THIS WEEK IN CRYPTO
- You can now bet on Bitcoin and Ether with Euro-denominated futures. CME Group unveiled futures contracts tied to the value of bitcoin and ether denominated in euros rather than dollars on Monday. The launch comes as the euro sits at parity with the dollar and bitcoin hovers around $20,000. The new offerings expand the ability of institutional investors to hedge their foreign exchange exposures appropriately.
- Crypto slump triggers more job cuts at Coinbase-backed Rain. Rain Financial Inc. is laying off hundreds of employees in a fresh round of job cuts, according to people with knowledge of the matter, as the ongoing volatility in digital assets takes its toll on one of the Middle East’s largest crypto exchanges. CEO cites ‘unfortunate changes’ within the crypto industry. Read more here.
- Coinbase, FTX, and Binance get inquiries as Congress looks to crack down on $1 billion crypto fraud. In a series of letters sent Tuesday morning, the committee asked four agencies, as well as five digital asset exchanges — Coinbase, FTX, Binance.US, Kraken, and KuCoin — for information and documents about what they are doing to safeguard consumers against scams and combat cryptocurrency-related fraud. Read more here.
- Thailand tightens crypto advertising rules after the market rout. Ads for virtual tokens must include clear and visible warnings about the risks of investing in cryptocurrencies, the nation’s Securities & Exchange Commission said in an emailed statement on Thursday. Thailand is joining countries like Singapore in seeking to protect retail investors in the wake of a $2 trillion selloff in digital asset markets.
- Crypto lender Hodlnaut is granted protection from creditors. The Singapore High Court granted judicial management to Hodlnaut, giving the struggling crypto lender additional breathing space to come up with a recovery plan. Justice Aedit Abdullah approved Angela Ee and Aaron Loh of EY Corporate Advisors Pte. as the interim judicial managers, Hodlnaut said in a statement on its website on Tuesday.
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- Temasek to lead $100 million funding for crypto landlord Animoca. Temasek will lead the financing through convertible bonds. It adds to a funding round first announced by Animoca in January, when the Hong Kong startup raised $359 million from backers including George Soros and the Winklevoss twins. Now valued at $6 billion, Animoca raised another $75 million in the same round earlier this summer. Read more here.
- Crypto.com mistakenly transfers $7 million to an Australian woman in a refund blunder. A Melbourne woman received quite a surprise when she discovered that nearly AU$10.5 million ($7.2 million) was accidentally deposited into her bank account by the digital currency app Crypto.com. However, the mistake was not realized by the company until months later by which time Manivel had already gone on quite a spending spree.
- Crypto.com pulls the plug on a $495M Champions League Sponsorship deal. The cryptocurrency exchange has backed out of a five-year sponsorship deal worth $495 million with the UEFA Champions League, European soccer's elite competition, according to a report in SportBusiness. The deal, which had reportedly been agreed in principle, would have seen Crypto.com take over as sponsor from Russian-state-owned energy company Gazprom.
- California Assembly passes a crypto regulation bill that requires bank-issued Stablecoins. California Gov. Gavin Newsom is set to sign a recently passed bill requiring digital asset exchanges and other crypto companies to obtain a license to operate in the state. California’s law, if signed by Newsom, a Democrat, would go into effect in January 2025.
- It's a slow death of L1s. Essentially, if there is nothing wrong with ETH post-merge and everything works, it will make more sense to build L2s instead. This would make it quite difficult for alternative L1s to gain traction. This means that unless there is a centralization issue, ETH will have ballooned ahead of the competition by a country mile. Read more here.
