Bitcoin News and Finance: What You Need to Know

The 78th United States secretary of the treasury Janet Yellen told CNN’s “State of the Union” on Sunday that U.S. lawmakers are considering taxing unrealized capital gains. According to Yellen, the funds collected would help finance things related to climate and social change. While Yellen said that U.S. senator Ron Wyden (D., Ore.) was working on drafting the plan, a great number of Americans have been criticizing the proposal on forums and social media. Janet Yellen Discusses Unrealized Capital Gains Tax Proposal, House Speaker Pelosi Approves The phrase “unrealized capital gains” has been trending on social media and forums during the last 24 hours after the U.S. secretary of the treasury Janet Yellen discussed the subject on CNN’s “State of the Union.” Yellen explained the concept, which aims to tax Americans on unrealized capital gains stemming from liquid assets. Of course, like the controversial $600 IRS monitoring proposal, Yellen stressed that the proposal was aimed at “

PRESS RELEASE. The MetaHUMAN Foundation has announced a grants program to support a new generation of projects looking to adopt and build on top of HUMAN Protocol. Successful applicants will have access to an allocated fund of $10 million, to supercharge the adoption of the Protocol, and realize new possibilities for HUMAN technology across new use cases. HUMAN Protocol is an open-source infrastructure. It is a beginning – a new way to represent and verify human value and contribution – that can be built upon. With each new application, the diversity of work processed by the Protocol expands, and the utility of the HMT token as a means to represent all forms of contribution increases. HUMAN Protocol facilitates a new future of work by offering a permissionless system of exchange. Automated by software, enforced by smart contracts, and settled on the blockchain, HUMAN Protocol means any input or interaction can be tokenized, and its value securely represented. Its primary application

As authorities in the EU are still discussing union-wide cryptocurrency regulations, a major U.S. bank has reportedly lobbied the Irish government to adopt its own rules for the space. BNY Mellon launched its digital asset business in Ireland this year to provide custodian services to institutional investors. Banking Giant BNY Mellon Calls for Irish Crypto Regulations U.S. banking corporation BNY Mellon, which established a crypto unit in Ireland this spring, has urged the country’s finance ministry to introduce crypto regulations while the EU rules for the space are still being developed, the Irish press reported. The bank’s digital hub in Dublin was set up to provide depository services for digital assets to institutions interested in cryptocurrency investments. A report by the Irish Independent unveils that representatives of BNY Mellon met with the Irish Minister of State at the Department of Finance Seán Fleming in May to try to convince the government about the need to adopt

Do Kwon, co-founder and CEO of Terraform Labs, the company that backs the Terra blockchain ecosystem, is suing the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). Kwon, who was served a subpoena while appearing at Messari’s Mainnet conference as a presenter, states this behavior was against the SEC’s own policies, and that they needed to go through proper channels to deliver the subpoena. Do Kwon Takes the Fight to the SEC Do Kwon, the co-founder and CEO of Terraform Labs, the company behind the design and creation of Terra , a smart contracts-enabled cryptocurrency, is suing the SEC over an incident that happened during the latest installment of Messari’s Mainnet conference. He had been conducting conversations with the SEC about possible actions against Mirror Protocol, a decentralized app that tracks prices of stocks for synthetic assets. The lawsuit explains the SEC had contacted Kwon in May to talk to him about the operation of Mirror Protocol, and the connection of Terraform

The construction of a bitcoin mega-mining farm in Argentina by Bitfarms is raising concerns for legislators. Martín Berhongaray, a national deputy, recently presented a resolution to force the government to disclose information about the installation of the facility, through representatives from the Ministries of Science, Technology and Innovation, Environment and Sustainable Development, and of the nation’s economy. Bitfarms Mega Farm in Sights of Legislators The ambitious project that Bitfarms, a mining behemoth headquartered in Canada, is building in Argentina, has already started to raise concerns with Argentinian legislators. Martín Berhongaray, a national deputy, introduced a law proposal for the government to explain how this deal was conceived and whether the company has passed oversight of the different state institutions linked to the deal, like the Ministries of Science, Technology and Innovation, Environment and Sustainable Development, and of the nation’s economy. The

On Friday, American social news aggregation and discussion website, Reddit published a job listing seeking a senior backend engineer for a non-fungible token (NFT) platform. As part of Reddit’s development team, the new hire would help “design, build and ship backend services for millions of users to create, buy, sell and use NFT-backed digital goods.” Reddit’s Job Application Is Looking for a Senior Engineer for a Possible NFT Platform Reddit seems to be in the midst of creating a non-fungible token (NFT) feature on its platform and from a recent job description it seems to be a marketplace. Reddit is seeking a “senior backend engineer” for its “NFT platform,” the recently added job listing explains. Reddit has already dipped its feet into cryptocurrency solutions and blockchain technology by leveraging Ethereum and Arbitrum . The job listing for a new engineer dedicated to NFT technology has a different focus than the firm’s community points system. “If there is one thing we’ve

PRESS RELEASE. The next-generation NFT Infrastructure – Label Foundation has announced the successful completion of its private sale round. Supported by many leading VCs and famous Grammy-winning artists, the NFT platform raised $1.0 million during the private sale that generated major interest from top investors and venture capitalists in the finance and blockchain industries. A major milestone for Label Foundation The private sale round was led by HG ventures and backed by some of the leading venture capitals and institutions in the blockchain sphere, such as GBIC, Mindfulness Capital, IOST, M6, Adaptive, and Icetea Labs, Alphabit,, and Pragma. These Venture Capital firms have joined forces to fund the next generation NFT infrastructure that provides the P2P incubating platform to foster the education platform. Speaking on the development, Simon Jeung co-founder at HG Ventures, revealed his delight in the development. “As the lead investors in the LABEL Foundation, we are first a

The Nigerian President, Muhammadu Buhari, is expected to formally launch the country’s central bank digital currency (CBDC) on October 25, 2021. High-Level Endorsement of the CBDC According to a statement released by the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), the formal event marking the e-naira’s launch will be held at the Buhari’s official residence. After the initial launch was postponed due to different factors, the CBN suggests in the statement that it has done enough to prepare for the launch this time around. The press statement explains: Following a series of engagements with relevant stakeholders including the banking community, fintech operators, merchants and indeed, a cross-section of Nigerians, the CBN designed the digital currency, which shall be activated on Monday, October 25, 2021. Describing the e-naira launch as a major step forward in the evolution of money, the CBN insists its CBDC will be available to everyone. The CBN to Promptly Address Challenges Encountered

Twitter and Square CEO Jack Dorsey has warned that hyperinflation will soon happen in the U.S. and elsewhere in the world. “Hyperinflation is going to change everything. It’s happening,” he predicted. Many people disagreed with him, however. US Will Soon Experience Hyperinflation, Says Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey The CEO of Twitter and Square Inc., Jack Dorsey, tweeted a warning about hyperinflation in the U.S. Friday. “Hyperinflation is going to change everything. It’s happening,” he wrote. Comments flooded his tweet. At the time of writing, it had garnered more than 7K comments and had been liked 70.1K times and retweeted 22.9K times. In a follow-up tweet, Dorsey emphasized: “It will happen in the U.S. soon, and so the world.” The Twitter CEO’s tweet came as consumer price inflation is running near a 30-year high in the U.S. and there are increasing concerns that the problem could be worse than what policymakers led on. Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell acknowledged Friday tha

Tesla CEO Elon Musk has shared what he believes to be the most important dogecoin improvements. He also clarified that he does not have anything to do with the Dogecoin Foundation and is not investing in the shiba inu (SHIB) token. Musk confirmed that he is only holding three cryptocurrencies. Elon Musk on Dogecoin Improvements, Shiba Inu Token Tesla and Spacex CEO Elon Musk made several tweets about cryptocurrency, bitcoin, dogecoin, and the shiba inu token Sunday. Regarding Dogecoin’s improvements, he was asked whether he had any recent interactions with the Doge development team. While admitting that he had not interacted with them lately, Musk shared: What matters imo is lowering fees, decreasing block time & increasing block size. A single layer network with exchanges as de facto layer 2 seems like the simplest solution for a medium of exchange. Dogecoin co-creator Billy Markus chimed in and responded to Musk’s Doge improvement tweet. He stressed that in his opinion, “

While the African continent is generally viewed as one of the most ideally placed to embrace and fully exploit the blockchain, the reality on the ground suggests otherwise. The East Africa Blockchain Expedition As Adedayo Adebajo, the managing director of Jelurida Africa and a blockchain enthusiast told Bitcoin.com News, much of the focus in terms of investment has been on two regions, Southern and West Africa. Adebajo suggests in written responses to questions sent to Bitcoin.com News that the East Africa region is being left behind. Therefore, to correct this anomaly, Adebajo has organized the East Africa Blockchain Expedition, an education and awareness campaign that will see him tour several African countries. This expedition, which commenced on October 23, is set to run for 30 days. To learn more about this expedition as well as its objectives, Bitcoin.com News sent questions Adebajo, and below are his responses. Bitcoin.com News (BCN): Can you explain in brief what this bl

PRESS RELEASE. Adshares ($ADS) decentralized network working since 2017, created the possibility to connect Publishers and Advertisers directly with the use of blockchain and allows them to sign advertising contracts without intermediaries. The Adshares team is constantly putting in a lot of effort to grow their ecosystem which shows that Adshares is considered one of the biggest players in the decentralized ad network market in the world for a reason. This is well illustrated by the number of impressions of their ads, which surpassed 200 million per month . Metaverse is a concept of a future iteration of the internet, made up of persistent, shared 3D visual spaces linked into a perceived virtual universe. The metaverse in a broader sense may not only refer to virtual worlds, but the Internet as a whole, including the entire spectrum of augmented reality. Metaverse is just a big evolution of physical reality, augmented reality and virtual reality all combined into one creation.

Bitcoin’s hashrate has been increasing a great deal during the last three months, as it’s increased more than 32% from 103 exahash per second (EH/s) on July 25 to today’s 137 EH/s, with a few highs in between around the 189 EH/s mark. Bitcoin’s price spike has pushed the hashrate higher and in a week’s time, the overall mining difficulty is expected to increase for the eighth time in a row. Bitcoin Hashrate Steadily Rises Higher As bitcoin’s price is still more than 30% higher during the last month, even after the fall below the $60K region, the network’s mining power has increased a great deal. Three-month statistics show that Bitcoin’s hashpower has jumped above the 160 EH/s zone nine times since July 25 and over 180 EH/s once so far. At that time three months ago, BTC ’s hashrate was steadily recovering from the bitcoin mining crackdown in China and the mass migration that followed. The hashrate and bitcoin’s spot price was much lower three months ago, as the network’s processin

According to a recent report, Beijing is pressing the fast-food retail chain McDonald’s to support the digital yuan before the Winter Olympics in China scheduled for February 2022. The report notes that China is also pushing companies like Visa and Nike to join in on the central bank digital currency (CBDC) rollout. Chinese Government Pushes McDonald’s, Visa, Nike to Accept CBDC The People’s Republic of China is preparing for its full roll-out of the CBDC in February 2022, during the introduction of the Beijing Winter Olympics. According to the Financial Times ’ (FT) unnamed sources, the Chinese government wants McDonald’s to get on board with the digital yuan. FT notes that a large quantity of McDonald’s restaurants in Shanghai are currently testing China’s CBDC. Now Beijing is pressing the company itself to get more McDonald’s restaurants to follow Shanghai’s lead. A source stemming from McDonald’s told FT: “Shanghai is our pilot city and we will learn from customers’ response.”

During the last month, four out of five of the top stablecoins by market capitalization saw their valuations swell in size. At the time of writing, there’s $135.4 billion in stablecoins but the top five collectively represent 94.40% of that total. While the largest stablecoin in terms of market cap increased by 2% over the last 30 days, the stablecoin DAI issued by the Makerdao protocol expanded by 22%. Tether and Circle’s USD Coin Rule the Roost Stablecoins are very popular these days and it’s safe to say that these dollar-pegged tokens are not going anywhere any time soon. For instance, at the time of writing, there’s around $29.2 billion in global trade volume dedicated to bitcoin ( BTC ) trades only. Currently, the stablecoin tether ( USDT ) commands 61.46% of all the BTC trades according to cryptocompare.com data . Below the U.S. dollar is the stablecoin BUSD, a stablecoin curated on the Binance Smart Chain as BUSD commands 5.29% of all BTC trades today. BUSD is, in fact, t

On October 22 at 4:52 p.m. (EDT), a miner that acquired 50 bitcoin on May 17, 2010, spent the funds that sat idle for 11 years and five months. There hasn’t been a 2010 block reward spent in three months and the last time a 2010 miner spent their ‘sleeping bitcoin’ was on July 4, 2021. After waiting patiently for more than a decade, the miner who spent the ‘sleeping bitcoin’ on Friday saw a percentage gain of 76,249,900% if the individual cashed out into U.S. dollars today. Old School Miner Spends 2010 Block Reward After Bitcoins Sat for More Than a Decade It’s been a while since a block reward of 2010 ‘sleeping bitcoins’ have been spent and on Friday, a block reward from that era was transferred after sitting for 11 years and five months. Prior to Friday’s 2010, block reward spend, the last 2010 block transferred was on July 4, 2021. Bitcoin.com News, alongside help from the creator of the blockchain parser btcparser.com , and members of the Telegram channel “Gold Found In Sand,”

PRESS RELEASE. NFTs are all the rage right now – they are essentially unique units of data that generally represent a piece of art, media, or other forms of digital files. There are many interesting projects in youthful stages right now, but one of the most prominent NFT projects to arise recently is CryptoDragons . The project is currently offering a limited collection of 10,000 NFT dragon Eggs for minting. The uniqueness of each individual Egg illustration has been generated through Artificial Intelligence, facilitating a process where the technology creates art. Once the Eggs hatch a unique firstborn Dragon will be minted. It can earn, battle on blockchain Arena, give offspring to the CryptoDragons Metaverse. This means that the initial 10,000 Eggs can be an investment, providing Egg owners an opportunity to generate an offspring of unique NFT dragons. The DNA of a dragon can consist of a genome package of 12,000 possible attributes. The project uses the term “Egg Today, Dra

The main organization representing participants in the Russian crypto space has lambasted authorities in Moscow for not doing enough to regulate the industry. The criticism comes four years after President Putin directed institutions to legally define the status of digital financial technologies. Regulators Accused of Failure to Take Russian Crypto Market Out of Shadow Russian regulatory bodies have been criticized for their actions regarding the cryptocurrency industry in the country. According to Yuri Pripachkin, head of the Russian Association of Cryptoeconomics, Artificial Intelligence and Blockchain ( Racib ), their actions are still “half-hearted” and are not aimed at finding a systematic solution for Russia’s state policy in the field of digital assets. Speaking to the business news portal RBC, Pripachkin reminded about President Vladimir Putin’s order from Oct. 21, 2017, in which the Russian leader mandated the adoption of legislation tailored to define the legal status of

While Colombia is not a country that has embraced cryptocurrencies compared to Venezuela or some African countries, it is the country with the second most cryptocurrency ATMs in the Latam region. The reason behind this could be that Colombia has a high percentage of cash usage. This makes cryptocurrency ATMs a very important tool for adoption in the country. Colombia, Crypto ATM Haven There is a cryptocurrency ATM boom going on in Colombia right now, being this is the country that hosts the second-highest number of these ATMs in the region. Columbia was in first place until not so long ago, before El Salvador made its bitcoin bet and declared the leading cryptocurrency legal tender. Currently, there are 50 cryptocurrency ATMs in Colombia, but the reasons for this boom are still not clear to some. Colombia has not been especially known for its cryptocurrency adoption, and its involvement with cryptocurrencies at a government level was limited to a regulatory sandbox that exchanges

Central Bank of Russia isn’t prepared to admit a bitcoin exchange-traded fund (ETF) to the market, the head of the regulator, Elvira Nabiullina, told Russian media. Her statement, reaffirming the bank’s hardline stance on cryptocurrencies that has been recently criticized again, came after the debut of bitcoin ETFs in the U.S. Central Bank of Russia Not Open to Bitcoin ETFs Yet The Central Bank of Russia ( CBR ) is not ready to permit the trading of ETFs based on bitcoin futures, its chair Elvira Nabiullina said at a press conference this week, quoted by the business news portal RBC. Nabiullina made the comment in response to a question whether the Russian monetary policy regulator is going to follow the example set by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and authorize the listing of bitcoin ETFs in the country. The first such investment fund, the Proshares Bitcoin Strategy ETF, launched on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) on Tuesday, Oct. 19, reaching almost $1 bi

Last week the leading luxury auction house Sotheby’s introduced its non-fungible token (NFT) marketplace called “Metaverse.” The Sotheby’s NFT marketplace has featured a number of collectible artworks including cards from the Rare Pepe card collection. Now the socialite Paris Hilton has introduced a few of her NFTs on Sotheby’s native NFT market featuring works from popular NFT artists such as Chelsea Evenstar and Maalavidaa. Leading Auction House Sotheby’s Introduces Metaverse NFT Market The British-founded American multinational luxury auction headquartered in New York City, Sotheby’s has been going big on non-fungible token (NFT) collectibles in recent times. Last week the company introduced the “ Sotheby’s Metaverse ” in order to host and auction the hottest NFTs in the space. The original Sotheby’s website could not offer the same experiences Metaverse offers and people can host their NFT collections by connecting with Sotheby’s. Just recently a collection of some of the rare