A government official in the Rivne region of Ukraine formally highlighted that he currently owns at least $ 8 million worth of cryptocurrencies and 500 Tesla shares. The news came right after another Ukrainian lawmaker in Kyiv found it hard to prove possession of the cryptocurrencies in his asset statement.

As Bitcoin.com highlights, cryptocurrency investments have enjoyed growing popularity among Ukrainian politicians in recent years, which have made mandatory disclosures of the assets they currently own. According to various Ukrainian media reports, a council member from the Virovsky village in western Rivne Oblast claimed to have 124 BTC worth nearly $ 8 million at current prices.

 A Millionaire Hodler

The story is an example that shows what Bitcoin has meant to those who purchased early, invested little money, and are now millionaires. According to Bitcoin.com, 36-year-old Vladimir Pachesny acquired the coins in early 2013 for 73,920 hryvnias at the time of purchase, a little over $ 2,800, using the current exchange rate for the Ukrainian currency.

The media highlighted that many Ukrainian officials became millionaires. An April report highlighted that government workers and politicians had 46,351 BTC worth 75 billion hryvnias (they are worth more than $ 3 billion today), and a member of the Dnipro City Council, Mishalov Dmitrovich , had the most prominent fortune: 18,000 BTC.

In 2020, for example, Rostyslav Solod, a newly elected MP from the Kramatorsk regional department in Ukraine, became the first political representative in the country to declare to legal bodies a personal stash equivalent to more than $ 24 million in funds. Monero.

In their 2020 statements, the set of public figures admitted to owning 46,351 BTC, several other digital currencies, including ETH, LTC, BCH, and XMR, according to figures registered by the Opendatabot platform that tracks public records in Ukraine.

However, not everyone could provide the necessary documents to prove that they have their currencies. This spring, the National Agency for the Prevention of Corruption (NAPC) assured their commitment to verify the figures.

Virtual Assets of Ukraine, a public organization, and the Blockchain4Ukraine association, which unites lawmakers from different political factions in the Ukrainian parliament, have proposed introducing a requirement that increases transparency in every move concerning asset declarations by officials.

The two entities defended the idea that public officials must now bring the addresses of their cryptocurrency wallets in their statements. In a 2019 law amendment, all Ukrainian citizens got required to reveal publicly the exact amount of crypto they currently own.

This new law in Ukraine forces citizens to disclose the number of cryptocurrencies they own, in addition to those currencies owned by their close relatives. Law No. 140-IX got introduced in 2019, and it arrived just after the European country amended the Constitution.

During the last years, Ukraine suffered from various economic challenges related to political conflicts in the region. This reason led to many efforts from Ukrainian entities to intensify measures against corruption.

By: Jenson Nuñez

An investigation by Chinese watchdogs determined that Xiao Yi, a senior official from Jiangxi province, had supported cryptocurrency mining companies.

The Chinese government expelled a senior provincial official from office and removed him from the Chinese Communist Party for allegedly abusing his power to show support to cryptocurrency mining and violating state bans.

An investigation by Chinese authorities reportedly found that Xiao Yi, former vice-chairman of the Jiangxi provincial committee of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference, had disrupted national policies on digital assets.

The Central Commission for Disciplinary Inspection (CCDI) determined that Xiao Yi abused his administrative power to introduce and support companies that carry out crypto mining activities. This information got indicated in an official Party statement revealed on Saturday.

Chinese Official got Expelled and Awaits Trial

The investigation and sanctions against Xiao Yi arrived shortly after China released a strong offensive against cryptocurrency mining operations and activities linked to such assets in general. The bans had an impact on the local crypto industry, forcing companies to close or move their operations abroad.

According to the South China Morning Post, Xiao Yi is not the first official to get investigated by Chinese authorities for alleged violation of local policies. According to the outlet, he is now the eighth provincial official to get investigated this year amid President Xi Jinping’s intensive anti-corruption campaign.

Although the representative is the highest-ranking Chinese official to get punished for supporting cryptocurrency mining, the decision sends a strong signal about the government’s stance on the matter.

Beyond breaching crypto mining bans, the investigation also found that Xiao Yi had abused his power by more widely accepting bribes. According to a CCDI report cited by Cointelegraph, the Chinese government found Xiao guilty of abusing his influence to allow illegal activities for profit, including fundraising for projects and exchanging power for money and sex.

As punishment, Xiao Yi was removed from his post as a Chinese government official, in addition to having his property and illegal income seized for review and prosecution.

A message on the status of the crypto mining ban

Last month, the National Development and Reform Commission of China (NDRC), one of the central government agencies, opened a public consultation on the addition of Bitcoin mining and other cryptocurrencies to the list of prohibited industrial activities in the country.

The consultation, most unlikely to lead to a local policy reversal, came a month after the People’s Bank of China (PBoC) declared essentially all cryptocurrency transactions, including trading and mining, illegal.

The ban related to digital currencies came amid coordinated crackdowns by local bodies to halt crypto mining operations in the country. The Chinese government had highlighted that the policies emerged as part of the government’s efforts to save energy and reduce carbon emissions.

Putting aside the latest policies on digital assets, the South China Morning Post says the government has investigated other officials in Jiangxi province. Li Yihuang, the vice governor of the province, got investigated in 2018 and Shi Wenqing, a senior lawmaker, got investigated last year. Both were found guilty of embezzlement and misappropriation of public funds and got subsequently fired and expelled from the party.

By: Jenson Nuñez

The Caribbean nation is currently joining efforts with other metaverse companies, such as Decentraland, to set up digital sovereign lands.

 The Caribbean nation of Barbados is now getting ready to establish a new embassy in the metaverse. This event is a historic step towards the legitimation and adoption of the metaverse.

The Barbados Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Foreign Trade sealed an agreement on Sunday with Decentraland, one of the most relevant and popular digital worlds with crypto technology, to move forward to create a new digital embassy.

According to information brought by a press release, the government is already sealing agreements with platforms like Somnium Space, SuperWorld, and many other Metaverse platforms.

Virtual Embassies

The various projects would help identify and purchase land, design virtual embassies, and consulates, develop facilities to provide electronic visas, and build a teleporter that will allow users to transport their avatars between different worlds.

During an interview with CoinDesk, Barbados’ Ambassador to the United Arab Emirates H.E. Gabriel Abed, highlighted that the country plans to set an expansion beyond this initial effort to build structures and purchase digital land in the diversity that represents these virtual worlds.

The ambassador explained that the main goal is not to pick a winner, the metaverse is still very young and new, and they want to make sure that what they build is transferable across the meta world.

First Real Country in the Metaverse

Abed is currently leading the country’s diplomatic issues on the metaverse. He mentioned that the Barbados government sees the decision as a unique diplomatic opportunity to expand their terrain regarding technology. The cabinet approved the metaverse embassy in August of this year.

Along with the release of the embassy, which is scheduled for January, Barbados would become the first country to recognize digital sovereign land worldwide. The Foreign Ministry, the Science and Technology Ministry, and many other government agencies reviewed the plans for several months, according to Abed.

The country has also hired legal advice, as the embassy will establish a series of unique precedents. So far, experts have said that the embassy will comply with international law and the Vienna Convention.

Likewise, Barbados is among the most crypto-friendly nations worldwide and has been among those working to create a central bank digital currency. On the other hand, many other countries in the Caribbean, but further north, such as the Bahamas, have pioneered CBDC.

Also, as early as 2015, when few countries were taking action about crypto, the possibility arose that the Caribbean country possessed Bitcoin in its reserves. Abed also pointed out that embassies would be a launchpad for more ambitious economic plans in virtual worlds.

Abed finally put on the table why embassies are the starting point to acquire a Visa to enter and stay in the country or travel without a Visa.

By: Jenson Nuñez

The money deposited in these solutions is breaking all-time highs in November. Arbitrum, dYdX, and Optimism are some of the most used options.

The total locked value (TVL) in the second layers of Ethereum, in which scalability tools such as rollups work, approached $ 5.25 billion. This event shows an almost constant increase, reaching 28% in the last 30 days.

According to a report by the L2beat site, 28% is the total value locked in the second layer of Ethereum. In the last week, this figure has increased by 7.78%, according to the same source.

This increase constitutes an all-time high in the said index for the Ethereum network, confirming its year-on-year growth. Rollups had over USD 8 million, which is 0.15% of the current total a year ago.

A similar data had been provided last Monday, November 8, by none other than Evan Van Ness, in a publication on his Twitter account. Van Ness is the director of decentralization at the Ethereum Foundation. The representative said on that occasion that the second layer surpassed USD 5 billion for the first time in its history.

Beyond the milestone reached, these locked funds do not speak for a significant number of Ethereum’s market capitalization. According to CoinMarketCap, this figure is $ 559 million while the TVL in its second layer runs in parallel with just under 1%.

However, the increase has been showing some responses and almost an uninterrupted flowing in the last semester, a trend that seems to take hold as new developments continue to show up on the Ethereum network, creating an environment that makes these second layer solutions more necessary.

Most Used Ethereum Second Layer Solutions

Arbitrum is one of the most used rollups. According to the L2beat site, the total value locked in this second layer solution is $ 2.8 billion, which speaks for 53.68% of this market.

The second place in the ranking is for dYdX, an exchange with USD 968 million. This figure represents 18.44% of the total deposited in the layers of Ethereum.

The rank finally meets its completion with Loopring, a rollup in which USD 489 million got deposited, considering that a large percentage (76%) comes from money invested in the Loopring token (LRC). Therefore, if we talk about funds purely invested in rollups, Optimism appears in third place, another exchange with at least a TVL of USD 488 million.

What are the Second Layers of Ethereum?

The second layers in Ethereum are solutions that allow more efficient organization when it comes to transactions that could get confirmed on the first network.

This network, also known as the mainnet, is usually a very congested site; precisely because of the high demand, and it is usually more expensive to operate. This struggle takes place because said blockchain is the one used to develop decentralized finance applications (DeFi), smart contracts, and non-fungible tokens (NFT), among other things.

All these products have had exponential growth since 2020, which has resulted in massive exploitation of the Ethereum network.  Tools such as rollups allow grouping thousands of minor transactions and confirming them all together on the first network.

It is possible to reduce their cost and the time necessary to execute these rollups. This situation constitutes a scalability solution that, in addition to improving Ethereum applications in the future, as experts point out, does not harm network security, which is also crucial for the evolution of the cryptocurrency.

By: Jenson Nuñez

The whales could be taking advantage of the rise in the price of Bitcoin to make significant profits. The Taproot upgrade will allow various projects, such as multi-signature transactions, to undergo positive changes like lower costs and less data usage.

The price of Bitcoin has reached a new all-time high in the last week but has not been able to maintain it entirely. However, the behavior of the whales and the performance of BTC indicate the latter again tries to do it.

According to data from CoinGecko, the value of Bitcoin has dropped from USD 65,312 and USD 59,150 in the last 24 hours. The movements of the whales seem to have influenced the profits of the pioneering cryptocurrency.

The Behavior of the Bitcoin Whales in the Last Week

In the last seven days, the Bitcoin whales have moved 118,705 BTC through 64 transactions. Regarding the amount of Bitcoin involved, the prevailing trend was that there were transfers between unknown wallets. A total of 70,335 BTC, equivalent to 59%, went from some wallets to others.

The introduction of liquidity into the market, with 20,877 BTC moved from exchanges to unknown wallets, is the second most marked trend. That is equivalent to 17.59% of the weekly total.

There was also an accumulation of Bitcoin, with 18,764 BTC transferred from exchanges to unknown wallets. That represents 15.81% of the weekly total.

Finally, the weakest trend was the transfer between exchanges. The whales moved 8,729 BTC, 7.39% of the weekly total, in that way.

All that suggests the whales take advantage of the rise in the price of Bitcoin to make some profits. However, the context of what happens in the cryptocurrency ecosystem is crucial to better understand the introduction of liquidity into the whale market.

The Effect of the Taproot Upgrade on the Price of Bitcoin

The activation of long-awaited BTC upgrade Taproot in block 709,632 occurred on November 14^th. It allows opening the door for developers to implement new features that improve privacy, scalability, and security on the network. More than 90% of miners expressed their support for the upgrade in July. Taproot is a mixture of various technical innovations throughout the history of BTC in a single update.

As a consequence of Taproot, various projects throughout the crypto ecosystem will undergo positive changes. For example, multi-signature transactions, which require more than one group of signers to authorize a transaction, will now be cheaper and require less data usage.

Taproot will allow new developments and solutions, offering developers the opportunity to work with a very extensive toolbox to continue thinking and building. Now that the most relevant Bitcoin upgrade since 2017 has occurred, analysts expect the value of the pioneering cryptocurrency will rise.

However, options data provider Skew revealed that the observed volatility of Bitcoin is gradually receding towards a minimum of a year. Analysts currently expect the volatility of the cryptocurrency to remain low despite recent all-time highs.

By Alexander Salazar