Author: Ibiam Wayas

Ibiam is an optimistic crypto journalist. He loves to associate with like-minded individuals and collaborate with them on similar projects. He spends much of his time honing his writing and critical thinking skills.

Categories
Binance Bitcoin Crypto News

There’s Now Over 570,000 BTC Held on Binance, Far More Than Any Other Exchange

BTC/USDT price chart on Android mobile app by Binance
BTC/USDT price chart on Android mobile app by Binance [https://unsplash.com/photos/y3FRkhP-UgY]

The largest cryptocurrency exchange, Binance, currently holds over 570,000 BTC in reserve. This is considered the highest amount of BTC held by the exchange and far exceeds the balance in other major exchanges, according to data from CoinMetrics.

What’s Behind the Spike in Binance BTC Reserve

It’s worth noting that Binance and some other major exchanges have been seeing an increase in BTC inflows over the past few weeks. There are a lot of factors at play behind the increase in Binance BTC balance. One is the current bearish state of the market, which is causing some investors to deposit Bitcoin to exchanges, probably for selling. 

CoinMetrics also opines that the increase in Binance Bitcoin balance is partially caused by Chinese investors moving their BTC holdings off local exchanges. 

Recently, the Chinese authorities stepped up their efforts in cracking down on Bitcoin mining activities in the country. The People’s Bank of China also resounded its warnings to financial institutions on providing their services to cryptocurrency-related activities. Such a development would add an extra layer of difficulty for crypto traders in China.  

Miners’ Outflows Subside After Initial Flurry

Not minding the regulatory unrest in China concerning digital currencies, there hasn’t been any significant increase in BTC miners’ outflows over the recent days. At first, miners’ outflows to exchanges increased following the announcement that Chinese authorities are planning to clamp down on cryptocurrency mining activities. However, the outflows have since subsided, even as some of the affected miners are relocating. 

At the time of writing, Bitcoin’s price was up by over 3% at US$33,664 over the previous 24 hours. BTC dropped below US$29,000 on June 22, amid the bear market. It remains to be seen how soon the market will recover. However, Crypto News Australia recently reported that BTC investors are gradually regaining confidence in the market, following a reserve in exchange flow. 

Categories
Crypto News Ethereum

Founder Vitalik Buterin Reveals How Ethereum Got Its Name

Vitalik Buterin, the co-founder of Ethereum, came across the term “Ether” (also written as aether) on Wikipedia while searching for science fiction-themed words as he wrote his whitepaper. 

Ether From Medieval Science

Ether is a common term from ancient and medieval science and was used in various theories to explain several natural phenomena, such as gravity and the travelling of light. However, there was no hard evidence to back ether being a medium through which light can travel. Scientists in the late 19th century postulated that ether was transparent, frictionless and weightless, and that it permeated all matter and space. 

South American-born crypto journalist and founder of DeFi newsletter The Defiant, Camila Russo, detailed in her 2020 book The Infinite Machine that the name of the second-largest blockchain network, Ethereum, was coined from a medieval scientific theory. As Ethereum was developed to be an imperceptible medium for every decentralised application, it’s worth mentioning that the blockchain is fairly living up to that. 

Ether is Still Relevant in Crypto

Although the concept of ether posed by medieval scientists has been dismissed, Buterin still chose the term for the blockchain network as he appreciates the assumed properties of ether. 

Vitalik wanted his platform to be the underlying and imperceptible medium for every application, just what medieval scientists thought ether was. […] Plus, it sounded nice.

Camila Russo

Buterin came up with “Ethereum” for the blockchain network, while “Ether” refers to the native cryptocurrency (ie, ETH). Since its inception in 2015, Ethereum has grown to become one of the core pillars of cryptocurrency. Several projects have been built on the network, and still counting. 

Despite the fact that Ethereum has scalability issues, many experts believe the network still has more to offer, especially with Ethereum 2.0 under way.

Vitalik owns over US$1 billion dollars worth of ETH and has also recently been in battle with Elon Musk over scaling transactions on Dogecoin and how he thinks it’s a flawed idea.

Categories
Banking Crypto News India Regulation

Major Indian Bank HDFC Renounces Recent Warning About Dealing With Crypto

HDFC Bank, India’s largest private-sector banking institution, has told its customers to ignore its recent warning against transacting with digital currency. This comes after the Reserve Bank of India clarified its regulatory stance on cryptocurrency, setting aside the circular which prevented Indian banks from dealing with cryptocurrencies.

Indian Banks are Opening to Cryptocurrency

As recently as May 28, HDFC reiterated its warning about customers dealing with cryptocurrencies. In an email sent to Rinku Saini, an Indian cryptocurrency investor, the bank cited the RBI 2018 circular, which authorises them to closely monitor transactions and exercise due diligence on any account dealing with “virtual currencies”.

However, the HDFC Bank has informed its customers to ignore the warning against dealing with cryptocurrency, following the RBI’s recent statement regarding the invalidity of the 2018 circular, which most banks, including HDFC, have been acting upon.  

RBI Confirms Indian Banks Can Serve Crypto Users

On the heels of the escalating warning against crypto by HDFC and other banks, including the State Bank of India (SBI), the central bank of India clarified its stance on cryptocurrency, stating the 2018 circular had already been rendered invalid by last year’s Supreme Court ruling.

In view of the order of the Hon’ble Supreme Court, the circular is no longer valid from the date of the Supreme Court judgment, and therefore cannot be cited or quoted from.

RBI statement

Despite the Supreme Court judgment, many Indian banks were still acting in accordance with the circular.

However, the clarification on RBI’s stance is a step in the right direction, and will gradually change how the Indian population of 1.4 billion view cryptocurrencies. Expect to see an upsurge in crypto-related activities from the country in coming months or years. 

Categories
Crypto News Stablecoins Tether

Stablecoin USDC Supply Has Been Growing Faster Than Tether in 2021

At the moment, Tether (USDT) is the largest stablecoin by supply. However, it has been losing out in supply growth to USD Coin (USDC), according to the “State of the Network” report by CoinMetrics. 

Tether vs USDC Supply Growth

Following the data on CoinMetrics, the total supply of USDC has risen over $22 billion, or about 57 percent since May and over 450 percent since the beginning of the year. In less than two weeks, USDC grew from a $15 billion USD asset on May 12 to over $20 billion USD. It’s worth mentioning that USDC is one of the fastest-growing stablecoins in the crypto market.

Two plausible factors driving more demand for USDC are market trust and the decentralized finance (DeFi) space. There is a possibility that USDC may soon catch up with USDT, provided the supply trend continues to increase.

USDT has only increased by over 190 percent in supply to a +$61 billion USD asset since the beginning of the year. Tron Network is currently the dominant blockchain for USDT, accounting for more than 50 percent of the entire USDT supply. There is now a lower supply of $30.9 billion USD (49 percent) on Ethereum, probably due to the expensive transaction fee on the blockchain, which led to the increase in demand on Tron. 

Notwithstanding the USDT supply and transaction count, the ERC-20 version of USDT sees more transfer value compared to the TRC-20 tokens, which indicates that both versions of USDT have different use cases, as per CoinMetrics.

BUSD Supply Increase Over 800% Since January

The Binance-backed BUSD is one other stablecoin in the spotlight. BUSD has risen by over 820 percent since the start of the year. There has been a strong demand for stablecoin amid the Binance DeFi space and the incredibly cheap transaction fee on the network. 

Categories
Crypto Exchange Crypto News DeFi Markets

Decentralized Exchanges Record Over $161 Billion ATH Volume in May

Decentralized Exchanges Record Over $161 Billion ATH Volume in May

Cryptocurrency trading volume across decentralized exchanges (DEXes) reached an all-time high above US$161 billion in the past month, according to market data shared by CryptoRank. Overall, trading volume in the crypto market grew significantly in May as centralized exchanges also saw a record high in monthly volume. 

DEXes Gain 16% in Monthly Volume

The massive jump in trading volume represents a 16 percent increase on the previous month (US$138.1 billion). The May figure also translates to a 157 percent rise since January 2021. 

To break down the volume, Uniswap was ranked the largest decentralized exchange with nearly US$58 billion in volume, while the Uniswap V3 closed at US$24 billion, according to data from TheBlock. Uniswap is followed by SushiSwap, 0x Protocol, and 13 other exchanges.

At the time of writing, PancakeSwap leads in reported 24-hour volume with US$371 million, followed by Uniswap, SushiSwap, 0x Protocol, Balancer, BakerySwap, and 1inch.  

The total value of digital assets locked in decentralized exchanges was US$21 billion as at June 2. 

Centralized Exchanges Exceed $2 Trillion in May Volume

The crypto market gained more trading volume last month regardless of the drops in major coins. This is evident as centralized exchanges also reported a 37 percent increase in trading volume to more than US$2.2 trillion last month, consecutively closing a trillion-dollar volume for the fourth time. Binance accounts for about 66 percent of the entire volume in May (+US$1.5 trillion).

Categories
Betting Crypto News Gambling

Asian Racing Federation To Counteract Illegal Crypto Betting

The Asian Racing Federation (ARF) warns that cryptocurrencies and blockchain technology are aiding illegal betting across the continent. This poses “several risks to legal betting operators and wider society”, according to a recent ARF report.

In its 12-page report, ARF asserts that legal betting is under threat, mainly due to the privacy feature of cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin, Ethereum and others. The anonymity associated with digital currencies enables many punters and betting operators to bypass regulatory restrictions, anti-money laundering policies and know-your-customers measures, the report says. 

Such sites and apps facilitate illegal betting by allowing illegal bookmakers and bettors to circumvent any restrictions on payment processors, and to move money instantly and anonymously.

Asian Racing Federation report

Over 780 Offshore Betting Platforms Accept Cryptocurrency

More than 780 offshore betting websites accept payments in one or more top cryptocurrencies. The report also claims that these platforms accept players from jurisdictions such as Hong Kong, Australia, Japan and Singapore.

ARF is concerned that the increasing adoption of cryptocurrencies in the betting space could result in more illegal betting activities.

The rise of cryptocurrency and blockchain in the betting industry underlines a key point in the global anti-illegal betting narrative, which is that illegal betting operators will always be swifter and more agile to adapt to new technologies and regulatory loopholes/grey areas.

Asian Racing Federation report

Authorities in several Asian countries are cracking down on illegal betting sites. In April, Chinese law enforcement officers arrested a group of developers running an illegal decentralised gambling platform. 

Categories
Bitcoin Crypto News Markets Trading

Crypto Exchange Volumes Rise 37% In May 2021 To US$2.2 Trillion

Binance Adds Apple (AAPL) as Fourth Stock Token

Last month, major cryptocurrency exchanges recorded a massive volume of over $2.2 trillion USD, despite the recent drops in the price of cryptocurrencies.

The volume in May represents over a 37 percent increase compared to the previous month (April – $1.66 trillion USD), according to the data from TheBlock shown below.

Crypto Exchange Volume is up 132% YTD

Following the data, crypto exchange volume has increased by 132 percent compared to the January record of $977.79 billion USD, and over 2,000 percent compared to the record of $107 billion in May last year. In February, crypto exchanges made their first +$1.2 trillion volume, which has been on the rise for four consecutive months.

The leading crypto-to-crypto exchange, Binance, recorded over $1.5 trillion volume, which is about 66 percent of the total volume in May. Coinbase recorded the largest volume amongst fiat-to-crypto exchanges. Coinbase gained about $201 billion USD, which is approximately nine percent of the entire volume last month.

Judging by the growing trend, exchange volume is likely to increase further this month.

Bitcoin Futures Volumes Also On The Rise

Likewise, derivative exchanges also recorded an increase in Bitcoin Futures trading volume for the past month. The volume precisely increased by 48 percent in May, led by OKEx, which gained over 48 percent in BTC Futures volume, followed by Binance (+42%), FTX (+38%).

Huobi and Deribit gained about 36 percent in volume, while BitMEX lost four percent.  

At the time of writing, open interest in Bitcoin Futures totaled $11.25 billion USD, with the price of the underlying asset at $35,962 USD.

Categories
Blockchain Crypto News Digital Asset Mining

Daymak is Making Electric Cars That Can Mine Cryptocurrency With Green Energy

Canadian personal Light Electric Vehicles (LEVs) manufacturer Daymak is building a unique series of electric cars dubbed “Spiritus” that can reportedly mine Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies, according to a June 1 announcement.  

Daymak Spiritus is more than a car.

Aldo Baiocchi, President of Daymak

Even Parked Cars Will Be Able to Mine Bitcoin

As Daymak explained, Spiritus will be the first-ever electric car to incorporate a cryptocurrency wallet and mining hardware. Each electric car will function as a node on a blockchain, equipped with the company’s proprietary digital wallet and GPU miner. Spiritus will be able to mine cryptocurrencies with eco-friendly energy even when parked or plugged in. 

We envision a future where your highway tolls, your parking, and your drive-thru order will be paid directly on the fly with crypto. Your online bills and your banking can be handled through the same software platform paid in crypto.

Spiritus electric cars will be launched in the next two years and can be pre-ordered with popular digital currencies including Bitcoin, Dogecoin, Ethereum and Cardano. 

Auto Industry Slowly Warming to Crypto and Blockchain

The automobile industry has been advancing towards cryptocurrency recently, as seen with many dealerships and Tesla, which has previously supported Bitcoin payments for electric cars. However, Daymak’s announcement of Spiritus is probably the farthest an automaker has gone towards embracing the future of crypto technology.

Blockchain, the technology behind cryptocurrencies, is also being used by automakers like Volvo to trace cobalt used in car batteries.

In February this year, the founder and CEO of Elrond, Beniamin Mincu, pitched to Elon Musk how Elrond blockchain networks could improve transactions involving self-driving Tesla vehicles.

Categories
Bitcoin Bitcoin Mining Crime Crypto News

British Police Discover Illegal Bitcoin Mining Farm in Search for Cannabis

English police stumbled upon a Bitcoin mining operation when their drone detected a considerable amount of heat emanating from a warehouse in the West Midlands on May 18.

Suspecting a cannabis farm, the police were able to seize around 100 Bitcoin mining devices which were running on stolen electricity.

Mining operation found by the Police in Sandwell, UK

Detectives said they were tipped off about lots of people visiting the unit throughout the day and a police drone picked up a lot of heat coming from the building.

It’s certainly not what we were expecting. It had all the hallmarks of a cannabis cultivation set-up.

Sandwell Police Sergeant Jennifer Griffin

The computer equipment has been seized but no arrests have been made.

Bitcoin mining equipment in question

Bitcoin Mining Is Not Illegal But Stealing Electricity Is

The police said although it wasn’t illegal to mine Bitcoin, the issue was that the electricity was syphoned from the power grid, hence illegal.

Mining for cryptocurrency is not itself illegal but clearly abstracting electricity from the mains supply to power it is. […]  It is just the second illegal mining operation the local force have discovered in the region.

Sandwell Police Sergeant Jennifer Griffin

We may see an increase in Bitcoin mining “operations” as it becomes easier to make it profitable with China clamping down on their mining farms.

Categories
Crypto News DeFi Ethereum

Total Value Locked on Ethereum DeFi Protocols Rose by 7,104% Since 2020

Decentralized Finance (DeFi) space on Ethereum has been gaining traction since the past year, despite some projects having left the network amid expensive fees and slow transactions.

Nonetheless, the total value of digital assets locked on the Ethereum-based DeFi protocol increased by four percent this month, according to market data from CryptoRank.

$66 Billion Was Locked in Ethereum Protocol in May

Since this month, about $66.35 billion USD worth of cryptocurrencies has been locked on Ethereum DeFi space. An all-time high of over $88 billion USD was recorded on May 12 before the market began to plummet.

This record today represents about a four percent increase compared to the $63.70 billion USD TVL recorded last month. Compared to the past months since May 2020, this is the lowest TVL percentage increase in the Ethereum DeFi space, which can be attributed to the recent massive correction of the market. Bitcoin (BTC), Ethereum (ETH), and some other major altcoins dropped significantly in value, which affected the market capitalization of cryptos globally, including DeFi.

Meanwhile, on the year-over-year (YoY) chart, the total value locked in Ethereum-based DeFi protocols is up by over 7,104 percent, as per analysis by CryptoRank.

Gross TVL on Binance Smart Chain

Binance Smart Chain is possibly the main competitor of Ethereum for DeFi projects. As of 28 May, the total gross value locked in protocols on the Binance Smart Chain was $16.6 billion USD, according to data from The Block. PureSwap was rated as the largest protocol with over $23.69 million USD.

Value Locked by DeFi Projects on BSC [source: The Block]