The developers of the cryptocurrency wallet alerted users that the March 31 airdrop is a fiction and warned them to be on their guard and not fall for the tricks of fraudsters.
MetaMask denied rumors about the March 31 airdrop. The developers say that there have been numerous reports that the crypto wallet will be holding a token giveaway at the end of the month.
“These rumors are not only false, but they are dangerous. They create opportunities for scammers and phishers. Please be on the lookout for fake sites in the coming days,” MetaMask warned.
Fraudulent reports about MetaMask's token giveaway appeared in mid-March, after ConsenSys CEO Joe Lubin revealed that MetaMask was planning to launch a decentralized autonomous organization (DAO) and create its own token for it. No details were disclosed and the scammers seized the chance.
The United Kingdom has tightened rules for cryptocurrency companies related to advertising and promotion of crypto projects.
UK introduces criminal responsibility for non-compliance with the rules of advertising of cryptocurrency projects. It provides for a term of imprisonment of up to 2 years. The new advertising rules were announced on the website of the UK Financial Conduct Authority (FCA).
Already since January 2020 in the UK there is an order in which for the deployment of cryptocurrency activities in the kingdom, companies must register with the FCA and comply with anti-money laundering regulations. According to the new rules, advertising will also have to be approved by the FCA.
Companies registered with the FCA and approved can launch advertising campaigns in the Kingdom. Non-compliant advertising campaigns will be considered a breach of the Financial Markets and Services Act of 2000. This is punishable by up to 2 years in prison.
The company has a blockchain called XRP Ledger, which they use as the basis for creating national digital currencies. The company’s pilot project will be to create a token for Montenegro.
Ripple Labs is looking for development engineers who can create projects within central bank currencies (CBDC). The company opened a vacancy to find an employee capable of developing cryptocurrency solutions that meet the requirements of regulators from different countries.
Ripple has been trying to develop in the CBDC sector for several years, offering XRP Ledger as the main blockchain for creating digital national currencies.
In September 2021, Ripple Labs entered into an agreement with Bhutan to jointly develop a national cryptocurrency. With such an initiative, the country's leadership planned to equip citizens with financial opportunities, most residents cannot take out a loan or open a savings account.
At this year’s Crypto Summit 2023, Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghaus met with Montenegrin President Dritan Abazovic. During the meeting, a partnership was made for Ripple to develop Montenegro’s national currency.
The company multiplied its productivity and sold $35 million worth of cryptocurrency to cover costs.
Marathon Digital sold 1,500 Bitcoins in January. In the first month of 2023, the company produced 45% more cryptocurrency than the month before. According to a press release, the company decided to sell some of its earned assets to cover operating expenses due to the increase in mining.
Marathon Digital is a leading cryptocurrency mining company based in the U.S. and entering public trading. Its farms with tens of thousands of devices are located in Texas, North Dakota and other states.
“We started the year by producing a record 687 bitcoins in January 2023, which is a 45% increase from the 475 bitcoins we produced in December 2022,” says Marathon Digital CEO Fred Thiel.
Thiel said the company will continue to sell the mined cryptocurrency to cover monthly expenses. The company also plans to increase its mining equipment capacity to 23 EH/s by the middle of this year Marathon Digital currently has the second largest amount of Bitcoin stored.
For the first time since last August, Bitcoin’s value rose above $24,000. Also, the “Fear and Greed” index increased by 4 points during the day and reached the mark of 60 points.
On February 2 Bitcoin rate reached $24.1 thousand, which is the maximum since August 15, 2022. The first cryptocurrency rose in price by 2.8% over a day. Now, according to Coingecko, the cryptocurrency is trading at $23.74 thousand.
The market capitalization of BTC now stands at $458 billion, which is 40.6% of the entire cryptocurrency market. The daily trading volume is $41.8 billion.
In addition to Bitcoin, other altcoins increased in price. Ethereum rose in price by 5.6% and reached $1,660, BNB grew by 6.9% to $322, Cardano by 5%, reaching a value of $0.4, Polygon increased by 12.2%, reaching a value of $1.24.
According to CoinGlass, cryptocurrency exchanges liquidated positions worth more than $137 million. $38.8 million was sold in pairs with Bitcoin, $34.5 was sold with Ethereum. The largest liquidation took place on the Bybit exchange, where $1.69 million was sold on the BTC/USD pair.
An international forum on the cryptoindustry will be held in February.
An international forum Blockcain Life 2023 will be held in Dubai from February 27 to 28. The forum will be attended by key figures from the crypto world, government representatives, heads of international companies, funds, investors and startups.
The forum has been held since 2017 and is among the top three international events dedicated to the crypto industry.
What will be at the forum
Networking with 4000 participants and meeting the heads of industry companies
An exhibition area with over 100 project booths
Speeches by industry experts in the conference hall
After-party on a luxury yacht “LOTUS”
The participants of the forum will find the projects for investment
interesting business solutions, partners. The Blockchain Life 2023 program will include speeches about industry trends: DeFi, NFT, metaverses, mining and much more.
Sam Bankman-Fried will appear in court in Bagram on December 19 and will not challenge his extradition to U.S. authorities.
Sam Beckman-Fried, the former head of the failing FTX exchange, will appear in court in the Bahamas on December 19 to overturn a decision not to extradite him to the U.S. This was reported by Reuters, citing a source. The head of FTX was detained in the Bahamas on December 13 at the request of the United States authorities.
Last week, the SEC filed charges against Bankman-Fried for running a scheme to defraud investors. The SEC plans to hold the FTX chief accountable for fraudulently obtaining billions of dollars from investors and for misusing those funds to buy luxury real estate and political contributions.
Upon arrival in the U.S., Bankman-Frieda will find himself at a detention center in Brooklyn, a few days after his arrival, a trial will take place where he will be asked to plead guilty and a judge will consider bail. Since it is unknown where the stolen funds are now, Bankman-Fried will remain in custody.
Aplle AppStore blocked Coinbase cryptocurrency wallet update due to the presence of NFT-related transactions.
The AppStore blocked an update to Coinbase Wallet that added the ability to send NFTs to other users. The app store on iOS gas payments must go through Apple’s payment system and the company must charge a 30% fee on transactions.
Apple’s claim is that the gas fees required to send NFTs need to be paid through their In-App Purchase system, so that they can collect 30% of the gas fee.
According to the Coinbase team, knowledgeable people who understand how blockchain works clearly understand that this is impossible. Gas goes to the processing of the transaction in the blockchain, not any of the parties. Especially since the payment system in Apple's apps does not support cryptocurrencies.
Coinbase Wallet developers hope that the problem will be solved soon and think that this is just an omission on Apple’s part. They are also ready to interact with the company and are willing to help sort out the issue.
Crypto wallet for mobile devices that allows you to easily manage all your assets, send cryptocurrencies by names, not addresses, and use decentralized applications.
Kraken has announced its intention to lay off 30% of its staff due to a decline in trading on the crypto exchange.
Cryptocurrency exchange Kraken will cut 30% of jobs, which is about 1.1 thousand employees. This decision was made so that the company could survive the Crypto Winter and adapt to the current market conditions. The decision was published on the exchange's blog.
The reduction of the team is due to the high level of decline in trading and reduced inflows of new customers, which is the consequence of macroeconomics and geopolitics. The size of the team will be reduced from the size of a year ago.
According to CEO Jesse Powell, the exchange has exhausted other ways to cut costs, and layoffs will help the platform maintain business in the long term.
Popular exchange known to many traders working on both the cryptocurrency and the fiat market. KR is a proven and reliable cryptocurrency exchange that provides a huge amount of tools for various types of trading.
Regardless of the long duration of the crypto winter and the collapse of FTX, cryptocurrency will still be used abundantly in the future.
According to Coindesk, analyst firm Morgan Stanley expects further bankruptcies of crypto industry players and deleveraging. Following the collapse of FTX, the market is now re-evaluating the value of the project’s issued tokens and trying to figure out if they were used as leverage.
Despite the fallout from FTX, financial analysts believe that the industry will see a new dawn and will continue to be profitable. The industry is still focused on building digital asset infrastructure, but experts believe it won't enter everyday life until 10 to 15 years from now.
Morgan Stanley expects further deleveraging, focusing on the declining capitalization of stablecoins, especially Tether (USDT).