Author: NBTC

The total market capitalization of euro-denominated stablecoins has climbed above $810 million as of Aug. 5, according to data from blockchain analytics platform Token Terminal. Circle’s $EURC leads the sector with a 65% market share, underscoring the growing demand for euro-backed digital assets in the crypto economy. $EURC Leads, But Competition Is Emerging $EURC, issued by Circle, has established itself as the dominant euro stablecoin, with a market cap of roughly $526 million. In second place is $EURCV, issued by SG-Forge, a subsidiary of French banking giant Societe Generale, holding a 16.7% share. The remaining 23 euro stablecoins collectively account…

Ripple is preparing to release 1 billion $XRP on August 1 as part of its monthly escrow unlock program. The upcoming release follows Ripple’s longstanding escrow mechanism, which automatically unlocks up to 1 billion $XRP each month from escrow accounts on the $XRP Ledger. Although the headline figure is significant, the market has largely treated these events as routine due to Ripple’s consistent practice of re-locking most of the released tokens. At current levels, $XRP’s circulating supply stands at approximately 65 billion tokens out of the asset’s fixed maximum supply of 100 billion $XRP. The August unlock will temporarily make…

Eric Halem, a former Los Angeles Police Department officer with 13 years of experience, was sentenced for orchestrating a fake police raid that ended with the theft of $350,000 in $BTC from a teenage crypto investor. Halem was sentenced to life in prison plus another 15 years for his role in the violent home invasion, which became one of the most high-profile crypto-related robbery cases in recent years. Halem remained a reserve officer at the time of the crime and was convicted of kidnapping and robbery after a jury found that he and several accomplices impersonated actual police officers to…

Ripple has obtained a Crypto-Asset Service Provider (CASP) license from Luxembourg’s financial regulator, the CSSF, under Europe’s MiCA legislation, enabling the company to offer regulated crypto payment services across all 30 countries in the European Economic Area (EEA). MiCA license enables single-market access With this new authorization, Ripple can operate throughout the EEA using a unified compliance framework. This simplifies the process for banks, payment providers, and enterprises wishing to engage with Ripple Payments, as they no longer need to deal with fragmented national regulatory systems. The company’s existing Electronic Money Institution (EMI) license complements this expansion, reinforcing its position…

Ethereum can process roughly 15 transactions per second. That is less than a single Starbucks checkout line. Rollups are the technology that lets Ethereum handle thousands of transactions per second without sacrificing the security that makes it valuable in the first place. They work by executing transactions off chain and posting compressed proofs back to Ethereum, turning the base layer into a settlement court rather than a transaction processor. The standard narrative says that rollups make Ethereum faster. This is technically true but misleading. Ethereum itself does not get faster. It still produces a block every 12 seconds. It still…

David Schwartz, chief technology officer at Ripple and one of the key architects of the XRP Ledger, weighed in strongly on the recent controversy surrounding the failed activation of Bitcoin Improvement Proposal 110 (BIP-110). Bitcoin Knots faces criticism over chain split narrative Schwartz delivered a pointed response to a statement by Bitcoin Knots, a Bitcoin node software project, after the group characterized the outcome of the BIP-110 attempt as an “attack” on the network. Chiding the project’s online post, Schwartz questioned the motives behind its messaging, stating that their remarks risked misleading people unfamiliar with the context. “Is the point…

Alpaca, a provider of brokerage infrastructure for digital assets and securities, has raised $435 million in a new funding round, as reported by The Block. The investment underscores growing demand for technology that enables financial institutions to offer tokenized trading and investment services. Funding Details and Strategic Focus The round brings Alpaca’s total funding to over $500 million, reflecting strong investor confidence in the company’s role as a backbone for brokerage operations. Alpaca plans to use the capital to expand its global reach, enhance its API-driven platform, and support the growing trend of tokenizing traditional assets like stocks, bonds, and…

The blockchain networks and decentralized applications with the highest weekly active users in the cryptocurrency market have been announced. The data shows that $BNB Chain tops the list with 14 million users, while Solana and Tron also reach approximately 9 million weekly active users. Weekly active user data generally measures the number of unique addresses that have performed at least one transaction on the relevant blockchain or protocol within the past seven days. However, the user calculation method may vary depending on the structure of the network or project being examined. $BNB Chain, which tops the list, has recorded 14…

Pro-bitcoin Senator Cynthia Lummis has said that bipartisan work is going into the crypto Clarity Act but warned that some lawmakers are still making unreasonable demands. The Republican, speaking to Fox Business Wednesday, said that she had been working with Democratic lawmakers into the night to get the bill over the line. But she said that some Democrats were still dragging their feet on the bill. Lawmakers are pushing to get a vote on the crypto market structure bill before the Senate goes to recess. JUST IN: Senator Cynthia Lummis says “I believe we will get a vote on the…

SBI Holdings, a major Japanese financial conglomerate and a key partner of Ripple in Asia, has finalized the acquisition of Bitbank, one of Japan’s largest cryptocurrency exchanges, for 46.7 billion yen, equivalent to approximately $289 million. Acquisition strengthens SBI’s crypto portfolio SBI Holdings is headquartered in Tokyo and operates across various financial services, including securities, banking, and insurance. This purchase ranks among the largest-ever crypto acquisitions in Japan and is set to position SBI as the country’s leading digital asset provider by total assets under management. The transaction will take place in stages. Initially, an SBI subsidiary will acquire shares…