Kategorie: Crypto Markets

Daily headlines and news about crypto markets.

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Do Kwon withdrew $100M worth of BTC via Swiss bank, SEC says

  • Do Kwon reportedly held 10,000 BTC in a cold wallet.
  • The now fugitive Terraform Labs founder reportedly cashed out a massive $100 million worth of Bitcoin through a bank in Switzerland.
  • The SEC announced it had charged Do Kwon with defrauding investors.

The United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) yesterday announced charges against Do Kwon, the founder of Terraform Labs. The regulator’s complaint is that Kwon and his company orchestrated a scheme that saw him defraud investors. 

Do Kwon is the founder of Terra, the crypto project that had a native token LUNA and stablecoin Terra USD (UST). He’s on the run and the latest news is that he cashed out massive amounts of Bitcoin (BTC) following the collapse of UST and LUNA.

SEC says Do Kwon defrauded investors

SEC charges against Do Kwon point to a plot to mislead investors, with the collapse of the then $40 billion LUNA ecosystem impacting the wider crypto market amid an intensifying crypto winter.

“We allege that Terraform and Do Kwon failed to provide the public with full, fair, and truthful disclosure as required for a host of crypto asset securities, most notably for LUNA and Terra USD,” SEC Chair Gary Gensler said in a press release on Thursday.

“We also allege that they committed fraud by repeating false and misleading statements to build trust before causing devastating losses for investors,” he added.

Kwon cashed out millions of BTC via Swiss bank

As Bloomberg notes in a report published Thursday, 17 February, Kwon’s company had ostensibly moved and cashed out over $100 million worth of Bitcoin using an unnamed banking provider in Switzerland. 

The transfers began in June 2022 and were reportedly part of more than 10,000 BTC stashed in a cold wallet and periodically withdrawn through the Swiss-based bank.

The SEC allege the fraudulent transactions had continued up to the date of its official complaint against Do Kwon and its firm. 

Unlike Sam Bankman-Fried who was arrested swiftly following the collapse of his firms FTX and Alameda Research, Do Kwon continues to evade capture. An arrest warrant by Interpol was issued last year and the latest reports on his whereabouts suggested the South Korean citizen was in Serbia.

Terra (LUNA) and Terra Luna Classic (LUNC) price outlook

As Coinjournal reported on Friday morning, the price of Terra (LUNA) fell sharply following news the SEC had charged Kwon. 

Data from CoinGecko as of 9 am ET on Friday, also showed that the Terra Luna Classic price was 3.6% down at $0.00016773, while its market cap stood at $992 million. LUNC is a community-driven project that emerged out of the LUNA debacle.

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Binance CEO says the stablecoin landscape is shifting

  • The market cap of Binance USD (USD) stablecoin has declined by $2.45 billion.
  • Over $2.37 billion has moved from BUSD to Tether (USDT).
  • USD Coin (USDC) has also seen its market cap shrink by about $739 million amid the regulatory events of the past few days.

Binance CEO Changpeng ‘CZ’ Zhao says the Tether has benefited most from the recent regulatory action against Binance USD (BUSD) and its issuer Paxos. But CZ reiterates that Binance does not issue BUSD.

Over $2.37 billion has moved from BUSD to USDT

As the negative impact of the order stopping Paxos from issuing BUSD jolted the crypto market, the flow of funds from the Binance branded dollar-pegged stablecoin ended with the USDT market capitalization gaining as BUSD’s declined.

In a tweet on Friday, Zhao noted that BUSD’s market cap had so far declined by over $2.45 billion and that most of it has gone into Tether’s stablecoin. The Binance chief noted that at least $2.37 billion in BUSD value had moved to USDT as traders sought to move capital from the Paxos-issued token.

According to Zhao, there’s a shift in the stablecoin market and the rotation of capital into the world’s largest stablecoin is an indication of that change.

While BUSD had managed to regain its dollar peg as of writing, the negative view following the regulatory crackdown means traders see USDT as the better alternative. 

Tether’s release of another $1 billion of USDT recently points to this outlook and as Zhao acknowledges, even USD Coin (USDC) has seen its market cap drop by over 739 million over the past few days.

Meanwhile, Binance has reportedly minted $50 million of True USD (TUSD) stablecoin, helping to push the price of TrueFi (TRU) higher. At the time of writing, the token was trading at $0.084, having gained a massive 88% in the past 24 hours.

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Terra LUNA price plunges: SEC charges Terraform Labs for fraud

  • The SEC has charged Terraform and its founder with fraud.
  • The SEC accuses Terraform Labs of embezzling billions of dollars from investors.
  • The news has sent the price of Terra LUNA crushing.

The US Securities and Exchanges Commission (SEC) has charged Terraform Labs, a Singapore-based blockchain payment protocol, and its co-founder Do Kwon, for orchestrating a multi-billion dollar fraud. The news has sent the price of LUNA tumbling and it had dropped by more than 6% at the time of writing.

According to a tweet by the US SEC, Terraform Labs PTE Ltd and Do Hyeong Kwon have been accused of “orchestrating a multi-billion-dollar crypto asset securities fraud involving an algorithmic stablecoin and other crypto asset securities.”

The press release by the US SEC stated:

“The SEC’s complaint alleges that Terraform and Kwon marketed crypto asset securities to investors seeking to earn a profit, repeatedly claiming that the tokens would increase in value. For example, they touted and marketed UST as a “yield-bearing” stablecoin, which they advertised as paying as much as 20 percent interest through the Anchor Protocol. The SEC’s complaint also alleges that, while marketing the LUNA token, Terraform and Kwon repeatedly misled and deceived investors that a popular Korean mobile payment application used the Terra blockchain to settle transactions that would accrue value to LUNA. Meanwhile, Terraform and Kwon also allegedly misled investors about the stability of UST.”

Months after Terra USD collapsed

SEC’s allegations come almost a year after the Terra USD (UST) stablecoin debacle that almost took down the entire crypto market. The collapse of the UST stablecoin spelt doom, especially for algorithmic stablecoins and investors are still sceptical to invest in them.

According to the SEC, the assets targeted in the allegation include Terra’s mAssets and Terra USD (UST).

The SEC also accuses Do Kown and Terraform Labs of manipulating their native tokens so that their value will eventually increase and allow users to earn profit.

Besides Terraform Labs and Do Kwon, the SEC has also listed a number of other individuals involved in the investigations including Roger Landsman, Daniel Koster, and Donald Battle and several others.

The post Terra LUNA price plunges: SEC charges Terraform Labs for fraud appeared first on CoinJournal.

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Japan set to launch its digital yen pilot

  • Japan has been conducting proof-of-concept (PoC) experiments on its CBDC for the last two years.
  • The Japan central bank now says that the project is now set for a pilot program.
  • Currently, China’s digital Yuan continues to lead the CBDC race globally.

After two years of testing the digital yen, the Bank of Japan (BOJ) on Friday said it would launch a pilot programme for the central bank digital currency (CBDC) in April.

A press release by the BOJ stated:

“Taking into account the results and findings of the PoCs along with our discussions to date, the Bank, as a next step, has decided to launch a pilot program this April.”

Proof-of-concept testing

The announcement comes after two phases of PoC testing. The first POC testing phase started in April 2021 and it involved the BOJ building a huge experimental environment around a CBDC ledger that would form the foundation for the project. The ledger confirmed CBDC transactions that include its issuance, transfer and payouts.

The second POC testing phase started in April 2022. At this stage, the BOJ implemented additional functions to the core functions of the CBDC that had been explored in Phase 1. It also investigated the CBDC’s feasibility and processing performance. This phase is expected to run until March and the results are already promising according to the bank.

The aim of the pilot project

According to the BOJ, the aim of the digital yen pilot programme is first to test its technical feasibility which was not possible with the POC testing phases and second to use the insights and skills of private businesses in operating and designing a CBDC ecosystem for social implementation.

If the pilot program was to be a success, Japan will join China whose digital Yuan currently leads the CBDC race globally.

The post Japan set to launch its digital yen pilot appeared first on CoinJournal.

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Cardano price outlook: What next for ADA after bulls break $0.4?

  • Cardano price reached an intraday high of $0.42 on Thursday.
  • The price of ADA token is up more than 63% in 2023 at current levels.
  • On-chain metrics and other factors suggest ADA could continue higher, especially is wider sentiment remains positive.

ADA, the native token of the Cardano blockchain ecosystem, was flat around 4 pm ET on Thursday as the market appeared to cool off following a strong showing that started with Bitcoin’s greatest performance of 2023 so far.

While the Cardano price shows a sideways outlook, ADA bulls did have a great break when they pierced resistance at $0.40. Indeed, the cryptocurrency’s value rose as high as $0.42 on leading crypto exchanges. Cardano’s token is up roughly 16% over the past month, with current prices last seen in the first week of February.

What helped ADA prices get higher in recent weeks?

After a brutal 2022 for ADA, Cardano has had a great start in 2023. In fact, ADA/USD is 63% year-to-date at current levels above $0.40.

What then has helped the Cardano price to surge to today’s highs? Mostly, it’s been down to the bullish sentiment experienced across crypto so far in 2023 – even with the slight derailment seen earlier in the week amid a stablecoin crackdown.

However, talk of revisiting algorithmic stablecoins, including Cardano based DJED particularly buoyed ADA markets. 

Data also shows there has also been massive whale activity around ADA in the past two weeks.  On-chain metrics highlight average daily transactions above 1,700, while large investors (whales and sharks) continued to scoop ADA throughout the last three or so months.

As Santiment researchers noted recently, addresses with 10,000 to 10 million ADA had accumulated nearly 660 million tokens approximately worth $235 million since the price crash that followed the collapse of the FTX crypto exchange.

Additionally, sentiment is this week more upbeat after Cardano developer Input Output HK announced a key upgrade to the network had successfully gone live. According to the firm, the SECP upgrade adds scalability, and enhances cross-chain interoperability. As such, Cardano now supports more cross-chain dApps.

Are these metrics good for Cardano price? Likely. Indeed ADA bull Dan Gambardello suggests ADA/USD has formed an inverse head & shoulders pattern and predicts the next target could be $0.65. 

The post Cardano price outlook: What next for ADA after bulls break $0.4? appeared first on CoinJournal.