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NEAR raises $150M to spur Web3 adoption

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In an official blog post, on 13 January 2022, the U.S.-based decentralized application platform and Ethereum competitor, NEAR protocol has announced that it has raised a $150 million fortune directed by Three Arrows Capital. According to the blog post, the funds would be used at regional centers through which it will bolster people to learn about decentralized podiums.

The funds will be utilized to advocate millions of people to learn and use blockchain technology and to endorse Web3 technologies. This benefit of development on the NEAR decentralized blockchain could make it possible for users to network with new audiences.

The agreement has conclusively proved sections across Asia, Europe, Africa, and the team aim to broaden support in Latin America, India, and Turkey.

Marieke Flament, NEAR Foundation’s CEO, said,

“We are delighted to have such a fantastic list of backers supporting NEAR’s mission. We are looking forward to leveraging the funding to improve access to blockchain technology in an ever growing list of countries across the world.”

What is NEAR protocol?

NEAR protocol is a highly efficient blockchain constructed to be extremely fast. It is considered to be unbelievably safe and also eminently scalable. It was designed to run decentralized applications and works to compete with Ethereum and many other superior smart contract-facilitated blockchains such as EOS and Polkadot. Its prime token is also known as NEAR and is used to pay for commission and cache. These tokens can also be invested by token holders who take part in executing network consensus as transaction proofs.

The company is formated by an explicit group of techies and entrepreneurs to be easy to utilize, general, and environmentally friendly. The company is supported by leading venture capitalists like A16Z, Pantera Capital, Electrical Capital, Dragonfly Capital, Coinbase Ventures, Blockchain.com, and Baidu Ventures.

As decentralized applications have grown in fame, the crypto society is faced with an increasing scalability issue. Ethereum has been surfaced with scalability obstacles because of the increasing request for its purpose, and whilst a few endorse scaling issues to be resolved by building it on top of Ethereum (Layer-2-solutions), other businesses like NEAR are determined to build a completely fresh blockchain with distinct framework.

Crocs registers for NFT Trademark

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The footgear company, Crocs, chronicled a trademark application, on 11 January 2022, with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO).

The application is notable for ‘downloadable computer software for creating, managing, storing, accessing, sending, receiving, exchanging, validating and selling digital assets, digital collectibles, digital tokens and non-fungible tokens (NFTs).

These days, Non-Fungible Tokens (NFT) seem to be the most spoken about. Every firm, enterprise, even people are getting themselves into NFTs. The most recent addition to this family is the very famous yet often criticized shoe brand, Crocs. The company has filed a trademark application to make use of its name in the virtual space.

A technique of declaring ownership over an item of online content such as videos or pictures, NFTs have been amplifying in fame among both collectors and investors as famous personalities like Martha Stewart and Paris Hilton enter the arena. Some eminent Nfts, like the Bored Ape Yatch Club, could be sold for millions.

The need for Crocs to enter this space

With clothing brands like Nike, Adidas and Under Armour making progressive moves to expand their contribution of NFTs, Crocs did not see a reason as why it shouldn’t be doing the same to keep up with the pace of the fast growing cryptocurrency industry. whilst, Nike bought a company that designs NFTs, Under Armour recently launched one that look like the pair of sneakers worn by the NBA legend, Stephen Curry, in the record breaking match.

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Stephen Curry-Under Armour NFT in Metaverse 3

In light of these recent events, the trademark filing at the USPTO, Crocs requests the right to use the brand’s name on NFTs of ‘footwear, clothing, bags, accessories and charms for decorating the same’ and on the software needed to create, develop and sell them.

The filing is yet to be reviewed by an inquisitor and could easily be made to obtain rights for the future, its files as ‘intent-to-use’ could imply that the foot apparel brand is likely to start pumping out NFTs quite soon.

Cryptocurrency worth $400M sacked by N.Korean hackers

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It has been reported that North Korean hackers stole nearly $400 million worth of digital assets through a minimum of seven attacks on cryptocurrency networks in 2021.

The blockchain data platform, Chainalysis reported that it was one of the most prosperous years for cyber-gangsters in North Korea. As reported, these attacks were primitively aimed at investment firms and centralized exchanges. The closed East Asian state started to launder the funds in custody only to cover up the theft.

In the report, Chainalysis said,

“From 2020 to 2021, the number of North Korean-linked hacks jumped from four to seven, and the value extracted from these hacks grew by 40%.”

The techniques and tactics used by the hackers had led many security investigators to identify cyber gangs for North Korea as advanced persistent threats (APTs). Techniques such as phishing lures, code exploits, malware, and advanced social engineering were used to drain funds out of the investment firms’ and exchanges’ internet-connected ‘hot’ wallets into Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK)-controlled addresses.

Rise of Lazarus Group linked to cryptocurrency crime

The Lazarus Group had first gained fame through its cyberattacks, in 2014, on Sony Pictures Entertainment. This hack was supposedly an act of revenge for ‘The Interview’, a satirical movie that mocked the leader Kim Jong Un.

Conforming to the report, since 2018, the Group has been involved in the theft and laundering of a huge amount of cryptocurrency every year, generally in an overflow of $200 million.

It is said that the hackers aim at an array of cryptocurrencies, with Bitcoin (BTC), accounting for only one-fourth of the embezzled wealth.

A panel of the United Nations (UN) monitoring sanctions on North Korea has reportedly charged Pyongyang with using embezzled assets to support its nuclear and ballistic missile programs as an out to dodge international sanctions.

Furthermore, in February 2021, the US had charged three North Korean computer programmers with an extensive hacking rampage that had targeted to steal more than $1.3 billion in capital and cryptocurrency.

The Department of Justice (DOJ) said that this cyberattack on cryptocurrency impacted firms from financial institutions to movie studios in Hollywood.

At the time of writing, Bitcoin (BTC) was priced at $43,098.27 with a daily rise of 0.69%.

Shiba Inu reacts to CoinMarketCap issues

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CoinMarketCap listed three fake Shiba Inu contract addresses on their website in a quite recent update. The SHIB token team took to Twitter to announce that the three contract addresses listed on CoinMarketCap, namely Binance Smart Chain, Solana, and Terra, are all fake and that interaction with these contracts must be avoided if not the user will be at risk of irreversibly losing their funds.

The SHIB token defense team expressed their disappointment in their tweet. Supposedly, the CoinMarketCap team had refused to communicate with the SHIB team concerning the updates on the token page. Allegedly, CoinMarketCap had willingly allowed these malignant troupe to deface the ‘dogecoin killer’ token. The meme coin team explicitly showed displeasure over the lack of professionalism rendered by the crypto asset price tracking website.

Wormhole addresses for Shiba Inu

In response to the squabble, CoinMarketCap interpreted that the contract addresses are indeed wormhole addresses for the SHIB. They explained that these addresses were used to aid cross-chain transactions of wrapped versions of the altcoin.

At the moment, the reason for the listing of the alternative addresses is uncertain, but such delinquency is adversely harmful not only to the altcoin but the entire crypto society.

At the time of writing, the three wormhole addresses were still visible on CoinMarketCap, in the dropdown segment next to the SHIB token’s official ETH contract address.

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Shiba Inu reacts to CoinMarketCap issues 3

Despite the warnings given by the Shiba Inu team, there seems to be an array of transactions on each of these fake contract addresses’ chains. This indicates that quite a few investors have already sent money to these addresses, which is alarming.

In a lighter perspective, Shiba Inu has risen as the most viewed cryptocurrency of the previous year, 2021, according to CoinMarketCap. It has been enumerated by the cryptocurrency price-tracking website that there have been more than 188 million views, for the meme token, over the last 12 months. The more astonishing fact happens to be, Bitcoin (BTC), the world’s largest and most sought-after cryptocurrency had only 145 million views at the same time, which makes it the second most viewed crypto asset.

Shiba Inu remains to be eminently frivolous despite its rising idolization among holders. At the time of writing, Shiba Inu was priced at $0.00003142 with a daily drop of 1.79%.

Tesla Takes DOGE Payments Mainstream as Musk Builds Hype

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It is now official that Tesla accepts Dogecoin (DOGE) payments for some of its merchandise. Not very long ago did Elon Musk tweet about his company accepting the famous meme coin, after which things were kept very low-key. Now, the cat is out of the bag.

Earlier this week Twitter user had confirmed the payment mode, among other modes of payment, on his Twitter handle. Although there was a huge tide of speculation, the token’s followers awaited an official confirmation from the company itself. Today, Elon Musk and Billy Markus, the founder of Dogecoin (DOGE) took to Twitter to announce that the American-based company is now accepting the meme token as payments. Musk’s tweet read,

“Tesla merch buyable with Dogecoin”

Tesla’s Electric cars not in exchange for Dogecoin

There was a bunch of merchandise listed in exchange for DOGE, but the electric cars weren’t one of them. Nonetheless, people were allowed to purchase Cyberquad bikes for kids, Giga Texas Belt Buckle, and Cyberwhistles with the altcoin.

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Tesla Takes DOGE Payments Mainstream as Musk Builds Hype 6
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Tesla Takes DOGE Payments Mainstream as Musk Builds Hype 7

The company put out a support page exclusively for Dogecoin inquiries. The page guides buyers on how to purchase with the altcoin. The Dogecoin network will be charging network fees every time a payment is made using the token.

The company has ensured to bring to the notice of the purchasers that any merchandise bought with DOGE as payment cannot be canceled once the order is placed. There is also a strict no-return policy in place when a product is bought using Dogecoin. To sum it up, the company has presented a draconian policy regarding all purchases through the altcoin and called it a ‘final sale’ with no return, no cancellation, and no exchange of products.

Furthermore, it has been made very clear that Tesla only accepts Dogecoin. The company asserts that it cannot receive or detect any other cryptocurrency. A disclaimer regarding the use of any other form of digital asset has been clarified on the support page.

With this news like a gust of wind, Dogecoin (DOGE) price seems to be soaring high. At the time of writing, Dogecoin (DOGE) was priced at $0.1965 with a an escalation of 13.26% over the last 24 hours.

Bitcoin ETF, a first in India

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The launch of India’s first Bitcoin and Ethereum Futures ETF and Metaverse US-listed Large-cap Discount Certificates by Torus Kling Blockchain IFSC, a 50:50 joint venture between Sam Ghosh endorsed Cosmea Financial Holdings (CFH) and Kling Trading India, signed an MOU with India INX has been the hot topic of the hour in the nation, as reported by local media.

These Exchange Traded Funds (ETF) Futures will be barraged under a Sandbox design of IFSCA. This will be the fircrypto-supportedted futures ETF outside of the US and the first Asian Discount certificates trailing Metaverse Large Cap stocks in US and Europe markets.

Torus Kling Blockchain will be at the financial end providing liquidity to India INX by catering to the all-time necessity of deep liquidity with smart order routing. The Torus global distribution team and its partners are accountable for the distribution of the products, according to reports.

Mr. V.Balasubramaniam, the Managing Director and CEO of India INX, said,

“India INX at GIFT IFSC is looking at exploring the launch of Digital Asset based products and has already made an application to IFSCA under Regulatory Sandbox. This is a part of our product innovation initiative to benchmark offerings with other internatiofinancialance centers. We will be launching products in these new-age assets in compliance with the prevailing laws after receiving all required post regulatory approvals”

Bitcoin ETF’s big struggle in the U.S

There have been big battles that were faced to launch the first Bitcoin ETF in the U.S. The reason was that Bitcoin, the largest cryptocurrency in the world, seemed to be unregulated. In addition, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) was hesitant to allow an ETF focused on the then-new and broadly unproven cryptocurrency market to make its way into the community.

After 8 long years of struggle, the first application for a Bitcoin ETF trade, at the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE), was filed in the U.S. The first Bitcoin ETF in the United States began trading on 19 October 2021.

Now, India escalated its game by permitting the launch of not only Bitcoin ETF but also Ethereum futures ETF. This being a first, crypto enthusiasts look forward to more ETFs being launched.

Digital assets information sought out by Congress’s Agriculture Committees

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The U.S Congress sent out a letter, on 12 January 2022, to the Commodities Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) requesting more information on digital assets marketplaces. The letter was addressed to Rostin Behnam, chairman of CFTC.

Currently, the agriculture committees are asking Behnam to report on the growth of the crypto industry and to specify how privileged the CFTC is to step up when that rise puts the consumers in jeopardy. The letter in detail talks about CFTC’s rapport with crypto, along with its supposition of Bitcoin (BTC) and Ether being commodities. It also reprises that the CFTC is authorized to enforce actions against digital asset forum though the Commodity Exchange Act (CEA).

The letter asserts that the CFTC has been active in prosecuting persons and entities engaging in misconduct in digital asset markets under its jurisdiction and that the Commission had also issued interpretive guidance on retail transactions in certain digital assets and educated the public on the technology underlying this marketplace and its attendant risks.

It has been highlighted that the consumers reported losing nearly $82 million to cryptocurrency scams between the fourth quarter of 2020 and the first quarter of 2021, more than 10 times the amount from the same six-month period a year earlier.

Considering the hike of digital assets that are being traded on decentralized financial (DeFi) protocols, the committees have expressed concern over the DeFi protocols offering derivatives contracts on unregistered exchanges which is the subject of the recent CFTC enforcement action.

8 specific explanations to 8 questions on digital assets

Congress wants to understand the benefits and risks better to identify the CFTC’s role. To understand the scope and size of the digital asset markets, the benefits and risks presented by these emerging technologies, and the role of the Commission with respect to these markets, the Congress has laid down a set of 8 questions for the CFTC to answer.

The questions ask the CFTC to estimate the measurement of the digital asset house on the whole and its U.S members, also to analyze and differentiate it to the conventional finance house. Information on any collaboration the company has with digital asset stakeholders and different businesses working to manage the trade and questions whether or not the Commission’s present authorities are sufficient to guard shoppers in the digital asset house was also requested.

Bitcoin (BTC) Up For a Good Medium-Term Outlook: Bitfury CEO

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In a recent interview with the ‘closing bells’ of CNBC, the former CEO of Binance.US discussed Bitcoin (BTC) and how ‘some things are going on short-term’ that are negative for the token.

Brian Brooks, the CEO of Bitfury, said that the asset’s short-term price decline was due to the Fed’s recent meeting minutes, where it was evident that the bank was set to remove stimulus from the economy to fight the hike in prices. He added,

“The Fed is introducing some mild inflation strategy for 2022. Due to bitcoin’s potential as a hedge against inflation, there are going to be some modestly negative effects on price.”

Bitcoin to achieve equal status with gold?

Brooks was bullish on BTC in the medium-term because of certain knowledge found in a recent report of Goldman Sachs. According to the report, Bitcoin is 20% of the global store of value asset when compared to gold. He believes that the BTC token could hit $100K and achieve equal status with gold as a store of value asset.

The report showed that the world’s largest crypto asset returned 60% in 2021. This was followed by crude oil which was at 55% and 29% for the S&P 500. Seconding Brook’s optimism about Bitcoin, Mike Novogratz of Galaxy Digital opined,

“I’m not nervous in the medium-term, but we’re going to have a lot of volatility in the next few weeks.”

When asked about Bitfury’s viability in light of the recent price action, Brooks said that the profitability of BTC mining is only partly related to the token’s price and that it’s about the hash rate and the ones that can grab the most market.

In light of recent events, Bitfury has engaged partnerships with renewable energy providers. The CEO, Brooks, opined that the company will have Initial Public Offering (IPO) in the USA.

Over the past few weeks, cryptocurrency prices were seen taking a plunge, but thankfully, they seem to have risen for the better in the last few days. At the time of writing, Bitcoin was priced at $43,954.23 and had risen by 2.42% in the last 24 hours.

Kim Kardashian sued for promoting alleged crypto scam

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Kim Kardashian and Floyd Mayweather Jr. are being sued for promoting the alleged crypto scam regarding the EthereumMax token. The promotion of the said altcoin by the reality star and the boxing legend to their millions of social media followers misled investors.

The lawsuit that was filed on 7 January 2022 in Los Angeles federal court, asserts the celebrities trumpeted tokens sold by EthereumMax (EMAX) only to get its price to rise and to earn themselves a profit “at the expense of their followers and investors.”

The lawsuit stated,

“The company’s executives, collaborating with several celebrity promoters … made false or misleading statements about EthereumMax through social media advertisements and other promotional activities.”

Floyd Mayweather and Kim Kardashian served

A class-action lawsuit was filed last Friday in the U.S District Court for the Central District of California accuses EthereumMax (naming the company specifically) and its celebrity promoters of working together to artificially hike the price of the token.

The reality star, Kim Kardashian, created a flutter on her Instagram post, in 2021, promoting the EMAX token. She wrote, “Are you guys into crypto???? This is not a financial advice but sharing what my friends just told me about the Ethereum Max token!” She mentioned a hashtag #ad in the post, implying that she was paid to promote it.

In the meantime, the boxing legend, Floyd Mayweather Jr. promoted the token in his boxing match with YouTube star Logan Paul. EMAX was accepted as a mode of payment for the tickets to the event; the lawsuit claims that this move had boosted the trading volume of the asset. Mayweather had also promoted the token at a huge Bitcoin conference in Miami, but whether he was paid to do so wasn’t disclosed by the boxing legend, according to the lawsuit.

According to the lawsuit,

“EthereumMax’s entire business model relies on using constant marketing and promotional activities, often from “trusted” celebrities, to dupe potential investors into trusting the financial opportunities available with EMAX tokens.”

Celebrity endorsements can be as glamorous as it seems, but it is always a safer way to play the game by having done one’s own research over investments.

Shiba Inu snags a spot on two Indian crypto exchanges

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Yet another Indian crypto exchange platform, Giottus, has endorsed the meme coin, Shiba Inu (SHIB). Giottus Cryptocurrency Exchange took to Twitter to announce their launch of SHIB deposits starting at 7 pm IST on 11 January 2022.

Giottus was founded in 2018 by blockchain and cryptocurrency enthusiasts Vikram Subburaj and Arjun Vijay, two IIM Calcutta Alumni. The company drives on its mission to make it possible for anyone to become a cryptocurrency trading expert by providing a reliable and trustworthy platform that is supposedly easy to use. Giottus claims to adhere to the highest compliance and cyber security standards to protect customers and their crypto assets.

Just like all the other Indian crypto exchanges, Giottus also gained a lot of traction in the Indian crypto world when the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) ordered all the financial institutions to not encourage companies and individuals acquainted with cryptocurrencies. Just around that time, Giottus was helping people with crypto assets buy and sell with peer-to-peer (P2P) services. Luckily for all the crypto enthusiasts, in 2020, the Supreme Court lifted the RBI ban on cryptocurrencies.

Shiba Inu enlisted on Koinbazar

Indian cryptocurrency exchange, Koinbazar has enlisted the SHIB token on their platform, as announced on its Twitter handle on 11 January 2022.

Koinbazar is a global cryptocurrency exchange, founded in the year 2017 by Saravanan Pandian. With many Indian cryptocurrency exchanges enlisting the ‘dogecoin-killer’, Shiba Inu seems like the most sought-after meme token.

In recent news, the SHIB token project team had announced Bone as the gas token in Shibarium. Shibarium is a blockchain/layer2 solution that will work on the Ethereum program. Over time, it will function in a similar way to ETH and build its own network for the users to access.

Shiba Inu is currently in the 14th position according to Coin Market Cap. At the time of writing, Shiba Inu (SHIB) was priced at $0.00002872 and had taken a hike of 5.03% over the last 24 hours.