Author: NBTC
After a relatively protracted stagnation between approximately $94,000 and about $99,000, Bitcoin (BTC) finally broke above $100,000 late on Wednesday, December 4, and even almost climbed to $104,000 during the upswing. Though such a move is undoubtedly good for BTC bulls and ensures the majority of long positions are in the green, it bodes ill for those investors who wagered the world’s premier cryptocurrency could not sustain the positive momentum. Specifically, at press time on December 5, $110,000 is shaping up to be a highly painful level for those who bet Bitcoin’s price will drop. Approximately $8 billion worth of…
Avalon Labs, the issuer of the BTC-backed stablecoin USDa, has raised $10 million to grow its Bitcoin decentralized finance (DeFi) ecosystem. The Series A funding round was led by Framework Ventures and included contributions from UXTO Management, Presto Labs and Kenetic Capital, according to an announcement shared with CoinDesk on Monday. Avalon aims to evolve BTC from a digital store of value to a more active financial instrument that can serve a range of different purposes. Users can unlock the value stored in their BTC by collateralizing it for USDa it at a fixed borrowing rate of 8%. The token…
This is a segment from the Forward Guidance newsletter. To read full editions, subscribe. When examining crypto stocks, chatting with a co-portfolio manager of the long-running blockchain-focused Amplify Transformational Data Sharing ETF (BLOK) makes for a good convo. Dan Weiskopf told me he’s more optimistic about 2025 now than he was about this year at the end of 2023. A main reason? The “crazy opportunity” for BLOK investors that’s set to come as more pure-play crypto companies go public. Some expect stablecoin issuer Circle could be among the next to do so. Weiskopf also has his eye on Figure Technologies.…
Top crypto analyst Leonidas calls attention to the extremely low fees for moving huge funds on the XRP Ledger (XRPL), referencing several transactions. Leonidas shared the development in reaction to an X post from Whale Alert regarding a recent transaction initiated by Ripple on the XRPL Network. Ripple Moves 380M to Unknown Wallet According to the post, Ripple transferred 380 million XRP worth $915.17 million to the wallet, ‘rP4…xv3.’ Notably, Ripple paid a fee of 0.0005 XRP for this transaction. Although Whale Alert labeled the recipient address unknown, data from top XRPL explorer Bithomp suggests that Ripple might be the…
Bitcoin’s (BTC) price hit $100,000 at 02:38 am (GMT) and is currently the seventh largest asset in the world with a market cap of over $2 trillion. This puts it ahead of the likes of silver, tech conglomerate Meta, and Elon Musk’s Tesla — a huge achievement for the currency that once upon a time, struggled to cross the $1,000 threshold. Needless to say, many crypto proponents are celebrating the occasion. MicroStrategy chief Michael Saylor, who’s built a career selling shares of his company to buy ridiculous amounts of BTC, announced, “There is going to be a 100K Party. 🚀”…
If you are into DeFi, you definitely have heard the term “Total Value Locked” before. It’s basically a way to measure how much value is secured within the smart contracts of a blockchain. The higher the TVL, the more adoption a blockchain usually has in DeFi. Here are the top 5 blockchains by TVL that are ruling the DeFi space: Ethereum, Tron, Solana, Binance Smart Chain (BSC), and Arbitrum. Together, they dominate the DeFi scene. But here’s a surprise—Bitcoin isn’t even in the top 10 by TVL. Weird, right? Let’s dive into what makes these blockchains tick and why Bitcoin…
San Francisco-based crypto payment provider Ripple is reportedly accelerating preparations for its much-anticipated Ripple USD (RLUSD) stablecoin. Such a conclusion is drawn from the recent transfers that occurred using the token. In particular, four million RLUSD were transferred from the treasury to unknown XRP Ledger-based wallets. Despite the anonymity of the parties involved in the recent transfer activity with RLUSD, the community account XRPWallets deciphered all the ways in and out for Ripple USD and, as it seems, the shift took place between Ripple and such venues as Bitstamp and Kraken, two major U.S. cryptocurrency exchanges. Just over a day…
American investment management firm BlackRock has achieved a new milestone with its spot Bitcoin ETF product, the iShares Bitcoin Trust (IBIT). Per an update from Bloomberg Senior ETF Analyst Eric Balchunas, the Bitcoin ETF product has now surpassed $50 billion in Assets Under Management (AUM). BlackRock’s Bitcoin ETF journey Since the U.S. SEC approved 11 spot Bitcoin ETF products in January, IBIT has maintained the lead among its peers. Specifically, IBIT has shown outstanding inflows and retained performance. $IBIT is now over $50b. It took it 228 days to reach this milestone, the next fastest ETF to reach 50b was…
Chainlink, the oracle network bringing global finance on-chain, has announced the launch of an oracle solution it says will help decentralized finance protocols recapture maximal extractable value. The Chainlink Smart Value Recapture is a MEV solution that DeFi applications can tap into to recapture non-toxic maximal extractable value from Chainlink Price Feeds. According to an announcement by the Chainlink (LINK) team, the initial version of its SVR is an effort contributed to by Aave (AAVE) DAO contributors BGD Labs and Flashbots among others. Chainlink SVR’s initial focus is DeFi lending protocols, according to Chainlink. It’s one of the solutions looking…
Customers at JPMorgan Chase, Wells Fargo and Bank of America have collectively lost $870 million to scammers on Zelle in the last seven years, according to a powerful US bank regulator. The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) says it’s suing the three banking giants and Zelle’s parent firm for allegedly failing to protect people from widespread fraud on the popular payments network. The lawsuit, which has been anticipated for months, alleges hundreds of thousands of the banks’ customers filed fraud complaints and were largely denied assistance, with some being told to contact the fraudsters directly to get their money back.…