Regulation of both ordinary financial services of trading and investing in cryptocurrencies will create a false sense of security among depositors, officials say

The U.K. House of Commons Treasury Committee argues that investing in “unsecured” cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin and Ethereum should be equated with gambling. Regulating the industry without such an approach could create an illusion of safety for investors in crypto-assets. That’s according to a committee report released May 17.

The House of Commons Treasury Committee is charged with examining Treasury spending, administration and policy. With all of its agencies and related bodies, including the Internal Revenue Service, Customs, the Bank of England.And the Financial Conduct Authority, the Royal Mint, and other government agencies. And the Financial Conduct Authority, the Royal Mint, and other government agencies.

Late last October, members of the U.K.’s lower house of parliament voted to recognize cryptocurrencies as regulated financial instruments. In their opinion, cryptocurrencies should be considered another type of financial assets, rather than a separate category.

The committee criticized this position in its report, saying that the government should take a different approach to regulating cryptocurrencies. To better protect consumers from losses due to the increased volatility of “unsecured assets,” such as Bitcoin and Ethereum.

Characteristics of cryptocurrency are more reminiscent of gambling than financial services.

Which is also supported by data on their consumer behavior, the report’s authors say. They argue that regulating trading and investing in crypto-assets as regular financial services would lead depositors to believe that the investments are safe, when in fact they are not.

In addition, the committee recommends that the government take a balanced approach to investing in cryptotechnology. And avoid spending public funds to support cryptocurrencies without a clear and profitable application scenario. It is not the government’s job to promote specific innovations for their own sake, the report warns.

Our experts point out that last year, the kingdom’s government set itself the goal of increasing London’s global competitiveness in the financial sector. And that includes the cryptocurrency industry. The U.K. is in the process of developing regulations for crypto-assets. According to the Ministry of Finance, they are aimed at realizing the government’s “ambitions. Which intends to make the country a leader in the cryptocurrency industry.

A blockchain analyst warned about a fake page of the HitBTC platform, on which scammers use phishing links to empty users’ cryptocurrency wallets

Hackers stole more than $15 million in various cryptocurrencies through a fake website. Which mimics the HitBTC cryptocurrency exchange page. This was reported by a blockchain security analyst at SlowMist. According to the company, scammers are stealing various cryptocurrencies, including bitcoin, Ethereum and USDT. They do this through a fake website that looks similar to the original exchange portal.

Analyst identified and published four cryptocurrency addresses of the attackers. He also explained that he discovered three ways in which hackers gain access to users’ wallets on this site.

The fake page may prompt users to verify the wallet’s connection. After a user clicks the Confirm button, hackers gain access to USDT tokens.

The second option was to go to the page for depositing funds, which is identical to the real page on the exchange. But in the field for the deposit address entered data hackers. In this case, they rely on the fact that the information in the standard fields will not be double-checked by the account owner.

In the third case, the scammers take advantage of the fact that the sidebar to sign the transaction on the site pops up automatically. And with the data already completely filled in, which are also usually not double-checked. When the user clicks on the transaction confirmation button, the hackers gain access to the assets.

Our experts point out that in February of this year, hackers spoofed the website of a major cryptocurrency conference. Where they offered users to connect MetaMask wallets and make a transaction that debited funds. To promote their site, the scammers even paid for advertising on Google. And rose to second place in search for a while.

Executives and investors of Coinbase, the second largest cryptocurrency exchange, are accused of selling $2.9 billion worth of shares. Which they did before the publication of negative information, which influenced the collapse of prices. Crypto-Upvotes expert review

The head of Coinbase, the world’s second-largest cryptocurrency exchange, Brian Armstrong. As well as its board member Mark Andriessen and other company officials avoided more than $1 billion in losses while using insider information, according to a lawsuit filed by one of the company’s investors.

He estimated that they sold Coinbase (COIN) stock within days of the cryptocurrency platform’s public offering two years ago. In doing so, knowing of “bad news” that would affect the further collapse of quotations.

The company’s board of directors conducted a so-called direct listing. Instead of a typical initial public offering and quickly sold off $2.9 billion worth of stock before Coinbase management disclosed “significant negative information. Which negated the market’s optimism after the company’s first quarterly earnings report. said in a complaint filed in Delaware state court.

“In five weeks, the value of these shares fell by more than $1 billion. And Coinbase’s market capitalization fell by more than $37 billion,” claims Adam Grabski, speaking on behalf of investors. He says he has held Coinbase stock since April 2021.

Armstrong sold $291.8 million worth of Coinbase stock in a direct listing. Says the complaint, and Andrissen’s venture capital firm, Andreessen Horowitz, sold $118.6 million worth of stock.

“As the most popular and only publicly traded cryptocurrency exchange in the U.S. We are sometimes the subject of bizarre litigation,” Coinbase representatives wrote in a commentary for Bloomberg.

The lawsuit lists the main beneficiaries of the stock sale. Among them are Andreessen Horowitz Group (sold $118.6 million worth of stock) and CEO Brian Armstrong (sold for $291.9 million). As well as COO Emily Choi (sold for $223.9 million), co-founder and board member Fred Ehrsam (sold for $219.4 million) and others.

Union Square Ventures, an investment firm owned by Fred Ehrsam, sold $1.8 billion worth of stock. According to the lawsuit, the company led the Series A funding round for Coinbase. In doing so, it invested $5 million at 20 cents a share, valuing the company at about $20 million. The stock sale was “the largest exit in the firm’s history,” Grabski claims.

Huobi Korea intends to sever ties with its parent exchange Huobi and continue to operate as a local company in South Korea

The South Korean division of cryptocurrency exchange Huobi will separate from the global platform, according to News1. The Huobi Korea platform intends to sever these ties and continue operating as a local company in South Korea.

Huobi, founded in 2013, is registered in the Seychelles and has offices in Hong Kong, the United States, Japan and South Korea. The platform recently announced plans to move its headquarters to the Caribbean. Huobi remains one of the largest crypto exchanges by trading volume. According to CoinMarketCap, the daily figure on the platform exceeds $373 million.

On Jan. 9, Huobi Korea began preparations for a stock buyback. More than half of Huobi Korea is owned by Leon Lin, founder of Huobi Global (which was renamed Huobi in November 2022). Major shareholders also include Huobi Korea chairman Cho Kuk Bong and Korea Land Trust. Cho will acquire a controlling stake from Lin, increasing his stake to 72 %.

Separation of companies takes place because of the conflict between Huobi Korea and Huobi. The Korean platform has suffered from the image of a foreign platform. And especially from associations with the “Chinese exchange.” The Huobi Global platform was founded and was based in China until 2017.

Huobi Exchange has been experiencing difficulties over the past few weeks. Amid news of the layoff of 20% of staff and a reduction in reward, its users began to withdraw assets from the platform in droves. They fear even the minimal risk of crypto exchange insolvency.

Our experts noticed that the CEO of CryptoQuant analytics platform Ki Jung Ju pointed out. That over the past year, Bitcoin reserves at Huobi have fallen by 90%. According to him, the platform has the dirtiest reserves compared to, for example, Binance.

Founder of Telegram announced plans to launch a decentralized platform for trading digital currencies. Our experts told us how successful this project could be. And whether its development will be hindered by regulators

The next step in development of Telegram is the creation of decentralized tools. Including cryptocurrencies, as well as decentralized cryptocurrency exchanges, Pavel Durov said on November 30.

“This is how we can correct the mistakes caused by excessive centralization, which has failed hundreds of thousands of cryptocurrency users,” wrote the head of Telegram.

He explained that the blockchain industry was built on the principle of decentralization. But it turned out to be concentrated in the hands of a limited circle of individuals abusing their power.

“As a result, many people lost their money when one of major crypto exchanges FTX went bankrupt,” Durov recalled.

He said the solution to the problem is for blockchain projects to return to decentralization. And users should switch to transactions and wallets that do not depend on any third party.

The founder of Telegram said that he and four other people launched a decentralized domain name auction platform Fragment in five weeks. It is based on the blockchain platform TON, which Durov called fast and efficient enough to host popular apps. At the same time, Durov criticized Ethereum, calling it outdated and expensive, even after the latest global network upgrade.

“Fragment is amazingly successful. In less than a month the platform has sold $50 million worth of user names. This week Fragment will go beyond user names,” Durov said.

How will regulators treat Telegram cryptoexchange?

In terms of resources and the existing experience of Telegram team in developing TON project. Creation of such a project as a decentralized exchange and cryptocurrency wallets seems realistic, our experts believe. However, the current global trend in regulation of cryptoassets turnover is tightening and streamlining of control requirements.

Since details of this project and specifics of functioning of announced project are not disclosed. At the moment, it is difficult for our experts to assess how it will meet the requirements of the legislation of different countries.

What are the future prospects for this Telegram project?

Decentralized crypto exchanges are difficult to regulate because they are essentially not companies. Therefore, it is legally possible to prohibit such exchanges, but it is more difficult to limit their activities. Our expert stressed that liability in case of using such exchanges from the legal point of view does not apply to their creators. It extends more to ordinary users in each specific transaction.

Our experts admit the possibility that the launch of this site may be timed to the lifting of SEC ban. Which is imposed on Durov until July 2023 because of the attempted launch of the TON platform with the participation of investors from USA.

Most likely, the new DEX exchange will not be connected to Telegram in any way. Except for simplified authorization and a number of mechanics. Otherwise, they are definitely two different products.

What risks will ordinary users face when using a new DEX exchange from Telegram?

Most likely, DEX exchange will be created on TON blockchain. The main advantage of a decentralized platform is that it does not store users’ cryptocurrency. The exchange only brings together buyers and sellers of digital financial assets, without intermediaries. And users do not need to open an exchange account for such transactions – transactions are made from investors’ wallets.

That is, there is no risk of losing their funds if the exchange decides to block them. As, for example, happens now with the centralized exchanges, which go bankrupt.

The only risk of participation in transactions on the decentralized exchange is the risk of losses due to delays in price updates. And you will need to pay a commission for transactions on that DEX exchange.

Crypto-Upvotes experts explained reason of the last fall of BTC price. And told how it can change in coming days

Last week from November 21 to 27, BTC updated its yearly low. High volatility on crypto market was observed at the beginning of this week. Bitcoin sales intensified on news of the possible bankruptcy of Genesis. Which had $175 million hanging in the collapsed FXT exchange. The BTC/USDt pair was down to $15,400.

BTC price did not go lower. The sales were stopped by a representative of Genesis. He said that company continues to negotiate with creditors and does not plan to declare bankruptcy in the near future. The Wall Street Journal reported that billionaire Justin Sun is considering options for the acquisition of certain FTX assets. This news backdrop formed a nice session bullish trend on the intraday charts. Also, the cryptocurrency market received support from the weakening U.S. dollar in forex. As well as the growth of stock indices in the U.S. before the release of the minutes of the U.S. Federal Reserve meeting on November 1-2. Bitcoin rose 8.6% to $16,800 in 53 hours.

Buyer activity was halted by news that Genesis had hired a restructuring consultant to explore all options, including bankruptcy.

On Thursday low activity on all world exchanges can be explained by day off in the USA. Markets in the States did not work because of the national Thanksgiving holiday. On Friday, trading was at the level of $16.5 thousand.

As long as there is no negative news, Bitcoin is trying to climb out of the hole Sam Bankman-Fried sent it into. Fear of a possible collapse is keeping investors from active action. Buyers need to pass $17.15k and $18.5k for the FTX exchange collapse to recede into the background.

No factors for BTC growth

After shocks associated with the collapse of FTX, the crypto market is frozen, waiting for new factors for movement. Most likely, there will be no strong changes. Bitcoin now trades at $16.2k, the same dynamics is expected in the next (range $16-16.5k). In the absence of negative news, of course, because there is no positive news to expect.

Level of $18.5k is the key resistance level. Its overcoming will open the way for buyers to $22.5k. Also it will allow many miners to accumulate BTC and not to sell at low prices. Sellers are still set to bring the market down to the $10-12k zone.

The most important event this week is the report on the US labor market in November. As the cryptocurrency market has decoupled from the S&P500. Then it can ignore the price swings of the dollar and the S&P500 after the report is published. If Bitcoin reacts to U.S. statistics. Then again we can look at correlation and stronger correlation with other risky assets.

There will likely be more reports of problems in the crypto industry this week. Even if not as significant and large as with FTX. For example, it is now known that the ecosystem of decentralized finance and stable dUSD coin Ardana. Which is based on the blockchain Cardano, has announced the suspension of project development. Because there is now uncertainty about the funding and timing of this project.

The next negative report is that cryptocurrency lender Matrixport is looking for $100 million in funding. Lead investors have already committed $50 million to the company, but the deal has not yet been finalized. As Matrixport needs to find those who will close the other half of volume.

Conclusion

There are no factors for growth of digital financial assets. Main thing is that there are no new ” Black Swans ” – poorly predictable negative events. In this case, Bitcoin will remain at the level of about $16.5k. However, if there are new reports about difficulties on cryptocurrencies, it can fall to $14-15k.

Crypto exchange Huobi said it plans to increase investment in Southeast Asia, Europe and other regions to expand its user base

Cryptocurrency exchange Huobi Global announced launching an updated branding strategy. This strategy includes changing the name to Huobi (without Global) and strengthening global development. These changes are related to the acquisition of the exchange by About Capital Buyout Fund in October 2022.

This new name consists of two Chinese characters, “火” and “必. First represents the eternal life force and its transmission to future generations in Chinese culture. The second symbol means determination to win, reflecting our desire to return to the top 3 exchanges of crypto industry.

Huobi also plans to increase investment in Southeast Asia, Europe and other regions. Which could potentially expand the platform’s user base. In addition, Huobi reported on possible strategic mergers and acquisitions. As well as plans to attract world-class talent in blockchain and virtual assets.

Huobi said it intends to establish a presence in the Caribbean region as part of its global development. It is a region with a regulatory stance favorable to crypto platforms, common law systems and the use of English.

In early November, the Chinese crypto exchange already announced that it would be moving its headquarters to the Caribbean. The Dominican Republic was the main candidate to locate this office.

Our experts note, while on CEX exchanges there is an outflow of liquidity. Other exchanges are trying to take higher places at the expense of this crisis.

Our Crypto-Upvotes experts have analyzed situation on cryptocurrency market. And told how Bitcoin price can change in the next few days

Last week, from November 14 to 20, trading on the crypto market was relatively quiet. Increased volatility was observed on the first day of the week. Bitcoin/USDt jumped from $15.8 th. to $17.1 th. (+8.69%). Growth in quotations was caused by the head of Binance, Changpeng Zhao. He said he will launch a fund to rebuild the industry and help promising companies. He did so to reduce the negative impact from collapse of crypto exchange FTX.

After updating the weekly high price stabilized in the range of $16 thousand – $17 thousand Investors are in no hurry to buy Bitcoin because they took a wait-and-see attitude. Because of fears of the next wave of sales on the background of new bankruptcies of companies related to the collapsed exchange FTX.

For ten days, market is in the phase of rest after a recent collapse. Bitcoin’s correlation with the S&P500 Index has turned negative at 0.62. Crypto market has stopped reacting to the dynamics of dollar and stock indices. Investors are busy transferring tokens from centralized exchanges to cold wallets. They are doing this to protect their cryptocurrency.

Bitcoin price is at $16,000 waiting for a new batch of news about crypto industry. As buyers have failed to quickly get the price back above $18,500. A level of $12k is still flashing green for sellers below, signaling a lack of resistance. Because of a collapse in FTX, events could begin to unfold in a worst case scenario for Bitcoin and crypto investors. Buyers need to consolidate above $18.5k. Without consolidation, bearish sentiment will not be offset.

There is a threat of new bankruptcies, and continued collapse of crypto market

So far, the ratio of long and short positions on futures market does not have any bias. Therefore, we do not expect a sharp change in the situation in the next few days.

On-chain parameters also speak in favor of absence of preconditions for fall. There is also growing interest in cold wallets, amid outflow of capital from CEX exchanges because of scandal with FTX.

Most likely scenario is a continuation of current levels. Accordingly, expected range of BTC price is about $16-17 thousand.

Among stability risks, there is a threat of new bankruptcies followed by an avalanche of liquidations. There are no guarantees that it will not happen this week. But the probability is not high either. And statements of major players about creation of crypto-business support funds to prevent exactly such chain reactions in the market. Should add optimism and confidence in protection of crypto industry from collapse.

Of important – it is worth to highlight protocol of November meeting of the US Federal Reserve, which will be published on November 23. Bitcoin is detached from risky assets, so it may ignore investors’ reaction to the publication of these protocols.

Daily futures trading volume on DeFi platforms reached $5 billion. This is the biggest amount since Terra collapsed in May of this year. Crypto-Upvotes expert review.

DeFi platforms increased revenues amid the outflow of funds from centralized exchanges that occurred due to the collapse of FTX. On-chain data showed an increase in activity on decentralized futures trading platforms and an increase in revenue for DeFi protocols, Cointelegraph reported.

However, not all decentralized applications (DApps) and protocols show such a trend. Because some of them have financial ties to FTX and Alameda. But data on DeFi projects’ revenues show that at least three protocols have exceeded $1 million in the last seven days, including Ethereum and OpenSea Marketplace.

Decentralized futures trading platforms have increased their trading volumes to record levels. Their daily turnover reached $5 billion, the highest since the Terra token crash in May of this year.

Despite the increase in trading volume, the total value of locked-in assets (TVL) at DeFi only increased at seven networks. Gains Network, a futures trading platform on the Polygon network, showed the biggest increase. Its TVL increased 17.3% over the week. And inter-network protocol Ren saw its TVL drop by 50%. This is because Ren worked closely with Alameda. And received quarterly funding and stored its funds directly on FTX.

Blockchain’s profit growth comes on top of an unchanged number of daily active users. Compared to previous weeks, the daily profits of leading blockchains have increased by more than 300%. This suggests that transactions among existing users are occurring more frequently.

Despite growth in profits, only Ethereum made profits among PoS-based blockchains. Other leading networks such as Polygon, BNB Smart Chain and Optimism did not profit. Holders of these tokens suffered inflationary losses.

Our experts told us what consequences may arise due to reduced liquidity on CEX exchanges. And how it will affect cryptocurrency prices

FTX exchange collapse caused a significant outflow of funds from centralized platforms. According to analytical platform CryptoQuant, after November 6, when it became known about problems FTX. CEX exchanges users withdrew 200 thousand BTC ($3.35 billion). As well as about 2 million Ethereum ($2.4 billion) and nearly $3 billion in Stablecoin.

For example, from Binance, users withdrew 81.7 thousand bitcoins ($1.35 billion) in just six days, or more than 15% of the total amount of bitcoins on this exchange. However, the head of Binance, Changpeng Zhao, called the surge in withdrawals small and explained that this is normal during a fall in cryptocurrency market.

Where do cryptocurrency owners transfer their funds?

Ordinary investors experience panic when there are some problems on centralized exchanges and market in general. And has a great desire to hide his funds to feel more relaxed. According to him, users primarily withdraw assets to decentralized wallets.

Means in these purses can not only store, but also exchange on the decentralized exchanges (DEX). After FTX started having problems, the number of such transactions increased dramatically.

In the last 24 hours alone, trading volume on DEX exchanges has increased by 38.66%, according to data from the CoinMarketCar platform.

Currently, the leading DEX platforms are Uniswap (v3), Curve (Ethereum), and PancakeSwap (v2). According to our analysts, daily trading volume on the first of them is more than $908 million, on the second and third – $170 million and $150 million, respectively.

In addition to decentralized storage, cryptocurrency owners began to take an active interest in hardware wallets. In the past week, revenue from the sales of Trezor devices grew by 300%. And competing company Ledger also recorded a significant surge in demand for its devices.

Reduced liquidity in CEX exchanges and the whole cryptocurrency market in general, what can it lead to?

Crypto market is now driven by investors’ fear of losing their investments. Reduced liquidity of crypto market and general pessimism mean a further decline in value of cryptocurrencies.

This process has a negative impact on the crypto market, it “slows” it down. This means it is not worth waiting for the recovery yet. Growth of crypto market can be forgotten for a while, now the main thing is not to fall even deeper.

However, our experts believe that cryptocurrencies are unlikely to hold out. The crypto market has not yet realized the scale of the disaster. Lack of liquidity leads to a decrease in trading volume. And hence, the profitability of trading platforms deteriorates greatly.

Large scale capital outflows can lead to a domino effect. One company is followed by collapse of other companies that are connected by common transactions. Some cryptoprojects have already reported financial difficulties caused by the collapse of FTX.

For example, crypto exchange AAX suspended withdrawals and said it lacked liquidity to continue operations. And cryptocurrency lender BlockFi is preparing a bankruptcy filing.

The next two weeks will show how serious the situation in cryptocurrency market is. According to our analyst, new bankruptcy filings will mean a massive collapse of the whole crypto industry.

Participants of trading on CEX exchanges may find it difficult to sell some coins quickly

This could happen because the outflow of assets from such exchanges reduces the volume of liquidity on them. Most likely, popular coins like Bitcoin, Ethereum and Stablecoin will not be affected. But some altcoins traded in tandem with Bitcoin or ether may suffer, according to our expert. Their liquidity will be low. This means traders will prefer not to deal with such liquidity. And prices for these altcoins will go down, largely due to the lack of active trading on exchanges.

“It’s a market, it’s all interconnected. The churn is mostly in Bitcoin and Stabelcoin, and all other pairs are losing liquidity,” explains our expert.

Traders can now pay attention to native coins DEX-exchanges. In addition, our expert noted that DEX crypto wallet tokens may also show growth in price.