Fuel claims to be the fastest and cheapest Ethereum rollup.
Fuel, a layer-2 network built on Ethereum, has announced that airdrop claims for its native token will open on Dec. 19, with ten percent of the total supply being allocated to more than 200,000 eligible wallets.
The window for airdrop claims will run for one month. 28% of the airdrop allocation will go to phase-1 pre-depositors, 20% to those who used the Fuel bridge, and 12.5% to “NFT connoisseurs.”
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Fuel claims to be the fastest and least expensive rollup on Ethereum. It boasts a transaction processing speed of up to 600 TPS at around $0.0002 per transaction. Fuel achieves this via parallelization, state minimization and interoperability. For comparison, Arbitrum, the largest layer-2 by TVL, has averaged 27.6 TPS over the past 24 hours, while Base is averaging around 90 TPS, according to L2BEAT data.
The token will have a maximum supply of 10 billion and users on the network can still earn “points” for Fuel phase 2, which can eventually be converted to the FUEL token.
Fuel’s block explorer shows that it has processed 154,000 transactions over the past 24 hours and has 63 active decentralized applications (dapps).
The investment round was led by Haun Ventures and included contributions from Coinbase Ventures and Tiger Global.
Stablecoin infrastructure platform BVNK has raised $50 million in Series B funding as it seeks to expand its U.S. operations.
Formed in late 2021, BVNK raised $40 million in Series A funding the following May and won registration in Spain a few months later.
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For the past year, the London-based company has been expanding in the U.S., opening an office in San Francisco, building a team and applying for operational licenses.
BVNK has applied for licenses in all U.S. states, securing approval in several, including Alabama, Arizona, Delaware, Florida, Michigan and New Hampshire, the company told CoinDesk in an e-mail.
The latest investment round was led by Haun Ventures and included contributions from Coinbase Ventures and Tiger Global, BVNK said on Tuesday.
The company aims to help businesses incorporate stablecoin payments into their processes, such as paying contractors worldwide, instant settlement with merchants and sending payouts without delays and exchange-rate risks.
OFAC says a front company in the UAE had been converting crypto into cash for North Korea.
The U.S. Treasury Department on Tuesday said it had shut down a North Korean money laundering network that used crypto to clean millions of dollars for the hermit kingdom, a global leader in crypto crime.
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A front company in the UAE called Green Alpine Trading, LLC, had been converting crypto into cash for North Korea, according to a press release by the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC). The U.S. government’s sanctions wing stuck that company on its blacklist as well as two Chinese nationals who had been participating in the network since 2022.
The United Arab Emirates partnered in the takedown, according to the press release. It is not clear what’s become of the two now-sanctioned Chinese nationals, Lu Huaying and Zhang Jian. They worked in cahoots with DPRK “agent” Sim Hyon Sop, the press release said.
North Korea is among the most aggressive state actors to target the crypto industry. Its agents have allegedly stolen billions of dollars worth of crypto to fund the country’s nuclear weapons program. But making digital cash useful, requires its conversion into fiat.
Green Alpine may have played a small part in that web. The Treasury press release didn’t say what money it laundered, beyond that it was from “illicit revenue generation schemes.”
Read more: How North Korea Infiltrated the Crypto Industry
BTC takes a breather after an indecisive Tuesday, as the Fed is expected to cut rates Wednesday while signaling slower easing next year.
Bitcoin (BTC) is taking a breather, experiencing selling pressure after Tuesday’s indecisive price action marked by a Doji candle. This seems to be a classic case of traders de-risking in anticipation of an expected hawkish Fed rate cut later Wednesday.
The leading cryptocurrency by market value traded around $103,750, marking a 2% drop for the day, according to TradingView and CoinDesk data. Prices had surged to a record high of over $108,000 on Tuesday but failed to maintain those gains, ending the UTC day flat. That formed a ‘doji,’ a candlestick pattern that signifies indecision and potential bullish exhaustion when seen at record highs.
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As expected, bitcoin’s decline has resulted in even larger losses for alternative cryptocurrencies, but some majors, such as XRP, SOL, and ETH, are experiencing losses comparable to BTC.
The Fed will announce the rate decision, the interest rate dot plot, projections, and economic forecasts at 14:00 ET. Fed Chair Jerome Powell’s press conference will be held a half hour later.
The consensus is that the Fed will cut rates by 25 basis points to the 4.25% to 4.5% range, marking a total easing of 100 basis points since September. But, the dot plot is expected to show fewer rate cuts for next year.
“The risk of slightly stronger near-term growth with the threat of higher inflation – tariffs putting up prices of goods and immigration controls potentially lifting wages and costs in the likes of agriculture, construction and hospitality sectors – means that we expect them to signal only three rate cuts in 2025. Previously, they had suggested four,” analysts at ING said in a note to clients.
“We look for 25bp of cuts per quarter in 2025 with a terminal rate of around 3.75% in the third quarter,” analysts added, noting the possibility of the Fed revising their projections for economic growth and inflation.
These so-called hawkish expectations are likely fueling the de-risking in the crypto market that is looking for reasons to correct, having seen prices for BTC soar from $70,000 to over $100,000 in less than two months.
It’s important to note that fewer rate cuts do not necessarily mean tightening; easing is still on the table. This suggests that the path of least resistance for risk assets remains tilted toward the upside.
Leading marketplaces such as OpenSea, Blur and Magic Eden have seen increased activity since November, the report said.
The non-fungible token (NFT) market is showing signs of recovery, Galaxy Research said in a report Monday.
NFTs are digital assets on a blockchain that represent ownership of virtual or physical items and can be sold or traded.
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NFT volumes had been declining for most of the year, but began to reverse in November following the U.S. elections and the ensuing crypto market rally.
Weekly NFT trading volumes exceeded $100 million in early November for the first time since May, reaching $172 million on Dec. 2, Galaxy said.
“This resurgence has been primarily driven by increased activity among the top 25 collections by market cap,” analyst Gabe Parker wrote, with increased participation across leading marketplaces such as OpenSea, Blur and Magic Eden.
Blur and OpenSea were responsible for 60% and 27% respectively of the total volume over the last 30 days, the report noted.
NFTs linked to the Pudgy Penguins ecosystem have outperformed. Pudgy Penguins and Lil Pudgys collections saw their floor prices rise 206% and 265% respectively, the report added.
Countries like the Netherlands are preparing for MiCA implementation.
ZBD, a payment platform powered by the Bitcoin Lightning network, said the Dutch Authority for the Financial Markets (AFM) approved its application for a European Union MiCA license.
When MiCA takes effect and the license is granted on Dec. 30, ZBD will be able to offer a wide range of crypto custody and crypto exchange services throughout the trading bloc, the company, formerly known as Zebedee, told CoinDesk on Wednesday.
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The company first submitted the application in April. The list of applicants receiving a license will be visible on the AFM’s website once MiCA kicks in, the regulator said.
Countries like the Netherlands are among the nations in the EU that have been getting companies ready for MiCA to take full force. Many others have yet to pass the required legislation for MiCA to take effect in their jurisdictions.
One trader lost $102,000 after getting swept up in the short-lived pump and dump.
Cryptocurrency exchange Binance posted a list of “alpha watchlist tokens” to one of its Telegram channels on Wednesday, causing a spike in the mentioned tokens, however it then clarified that the information was “false” which led to the tokens giving up their newfound gains.
The post read: “Ready to explore early stage crypto projects?” before naming Wise Monkey (MONKY), Happy Cat (HAPPY), Rifampicin (RIF), Zircuit (ZRC) and ai16zeliza (ELIZA) as five projects with “strong fundamentals” and “active communities.”
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Several traders speculated over whether the Telegram group was fake and trying to lure people into a rug pull, but it turns out that it was posted by binance_web3_wallet_community, which is an official Binance channel.
MONKY rose by 38% after the post before dropping by 22% when it was deleted. One trader lost $102,000 in 12 minutes after buying 1.42M ELIZA at $0.1376 before panic selling at $0.09567 whilst the rest of the position was liquidated at $0.01157 when the false news was confirmed.
Binance did not immediately respond to CoinDesk’s request for comment.
Delisting a token from major exchanges is often perceived as a lack of confidence in its viability or future, triggering negative market sentiment around the affected token.
A Binance delisting decision sent prices of defunct crypto exchange WazirX’s WRX tokens down 60% in an hour, even as the exchange hopes for a “fresh start” of its platform.
Binance said Wednesday that it was delisting WazirX’s WRX, along with Kaon (AKRO) and Bluzelle (BLZ), as part of a regular review of tokens that no longer meet its offering standards.
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Delisting a token from major exchanges is often perceived as a lack of confidence in the token’s viability or future, triggering a negative market sentiment around the affected token. Prices of AKRO and BLZ fell as much as 40% after the announcement, but WRX was the hardest hit.
WRX token exchange hands at 10 cents as of Wednesday, down 98% from a 2021 peak above $5.
(CoinGecko)
The delisting is another blow for the once-darling Indian exchange WazirX. It was the biggest exchange in India by volumes and popularity before a $230 million hack in July, accounting for over 45% of the total user assets reserves cited by the exchange in a June report. The exchange has since filed for a restructuring process in Singapore to clear its liabilities.
The hacker laundered all the stolen funds to various addresses using Tornado Cash to obscure the transactions, as CoinDesk reported in September, further dampening hopes of a full recovery.
WazirX, still reeling from the financial and reputational damage, has worked to recover the funds with limited success. It has faced criticism for its handling of the crisis, especially concerning user communication and fund recovery processes.
The exchange is making various efforts to restart operations. The company said in a Wednesday post it plans to restart the business and launch a decentralized exchange, intending to keep the brand alive.
“We are gearing up for a fresh start with enhanced services and a recovery-driven approach for Scheme Creditors,” the company said on X. “Following Scheme approval (subject to legal and regulatory requirements), we plan to reopen the WazirX platform and launch a decentralized exchange (DEX) with innovative features to enhance user experience and provide a more robust platform.
That came a day after WazirX floated the concept of recovery tokens (RTs), which are proposed as a mechanism to compensate users for losses the hack.
These tokens will be airdropped to creditors based on their platform balances, offering recovery through future platform profits, potential buybacks, and trading on open markets, per a post.
Banks that use Temenos core software can now easily create crypto wallets and have exposure to any type of digital assets they want
Swiss cryptocurrency custody specialist Taurus is collaborating with Temenos, a firm that provides core banking software to many of the world’s largest financial institutions, allowing those banks to quickly and easily create crypto wallets and transfer a wide range of digital assets.
This collaboration is important as the Geneva-headquartered Temenos is quite big: the firm has 67 offices in 40 countries and serves over 3000 banks and financial institutions. Taurus, whose crypto custody clients include the likes of Deutsche Bank and State Street, says it is the first digital asset custody platform to fully integrate with Temenos.
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The integration means banks using Temenos can avail themselves of one-click crypto wallets that seamlessly connect with traditional accounts, as well as automated deposit, transfer, and withdrawals, and real-time booking, reconciliation and regulatory reporting for digital assets, according to a press release.
“It means banks using Temenos can have exposure to any type of digital assets they want,” Taurus co-founder Lamine Brahimi told CoinDesk in an interview. “That could be cryptocurrencies, tokenized securities, stablecoins, even memecoins if they wish and their risk department is open to it.”
It’s good timing, Brahimi said, given the imminent arrival of a pro-crypto administration in the U.S., as well as Europe going live with the markets in crypto assets regulation (MiCA).
“Everybody is preparing for regulatory clarity in the U.S.,” Brahimi said. “America is a big market for Temenos and they have a lot of their C suite there. So, we are making ourselves ready, not just in the U.S., but everywhere; hopefully to start in Q1 of next year.”
The platform has brought over $4 billion of traditional assets on-chain, ranging from renewable energy projects to mineral rights and private credit.
Plume, a blockchain network focused on real-world assets, raked in $20 million in fresh funds in a Series A fundraising round, the platform told CoinDesk on Wednesday.
Investors participating in the round included Brevan Howard Digital, Haun Ventures, Galaxy Ventures, Lightspeed Faction, Superscrypt, Hashkey, Nomura’s crypto arm Laser Digital, A Capital, 280 Capital, SV Angel, Reciprocal Ventures and others. The fresh investment round followed a $10 million seed fundraising in May led by Haun.
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With the investment, the team plans to speed up the development of its own layer 1 blockchain. Plume’s mainnet launch is slated for early next year, the press release said.
Plume aims to streamline bringing and investing in traditional financial instruments, or tokenized real-world assets (RWA), on blockchain rails with its tokenization engine, and is also developing an Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM)-compatible blockchain where users can trade assets. RWAs are a rapidly growing class of digital assets, with analysts forecasting to mushroom into a market worth several trillions of dollars over this decade as crypto firms and big financial institutions place assets like bonds, commodities and real estate on blockchains.
Plume said it has onboarded over $4 billion worth of assets to its ecosystem including private credit funds, renewable energy financing and mineral rights. The platform also brought niche products on-chain that often are not widely available to average investors such as graphics processing units (GPU) and carbon credits, noted Will Nuelle, general partner of Galaxy Ventures, one of Plume’s investors.
“RWAs have always had tremendous demand, but historically the infrastructure to bring these assets on-chain just hasn’t existed,” said Chris Yin, co-founder and CEO of Plume. “Through our technology and ecosystem, we plug them directly into our community, ecosystem, and liquidity and all in an open, permissionless and composable way.”
