Bitcoin News and Finance: What You Need to Know

Visa, the financial services corporation headquartered in San Francisco, California, published a blog post that talks about leveraging ethereum and the layer two (L2) scaling solution Starknet so people with self-custodial wallets can pay their bills. The blog post notes that while Ethereum doesnt support account abstraction or delegable accounts, the financial services company implemented a delegable accounts solution on Starknet, the L2 blockchain network. Visa Develops Account Abstraction Using the L2 Ethereum Scaling Solution Starknet, Payments Company Envisions a Future With Programmable Money On Dec. 19, 2022, Visa’s Crypto Thought Leadership blog published a post written by Andrew Beams, Catherine Gu, Srini Raghuraman, Mohsen Minaei, and Ranjit Kumaresan. Visa’s subject brief is about “auto payments for self-custodial wallets,” and Visa shows that it is possible to leverage Ethereum to execute auto-payments from a self-custodial wallet solution. However, the concept utilizes...

Gold bug and economist Peter Schiff has warned that the price of bitcoin may not rise when other financial assets rebound, even though the crypto fell alongside them. “The bitcoin bubble popped and collectors will be selling no matter what happens to financial assets,” he predicted. Peter Schiff’s Bitcoin Outlook Economist and gold bug Peter Schiff shared his thoughts about the future of bitcoin and cryptocurrency in a series of tweets this week. He wrote Monday: The fact that bitcoin fell along with financial assets doesn’t mean that it will rise once those markets turn. “Bitcoin isn’t a financial asset. It’s a collectable digital token,” Schiff continued. “The bitcoin bubble popped and collectors will be selling no matter what happens to financial assets.” The economist also believes that bitcoin is not scarce despite the cryptocurrency’s 21 million supply cap. Responding to a tweet Tuesday stating that BTC is “the scarcest and most desirable asset the world has ever seen,” ...

A U.S. senator has suggested that cryptocurrency should “maybe” be banned following the collapse of crypto exchange FTX. However, he acknowledged that banning crypto “is very difficult because it will go offshore and who knows how that will work.” Senator Sherrod Brown Suggests Banning Crypto U.S. Senator Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio), the chairman of the Senate Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs Committee, talked about cryptocurrency in an interview with NBC Sunday. He stated that the Treasury Department and all the different regulatory agencies, including the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), need to get together and assess any possible action related to the cryptocurrency market. Referring to the SEC and CFTC, the senator said: We want them to do what they need to do. At the same time, maybe banning it, although banning it is very difficult because it will go offshore and who knows how that will work. Last week, the ...

The Central Bank of Russia plans to use cryptocurrency for cross-border payments in trials with private companies, a member of its top management has revealed. The testing will be conducted under a special legal regime that’s currently under development. Russia’s Central Bank to Explore Crypto Settlements Amid Financial Sanctions The Central Bank of the Russian Federation (CBR) intends to trial international trade settlements with cryptocurrencies, the monetary authority’s First Deputy Chairman Olga Skorobogatova announced on Monday. “We are now planning, within the framework of the experimental legal regime that we are preparing, to try the use of cryptocurrency for international settlements, that is, for foreign economic activity,” she said, quoted by the Tass news agency. Speaking at the State Duma, the lower house of Russian parliament, Skorobogatova detailed that the pilot project will be carried out with interested companies. However, she did not specifically name the market...

Meta will continue to invest in VR (virtual reality) tech in 2023, according to statements made by Andrew Bosworth, head of Reality Labs, the metaverse division of the company. While Meta has made some changes and adapted to the current shaky economic atmosphere, Bosworth states that the company is still committed to its metaverse pivot. Meta to Continue Pushing Metaverse and VR in 2023 Meta, the social metaverse company, is planning to continue to develop metaverse and VR-related projects during 2023. In an article written on Dec. 19, Andrew Bosworth, head of the metaverse division called Reality Labs, explains that while the company has suffered major drawbacks due to the economic downturn, it will still be pushing its new vision forward. Bosworth stated: I can say with confidence that after one of the hardest years in the history of the company, Meta remains as committed to our vision for the future as we were on the day we announced it. Facebook’s rebranding to Meta was an...

FTX co-founder Sam Bankman-Fried (SBF) had a difficult day in court on Monday according to a number of accounts that said SBF’s local attorney seemed to be in conflict with his U.S. legal team. Furthermore, courtroom reports noted that SBF dozed off for an extended period of time and had to be shaken awake by an official. SBF’s Day in Court After Close to a Week in Fox Hill Prison Doesn’t Go so Smoothly According to a number of reports on Monday, Sam Bankman-Fried (SBF) was transferred back to Fox Hill prison after a “confusing turn of events” in court, according to the local island media publication The Tribune. SBF’s local lawyer, Jerone Roberts, “appeared at odds with [SBF’s] U.S. legal team,” the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reported the same day. The Tribune and other reports detailed that SBF had mentioned to the judge that he had not yet seen his U.S. indictment. Roberts was allegedly unaware that his client SBF was supposed to be in court on Monday as well. “I did not requ...

John Carmack, the founder of renowned company ID Software and executive consultant on VR for Meta, has announced he is leaving Meta. Among the reasons for this departure, Carmack signals that there are inefficiencies and self-sabotage at Meta that have affected the work that the company is doing regarding its VR (virtual reality) and metaverse efforts. John Carmack Abandons Meta Meta (formerly Facebook), the social network and metaverse company, has lost one of its leading VR consultants. John Carmack, a founder of ID Software, creators of the Doom franchise of games, has announced his departure from the Meta. In a Facebook post , Carmack explains that his resignation as a VR consultant for the company marks the end of a VR-dedicated decade, and reveals the company is plagued by inefficiencies regarding the work done towards VR and metaverse development. Carmack explains: We have a ridiculous amount of people and resources, but we constantly self-sabotage and squander effort. The...