Kategorie: Crypto News

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Wave Financial acquires Swiss based Criptonite Asset Management

SEC regulated Waves Financial plans to use the acquisition to expand its reach across Europe and globally.

Wave Financial, a digital asset investment manager regulated by the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), has acquired Geneva based crypto asset manager Criptonite Asset Management, according to a press release shared with CoinJournal.

Per the announcement, the acquisition is subject to regulatory approval. However, Los Angeles-based Wave Financial has taken a minority stake in Criptonite and expects to complete a full acquisition – the company’s first in Europe – by the end of the year.

The acquisition comes after an initial strategic partnership between the two companies in 2021.

Demand for managed digital asset funds

Criptonite is regulated by Swiss Financial Markets Supervisory Authority (FINMA) and its managed digital assets-focused products are targeted at institutional and accredited investors only.

Europe has seen this group of investors increasingly look for exposure to the crypto investment asset class, particularly around digital asset funds.

The demand has also seen multiple offerings, including crypto exchange-traded funds (ETFs) and exchange-traded products (ETPs), hit the European market. On the growing list of providers are companies such as ETC Group, Fidelity International, Grayscale and Valour Inc.

By acquiring Criptonite, Wave is positioning itself towards curving a share of the market to provide its digital asset funds and products to qualified investors.

Matteo Dante Perruccio, President International at Wave Financial commented:

“We have seen unprecedented demand from institutional and other accredited investors for professionally managed digital asset funds in Europe. There seems to be a flight to quality taking place, so it makes sense to take our relationship with Criptonite to the next level.”

According to Perruccio, Wave Financial’s acquisition of the Swiss firm is its first outside the United States. However, the company plans to seal further partnerships and acquisitions across the globe to bring its diverse products and solutions to investors.

The post Wave Financial acquires Swiss based Criptonite Asset Management appeared first on CoinJournal.

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Robinhood’s crypto division slapped with a $30 million fine

The crypto division of the popular trading app Robinhood has been fined $30 million by the New York State Department of Finance Services for allegedly violating cybersecurity regulations and anti-money laundering laws.

The New York State Department of Financial Services accused the trading app company of failing to use proper resources to stop illicit trading activities on the platform.

A press release on this matter notes:

“All of these deficiencies resulted from what the department found were significant shortcomings in the management and oversight of RHC’s compliance programs, including a failure to foster and maintain an adequate culture of compliance. The department also discovered that adequate resources were not devoted to RHC’s compliance programs, particularly as it grew, which exacerbated these issues.”

Robinhood is now being investigated further and will be required by the department to hire the services of an independent monetary consultant who will regularly evaluate its compliance efforts and enforce remedies when necessary.

Failing to hire and train staff

In addition to failing to prevent anti-money laundering activities, Robinhood was also accused of failing to hire and train its staff to prevent illicit financial behaviour. The department said that Robinhood did not take note of the apparent trading risks and therefore didn’t take the necessary actions to prevent illicit behaviour.

In its defence, Robinhood through its associate general counsel, Chery Crumpton said in an interview:

“We have made significant progress building industry-leading legal, compliance, and cybersecurity programs. We will continue to prioritize this work to best serve our customers. We remain proud to offer a more accessible, lower-cost platform to buy and sell crypto and are excited to continue to grow our business in a responsible manner with new products and services that our customers want.”

The post Robinhood’s crypto division slapped with a $30 million fine appeared first on CoinJournal.

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Babylon Finance to shut down on November 15: BABL price falls by 91%

Babylon Finance, the protocol for DeFi asset management, has issued a statement saying that it shall shut down its services on November 15.

This comes after the firm failed to recover from the $80 million Rari/FEI hack that took place in April this year.

The Rari/FEI hack

Prior to the Rari/FEI hack, Babylon Finance was operating perfectly and it had established a top 10 lending pool on Rari, a protocol that allows users to supply and borrow any asset from its Fuse pools to generate yield.

Rari users can create pools with a selection of Ethereum-based digital assets, like Babylon Finance’s native token, BABL, and other users can contribute money to those pools to receive rewards. At its peak, Babylon Finance held $30 million worth of different cryptocurrencies on Rari and was one of the top lending pools on Rari. $10 million worth of the assets were supplied by users.

The Rari/FEI hack caused the protocol $3.4 million and in the following two days, customers had withdrawn 75% of the TVL.

Following the exploit, Babylon’s $10 million loan market on Rari, Fuse, was suspended because BABL could no longer be used as security in borrowing funds on Rari.

The Babylon Finance token, BABL

Following the news, the price of the BABL token has dropped by over 91% in the last 24 hours and it is currently trading at $0.4563 according to Coinnmarketcap.

According to a press release by Babylon Finance:

“Since the token supply is finite, non-inflationary, and only 10% remains in the treasury, the fall has eliminated any chance of further fundraising initiatives.”

The Babylon Finance team has said that starting on September 6, the firm would combine all its treasury holdings and distribute them to BABL holders. In addition members of Babylon Finance must withdraw their money before November 15.

The post Babylon Finance to shut down on November 15: BABL price falls by 91% appeared first on CoinJournal.

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Prospect of Ethereum Merge happening earlier going by the ETH hashrate

Ethereum blockchain has been working hard to migrate from the current proof-of-work (PoW) consensus mechanism to a proof-of-stake (PoS) consensus mechanism. The process of moving from PoW to PoS is expected to culminate with the much-anticipated Merge upgrade.

In 2020 several testnents upgrades have been carried out all in readiness for the ultimate Merge upgrade. It started with the launch of the Beacon Chain which revived the hopes of a blockchain that could offer near-instant transactions.

After the final testnet Goerli went live successfully Ethereum developers anticipated that the Merge Upgrade would take place on September 15 going by the hashrate and the targeted total difficulty.

Target total difficulty for the Merge to take place

After several Ethereum developers hinted at September 15 as the date for the Ethereum Merge, Vitalik Buteirn came out to specify that the exact date would depend on the ETH hashrate since the total difficulty to be achieved had already been set at 58,75,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,000.

It was with respect to the set total difficulty and the average hashrate of 872.2 THs at the time that the date of September 15 was arrived at.

The total difficulty, however, currently stands at around 57,70,49,02,01,07,48,20,74,40,547 with the preparations for the Merge being 98.21% complete.

If the current hashrate is maintained and the Bellatrix update scheduled for September 06 2022 takes place without a hitch, then the Merge may be triggered well before the announced date of September 15.

The post Prospect of Ethereum Merge happening earlier going by the ETH hashrate appeared first on CoinJournal.

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Litecoin price prediction: LTC could crash to $40 in September

Litecoin price was in a tight range on Thursday as investors started to reposition their assets for September. The LTC coin rose slightly to a high of $55.80, which was slightly above this week’s low of $52.36. Its market cap stands at over $3.2 billion.

Hawkish Federal Reserve

Litecoin price has been under pressure as investors focus on the hawkish tone by the Federal Reserve. In a statement at the Jackson Hole Symposium at Wyoming, Jerome Powell insisted that the bank will continue hiking interest rates in the coming months.

His sentiment was shared by other Federal Reserve officials like Charles Evans and Neel Kashkari. In a statement on Wednesday this week, Cleveland Fed’s Loretta Mester said that the bank will continue hiking and also maintain high interest rates until inflation moves to 2%.

Historically, cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin and LTC tends to underperform in periods of a hawkish Federal Reserve. This also explains why cryptocurrencies and stocks have continued their bearish trend in the past few months. Indeed. American stocks have fallen in the past five straight days.

Litecoin price has also underperformed because of the sluggish demand for the coin. With cryptocurrencies down by more than 50% this year, many users of LTC have stayed away. This is evidenced by on-chain data that show weak demand in the ecosystem.

Meanwhile, the coin has lagged because of the significantly strong US dollar. The US dollar index has jumped to the highest level in over 20 years. Litecoin and other cryptocurrencies have an inverse correlation with the US dollar.

Litecoin price prediction

The daily chart shows that the LTC price has been under pressure in the past few months. It has fallen by 86% from the highest level in 2021. A closer look shows that the coin has formed a bearish flag pattern, which is usually a bearish sign. 

It has moved below the 25-day and 50-day moving averages while the Relative Strength Index (RSI) has moved below the neutral point at 50. Therefore, there is a likelihood that the coin will have a bearish breakout in September. If this happens, the next key support level to watch will be at $40.

The post Litecoin price prediction: LTC could crash to $40 in September appeared first on CoinJournal.