Bitcoin News and Finance: What You Need to Know

In another world-first for the non-fungible token (NFT) space, Steve Job’s handwritten job application letter in its physical form and an accompanying digital NFT of the same item will go head to head in respective auctions. Auction to Expose How Collectors Value Different Formats As NFTs continue to push the boundaries of possibilities, whether introducing new, novel use cases for tokenization or adding layers of value propositions to existing physical items, the question of collector preference is set to best tested. Today, at 9:41 AM Pacific Daylight Time (PDT), Rarible and Snoofa will be hosting simultaneous auctions set to last for six days featuring Steve Job’s 1973 handwritten job application in two rival formats: the original physical copy and an NFT version. The written application highlights Job’s skills and interests, underlining his experience just a year before moving to Atari, which was then just a startup in the gaming space. Rarible, an NFT marketplace for creat...

The Nigerian pop artist and celebrity, Davido, recently posted several tweets endorsing ‘rapdoge,’ the so-called “first deflationary meme token fully supported by celebrities & rappers.” In one of the tweets, Davido tells his 9.5 million followers to “buy $20, $100 or $1000 worth of rap doge tokens and be ready to make some money.” Pump and Dump In a subsequent tweet , Davido, who has previously said he was thinking about starting a bitcoin trading company, asks: “Who listened to me about RapDoge?” Following the artist’s shilling of the coin on July 19, 2021, the rap doge token price surged by more than 100% as interest in the crypto grew. However, at the time of writing, rapdoge, which promoters claim to be the next big meme coin, saw its value return to pre-shilling levels. In the meantime, it seems the pop artist’s latest endorsement of a crypto asset has not gone over well with some of his followers. As a Cryptotvplus report explains, Davido’s shilling of the rapdoge tok...

Opensea has become the latest non-fungible token (NFT)-focused firm to raise funds this year as the company announced raising $100 million in a Series B this week. The venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz led the Opensea financing round alongside investors like Kevin Durant, Ashton Kutcher, and Tobi Lutke. NFT Marketplace Opensea Joins the Blockchain Unicorns, Project Now Supports Polygon One of the largest non-fungible token (NFT) marketplaces today, Opensea , has announced the company has raised $100 million in a Series B funding round. Additionally, the project also announced it was expanding its features to “cross-blockchain support” and Opensea will start supporting the Polygon blockchain. The funding round led by Andreessen Horowitz (a16z) puts Opensea into the unicorn status of blockchain startups with a valuation of $1.5 billion after the Series B. “At Opensea, we believe NFTs are emerging as one of the first consumer-oriented killer applications for blockchains,” the ...

On Wednesday, following the drop below the $30,000 region, bitcoin’s price has rebounded more than 8% since Tuesday’s low. Meanwhile, the sentiment metric recorded by the Crypto Fear and Greed Index (CFGI) is extremely low, pointing to “extreme fear” in the market. Despite being a scary term, the time is usually the best time to obtain assets for a lower price. However, data from Tradingview’s technicals show bitcoin is still in the “sell” range, while bitcoin market oscillators are more “neutral.” CFGI Sentiment Metric Reaches ‘Extreme Fear’ The price of bitcoin (BTC) tapped a low of $29,300 on July 20, 2021, and since then the price has managed to jump back above the $32,000 handle. Despite the rebound, there’s a lot of uncertainty within the crypto space as far as short-term bitcoin price predictions are concerned. BTC /USD chart shows bitcoin managed to climb back above the $32K zone on Wednesday. Some believe the price may plunge to the $20,000 zone again and others believ...

According to reports stemming from investigative journalist Matthew Russell Lee, from Inner City Press, former Ethereum developer Virgil Griffith has violated the terms of his bail and has been taken into custody. According to the reports, the U.S. Attorney’s Office revoked Griffith’s bond because he allegedly tried to access the crypto exchange Coinbase. Report Says Virgil Griffith Violated His Bond Terms At the end of November 2019, the United States Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York (SDNY) arrested the former Ethereum Foundation member Virgil Griffith for allegedly “assisting North Korea in evading sanctions.” After the Manhattan U.S. Attorney revealed the news, the cryptocurrency community erupted in outrage . A year and eight months later, Griffith was released on bail but reports from Matthew Russell Lee of Inner City Press note that he’s recently been taken into custody. Allegedly, Griffith violated the terms of his bail and the SDNY judge presiding o...

Off the coast of the Irish Sea, humans have lived on the Isle of Man since before 6500 B.C. The island has a robust history of Viking Age treasures. According to a recent announcement from Manx National Heritage, a heritage agency located there, an amateur treasure hunter recently discovered a hoard of Viking silver on the island. U.S.-based researcher and numismatist, Dr. Kristin Bornholdt-Collins, said the unearthed Viking silver hoard was similar to today’s cryptocurrency and embodied a 1,000-year-old comparison to Satoshi Nakamoto’s Bitcoin. Viking ‘Hack’ Silver Hoard Was Modern-Day Equivalent to a Cryptocurrency Just recently, an amateur treasure hunter searching for trinkets on the Isle of Man found a hoard of Viking silver otherwise known as “hack silver.” Manx National Heritage disclosed that the stash of ancient money contained 87 silver coins, 13 pieces of silver arm-rings, and a small fraction of other numismatic artifacts. The Viking stash was discovered in April when Ka...

Core Scientific, a major blockchain hosting and digital asset mining company, is going public through a merger with Power & Digital Infrastructure Acquisition Corp. The deal values the combined company at approximately $4.3 billion. Core Scientific to List on Nasdaq Core Scientific Holding Co., one of the largest blockchain hosting and digital asset mining companies in North America, announced Wednesday its plan to go public on Nasdaq via a special purpose acquisition company (SPAC). The crypto firm has entered into “a definitive merger agreement” with Power & Digital Infrastructure Acquisition Corp. (Nasdaq: XPDI), a publicly traded SPAC backed by the world’s largest asset manager, Blackrock. Under the agreement, XPDI will acquire Core Scientific. The combined company is expected to operate as Core Scientific Inc. and remain a publicly listed company on the Nasdaq stock market. The announcement states: The transaction [acquisition] values the combined company at an imp...

China’s first insurance policy using the digital yuan for settlement has been issued in Shenzhen, local media reported. The new product, targeting medical personnel exposed to coronavirus risks, is offered by the country’s largest insurer, Ping An. The financial giant also has fintech and healthtech entities under its umbrella. Ping An Teams Up With Bank of China to Offer Digital Yuan Insurance Policy In what has been described as another major step towards wider deployment of China’s central bank digital currency ( CBDC ), the first digital yuan-settled insurance policies have been launched in Shenzhen, Guangdong Province. They come as the result of cooperation between the local subsidiary of Ping An Property Insurance and the Bank of China’s branch in the city, the Shenzhen Special Zone Daily reported . The new insurance product is oriented towards medical staff in Shenzhen’s Nanshan district. The policy provides 300,000 yuan (over $46,000) in coverage for death resulting from C...

Three U.S. senators have urged the United States Olympic & Paralympic Committee to forbid American athletes from receiving or using digital yuan during the Beijing Olympics. Raising many concerns, including privacy, they warned, “Olympic athletes should be aware that the digital yuan may be used to surveil Chinese citizens and those visiting China on an unprecedented scale.” US Senators Raise Concerns About China’s Digital Yuan Three U.S. senators wrote a letter to Susanne Lyons, the chairman of the board of the United States Olympic & Paralympic Committee (USOPC), Monday with concerns regarding the digital yuan. Senators Marsha Blackburn, Roger Wicker, and Cynthia Lummis wrote: “We write to express our concerns with the communist Chinese government’s plans to officially launch the Digital Currency Electronic Payment, commonly referred to as the digital yuan, prior to the Beijing Winter Olympics in 2022.” They clarified: Specifically, we urge the United States Olympic ...

The HOPR protocol provides network-level and metadata privacy for every kind of data exchange. Designed to be better than TOR, the mixnet protects the identity of both sender and recipient by routing data via multiple intermediate relay hops that mix traffic. Now the project launches staking with NFT rewards and you can earn over 18.25% APR. The HOPR Staking Program HOPR , the first-ever open incentivized communication mixnet where users earn tokens for running nodes, is launching a gamified staking program. The contract is available for staking deposits from July 20th, rewards will start to pay out from July 27th and the program will run for 175 days. The contract will be deployed on xDAI Chain and the staking token will be xHOPR. To stake and lock tokens you can simply send xHOPR to the contract address from the address you want to stake from. Rewards will be paid out in wxHOPR, the project’s wrapped token. The developers will also provide an interface to manage your stake, rewar...

The European Commission has proposed legislation to “ensure full traceability of crypto-asset transfers, such as bitcoin,” in order to prevent and detect “their possible use for money laundering or terrorism financing.” Moreover, “anonymous crypto asset wallets will be prohibited.” New EU Rules Ban Anonymous Crypto Transactions and Wallets The European Commission presented a set of legislative proposals Tuesday aimed at strengthening the EU’s anti-money laundering and countering terrorism financing (AML/CFT) rules. Among the proposals is a revision of the 2015 Regulation on Transfers of Funds “to trace transfers of crypto-assets.” The proposals take into account “new and emerging challenges linked to technological innovation,” including “virtual currencies, more integrated financial flows in the Single Market and the global nature of terrorist organisations,” the Commission explained. At the heart of the proposed legislative package is the creation of a new “EU-level Anti-Money La...

The Turkish government has prepared a bill designed to implement new regulations for the country’s crypto space. The legislation, which will be filed in the parliament this fall, will introduce taxation for crypto holdings and specific capital requirements for companies operating with digital assets. New Legislation to Regulate Turkey’s Crypto Market Following in the footsteps of the West, Turkey is planning to soon put its crypto space in order. The work on a draft law aiming to strengthen investor protection, prevent dirty money laundering, and improve control over cryptocurrency trading has been completed, the Deputy Minister of Treasury and Finance Şakir Ercan Gül announced. Quoted by the Sabah daily, Gül noted that the Turkish regulations will be similar to those that are being introduced in Western Europe and the United States, although a “little more stringent,” the official remarked, citing the country’s free-floating exchange rate regime as a factor. Speaking to the parli...

FTX Trading Ltd. announced the firm has closed the largest capital raise in crypto exchange history in a Series B funding round for $900 million. The financing gives FTX a valuation of around $18 billion and the crypto firm aims to expand its global presence. FTX Closes Largest Capital Raise in Crypto Exchange History FTX has seen a number of partnerships and growth in 2021 and following the firm’s Series A financing round last year, the company raised $900 million from over 60 investors for its Series B. The company details that since the last funding round, FTX revenues have increased tenfold and it now has over one million users. Investors that participated in the $900 million Series B include Paradigm, Sequoia Capital, NEA, Coinbase Ventures, Willoughby Capital, the Paul Tudor Jones family, Izzy Englander, Alan Howard, Vaneck, Hudson River Trading, and Circle Financial. The newly injected funds will be dedicated to expansion and increasing both FTX users and products. FTX will ...

As Georgia seeks to bring its millennia-old wine industry into the 21st century, it is collaborating with blockchain platform Wiv to put the nation’s winemakers in front of a global audience of wine collectors, producers, and merchants. Move Brings Wines and Accompanying Provenance to Blockchain Although not well-known on the global wine stage, Georgia has a long and storied history of wine production that dates back more than 8,000 years. Much of the winemaking techniques remain unchanged for millennia, with producers still employing traditional methods that involve clay storage vessels during the maturation process, known as a kveri, instead of wooden barrels. Today, the country boasts approximately 525 grape varietals and more than 1,800 producers, with wine exports reaching 94 million bottles in 2019. To modernize the industry and engage with the growing global community of wine producers and consumers, the Georgian government has selected Wiv to bring its wine industry into t...

PRESS RELEASE. 20th July 2021, SINGAPORE – Leading DeFi and NFT gaming platform Seascape Network is working with Binance NFT, enabling the integration of BSC for exclusive NFTs from their upcoming Zombie game series on the brand new Binance NFT Marketplace . Binance NFT Mystery Boxes The limited edition zombie slayer character Wichita will be exclusively available only through Binance NFT patented Mystery Boxes and will be available in 5 qualities. Higher quality NFTs are extremely rare and bring players higher rewards when using them in Seascape’s upcoming 5th game. With a finite number of the rare NFTs minted, serious players are encouraged to try and acquire them via the NFT Mystery Boxes to start staking them for competitive rewards. Seascape tops DeFi games category This news comes after a series of high points for the growing gaming network this summer. All of its DeFi games earned top 10 spots in BSC’s DeFi games category , and their original NFTs Scapes were Number ...