This morning, OpenSea said it had received a Wells Notice from the Securities Exchange Commission warning the agency was about to sue the leading NFT platform for violation of securities laws. The threatened action is the latest in a long line of similar moves from the SEC, and the reaction from the crypto industry has been fierce and near-uniform. Here is a small, representative sample. Source
For now, DeFi products will continue to compete with traditional products, but it is likely that the two will blend at some point. By leveraging DeFi’s technical components and CeFi’s KYC and AML requirements, we are looking at “CeDeFi”-based models becoming the most appropriate form that will be the underlying infrastructure of future finance. Source
Its first stop in Arizona will feature U.S. Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (I-Ariz.) and a top Republican state legislator, Arizona House Speaker Pro Tempore Travis Grantham, along with crypto businesspeople, according to the organization. After that event in Phoenix, Stand With Crypto will hit several other potential tossup states in the election, hosting similar events in Nevada, Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania. Source
However, the collapse of many key institutional lenders (e.g. BlockFi, Celsius, Voyager, Genesis) hampered the speculative demand these same lenders helped fuel. Though we’ve started to see signs of a recovery, with new entrants like Coinbase’s institutional financing business, this area remains tepid compared to just a few years ago. In addition, today’s higher rate environment offers less incentive to move money on-chain into a choppy market, especially when the alternative is getting paid 5% on your cash or stablecoin holdings to wait and see. Source
Ether (ETH) outperformed by a hair, falling 4% over the past day, but longer-term, the second-largest crypto has seen its price relative to bitcoin plunge 21% this year to its lowest level since April 2021. At $2,490 at press time, ether’s 2024 year-to-date advance has narrowed to just 9% versus bitcoin’s 39% rally. Source
It seems fairly obvious to fair-minded observers that after over a decade of the cryptocurrency currency trading makes it unlikely it’s going away anytime soon, as much as some may want that. Given that, you would think the reasonable person would say, “let’s properly regulate these products.” It is not true that crypto doesn’t face a myriad of state and federal regulations. What is true is that, as long as an enforcement-only regulatory approach is taken, the U.S. will see jobs move overseas, innovation will be hampered and crucial decisions…
Adding to earlier losses alongside a broad crypto decline begun Tuesday evening U.S. hours, Blur (BLUR) fell another 5% in the minutes following the news before a modest bounce. It’s now down 10% over the past 24 hours. Tensor (TNSR), a Solana-based NFT marketplace aggregator, also traded 3% lower. The token’s price was down nearly 9% over the past 24 hours. The broader CoinDesk 20 Index was lower by 4% over the same time frame. Source
According to a charge sheet published by French authorities earlier this week, Durov is being charged with being complicit in the administration of an online platform allowing illicit transactions, refusing to comply with police requests for documents or other communications in ongoing investigations, being complicit in the dissemination of child exploitation material and a host of other charges. Source
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Please note that our privacy policy, terms of use, cookies, and do not sell my personal information has been updated. CoinDesk is an award-winning media outlet that covers the cryptocurrency industry. Its journalists abide by a strict set of editorial policies. In November 2023, CoinDesk was acquired by the Bullish group, owner of Bullish, a regulated, digital assets exchange. The Bullish group is majority-owned by Block.one; both companies have interests in a variety of blockchain and digital asset businesses and significant holdings of digital assets, including bitcoin. CoinDesk operates as…