SBF ordered to jail, Bitcoin ETF delayed and SEC to appeal Ripple case

Prime Tales This Week

Decide revokes Sam Bankman-Fried’s bail, remands him to custody

FTX’s former CEO, Sam “SBF” Bankman-Fried, had his bail revoked by a federal choose in response to the discharge of knowledge to The New York Occasions allegedly supposed to intimidate witnesses. Throughout a listening to on Aug. 11, Decide Lewis Kaplan revoked Bankman-Fried’s bail and remanded him to custody, seemingly on the Putnam County Correctional Facility. As soon as his October trial begins, he could possibly be moved to the Metropolitan Detention Heart in Brooklyn. Bankman-Fried was reportedly led out of the courtroom in handcuffs. In Kaplan’s view, Bankman-Fried’s interviews with NYT reporters resulted in sharing data with the seemingly intention “to harm and frighten” former Alameda Analysis CEO Caroline Ellison, his former colleague and girlfriend.

The U.S. Securities and Alternate Fee (SEC) has delayed a choice on whether or not to approve or disapprove the spot Bitcoin exchange-traded fund (ETF) proposed by ARK Funding Administration and 21Shares. ARK initially filed to checklist the ETF in Might, giving the SEC a most of 240 days — till January 2024 — to succeed in a last determination. The SEC’s newest transfer is fueling expectations {that a} last verdict will come as a part of a batch that features functions from key gamers on Wall Road, together with BlackRock and Constancy Investments.

SEC to hunt an enchantment and keep in Ripple Labs courtroom case

The U.S. SEC is transferring to enchantment a courtroom determination from its lawsuit towards Ripple Labs. In a letter to Decide Analisa Torres — the presiding choose within the case — the SEC stated it believed her determination warrants a contemporary look by an appellate courtroom. The fee requested Decide Torres to place the case on maintain throughout the enchantment, saying there are a number of different pending courtroom instances that could possibly be affected, relying on the enchantment’s end result. The SEC is presently in a authorized battle with various crypto companies, together with Binance and Coinbase, over alleged securities violations. Decide Torres dominated, in July, that Ripple’s native token, XRP, isn’t a safety when bought to retail buyers. Torres plans to schedule the jury trial for the second quarter of 2024.

PayPal launches PYUSD stablecoin for cost

PayPal launched a brand new U.S. dollar-pegged stablecoin referred to as PayPal USD (PYUSD). Constructed on the Ethereum community, the stablecoin is backed by U.S. greenback deposits, short-term treasuries and comparable money equivalents. Based on PayPal, stablecoin will quickly be accessible as a mode of cost for numerous purchases. The fintech firm is dwelling to over 350 million lively customers, placing it in a powerful place to turn into a crypto cost large with the introduction of the brand new stablecoin. PYUSD will probably be redeemable for U.S. {dollars} and will be exchanged for different cryptocurrencies on PayPal, in addition to being transferable between PayPal and Venmo accounts.

Temasek, Sequoia Capital, Softbank, main VCs face lawsuit for “abetting” FTX fraud

Eighteen main enterprise capital funding companies, together with Temasek, Sequoia Capital, Sino International Capital and SoftBank, have been named as defendants in a class-action lawsuit filed in america for his or her hyperlinks to the now-bankrupt crypto alternate, FTX. Based on the lawsuit, the funding companies have been liable for “aiding and abetting” the FTX fraud. The go well with additional claims that the defendants used their “energy, affect and deep pockets to launch FTX’s home of playing cards to its multibillion-dollar scale.”

Winners and Losers

On the finish of the week, Bitcoin (BTC) is at $29,379, Ether (ETH) at $1,842 and XRP at $0.63. The whole market cap is at $1.17 trillion, according to CoinMarketCap.

Among the many largest 100 cryptocurrencies, the highest three altcoin gainers of the week are THORChain (RUNE) at 20.74%, Shiba Inu (SHIB) at 20.16% and dYdX (DYDX) at 9.63%.

The highest three altcoin losers of the week are GMX (GMX) -12.47%, Mantle (MNT) at -10.10% and XDC Community (XDC) at -8.09%.

Most Memorable Quotations

“Stablecoins symbolize the issuance of a brand new type of cash, making it integral that there are Federal guardrails.”

Maxine Waters, United States Consultant

“That is the Ethereum contract deal with for PayPal’s stablecoin. I can’t consider i get to tweet that. We’ve come to date.”

Ryan Sean Adams, crypto investor

“By providing customers a comparatively seamless technique to execute transactions, bots have the potential to carve out their very own area of interest within the crypto ecosystem.”

Jie Xuan Chua, analyst at Binance Analysis

“PayPal USD is probably the most vital leap ahead for digital belongings and the monetary trade.”

Charles Cascarilla, CEO of Paxos Belief Firm

“It’s clear that the world wants and can want one thing like Worldcoin within the coming years. We simply hope that occurs in a privacy-preserving decentralized, open-source, permissionless means.”

Tiago Sada, head of product at Instruments for Humanity

“By accepting digital currencies, we open our doorways to a brand new phase of donors who’re tech-savvy and want to make a distinction by their digital belongings.”

Benjamin William, CEO of the Singapore Purple Cross

Prediction of the Week 

Bitcoin dealer reveals ‘vital’ BTC worth zone as bulls maintain $29.3K

Bitcoin faces a brand new battleground as bulls and bears combat for management of a sideways market. Widespread pseudonymous dealer Daan Crypto Trades flagged, in his newest evaluation, a key stage to reclaim as BTC worth assist.

Based on the dealer, each Bitcoin bulls and bears are caught in a “strongly contested” vary, ensuing from numerous journeys above and under the present spot worth, making the midpoint the extent to look at subsequent.

“Fairly clear that the $29.5–29.7K area is an space that’s strongly contested by the bulls and bears,” Daan Crypto Trades wrote.

Bitcoin worth has primarily remained the identical since mid-June — $28,500 as elementary assist, and $31,800 as resistance. Gaining management of the world round $29,700 is, thus, a necessary transfer if bulls are to construct the required momentum to alter the panorama for good, the dealer added.

FUD of the Week 

Solely 6 out of 45 crypto pockets manufacturers have undergone penetration testing: Report

Cybersecurity platform CER discovered that solely six of 45 cryptocurrency pockets manufacturers, or 13.3%, have undergone penetration testing to search out safety vulnerabilities. Of those, solely three manufacturers have carried out checks on the newest variations of their merchandise: MetaMask, Zengo and Belief Pockets. An total rating of the safety of every pockets lists MetaMask, Zengo, Rabby, Belief Pockets and Coinbase Pockets as being probably the most safe wallets available on the market.

US Fed steps up oversight of banks’ involvement with crypto companies

The U.S. Federal Reserve is increasing the scope of its supervision for banks engaged with the cryptocurrency and blockchain trade. Below the Novel Actions Supervision Program, firms offering banking infrastructure to digital asset companies or working with firms that use distributed ledger applied sciences will probably be regulated. The insurance policies apply to each insured and uninsured U.S. banks supervised by the Fed. Actions regulated underneath this system embody the custody, lending, buying and selling, issuance or distribution of crypto together with stablecoins.

SEC pronounces $24M settlement for the case towards Bittrex and its former CEO

The U.S. SEC introduced an settlement with crypto buying and selling platform Bittrex and its co-founder and former CEO, William Shihara, for working an unregistered alternate. Bittrex and Bittrex International agreed to pay $14.4 million in disgorgement (the reimbursement of ill-gotten good points), $4 million in prejudgment curiosity, and $5.6 million in civil penalties to settle the authorized dispute with the federal regulator. The settlement remains to be topic to courtroom approval. The SEC’s criticism, filed in April, claimed Bittrex and Shihara operated an unregistered nationwide securities alternate, dealer and clearing company.

Greatest Cointelegraph Options

Blockchain video games aren’t actually decentralized… however that’s about to alter

Placing video video games absolutely on the chain is a horrible thought and may’t work … or can it?

AI Eye: Apple growing pocket AI, deep pretend music deal, hypnotizing GPT-4

Apple is growing AI to run domestically in your cellphone, researchers ‘hypnotize’ GPT-4 to show it evil, and Google negotiates a deep pretend music deal.

Grails’ fortunate dip of well-known NFT artists, new hope for PFP holders: NFT Collector

Pudgy Penguins CEO reveals why PFT holders aren’t doomed, Grails gives a blind tasting to purchase well-known NFT artists, and free Amazon Prime NFTs.