| Hey Insider! Welcome to today's Inside Cryptocurrency newsletter! The week has been in the shadow of the ongoing trial against the bankrupt crypto exchange FTX's former CEO as the testimonies from the key witnesses continue to come. The new issue covers the recent details from those testimonies as well as some of the other biggest stories from the industry, including Trezor's new hardware crypto wallets, a brand-new machine turning tattoos into NFTs, the drop in Coinbase's spot trading volume, and more. Enjoy your reading, and if you find this newsletter useful, please do not forget to share it with your friends and colleagues! Doğa
p/dogayurduneri | |
| 1 | | U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of New York has recently approved a $175M deal between the bankrupt crypto exchange FTX and the bankrupt crypto lender Genesis to settle the disputes in their Chapter 11 bankruptcy cases. The approval will see FTX's sister company, Alameda Research, receiving $175M from Genesis. More: - The court has also officially dismissed Genesis' parallel claims against FTX.
- Also, Judge Sean Lane has accepted the withdrawal of various claims, including three by FTX Trading, six by Alameda Research, and six by FTX.US.
- The $175M figure represents a significant reduction from FTX's initial claim of $3.9B made in May 2023.
- The court approval came nearly two months after the two companies reached the settlement deal.
- At the time, FTX's new CEO, John J. Ray III, said the agreement was fair and served the company's best interest, eliminating legal uncertainties about the claims.
Zoom Out: - FTX and Genesis filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in November 2022 and January 2023, respectively.
- When FTX collapsed, Genesis was severely impacted by the situation since its derivatives business lost access to nearly $175M in crypto held in an FTX trading account, confronting liquidity issues.
- Genesis' exposure to FTX's bankruptcy ultimately took it to a downfall.
Q: Do you find the $175M settlement deal between FTX and Genesis fair? Join the conversation here. |     | |
| 2 | | 
What the numbers say: The data compiled by the digital asset data provider CCData has revealed the spot trading volume on Coinbase, the largest U.S. crypto exchange, in Q3. The platform was able to reach only $76B in volume during the last quarter. The figure represents a 52% drop from $157.9B in the same period last year and a nearly 18% quarterly decline. It also accounts for the lowest level ever seen since the company was first listed on the Nasdaq Stock Market in April 2021. Relevance: In addition, the data has shown that the downward trend in Coinbase's spot trading volume mainly started in Q2 2022 when the multi-billion dollar Terra ecosystem collapsed, causing over $60B to be wiped off the crypto market. The drop accelerated even more after Q3 and Q4 of the same year, coinciding with the previously third-largest crypto exchange FTX's downfall. The two major events caused distrust in the crypto industry among investors, triggering a prolonged crypto winter and the collapses of many other crypto-related companies with exposure to the downfall of Terra and FTX. This broader market downturn also affected Coinbase's trading volumes negatively. Brands that should care: On the other hand, Coinbase increased its market share, another key metric for the crypto exchanges, within the period it experienced a decline in spot trading volumes. The surge in the platform's market share was mainly triggered by the increased regulatory scrutiny over its biggest rival, Binance. The heightened crackdown worldwide helped Coinbase receive Binance's shares of the cake. | | | |
| 3 | | Former Alameda Research CEO Caroline Ellison, one of the key witnesses in the ongoing trial against the bankrupt crypto exchange FTX's former CEO Sam Bankman-Fried (SBF), has recently testified that a tweet from Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao (CZ) contributed to the downfall of FTX. In the tweet from November 2022, CZ announced that Binance would sell its FTT holdings due to recent revelations, causing a 14% price decrease in the token within 24 hours. More: - At the time, Binance's liquidation move caused many retail investors to withdraw their funds from FTX, tracing the largest crypto exchange by trading volume.
- Ellison said the exchange mainly collapsed since its sister company, Alameda Research, borrowed $10B from FTX it could not repay, though CZ's tweet contributed to the fall.
- In December 2022, CZ responded to the claims by saying that no healthy business can be destroyed by a tweet.
- When she first took the stand on Oct. 10, Ellison also testified that SBF was the one who asked and directed her to commit crimes that took the exchange to bankruptcy, blaming him for being aware of the risks at Alameda Research.
- Ellison is among the names who pleaded guilty to charges over their involvement in the collapse and agreed to cooperate with federal prosecutors, along with FTX's former engineering director Nishad Singh and former chief technology officer Gary Wang.
- On the other hand, a class action lawsuit filed by an FTX user also recently accused Binance and CZ of triggering the collapse of FTX by competing unfairly and manipulating the market.
Zoom Out: - FTX, previously the third-largest crypto exchange, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in November 2022, with all the 130 entities under the roof of FTX Group.
- The downfall followed the claims that SBF used customer funds in FTX to compensate for losses at Alameda Research.
- The 31-year-old former CEO is currently being tried on seven charges, including money laundering and misappropriation of customer funds, to which he pleaded not guilty, facing a statutory maximum of 110 years in prison.
| | | |
| 4 | | Czech Republic-based crypto hardware wallet manufacturer Trezor has introduced three new products, including the crypto wallet Trezor Safe 3, a Bitcoin-only version of Trezor Safe 3, and the private key backup solution Trezor Keep Metal. The new products came on the 10th anniversary of the launch of the firm's first Bitcoin hardware wallet. More: - The tamper-resistant Trazer Safe 3 wallet supports more than 7,000 different cryptocurrencies.
- The self-custody wallet, featuring a simple design and two buttons, is available in four colors, including solar gold, stellar silver, galactic rose, and cosmic black, for $79.
- On the other hand, Trezor Keep Metal can be used for backing up recovery phrases, a random string of words to regain access to the crypto wallet in case of an incident.
- The product is made from corrosion-resistant stainless steel with a waterproof seal, which allows users to keep their recovery phrase safe in any condition impacted by factors like fire, water, and acids.
- The physical backup solution, being available for $99, allows users to store 12-word and 24-word phrases on a steel tube with alphabet tables emblazoned onto it.
- Users can access their recovery phrases by punching through the relevant letters on the tube.
- Meanwhile, the limited-edition version of the Safe 3 wallet only allows users to store their assets in Bitcoin (BTC), and Trezor releases 2,013 Bitcoin-only devices to the market with the promise to donate $21 from each sale to the Trezor Academy, a Bitcoin education initiative.
Zoom Out: - Self-custody solutions let users fully control their crypto assets without needing any third party.
- Trezor says less than 2% of the 420 million crypto owners worldwide use self-custody solutions.
| | | |
| 5 | | Tether, the issuer of the largest stablecoin USDT, has appointed its chief technology officer (CTO), Paolo Ardoino, as its new CEO. Ardoino will replace the current CEO, Jean-Louis van der Velde, as of December. More: - The transition will see Jean-Louis van der Velde carrying out an advisory role at Tether while remaining the CEO of Tether's sister crypto trading platform, Bitfinex.
- Ardoino will also remain as the CTO of the exchange.
- Besides, Tether's new CEO will continue to lead the company's technology teams simultaneously.
- Jean-Louis van der Velde said Ardoino is extremely well-suited to take his place.
Zoom Out: - USDT is currently the largest stablecoin with its $83B market cap.
- Stablecoins are cryptocurrencies whose value is pegged to another reference asset, mostly a fiat currency.
- Customers generally use these assets to trade with different cryptocurrencies without converting their funds back into fiat currencies.
| | | |
| 6 | | Texas-based Blackdot has unveiled a new tattoo machine that can ink a tattoo on the human body while storing the same tattoo on the blockchain as an NFT. The machine will offer custom designs from a wide range of artists who will create tattoos. More: - After the inking is completed, the recipients will be able to own the NFT version of their tattoos.
- Artists will also earn royalties when their designs are used by a customer.
- Before inking the tattoo, the device first uses a small number of concealed test dots to determine the proper dot depth for the customer's skin type.
- Blackdot's chief technology officer (CTO), Yan Azdoud, said the machine offers fidelity and accuracy while reproducing artists' works on skin.
- Azdoud also added that the device inks the tattoos with surgical precision and executes extremely detailed designs that cannot be inked by hand.
- The project's supporters include the digital artist Tyler Hobbs, who earned millions of dollars from the sales of the pieces of his Fidenza collection.
Zoom Out: - Blackdot currently searches for additional investors for fresh funding to expand across the U.S. and other countries.
- The firm secured $4.5M in a fundraising round in 2021.
| | | |
| 7 | | Quick Hits: - Discover ideal customers with data segmentation with BiglySales.com's data segmentation and AI-powered Outreach.*
- Binance, the largest crypto exchange by trading volume, has rebranded its content aggregator space, Binance Feed, to a user-generated social platform dubbed Binance Square.
- Former Alameda Research CEO Caroline Ellison has testified that the bankrupt crypto exchange FTX's former CEO, Sam Bankman-Fried (SBF), bribed Chinese officials with $150M to unfreeze funds locked in local exchanges.
- Swiss-based crypto firm Taurus has opened two new offices in the U.K. and France, expanding its presence in Europe.
- The Cord SDK saved product teams at monday.com, BILL, and ThoughtSpot 12 months of developer time and $100,000s.*
*This is a sponsored post. | | | |
| Upcoming Events | | OCT
16 | | Meet Our Fund 5, Building and Investing in AI | | | | | | | OCT
30 | | Discover the latest digital experience innovations, updates, and breakthroughs at Opticon Online.* | | | | | | | NOV
17 | | Join the Docker AI/ML Hackathon to help shape the exciting new frontier of AI and have a chance to win cool prizes!* | | | | | | * This is a sponsored event | | | |
Term of the Day Whitepaper: In marketing, a white paper is a detailed document explaining a problem and how a specific product, service or company provides a solution. Question of the Week What perks would convince you to return to the office? Join the conversation Today's Knowledge Hub Is Brought To You By Symon.AI - The All-in-One Data Tool for Startups. Start your free trial here.* |
INSIDE CRYPTOCURRENCY LEADERBOARD (30 DAYS) |
 | Staff Writer | | Doga is a tech and science editor who has been writing news for nearly 10 years. She worked for leading tech platforms and mainstrem media channels as an editor and presenter throughout his career. Then, she carried her know-how to more than one platform. She is a part-time cat lover and binge-watcher, and also fond of science, space, and emerging tech. She always has a story to tell. She is a bit addict to the laughter and -unfortunately- the '90s culture. | | This newsletter was edited by Aaron Crutchfield | |
| |
| |
Comments
Post a Comment