2023-11-14 08:04
SOL prices have risen 150% in the past month, making it the top-performing major cryptocurrency. Wallets linked to bankrupt crypto exchange FTX continue to move millions of dollars worth of Solana’s SOL as the token's near 150% monthly rally takes a pause. On-chain analysis tool PeckShield flagged that some FTX-labeled addresses had transferred 250,000 SOL, worth just over $13.5 million at the time, and $4 million in USDT stablecoins to crypto exchange Binance and trading firm Wintermute. These wallets are controlled by a debtor group that is in charge of handling the FTX bankruptcy proceedings, including its multi-billion dollar asset holdings. Moving to exchanges may likely indicate a sale of those tokens on the open market. SOL prices are down 7.5% in the past 24 hours, CoinGecko data shows, underperforming an average of 0.6% in losses among cryptocurrencies tracked by the CoinDesk Market Index (CMI). Tuesday’s transfer comes a week after the group moved over $30 million worth of SOL to Binance and Kraken, another crypto exchange. Prices tumbled 5% amid the movement but recovered and rallied afterward. SOL has risen some 150% in the past month and over 500% year-to-date on the back of long-term optimism for its blockchain technology and popularity among crypto circles. Some said that part of the surge may also be attributed to the debtor group staking over $120 million of SOL tokens in a surprise move in October – dampening fears of an impending sell-off as the tokens were effectively locked out of circulation. But the debtor group has sent mixed messages about what it plans to do with its sizable stake, estimated at over $1 billion, which was acquired by the Sam Bankman-Fried led exchange from 2020 to 2022. So far, the bankrupt crypto exchange’s estate has moved north of $100 million in SOL to exchanges in a series of transactions that has apparently stressed an impressive rally. Part of these holdings were obtained by unstaking some $67 million worth of SOL. https://www.coindesk.com/markets/2023/11/14/ftx-linked-wallets-shift-135m-sol-as-solana-rally-takes-a-breather/
2023-11-14 06:56
XRP prices jumped to 73 cents from 65 cents in 25 minutes after a tweet suggested financial behemoth BlackRock had filed for an XRP ETF in the U.S. Traders invested in XRP futures lost some $7.26 million in the past 24 hours as prices moved wildly following rumors of a BlackRock (BLK) exchange-traded fund (ETF) filing. The liquidations were fourth behind those of bitcoin (BTC), ether (ETH) and Solana’s SOL futures, data shows. XRP prices jumped to 73 cents from 65 cents in 25 minutes after a tweet that suggested financial behemoth BlackRock had filed for an XRP ETF in the U.S. state of Delaware. Reputed crypto news firms reported on the filing as fact, which also helped amplify prices. However, the filing turned out to be fake: Someone had likely filed out an elaborate form using a BlackRock executive’s alias and effectively replicated an actual online filing. This caused prices to quickly tumble back to previous levels. But leveraged traders had already piled on their traders by then. Data shows that over 75% of traders from the total XRP liquidations were longs, or bets on higher prices, meaning those traders placed nearly $5 million in orders in that short time span without confirming the authenticity of the filing. Most of these trades were placed on crypto exchange Binance and Bybit, data shows, with position sizes ranging from a few thousand to over $200,000. Liquidation refers to when an exchange forcefully closes a trader’s leveraged position due to a partial or total loss of the trader’s initial margin. It happens when a trader is unable to meet the margin requirements for a leveraged position (fails to have sufficient funds to keep the trade open). https://www.coindesk.com/markets/2023/11/14/xrp-futures-traders-nurse-7m-loss-as-blackrock-etf-rumor-causes-wild-price-swings/
2023-11-13 21:36
The fake filing sent XRP higher by more than 10% before the token gave back those gains. Blackrock (BLK) is not attempting to launch an XRP exchange-traded fund (ETF), the asset manager said Monday. A regulatory filing suggesting the company had taken a first step toward doing so is fake, a spokesperson said shortly after the news began circulating on social media. XRP's price jumped more than 10% at one point but had already begun sinking back to its pre-news intraday price of around 65 cents. Blackrock has previously filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to launch spot bitcoin and ether ETFs. Prior to those SEC filings, were filings for a Delaware entity, which acts as the corporate vehicle for the product. Paperwork submitted Monday mimicked those forms but was not in fact filed by the asset management giant. This is not the first time Delaware's corporate registration process has been abused, seemingly in an attempt to pump crypto prices. A pair of filings in 2021 suggested Grayscale, an asset manager, would launch trust vehicles for two tokens that Grayscale did not have plans for. Grayscale is a subsidiary of CoinDesk parent company Digital Currency Group. Speculators took hold on Monday afternoon as ETF watchers, including Bloomberg's Eric Balchunas, amplified the phony filing, presenting it as true. Media corporations including Bankless and The Block also recirculated the news, fueling buy pressure on XRP. But other informed observers expressed a high degree of doubt that Blackrock – hardly regarded as a risk-taker in crypto – would even think about creating an ETF product for XRP, which is the subject of active litigation with the SEC. XRP also doesn't have a massive regulated futures market in the U.S., unlike bitcoin and ether. https://www.coindesk.com/business/2023/11/13/bogus-blackrock-xrp-filing-spoofs-etf-watchers-crypto-traders/
2023-11-13 18:39
The U.S. government tomorrow will report on October inflation data. After a major five-week run that took its price nearly 40% higher, bitcoin (BTC) has stalled for the past several days around the $37,000 area. To the extent that enthusiasm around possible approval of a spot bitcoin ETF has run out of some fuel, bulls might be looking to Tuesday's Consumer Price Index (CPI) as a fresh catalyst higher. Economists expect monthly headline CPI in October to have slowed to 0.1% from 0.4% in September. Year-over-year CPI is anticipated to have fallen to 3.3% from 3.7%. The core CPI, which strips out food and energy costs, is expected to have remained flat from September – 0.3% monthly and 4.1% year-over-year. Both gauges remain well above the U.S. Federal Reserve's 2% target. While the central bank has indicated that inflation doesn't need to fall all the way to 2% as a requisite for ending rate hikes and considering rate cuts, speakers have made clear they want to see continued progress toward that target. To the extent that higher interest rates compete with risk assets for investor dollars, the idea of a lower rate regime might provide a boon to bitcoin. The opposite – of course – also holds, and should tomorrow's inflation report come in faster than anticipated, crypto prices are likely to give back more of their October advance. https://www.coindesk.com/markets/2023/11/13/cpi-report-tuesday-could-provide-next-bitcoin-catalyst/
2023-11-13 16:52
The proposal by Robin Linus, a core contributor to ZeroSync, a developer of zero-knowledge proofs for use on the Bitcoin blockchain, sets out how an open market for content hosting could be created by "an atomic swap of coins for files." Bitcoin researcher Robin Linus, who turned heads last month with the release of his "BitVM" paper outlining a path for bringing Ethereum-style smart contracts to the original blockchain, is creating buzz anew with his latest publication: a proposal for decentralized file hosting, incentivized via Bitcoin payments. The new "BitStream" proposal by Linus, a core contributor to Bitcoin-based zero-knowledge proofs developer ZeroSync, sets out how an open market for content hosting could be created by "an atomic swap of coins for files." Using payment channels like Lightning, the server would charge for each download, thereby avoiding spiraling overhead costs in the event of a subsequent huge number of downloads. "The server encrypts the file such that if there’s any mismatch during decryption the client can derive a compact fraud proof," Linus said in the abstract to the white paper dated Nov. 12. "A bond contract guarantees the client receives the exact file or they can punish the server." The BitStream proposal echoes the BitVM paper's attempt address the risk of damaging the network's performance by clogging it up with transactions or other computations by carrying them out off-chain. In both cases, transactions or computations would only need to carried out on-chain for verification or to address a dispute. In response to Linus's post about the new white paper on X (formerly Twitter), one user suggested BitStream could do "for storage space what BitVM does for execution time," with which Linus agreed and confirmed that the two proposals could be combined. Another poster on X asked, "What makes this better than the numerous storage cryptocurrencies we have had before?" Linus answered, "It's Bitcoin." Read More: Bitcoin Is Fundamentally Different From Other Cryptocurrencies: Fidelity Digital Assets https://www.coindesk.com/tech/2023/11/13/bitcoin-researcher-behind-bitvm-ignites-fresh-buzz-with-new-paper-on-file-hosting/
2023-11-13 16:48
The FTX estate says the funds were "preferentially" or "fraudulently" transferred to Bybit and affiliates in the lead up to its November 2022, bankruptcy filing. The estate of bankrupt crypto firm FTX has sued exchange platform Bybit to try and recover a total of $953 million transferred to the latter's investment arm, court filings from Friday show. Efforts so far to claw back what it says were "misappropriated funds" have included suing former FTX executives and even the parents of founder Sam Bankman-Fried. Friday's legal complaint filed in Delaware targets Bybit Fintech Ltd., its investment arm Mirana and several individuals, including Mirana executive Sean Tan. It alleges the investment unit "received gross transfers from FTX.com of digital assets currently valued at approximately $838 million," of which about $500 million were transferred in the days before FTX halted withdrawals on Nov. 8, 2022. The suit also alleges an additional $115 million in digital and fiat assets were transferred to entities and individuals affiliated with Bybit and Mirana. "As with Mirana, the majority of these assets – more than $61 million – were withdrawn in the final days before FTX.com and FTX US disabled withdrawals," the complaint said. The FTX estate claims Bybit was given VIP status on the exchange, and that, in the days leading up to the bankruptcy filing, Mirana and affiliates "raced to withdraw assets" from their FTX accounts. "Mirana leveraged its VIP connections to pressure FTX Group employees to fulfill its withdrawal requests as soon as assets became available, further reducing the funds available to meet withdrawal requests by FTX.com’s non-VIP customers," the complaint said, adding that FTX employees also repeatedly changed Mirana’s Know-Your-Customer (KYC) settings in the days prior to the withdrawals pause. The suit seeks the return of assets "preferentially" or "fraudulently" transferred to Bybit and affiliates that are now allegedly "held hostage" by the latter. FTX's former management has been accused of misappropriating customer funds by the estate's new management and the U.S. government. Bankman-Fried was recently found guilty of fraud against FTX customers by a New York jury and faces jail time when sentenced next year. CoinDesk has reached out to Bybit for comment. https://www.coindesk.com/business/2023/11/13/ftx-sues-bybit-to-claw-back-953m-in-misappropriated-funds/
