Quick Take
- In July, influential DeFi investor Santiago Santos left ParaFi Capital.
- He’s now branching out on his own, investing his own money in the crypto space.
2021 is proving to be a bumper year for ransomware, but may also be witnessing an improvement in reporting practices.
The post FinCEN charts massive surge in ransomware activity reports in H1 2021 appeared first on The Block.
Both Coinbase and a16z released policy frameworks this week.
Tribe Capital, a venture capital firm with previous investments in Kraken and FTX among others in the crypto sector, is launching a $75 million cryptocurrency fund, sources familiar with the initiative told CoinDesk.
- The fund initially sought to raise $50 million but strong interest from investors raised the total, according to the sources.
- San Francisco-based Tribe’s fund will take long positions in early-stage projects, SAFTs (simple agreements for future tokens, a type of investment agreement that developers use to work with investors), yield farming, treasury buys and mining.
- The fund will make 75% of its investments in U.S. projects and 25% internationally.
- Tribe Capital has had a deep interest in the blockchain space, investing about 20% of its assets in cryptocurrency projects, according to the sources. Its portfolio includes an investment in Digital Currency Group, CoinDesk’s parent company.
- Arjun Sethi, Tribe Capital’s co-founder, and Jared Madfes, a partner at the firm, will manage the crypto fund.
The crypto industry has been waiting years for the regulatory approval a Bitcoin ETF and now two have been permitted in Canada. What are they?
The Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) fined Bitfinex and Tether more than $42 million on allegations the USDT stablecoin was not fully backed at all times and that Bitfinex violated a previous agency order.
The federal commodities regulator settled charges with the sibling crypto companies on Friday, barring both firms from “any further violations of the Commodity Exchange Act (CEA) and CFTC regulations.”
According to a CFTC press release, Tether’s stablecoin was fully backed by reserves for only one-quarter of the time over a 26-month period between 2016 and 2018. Further, Tether comingled reserve funds with the company’s corporate funds and held reserves in non-cash products.
“At various times, Tether maintained some of the Tether Reserves in bank accounts other than the Tether Bank Accounts. Tether represents that, at times, it also included receivables and non-fiat assets among its counted reserves; and further represents that Tether has not failed to satisfy a redemption request for tether tokens,” an order attached to the release said.
The New York Attorney General’s office reported similar findings in an investigation into Tether and Bitfinex that was settled earlier this year.
“The order also finds that, instead of holding all USDT token reserves in U.S. dollars as represented, Tether relied upon unregulated entities and certain third-parties to hold funds comprising the reserves,” the press release said.
Spokespeople for Tether and Bitfinex did not immediately return a request for comment.
In a statement published shortly after the CFTC release, the firm contested the claims.
“As to the Tether reserves, there is no finding that tether tokens were not fully backed at all times – simply that the reserves were not all in cash and all in a bank account titled in Tether’s name, at all times. As Tether represented in the Order, it has always maintained adequate reserves and has never failed to satisfy a redemption request,” Tether wrote.
The CFTC said it also settled commodities charges against Bitfinex in a simultaneous action.
“The order finds Bitfinex engaged in illegal, off-exchange retail commodity transactions in digital assets with U.S persons on the Bitfinex trading platform and operated as a futures commission merchant (FCM) without registering as required,” a press release said.
Bitfinex will pay $1.5 million and institute “additional systems” to ensure it does not facilitate unlawful commodities transactions again, the press release said.
In a concurring statement, CFTC Commissioner Dawn Stump said she agreed with the agency’s findings but expressed concern about the CFTC’s role in regulating stablecoins specifically.
“We should seek to ensure the public understands that we do not regulate stablecoins and we do not have daily insight into the businesses of those who issue such,” Stump said. “But in pursuing and settling this matter, do we provide users of stablecoins with a false sense of comfort that we are overseeing those who issue and sell these coins such that they are protected from wrongdoing?”
Stump questioned whether the CFTC was broadening its jurisdiction versus protecting investors.
UPDATE (Oct. 15, 15:18 UTC): Adds context.
UPDATE (Oct. 15, 15:21 UTC): Adds statement from Tether.
UPDATE (Oct. 15, 15:26 UTC): Adds statement from CFTC Commissioner Dawn Stump.
Digital asset platform Bakkt Holdings has completed its merger with VPC Impact Acquisition Holdings, Intercontinental Exchange (ICE) announced on Friday. Bakkt will start trading on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) as a public company starting Oct. 18, ICE said in a press release. It will use the ticker “BKKT.” ICE, best known for operating […]
The post Bakkt set to start trading on NYSE next week appeared first on The Block.
The owner wrote on Twitter that he won’t sell his CryptoPunk no matter the price hours before the bid and declined the offer.
The post CryptoPunk owner declines a $9.5 million bid for his rare NFT appeared first on The Block.
The company behind Steam updated its rules and guidelines to prohibit applications that issue or allow cryptocurrencies or NFTs to be exchanged.
The ProShares bitcoin futures-based exchange traded fund (ETF) is slated to list Monday pending no last minute regulatory interference.
The post Bitcoin futures ETF slated to list Monday appeared first on The Block.
