Bitcoin News and Finance: What You Need to Know

PRESS RELEASE. Vasyl Virastyuk, the strongest man on the planet in 2004 and 2007, tokenized his autograph through the innovative NFT project PHILOGRAPHY . The strongman was the first to start a partnership with PHILOGRAPHY.BIZ. He provided his original autograph to produce a limited edition of collectible NFT autographs and sell them. This is the project’s first NFT token, which will increase its collectible value and investment value in the long run. Vasyl Virastyuk is the owner of the 2004 and 2007 World’s Strongest Man titles and the multiple world champion in strongman competitions. According to reputable online media, the athlete is among the top 10 strongest men in the world in mankind’s history. Vasyl Virastyuk has set a number of world records. Among them: Movement of 5 streetcars weighing 101.5 tons. Movement of 10 cars with a total weight of 16.5 tons over a distance of 18.5 meters. Movement of 7 cars with a total weight of 11 tons over a distance of 25 meters. Vasy

A Zimbabwean artist, Greatjoy Ndlovu, joined the growing list of African artists pivoting to the non-fungible tokens (NFT) market after his digital artwork was sold for 0.7 ethereum. The sale, which took place on the Async Art NFT marketplace, is Ndlovu’s first foray into the digital art space. NFTs an Opportunity for African Artists According to a report , Ndlovu’s digital art piece, which is called Burnt Out, depicts the challenges that were experienced by health care workers who were fighting to stop the spread of the Covid-19 pandemic. In addition, the report says Ndlovu is hopeful that his break into the NFT space will help “inspire many young creators to take a leap and test the market themselves.” According to the artist — who also serves as the Ambassador of SOS Children’s Village — NFTs represent an “alarmingly bright future” for African art makers. Artists Embrace NFTs Meanwhile, with this pivot to NFTs, Ndlovu joins Nyasha Warambwa and Indigo Saint, the first ar

A recently published report that went viral across social media details how a former U.S. Marine, Stephen Lara, was pulled over by police and was suspected of being a drug trafficker. Police then searched Lara’s vehicle and subsequently took $87,000 in cash from a bag kept in Lara’s trunk. Lara, who also had a stack of automated teller machine (ATM) receipts that showed the funds were legitimate, said “I could not believe that I had just been literally robbed on the side of the road by people with badges and guns.” Policing for Profit — DEA and Nevada Police Leverage Controversial ‘Adoptive’ Forfeiture Scheme to Take Former Marine’s $87K in Cash Civil forfeiture has been a problem for a long time in the U.S., as law enforcement has been known to “police for profit” over the last decade. All law enforcement needs to have is the “preponderance of evidence” to seize funds from someone and then leverage the funds for their own use cases. Since the year 2000, it has been estimated that

Over the last few weeks, Americans have read about the U.S. Internal Revenue Service (IRS) upping its tax enforcement to catch cryptocurrency users who have not paid taxes. According to one report, the IRS may get access to bank inflows and outflows via Joe Biden’s American Families Plan. On top of this, another story explains how an IRS agent posed as a bitcoin trader called “Mr. Coins” on the peer-to-peer (P2P) marketplace Localcryptos.com in a $180K sting operation. America’s Tax Agency Is Stepping Up Enforcement via Biden’s American Families Plan The IRS has been stepping up enforcement against tax evaders and has recently been specifically focused on cryptocurrency transfers. This past April, Forbes contributor Guinevere Moore published a report on how U.S. President Biden’s “American Families Plan” aims to increase IRS enforcement. Essentially, Moore details that America’s financial institutions have always had to report capital gains to the IRS, but under Biden’s plan banks a

The overall market capitalization of all 10,000+ digital assets has reached a September high of $2.33 trillion as it has risen over 5% on Thursday. The crypto economy hasn’t been at this U.S. dollar value since mid-May or approximately 108 days ago, as the value has increased 83.46% since the crypto economy’s low point on July 19 ($1.27 trillion). Crypto Economy Rises 83% in Value, But It Wasnt Due to Bitcoin A lot of money has entered the crypto economy since July 19, and the market capitalization of all the coins in existence today is worth $2.33 trillion. Up more than 5% over the last 24 hours, the crypto economy has not been this valuable in over three months. The last time the crypto economy was in the $2.33 trillion range was May 16, 2021, and prior to that date, it reached an all-time high (ATH) at $2.493 trillion. On July 19, the crypto economy dropped as low as $1.27 trillion and has since gained 83% in value. In fact, the entire crypto economy only needs to gain more t

In late August, the South African Revenue Service (SARS) released new guidelines that clarify the correct treatment of taxable crypto events. The new guidance, which was published on the revenue collector’s webpage, explains how cryptocurrency-related income should be disclosed in tax returns. Distinction Between Income and Capital Gains Tax As shown on SARS’ crypto-asset tax webpage, “income received or accrued from crypto assets transactions can be taxed on revenue account under ‘gross income.'” Alternatively, the new guidance says such gains “may be regarded as capital in nature, as spelt out in the Eighth Schedule to the Act for taxation under the Capital Gains Tax (CGT) paradigm.” SARS also reveals that “taxpayers are also entitled to claim expenses associated with crypto assets accruals or receipts, provided such expenditure is incurred in the production of the taxpayer’s income and for purposes of trade.” Meanwhile, a tax consulting firm, Tax Consulting SA, told to Bit

The Play-to-Earn NFT based Polker.Game ‘s native token $PKR has been officially listed on the popular centralized exchange BitMart. Polker.game has been in the spotlight recently as Akon, the American R&B superstar and record producer gave his official endorsement of polker stating that the “game is revolutionary” and that Polker is “hands down.. the best play to earn, NFT game in the space.”. With the BitMart listing and celebrity endorsement from Akon, Polker is perfectly positioned to become a major player in the Play-to-Earn league. Watch Akon’s Video Here What is Play-to-Earn? Although not a new concept, play-to-earn has become a trending term due to the popularity of the NFT game AXIE infinity. In the past, previous play-to-earn games have also achieved success – however, thanks to the huge amount of development in the blockchain space in recent years the gaming experience is now massively improved. Play-to-Earn games are essentially free to play and open to anyone and

This past weekend at the Market America Worldwide Shop.com 2021 International Convention (MAIC2021), the president of the e-commerce firm, Steve Ashley, announced Shop.com sites from around the world will be accepting cryptocurrencies via Bitpay. This means that bitcoin, ethereum, bitcoin cash, and several other digital assets can be used to purchase products via Shop.com’s websites. Shop.com Now Accepts Digital Currencies via Bitpay Shop.com is accepting cryptocurrencies via Bitpay , the largest crypto payment service provider in the world. Steve Ashley the president and COO of Shop.com announced “the use of cryptocurrency as the next chapter in purchasing products on all Shop.com sites.” Ashley revealed the crypto support at the Market America Worldwide Shop.com 2021 International Convention (MAIC2021). “Today I’m announcing that Shop.com is going to be offering bitcoin, ethereum, and several other cryptocurrencies through Bitpay,” said Ashley. “We’re going to be offering this a

An overwhelming majority of Russian investors view cryptocurrencies as a more attractive investment proposition than traditional fiat currencies or gold, a new survey has established. Even among those who have never traded digital assets, most already think of buying crypto in the near future. Crypto Is the Promising Opportunity for Russian Investors National currencies are losing attractiveness for investors in Russia, a poll by the country’ Association of Forex Dealers ( AFD ) has recently found. Only a little over 14% of the respondents said they would put money into fiat while a staggering majority of 76.9% would rather buy cryptocurrencies such as bitcoin. Less than 9% don’t see good perspectives in any currency and have chosen gold. Over 17% of the participants in the survey transact with digital currencies at least once a month and 35.1% trade crypto even more often than that. Another 24.7% can skip a month and less than a quarter, or 23.1%, have never performed crypto tran

On August 31, 2021, Offchain Labs announced the official launch of Arbitrum One mainnet and further detailed that the company has raised $120 million in funding. The Series B financing led by Lightspeed Venture Partners gives the firm a $1.2 billion valuation. Arbitrum One Mainnet Is Now Live, Offchain Labs Raises $120 Million in Funding The highly anticipated Arbitrum One mainnet launch has been revealed by the firm Offchain Labs and the startup also detailed the company has raised $120 million in financing. Bitcoin.com News has written about the Arbitrum One Layer-2 scaling solution on a few occasions as the protocol leverages Optimistic rollups to help Ethereum scale. A number of popular decentralized finance (defi) projects are leveraging Arbitrum’s gateway in order to give users better fee rates and faster actions. Arbitrum’s technology is leveraged by defi projects like Aave, Balancer, Band Protocol, Coinbase Wallet, Chainlink, Curve, DAI stablecoins, Etherscan, Dodo, Met

PRESS RELEASE. The highly anticipated new crypto friendly social platform, Carbon , has launched. Carbon has been in beta stage since March, undergoing thorough testing, improvements and added features and gaining over 12,000 beta testers. Offering an emphasis on free speech as well as great security and privacy, Carbon includes an end-to-end encrypted messenger, integrated crypto portfolio tracker, Twitter style social feed, Reddit style topics and much more. Influencers have begun to migrate to Carbon as their platform of choice and many are expected to follow. Carbon offers generous crypto rewards for the best content creators, as well as tipping, so it’s little wonder it looks set to become an attractive platform for monetising user influence. The Carbon team is based in Western Australia and highly experienced in designing and launching apps and games. Carbon co-founder Daniel Abela says “We really wanted to create a platform that brought the fun back into social media. We’v

Iran’s Ministry of Industries, Mining and Trade has rejected claims blaming illegal cryptocurrency miners for the continuing electricity shortages in the country. The department believes the state-run utility company, Tavanir, has overestimated their role in the power deficit. Illegal Miners Burn Less Energy Than Tavanir Estimates, Ministry of Industries Says An official from the Iranian Ministry of Industries, Mining and Trade has denied claims by the Iran Power Generation, Distribution and Transmission Company ( Tavanir ) that illegal crypto miners are largely responsible for the ongoing power shortages in the Islamic Republic. Quoted by Way2pay and the English-language business daily Financial Tribune, the ministry’s Director of Investment and Planning Alireza Hadi stated: Figures announced by Tavanir seem to be highly exaggerated. The consumption of illegal miners is considerably lower than the 2,000 megawatts estimated by the utility. According to Hadi, this amount of elec

A crypto survey of U.S. consumers, commissioned by regulated crypto platform Bakkt, shows that nearly half of all respondents said they invested in cryptocurrencies during the first half of the year. Nearly Half of US Consumers Invested in Crypto During the Past 6 Months, Study Shows A survey commissioned by regulated digital asset platform Bakkt shows that nearly half of surveyed consumers in the U.S. invested in cryptocurrencies in the past six months this year. Bakkt was launched in 2018 by Intercontinental Exchange, which operates over a dozen of the world’s most prominent exchanges including the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE). “Commissioned by Bakkt and conducted over an online survey tool, we polled more than 2,000 consumers across the U.S. and was fielded in July 2021 … Data have been weighted for age, race, sex, education, and geography using the Census Bureau’s American Community Survey to reflect the demographic composition of the United States,” the survey report explain

A vocal critic of the upcoming bitcoin law in El Salvador, Mario Gomez, was briefly detained Wednesday. According to reports, he was arrested without a warrant. Critic of El Salvador’s Bitcoin Law Arrested An IT specialist and founder of Hackerspace San Salvador, Mario Gómez, was briefly detained Wednesday morning. His attorney said there was never an arrest warrant for him. Gomez has been a vocal critic of the upcoming bitcoin law in El Salvador. The National Civil Police of El Salvador (PNC) said they detained Gómez “while investigating financial fraud relating to an email phishing scam,” El Faro publication described. A press officer at the Attorney General’s Office told the publication: They tell me it’s a move by the National Civil Police. Our office has no information at this time. Gómez’s mother, who was with him when the arrest happened, explained that the police stopped their car, told her son to get out and go with them. She also said they seized his cell phone. The

In 2021, there’s no doubt that non-fungible token (NFT) collectibles have been extremely popular and NFTs have made billions in sales during the last year. For instance, in the last month Opensea saw $3.44 billion in NFT sales, Axie Infinity saw $838 million, and the pixelated NFTs Cryptopunks saw $653 million in sales. However, there are plenty of NFT skeptics who wonder why JPEGs are selling for millions in ether, and some have suspected auctions and sales could be bolstered by shill bidding or rigging. While NFT Market Values Swell, Skeptics Wonder Why JPEGs Sell for Millions You’ve probably seen all the NFTs in the news as rock JPEGs and pixelated images have been selling for more than most medium-sized homes. Non-fungible token (NFT) assets have made billions of dollars during the last 12 months and believers don’t expect the trend to end. For example, Autoglyph #463 sold for 460 ether or $1.582 million on August 31, and the Art Blocks NFT Fidenza #6 sold for 460 ether or $1.58

This week a project called Pleasrdao announced that a notable Doge non-fungible token (NFT) that sold in June 2021 for 1,696.9 ether or over $3.6 million at the time of sale, will be fractionalized. At the time of sale, the Doge NFT was a historic sale and the NFT’s owner wants others to enjoy the ownership. Furthermore, Cryptopunk #543 is being fractionalized as well and sold at $1 per share. Fractionalizing the Doge NFT Into $DOG A project called Pleasrdao wants to sell shards of the Doge NFT that sold in June for close to 1,700 ether which is now worth more than $6.3 million using today’s exchange rates. The organization’s web portal says that “Pleasrdao is a collective of defi leaders, early NFT collectors and digital artists who have built a formidable yet benevolent reputation for acquiring culturally significant pieces with a charitable twist.” This week the project told the public that it would fractionalize the Doge NFT that sold in June and leverage Fractional Art . The

All the recent money creation from the Federal Reserve wasn’t enough, according to a few American bureaucrats, as three politicians from the House Financial Services Committee are urging U.S. president Biden to replace Fed chairman Jerome Powell with someone who will address “climate risk.” AOC, Tlaib, Pressley: ‘Climate Change Is a Warning of the Potential Catastrophic and Irreversible Damage’ According to three U.S. representatives Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (AOC), Rashida Tlaib, and Ayanna Pressley the Federal Reserve leadership is lacking. Despite the massive amounts of quantitative easing (QE) tactics and a benchmark rate suppressed at zero, the three politicians who are members of the House Financial Services Committee want more. Rashida Tlaib (pictured left) Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (AOC) (pictured middle) and Ayanna Pressley (pictured far right). Speaking with Politico , the representatives otherwise known as the “Squad” explained new leadership is needed in regard to the

Twitter is reportedly testing the option of tipping with bitcoin as part of its “Tip Jar” feature. This followed the company’s CEO, Jack Dorsey, stating that bitcoin is a major part of Twitter’s future, hinting that the cryptocurrency will be part of several upcoming products. Twitter Reportedly Testing Bitcoin Tipping Option Twitter Inc. (NYSE: TWTR) is reportedly testing a bitcoin tipping feature. This development followed CEO Jack Dorsey hinting in July that bitcoin may be integrated into several products, including Tip Jar. Macrumors reported Tuesday: Twitter’s latest beta update introduces support for providing content creators with bitcoin tips using the ‘Tip Jar’ feature that Twitter introduced earlier this year. “Bitcoin isn’t yet available to select as a tip option for beta users, but code in the beta suggests that Twitter is in the process of rolling it out,” the publication described. “Details in the latest Twitter beta indicate that users will be directed through a

On Tuesday, the global talent, sports, and entertainment agency, United Talent Agency (UTA), announced the company has signed three non-fungible token (NFT) projects created by the firm Larva Labs. UTA will work with the NFT collectibles and intellectual property (IP) for Cryptopunks, Meebits, and Autoglyphs across television, film, licensing, publishing, and video games. UTA to Work With 3 Larva Labs Projects Including Cryptopunks The American talent firm based in Beverly Hills, California, United Talent Agency (UTA), has been a growing force since it was established in 1991. With close to 1,000 employees and various divisions, UTA works with merchandise branding and licensing, film, television, digital, books, music, video games, marketing, fine arts, news, and broadcasting. Now UTA is stepping into the world of Larva Labs as it will represent three popular non-fungible token (NFT) projects minted by the NFT startup. This means that the company’s intellectual property (IP) associ

The world’s second-leading crypto asset in terms of market valuation, ethereum, has seen significant gains during the last few days. Over the last 24 hours, ether values have jumped over 5% and during the course of the last week, ether has gained 11.8%. The crypto asset’s $417 billion market cap represents 18.9% of the $2.21 trillion crypto economy. Ethereum Prices Jump Close to 40% in 30 Days All eyes have been on ethereum (ETH) during the last few days as prices continue to climb higher. On September 1, 2021, ETH prices tapped a high of $3,563 per unit gaining more than 5% in value over the last day. Two-week statistics show ether has jumped 18.1% and 39% during the last month. At the time of writing, the crypto asset ETH ’s market cap is $417.5 billion which has increased ETH ’s market dominance to 18.9% while bitcoin ( BTC ) dominance has slid to 40%. ETH /USD chart recorded on September 1, 2021. Out of the $158.5 billion in global trade volume across all the coins in exi