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A 101.38-carat diamond sold at auction in Hong Kong has become the most physical object ever to have been purchased using cryptocurrency, Bloomberg reports. Fast facts The HK$95.1 million (US$12.3 million) sale price nevertheless fell short of the expected US$15 million price, auctioneer Sotheby’s said. A spokesperson for Sotheby’s told Forkast.News it was unable to […]

India-based cryptocurrency exchange CoinDCX has announced the launch of its new Liqueth (LQTH) token, which will enable users to stake Ether — the native cryptocurrency of the Ethereum blockchain. Fast facts Users will be able to stake ETH on Ethereum 2.0 from a minimum 0.1 ETH. LQTH, an ERC-20 token, will be generated and transferred […]

Despite opposition from the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, Ripple is pushing ahead with plans to question former SEC director William Hinman, the former head of the regulator’s Division of Corporation Finance, telling the judge overseeing discovery in the SEC v. Ripple Labs lawsuit that Hinman’s deposition has been rescheduled to July 19, according to a […]

Crypto industry gets the ‘overleveraged’ label and authorities are cracking down on derivatives providers. Alexander Höptner of 100x believes the pushback foreshadows the industry’s next big thing — derivatives.

Market dominance suggests that investors are flocking towards Bitcoin as Covid delta variant concerns hit markets. In Thailand, authorities remind the industry of their stance on cryptocurrency payments.

Cryptocurrency miners blamed for blackouts as government eyes excess electricity for mooted state crypto mining operation.

Closure of center comes despite — or perhaps because of — professional pedigree of crypto exchange founder board members.

Cardano leapfrogged Bitcoin as the most held cryptocurrency on social trading platform eToro in the second quarter of 2021, the platform reported this week. Fast facts Bitcoin, which led the cryptocurrency bull run at the start of the year, saw a 42% increase in demand, but slipped from first to second place behind Cardano. Cardano […]

U.S. Senator Elizabeth Warren has written to Securities and Exchange Commission Chair Gary Gensler enquiring about the SEC’s authority to regulate cryptocurrencies and asking what future congressional regulatory action is needed, according to a Reuters report. Fast facts Requesting a reply by July 28, Warren, who heads the Senate Banking Committee’s Subcommittee on Economic Policy, […]

The price of Bitcoin and other cryptocurrency continue to slide as global failure to contain the Covid Delta variant lead to worries of another economic downturn.

Though Dogecoin and NFTs dominate headlines, their underlying technology — blockchain — is transforming our world in more meaningful ways, according to authors Kosrow Dehnad and Joe Duncan.

El Salvador’s government may face challenges in making Bitcoin legal tender, as more than three-quarters of the country remains skeptical of the plan, according to a report by Reuters. Fast facts A survey of 1,233 people across El Salvador earlier this month found that 54% of people said Bitcoin adoption was “not at all correct.” […]

Is William Hinman a former ‘high-ranking’ SEC official exempt from disclosing his prior communications on XRP, or must he provide testimony to Ripple?

U.S.-based cryptocurrency exchange Gemini is planning to expand its Asia-Pacific operations to cash in on the region’s growth, the bourse’s Asia-Pacific Managing Director, Jeremy Ng, wrote in a blog post this week. Fast facts The new expansion is to capture the growth of its Singapore office after it was first established last year, he wrote.  […]

Solidifying its stance against cryptocurrency like Bitcoin, the Bank of Thailand declared yesterday that it does not support the use of cryptocurrency as a means of payment, likening crypto transactions to “barter trade” as the bank does not consider crypto legal tender. Fast facts Siritida Panomwon Na Ayudhya, assistant governor of payment systems policy for […]

Korea issues penalties for kimchi premium arbitrage as China holds its 15th digital yuan pilot trials.

Customs officers use foreign exchange law to shut down cycle of foreign remittances and arbitrage.

Warning comes as Beijing ramps up efforts to internationalize China’s currency through launch of digital yuan.

Trading app Robinhood has seen a 369% increase in the number of women using its services in the past year, according to COO Gretchen Howard. According to a report by Business Insider, women now make up 30% of its customer base. Fast facts The result comes following Howard’s setting up of a task force to […]

Israel’s National Bureau for Counter Terror Financing has issued a seizure order against 84 cryptocurrency addresses associated with Palestinian resistance group Hamas as it looks to confiscate holdings of Bitcoin, Tether, Dogecoin and other cryptos. Fast facts “This action comes after a sizable uptick in cryptocurrency donations to Hamas in May following increased fighting between […]

More than US$1 billion was spent on crypto-linked Visa cards in the first six months of 2021, according to a Visa blog post this week. Fast facts Apart from enabling customers to buy cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin using its cards, Visa has partnered with 50 crypto platforms on card programs — such as Coinbase, the largest […]

An Argentine lawmaker presented a bill this week to allow employees and those exporting services abroad to be paid in cryptocurrency, Yahoo News reports. Fast facts Congressman José Luis Ramón said that he presented this bill to allow Argentina’s people — whose local currency, the peso, currently suffers from roughly 50% inflation a year — […]

Top blockchain and crypto news: Ethereum upgrade, torque of the town. SEC in snafu over Bitcoin ETFs. Crypto miners flourish amid China fallout.

Chinese tech giant forecasts a US$17.3 million loss in its BTC investment as more musicians in Asia lean towards NFTs.

Iran has continued a suspension of cryptocurrency mining, with Vice President Eshaq Jahangiri urging all licensed miners to stop operating as the country continues to suffer power outages, according to a report by U.Today that cited a Farsi-language tweet by the Tasnim News Agency. Fast facts Jahangiri said the ongoing electricity supply problems could last […]

China’s central bank has reiterated its ban on cryptocurrency trading and yesterday said it had ordered a company in Beijing suspected of offering software services for crypto trading to shut down as part of an ongoing nationwide crackdown on the crypto industry. Fast facts A Beijing office of the People’s Bank of China and a […]

The chief of South Korea’s main finance sector regulator has spoken out again against banks that have requested exemptions from anti-money laundering compliance rules in their contracts with cryptocurrency exchanges. Fast facts Eun Sung-soo, the chairman of the Financial Services Commission said yesterday: “Banks should use their own judgement to make decisions and apply for […]

Facing an onslaught of regulatory scrutiny, Binance CEO calls crypto regulations ‘positive sign’ of a maturing industry and announces new hires in compliance.

Mixed martial arts organization UFC and Hong Kong-based cryptocurrency exchange Crypto.com today announced a partnership that will see Crypto.com become UFC’s first global official fight kit partner. Fast facts Apart from Crypto.com’s logo placement on UFC fight kits, Crypto.com will, as UFC’s cryptocurrency platform partner, have a brand presence inside the Octagon during all pay-per-view […]

The standards-setter for banks around the world wants to subject crypto like Bitcoin to higher capital requirements. What do industry players think?

A ransomware attack on U.S. software company Kaseya has likely affected between 800 and 1,500 businesses around the world, the company said in a statement on Monday, as the group claiming responsibility for the attacks demands US$70 million in Bitcoin to release user’s data. Fast facts Cybercrime group REvil, which is linked to Russia, claimed […]

IBC Group becomes the latest to seize Bitcoin and Ethereum mining operations in China as crypto gets the nod from Pavilions Hotels and Resorts.

Global resort group Pavilions Hotels & Resorts will allow its customers to use crypto to book stays as of tomorrow, its managing director for Asia has told Forkast.News. Fast facts Scot Toon said Pavilions had partnered with British payment service Coindirect to allow guests paying in more than 40 cryptocurrencies, including Bitcoin and Ethereum, to […]

Institutional sentiment appears to be shifting back to being positive toward crypto as crypto investment products saw inflows of US$63 million for the first time in five weeks, according to a report by CoinShares, Europe’s largest digital asset investment firm. Previously, there were four straight weeks of crypto fund outflows. Fast facts: “For the first […]

Aussies may be leaning towards crypto for retirement funds while Vietnamese Prime Minister greenlights pilot crypto program.

Input Output Hong Kong, one of the companies behind the Cardano blockchain, is expanding the Cardano ecosystem through partnerships with Nexo, a cryptocurrency lending platform and decentralized finance liquidity aggregator Orion Protocol. Fast facts Input Output Hong Kong is partnering with Nexo to integrate ADA — the native cryptocurrency of the Cardano blockchain — to the […]

The price of Ether has jumped to a fortnight high as Ethereum’s London EIP-1559 upgrade draws close and investors look to get back into alt-coins.

Three of the biggest cryptocurrency exchanges in South Korea have tightened restrictions on virtual currency trading by their employees in a move designed to comply with the nation’s crypto regulations. Fast facts Bithumb announced that starting this month, it had banned its employees from trading cryptocurrencies using Bithumb accounts. The exchange has made employees sign […]

The Philippine Stock Exchange wants to be the country’s platform for trading crypto assets when regulators issue rules to govern the sector, according to a report by CNN Philippines.  Fast facts Stock exchange President and CEO Ramon Monzon said the bourse’s management had first discussed the idea of setting up a domestic crypto exchange two […]

Marathon Digital Holdings mined 265.6 Bitcoins last month, a 17% increase over the previous month, according to a company press release. Fast facts That mining increased the company’s holdings to 5,784 bitcoins with an estimated market value of US$206.1 million. The total includes a bulk purchase of 4,182 bitcoins the company bought in January for […]

Despite uncertainty surrounding cryptocurrency regulation in India, Coinbase — the largest cryptocurrency exchange in the United States — is stepping up its expansion plans in the world’s second-most populous country and home to fast-growing projects such as Polygon and Instadapp. Fast facts Coinbase is looking to build out its India tech hub, which was announced […]

Being a ‘crypto native’ involves much more than using Bitcoin and DeFi, writes Alvin Lee of DeGate DAO. It’s sharing core values like freedom and inclusion.

Crypto exchanges WazirX and Binance look to implement stronger compliance measures. Forkast News speaks with FTX founder and CEO Sam Bankman-Fried about crypto regulatory measures in Asia. Chinese district rewards residents with e-Yuan for counting footsteps. We’ll have more on these stories and other news shaping the cryptocurrency and blockchain world in this episode of […]

Mintable, a Singapore-based non-fungible token platform, this week closed a US$13 million series-A funding round, with U.S. payments technology company Ripple Labs investing. Fast facts Mintable, currently built on the Ethereum and Zilliqa blockchains, enables users to create, buy and sell NFTs using fiat or cryptocurrency. Mintable intends to use the fresh capital to scale […]

El Salvador recently became the first country to recognize Bitcoin as legal tender, and it seems unlikely to be the last. Samson Mow, chief strategy officer of Bitcoin technology company Blockstream, looks forward to a future in which Bitcoin edges out fiat currency.

As countries step up their implementation of the Financial Action Task Force’s standards, the list of regulators that have Binance in their crosshairs just keeps growing longer. Fast facts Thailand’s Securities and Exchange Commission today filed a criminal complaint against Binance — the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange by trading volume — for operating a digital asset […]

Japanese conglomerate SoftBank’s Latin America fund has plowed US$200 million into Brazilian crypto exchange Mercardo Bitcoin, according to a Reuters report. Fast facts The investment is SoftBank’s largest in Latin America to date, and brings the valuation of Mercardo’s parent company, 2TM Group, to US$2.1 billion, making it the eighth-most valuable fintech firm in the […]

Deposit account bears closer comparison to distressed debt fund than to mainstream bank account, expert says.

The chief of South Korea’s main finance sector regulator has said that no banks will be exempted from anti-money laundering and counter-financing of terrorism compliance when they sign contracts with virtual asset trading platforms. Fast facts According to South Korea’s crypto exchange regulations, crypto trading platforms must acquire contracts with local banks to provide their […]

Crypto exchange Huobi yesterday issued an announcement in simplified Chinese saying that it would implement a “T+1” withdrawal freezing time for all over-the-counter trades, meaning that traders can transfer cryptocurrency out only 24 hours after depositing it. In some cases, the freeze will last up to 36 hours.  Fast facts At present, the announcement appears […]

Top blockchain and cryptocurrency news: Binance bounced out of Britain. Musk moves Shiba Inu prices again. China’s digital currency gets ready to roll.

Demand for blockchain analytics is on the rise as FTX partners up with NFL superstar quarterback Tom Brady and supermodel Gisele Bündchen.

Wealth management firms need to develop new offerings around emerging trends such as the rise of digital assets and sustainable investing, according to Capgemini’s World Wealth Report 2021.

Formula 1 has announced that Hong Kong-based Crypto.com will be an inaugural global partner for the new F1 Sprint series in 2021.

Taiwan is set to enact new anti-money laundering rules that take effect July 1 to further boost AML requirements for crypto exchanges.

Bitmain has signed a deal to sell 30,000 of its Antminer machines to TeraWulf, a U.S. crypto miner that claims to use mostly clean energy.

Institutional demand for cryptocurrency appears to be slowing, according to a report by analytics company Glassnode.

Bithumb — South Korea’s second-largest crypto exchange — has rubbished claims that it is charging token issuers fees to list their coins on its platform.

Nasdaq-listed Coinbase, the largest cryptocurrency exchange in the United States, announced today its plans to expand its business internationally as it seeks to improve its asset-listing process and build a crypto app store. Fast facts: “We’re seeing crypto quickly mature from its initial use case of trading bitcoin to the trading of thousands of new […]

With Theta’s new mainnet 3.0, the network aims to be the go-to blockchain-powered content delivery platform for online streaming. Will Theta succeed?

In the last installment of a 3-part series on blockchain in Asia, Forkast.News examines: Everyone knows money has value. But does it also have ‘values’?

Do cryptocurrencies follow broader market trends? Cryptocurrency has long been perceived as a hedge against the fluctuations of the broader equities market. The idea of cryptocurrency as an alternative investment has taken off during the Covid-19 pandemic as equity prices rose to stratospheric highs despite the fundamentals of the economy significantly weakening.  An example that […]

Millennials and Gen Z Millennials have earned the reputation of disrupting or killing traditional industries, and the financial sector is no exception.  The disconnect between millennials and traditional investments is the result of various factors, such as their firsthand experience with the long-term effects of the 2008 global recession on assets and investments, as well […]

How value is created Our methodology for calculating the value of this market includes tokenized commodity, energy, currency (i.e., stablecoins), gold and real estate projects. Calculations include publicly listed projects found via Blockexplorers. It excludes cryptocurrency, as it’s a native digital asset, as well as DeFi projects because of their extreme volatility. All tokenized assets […]

Cryptocurrency exchange FTX today announced that American football star Tom Brady and his wife, Gisele Bündchen, are taking equity stakes in it, in a multi-year partnership.

Although institutional interest in Bitcoin is rising, there is still the volatility conundrum to consider. Bitcoin’s market fluctuations, however, make it a poor store of value. But, at the same time, there is an advantage to keeping capital stored in crypto: cashing out crypto into fiat is almost always a taxable event and not ideal […]

South Korea’s top asset managers are racing to get into the metaverse game while Forkast.News visits a decentralized theme park in Hong Kong.

Through tomorrow, a Senate committee is taking public comments on how best to make Australia into a global crypto leader and fintech hub.

Hong Kong’s Securities and Futures Commission chief, Ashley Alder, kicked off a firestorm during Hong Kong FinTech Week 2020 by announcing a plan to regulate all cryptocurrency exchanges that operate in the city or target its citizens.  These new proposed rules would replace a voluntary framework introduced in 2019 that allowed exchanges to opt in […]

Crypto investment in India has grown from about US$200 million to nearly US$40 billion in the past year, driven in large measure by demand among young investors.

Singapore cryptocurrency exchange Coinhako today announced a 500% increase in trading volume during the first five months of 2021 compared to the whole of 2020.

Chinese cryptocurrency exchange Huobi has stopped providing crypto derivative trading services to users in China and Taiwan.