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Bitcoin, Ethereum Enabled In Burger King Paris: Details

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Bitcoin, Ethereum, and a host of crypto assets have been added to fast food behemoth Burger King [BK] at its Paris outlet, thanks to a partnership between crypto payment providers, Alchemy Pay and Binance Pay.

In accordance with the press release dated March 27, Burger King has installed market-leading Instpower power bank rental machines that take cryptocurrency payments processed by cryptocurrency payment providers- Alchemy Pay and Binance Pay.

Instpower previously collaborated with the two top payment modules to enable consumers to pay for power bank devices at more than 14,000 places across the world using cryptocurrency.

The latest addition of Burger King is touted as a big step forward for the firm and for the acceptance of cryptocurrency for real-world goods and services.

The inclusion of the machines in Paris has thrilled Yann Phu, CEO of Flash Development, the distributor in charge of achieving the deployment of Instpower equipment across Europe:

“This collaboration with Burger King in Paris has taken us to the next level with our operations in Europe. By having Alchemy Pay helping users to pay with crypto via Binance Pay, we are bringing cutting-edge payment options to Europeans.”

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Bitcoin, Ethereum Enabled In Burger King Paris: Details 2

In 2017, the Russian subsidiary of the highly popular Burger King restaurant conducted the first cryptocurrency test by issuing WhooperCoin tokens on the Waves network, which were made available to consumers at every purchase.

Although the project never took off, other BK branches started to accept Bitcoin payments, such as in the Netherlands, Germany, Venezuela, Brazil, and more. Nowadays, one can buy Whoppers with Bitcoin through debit cards.

Bitcoin also gained more utility, thanks to the crypto-based rewards program.

Crypto Reward Schemes Boosted Bitcoin’s Use Cases

These are becoming increasingly popular within the restaurant industry as brands look for new and innovative ways to engage with consumers and build their technological cred.

In 2021, Burger King US partnered with Robinhood to give away free cryptocurrency to its customers.

A year ago, popular burger chain Shake Shack launched a new Bitcoin-based rewards program in an effort to attract younger consumers and test the potential for long-term adoption.

As reported by TronWeekly, Shake Shack begin offering rewards of up to 15% in the form of Bitcoin for all payments made via Cash Card, a debit card available through Cash App.

Bitcoin & Wrapped BTC Whale Transactions Reaches $100k+

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Bitcoin and Wrapped Bitcoin [WBTC] are seeing rising whale activity in the month of March. In the past seven days, BTC large-scale holders are on an accumulation binge, with over 10,000 transactions valued at $100k+ per day.

While WBTC is receiving more than 930, both of these numbers are record-breaking for 2023.

According to the chart illustrated by Santiment, as of March 21, 2023, this is the highest average daily whale activity for BTC in 16 weeks and for WBTC in 15 weeks.

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Bitcoin & Wrapped BTC Whale Transactions Reaches $100k+ 4

The number of transfers totaling at least $1 million in value that is currently being made on the Bitcoin blockchain is measured by the whale transaction count.

A high value of this metric indicates the presence of a large number of whale transactions on the network. Such a trend demonstrates that these enormous holders are currently actively interested in trading Bitcoins.

Due to the sheer scale of the transactions occurring all at once, this might also cause fluctuations in the asset’s price. As a result, high whale transaction count levels may indicate strong short-term volatility for the asset.

A low value in the whale transaction count, on the other hand, implies that these large-scale hodlers aren’t currently engaging in such activity and may not be very interested in BTC. Consequently, this kind of tendency can come before a market that is more tranquil.

Having said that, in a recent study led by Kaiko, Bitcoin was up 30% in the previous two days and trading at nine-month highs. At press time, BTC has maintained its uptrend at $28.2k.

The recent spike has persisted despite ongoing turmoil in the banking industry and apprehension around the Fed meeting.

BTC’s price resurgence has led many experts to make bold predictions.

Experts Bullish Bet On Bitcoin

In a tweet, Messari CEO Ryan Selkis suggested that Bitcoin might reach $100,000 in the coming year as a result of more bank failures, the resumption of Federal Reserve rate cuts and quantitative easing, as well as persistent moderate inflation.

He also mentioned that businesses might start purchasing bitcoin before the Federal Reserve can stop them.

Former Chief Technical Officer of Coinbase and well-known cryptocurrency enthusiast Balaji Srinivasan is wagering that the value of bitcoin will rise as a result of the weakening of the dollar and will surpass the $1 million mark by June 17.

Bitcoin’s Active Addresses Gather Steam; 1.7M In 8 Weeks

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Bitcoin’s on-chain metrics such as the Active Address count [AA] have been growing steadfastly, despite the current market turmoil.

Active Addresses is a metric that includes all addresses sending and receiving BTC, providing a look at how active market demand is.

According to market intelligence firm, Santiment, in the last two months, the total amount of BTC addresses has grown by 1.71 million, an increase of nearly 4% in a relatively short period.

Following a year of subpar development, the number of AAs dramatically increased starting on March 18, as shown in the graph below. The most recent instance of this expansion occurred between March and June of last year.

Around 45 million addresses have already been created for Bitcoin, showing that the network is currently thriving.

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Bitcoin's Active Addresses Gather Steam; 1.7M In 8 Weeks 6

Even with its 50% price increase, Bitcoin’s lackluster growth in Active Address this year worried many experts.

One such analysis took into consideration the on-chain volume and active address factors that characterize bull markets.

In a blunt assessment of the 2023 BTC price rebound, on-chain analytics platform CryptoQuant deduced that Bitcoin might be weaker than it appears.

“You can see that Active Addresses increased both during the 2019 bull market turnaround and when coming out of the 2020 COVID-19 shock,” Yonsei_dent, of CryptoQuant added.

“I am concerned that this 2023 rally did not show any rise in Active Addresses.”

But, the most recent spike in network activity during a turbulent moment has revived hopes that all is not yet lost.

It needs to be told that Bitcoin‘s value staged an astounding comeback after falling to new two-month lows beneath the $20k mark last week.

Bitcoin Cross $26k In 8 Months

This occurred after a series of crypto-friendly banks went under. However with a combination of bullish factors, which included the launch of a new bank liquidity program.

This helped USDC, a crucial component of the crypto market’s plumbing, recover back to its $1 peg, and analysts’ expectations that the risk of a banking crisis would prevent the Fed from undertaking significant further rate hikes, were other reasons, analysts believe that the market is currently up.

The coin reached the mid-$26,000s, its highest level since last June the mid-$26,000s earlier this week.

At the time of writing, BTC has mildly retraced back from its previous high to trade at $24303.

Bitcoin Inches Towards $25k As Net Inflow Reaches 6-Month High

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Bitcoin’s value has increased by over 20% to hover around $25k in a span of just four days. This comes after its plunge of $19662 in the wake of Silicon Valley Bank’s failure and a declining dollar.

The dominant coin rose over 8% in the last 24 hours to trade at $24340 at press time.

Another noteworthy development was the return of 21,524 BTC to exchanges, the greatest amount since September 13, 2023. This, according to Santiment, indicated that traders are profit-taking while they can.

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Bitcoin Inches Towards $25k As Net Inflow Reaches 6-Month High 8

The U.S. government’s decision to intervene and stop the expanding banking contagion has improved the overall state of the cryptocurrency market significantly from last week.

Except for the top 200 stablecoins, which were sold en masse by traders re-entering the market, the altcoin market is a sea of green.

The rebound also brought other good news as BTC’s market cap of $467 billion came close to Meta’s market cap, of $469 billion.

Earlier TronWeekly reported that BTC had eclipsed Visa and Mastercard, two of the biggest competitors in the payment processing industry.

The king coin had an impressive debut in 2023 with an over 51% rally. In addition, its third “flippening” of Visa followed 14 days of price rises between January 4 and January 17.

Yet, on March 13, more than $100 million in Bitcoin shorts—bets against an increase in price—were settled. Since January 14, when a bitcoin rise led to a $500 million liquidation across numerous crypto futures, this was the largest sum that had been liquidated.

Bitcoin Sees Two-Month High Liquidations

According to information from Coinglass, the widespread liquidations resulted in losses for 78% of all bitcoin futures traders. The main cryptocurrency exchanges that suffered losses were Binance, OKX, Huobi, and Bybit.

When an exchange is compelled to close a trader’s leveraged position as a result of a partial or complete loss of the trader’s initial margin, this is known as liquidation.

It happens when a trader is unable to match the margin requirements for a leveraged position or does not have enough money to keep the transaction open.

The local peak or bottom of a sharp price move can be identified by large-scale liquidations, which may allow traders to adjust their positions.

Bitcoin Falls Over 7% As Biden Brings 30% Tax Proposal

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Bitcoin and the rest of the market prepare for yet another slump as President Joe Biden’s budget proposal would subject cryptocurrency miners to a 30% tax on electricity expenses in a bid to “limit mining activity.”

In accordance with a letter published by the treasury dept., any company using resources, whether they are owned or rented, would be “subject to an excise tax equal to 30% of the costs of power used in digital asset mining.”

The Treasury cited “negative environmental effects,” “increased pricing for individuals using a grid shared with the businesses,” and “uncertainty and hazards to local utilities and communities” as reasons for imposing the tax.

“An excise tax on electricity usage by digital asset miners could reduce mining activity along with its associated environmental impacts and other harms.”

Additionally, it was proposed that the tax would start on January 1 and be phased in over three years at a rate of 10% per year, increasing to the maximum tax rate of 30% by the third year. The tax was also said to take effect after December 31.

The plan sparked a lot of controversy within the crypto community and crypto-friendly political organizations. The Biden administration’s handling of crypto assets, according to Republicans in the U.S. House of Representatives, poses a threat to the budding industry.

Republicans concede that the trillion-dollar market for digital assets is growing in a new document they have sent to the members of the House Committee on Financial Services.

Bitcoin’s Crowd Interest Surge

The congressmen also warned that due to the regulations put forth by the Biden administration during the previous two years, the crypto business in the US is now in danger of being driven abroad.

Recall, when Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse urged US authorities to create a regulatory framework, warning that without one, the country would lose its competitive edge in the crypto industry.

The Republicans continued by urging lawmakers to provide clear regulatory rules for the crypto industry and coordination between enforcement authorities in order to stop this.

While Bitcoin as well rest of the altcoin troupe have been trading in the red, leading data analytics Santiment showed that this price dip comes at a time when the social discussions surrounding Bitcoin have been one-third of the top 100 assets.

High bitcoin discourse, according to the platform, is a fear sign, which historically can turn around markets, TronWeekly reported.

Bitcoin Slides Below $20K Amidst Growing Crowd’s Interest

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“Social Dominance” of Bitcoin has risen to its greatest level since July, as the crypto retreats to a two-month low, falling below $19k.

While BTC as well rest of the altcoin troupe have been trading in the red, leading data analytics Santiment showed that this price dip comes at a time when the social discussions surrounding Bitcoin have been one-third of the top 100 assets.

High Bitcoin discourse, according to the platform, is a fear sign, which historically can turn around markets.

On the other hand, a low amount of BTC discussion signals optimism in altcoins and the market in general.

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Bitcoin Slides Below $20K Amidst Growing Crowd's Interest 10

Recently, a source person familiar with the activities of Mt. Gox’s largest creditor has revealed that the fund has decided to hold the tokens that are scheduled to be returned this October rather than selling them.

As reported by TronWeekly, Mt. Gox Investment Fund, the creditor, in question has also chosen an early payout where it would receive 90% of what is due, with a ratio of approximately 70% BTC and 30% fiat, according to an anonymous source. 

Also, in the early payout option, the trustee need not sell tokens to buy fiat funds since the creditor also chose to be paid in BTC.

This has eased market fears because token sales of that magnitude could potentially have a negative impact on the crypto market, 

Earlier, the trustee for the defunct Japanese bitcoin exchange, Mr. Nobuaki Kobayashi, issued a notice on March 7, informing creditors to register their repayment claims before March 10, 2023.

The deadline has now been extended to April 6.

That being said Bitcoin’s negative on-chain metrics have pushed BTC traders to take a step back, especially after the “voluntary liquidation” of crypto-focused bank Silvergate.

Bitcoin’s Negative Sentiment Has Affected Trading

Data from CoinGecko and CryptoQuant points out that key metrics such as trading and transfer volume as well as active addresses count have taken a hit in the month of March.

However, analyst Guilhem Chaumont, who heads the Paris brokerage firm Flowdesk, believed that BTC’s lackluster trading activity is giving signs of a “calm before the storm,” adding that ” the situation can still go either way.”

At press time, Bitcoin is exchanging hands at $19,925, down by over 8% in the daily index. In the last seven days, over 10% of BTC’s value has been eroded.

Bitcoin Trading Comes To Standstill After Silvergate’s Demise

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For Bitcoin investors, it seems as though things have gone a little haywire after the collapse of FTX, and now the “voluntary liquidation” of crypto-focused bank Silvergate.

Data from CoinGecko showed that key metrics such as trading volume have fallen by $9 billion in the month of March at roughly $25 billion as opposed to $36 billion in February.

In addition to that, transfer volume and the total number of transactions on the Bitcoin blockchain have plummeted by 35% and 17% respectively in the last 24 hours.

At the same time, the number of active addresses has slid by 10%, stats provided by CryptoQuant showed.

But, according to Guilhem Chaumont, CEO of Paris-based market maker and brokerage Flowdesk, the decline does not indicate that investors are running or panicking.

While acknowledging the obvious dip across the ecosystem brought on by Silvergate’s financial difficulties, Chaumont opined that Bitcoin traders are taking a break and deciding what to do next.

He also likened Bitcoin’s lackluster trading activity to the “calm before the storm,” adding that ” the situation can still go either way.”

It certainly has a ‘calm before the storm’ feel to it. So the market is not shaking it off — FTX has made us all very much aware that anything can happen. However, the situation can still go either way — meaning that if news about a reassuring resolution came, the confidence that characterized the first two months of 2023 could return.

Silvergate became one of the first legacy fintech institutions that fell victim to the crypto crash after it announced to write off its assets and close its bank down.

The crypto-focused bank’s issues started after FTX’s collapse and increasing scrutiny from regulators including an ongoing US Department of Justice investigation into its operations.

The incident spurred selloffs as investors rushed to protect their assets.

Bitcoin: FED Chair’s Flip Flop

Bitcoin’s value further declined as Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell proposed raising the rate at the forthcoming FOMC meeting by 50 basis points rather than the previously anticipated 25 basis points.

But, Powell’s stance softened the next day when it emphasized that the central bank has not yet decided on the amount of the rate hike.

Many thought that this might have been an effort to allay the market’s hawkish anxieties, which culminated in Bitcoin falling below the $21k level.

Right after Powell’s “no decision” comments, Bitcoin momentarily recovered to $22,000. At press time, BTC is trading at $21,659, down by nearly 2% in the past 24 hours.

Bitcoin: Buy Or Sell? Mt. Gox Top Creditor Reveals As Deadline Gets Extended

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The largest creditor of the now-bankrupt crypto exchange Mt. Gox prefers to hold Bitcoin instead of selling, Bloomberg reported citing anonymous sources.

Mt. Gox Investment Fund, the creditor, in question, doesn’t plan to sell the tokens that are slated to be returned in September, this year.

It needs to be told that, Nobuaki Kobayashi, who was appointed as the legal trustee for the defunct Japanese bitcoin exchange issued a notice on March 7, informing creditors to register their repayment claims before March 10, 2023 [Japan Time].

But as per the latest publication, the deadline for claim application registration has been extended to April 6, 2023.

Recently, the top creditor chose to have an early payout in Bitcoin rather than wait longer for an even larger payment.

According to Bloomberg, the creditor has reportedly opted for an earlier but lesser compensation by September this year.

The early plan, as per the report, meant that the recipient will get 90% of what was due to them. Here the trustee need not sell tokens to buy fiat funds since the creditor also chose to be paid in BTC.

This will ease market concerns because token sales of that magnitude could potentially have a negative impact on the crypto market, the report added.

The longer option, on the other hand, would take another nine years after all the legal issues are resolved but with comparatively more payout.

Prior to its bankruptcy in 2014 as a result of the theft of 800,000 bitcoins, Mt. Gox was regarded as the world’s biggest cryptocurrency exchange.

Since then, 200,000 BTC have been found; these coins, together with the associated bitcoin cash [BCH] assets, are now being used to pay off Mt Gox’s debtors.

Meanwhile, another event has sparked worries about potential sell-offs.

US Authorities Move Stolen Bitcoins; Another Sell-Off Scare?

Roughly $1 billion worth of bitcoin recovered from dark web hacks by U.S. authorities were transferred to new wallet addresses, including one owned by Coinbase, sparking fears of intensive sell-offs.

According to data from blockchain security firm PeckShield, authorities moved the tokens in three transactions where around 10k bitcoin were sent to Coinbase-controlled wallets, while another $41,000 tokens were shifted to government-owned wallets.

Within hours of the findings, investors expressed their concerns that authorities might dump the recovered bitcoin on the open market, sinking the price further.

The world’s largest crypto is yet to recover from its 21st Feb gains and is currently trading below $22k.

Grayscale’s Bitcoin ETF Lawsuit Gains Major Advantage Over SEC

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In a major development to the Grayscale’s Bitcoin ETF lawsuit, a panel of judges in Washington quizzed the SEC over its decision to reject the latter’s application for its flagship spot investment fund, while approving other products.

The US top regulator rejected Grayscale Investment LLC’s application last June on the grounds of not meeting anti-fraud and investor protection standards.

Judges at the court hearing stated that since both Grayscale’s spot and futures funds depend on the price of bitcoin, the regulator’s earlier approval of specific surveillance agreements to prevent fraud in bitcoin futures-based ETFs should also be acceptable for Grayscale’s spot fund.

One of the judges, Neomi Rao stated,

It seems like it’s fine for an agency to say okay, we need some more information, but it seems there’s quite a bit of information here on how these markets work together, and the SEC has not offered any explanation… that the petitioners here are wrong.

Emily True Parise, senior litigation counsel for the SEC, claimed that there is not enough information available for the agency to establish if the agreements for surveillance may also detect potential fraud and manipulation in the spot markets.

“The evidence is just mixed at this point. It’s bi-directional sometimes,” she said.

On the other hand, Grayscale’s lead counsel Donald Verrilli Jr. argued that a spot bitcoin ETF would “better protect investors” because it would give them the advantage of oversight based on the surveillance arrangements established with the Chicago Mercantile Exchange, where BTC futures are traded.

In Jan, this year, Grayscale’s Chief Legal Officer, Craig Salm accused the SEC of treating spot bitcoin ETFs differently from the futures ETFs, despite both deriving their pricing from the same underlying spot BTC markets. 

Salm went on to say that the “substantial market test” that the SEC used to assess the proposal was deeply flawed, excessive, arbitrary, and unreasonable. 

Proponents Vouch For Spot Bitcoin

It needs to be mentioned that in 2019, Grayscale Investment Fund, filed Form 10 with the SEC to push its ETF product only to be thwarted several times by the agency citing multiple reasons.

Michael Sonnenshein, the CEO of Grayscale, recently stated that he anticipates the court would decide in Grayscale’s favor and that he expected a definitive decision in the case this fall.

Bitcoin futures ETFs follow contracts to buy or sell bitcoin at a specific price on a specific date whereas a spot bitcoin ETF tracks BTC’s underlying market price.

A spot bitcoin ETF, according to supporters, would give investors exposure to BTC without requiring them to buy it.

Bitcoin’s 32% YTD Return Outshines Major Stock Indices & Gold

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Bitcoin’s year-to-date return came at 32.23%, way ahead of some of the biggest stock indices of the world and gold, as of March 6.

As highlighted by MarketWatch, BTC surpassed NASDAQ whose YTD stood at around 12%, followed by the S&P 500 with a 5.8% gain, and the Dow Jones which surged by only 0.12% this year.

Gold, on the other hand, significantly lagged behind Bitcoin with a YTD return of just 1.17%. 

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Bitcoin's 32% YTD Return Outshines Major Stock Indices & Gold 12

However, on the price front, Bitcoin along with the broader crypto market has been in a state of uncertainty over the past few days, as the dominant asset struggled to bounce back after a sudden price dip.

The decline has been attributed to the collapse of Silvergate Bank’s share prices, which has sparked concerns about the sustainability of the bank’s operations.

Recently, leading data analytics platform Santiment highlighted the reason behind the fall in the price.

Following a scintillating rise above $25,000 in mid-February, Bitcoin has been witnessing ups and downs, with prices going as low as $21,000 at one time.

The ongoing market downturn is causing some analysts to speculate that BTC may continue to decline, possibly hitting levels as low as $19,500.

On March 3rd, BTC took a nose dive from $23,435 to $22,259 in just an hour, coinciding with the 60% drop in Silvergate’s share prices.

Experts’ Doomsday Prediction For Bitcoin

The crypto-focused bank reported a loss of $1 billion in the fourth quarter as panicked investors rushed to withdraw deposits in the wake of crypto exchange FTX’s bankruptcy.

Several of its clients such as Coinbase, Circle, Paxos, Crypto.com, Bitstamp, Cboe Digital Markets, Galaxy Digital, and Gemini suspended ACH transfers and other commercial dealings with the bank.

It needs to be mentioned that Federal prosecutors in Washington are currently probing the La Jolla, Calif.-based Silvergate and its dealings with the now-defunct FTX and trading firm Alameda Research.

Experts further warned that BTC could see a sharp drop, possibly hitting $19.5K, if it fails to maintain its position around the $22.3K range.

One report even compared the negative market tailwinds to that of Sword of Damocles to describe how it would affect the asset.

As the largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization, Bitcoin remains susceptible to further decline, particularly if negative news regarding the crypto sector emerges, like a Sword of Damocles hanging over its head.