The Worldcoin Foundation, co-founded by Sam Altman, Alex Blania, and Max Novendstern, has announced that the protocol migration of the Worldcoin project to the OP Mainnet will be completed on July 24, 2023. One of the driving forces behind this endeavour is Sam Altman, the CEO of OpenAI and the founder of ChatGPT. The project’s

Dogecoin (DOGE) increased by up to 5% in response to Twitter’s makeover on Monday. During the European morning hours, bitcoin (BTC) fell below $29,100, defying the larger market decline. Elon Musk’s Twitter is renaming to X as part of his X.AI artificial intelligence-focused group of enterprises. Musk placed the ticker logo for dogecoin to his

Last week, eleven startups announced funding rounds as venture capital and investment firms invested $201.4 million in cryptocurrency initiatives.The highest deals were a $54 million raise for the metaverse business Futureverse and a $40 million Series A financing for RISC Zero, a provider of zero-knowledge proof tools for developers.This week, infrastructure projects shown their resistance to the crypto winter once again, as evidenced by the six financing rounds that fell into this category: RISC Zero, Cosmic Wire, Manta Network, Echooo Wallet, Side Protocol, and Over Protocol.A growing cryptographic technique for mathematically validating transactions while ensuring anonymity, zero-knowledge technologies are the focus of both RISC Zero and Manta Network. Following the announcement of the deal, the token of one project, RDNT from Binance Labs-backed DeFi lender Radiant Capital, increased by more than 10% to 31 cents. The cryptocurrency-focused company Polychain Capital received $200 million in an initial close for its fourth venture capital fund this week, according to a story in Fortune.These specifics have not been verified by Polychain.The information in the table only pertains to funding rounds when a dollar amount was given.As of Friday, July 21 at 5 p.m. ET, the data was accurate.After that, any deal announced will be included in the roundup the following week.

According to crypto asset management CoinShares, there was a $13 million outflow from bitcoin (BTC) investment products last week, breaking the trend of weeks that saw significant inflows. Instead, investors preferred funds that focused on lesser cryptocurrencies like ether (ETH) and Ripple’s XRP.The entire value of digital asset funds decreased by $6.5 million each week after increasing by $742 million over the preceding four weeks. After some significant catalysts in recent weeks, BTC investors appear to have run out of good news to bid on, which is when the trend reversed.On June 15, the long-desired slot for a BTC exchange traded fund was filed for by the world’s largest asset management company BlackRock.Investors poured money into BTC-focused investment funds over the following month at the quickest rate since October 2021 as a result of the BlackRock revelation.BTC’s price reached a new yearly high earlier this month when XRP partially defeated the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) in court, but it immediately dropped below $30,000.However, the decision increased investor confidence in altcoins, which are alternative cryptocurrencies to bitcoin, as seen by positive capital flows throughout last week. Among all cryptocurrencies, ETH-focused investment products saw the highest inflows, reaching $6.6 million.According to James Butterfill, head of research at CoinShares, the surge indicates that “sentiment, which has been poor this year, is beginning to turn around” for the second-largest crypto asset.Over the past 11 weeks, XRP funds received inflows of $2.6 million, or $6.8 million, or 8% of all inflows into assets under management.This suggests that investors are growing more optimistic about the future of XRP, according to Butterfill.Smaller altcoin holding funds saw positive flows of $1.1 million, $0.7 million, and $0.7 million, respectively, for Solana’s SOL, UniSwap’s UNI, and Polygon’s MATIC.

Alphapo, a payment processor for numerous gambling businesses, revealed a breach of their hot wallets today, July 23, 2023. The hack resulted in a loss of nearly $23 million in Ethereum (ETH), TRON (TRX), and Bitcoin (BTC) coins. The actual amount of Bitcoin stolen is unknown. Alphapo is well-known for handling payments for a variety

The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has shown no signs of abandoning its central bank digital currency (CBDC) programme despite the former governor’s removal about two months ago.The CBDC smartphone app has recently been improved by the central bank by integrating Near Field Communication (NFC) technology, claims local news source The Sun.This improvement makes it possible for mobile devices and payment terminals to communicate while they are close to one another, making contactless and practical eNaira payments possible. The CBN reportedly highlights that the most recent addition of NFC technology will play a vital role in increasing the adoption rates for the CBDC despite the fact that earlier versions had QR codes.According to reports, the CBN’s deputy director for risk management, Joseph Angaye, stated that the banking regulator is committed to using cutting-edge technologies to improve user experience. Angaye reportedly stated that the CBDC would include programmability features, embracing the idea of leveraging cutting-edge technology.He noted that by limiting CBDC payments to specific government programs only, these programmability features could lower the danger of fraud.According to reports, Angaye went on to underline that the programmability of the CBDC enables targeted financial allocation to farmers, enabling certain goals like the purchase of tools.This strategy ensures that the intended usage is strictly followed by making the money put into their eNaira wallet non-divertible for any unrelated uses. According to sources, Angaye emphasized the benefits of CBDCs for retail users in the nation, including reducing settlement risks and facilitating quick transaction processing.He noted that the eNaira’s goal is to solve the problem of financial inclusion, and that Nigeria’s role as a pioneer in the adoption of CBDCs offers useful lessons for other economic players and entities to draw from. Nigeria introduced the eNaira in 2021 to join a select group of nations having a CBDC program.However, adoption rates have fallen short of forecasts, leading the central bank to consider a number of usage-boosting approaches.While integrating USSD capabilities into the service, the central bank released use cases in the transportation sectors.Former CBN Governor Godwin Emefiele attributed poor adoption rates to commercial banks’ suppression of eNaira’s expansion in favor of their own profitability.

Bundle Africa, a significant player in the crypto field, has stated that it will discontinue its exchange services in order to focus on Cashlink, its payment solution for the Web3 ecosystem. The announcement was issued on July 20, 2023, and the last day of operation for the exchange services is slated for September 10, 2023.

According to a court filing, Craig Wright, who claims to be Satoshi Nakamoto, will be able to make his case that the Bitcoin file format should be given copyright protection under UK law after having his appeal against a prior court denial granted by a panel of three UK judges. A UK Court rejected Wright’s argument that he should be able to halt the operation of Bitcoin and the system that branched from it, Bitcoin Cash, because they infringe upon his intellectual property rights on February 8, 2023.A large number of defendants (26 in total) connected to Bitcoin, including developers and several units of the cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase, were the targets of Wright’s lawsuit.Wright asserts that the Bitcoin Satoshi Vision blockchain, which he forked off of another Bitcoin, is the genuine Bitcoin blockchain. “This ruling means the judges only agreed that Dr. Wright should be allowed to argue that the Bitcoin file format is sufficiently well-defined to receive copyright protection under UK law,” said a statement from the Bitcoin Legal Defense Fund, a nonprofit set up by former Twitter chief Jack Dorsey to assist developers facing

Bitget, a prominent crypto derivatives and copy trading platform, has revealed plans to expand into the Middle East, as published on July 20, 2023. The Seychelles-based exchange plans to hire 60 more employees as part of its worldwide scaling strategy to increase crypto adoption among new audiences. The Middle East area, recognised for its booming

The French Central Bank announced recently that its wholesale central bank digital currency (wCBDC) will increase cross-border payments, settlement finality, and security for a wide range of financial assets after undertaking multiple tests utilising crypto-powered technology. “Through these experiments, the Banque de France demonstrates the operational feasibility and practical implementation of the three models it

Following several delays, Indonesia’s new cryptocurrency exchange and clearinghouse is now open for business, the nation’s commodities regulator announced on Thursday.The government had intended for operations to begin by the end of 2021, but delays—the most recent occurring in February—have caused the launch to be delayed.The release states that the long-awaited market has been open since July 17. Given that it is government-approved, the platform is more comparable to a regular stocks market, such as the New York Stock Exchange, Nasdaq, Tokyo Stock Exchange, etc., than to cutting-edge crypto exchanges like Binance or Coinbase. “The establishment of exchanges, clearing houses and managers of crypto asset storage is proof that the government is present in an effort to create a fair and fair crypto asset trading ecosystem to guarantee legal certainty and prioritize protection for the public as customers,” Didid Noordiatmoko, head of the Indonesian Commodity Futures Trading

Binance Venture Capital has invested $10 million in Radiant Capital, a lending and borrowing mechanism based on decentralised finance (DeFi). The increased money will be used to develop technology and products, such as extending collateral and deploying on the Ethereum mainnet. Radiant is built on LayerZero Labs’ architecture, another Binance Labs portfolio business. By acting

FedNow, the controversial quick payments service offered by the United States Federal Reserve, went live Thursday, with 35 banks and credit unions participating, according to the central bank. JPMorgan Chase and Wells Fargo are among the early adopters, with 16 other institutions supporting payment processing that the Fed claims would provide just-in-time access to salaries

In a document released on Thursday, the U.K. government rejected legislative proposals to regulate cryptocurrencies like gambling, claiming that its current ideas better handle the risks posed by occurrences like the FTX crash.The Treasury Committee of the House of Commons voiced worry in May that government planned to treat the cryptocurrency industry too leniently, leading individuals to believe that investing in bitcoin (BTC) or ether (ETH) is secure, by using standards that are generally comparable to those for traditional finance.According to the Treasury answer, “The Government firmly disagrees with the Committee’s recommendation” regarding retail crypto trading and investing. According to the government, “a system of gambling regulation, in isolation, would be unlikely to address these risk factors” like the alleged mixing of customer funds at cryptocurrency exchange FTX or address issues with insider trading and market manipulation that are dealt with by conventional financial regulation. “The recommendation to rely on gambling regulation would represent a fundamental departure from the Government’s intended approach which reflects recommendations from global standard-setting bodies,” the government said,citing suggestions from the Financial Stability Board that the 20 largest economies in the world’s recent endorsement of their finance ministers, and warning that divergence would only drive cryptocurrency offshore. The U.K.’s financial sector has cautioned that its rulemaking is lagging behind other jurisdictions like the European Union. In 2022, Rishi Sunak, then finance minister and now prime minister, stated that he wants to become the country a centre for cryptocurrency.

The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) of the United Kingdom (UK) intends to give companies access to a digital sandbox, or testing environment, so they may examine how their products work at an early stage of development.The sandbox, which began testing in 2020, is open to data suppliers as well and will give businesses access to data sets, application program interfaces (API), and data security protection.It was used to assess sustainability performance, including eco-friendly decentralized ledgers, during one of the two trial phases. Developers can test and assess their products in a secure environment called a sandbox knowing that any unforeseen side effects will be isolated from a live environment.According to a person familiar with the initiative, the FCA’s service can be set up to enable a variety of distributed ledger and digital asset use cases, such as creating network interoperability. In a speech last year, the former Economic Secretary John Glen outlined plans for the sandbox and stated that he wanted the nation to promote crypto innovation. His successor, Andrew Griffith, repeated this position.The sandbox was previously only accessible during pilots and TechSprints, which brought together individuals from the financial industry to address difficulties facing the sector.

Societe Generale’s (GLE) cryptocurrency business, SG Forge, has been the first company to be granted a licence to provide crypto services in France by the country’s financial regulator. According to the website of the Autorité des Marchés Financiers (AMF), SG Forge is licenced to provide digital asset buying and selling, exchange, and custody as of

Polygon Labs developers recently recommended reorganising the governance system for the future Polygon 2.0 roadmap, which aims to build many layer-2s on the network. According to the developers, the new governance system would be made up of “three main pillars,” each of which would be responsible for a specific duty. The first step would be

CoinFund has successfully secured $158 million for its Seed IV Fund, above its initial target of $125 million, according to current reports. This accomplishment demonstrates the company’s dedication to promoting innovation in the web3 ecosystem. Since its start in 2015, CoinFund, a prominent cryptonative investment firm, has been creating waves in the sector. Jake Brukhman,

In what is the 24th quarterly burn event for the token, Blockchain BNB Chain burnt approximately 1.99 million bnb (BNB) tokens today in a programmed action under the “auto-burn” mechanism, according to transactional data.The tokens were effectively removed from circulation for $484 million.Token burning is the process of permanently removing currency from circulation.In transaction DE23DB2FB61495A902A22E5DE72744AD587A78881FFC4E3136D2BD2C7E824E29, the burn was carried out at 10:33 UTC. The BNB Smart Chain and networks built on the BNB Chain, like Greenfield, use BNB as their native currency.After a 2017 ICO, it was released by the cryptocurrency exchange Binance.With an initial supply of 200 million BNB, BNB employs an auto-burn technology that gradually lowers that amount to 100 million BNB. The auto-burn mechanism modifies the quantity of BNB to be burned based on the price of BNB and the quantity of blocks produced on the BNB Smart Chain (BSC) during the quarter. The burn event did not, however, result in an instant increase in trading demand for BNB tokens as prices were stable over the previous day.

The Wall Street Journal recently reported that the global cryptocurrency exchange Binance has slashed various employee benefits, including reimbursements for mobile phone usage, fitness, and work-from-home expenses. The corporation cited the “current market environment and regulatory climate” as the grounds for the shift, which has resulted in a profit decline. This implies that further cost-cutting

On July 18, 2023, Chinese officials in Qingshui County, Jincheng City, Shanxi Province successfully solved a money laundering case employing the cryptocurrency Tether (USDT). The operation resulted in the arrest of 21 people, the seizure of over 40 mobile phones, and the confiscation of cash and USDT valued over 1 million yuan. The inquiry began

Bitcoin (BTC) is just holding above a one-month low at $29,780 as Tuesday’s economic data verifies the US economy is still growing and traders brace for what is now a near-certainty of another Federal Reserve rate hike next week. On the surface, the June retail sales report from the United States Census Bureau revealed some

Bitsure, a specialized insurer of Bitcoin mining operations, has been bought by Evertas, one of the few cryptocurrency insurance providers to deal with the Lloyd’s of London market, for an unknown sum.Thomas Shewchuck, co-founder and president of Bitsure, joins Evertas as head of underwriting as a result of the agreement.Due to underwriters and issuers’ difficulties in comprehending the distinctive characteristics of digital assets, crypto firms have found it difficult to find insurance products in recent years. By contrast, Bermuda-based Arch Insurance has given Evertas permission to provide mining insurance of up to $200 million per location after Bitsure was requested to be its specialized mining policy underwriter early this year. Bitsure had the ability to construct policies for only $5 million per site earlier. Compass Mining, a bitcoin hosting and mining company, announced in December that it has created a $75 million insurance coverage for mining equipment. According to Evertas CEO J. Gdanski, offering insurance for the specialized machinery used to mine bitcoin can seem similar to offering data centers and similar facilities the same basic property-risk protection.However, a persistent aversion to cryptocurrencies in general, along with a number of factors that influence the price of mining rigs, make it a poorly understood risk, according to Gdanski. “Of all the crypto risks this is probably the most familiar to the conventional insurance market,” Gdanski said. “Still, there’s so much variability in the pricing of mining hardware due to the fact that its replacement value is based on the value of the asset that’s being mined. That does

Nirmala Sitharaman, the finance minister of India, which is now holding the G20 presidency, stated at a news conference on Tuesday that the Group of Twenty (G20) had accepted the high-level recommendations of the Financial Stability Board (FSB) on crypto asset operations and international stablecoin arrangements.After numerous charges of improper behavior emerged throughout the previous volatile year for cryptocurrency, the international standard-setter FSB urged for stricter regulations on Monday to protect clients’ investments and prevent conflicts of interest.The suggestions come after a survey in which traditional financial institutions urged for tighter crypto controls while firms like Binance and Coinbase cautioned that more stringent regulations might stifle innovation.  The Group of Seven (G7) and the G20 disagree on stablecoin regulation, although Sitharaman stated that the G20 supports the FSB’s recommendations for control of stablecoins.The declaration was made during the third meeting of central bank governors and finance ministers, which took place over the previous three days in Gandhinagar, Gujarat, in eastern India.According to Sitharaman, during the lengthy deliberations that went into Monday night, the Indian presidency paper on cryptocurrencies was also given.It’s unclear exactly what the message said, but according to local accounts, it was supposed to outline the efforts that different nations and institutions had done. “Members also discussed the presidency note that India had prepared and noted that it would be an important input towards prioritizing areas of work essential for achieving a comprehensive cohesive and coordinated global policy and regulatory framework,” said Sitharaman. It is unclear whether the G20 countries would agree to follow legislation or a template for crypto rules globally as a result of the FSB proposals and the joint synthesis paper of the FSB and International Monetary Fund (IMF), which is anticipated in September.

International standard-setters demanded more regulations on Monday to protect the assets of cryptocurrency clients and prevent conflicts of interest in the wake of numerous allegations of unethical activity during the industry’s recent difficult year.The Financial Stability Board (FSB), which brings together regulators from about 20 different countries and regions, including the U.S., EU, China, and the U.K., has released proposals to ensure “consistent and comprehensive” supervision of the industry.The guidelines are intended to stop the kind of conduct that firms like FTX and Celsius are claimed to have engaged in and are an expansion of ideas that were first floated in October. “The events of the past year have highlighted the intrinsic volatility and structural vulnerabilities of crypto-assets and related players,” said the document, announcing new standards that would require huge crypto corporations to split up some of their operations. A flurry of claims of bad record-keeping and misusing consumer funds have been made against FTX, which declared bankruptcy in November.Alex Mashinsky, a co-founder of Celsius and a former CEO, was detained in New York on Thursday and has pled not guilty to many accusations that he deceived investors and manipulated token values for his own benefit. The recent failure of crypto-focused institutions, the brief de-pegging of Circle’s USDC stablecoin two months ago, and the abrupt demise of the terraUSD stablecoin in May 2022 that signaled a new crypto winter were all mentioned by the FSB in laying out the case for stricter international regulations. Major international players are approaching the regulation of cryptocurrency from various angles.The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) is attempting to claim that it may apply existing laws that were created a century ago for traditional financial products, while the European Union has created a new customized law known as the Markets in Crypto Assets (MiCA) regulation.The FSB’s guiding principles ought to be adaptable enough to support both strategies, but officials are keen to emphasize continuity. “This global framework does not rewrite or create a completely new regulatory rulebook for crypto assets,” FSB Secretary General John Schindler told reporters. “Crypto asset activities are not as

According to a statement, owners of Bitcoin (BTC) can now use the Lightning Network to deposit their assets to Binance, a cryptocurrency exchange.After announcing last month that it has built up Lightning Network nodes, Binance has now finished the integration process.The base charge on lightning is $0.04, whereas ordinary bitcoin deposits climbed to as high as $30 in May, according to ycharts. Depositing bitcoin via Lightning is also quicker and less expensive than doing so on the main blockchain.Additionally, settlement times for transactions are under a minute, while confirmation times for typical bitcoin transactions are around ten minutes. The Lightning Network, sometimes known as “Bitcoin’s second layer,” was created in 2016 to reduce network congestion and speed up transaction times.According to 1ml data, the network presently has a $147 million capacity with 69,395 payment channels.With Coinbase (COIN) CEO Brian Armstrong recently indicating that his exchange will also implement the scaling solution in the future, Binance joins exchanges like Bitfinex and Kraken in allowing Lightning Network deposits.

After a U.S. bankruptcy judge approved the transaction late last month, bankrupt crypto lender Celsius Network deposited a total of $59.4 million in cryptocurrencies to institutional crypto exchange FalconX early Monday, likely to trade them for bitcoin (BTC) and ether (ETH). Due to deteriorating liquidity, the manoeuvre could put considerable downward pressure on the coins’

National Australia Bank is the latest bank to announce prohibitions on specific cryptocurrency exchanges, citing the significant danger of scams.Another major Australian bank has announced that it will restrict certain cryptocurrency platforms, citing high levels of scam risk in the business. Recently, National Australia Bank (NAB) unveiled a series of additional steps to safeguard clients

TrueUSD, a popular stablecoin with the ticker TUSD, has just changed management.  According to a thread posted this morning by the project’s official Twitter handle, Archblock Inc., the current TUSD operator, has begun the transfer of total ownership of Token to its Asian-based owners, Techteryx Ltd.   Techteryx purchased TUSD in December 2020, but hired