Get your daily, bite-sized digest of cryptoasset and blockchain-related news – investigating the stories flying under the radar of today’s crypto news.
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Investments news
- Digital asset investment products saw inflows totaling USD 193m last week, the largest since mid-December 2021, per CoinShares data. 76% of inflows came from Europe at USD 147m, while the Americas lagged at USD 45m. Bitcoin (BTC) saw inflows totaling USD 98m, while ethereum (ETH) received USD 10m. In comparison, a week earlier, BTC had seen the largest outflows for the week, with USD 33m flowing out of investment products, while had seen outflows of USD 17m. Meanwhile, solana (SOL) saw the largest single week of inflows on record totaling USD 87m. It was less than USD 1m a week earlier.
- SK Square, an offshoot of South Korean giant SK Group, announced it plans to spend at least KRW 2trn (USD 1.6bn) over the next three years in the field of semiconductor chips and blockchain technology, per the Korea Herald.
- Web3 launchpad community OP3N announced the launch of a USD 100m Culture Catalyst initiative in partnership with Avalanche Foundation, the team behind the Avalanche (AVAX) blockchain project. The initiative will fund and support the development of art, entertainment and culture projects on Avalanche, while two musicians, Grimes and Ava Max, are also working with the initiative, they added.
Regulation news
- Japan will revise its foreign exchange law to prevent Russia from evading Western financial sanctions following Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine through cryptoassets, Reuters reported, citing top government officials. The government will submit a revision of the Foreign Exchange and Foreign Trade Act to the current parliament session, Chief Cabinet Secretary Hirokazu Matsuno said, while Prime Minister Fumio Kishida also called for the law to be amended in a Monday parliament session.
- US House Democrats plan to introduce a law bill calling for an electronic version of the US Dollar that is equivalent to the physical one, The Register reported. However, e-cash would not be issued by the Federal Reserve and thus would not be a central bank digital currency (CBDC), nor would it involve any sort of blockchain, distributed ledger, or other intermediated account, opting for a “purely peer-to-peer” approach.
- The USA White House’s Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) is seeking public commentary on crypto’s impact on energy use and the climate. Interested parties have until May 9 to share their thoughts with the White House.
Exchanges news
- Coinbase announced that users residing in Canada, Singapore, or Japan who are sending digital assets outside of the exchange may need to provide information about the type of wallet they’re sending assets to and information about the recipient. The new rules take effect on April 1 and differ from country to country.
- ByBit received in-principle approval to conduct a full spectrum of virtual assets business in Dubai, the United Arab Emirates, the firm announced in a press release shared with Cryptonews.com. ByBit also said that it plans to set up its global headquarters in Dubai, offering a full suite of products and services globally, under the Emirate’s “test-adapt-scale” virtual assets market model. The new headquarters office is expected to commence operations as early as April 2022.
- Digital assets platform Zipmex announced partnerships with mainstream brands in Asia including media conglomerate GMM Grammy, airline Thai Airways, retail, and real estate developer Siam Piwat, and media THE STANDARD, to bring NFTs and metaverse experiences into the region.
- MetaVerse Green Exchange (MVGX) announced a partnership with global financial technology enterprise group Greenland Financial Technology Group to offer “accessible cryptoassets” and digital carbon credits. The latter’s exchange, Guizhou Green Finance and Emissions Exchange (GGFEX), will also work with MVGX to establish a digital carbon trading platform and registry based on carbon assets in China.
Crime news
- The Hong Kong police rescued four people who were detained in a hotel for four days by a syndicate after being lured into creating crypto accounts that were allegedly used to launder money, per the South China Morning Post. Officials said that although the victims did not suffer any financial losses, officers were tracing the money flow of their accounts while they were kept at the hotel.
NFTs news
- An NFT created from Nelson Mandela’s original arrest warrant raised ZAR 1.9m (USD 130,000) in an auction to help fund Liliesleaf Museum Heritage Site, per Bloomberg. The buyer of the NFT will have exclusive access to the original document at Liliesleaf Museum, Ahren Posthumus, CEO of NFT marketplace Momint, said.
- An NFT collection titled the Ross Ulbricht Growth Collection, made up of original art by Ross Ulbricht, will be minted on the Bitcoin blockchain on April 5 and available for bidding between April 6 and 8 on the Scarce.city platform. It is made up of four physical oil paintings, one animation made up of 318 hand-drawn frames, and five corresponding Bitcoin NFTs with Bitcoin-tokenized certificate of authenticity (COA), per the announcement.
Mining news
- Bitcoin miner Iris Energy Limited announced the closing of an additional USD 71m equipment financing facility between a wholly-owned subsidiary of Iris Energy and a subsidiary of bitcoin company NYDIG. The facility is secured by 19,800 Bitmain S19j Pro miners, with 1.98 EH/s, they added.