Ethereum
Blockchain

Another $22 million worth of cryptocurrency assets were transferred by FTX and Alameda.

Blockchain research company Lookonchain has shown that major players in the cryptocurrency space, FTX and Alameda Research, are actively transferring a significant amount of digital assets worth a whopping $22 million.UNI, $SHIB, $BAL, $LOOKS, $WOO, $IMX, $GMT, $ETH, and $UNI make up the varied cryptocurrency mix.After filing for bankruptcy, FTX and Alameda Research were among the first to move quickly in the cryptocurrency space, moving substantial amounts to well-known exchanges.From October 2023 to the present, the business has arranged incredible deals totaling $551 million in 59 different tokens. In their most recent transaction, $10.8 million was transferred through websites including Coinbase, Binance, and Wintermute.Eight tokens received the most recent $10.8 million transfer: $2.58 million in StepN, $2.41 million in Uniswap, $2.25 million in Synapse, $1.64 million in Klaytn, $1.18 million in Fantom, $644,000 in Shiba Inus, and minor amounts in Arbitrum, ARB, and Optimism, OP. A single wallet address received $10 million on October 24 from the FTX and Alameda wallets; this money was then moved to Coinbase and Binance accounts.The Kraken and OKX exchanges experienced a surge in cryptocurrency assets of $24 million on November 14, 2023, marking another peak in the market.They are now able to sell digital assets for up to $100 million at first, with the potential to go up to $200 million with special committee permission, according to a scheme that was approved by a U.S. court. The initial notes of this financial song were played in March 2023, coordinating a deft move of $145 million in stablecoins to exchanges including Coinbase, Binance, and Kraken.Even with assets recovered that exceed $5 billion, FTX has a difficult situation because of liabilities that exceed $8.8 billion.As FTX and Alameda manage ongoing liquidations, the severity of this financial burden becomes apparent, illustrating a tremendous effort to handle significant obligations while offering some relief to creditors. The cryptocurrency community is keenly awaiting the resolution of this financial composition because the outcome of this liquidation saga is yet unknown

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Ethereum

The head of the Ethereum team sees no interest in working with the university.

Ethereum’s team lead, Peter Szilagyi, expressed his displeasure with his former university’s lack of enthusiasm in pushing students to work with Ethereum. Ethereum team lead Peter Szilagyi has expressed frustration that his university is not interested in giving students chances to work with Ethereum. After returning to his old university to give talks about Ethereum,

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Blockchain Defi

After USBTC merged, Hut8 Mining is a US-domiciled company.

The cryptocurrency mining firms Hut 8 Mining Corp. and US Bitcoin Corp. (USBTC) have merged through an all-stock merger of equals to become Hut 8 Corp (New Hut), a new company with US domicile.The merger was finalized on November 30, and Jaime Leverton, CEO of New Hut, branded it the “largest mergers and acquisitions transaction” in the cryptocurrency space. Hut 8 is situated in Canada.Leverton led Hut 8 as CEO for more than three years prior to the merger. Due to the transaction, Hut 8 common stocks will be delisted by no later than December 4 from both the Nasdaq and the Toronto Stock Exchange.New Hut common stocks, ticker symbol “HUT,” will replace it.A share of New Hut common stock was awarded to Hut8 shareholders for each Hut 8 share they held during the delisting and relisting process.The company’s preparations for the impending Bitcoin halving were disclosed by Asher Genoot, president of New Hut.As a result of pooling resources, the release states that “New Hut has access to approximately 825 MW [megawatts] of gross energy across six sites with self-mining, hosting, and managed service operations.” The Supreme Court of British Columbia gave Hut8 final permission to merge with USBTC in September. Still, the planning started in February.The combination required legal and regulatory permission at the time from US and Canadian authorities.In addition to the legal complexities, USBTC was involved in “a legal dispute” with the City of Niagara Falls, New York, on complaints from locals regarding noise pollution caused by the mining activities. On April 7, the disagreement was resolved. Decentralization of Bitcoin mining operations is being advocated by X (formerly Twitter) and Block co-founder Jack Dorsey.New decentralized Bitcoin mining pool Ocean, whose goal is to give miners more transparency into the process and allow them to get block rewards directly from Bitcoin instead of mining pools, just raised $6.2 million in a seed round led by Dorsey for Mummolin, the business’s parent company.

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Blockchain Crypto

Key lawmakers claim that the Republican leadership’s squabbles have delayed US cryptocurrency bills until 2024.

Legislators working behind the scenes are looking to 2024 as the year when digital asset bills may get passed by that Republican-controlled chamber, though the efforts still face an uphill climb in the Senate where Democrats hold the majority. This is in contrast to months of hope that U.S. crypto legislation could win approval in the House of Representatives this year.The head of the House Financial Services Committee’s subcommittee on digital assets, U.S. Rep. French Hill (R-Ark.), stated that the House’s deliberations on two significant cryptocurrency bills—one pertaining to U.S. stablecoin issuer regulation and the other establishing a comprehensive regulatory framework for crypto markets—have most likely been moved to “early 2024.” Hill stated at a Blockchain Association event in Washington on Thursday that the House Republicans’ recent dispute over choosing a new speaker—which temporarily forced key crypto negotiator Rep. Patrick McHenry (R-N.C.) to serve as stand-in speaker—delayed the floor time legislators needed for the legislation. “That, I think, set us back a little bit,” Meanwhile, at the same occasion, Sen. Cynthia Lummis (R-Wyo.).Lummis, who has been pushing for her own comprehensive crypto legislation in the Senate, also predicted that next year will see more advancements with the stablecoin bill in particular.“That is an area that could come early in 2024.”The top Democrat on the committee, Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.), withdrew her support for the bills, and Rep. Jim Himes (D-Conn.), who has also played a leading role in the House negotiations, suggested the industry counter what House Democrats are hearing from outside groups and U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission Chair Gary Gensler, a devoted industry critic. A small group of Democrats on the House Financial Services Committee defied the ranking member of their party and supported both of this year’s cryptocurrency proposals.As of late, Waters has made it clear that she is still willing to pursue legislation, and Himes stated on Thursday that “a Democratic Senate sits up and takes notice” if Waters supports a bill and the House as a whole passes it. “On the other side of the Capitol, the weather is uglier,” Himes said of the crypto views of some Senate Democrats, including Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio), who runs the Senate Banking Committee. “You could see a path, but I think it probably starts

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Blockchain Crypto

Digital Securities Brokerage to Be Launched in Abu Dhabi by Crypto Custody Company Copper

Early in the upcoming year, Abu Dhabi will see the launch of a digital equities brokerage service by cryptocurrency custody and trading startup Copper, the company announced on Wednesday.The Financial Services Regulatory Authority (FSRA) of the emirate is collaborating with Copper Securities, the new company providing execution and custody services, to ensure that the required licenses are in place by the beginning of 2024. The transfer has been made easier by Copper’s recent acquisition of Securrency Capital, an Abu Dhabi-based branch of the tokenization platform for cryptocurrencies that was not part of the Depository Trust & Clearing Corp.’s (DTCC) October acquisition of Securrency Inc. Copper has joined the increasing number of cryptocurrency companies who are turning to the United Arab Emirates because it provides more legislative clarity for digital assets than many other countries.Referring to Abu Dhabi as “the capital of capital,” Copper CEO Dmitry Tokarev highlighted the region’s amassing of institutional wealth. “Abu Dhabi is more institutional and more focused around asset management, and that’s exactly what Copper is; we only have institutional clients,” Tokarev said in an interview. “While there isn’t a huge retail market here, you will find all the big institutions, hedge funds and sovereign wealth funds.” The movement by banks and asset managers to tokenize traditional financial assets is causing a progressive convergence of blockchain technology and traditional financial (TradFi) plumbing. Over the course of the upcoming year, Copper Securities expects to launch securities financing, lending, and payment apps in addition to providing automated processing of corporate activities, settlements, top-ups, and rebalancing.

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Blockchain Crypto

CBDC Payments Can Be Private, According to a Central Bank Project

A collaborative effort between central banks has demonstrated that using national digital currencies for payments can still protect privacy.The Bank for International Settlements’ (BIS) Innovation Hub in Switzerland is investigating payer anonymity with central bank digital currency (CBDC) under Project Tourbillon.The central banks examined payment methods where customers can make purchases without disclosing personal information to any third party, including the retailer, according to a project final report released on Wednesday.To lessen tax avoidance and illegal payments, the merchant’s identity would be given to their bank at the time of payment. Privacy has become a major public worry as countries all over the world ponder issuing digital versions of their national currency. “Privacy is an important user requirement but it is the most difficult to solve. The difficulty lies in ensuring privacy protection technologically rather than just promising it, and at the same time ensuring that such a high level of protection cannot be abused,” Thomas Moser, alternate governing board member at the Swiss National

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Blockchain

With a $5 million seed round, A16z supports Web3 Consumer App Setter.

A $5 million seed round lead by venture capital powerhouse Andreessen Horowitz (a16z) was invested in Setter, a consumer app that lets brands experiment with Web3-powered commerce.In an email statement on Tuesday, New York-based Setter stated that its software will assist firms in innovating their strategies for promoting unique products and offering customers limited edition drops. According to the statement, Setter seeks to address “the complexity and unfriendliness of current wallet technologies,” facilitating a more seamless introduction into Web3 for a greater number of users. “It looks and feels like a Web2 app, but it is a full-blown smart contract wallet under the hood,” CEO Juan Hernandez told CoinDesk in an interview. Web2 refers to the existing, centralized Web-based technology. “We’re trying to make it really seamless, where the Web2 and Web3 objects are just sitting right next

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Blockchain

Animoca Brands Becomes the Biggest Validator by Investing in TON Network

As the biggest validator on the TON blockchain, Animoca Brands, a venture capital business specializing in gaming and metaverse, has invested in the TON ecosystem.An announcement on Tuesday stated that Animoca Brands, based in Hong Kong, is sponsoring TON Play, the network’s gaming infrastructure initiative, in order to help other gaming ventures integrate into the ecosystem. Telegram’s 800 million users are a possible target audience for TON-based initiatives as they were endorsed as the blockchain of choice for Web3-related advancements in September.

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Blockchain Crypto

Nine Blocks Crypto Hedge Fund Acquires a Dubai Digital Assets License

As the first bitcoin hedge fund to receive a license from Dubai’s Virtual Assets Regulatory Authority (VARA), Nine Blocks Capital Management is taking pride in this fact.Additionally, the hedge fund said on Monday that Dubai will become its global headquarters.Due to a thorough set of regulations covering everything from advertising to issuance and exchange services, a thriving community of cryptocurrency firms has established itself in Dubai, seemingly a world apart from the obscurity and unpredictability of U.S. regulations. “I think what’s interesting is that VARA has really created an ecosystem for crypto in Dubai,” Nine Blocks co-founder Henri Arslanian said in an interview. “Many of our hedge fund’s counterparties are one minute walk away from my office. Everybody is in this one square kilometer, which makes it easy to meet up, have

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Blockchain Defi

Standard Chartered China Provides Digital Yuan Exchange Services

The Chinese central bank’s digital currency, the digital yuan (CBDC), is now exchangeable at the multinational bank Standard Chartered (STAN).An announcement on Monday stated that the bank’s China business is collaborating with City Bank Clearing Services to provide users with access to the digital yuan’s interconnection platform, which offers redemption and recharge options. Standard Chartered said that it is among the first international companies to participate in the CBDC’s business pilot program. At 1.8 trillion yuan ($250 billion) in transaction volume as of the end of June this year, China’s digital yuan, or e-CNY, is the most sophisticated CBDC among those being explored or created by major nations. Customers of just few banks are able to conduct business with China’s CBDC.It was claimed in May that by connecting the wallets of its corporate clients to bank accounts, the French bank BNP Paribas (BNP) was encouraging the usage of China’s digital yuan.

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Tech Africa

Zenith Bank plans to expand into France and join other Nigerian banks in the international arena.

One of the biggest banks in Nigeria, Zenith Bank, has ₦13.38 trillion in client deposits. It plans to join banks like First Bank, UBA, and Access Bank that are growing internationally by relocating to France. At the Chartered Institute of Bankers annual dinner, which was held on Friday night at Eko Hotels in Lagos, Ebenezer

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Blockchain Crypto

Binance brought millions of people into the finance industry, but they overlooked the paperwork-A Columbia professor said

Events surrounding the cryptocurrency exchange Binance has generated a lot of discussion over the US government’s crackdown on cryptocurrency companies. Omid Malekan, a writer and adjunct professor at Columbia Business School, claims that the American Department of Justice’s strategy in this case is very different from conventional financial practises. Malekan posted on X (formerly Twitter):

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Blockchain Crypto

Bull flag in XRP pricing suggests a 20% increase by New Year’s

A traditional bullish continuation setup could see the price of XRP rise by more than 20% in the upcoming weeks. After a significant increase, the price consolidates inside a parallel channel, forming the so-called bull flag pattern. It ends when the price climbs to the height of the prior upswing and breaks over the upper

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Blockchain

Indexed Finance defeats hackers and plans to reimburse 2021 hack victims

After a $16 million hack in 2021, Indexed Finance, an Ethereum-based project, was able to successfully thwart two attempts at hijacking. The founders of the project will regain control of the decentralised autonomous organisation (DAO), with the intention of distributing the leftover money to the victims of the 2021 hack. Former core contributor Laurence Day

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Blockchain

The governor of California demands generative AI training across the state.

California Governor Gavin Newsom stressed in a recent report the need to get ready for the next generation of skills needed to succeed in the GenAI economy. Governor Gavin Newsom of California has emphasised the significance of learning new skills and familiarising oneself with cutting-edge technology in order to stay ahead of the curve in

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Blockchain Crypto

UK authorities support tokenizing funds for asset managers.

Investment managers in the UK are moving away from traditional record-keeping systems by using blockchain technology to tokenize funds with regulatory support. The Investment Association stated in a recent research that the financial industry will become more transparent and efficient as a result of fund tokenization, which is the process of issuing tokenized units or

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Nft's

After dropping its lawsuit against the founder, Azuki DAO rebrands as “Bean.”

In response to a dilutive $39 million NFT minting that happened in June, the DAO had earlier suggested filing a lawsuit against Zagabond, the creator of Azuki. In the midst of dropping a planned lawsuit against Zagabond, the founder of the NFT collection, over a $39 million minting scandal, Azuki DAO, an unofficial community decentralised

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Blockchain Defi

On the first day of trading, the Cross Chain Swap Token FLIP more than doubles.

The native token of ChainFlip, a cross-chain swapping platform, increased in value by over 100% on its first day of trade.With multiple exchanges listing it, including as Bybit, Crypto.com, Kucoin, and Gate.io, the currency saw a 150% increase, reaching a high of $5.94.CoinMarketCap reports that since its introduction, trading activity has reached $79 million across all venues. Based on the Ethereum blockchain and Uniswap’s V3 concept, ChainFlip was created using the Rust programming language.With the goal of increasing trading efficiency and lowering slippage, it bills itself as a “JIT (Just In Time) automated market maker.”When big orders are processed, a lack of liquidity may result in slippage, which is the difference between the price a trader expects to pay and the price they actually pay. In August, ChainFlip sold 4.5 million tokens for $1.83 each. At $2.50, they began trading on Friday.There is no need to bridge or wrap assets while using ChainFlip and other cross-chain swapping platforms.Rather, after a trade is done on a conventional centralized crypto exchange, the market makers instantly buy an asset.The bought assets are then sent by ChainFlip validators to the wallet address that the trader initially supplied. Decentralised liquidity protocol THORChain praised the protocol, stating on X that it will collaborate with ChainFlip to “dethrone the centralized gatekeepers of today.”Lead by Framework Ventures, ChainFlip raised $6 million in a 2021 funding round.

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Blockchain

Tether and Bitfinex consent to stop objecting to the FOIL request.

A Freedom of Information Law (FOIL) request filed in New York by several prominent news outlets has been met with initial support from Tether and Bitfinex. In response to CoinDesk’s FOIL request earlier this year, the USDT stablecoin issuer and cryptocurrency exchange assured Cointelegraph that they would provide information transparently.Additionally, the corporations said that the method was inconsistent with their business standards and that they would not be publicly disclosing documentation. “It’s essential to clarify that transparency does not mean a wholesale release of all our documents.” Tether and Bitfinex have decided not to file an appeal against the FOIL request that was submitted by journalists Ada Hui, Shane Shifflett, and Zeke Faux, who they claim are engaging in “certain behaviors.”Faux’s previous investigations on Tether and Bitfinex, according to the firms, have “extended beyond the boundaries of professional journalism.”In addition, they allege that journalists from The Wall Street Journal and Bloomberg, whose publications are taking part in the current FOIL request, have been “one-sided and inaccurate.” The statement emphasizes that both businesses “adhere to ethical reporting standards and respect data privacy boundaries,” and that they are dedicated to transparency and will continue to be accessible for interaction with the media and government agencies.Noting that their attempts at transparency do not “equate to unrestricted public disclosure of all documents,” Tether and Bitfinex also demanded “responsible document review” prior to any information being made public. The deal that Tether and Bitfinex reached with the New York Attorney General (NYAG) in February 2021 is the subject of the current FOIL request.The arrangement, which was first revealed by CNBC, called for paying a $18.5 million fine in order to resolve a lawsuit that had been pending for two years over the purported misappropriation of $850 million in customer and company assets.As part of the settlement, Tether and Bitfinex agreed to provide the NYAG with quarterly transparency reports for a period of two years.Following the completion of these duties, CoinDesk filed a FOIL request in New York, requesting the public release of Tether’s first quarter submission papers that it had provided in accordance with the settlement agreement. Tether stated in June 2023 that it had rejected the FOIL request in order to stop “sensitive commercial information” from being used and “confidential customer data” from being made public because it was concerned that “malicious actors” might take advantage of it.

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Blockchain Ethereum

Crypto Users Differ on the Significance of the Ethereum Layer 2 Blast

Despite the doubts of many cryptocurrency investors, Blast, a layer-2 blockchain that is slated to launch in March, has amassed more than $225 million in staked ether, stETH, and stablecoins since Monday.Blast, which is billed as the first layer-2 network with native staking, intends to eventually produce yield by staking Ethereum (ETH) and using real-world assets (RWAs).Developed on top of layer-1 blockchains like Ethereum, layer 2 networks aim to reduce transaction costs and increase transaction speed. Leading the protocol is the anonymous @PacmanBlur, a co-founder of the well-known NFT marketplace Blur.A portion of the network’s appeal can be ascribed to its supporters, which include well-known cryptocurrency fund Paradigm and a group of investors known as “eGirl Capital,” among others.One important note is that until the Blast bridge goes active in February, staked assets cannot be withdrawn.Users can redeem an airdrop slated for May by using their “Blast points,” which they get in the interim.By referring other users via special referral links, users can earn extra Blast points.Consequently, as of Thursday, Blast is invite-only and requires a code from an active user to access. According to Etherscan, Blast is currently the seventh-largest ether holder, having staked the majority of the $225 million that it has received on Lido, a liquid staking protocol.But the cryptocurrency community has taken issue with the concept of restaking on Lido in exchange for giving away obscure Blast points. “Blast is actually insane,” one crypto trader wrote on X. “Use points to attract TVL to a chain that doesn’t exist, convert the deposited ETH into stETH on a 5-person multisig of anon devs,” referring to total value locked, or the overall value of assets deposited in the protocol. According to some analysts, Blast points resemble a pyramid scheme in that early users can increase their point total based on how many new users they refer.According to technical papers, users receive an extra 16% points for each user they invite to bring in more participants, and an additional 8% for each additional person the second level brings in. Another topic of dispute is whether additional layer-2 networks are necessary in the congested decentralized finance (DeFi) area.DeFiLlama claims that there are currently 232 blockchains overall, many of which share users and services.Out of all of them, Ethereum is the biggest, holding 55% of the locked value, followed by BSC at 6% and Tron at 17%. Although it’s important to note that Blast’s $225 million total value locked is quickly nearing that of Coinbase’s Base, which has $284 million, cryptocurrency exchanges Coinbase (COIN) and Kraken have lately emerged with their own layer-2 networks.Despite the uncertainty surrounding Blast points, investors are still willing to invest in the platform, even if the Blast blockchain will not be operational for a further four months.

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Tech Africa

TBD and DevCareer are hosting the first-ever African Web3 Hackathon.

With the help of Block’s TBD, the African non-profit DevCareer is bringing Web3 technology to the continent by organising the first Web3 hackathon. With its tools, TBD hopes to make decentralised finance accessible to all developers. Participants in the DevCareer hackathon can investigate Web3 and create self-sufficient technologies. With an identity layer that goes beyond

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Blockchain

Over $86.6M was transmitted to suspect addresses after the HECO Chain Bridge was compromised.

The HECO Chain bridge saw the movement of more than $86.6 million in digital assets to dubious addresses, according to data provided by blockchain security firm PeckShield.According to the security company, there is a continuous exploit and the bridge is hacked. Justin Sun, the founder of Tron, responded to the event by declaring that HTX will reimburse users in full for any losses they may have suffered as a result of the attack.While they look into the situation, the company has also temporarily stopped accepting deposits and withdrawals.The executive stated that upon the conclusion of the probe, services will resume. At first, PeckShield released a notice highlighting a transaction in which 10,145 Ether—or around $19 million—were moved off the bridge.Subsequent transactions involved the transfer of digital assets to several addresses, including USD Coin, Chainlink, Shiba INU, and others. On December 21, 2020, HTX Eco Chain (HECO) was formally introduced to offer a cross-chain experience with reduced gas prices.The project was a combination of the BitTorrent bridge ecosystem and the Tron environment, which Sun had merged into HECO in 2022. The most recent breach of the HECO Chain is the second exploit involving a Sun-related project.On November 10, Poloniex, an exchange that Sun purchased in 2018, experienced a $100 million hack.Security experts speculate that a compromised private key may have caused the problem.

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Blockchain

Avalanche Accelerator Colony Lab to Provide $10M to AVAX Ecosystem

The Avalanche ecosystem developer and accelerator, Colony Lab, announced that it will contribute $10 million to help the network’s sustained expansion.The company announced that it has purchased over 500,000 AVAX tokens for a total of $8 million in recent months. The money will be utilized to establish a validators program that will assist AVAX holders. In a proof-of-stake (PoS) blockchain network, a validator is an individual who contributes to security upkeep and verifies newly submitted transactions.By staking their tokens, validators accomplish this and usually receive rewards. Avax and Trader Joe’s JOE are two examples of the assets in the Avalanche ecosystem that are included in the Colony Avalanche Index (CAI), a yield-bearing token index in which Colony Lab will also invest.Colony Lab’s CLY token holders will receive a portion of mint or redemption fees.The community of CLY stakeholders will receive rewards from both the first and next validator initiatives. “As we channel a $10 million investment into the Avalanche ecosystem, we’re not just growing Colony Lab – we’re fostering the long-term potential of AVAX,” CEO Elie Le Rest said in a message to CoinDesk. “Avalanche understands that real blockchain growth comes from expanding its use cases, and its technology reflects this

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Blockchain Crypto

Tether Freezes $225 Million Associated with Human Trafficking Organisation During DOJ Probe

The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) has launched an investigation into a global human trafficking organisation operating in Southeast Asia, leading stablecoin issuer Tether to freeze $225 million worth of its own stablecoin. For months, the inquiry was conducted using Chainalysis’s blockchain analysis tools. According to a press release, it is the biggest stablecoin freeze

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Blockchain

Emmett Shear, Former CEO of Twitch, Named New Head of OpenAI

OpenAI has named co-founder and former Twitch CEO Emmett Shear as its new CEO. OpenAI is an artificial intelligence (AI) startup. Sam Altman was dismissed from his position as CEO of OpenAI last week after the board expressed lack of faith in his ability to guide the business due to allegations that “he was not

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Blockchain

The XRP Ledger is driving asset tokenization, according to the CTO of Ripple.

David Schwartz, the CTO of Ripple, recently spoke with me about how the XRP Ledger is facilitating a revolution in the tokenization of physical assets.In an interview conducted recently, Schwartz expressed his excitement about the XRP ecosystem as investors’ focus shifted from the XRP coin to a more comprehensive interest in the features of the XRP Ledger.The CTO claims that the XRP Ledger’s technology is becoming more institutionally adopted and is being used in more business and financial applications. In recent years, the idea of tokenizing real-world assets (RWA) has gained traction.Owners of real-world assets can store their rights to things like gold and commodities on the blockchain through the process of digital asset tokenization.However, Ethereum and a few other blockchains have received the majority of the focus surrounding asset tokenization. The tokenization of conventional assets is being actively pursued by major financial institutions like JP Morgan and Bank of America, according to Schwartz in the interview, and this trend is now spreading to the XRP Ledger. “There’s real interest from mainstream financial giants like JPMorgan and Bank of America are actively pursuing tokenization of traditional assets. So I think that’s a scenario to watch and I think that scenario with the XRP ledger is going to excel,” Schwartz said. The CTO also underlined the core capabilities of XRP as a buyable and sellable token with sufficient liquidity.Traditional lenders are starting to adopt this feature more frequently; Chase Bank and HSBC, for example, let customers use XRP to pay down their mortgage debts. Schwartz noted that the XRP Ledger was created by the company’s early engineers in order to overcome the enterprise adoption barrier that Bitcoin faced at the time by establishing XRP payment bridges with conventional finance.He noted that while the XRP Ledger was initially designed to facilitate cross-border payments, the technology supporting XRP isn’t nearly as fascinating as the other features of the Layer-1 that power the XRP Ledger. “It’s exciting to see more focus on

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Blockchain

James Wallis of Ripple emphasizes the importance of CBDCs in removing financial obstacles.

In a brief film, James Wallis, vice president of Ripple for central bank digital currency (CBDC) Engagements, emphasized the contribution that CBDCs make to the advancement of global financial inclusion.Wallis makes it clear that the goal of financial inclusion is to make financial services available to everyone on the planet, particularly to those who don’t have any financial institution connections and have low incomes. Wallis identified several critical elements contributing to financial exclusion, such as low incomes and a lack of prior connections with financial institutions, which results in the absence of a credit history.Banks are frequently commercial organizations motivated by shareholder interests in areas where there is financial exclusion. This presents difficulties in providing services to low-income people because it is hard to make money from this group.Wallis argued that by offering financial services at a substantially lower cost than conventional techniques, CBDCs offer a cost-effective option.With CBDCs, you may build credit and have easier payment alternatives even if you have never worked with a bank before. This effectively gives people the ability to establish credit histories, obtain borrowing capacity, and promote the expansion of their enterprises.Wallis stated that in order to address global difficulties in financial inclusion, CBDCs constitute a disruptive breakthrough.In addition to serving as the technology partner for the Republic of Georgia’s CBDC project’s second phase, Ripple is collaborating on CBDC efforts with more than 20 central banks worldwide.Furthermore, Ripple is now working on CBDC partnerships in Bhutan, Palau, Montenegro, Colombia, and Hong Kong. Ripple and the SEC are now at odds in court.For its contributions to the progress of digital currencies and best sustainability initiative—particularly for encouraging innovation in CBDCs—Ripple was recognized in July by Currency Research.Prior to collaborating on the digital lari initiative with the NBG, Ripple actively partnered with companies looking to deploy CBDCs.

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Blockchain Technology

Investors in OpenAI demand that Sam Altman take over as CEO again: Report

According to reports, investors are taking issue with OpenAI’s board of directors’ decision to fire CEO Sam Altman. Several investors in OpenAI, the artificial intelligence (AI) startup that created ChatGPT, are allegedly in contact with its largest shareholder, Microsoft, in an attempt to have Altman reinstated as CEO, according to a Nov. 19 Bloomberg article that cited people familiar with the subject.OpenAI stated on November 17 that Mira Murati, its chief technology officer, would take over as CEO in lieu of Altman.The board stated in a blog post that it was difficult to have a thorough knowledge of the operations since Altman’s communication was unclear and dishonest. It has been reported that Thrive Capital, which was expected to lead a tender offer for employee shares, has not yet sent the money, and Altman’s exit will likely affect its plan of action.Thrive reportedly wants to bring back Altman and its president, Greg Brockman, who left the firm on Friday not long after Altman was fired. When word got out that Altman had been let go by the board, Brockman made his departure official.In a post on X, Brockman said, “I quit based on today’s news” (previously Twitter).Three prominent researchers at OpenAI, including director of research Jakub Pachocki, head of readiness Aleksander Madry, and senior researcher Szymon Sidor, left after hearing the news. According to sources, Altman is open to rejoining the company, provided that the current board members vacate their positions by this weekend.Moreover, it has been claimed that Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella has stated that, considering that he was similarly taken aback by the board’s decision, he will support Altman’s choice.Nevertheless, after being fired on Friday, Altman is reportedly working on a new artificial intelligence project, according to reliable sources.Moreover, rumors suggested that Altman would be collaborating with Brockman on this project.

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Blockchain

Amidst restructuring, Meta dissolves its responsible AI division.

The reorganisation takes place as Facebook’s parent company approaches the conclusion of its “year of efficiency.” The social media behemoth Meta is said to have dissolved the department in charge of overseeing its artificial intelligence (AI) projects as they are being developed and implemented. Numerous team members of Meta’s responsible AI division have reportedly moved

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Blockchain Technology

OpenAI fires Sam Altman, appointing CTO Mira Murati as interim CEO

On the grounds that he was “not consistently candid in his communications with the board,” the board of directors dismissed Altman. In a  recent blog post ChatGPT developer OpenAI announced that founder Sam Altman had resigned from his role as CEO. Mira Murati, the chief technology officer, will become the CEO protemporarily. After a “deliberative

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