitcoin skeptic, but his team started accepting the cryptocurrency in 2019 through the payment processor BitPay.

In recent months, the billionaire entrepreneur has also discussed the potential that he sees in decentralized finance (DeFi) and his belief that Ethereum prices will rise higher.

Dogecoin Goes Mainstream

Dogecoin has come a long way since its 2013 launch. The cryptocurrency was originally created as a joke variation on Bitcoin, but it has soared in value thanks to communities such as /r/satoshistreetbets and support from celebrities like Elon Musk.

It remains to be seen whether DOGE will maintain its high price, given the coordinated nature of those campaigns.

However, the coin gained widespread adoption even prior to its most recent surge in popularity. The cryptocurrency has historically attracted support from dozens of exchanges and payment companies. The most recent supporter is the ATM network CoinFlip.

Disclaimer: the author owned BTC, ETH, UNI, and DOT at the time of writing.

Crypto.com Has Introduced a $200 Million Startup Fund

Thu, 04 Mar 2021 20:50:57 GMT

Crypto.com has launched a $200 million fund for crypto startups, according to an announcement from the company.

Crypto.com to date has offered an exchange and wallet, plus crypto cards and loans products. Now, the firm is expanding its horizons: after passing 10 million users, the company is looking for long-term partnerships with crypto entrepreneurs and businesses.

That means Crypto.com will fund new cryptocurrency startups. It will issue cheques for seed rounds ranging from $100,000 to $3 million, and it will lead series A rounds ranging from $3 million to $10 million.

Bobby Bao, co-founder, said: “The motto and operating principle of Crypto.com Capital is ‘Founders First.’ As company builders ourselves, we understand how hard it is to bring game-changing ideas to life. Founders can count on us to move fast and provide both capital and access to a global user base, helping them succeed.”

Crypto.com has gained significant traction in the past year—expanding its user base across the world and even bagging a contract to sponsor Aston Martin’s Formula One team.

Disclosures: Crypto.com is a sponsor of Crypto Briefing. This article was written independently from that relationship. The author held BTC, ETH at the time of press.