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Investment bank Nomura has invested in Japanese blockchain business Crypto Garage, according to a press release.

The company said that it has “agreed to a third party allocation of shares” in Crypto Garage, a subsidiary of Digital Garage whose products include Settlenet, a blockchain settlement platform.

Nomura said it will work closely with the startup to help cater to institutional investors in Japan’s digital assets sector.

A memorandum of understanding has also been struck that will see Nomura, Crypto Garage and Komainu — a crypto custody business set up as part of a joint venture involving Nomura — explore offering crypto custody services for institutions in Japan.

Komainu raised $25 million in March of this year in a Series A round led by British billionaire Alan Howard.

Crypto Garage is registered with the Kanto Finance Bureau, part of Japan’s Ministry of Finance, as a crypto asset exchange — meaning it can act as an intermediary for transactions between domestic crypto firms and other companies.

© 2021 The Block Crypto, Inc. All Rights Reserved. This article is provided for informational purposes only. It is not offered or intended to be used as legal, tax, investment, financial, or other advice.

JD.com’s tech arm revealed its non-fungible token technology and plans, following in the heels of its rival Alibaba.

• JD Technology is offering seven free limited edition NFTs built on its own NFT chain, commemorating its annual conference, JD Discovery, according to a WeChat post on its official account.
• The NFTs, JD’s first, are minted and released on JD Technology’s own blockchan, dubbed JD Chain. The company has developed “an NFT technical service platform” on which users can store, verify, circulate, and trace NFT collections.
• In August, Tencent and Alibaba launched their own NFT platforms.
• The seven NFTs feature JD.com’s mascot, each representing one of the company’s key sectors; retail, tech, logistics, health, finance, and smart cities.
• One NFT will be given for free to anyone who signs up for the company’s Discovery conference between Oct. 19 and Nov. 22. If they invite more people to attend, they can collect more NFTs to form the full set.
• The seven NFTs will not be released after Nov. 22, but users will be able to transfer them to others.
• JD plans to apply its NFT platform on copyright protection, public welfare, art collection, and e-commerce, according to the post.
• JD Technology, formerly JD Digits, is the tech development arm of JD.com, one of China’s biggest e-commerce apps. JD Technology works on blockchain, fintech, AI, healthtech, and cloud services.

Read more: Alibaba to Stop Selling Crypto Mining Machines

OSL, a Hong Kong-based digital asset trading platform, has started offering its exchange services to professional and institutional investors in Argentina, Brazil, Colombia and México, the company said in a statement on Tuesday.

The company, part of BC Group, a public technology and digital asset company, will provide institutional customers with “access to a global liquidity pool,” the company said.

Fernando Martinez, OSL’s head of Americas, told CoinDesk that the company was addressing the growing demand for crypto services among institutional investors in Latin America and will serve regional funds, family offices and private banks.

“Until the end of the year, we have removed fees for professional investors and institutions that want to start interacting with our exchange,” Martinez said, adding that the exchange does not operate with local currencies but directly with U.S. dollars.

In recent months, large financial services firms in the region have launched of a number of new investment products. In June, blockchain investment firm QR Capital started trading its bitcoin exchange-traded fund (ETF) on the Brazil stock exchange. A month later, the firm listed an ether ETF on the same exchange after winning approval from regulators.

Earlier this month, the Mexican Stock Exchange (BMV) announced that it is considering listing crypto futures on its derivatives exchange.

Martinez said that OSL, the first and only digital asset company licensed by Hong Kong’s Securities and Futures Commission, would compete against regional platforms that are currently providing similar services.

OSL primarily offers brokerage and exchange services, and to a lesser extent, custodial services, Martinez said. He believes that institutional crypto investment flow will soon equal retail investment flow in Latin America.

Wormhole, a communication bridge between Solana and other top decentralized finance (DeFi) networks, has added user interface support for the Terra network.

The move allows users to port digital assets between Terra, Solana (SOL), Ethereum (ETH), and Binance Smart Chain (BSC) via a single unified interface without the need to double wrap Terra tokens.

Like stablecoins whose values are pegged to fiat currencies or particular commodities, wrapped tokens fulfil a similar function by representing real-world assets on networks they aren’t native to. “Wrapping” refers to storing particular digital assets in a wrapper or digital vault so they may function on one blockchain even though they were issued on another.

In order to allow assets to exchange value across multiple chains, tokens often need to be double wrapped – which can prove costly and time-consuming.

“By allowing value to flow freely throughout decentralized networks, Wormhole is opening the door for use cases that were previously unattainable,” said Hendrik Hofstadt, director of Special Projects at Jump Crypto in a press release on Tuesday.

“Now, cross-chain governance, liquid staking tokens, oracle data being passed over multiple chains and the ability to avoid double wrapping tokens are all within a user’s reach.”

Wormhole’s interoperability protocol enables crypto assets like tokens and non-fungible tokens (NFTs), and even price data, to flow between blockchain networks that don’t usually talk to each other. At launch, the protocol supported Terra, Ethereum and Binance Smart Chain.

Previously, Terra’s stablecoin, UST, and Luna, the native crypto powering Terra’s ecosystem, passed through Wormhole V1, but upon reaching the Solana network they became double wrapped.

The addition of Terra support to Wormhole’s already existing ETH <> SOL <> BSC token bridge means the four large DeFi blockchains by total value locked can now “flow freely” between the four, per the release.

The support comes on the heels of Terra’s recent Colombus-5 upgrade which enabled the network to function more seamlessly with other crypto ecosystems.

1/ The @wormholecrypto support for Terra in the V2 UI is live!

Transfers of $UST and $LUNA between Terra, @ethereum, @solana, and @BinanceChain via Wormhole’s cross-chain bridge are now available 🙂 https://t.co/2gWsIq2KxW

— Terra (UST) 🌍 Powered by LUNA 🌕 (@terra_money) October 19, 2021

Terra also said it will be shuttering its Ethereum bridge, Shuttle, and drive liquidity toward Wormhole, which already has $350 million in TVL, according to the protocol’s own data.

Read more: Bridged Stablecoins on Solana Get a Boost With Mercurial Finance Pools

Multicoin Capital, an investment firm focused on cryptocurrency and blockchain companies, is planning to raise a $250 million for a third crypto-focused venture fund, according to an article by The Information.

• The Austin, Tex.-based company intends to complete the raise by the end of 2021, according to the story, which cited fundraising materials that the publication had seen.
• The initiative comes less than six months after Multicoin Capital raised $100 million for its second crypto venture fund.
• It is the latest in a series of large funds that major venture capital firms have created this year or are in the process of raising to focus on cryptocurrency and blockchain projects. In June, Andreessen Horowitz raised $2.2 billion for its third crypto fund. Paradigm, the cryptocurrency venture capital firm led by Coinbase co-founder Fred Ehrsam, is looking to close a $1.5 billion fund for startup investments, according to documents viewed by CoinDesk.
• In the ensuing years, Multicoin Capital will be looking to invest in crypto companies that others might miss.
• Multicoin Capital Managing Partner Tushar Jain has called blockchain “the best social good in the world.”
• In an email to CoinDesk, a Multicoin Capital spokesperson wrote that the firm had no comment on The Information report.

UPDATE (Oct. 19, 00:47 UTC): Adds Multicoin Capital spokesperson’s reply.

Crypto-focused hedge fund Multicoin Capital plans to raise $250 million for a third venture fund aimed at crypto startups, The Information reported after reviewing the company’s fundraising materials. 

Austin, Texas-based Multicoin had already raised $100 million for a second fund in May, and plans to finish fundraising by the end of 2021. It joins other firms bolstering their crypto funds this year, including Andreessen Horowitz .

Multicoin is interested in exploring opportunities in decentralized finance (DeFi) interest rate markets, its co-founder Tushar Jain wrote on Oct. 6. The firm recently led a funding round for the DeFi project Strips Finance, which intends to set up a decentralized exchange for trading interest rates.

Binance invested in Multicoin in March, making it a partner of the hedge fund. Multicoin also received funding from Ribbit Capital, Union Square Ventures, venture capitalist Marc Andreessen and former PayPal Chief Operating Officer David Sacks.

© 2021 The Block Crypto, Inc. All Rights Reserved. This article is provided for informational purposes only. It is not offered or intended to be used as legal, tax, investment, financial, or other advice.

ProShares’ bitcoin futures exchange-traded fund (ETF) listed on the New York Stock Exchange today, and it was welcomed with explosive interest. 

“It absolutely obliterated,” said James Seyffart of Bloomberg Intelligence.

At the time of writing, volumes for the so-called ProShares Bitcoin Strategy ETF (BITO) stood near $1 billion after its inaugural trading day. At last check, volumes stood at $999.473 million. 

Many expected a massive launch, but Seyffart told the Block that the volumes blew away expectations. Bloomberg Intelligence was expecting the product to top the launch of the VanEck Social Sentiment ETF ($BUZZ), according to Seyffart. $BUZZ did more than $400 billion on its opening day, but ProShares’ $BITO traded nearly twice that.

Seyffart said there were a few main takeaways from the launch outside the high demand for the product in the market. There weren’t many block trades, or large orders, he said, which suggests most of the action was dominated by retail.

“The thing traded super tight and was within a penny wide pretty much the entire day,” said Seyffart. “And it traded extremely close to the underlying futures and bitcoin itself.”

The launch of a bitcoin ETF has been long awaited by the industry. The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has yet to allow an ETF trading spot, but today’s launch of a futures product is a huge step for the ETF industry, according to Douglas Yones, Head of Exchange Traded Products at the NYSE.

ProShares is the first to offer a crypto ETF product in the U.S., winning the race to list. Earlier this year, SEC Commissioner Gary Gensler expressed an interest in reviewing crypto proposals for products filed under the Investment Act of 1940 tied to CME bitcoin futures. ProShares was the first to make it to listing, but there are still a number of issuers jockeying for position. These include  Valkyrie, VanEck, Invesco and BlockFi, among others.

© 2021 The Block Crypto, Inc. All Rights Reserved. This article is provided for informational purposes only. It is not offered or intended to be used as legal, tax, investment, financial, or other advice.

Los brasileños adquirieron $496 millones en criptomonedas en agosto y ya han comprado $4.270 millones en lo que va de 2021, reveló el viernes el Banco Central de Brasil (BCB).

Según la autoridad monetaria brasileña, en mayo se dio el pico de adquisición de criptomonedas, con $756 millones en compras. Desde entonces la cifra bajó a $695 millones en junio y a $583 millones en julio, pero fue superior a las de febrero y marzo. En ese momento se adquirieron $386 millones y $357 millones, respectivamente, informó el medio brasileño Portal do Bitcoin.

Si se calcula a precio de mercado, el total de activos digitales en manos de los brasileños ascendería a casi $50.000 millones, frente a los $16.000 millones en acciones estadounidenses, dijo el viernes el director de política monetaria del BCB, Bruno Serra.

En agosto, el presidente del BCB, Roberto Campos Neto, había dicho que los brasileños tenían unos $40.000 millones en criptomonedas.

“Es un negocio muy grande, atrae la atención de los reguladores de todo el mundo, no es sólo en Brasil”, dijo.

Según Serra, la autoridad monetaria de Brasil tiene un “mercado de divisas muy controlado” que le permite estar al tanto de las transacciones relacionadas con criptomonedas. “Tenemos contratos de cambio de divisas para todas las transacciones; somos capaces de mapear el cien por ciento de ellas”, dijo.

A partir de agosto la transferencia de propiedad de criptomonedas entre residentes y no residentes comenzó a ser divulgada por el Banco Central en la parte de “Bienes” de la balanza de pagos, informó Portal do Bitcoin. Las criptomonedas son consideradas bienes —o activos no financieros o producidos— siguiendo la metodología recomendada por el Fondo Monetario Internacional.

Según Serra, la inversión en criptomonedas es una búsqueda de diversificación de riqueza por parte de inversores. “Creo que esta dinámica de diversificación en el extranjero es una dinámica que puede llegar para quedarse. Los canales de diversificación se han abierto mucho. Las regulaciones cambiarias se están flexibilizando en este sentido; es algo que tenemos que abordar”, dijo.

“Es un flujo unidireccional. Debido al coste de la energía Brasil no produce criptoactivos. Sólo es un importador”, añadió Serra.

The ProShares Bitcoin Strategy exchange-traded fund’s trading volume topped $1 billion on its first day, ranking the investment vehicle as one of the top ETF launches in history.

As of 4:02 p.m. ET, shortly after the close of U.S. stock markets on Monday, trading volume in the ProShares ETF (ticker $BITO) had reached 23.9 million shares, worth more than $1 billion based on the closing price.

The $BITO price rose to $41.89 at the close, up 4.7% from the initial $40 net asset value.

Based on first-day trading volume, the launch would rank the new ETF as one of the top two or three ever, said Dave Nadig, chief investment officer and director of research of ETF Trends.

Most of the trading appears to have come from retail investors, since there were few large “block” trades of the size that big institutional traders often deal in, Nadig said.

“This is probably going to be what we all expected, which is it’s an access vehicle for certain players in the marketplace,” Nadig said in a phone interview. “There’s lots of folks who are active participants in the markets who just don’t want to cross over the crypto bridge by themselves.”

Quick Take

• Worldpay has been processing payments for crypto exchanges since 2013. 
• Now, the FIS-owned company is ramping up hiring for its crypto businesses and eyeing new products, including crypto settlement.

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