Monat: August 2023

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Coinbase gains approval to offer regulated crypto futures to US customers

Key takeaways

  • Coinbase has been cleared to offer regulated crypto futures to eligible US customers.

  • Coinbase Advanced Trade users will have access to crypto futures in a few weeks.

CFTC grants Coinbase permission to offer crypto futures

The National Futures Association, a self-regulatory organization designated by the Commodity and Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), has granted Coinbase the approval to offer eligible US customers access to crypto futures directly from its platforms.

This latest cryptocurrency news comes despite Coinbase’s ongoing legal battles with the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). 

Coinbase Financial Markets CEO Andrew Sears stated that this latest development is key to unlocking growth and enabling broader participation in the crypto economy.

The cryptocurrency exchange filed an application with the NFA to register as an FCM nearly two years ago. 

Following its application, Coinbase acquired CFTC-regulated futures exchange FairX and renamed it Coinbase Derivatives Exchange. 

Coinbase Advanced Trade to gain access to crypto futures soon

The cryptocurrency exchange revealed that users of Coinbase Advanced Trade will be the first to be granted access to the regulated crypto futures. The products will then become available to customers of the institutional-focused prime brokerage platform Coinbase Prime later afterwards. 

Greg Tusar, Coinbase’s head of institutional products, wrote in a company blog post that;

“Obtaining FCM approval was our next step in bringing these transparent and secure markets to our customers so they can access regulated futures contracts alongside our liquid spot market. In the coming months, we’ll provide additional information on how our verified US customers can access our futures offering.”

By offering regulated cryptocurrency futures, eligible users can be able to open long and short positions in the cryptocurrency market via Coinbase. 

Coinbase Chief Policy Officer Faryar Shirzad believes that with the supervision of the CFTC and NFA, the cryptocurrency exchange can offer regulated futures that protect consumers and ensure that the United States remains the centre for digital innovation. 

This latest development came barely two days after Coinbase entered the Canadian market. The cryptocurrency exchange expanded its service into Canada with the launch of Coinbase One in the North American country. 

Coinbase also offered Canadians a free 30-day trial of Coinbase One as it looks to attract more customers to its platform. 

The post Coinbase gains approval to offer regulated crypto futures to US customers appeared first on CoinJournal.

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Volatility Shares aims to list its Ether Futures ETF on October 12

  • Volatility Shares plans to have its Ether Futures ETF (ETHU) open to investors on October 12. 
  • The company listed its 2x Bitcoin-linked ETF (BITX) in July.

While all eyes remain on the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) with regard to the several spot Bitcoin ETF applications before it, market experts say the first Ethereum futures exchange-traded fund in the US is an equally massive development.

First ETH Futures ETF for US market

Volatility Shares, one of the leading ETF providers in the market, has indicated plans to list its Ether Strategy ETF on October 12, 2023. The product will trade under the ticker ETHU, offering the company’s first Ether-linked ETF and come a few months after Volatility Shares’ 2x Bitcoin-linked ETF (BITX) that launched in July.

Eric Balchunas, a senior ETF analyst at Bloomberg, says Volatility Shares’s positioning for the debut of the Ether ETF could see it beat rivals amid the race to be first to market with the highly anticipated product.  

Even though the SEC hasn’t pronounced itself on ETHU, Balchunas notes that the regulator “looks to be ok” with the proposal as there hasn’t been any withdrawal. Also notable is the application date, which with the 75-day approval window, means the company is likely to be first to the market on October 12.

Nonetheless, the SEC may choose to group the filings and Volatility Shares are probably “just pushing the envelope” as they did with their BITX offering.

Stuart Barton, the CIO of Volatility Shares has indicated that the company is looking to have ETHU available to investors before they shift focus to the increasingly demanded-for spot ETF market.

The SEC has notably not approved any spot crypto ETF for the US, and the next big decision after a recent delay for the Ark spot Bitcoin ETF, will be on Grayscale. With the 160-day window up on Tuesday, the expectation is that this decision comes on Friday morning.

The post Volatility Shares aims to list its Ether Futures ETF on October 12 appeared first on CoinJournal.

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BNB Chain’s opBNB mainnet goes live for infrastructure providers

  • opBNB mainnet has gone live for infrastructure providers a few days after Binance announced its deployment.
  • The testnet for the layer-2 scaling solution built on the OP Stack took one and half months.

BNB Chain has announced that its layer 2 scaling platform opBNB mainnet is now live for infrastructure providers, putting the EVM-compatible solution on the path to the much anticipated public launch.

opBNB is built using the OP Stack and leverages Optimistic Rollups to allow for low gas fees, network stability and security. Its importance to the optimal performance of the BNB Chain ecosystem could be felt across gaming, decentralised exchanges (DEXs) and digital collectibles.

opBNB mainnet launch

opBNB’s mainnet launch for infrastructure providers means the next step is a public launch, powering fresh adoption from developers and projects.

Binance released the opBNB testnet on June 19 and recently unveiled a promotion dubbed “Odyssey” as it revealed the imminent launch of the protocol’s mainnet. That announcement came on August 10, with mainnet deployment scheduled for this month as BNB Chain prepared for a significant milestone that could revamp its position in the decentralised finance ecosystem.

On-chain transactions by the BNBChain community during the testnet surpassed 7 million, with a daily transaction range of 100-150K.  A total of 435,972 unique wallet addresses connected to the network, Binance noted in a recent post highlighting opBNB’s testnet performance.

The network also saw more than 6k daily active users and 40 dApps deployed on the testnet during the one-and-half months of testing.

BNB price outlook

BNB, the native cryptocurrency powering the BNB Chain ecosystem, was trading around $233 at the time of writing – down 2% in the past 24 hours and nearly 5% in the past week. Meanwhile, total value locked assets on the chain stood at $3.07 billion.

The post BNB Chain’s opBNB mainnet goes live for infrastructure providers appeared first on CoinJournal.