Binance Launches Blockchain Education Program, Cardano Launches Cardano Spot, Snowfall Protocol Phase 3 Presale Almost Sold out

Audy Castañeda
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Snowfall is likely to become a better investment than ADA and BNB next year.

The crypto market has been volatile in the last year and a half. Despite this volatility, some projects prospered, while others failed. One such project that has gained a lot of traction since its launch two months ago is Snowfall Protocol (SNW). Here, the key reasons why Snowfall Protocol (SNW) will be a better investment than Cardano (ADA) and Binance (BNB) in 2023 will be discussed.

Binance (BNB) Partners with Blockchain Center Research Lab for Educational Program

Binance (BNB) has announced in a press release that it will start a nationwide Blockchain education program in Kazakhstan, in partnership with the Blockchain Center research lab. Binance, a major cryptocurrency exchange, aims to prepare college students in the Central Asian country of Kazakhstan for careers in the cryptocurrency sector.

According to the announcement, by 2026, Binance (BNB) plans to train in Blockchain more than 40,000 students at educational institutions across the Central Asian country. While the crypto winter continues to cause the token to decline, Binance has engaged with officials from neighboring Kyrgyzstan and Azerbaijan to discuss expanding its footprint in the region.

Binance may be making headlines for all the right reasons, but its current investors haven’t fared so well. In the last month, Binance has lost 23% of its value, currently trading at $242.79, which is a 64.86% decline from its all-time high.

Cardano (ADA) Launches Social Network Called “Cardano Spot”

Founding member of the Cardano (ADA) Blockchain, EMURGO Group Pte. Ltd., has announced the formation of a new business company, EMURGO Media, to develop media-related products and services for the Cardano ecosystem.

Only time will tell if the introduction of Cardano Spot makes any difference to the growth of Cardano as a cryptocurrency. So far, the Cardano price charts do not look convincing. ADA has fallen more than 17% in the last month and 50% in the last six months. At the current trading price of $0.26, Cardano is 91% below its all-time high.

Snowfall Protocol (SNW) in its Last Stage of Presale

Investors are drawn to Snowfall Protocol (SNW) for more than just its exceptional value and rate of growth. According to crypto experts, there is huge potential in the Blockchain industry for SNW.

The Snowfall Protocol team has created an interactive and easy-to-use platform, for users regardless of their technical background. SNW is moving at an extraordinary pace due to its immense potential. So far, more than $3 million has been raised through pre-sale sales.

The value of Snowfall Protocol tokens has increased by 250% from the second phase to the third phase, with more gains expected in the future. According to analysts, Snowfall Protocol could soon increase by 5000%, by the time it launches. Therefore, this appears to be the perfect time to buy SNW.

By Audy Castaneda

Venezuelan Banks Have Blocked more than 75 Accounts since the End of Last Year Due to Crypto-Related Activities

Audy Castañeda
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Venezuelan Banks Have Blocked more than 75 Accounts since the End of Last Year Due to Crypto-Related Activities

According to Legalrocks, a crypto and Blockchain-focused law firm in Venezuela, private Venezuelan banks have blocked more than 75 accounts for facilitating crypto-to-fiat and fiat-to-crypto conversions since late 2021.

Venezuelan banks have begun to look at customer accounts linked to cryptocurrency trading, mainly related to peer-to-peer (P2P) transaction activity.

Venezuelan banks are increasing surveillance of accounts that are commonly related to cryptocurrency transactions. Since the end of 2021, according to a blog post published by Legalrocks, a Venezuelan law firm focused on cryptocurrency and Blockchain, there have been more than 75 cases of accounts being suspended or under investigation.

Venezuelan Banks Suspend Crypto-Related Accounts

Ana Ojeda, CEO of Legalrocks, states that using these accounts to receive fiat currency for a cryptocurrency sale or exchange should not be considered a valid reason to block them. However, she clarifies that this changes if there are sufficient indications that the funds used in these transactions are related to illegal or criminal activities.

Similarly, transactions made through cryptocurrency exchanges not authorized by Sunacrip, the national superintendency of cryptocurrency assets in Venezuela, could also be considered suspicious by financial authorities, and thus warrant an investigation.

Stablecoin Love

Ojeda explains that stablecoin exchanges through P2P markets are common, due to the economic debacle, as well as the high levels of devaluation that the national fiat currency (the Venezuelan bolivar) has experienced this year.

This means that people use stablecoins as a store of value, buying them when they receive fiat currency as payment, and then exchanging them for fiat currency again to buy goods and pay for services.

According to a report presented by the United Nations in July, Venezuela ranks third among the countries with the most adoption of cryptocurrencies.

According to Ojeda “Venezuela has been leading the region for several years as the Latin American country that uses cryptocurrencies the most to protect itself from inflation and the loss of savings capacity.”

Given the situation of blocked bank accounts in Venezuela, LegalRocks issued a legal opinion. In it, they clarify that, in accordance with the Constituent Decree on the Comprehensive System of Cryptoactives and Related Activities, the use of cryptocurrencies in the Caribbean country is a legal activity.

Stablecoin-based P2P marketplaces have become so popular and widespread in Venezuela that some analysts believe they could be playing a significant role in the dynamics of the US dollar-bolívar exchange rate.

In November, when the bolivar fell 40% against the US dollar, economist Asdrúbal Oliveros cited the interplay of crypto markets and the broader economy, along with the collapse of FTX and the fear of holding funds in custodial exchanges, as a possible cause.

By Audy Castaneda

Mango Markets Hacker Arrested on Fraud and Manipulation Charges

Audy Castañeda
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<strong>Mango Markets Hacker Arrested on Fraud and Manipulation Charges</strong>

The United States Department of Justice announced the arrest of Mango Markets operator Avraham Eisenberg in Puerto Rico.

Avraham Eisenberg is accused of carrying out the $110 million Mango Markets crypto exchange exploit in October of this year. The hacker has charges against him in the Southern District Court of New York.

Damian Williams, the US Attorney for the Southern District of New York, as well as Assistant US Attorneys Thomas Burnett and Noah Solowiejczyk, ordered Eisenberg’s arrest.

Accused of Fraud and Manipulation Charges

The Department of Justice complaint dated December 27 states the following:

“I attach complaint 22 Mag. 10337, which accuses Avraham Eisenberg of crimes of market manipulation. The complaint is sealed. Last night, the defendant was arrested in the District of Puerto Rico and will be presented later today. Attached is a proposed Order to open the claim for the Court’s consideration.”

The 22 Mag. Filing 10337 charges Eisenberg with two counts. Charge one is for commodity fraud, while charge two is for commodity tampering.

Following the October hack, Avraham Eisenberg acknowledged masterminding the over $100 million exploit on the Mango Markets platform. Interestingly, he even defended himself by arguing that the hacking of the platform was actually within the bounds of the law:

“I believe all of our actions were legal open market actions, using the protocol as designed, even if the development team did not fully anticipate all the consequences of setting parameters the way they are.”

Mango Markets Exploit Was a Team Effort

Avraham Eisenberg acted with others, leading a team to pull off the feat of decentralized exchange Mango Markets. He manipulated the price of the native MNGO token to buy a massive position.

The hacker also artificially inflated prices by up to 1,300%, allowing him to borrow other tokens as collateral. At the time, he said he was negotiating a settlement agreement with the insurance fund. However, at no time did he show any intention of returning it.

The arrest request from the United States Department of Justice emphasized the following:

“AVRAHAM EISENBERG, defendant, knowingly and intentionally manipulated and attempted to manipulate the price of a product in interstate commerce, and for future delivery and subject to the rules of a registered entity, and of an exchange, namely, EISENBERG engaged in a scheme involving the intentional and artificial manipulation of the price of perpetual futures contracts on a cryptocurrency exchange called Mango Markets.”

BeInCrypto had reported on the incident in late October after Eisenberg claimed that he “didn’t care” about the criticism he had received for his actions. He even argued that lending platforms are willing to lend at the current price of a token. In November, Eisenberg tried to replicate the exploit on Aave but was unsuccessful.

By Audy Castaneda

Investors Increasingly Worried about Grayscale’s GBTC

Audy Castañeda
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<strong>Investors Increasingly Worried about Grayscale’s GBTC</strong>

Investor concern is growing around Grayscale’s GBTC product which has been trading at a substantial discount to its underlying net asset value.

Investors in Grayscale’s Bitcoin Trust are concerned that the company’s gated product will hurt clients, as the discount between GBTC and the net asset value (NAV) of Grayscale’s Bitcoin holdings widens to about 46%.

Investors have urged the digital asset manager to offer lower administration fees and allow clients to redeem GBTC shares.

Grayscale Faces Hedge Fund Complaints

Investment firm Fir Tree Capital Management and cryptocurrency mutual fund manager 3iQ have joined the growing chorus of investors saying that Grayscale needs to move quickly to help restore investor confidence in cryptocurrencies.

Fir Tree criticized an apparent voluntary decision by the asset manager to have its fund closed, restricting clients’ ability to profit through redemptions.

Currently, only Grayscale can delete or create GBTC shares through periodic redemptions and private placements. GBTC shares have fallen 75% since the beginning of 2022.

Fir Tree has also asked the Delaware Chancery Court to investigate Grayscale’s alleged mismanagement of client funds.

Founded in 2013, Grayscale’s Bitcoin Trust has $10.8 million in assets under management. Investment in the fund grew from $100 million to $1 billion between September 2016 and October 2017, taking advantage of the 2017 bull market that saw Bitcoin peak at around $19,400 in late December 2017.

Hedge Fund Rejects ETF Argument

According to Fir Tree, Grayscale faces minimal legal barriers to changing the status of its fund to restore the imbalance between supply and demand. Restoring this imbalance would reduce the current discount between GBTC and the value of Grayscale’s underlying Bitcoin asset.

Furthermore, Fir Tree suggested that Grayscale’s reluctance was motivated by a potential loss of profit if investors were allowed to redeem GBTC shares. Grayscale charges a 2% administration fee for the administration of its trust.

Grayscale has also claimed that the only legal way to introduce redemptions would be to convert GBTC into an exchange-traded fund (ETF). An ETF would track the price of Bitcoin directly, and reduce the discount by allowing investor discretion in redeeming shares.

Grayscale has been embroiled in a court battle with the US Securities and Exchange Commission after the agency rejected its initial application for the conversion.

Earlier this month, CEO Michael Sonnenshein said that the company may issue a public offer for 20% of GBTC’s outstanding shares, to help return capital to investors. The asset management company later rejected the idea of ​​an “ongoing redemption program,” after Fir Tree’s complaint.

Adding to investor concerns, Grayscale’s sister company Genesis Trading recently halted client withdrawals and loan origination from its crypto lending arm, Genesis Global Capital.

Grayscale has yet to respond to 3iQ’s suggestions to allow customers to redeem GBTC for physical BTC. Earlier this month, the investment fund suggested that Grayscale issue a takeover bid to convert GBTC shares into a vehicle that allows for trades at Bitcoin’s NAV.

By Audy Castaneda

Coinbase Aims to Accelerate Crypto and Web3 Adoption

Audy Castañeda
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<strong>Coinbase Aims to Accelerate Crypto and Web3 Adoption</strong>

Here’s what the world’s second-largest exchange has planned to do to accelerate the adoption of the new industry.

The largest cryptocurrency exchange in the United States published a blog post on December 21. Coinbase’s plan to conquer the markets in the midst of the bear market is not to be taken lightly. In fact, the recent blog post published by the crypto exchange confirms that it is actively preparing to carry out this project.

Coinbase also indicated in a tweet that it is “working on building the bridge to web3.” The regulated DEX aims to accelerate the adoption of cryptos and Web3 protocols through concrete actions.

Succeed in Serving as a Bridge to Web3

Coinbase wants to start by improving the security of its crypto wallet. In this regard, it explained the following:

“We have invested heavily in Coinbase Wallet because there is no Web3 without self-custody. Over the past five years, Coinbase Wallet has been the most downloaded self-custody mobile wallet and browser dApps in the United States.”

Three more tweets by Coinbase offer more details:

“We want to drown out the noise, and bring focus back to our long-term strategy. Here are some recent highlights that demonstrate our commitment to building for this space.”

“Coinbase is serving as the bridge to web3. And providing our customers seamless access to the entire cryptoeconomy.”

“We’re supercharging key building blocks for web3 including the self-custody wallet, NFTs, developer tools, and tech advancements such as MPC.”

Other Actions Implemented by Coinbase

The exchange cited one of the actions it is already implementing to be more secure with its wallet. “Coinbase Wallet hides known-malicious assets from your home screen and gives you the ability to report suspicious tokens appearing in your wallet,” it claimed.

This feature was implemented to prevent scammers from luring users to malicious websites. To achieve their goal, malicious actors often deposit tokens in users’ wallets. At the same time, Coinbase plans to offer spam token management tools for its wallet. The launch of a dApp block list is also planned.

Additionally, Coinbase wants to “enable easy participation in Web3 via NFTs.” Furthermore, the exchange stated the following:

“If we can make it easier for developers to build decentralized apps, amazing experiences, games, and social media on Web3, we can give more people access to the economic freedom that Web3 offers.”

To accelerate crypto and Web3 adoption, Coinbase also plans to target institutions. The crypto exchange recognizes that these blue-chip investors are becoming more interested in the sector. In particular, they want to get into DeFi, crypto gambling, and NFTs.

“We are seeing increased demand from institutions for features and functionality to access and interact with Web3 and DeFi, and we are building to meet those demands,” Coinbase added.

By Audy Castaneda

Ethereum: the Big Year in Review 2022

Audy Castañeda
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0
Ethereum: the Big Year in Review 2022

Founder Vitalik Buterin’s Blockchain remains the measure of all things.

For all the talk about “Ethereum killers” in the 2021 bull run: Aside from Bitcoin, Blockchain remains the measure of all things, especially in the course of this ruthless bear market. It leaves Solana, Avalanche, Terra, Fantom, and others far behind in the rearview mirror.

At the start of the year, it was clear that Ethereum still had a lot of work to do before the second-largest Blockchain by market cap could be considered mass adoption. The results had to follow last year’s promises this year.

Additionally, then there was this too, not just with the long-awaited Merger. Although the price took a different direction in 2022, the cryptocurrency is ending the year better than its price suggests.

Price Falls, Network Grows (Q1)

In the first quarter of 2022, Ethereum saw massive gains in network revenue, as compared to the same quarter last year, as well as new records for engagement and daily active addresses.

The focus of Ethereum and the crypto community, in general, changed towards the end of the quarter, in the biggest event of the year: the change of the consensus mechanism, also known as “The Merger”.

When to Merge? (Q2)

The project’s developers put the brakes on their supporters in April: the switch from proof-of-work to proof-of-stake was postponed. The “difficulty bomb”, which was supposed to be a time-controlled compulsion for miners to switch, was also postponed and fueled fears that ETH 2.0 would not work this year either.

Barely a month after the Terra crash, the crypto market was once again on the brink of a crash. For Ethereum, it meant reaching the (provisional) annual minimum by 2022. At around 880 US dollars, the course marked the “lowlight” of the year. This is a quarter to forget.

Is Ethereum Too Centralized? (Q3)

After the shock of the collapse of Terra, as well as the bankruptcy of Celsius and cryptocurrency hedge fund Three Arrows Capital, Ethereum, along with the rest of the cryptocurrency market, was able to catch its breath in late July. The announcement of a fixed date for the Ethereum merger contributed, among other things, to the price recovery.

So, on September 15, a few days earlier than expected, at 08:44 in the morning, the developers successfully kicked off the Ethereum 2.0 era.

As a result, the ETH payout plummeted, lowering the price of network backing and increasing selling pressure. More importantly, changing the consensus mechanism meant a 99 percent reduction in power consumption.

Suddenly, the “Ultra Sound Money” Blockchain not only became interesting to ESG-conscious investors, it even caused “energy waster” Bitcoin to have a hard time.

Facing the Future (Q4)

The fourth quarter evolved into the phase of Layer 2 Blockchains, which could be another driver of mass adoption in the coming year. The ultimate goal is to reach 100,000 transactions per second on Ethereum, a task that is now an integral part of the Ethereum roadmap.

Technical innovations, “ultrasonic tokenomics” and the DeFi sector as a driving force should ensure that Ethereum stays closer than ever on the heels of the king of cryptocurrencies, Bitcoin, next year.

By Audy Castaneda

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