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A curated weekly summary of forward-focused crypto news that matters. This week, digital asset markets slide as the Fed signals aggressive monetary tightening is coming, Coin Center defends Tornado and Revolut is granted permission to offer crypto services across Europe.
The Bitcoin price is down by nearly 13% since last week and currently sits at ~US$21.4K. Ethereum‘s (ETH) price also plummeted hard, by over 18%, and dipped to ~US$1.6K. Binance-coin (BNB) fell by over 7% and presently sits at just under US$300.
St. Louis Fed President Jim Bullard announced that he would favor a 75 basis point hike for September. Also last week, Fed minutes for the FOMC July meeting indicated general support for interest rate hikes for the next few months in an effort to control inflation.
In Germany, there has been a record jump in producer prices – https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/german-economic-outlook-gloomy-finance-ministry-says-2022-08-18/37.2% for the year.
The Washington DC-based cryptocurrency advocacy organization Coin Center stepped up to challenge the Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) for having sanctioned Ethereum blockchain-based mixing service Tornado Cash. Coin Center published a blog article last week that identifies what it believes to be OFAC “overstepped[ing] its legal authority by adding certain Tornado Cash smart contract addresses to the SDN [Specially Designated Nationals and Blocked Persons] List, that this action potentially violates constitutional rights to due process and free speech, and that OFAC has “not adequately acted to mitigate the foreseeable impact its action would have on innocent Americans”.
Coin Center argues that OFAC has overstretched the powers given to it by Congress under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, “[denying] American’s their Liberty and Property without Proper Procedural Due Process”, and violating protected free speech. The Coin Center article concludes with mention of exploring court action against OFAC.
Digital financial services company Revolut has been granted permission to provide cryptocurrency services throughout the European Economic Area. The approval was issued by the Cyprus Securities and Exchange Commission (CYSEC) and includes all 27 EU member countries, plus Iceland, Liechtenstein and Norway.
Revolut will now be able to provide crypto services to its 20 million customers and has launched digital assets of its own.
The Federal Reserve has issued guidelines to allow “crypto banks” to access Federal Reserve accounts and services. The guideline breaks would-be crypto banks into three tiers, based on whether they are federally-insured and the extent to which they are subject to prudential supervision by a federal banking agency. The level of regulatory scrutiny for each tier is determined by these criteria.
This is likely to means banks offering service to crypto holders like Wyoming-based Custodia and Kraken Bank will be able to access Federal Reserve “master accounts” without the need to go through an intermediary bank.
August 24th
The Sandbox announces its metaverse Alpha Season 3 event.
August 28th
A new liquidity rewards program Yield+, denominated in EOS, is set to be launched for DeFi dApps by the EOS Network based on total value locked (TVL).
Week of September 15th
The Ethereum blockchain is projected to launch its mainnet proof-of-work (PoW) to proof-of-stake (PoS) transition (“the Merge”) on 15 September.
All assets on Brave New Coin’s top-ten market cap are down this week (aside from stablecoins). The trend downward follows Federal Reserve minutes published on Wednesday of last week for the July FOMC meeting in which Federal Reserve governors predicted further interest rate increases for the coming months as they look to control inflation. Solana (SOL), Cardano (ADA) plunged by over 20% each, and Ether (ETH) by 18% — despite market anticipation for “the Merge”.
Glassnode’s special report this week looked at Bitcoin onchain data and noted a long-term holder flushout event over the past month or so, with short-term holders (those that hold their coins for fewer than 155 days) increasingly buying those coins. While on the overall macro-level, long-term holder supply has been sideways since the November all-time high, there has been a recent downward selling event — as noted by the HODL Waves and Realized Cap HODL Waves. At the same time, we are seeing large-scale outflows from exchanges.
A curated weekly summary of forward-focused crypto news that matters. This week, asset management giant BlackRock announces the launch of a new Bitcoin trust, the US Treasury Department sanctions Tornado Cash, and Ethereum gears up for the Merge.
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A curated weekly summary of forward-focused crypto news that matters. This week, a new bipartisan bill in the US aims to make small Bitcoin transfers more accessible, Another crypto lender wobbles, and Michael Saylor steps down from his role as CEO of MicroStrategy.
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A curated weekly summary of forward-focused crypto news that matters. This week, the price of Bitcoin rises despite a Fed interest rate rise, Vitalik discusses what to expect from Ethereum post-merge, and Coinbase pushes back against SEC probe.
