Bitcoin News and Finance: What You Need to Know

PRESS RELEASE. UniLend Finance published their protocol update blog introducing UniLend v2. The Binance Innovation Zone project has earlier this year enabled Lending for every token along with Flash Loans. The team published an initial blog explaining various innovative features in their upcoming version, which will equip UniLend to handle Lending and Borrowing of more than 9000 assets. The protocol went live with the Permissionless listing of any token this august. As a result, it already has more than 25 cryptocurrencies live for Lending and uncollateralised borrowing through Flash Loans. This Major protocol update will equip UniLend to tap into the untapped $1 trillion+ crypto market cap without significant competition. First, let’s take a look at the Key Features of the UniLend V2: Dual Asset Pools – UniLend v2 introduces pools for dual assets similar to the UniSwap liquidity model. Dual asset pools prevent the tokens in a specific pool to be immune to price and liquidity ...

The Bank of Spain, the central bank of the country, criticized the adoption process El Salvador chose when declaring Bitcoin legal tender last month. In a report titled “The role of crypto assets as legal tender: the example of El Salvador,” the bank examines several pain points the country encountered while applying its bitcoin strategy, and raises concerns about how some actions have been taken with little transparency. Bank of Spain Scrutinizes El Salvador’s Bitcoin Bet The Bank of Spain issued a report scrutinizing and reflecting upon the entrance of El Salvador into the Bitcoin world. The report, titled “The role of crypto assets as legal tender: the example of El Salvador,” written by Sergio Gorjón, of the General Directorate of Operations, Markets and Payment Systems, states that as every first-mover, El Salvador committed many mistakes in the implementation of Bitcoin as legal tender. One of the principal worries of the Bank of Spain has to do with the relative lack of tr...

Crypto exchange Binance has launched a $1 billion fund which it calls “the biggest funding program of its kind in the whole cryptocurrency industry.” The company aims for the fund to “push the adoption” of the Binance Smart Chain and “the whole blockchain industry.” Binance Launches ‘the World’s Largest Crypto Accelerator’ Cryptocurrency exchange Binance announced Tuesday the launch of a $1 billion Binance Smart Chain (BSC) Fund. The announcement states: Binance announces the biggest funding program of its kind in the whole cryptocurrency industry — the $1 billion fund to push the adoption of not only BSC but the whole blockchain industry. The Binance Smart Chain mainnet launched in September last year. At the time, the company announced a $100 million BSC Accelerator Fund to support Dapps building on BSC. It seed-funded over 40 projects with up to $1 million. In addition, over 60 projects have been incubated under the company’s Most Valuable Builder (MVB) Accelerator Program ....

Cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase is launching a peer-to-peer marketplace for non-fungible tokens (NFTs). The Nasdaq-listed company says that “Coinbase NFT” will make “minting, purchasing, showcasing, and discovering NFTs easier than ever.” In addition, Coinbase says, “We’re going to grow the creator community exponentially, a win for artists and for fans.” Coinbase NFT to Help Grow Creator Community ‘Exponentially’ The Nasdaq-listed cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase announced Tuesday that it is launching a marketplace for non-fungible tokens (NFTs). Sanchan Saxena, VP of Products at Coinbase, wrote: Today, we’re announcing Coinbase NFT, a peer-to-peer marketplace that will make minting, purchasing, showcasing, and discovering NFTs easier than ever. “Just as Coinbase helped millions of people access bitcoin for the first time in an easy and trusted way — we want to do the same for the NFTs,” he added. Coinbase further explained: “All NFTs are on-chain. The initial launch will sup...

Americans are still concerned about dealing with inflation, as the cost of goods and services has continued to rise significantly in a short period of time. The Federal Reserve has published the latest Survey of Consumer Expectations report and U.S. households believe inflation will be up 5.3% one year from now. In addition to the dreary economic outlook, gas prices across the U.S. have skyrocketed up more than $1 from a year ago. New York Fed’s Survey of Consumer Expectations Continues to Look Gloomy After 2020’s massive monetary expansion, in order to help the economy combat the coronavirus outbreak and help facilitate the lockdown orders that subsequently followed, inflation has crept into the wallets of every American. Month after month, the Federal Reserve has published the central bank’s Survey of Consumer Expectations (SCE) reports, and every month, inflation expectations jump higher. Once again, the latest Fed SCE report published on Tuesday indicates that Americans are st...

HIVE Blockchain is set to expand its data center campus in New Brunswick, Canada with 40 megawatts capacity. It is the first publicly-traded cryptocurrency miner, listing in Toronto on the Venture Exchange back in 2017 and added to NASDAQ in 2021. It mines both Bitcoin and Ethereum using 100% green energy in facilities across Canada, Sweden, and Iceland. HIVE Blockchain to Expand Data Center in New Brunswick, Canada HIVE Blockchain Technologies (NASDAQ: HIVE, TSX.V: HIVE) will soon begin testing a new high-performance computing cloud hosting operation. At the company’s largest data center campus in New Brunswick, Canada, where it owns the land, the team is currently building expansions from the ground-up (“greenfield expansions”), which will provide it with 40 megawatts of data center capacity. HIVE currently operates 5 data center campuses, where they are mining both Bitcoin and Ethereum. HIVE’s data centers already have access to approximately 50 megawatts of power, placing it a...

On Tuesday, the Atlanta-based cryptocurrency payments company Bitpay announced the Israeli software company Wix has enabled its Software as a service (SaaS) e-commerce product to accept crypto-asset payments. The integration will allow Wix merchants to accept 12 different cryptocurrencies such as bitcoin, dogecoin, bitcoin cash, ethereum, litecoin, and stablecoins as well. SaaS Platform Wix Implements Bitpay Infrastructure So Merchants Can Accept Crypto Founded in 2006, by the Israeli software engineers Nadav Abrahami, Avishai Abrahami, and Giora Kaplan, the global SaaS platform Wix provides users with the ability to develop both mobile and HTML5 websites without coding experience. On October 12, Wix announced that it would be implementing Bitpay’s cryptocurrency payment processing infrastructure so users can choose it as an option for the Wix e-commerce platform. Alongside five different stablecoins such as BUSD, DAI, GUSD, USDP, and USDC, Wix Merchant users can also accept bitcoi...

Cleanspark, a Nevada-based energy technology and clean bitcoin mining firm, has announced the purchase of 4,500 Bitmain-brand Antminer S19 bitcoin mining rigs. The company says the mining devices were purchased by leveraging a portion of the company’s bitcoin holdings. Cleanspark Purchases 4,500 ASIC Mining Rigs From Chinese Manufacturer Bitmain The publicly-listed bitcoin mining firm Cleanspark (Nasdaq: CLSK ) announced on Tuesday that the company has purchased 4,500 S19 bitcoin mining rigs from Bitmain. The rigs are expected to start the delivery process by next month and the units were “partially funded through a portion of the company’s BTC holdings.” The company estimates that the machines will increase hashrate by 450 PH/s or 0.45 exahash (EH/s), which is equivalent to Cleanspark’s current capacity. Cleanspark’s acquisition of 4,500 bitcoin miners follows other major purchases of bitcoin mining machines by large-scale operations this year. For instance, at the end of August...

Decentralized finance (defi) has swelled quite a bit this year and on October 5, the total value locked (TVL) in defi protocols crossed the $200 billion mark. Since January 1, the defi TVL across various blockchains has risen almost 855% from $21.4 billion to today’s $204 billion . Total Value Locked in Defi Jumps Over the $200 Billion Handle, Ethereum TVL Commands 69% Dominance The total value locked (TVL) in defi today has jumped nearly ten times higher than the value at the beginning of 2021. On October 5, 2021, the TVL in defi surpassed the $200 billion handle for the first time and the value has remained above $200 billion during the last seven days. Statistics from defillama.com indicate that the defi protocol Curve has the largest dominance with $15.94 billion, up more than 7% over the last week. Curve’s dominance is 7.80% on Tuesday and it interacts with six different crypto networks including Avalanche, Ethereum, and Polygon. Metrics show that Aave, Makerdao, and Wrapped...

Coinzo, one of Turkey’s largest cryptocurrency exchanges, is terminating its digital asset trading services. The platform said its website will remain online in the next six months to allow users to withdraw their holdings in cryptocurrency and Turkish fiat money. Another of Turkey’s Crypto Exchanges Closes Amid Ankara’s ‘War’ on Cryptocurrency Leading Turkish crypto exchange Coinzo announced on Monday it’s ending trading operations. The platform called on customers to withdraw their assets in Turkish lira and cryptocurrency without providing any particular reason for its decision to exit the market. In a notice published on its website, the company stated: 　We have decided to terminate our digital asset service provider (cryptocurrency platform) service. The exchange emphasized that its website, Coinzo.com, will continue to be accessible for another six months, during which traders will be able to log in to their accounts and withdraw Turkish lira and cryptocurrencies. All f...

PRESS RELEASE. Using the iExec Oracle Factory, developers are able to create their own decentralized oracles with just the API’s URL and key. October 12 th , Lyon, France, 2021 – iExec , a decentralized marketplace for computing assets, has announced the launch of the iExec Oracle Factory , a developer interface allowing anyone to create their own oracles, from scratch, in minutes, without any blockchain knowledge and directly from their browser. In order for decentralized applications to solve real world problems, they need to make use of real word data. Decentralized oracles play a major role in blockchain-based architectures, acting as bridges between blockchains and the real world. However, developers who want to create their own oracles need existing blockchain knowledge, and coding them from scratch can take hours. iExec is releasing the iExec Oracle Factory, making oracles accessible to everyone. The iExec Oracle Factory is an interface allowing anyone to create their...

Reports from South Africa say the country’s police have now issued a warrant for the arrest of Sandile Shezi, a 29-year-old cryptocurrency trader. The warrant was issued after one Allan Ledwaba, an investor with Shezi’s Global Forex Institute, accused the cryptocurrency trader of swindling him out of more than $33,000 (R500,000). Using Supercars to Woo Victims According to a report by City Press, Ledwaba’s interactions with Shezi began soon after he attended one of the latter’s seminars where attendees were taught forex trading. Ledwaba alleges that he was shown a “trading account” belonging to Shezi which had over $5.9 million. The report adds that Shezi’s Ferraris and Lamborghinis were also used to entice Ledwaba. Having been convinced by Shezi’s pitch, Ledwaba went on to procure a $33,000 loan from his father, which he invested in the crypto trader’s company. However, soon after investing, Ledwaba says he became suspicious. The report quotes Ledwaba explaining: The agreement ...

Nigerian Vice President Yemi Osinbajo recently warned that the country’s official naira exchange rate of N411 for every dollar is artificially low. This exchange rate, according to Osinbajo, discourages foreign exchange entrance into the country. Naira Exchange Rate Must Reflect Realities of Market Consequently, Vice President Osinbajo says he wants the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) to allow the naira to “reflect the realities of the market.” As a report by The Cable details, Osinbajo also wants the CBN to rethink its foreign exchange management strategy. He explained: We can’t get new dollars into the system, where the exchange rate is artificially low. And everyone knows by how much our reserves can grow. I’m convinced that the demand management strategy currently being adopted by the CBN needs a rethink, and that is just my view. Still, Osinbajo suggested that any such reassessment should only be done when the CBN governor has time to address this issue. Naira Depreciation...

Bitfarms, a bitcoin mining company, announced last week that construction is underway for a mega bitcoin mining farm in Argentina. The facility, which is designed to accommodate 55,000 miners, will be finished by next year. This is yet another signal that mining companies are looking for new areas with favorable conditions and cheap energy to migrate to, including places like Texas and El Salvador. Bitfarms Expands to Argentina Bitfarms, a Nasdaq -listed bitcoin mining company, announced it started building what will be a mega bitcoin mining farm in Argentina last week. The company says this facility will be able to power thousands of miners with power secured through a contract with a private power company. The farm will provide more than 210 megawatts of infrastructure capacity for the company, which reported having a mining power of 1.4 exahash per second in September. About the construction, Emiliano Grodzki, CEO of Bitfarms, stated: Our new high-production facility in Argen...