Month: April 2021

The billionaire investor and television personality, Mark Cuban recently did an interview on the recent episode of a podcast and discussed crypto assets at length. Cuban says his cryptocurrency portfolio is 60% bitcoin, 30% ethereum, and the rest is dedicated to smaller cap cryptos. Mark Cuban Shares His Crypto Portfolio Allocations Mark Cuban is a well known investor, one of the hosts on Shark Tank, and the owner of the National Basketball Association’s (NBA) Dallas Mavericks. For years now, Cubans Read more …

The current acting director of the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network, or FinCEN, will bid farewell to the governing body in April. His replacement: Michael Mosier, Chainalysis’ former chief technical counsel.  “Director Kenneth A. Blanco today announced several leadership changes impacting the bureau,” said a public statement from FinCEN on Friday, adding: “Director Blanco announced he will depart FinCEN on April 9, after serving as the organization’s director since December 2017. Michael Mosier, former FinCEN Deputy Director and current Counselor to Read more …

According to an April 1, 2021, release from the U.S. Department of Justice, a federal court in Manhattan has entered an order authorizing the IRS to serve a John Doe summons to cryptocurrency payments company Circle and its subsidiaries, including the cryptocurrency exchange Poloniex. A John Doe summons is an investigative tool used by the IRS to obtain information about unidentified U.S. taxpayers. In this case, it is attempting to compel Circle to provide information about users who conducted cryptocurrency Read more …

Hype cycles can work wonders for token prices and social media statistics, but they also bring increased pressure on developers to launch a functioning product that validates its rising market cap.  As nonfungible tokens took center stage over the past six weeks the decentralized finance (DeFi) sector took a break from the spotlight as developers refined their protocols and sought out interoperable, Ethereum network alternatives. Data from CoinGecko shows that the total value locked (TVL) on all DeFi platforms has Read more …

In a flurry of price action reminiscent of 2017 mania, shortly after announcing that they had acquired NFT display and tracking platform Tokenwave, pop-culture collectibles giant Funko’s stock (NYSE: FNKO) rallied over 20%.  Unlike many price-pumping announcements heavy on hype and sparse on content from the last bull run (and the dozens inevitably to come over the next few months), Funko and NFTs may be a perfect fit, however. On Thursday the creator of the widely popular Funko Pops collectibles Read more …

Ethereum, crypto’s second largest asset by market cap, has broken its previous all-time price high near $2,041 , set on February 19, 2021. Ethereum (ETH) hit a record price high of approximately $2,081 today, according to TradingView data. ETH trades near $2,067 at time of publication. Since its February high, ETH has corrected twice on its daily chart, posting a higher low on the second correction. In the days after its $2,041 summit, the asset dropped down to about $1,293. ETH Read more …

On paper, the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) was created more than 30 years ago by G7 countries to fight organized criminal and narcotic financial flows. The intergovernmental organization describes itself as a “dynamic contributor to peace and security” and issues recommendations that most countries transpose into national laws. In practice, it’s a totally different story than just laudable intentions with limited effects on society. The FATF can decide to arbitrarily place jurisdictions on gray and black lists, which has Read more …

Morgan Stanley has filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to add bitcoin exposure to 12 of its mutual funds’ investment strategies. These mutual funds may invest in bitcoin futures as well as obtain indirect exposure to the cryptocurrency through investments in Grayscale Bitcoin Trust, the filing details. Bitcoin Exposure for 12 Morgan Stanley Mutual Funds Morgan Stanley Institutional Fund Inc., the asset management division of Morgan Stanley, filed a statement of additional information supplement with the U.S. Read more …

Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse said performing a single Bitcoin transaction requires burning 75 gallons of gasoline. This shocking statistic gives a degree of the scale of Bitcoin’s possible environmental impact. Bitcoin Gets a Thumbs Down From Environmentalists It emerged recently that Bitcoin’s annual energy consumption currently matches that of a mid-sized country, with Argentina given as an example. Garlinghouse said Bitcoin’s proof-of-work consensus model ensures the problem will get worse as the network grows. This is because rising price correlates Read more …

With more than 35 million customers, $21 billion in revenues and $3.8 trillion in discretionary managed assets, Fidelity Investments is one of the largest investment management companies in the world. It may need all its heft to break the losing streak of crypto-fund sponsors that have gone up against the United States Securities and Exchange Commission. As reported, Fidelity filed with the SEC on March 24 a preliminary registration statement on behalf of its Wise Origin Bitcoin Trust — an Read more …

Polkadot and Chainlink have announced the release of Chainlink’s Price Feeds as a module, or “pallet” in Polkadot terminology, for the Substrate blockchain framework. The release means that any project building on the Substrate framework — which includes Polkadot and Kusama parachains, as well as independent blockchains — can integrate Chainlink oracles through a simplified library. The announcement comes as the latest result of a long-standing collaboration between Chainlink and Polkadot, now offering a tangible product that can enable a Read more …

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has greenlighted Coinbase’s initial public offering via a direct listing on Nasdaq, the company has confirmed. Coinbase’s IPO is set to debut in two weeks, on April 14. Coinbase IPO to Debut in 2 Weeks Coinbase Global Inc. announced Thursday that the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has declared its registration statement relating to its initial public offering (IPO) effective. The company has also set a date for its IPO, stating: Coinbase Read more …