CBDC Race, Blockdaemon Unicorn, Harmony & Algorand Pour Millions + More News
Get your daily, bite-sized digest of cryptoasset and blockchain-related news – investigating the stories flying under the radar of today’s crypto news.
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CBDCs news
- The Bank for International Settlements is urging central banks to speed up their efforts in developing their own digital currencies (CBDCs) as stablecoins and cryptocurrencies are already a reality. “The time has passed for central banks to get going. We should roll up our sleeves and accelerate our work on the nitty-gritty of CBDC design. CBDCs will take years to be rolled out, while stablecoins and cryptoassets are already here. This makes it even more urgent to start,” Benoît Cœuré, Head of the BIS Innovation Hub, said at the The Eurofi Financial Forum, Ljubljana, today.
Investments news
- Crypto startup Blockdaemon is raising new capital led by venture fund Softbank Vision Fund 2 that will value the company at USD 1.2bn including the investment, The Information reported. The company manages hardware and software to help businesses conduct transactions on the blockchain.
- Harmony Foundation has announced they will allocate USD 300m in the network’s ONE token over the next four years to attract projects. The company aims to support 10,000 startups with bounties, grants, and other incentives.
- Algorand Foundation has announced the launch of its Viridis DeFi fund. This fund will provide ALGO 150m (USD 300m) to fuel the early growth of the decentralized finance (DeFi) ecosystem on Algorand.
- The US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has again extended the deadline for their decision on the Vaneck bitcoin (BTC) exchange-traded fund (ETF). The new deadline is November 14th and has been consistently moved since March 2021, when Vaneck amended the proposal.
- Venture capital fund Bain Capital Ventures has disclosed the creation of a new crypto-focused fund called the BCV Crypto Fund I. It is identified as a pooled investment fund, the filing shows.
- Digital asset manager Grayscale Investments said that three of its single asset products, Grayscale Bitcoin Cash Trust (BCHG), Grayscale Ethereum Classic Trust (ETCG), and Grayscale Litecoin Trust (LTCN) have become SEC reporting companies, per Forbes. All of the offerings will now be regulated in a manner similar to publicly-traded companies on national bourses.
Exchanges news
- SIX Digital Exchange (SDX) said it has formally received the FINMA go-ahead to operate a stock exchange and a central securities depository for digital assets in Switzerland. This authorization enables SDX to go live with a fully regulated, integrated trading, settlement, and custody infrastructure based on distributed ledger technology for digital securities, they added.
Marketing news
- Football club Paris Saint-Germain has announced a multi-year partnership with crypto platform Crypto.com, where Crypto.com will become the club’s Official Cryptocurrency Platform Partner. The partnership will also include releasing a series of non-fungible tokens (NFTs) on the Crypto.com platform.
Adoption news
- The UK’s Post Office will next week start offering users the ability to purchase crypto through its identity-verification service, EasyID, The Telegraph reported. People who use the EasyID app will be able to purchase crypto vouchers from decentralized exchange Swarm Markets.
Career news
- Crypto exchange Binance.us has announced they have appointed Brian Shroder as president of the exchange. This comes a month after previous CEO Brian Brooks resigned from the position.
- Dan M. Berkovitz, Commissioner of the US Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), has stated his intent to depart his position on October 15th, 2021. He has added that it is time for him to “turn to other challenges,” but did not elaborate further.
Mining news
- Crypto mining company Argo Blockchain has announced it has entered into a GBP 18.05m (USD 25m) loan agreement with Galaxy Digital, using a portion of the company’s BTC as collateral. The company’s outstanding loan with Galaxy Digital of GBP 14m (USD 20m) will be rolled into the new loan agreement, resulting in a total outstanding principal amount of GBP 32.05m (USD 45m).
M&A news
- Animoca Brands said it has acquired the Prosper platform, a non-custodial cross-chain prediction market and hedging platform, and its assets including the token reserve of Prosper Tokens (PROS) within Prosper’s possession. The acquisition is not considered to be material, they added.
Crime news
- Ghaleb Alaumary, a Canadian-American citizen who laundered funds for North Korean military hackers using wire transfers and crypto exchanges, has been sentenced to 11 years in prison and ordered to pay USD 30m in restitution by a US federal court.
