Bitcoin News and Finance: What You Need to Know

This week Universal Music Group, the Dutch–American multinational music corporation announced the formation of a non-fungible token (NFT) metaverse music group called Kingship, which features four Bored Ape Yacht Club (BAYC) NFTs. Following the announcement, the hit record producer Timbaland revealed the creation of a metaverse-based entertainment company called Ape-In Productions (AIP), which will also leverage BAYC NFTs. Universal Music Group Reveals BAYC NFT Supergroup Called Kingship While non-fungible token (NFT) collectibles have been all the rage this year, one particular collection called Bored Ape Yacht Club (BAYC) has turned a lot of heads in terms of sales and popularity. Data shows that BAYC has an overall market valuation of $1.82 billion and the collection has seen $658 million in all-time sales volume, according to dappradar.com statistics. BAYC’s trade volume has been among 9,296 traders across 22,122 sales. The average sale price for a single BAYC NFT on November...

PRESS RELEASE. The blockchain industry is an ever-evolving world and Litentry is at the forefront of this revolution. Litentry intends to create a truly decentralized identity aggregation solution that will power web 3.0 applications. Its blockchain architecture is advanced and has witnessed massive growth due to its application in different sectors. Litentry has also created a DID Startups Programs that incentivizes innovative teams to build products that will add value to its blockchain. To continue its growth, Litentry has applied for a Polkadot Parachain slot that will transform its ecosystem. This article will open your imagination into the future of web 3.0 that can be achieved when Litentry gets a parachain. A decentralized ecosystem for innovative projects Litentry has built an innovative decentralized based identity ecosystem that has attracted several projects to its blockchain protocol. One of such projects is the Polkadot Naming System (PNS). PNS intends to introduc...

Egyptian billionaire Naguib Sawiris has said he remains bullish on gold and has no intention to invest in cryptocurrencies like bitcoin because such investment is a very risky business. Sawiris Says Gold Still Safe-Haven Asset In his remarks published by The National News, the billionaire reveals he believes it is wrong for people to make comparisons between gold and bitcoin. Sawiris, who is also the executive chairman of Cairo-based Orascom Investment Holding, insists gold is still the safe-haven asset. “I’m still very bullish [on gold] and it is a safe haven. People now are comparing Bitcoin with gold; it’s a wrong comparison,” said the billionaire. As a sign of his endorsement of gold ahead of cryptocurrency, one of the companies that Sawiris backs, AKH Gold, is reported to have signed a deal to explore nine blocks in Egypt’s gold-rich Eastern Desert. Similarly, La Mancha Holding — the company which the billionaire chairs — is reported to have launched a $1.4 billion investmen...

Goldman Sachs’ head of energy research says, “Just like we argue that silver is the poor man’s gold, gold is maybe becoming the poor man’s crypto.” He sees funds starting to flow from gold into bitcoin as inflation fears escalate, noting that “We’ve argued historically that crypto and gold do not have to cannibalize each other.” Goldman Sachs on Gold and Bitcoin Damian Courvalin, Head of Energy Research at Goldman Sachs, talked about the outlook for gold and crypto in an interview with Bloomberg Thursday. He was asked whether he sees any evidence of investors using other assets, including bitcoin and cryptocurrencies, to hedge against inflation other than gold. “I think it’s actually starting,” he replied, adding: “We’ve argued historically that crypto and gold do not have to cannibalize each other.” Admitting that “it’s a fact, we have seen substitution recently,” he detailed: Just like we argue that silver is the poor man’s gold, gold is maybe becoming the poor man’s crypto. ...

A former CEO of Citigroup said that every major bank and securities firm will consider crypto trading or services within one to three years. He also hopes that central banks worldwide will adopt digital currencies. Former Citi CEO Expects All Major Banks to Embrace Crypto in 1-3 Years Indian-American banker Vikram Pandit, a former CEO of Citigroup, talked about the outlook for cryptocurrency and central bank digital currencies (CBDCs) at the Singapore Fintech Festival event last week. Pandit became the CEO of Citigroup in December 2007 and led the U.S. bank during the financial crisis. Prior to Citi, he joined Morgan Stanley in 1983 and ultimately became president and chief operating officer of the company’s institutional securities and investment banking businesses. He co-founded investment firm Orogen in 2016 where he currently serves as the chairman and CEO. He explained at the fintech conference that all major financial institutions will soon be thinking about trading or provi...

Another major cryptocurrency exchange has added support for the meme cryptocurrency shiba inu. Gemini has begun supporting SHIB alongside a few new defi, metaverse, infrastructure, and data management tokens. Meanwhile, the petition for Robinhood to list the shiba inu crypto has garnered more than 531K signatures. Shiba Inu (SHIB) Now Supported on Gemini Cryptocurrency exchange Gemini announced its support for the meme cryptocurrency shiba inu (SHIB) Friday. The company wrote: We are delighted to announce support for shiba inu (SHIB) as well as a range of new defi, metaverse, infrastructure, and data management tokens. The exchange detailed: “shiba inu (SHIB), audius (AUDIO), mask network (MASK), wrapped centrifuge (WCFG), quant (QNT), radicle (RAD), burn (ASH), superrare (RARE), fetch.ai (FET), and numeraire (NMR) are now supported for deposits and custody on Gemini.” The company added: We believe these tokens will provide value to our users and will continue to support defi...

Visa’s head of crypto sees a “whole new class” of mainstream consumers entering the crypto space due to non-fungible tokens (NFTs). The executive f urther says: “Crypto is becoming cultural. It’s becoming cool.” Visa’s Executive: ‘Crypto Is Becoming Cultural, It’s Becoming Cool’ Cuy Sheffield, Visa’s head of crypto, talked about cryptocurrency during a panel discussion early this week at the Singapore Fintech Festival. He explained that a “whole new class” of mainstream consumers are entering the crypto space because of non-fungible tokens (NFTs). The Visa executive added that people who are interested in art, music, or culture are “setting up crypto wallets in waves,” noting that they are excited to create their own NFTs and support other creators. Before the NFT boom, Sheffield said crypto assets mainly attracted people who are interested in gold and finance. “It used to be that if you were investing in crypto, you were kind of weird,” he opined, elaborating: Crypto is becomi...

PRESS RELEASE. ChangeHero instant cryptocurrency exchange listed SHIB on its platform. Customers can exchange SHIB against over 80 cryptocurrencies without an account. Now crypto enthusiasts can easily exchange or buy SHIB not only with Ethereum based tokens but also with cryptocurrencies of different blockchains. To celebrate the listing, ChangeHero announced a zero fees exchange offer for SHIB. Users can exchange SHIB to any other cryptocurrency or the other way around without any fees. The offer is valid until November 15, 2021, and available only on the web version of the platform. One can make a simple exchange with SHIB using the Best Rate type of transaction on ChangeHero. Please note that the zero fees exchange offer is not valid for the Fixed Rate type of transaction. There are no additional requirements such as a registration for the users to enjoy the offer. Furthermore, there is no maximum limit on the amount of SHIB that can be exchanged in a transaction. About Shiba ...

A recent report by CR2 on Africa’s fintech transformation suggests traditional financial institutions can still be a part of the fintech financial revolution if they leverage one of their most significant assets: client trust. Partnerships Between Banks and Fintechs The report urges financial institutions that wish to accelerate their advance to success in the fintech space to forge partnerships with fintech startups and technology companies. Having such partnerships, as well as their longstanding client networks and more defined regulatory environment, means financial institutions can still grow their share of Africa’s digital market. To illustrate the importance of the collaboration between banks and fintech, the CR2 report makes reference to the story of how one Nigerian bank, GTB, lost clients after its mobile banking platform went offline. The report then contrasts GTB’s misfortunes with the rise of the VC-backed fintech startup Kudabank, which saw its customer base rise fro...

A group of South African cryptocurrency investors have voiced concerns about the fate of their investment in the Fight to Fame (F2F token) after they reportedly were unable to withdraw their funds as promised. Token Sale Attracts Over 2,000 Applicants According to an IOL report , the investors had invested in a token that was promoted by Marius Fransman, a former regional leader of South Africa’s governing party, the ANC. Some media reports suggest Fransman’s company may have received over 2,000 applications from investors that include actors, writers, musicians, and directors that wanted to be a part of the project. Fransman had planned to use the funds that were raised to promote an international TV reality boxing show called “Fight to Fame.” The report adds that Fransman’s company, F2F SA, would host large entertainment events at venues such as big casinos, where the tokens would be the means to access the venue and also to be exchanged for gambling chips. Yet as one anonymous ...

While the price of bitcoin has been volatile during the last seven days, a number of smart contract platforms have been performing far better this week. Statistics indicate that the total value locked (TVL) in decentralized finance (defi) is $267 billion and the TVL held on Ethereum commands the lion’s share of this value. Ethereum is the largest smart contract platform today, in terms of market valuation, but a number of competitors have increased significantly in value over the last 12 months. 3 Smart Contract Tokens Surpassed Ethereum’s 12 Month Gains by a Long Shot The largest smart contract platform Ethereum (ETH) has a market valuation of around $555 billion and it commands 18.7% of the entire crypto economy’s net value. Metrics also show that there’s $267 billion TVL in defi today, and the Ethereum protocol captures $179 billion or 49.16% of the overall TVL in defi. In terms of trade volume, ether has $15.5 billion in global swaps today, which is much larger than its compet...

Following the passing of the Biden administration’s infrastructure bill, the U.S. president appears to be nearing his decision on whether or not he will reappoint Jerome Powell, the current Federal Reserve Board chairperson. According to a few reports Powell may be chosen, but other reports say the Fed’s Board of Governors member, Lael Brainard, could also be a frontrunner for the position. President Biden to Choose Fed Chair ‘Fairly Quickly’ Amid the rising inflation and supply chain woes, U.S. president Joe Biden is thinking about who will run the Federal Reserve when Jerome Powell’s term ends next February. Media pundits say the timing “ is crucial ,” as the U.S. central bank has been discussing tapering back quantitative easing (QE) and adjusting rates upwards. Of course, these have all been just conversations so far and the members of the Fed have yet to decide on tapering back large asset purchases and hiking the benchmark rate. Meanwhile, rising inflation has reared its u...

U.S. law enforcement agents have “kidnapped” crypto entrepreneur Denis Dubnikov in Mexico, before transferring him to the Netherlands where he was arrested, his lawyer told Russian media. Dubnikov is suspected of money laundering and faces up to 20 years in prison if extradited to the United States. FBI Accused of Kidnapping Russian Citizen With Cryptocurrency Business The U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation ( FBI ) has “practically kidnapped” Russian national Denis Dubnikov in Mexico, later arrested in Amsterdam on Nov. 1, his lawyer Arkady Bukh alleged, speaking to Sputnik. The co-founder of crypto trading platforms Coyote Crypto and Eggchange was first held at the airport in Mexico City while on vacation and then boarded a flight to the Netherlands where he was detained by Dutch authorities. The defense attorney explained: Mexico has not let him enter the country. The US intelligence services have put him on a plane to the Netherlands and sent him there having paid for his ti...

On November 6, 2021, Alchemy Pay’s Chief of Staff, Karmen Tang, delivered her keynote address at the Epicenter Crypto Conference in Lisbon. Tang took the audience through a brief history of Alchemy Pay and the broad ecosystem they have now built within blockchain infrastructure. The founders of Alchemy Pay come from giants of traditional payments such as Mastercard, QFPay, PayPal, and Tencent. “Experience, expertise and networking have all been key to what Alchemy Pay does. That gives us that edge over others in the crypto payment space,” said Tang. Significant Network Growth In the past year, Alchemy Pay has achieved significant growth and secured new partnerships including access to PayPal payment channels in Q4 of 2020, and to Visa and MasterCard payment channels earlier this year. Today, Alchemy Pay is in over 60 countries, and provides over 200 payment channels for fiat and crypto acceptance. The industry still faces a lack of real-world use cases and in order to solve this A...

Lawmakers from the Liberal Democratic Party of Russia are gearing up to introduce a draft law designed to regulate crypto mining. The nationalists say the legislation will benefit both Russian citizens and the state, as well as those who want to get involved in the business legally. Nationalists Propose Regulations for Russian Crypto Miners The popularity of cryptocurrencies, rising with their market value, has drawn the attention of the nationalist faction in the State Duma, the lower house of Russian parliament. “Unsecured” bitcoin is now trading at $68,000 per coin, one of its members, Andrey Lugovoy, noted in comments to local media this week, adding: If three years ago someone invested 1 million rubles, they would now have 5 billion. The deputy revealed that his Liberal Democratic Party of Russia ( LDPR ) is going to file a draft law on the regulation of cryptocurrency mining. Digital coin minting has also expanded in the vast and energy-rich country where it still develops...

Onedegree, a virtual insurer based in Hong Kong, will provide insurance services for digital assets as part of a partnership with a local cryptocurrency exchange. By working together, the two firms hope to alleviate concerns discouraging potential investors from entering the crypto market. Onedegree to Underwrite Insurance Policies for Crypto Assets Hong Kong has several licensed providers of virtual insurance services and one of them, Onedegree, will now offer up to $100 million in coverage to Hkbitex, a crypto trading platform operating in the global financial hub. The two companies have teamed up to protect clients’ cryptocurrencies entrusted to the exchange against risks such as theft and hacking. According to a report by the South China Morning Post on Thursday, Onedegree becomes the first insurer to underwrite insurance policies for crypto assets in Asia while few companies around the world offer this kind of service. The available coverage, the publication revealed quoting i...

Terra, an algorithmic stablecoin project, will burn $4.5 billion worth of terra (LUNA), its native token, from its community pool. The decision was taken using the on-chain governance system, and according to proposals 133 and 134, the LUNA will be burned and swapped for the native stablecoin of the chain, UST. This burn is expected to raise the price of LUNA, at least in the long term. Terra Starts Burning LUNA Terra, a smart contract-enabled algorithmic stablecoin project, passed a pair of proposals to burn $4.5 billion worth of terra (LUNA), its native token, from community pools. The burn will occur every 800 blocks produced, and its purpose is to adapt the structure of the currency for the new Columbus 5 upgrade, which changed the way UST is produced. The UST obtained from the burn will be reallocated to the community pool, with governance responsible for deciding what to do with these funds. The first swap transaction already took place earlier this week. After the whole sta...

Investment bank Morgan Stanley has stated the metaverse is now the next big investment theme, in a note directed to investors Thursday. Strategists from the bank believe this alternate conception of reality is amassing important interest from companies like Meta (formerly Facebook) and Microsoft, which are already trying to grasp the concept. Some of these companies are already capitalizing on it. ‘Metaverse’ the New Buzz Concept Morgan Stanley, one of the biggest investment banks in the world, announced it considers the metaverse the next big investment scheme, according to a note directed to investors Thursday. The metaverse is a concept that includes the construction of an alternate universe where individuals can model their image to whatever they want to be, and perform real-life tasks such as buying things, gaming with friends, and other activities. The concept has already been grasped by companies that are trying to build their respective takes on it. Facebook was renamed t...

While bitcoin has been hovering above the $60K handle for a great majority of the last 28 days, the network’s hashrate has jumped considerably during that time as well. Since August 13, Bitcoin’s hashrate has climbed 42% from 110 exahash per second (EH/s) to today’s 157 EH/s. Moreover, after nine consecutive difficulty changes, going forward, it will be 50% more difficult to mine bitcoin than it was three months ago for the next two weeks. Bitcoin’s Hashrate Follows the Price Rise At the time of writing, Bitcoin’s hashrate is coasting along at 157 EH/s and approximately 14 known mining pools are dedicating hashpower to the network. 16.39 exahash or 10.24% of the network is being mined by stealth miners and the hashrate is classified as “unknown.” The unknown hashrate represents the fifth-largest mining ‘pool’ dedicating hash toward the network. Meanwhile, during the last three months, Bitcoin’s hashrate has followed the price moving northbound. The overall hashrate is 42% higher ...

A large amount of cryptocurrency has reportedly been withdrawn from a wallet previously controlled by the Finiko Ponzi scheme in Russia. The wallet’s unknown operators have transferred coins worth $48 million this month. The digital currency was split into smaller amounts and deposited to different addresses. 750 BTC Removed From Crypto Pyramid Finiko Wallet A total of 750 BTC , worth around $48 million at the time of writing, has been withdrawn from one of the wallets used by crypto Ponzi scheme Finiko, Forklog reported . Youtube blogger Andrey Alistarov broke the news about the transfer, revealing that it was made in three separate transactions of 250 BTC each since the beginning of November. The money was initially moved to a single address and subsequently sent to another wallet at the cryptocurrency exchange Huobi, quoted data from blockchain analysis platform Crystal Blockchain shows. The crypto funds were then divided into smaller amounts and transferred to other addresse...

In mid-June, the ‘Speedy Trial’ lock-in period for the Bitcoin network upgrade Taproot locked in at block height 687,285 and was mined by the bitcoin mining pool Slushpool. Taproot is expected to activate on the network on Saturday, November 13, 2021, and the upgrade is considered one of the largest changes the protocol has seen since Segregated Witness (Segwit) went live in 2017. Bitcoin Upgrade Taproot Expected to Activate on Saturday Taproot is expected to activate and go live on the main network on Saturday, November 13, 2021, following the lock-in period this past summer. When activated, Taproot is expected to enhance the digital currency network’s scripting capacity and the ability to leverage Schnorr signatures (BIP340) will be made available. Taproot is also expected to amplify bitcoin transactions by allowing certain types of complex, ‘smart’ transactions. People say this often but this is actually the first time I do… this may literally be the last dip before a HUGE ral...

ADALend , currently in the process of developing a decentralized financing (DeFi) project has just announced its plans to start the development of its cross-platform integrations very soon. The cross-platform integrations will simplify and allow access to decentralized financial services by a larger segment of users around the globe. ADALend’s GM, Javed Khattak, has earlier announced that ADALend will work on its UI and the platform’s user experience and simplicity to provide less barriers of entry for traditional users to get involved with decentralized financing. About ADALend ADALend is a decentralized lending protocol governed by the Cardano system. Within this Cardano system, ADALend will influence the flexibility of digital finance markets by providing a basis for immediate access to loans and collaterals, resulting in sustained liquidity of the blockchain assets of the lender. Permissionless Lending On Any Pairing Guarantees the users will always be granted the best o...