It’s Rebel Digest here, with a mashup of only the most relevant bits and pieces of all the top crypto stories that you need to know about.
Fasten your seatbelt and be ready to be brought up to speed in less than 7 minutes. Here are some of the stories in this issue:
Aptos and Mastercard Link Up to Bring Trust to Blockchain
CZ Calls BS on the Fake News by ChatGPT
Sotheby’s Brand New Art House on Ethereum and Polygon
A16Z Chummy with the UK Treasury to Shape the Future of Crypto Regulation
Poloniex Fined for Playing Fast and Loose with Sanctions
Let’s get the details.
Read the full issue to find out
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MARKETS
7-Day Market Moves
Last week, BTC managed to pull off a 1.97% gain, while ETH fell by 0.13% with its price now back to early April levels. In the past 24 hours, the total crypto market cap fell 3.21% to US$1.16 trillion, while trading volume increased 28.9% to US$40.97 billion.
Investors remain cautious about crypto and other assets due to uncertainty about the U.S. banking system and potential failures. Experts predict a 25 bp rate hike by the Fed this week, with rates currently at the highest since June 2006.
In Other News,
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COIN WATCH
Listings
Ongoing ICO
A strong holder offering (SHO) is a fundraising mechanism where eligible investors are chosen based on their on-chain activities and other proprietary data sets.Watch this space as we will notify you of any ongoing or upcoming SHOs.
Upcoming ICO
This week, there are no upcoming ICOs/IDO on major platforms, but some worth noting include LitLab Games, WeFi, SoonSwap, and Fitburn.
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HEADLINES
Aptos and Mastercard Link Up to Bring Trust to Blockchain
TL: DR
Aptos and Mastercard partner to create a new framework.
Blockchain company Aptos is partnering with Mastercard to create a framework called Mastercard Crypto Credential, which aims to establish common standards for attesting interactions on blockchain networks.
The framework will improve trust in on-chain financial transactions and has use cases in payments, remittances, ticketing, and NFTs. The initiative also involves Ethereum rivals Solana, Polygon, and Avalanche, as well as the Solana Foundation, Polygon Labs, and Ava Labs.
In other news,
Justin Sun apologizes to CZ after the SUI launchpool clash. Read more.
Level Finance loses $1M in a smart contract exploit. Read more.
Binance accuses ChatGPT of spreading false information about the company and its CEO, Changpeng Zhao.
The AI bot alleges that CZ has ties to the CCP.
Binance says it’s fake news.
Binance claims that false information about the company and its CEO, Changpeng Zhao, is being fed to OpenAI's ChatGPT to discredit the firm's standing with US lawmakers.
The AI bot suggested that CZ developed a social media platform for the China National Petroleum Corporation and had ties to the Chinese Communist Party, but Binance claims that the information is false and that the bot relied on a fake LinkedIn page impersonating CZ and a Forbes article that has been removed.
Experts warn of AI's potential to spread false news and aid hackers in cryptocurrency, particularly posing a threat to blockchains and protocols with limited security testing.
In other news,
‘Godfather of AI’ resigns from Google, warns of the dangers of AI. Read more.
7,800 jobs at IBM could be replaced by AI within years - CEO. Read more.
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EXCHANGES
Poloniex Fined for Playing Fast and Loose with Sanctions
TL: DR
Poloniex has agreed to pay a $7.6 million settlement to the US Treasury Department's OFAC.
The settlement is for over 65,000 apparent violations of multiple sanctions programs.
Poloniex allowed users in sanctioned countries to conduct over $15 million worth of digital asset trades, deposits, and withdrawals between January 2014 and November 2019.
Cryptocurrency exchange Poloniex has agreed to pay a $7.6 million settlement to the United States Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Asset Control (OFAC) for over 65,000 apparent violations of multiple sanctions programs.
Poloniex allowed users in sanctioned countries to conduct over $15 million worth of digital asset trades, deposits, and withdrawals between January 2014 and November 2019.
The violations were due to Poloniex's failure to retroactively screen users who registered between January 2014 and May 2015, before establishing a sanctions compliance program. The violations were not voluntarily self-disclosed nor egregious, according to OFAC. Stablecoin issuer Circle acquired Poloniex in 2018, and a group of investors, including Tron founder Justin Sun, purchased the firm from Circle in 2019.
In other news,
Coinbase in hot water over alleged privacy violations in biometrics collection. Read more.
Australian crypto exchange Coinjar kickstart of a US expansion. Read more.
SEC slaps Coinme with a 4M fine for misleading investors. Read more.
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NFTs
Sotheby’s Brand New Art House on Ethereum and Polygon
TL: DR
Sotheby's Metaverse is launching a p2p secondary marketplace for NFTs on Ethereum and Polygon networks.
The marketplace will connect collectors and honour artist royalties through smart contracts.
Sotheby's Metaverse, the art auction house's NFT platform, is launching a peer-to-peer secondary marketplace on the Ethereum and Polygon networks.
The platform will offer direct transactions between collectors and will honour artist royalties through smart contracts.
Sotheby's Metaverse will launch with works from 13 digital artists and will rotate artists every few months. Sotheby's has made over $120 million in total NFT sales since jumping into the market in April 2021 and has facilitated record-breaking NFT sales, including a CryptoPunk that sold for $11.7 million and the World Wide Web source code that sold for $5.4 million.
In other news,
NFTs as collaterals - Blur allows users to take loans against digital assets. Read more.
Bored Apes reveal plans to take over Web 3. Read more.
Magic Eden stages a comeback for the NFT marketplace crown. Read more.
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REGULATIONS
A16Z Chummy with the UK Treasury to Shape the Future of Crypto Regulation
TL: DR
A16Z is bringing the VC firepower to the table, ready to tackle the ins and outs of the crypto world with the UK's finest financial minds
Venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz (a16z) has submitted a comprehensive response to the UK Treasury Department's consultation paper on the proposed financial services regulatory regime for crypto assets.
In its response, a16z commends the Treasury for its transparent approach to policy-making and emphasizes the importance of understanding that not all scenarios necessitate the same form of regulation to achieve equivalent regulatory outcomes.
The response letter focuses on the key considerations that regulators must consider when looking to effectively regulate crucial elements of the web3 ecosystem, such as the impact of decentralization on the regulation of crypto asset transactions and decentralized finance (DeFi).
In other news,
US reps plan a series of congressional hearings this month to discuss clear rules for crypto. Read more.
Nigeria is ready to accept token-backed assets but not crypto. Read more.
