Autor Cointelegraph By Editorial Staff

Coming every Saturday, Hodler’s Digest will help you track every single important news story that happened this week. The best (and worst) quotes, adoption and regulation highlights, leading coins, predictions and much more — a week on Cointelegraph in one link.Top Stories This WeekStarbucks announces NFT initiative as union-busting controversy continuesNonfungible tokens continue making headlines, with coffee giant Starbucks having recently signaled its intent on joining the NFT party. “Sometime before the end of this calendar year, we are going to be in the NFT business,” said Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz via a Partner Open Forum on Monday. The NFT talk surfaced in tandem with a rising interest in unionization led by workers of the chain’s U.S. stores. One of the folks heading up the union movement, Laila Dalton, was let go from Starbucks shortly after the NFT announcement. Comments from Schultz show he is not in favor of unions.UK government moves forward with regulatory framework on stablecoins for paymentsThe U.K.’s HM Treasury expressed interest in crypto regulation on a number of fronts. Included in the mix was the recognition of the potential for stablecoins as commonplace payment vehicles, with the aim of fitting the asset type into current regulatory guidelines.  “It’s my ambition to make the U.K. a global hub for crypto-asset technology, and the measures we’ve outlined today will help to ensure firms can invest, innovate and scale up in this country,” HM Treasury Chancellor Rishi Sunak noted. Economic Secretary to the Treasury John Glen said: “If crypto technologies are going to be a big part of the future, then we, the U.K., want to be in — and in on the ground floor.”Crypto Twitter unites to raise funds for community member’s cancer treatmentPart of the crypto industry since mid-2021, pseudonymous Twitter user “Yopi” is a cancer fighter. After trying chemotherapy, doctors told Yopi he needed stem cell treatment upon the return of the cancer. The treatment cost for Yopi: $50,000. Yopi posted a tweet explaining the situation, which was met with significant response from the crypto community. He ended up receiving about $74,000 in crypto assets, as of the time of Cointelegraph’s reporting. ProShares files with SEC for Short Bitcoin Strategy ETFTuesday saw a filing for a different type of Bitcoin exchange-traded fund (ETF) from ProShares — one that would allow investors to bet against BTC futures. ProShares has filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) for its Short Bitcoin Strategy ETF. Essentially, shares of the ETF would profit when Bitcoin futures go down in price instead of up. These so-called inverse ETFs, which are designed to perform the opposite of the benchmark in which they track, are relatively common in the futures market. ProShares’ Bitcoin Strategy ETF, based on Bitcoin futures, was listed in October 2021 after the SEC approved the product. The newly filed ProShares Short Bitcoin Strategy ETF has a June listing goal, although a decision from the SEC could see this being delayed. Blockstream and Block Inc to build solar Bitcoin mining facility powered by Tesla technologyA new collaboration between crypto storage company Blockstream and Jack Dorsey’s Block (formerly Square) will see the development of a fully solar-powered, open-source BTC mining facility. According to the announcement, the mining facility will be outfitted with a 3.8 megawatt Tesla solar PV (photovoltaic) array and 12 MWh (megawatt hour) lithium-ion battery Tesla Megapack. With this mining facility, the companies intend to investigate the feasibility of operating a zero-emission energy BTC mine. The collaboration will also see the development of a publicly accessible dashboard, which will display key metrics including the power output, total number of mined BTC, storage performance, expenses and return on investment, to name a few.Winners and LosersAt the end of the week, Bitcoin (BTC) is at $42,388.53, Ether (ETH) at $3,207.75 and XRP at $0.76. The total market cap is at $1.96 trillion, according to CoinMarketCap.Among the biggest 100 cryptocurrencies, the top three altcoin gainers of the week are Mina (MINA) at 17.56%, NEAR Protocol (NEAR) at 16.07% and Convex Finance (CVX) at 10.06%. The top three altcoin losers of the week are Waves (WAVES) at -50.60%, Zilliqa (ZIL) at -37.08% and Axie Infinity (AXS) at -29.43%.For more info on crypto prices, make sure to read Cointelegraph’s market analysis. Most Memorable Quotations“Under the global inflation backdrop, Bitcoin has the chance to become a broadly used currency in international settlement.”Chen Li, CEO and co-founder of Youbi Capital“While it is clear that the energy requirements of global Bitcoin mining have grown significantly since 2017, recent literature indicates a wide range of estimates for 2020 (47 TWh to 125 TWh) due to data gaps and differences in modelling approaches.”The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)“There’s no reason to treat the crypto market differently just because different technology is used.”Gary Gensler, chair of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission“Just imagine where we could be in five years, where virtually everyone in the Western world will have a smartphone wallet on their smartphone and they‘ll likely be able to transact with every restaurant in the world.”Anthony Scaramucci, founder and managing partner of Skybridge Capital“The scarcity and pristine nature of Bitcoin as collateral may well be returning to the foreground once again.”Glassnode“El Salvador is an independent democracy and we respect its right to self-govern, but the United States must have a plan in place to protect our financial systems from the risks of this decision, which appears to be a careless gamble rather than a thoughtful embrace of innovation.”Norma Torres, U.S. representative, on El Salvador making Bitcoin legal tender“If people have an itch to contribute something or to do a side project in this space, I would say, ‘Throw your heart into it,’ because you’re going to get feedback and connections and insights and experiences from it that you just wouldn’t have dreamt of.”MTC, founder of Sats LedgerPrediction of the Week Why the Bitcoin ‘mid-halving’ price slump will play out differently this timeRoughly every four years, Bitcoin’s mining payout per block cuts in half. Called the Bitcoin halving, this event has coincided with four-year price cycles, including bull and bear periods. This four-year cycle could be over, however, according to multiple industry participants. The Santiment blog’s pseudonymous author “Alerzio” noted April 11 as a potential signal of changing times. BTC maintaining price action north of $50,000 per coin before or around that date may be evidence of a cycle that differs from previous four-year periods, Alerzio wrote. April 11 is the midpoint between the most recent BTC halving and the next one.FUD of the Week Aussie crypto ‘finfluencers’ face tough new legal restrictionsThe Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) recently waved a red flag pertaining to influencers involved in finance. ASIC essentially warned influencers, both solo and companies employing influencers, of using language that might be seen as financial promotion. The warning from ASIC mentions finance as opposed to crypto specifically, but crypto is often grouped into the category of finance. “If you present factual information in a way that conveys a recommendation that someone should (or should not) invest in that product or class of products, you could breach the law by providing unlicensed financial product advice,” the ASIC information sheet states. Some comments of opposition regarding the move in part relate to the lack of clarity regarding what counts as financial influence.Shopify facing another lawsuit from crypto holders over Ledger data breachA collection of Ledger hardware wallet users have brought a legal case against Ledger, Shopify and TaskUs. In short, the case alleges that the defendants did not take appropriate steps to prevent the leak of a significant number of Ledger buyers’ personal data in 2020. The complaint alleges that Ledger and Shopify misled customers by advertising the “unmatched security” of their products – promises that are at odds with the current leak. The plaintiffs also claimed that Shopify and TaskUs were aware of the leak for over a week before alerting customers. Shopify was in charge of Ledger’s online store at the time of the leak, and TaskUs is a third-party data consultant responsible for handling customer service, as delegated by Shopify, according to the legal complaint.   The group of Ledger users behind the legal complaint seeks certain damages, as well as disclosure of what data was actually leaked.EU bans providing ‘high-value crypto-asset services’ to RussiaIn an attempt to further suppress Russian nationals from using cryptocurrencies to safeguard assets amid the war in Ukraine, the Council of the European Union announced its intent to prohibit “providing high-value crypto-asset services” to the country.Some of the other restrictive measures proposed by the European Commission this Friday include banning transactions and freezing assets connected to four Russian banks as well as a “prohibition on providing advice on trusts to wealthy Russians.”Just a day before the Council’s announcement, Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin claimed that Russian entities and individuals hold more than $130 billion in crypto assets — an amount that nearly equals Russia’s total gold holdings, which is valued at roughly $140 billion as of March 2022. Best Cointelegraph FeaturesAre CBDCs kryptonite for crypto?“A CBDC is an authoritarian government’s dream and represents a giant step backward for consumer privacy.”What Elon Musk’s investment could mean for Twitter’s crypto plansTesla CEO Elon Musk recently bought a 9.2% stake in Twitter, making him the largest stakeholder in the social media firm.Unhosted is unwelcome: EU’s attack on noncustodial wallets is part of a larger trendRegulators on both sides of the Atlantic seem to be nervous about people transacting with their wallets.

Coming every Saturday, Hodler’s Digest will help you track every single important news story that happened this week. The best (and worst) quotes, adoption and regulation highlights, leading coins, predictions and much more — a week on Cointelegraph in one link.Top Stories This WeekCrypto industry fires back after EU vote to block ‘unhosted’ walletsThe cryptocurrency industry has fired back at the European Parliament, the legislative arm of the European Union, voting in favor of stringent crypto regulations relating to ”unhosted” private wallets. The guidelines would require crypto service providers to verify the identity of every individual using an unhosted wallet that interacts with them, while any transaction greater than 1,000 euros would need to be reported to authorities. “Imagine if the EU required your bank to report you to the authorities every time you paid your rent merely because the transaction was over 1,000 euros,” Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong wrote on Twitter. “Or if you sent money to your cousin to help with groceries, the EU required your bank to collect and verify private information about your cousin before allowing you to send the funds.”Axie Infinity’s Ronin bridge hacked for over $600MAxie Infinity’s Ronin Bridge was the victim of a hefty hack worth around $612 million earlier this week, with 173,600 Ether and 25.5 million USD Coin being stolen from the platform. Ronin developers stated that the attacker used hacked private keys to forge fake withdrawals, draining the funds from the Ronin Bridge in just two transactions. In a statement on Wednesday, the developers stated that they were “working with law enforcement officials, forensic cryptographers and our investors to make sure that all funds are recovered or reimbursed. All of the AXS, RON and SLP [tokens] on Ronin are safe right now.”Terra smash-buys $139M Bitcoin, wallet reaches 31,000 BTCAs part of the Bitcoin buying spree led by Terraform Labs founder Do Kwon, the Terra wallet belonging to Luna Foundation Guard approached $1.5 billion in BTC following another huge $139 million purchase this week. Terra has been snapping up BTC aggressively since late January to build reserves to back its TerraUSD (UST) stablecoin, with Kwon also outlining earlier this month that Terra plans to accumulate a whopping $10 billion worth of BTC. Terraform Labs is on track to overtake Tesla as the second-largest holder of Bitcoin soon, with MicroStrategy also in its sights, according to data from Bitcoin Treasuries. OpenSea set to integrate Solana in April, further expanding the NFT ecosystemTop NFT marketplace OpenSea announced a long-awaited integration with the Solana blockchain on Wednesday. The expanded support, expected to go live in April, adds to OpenSea’s existing support of Ethereum, layer-2 Polygon and Klaytn. It appears the move has been well received, with OpenSea’s 16-second teaser video on Twitter pulling 615,500 views, 8,964 retweets and 21,700 likes within 18 hours of posting. Alluding to the vast number of tweets and media publications commenting on the potential for a Solana launch, OpenSea cheerfully referred to the announcement as the “best-kept secret in Web3.”MetaMask rolls out Apple Pay integration and other iOS updatesConsenSys-owned MetaMask revealed important updates for iPhone and Apple Pay users on Tuesday that enable them to purchase cryptocurrency directly through the app via debit or credit cards, removing the hassle of sending Ether from an outside source to add funds.Notably, the move is said to lower gas fees, and MetaMask is utilizing two payment gateways, Wyre and Transak, to support debit card and credit card purchases. Users are now able to deposit a maximum of $400 daily into their wallets via the new service. “We wanted to expand the way in which users can convert crypto within the app itself and not have to leave it,” James Beck, director of communications and content at ConsenSys, told Cointelegraph.Winners and LosersAt the end of the week, Bitcoin (BTC) is at $45,119, Ether (ETH) at $3,275 and XRP at $0.81 The total market cap is at $2.07 trillion, according to CoinMarketCap.Among the biggest 100 cryptocurrencies, the top three altcoin gainers of the week are STEPN (GMT) at 325.60%, Zilliqa (ZIL) at 303.89% and SKALE Network (SKL) at 82.33%  The top three altcoin losers of the week are Axie Infinity (AXS) at -13.23%, Zcash (ZEC) at -8.16% and Helium (HNT) at -7.54%.For more info on crypto prices, make sure to read Cointelegraph’s market analysis. Most Memorable Quotations“I’m sort of betting that the long-term scenario of Bitcoin going up and the reserves being strong enough to withstand UST demand drops is the more likely scenario.” Do Kwon, founder and CEO of Terraform Labs“New York can issue $2 billion of debt and buy $2 billion worth of Bitcoin — the Bitcoin is yielding 50% or more, the debt costs 2% or less.” Michael Saylor, CEO of MicroStrategy“Dictators aren’t really going to like Bitcoin because they can’t control it.” Alex Gladstein, chief strategy officer at the Human Rights Foundation“Ethereum is like New York City: it is vast, expensive and congested in certain areas. However, it also features the richest application ecosystem, with over 500 apps that command a total value of over $100 billion — more than 10x larger than any other competing network.” Grayscale, digital asset manager“Nothing is growing as fast as cryptocurrency.” Karim Khanjeza, member of parliament of Kyrgyzstan“Web3 takes the concept of democratization to a whole new level, whereby data/information cannot only be made openly shareable but can be made openly unfalsifiable.” Shubham Gupta, Indian Administrative Service officer“I’d put the chance of Bitcoin ever moving to PoS at exactly 0%. There is no appetite among Bitcoiners to destroy the security of the protocol by making such a move.” Chris Bendiksen, Bitcoin researcher at CoinShares“People should have the freedom to choose other money. If the government is going to abuse our cash, we should have the freedom to use other, higher quality cash.” Pierre Poilievre, Canadian Conservative Party candidate for prime ministerPrediction of the Week VanEck says Bitcoin could hit $4.8M if it became the global reserve assetU.S. investment giant VanEck has come up with a lofty prediction concerning Bitcoin — and one that has very little chance of coming to fruition in the foreseeable future. The firm suggested this week that 1 BTC could be worth $4.8 million if it becomes the world’s reserve currency. The extremely optimistic estimation was part of a report by VanEck’s head of active EM debt management, Eric Fine, and chief economist Natalia Gurushina, who outlined a thought experiment comparing the price implications for gold and Bitcoin after being adopted as reserve currencies. VanEck’s analysis found that the implied price for BTC ranged from $1.3 million to $4.8 million. But they ultimately concluded that the Chinese yuan is the most likely currency to become a global reserve asset if the U.S. dollar crumbles moving forward.FUD of the Week Crypto-skeptic gamers review bomb Storybook Brawl after FTX buys itA bunch of angry gamers review-bombed Storybook Brawl on Steam over fears of potential NFT and blockchain integrations, following crypto exchange FTX US acquiring its developer, Good Luck Games. FTX US announced the acquisition on Friday and, at the time of reporting, 600 out of 761 reviews were negative, with most of them commenting about how good the game was until it sold out to a crypto firm. “Good Luck Games was acquired by FTX, a cryptocurrency company, as a way to ‘help crypto make inroads with gamers.’ I want no part of that and I don‘t want crypto ‘making inroads’ in things I‘m interested in. Uninstalled,” wrote Steam user “King Bear,” who has clocked more than 60 hours in the game. With inflation going through the roof, Sudan’s central bank cautions citizens against using cryptoThe Central Bank of Sudan (CBOS) has warned local citizens about dealing with cryptocurrencies over risks such as “financial crimes, electronic piracy and the risk of losing their value.”The warning came amid reports that crypto is gaining traction in Sudan at a time when the African nation is dealing with three-digit inflation following a 2021 military coup. The CBOS also cited legal risks, as cryptocurrencies are not classified as money “or even private money and property” under Sudanese law. The central bank admitted that it has been noticing an uptick in crypto promotions on social media recently.Greenpeace, Ripple co-founder campaigning to change Bitcoin codeGreenpeace has teamed up with Ripple co-founder and executive chairman Chris Larsen to launch a new campaign aimed at changing Bitcoin’s mining practices to an environmentally sustainable model. The campaign is called “Change the Code, Not the Climate,” and Greenpeace in particular cited concerns that the energy required to mine Bitcoin comes mostly from fossil fuels. “If only 30 people — the key miners, exchanges and core developers who build and contribute to Bitcoin’s code — agreed to reinvent proof-of-work mining or move to a low-energy protocol, Bitcoin would stop polluting the planet,” the campaign notes.Bitcoin enthusiasts were less than pleased with the new campaign, with several prominent industry leaders arguing that the Bitcoin network would never abandon proof-of-work.Best Cointelegraph FeaturesCrypto critics: Can FUD ever be useful?“Anyone who says that David Gerard personally stopped their crypto getting into Wikipedia is a fuckwit,” says editor, Wikimedia spokesman and professional crypto hater David Gerard in his typically no-nonsense fashion.The Bitcoin shitcoin machine: Mining BTC with biogasA Bitcoin mining facility in Slovakia converts human and animal waste into Bitcoin hash rate, securing the network while mining Bitcoin.Planet of the Bored Apes: BAYC’s success morphs into ecosystemThe success of the “Bored Ape Yacht Club” collection sparked the creation of an NFT universe powered by its proprietary ApeCoin token.