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The service is currently available in the U.S., UK, EU, Brazil and the Philippines, but Zebedee plans on expanding the service to accommodate “all countries and currencies across the world.”

The largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization has changed hands within a narrow range over the past 24 hours following the CFTC’s filing against Binance and its CEO, Changpeng Zhao.

The CFTC’s lawsuit against Binance and CEO Changpeng Zhao noted at least three U.S.-based quantitative firms that were active on the exchange.

With the ink still drying on its Binance action, U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) Chairman Rostin Behnam reiterated Tuesday that he believes ether is a commodity – a potentially controversial assertion that seems to counter what his counterpart at the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has contended.

“This is a big deal,” Timothy Massad told CoinDesk TV’s “First Mover” regarding the agency’s action against the largest crypto exchange in the world.

North Korean group APT43 has used crypto services to launder stolen currency, according to a new report from threat intelligence firm Mandiant.

This is part of the group’s wider mission of cyber espionage of other countries, with the U.S. and South Korea being two of the main targets, the report said.

“In contrast to other North Korean groups such as APT38, which are likely primarily tasked to bring in funds for the regime, APT43 most likely carries out such operations to sustain its own operations,” it said.

APT43 likely used stolen bitcoin to pay for hash rental and cloud mining services which on the other end would result in “clean bitcoin,” Mandiant said.

“For a fee, these hash rental and cloud mining services provide hash power, which is used to mine cryptocurrency to a wallet selected by the buyer without any blockchain-based association to the buyer’s original payments,” the firm also said.

Cloud mining services offer anyone the chance to mine bitcoin by simply paying a fee instead of having to install and run mining machines themselves, which are instead in a shared remote location. 

© 2023 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.

The Financial Services and Markets Act amendment, which would enable the new rules, will soon be discussed in Parliament.

The U.S. banking crisis has acted like an “adrenaline shot” for crypto and given the bitcoin community “unbelievable resilience,” Galaxy Digital CEO Michael Novogratz said.

“There is nothing like a banking crisis in the United States … to remind you that our systems are fragile, Novogratz said during Galaxy Digital’s fourth-quarter earnings call. “We have been on a debt orgy, literally, gorging ourselves with cheap money for years.”

The company reported a net loss of $1 billion last year, missing analyst estimates. It reported a net profit of $1.7 billion in 2021.

Galaxy Digital expects to turn a profit in the first quarter of 2023 and achieve positive gains for its balance sheet after recent bank collapse kickstarted a price rally in crypto assets. Galaxy saw some of its best volume days in the past weeks, said Chief Investment Officer Christopher Ferraro, adding that the company had multiple banking providers and acted as a “pretty important liquidity center.”

BTC/USC chart by TradingView

“Crypto was in lots of ways created for this point,” Novogratz said. “Satoshi Nakamoto, way back in 2009, worried about the breakdown of the legacy financial system … Bitcoin really is the first decentralized store of value or money, which then really gave birth to this whole industry.”

The CEO believes that 2023 will bring with it big macro tailwinds for crypto.

The good, the bad and the ugly

If price action represents the good — coupled with overseas adoption of crypto in places like Hong Kong — then the current regulatory environment in the U.S. is the bad, Novogratz said.

The ugly would be Galaxy Digital’s share price, which has dropped more than 80% over the past year, according to TradingView.

“It’s lower with Bitcoin higher and it’s lower with our company doing better,” Novogratz said. “We have an operating business that I think will make money or at least break even this year and if not, should come close.”

The company plans to buy back stock starting May 15.

Galaxy Digital share price chart by TradingView

Novogratz on regulatory enforcement

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission last week said that it was investigating Coinbase and on Monday the Commodity Futures Trading Commission announced it was suing the biggest crypto exchange, Binance, for allegedly violating U.S. laws. This follows other regulatory actions like the SEC’s probe into former BUSD issuer Paxos.

“The regulatory regime in the United States is very tough,” Novogratz said. “It was making lots of progress until FTX and then the Democrats felt foolish that they were so close to Sam Bankman Fried — from the SEC to the CFTC to the Biden administration — and have used this one example of horrific fraud and being snookered by a guy in Bermuda shorts to just say the whole thing is bad.”

Novogratz also pointed out that activity and prices are still moving up despite what he sees as an “attack on crypto.”

© 2023 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.