<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-topline">TOPLINE</h2>



Set to occur on Saturday is the highly anticipated bitcoin halving event, a somewhat mysterious phenomenon that occurs every four years, which should theoretically provide a major tailwind to bitcoin prices flatlining in recent weeks.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-key-facts">KEY FACTS</h2>



The halving event refers to the 50% reduction in the new bitcoins available daily to digital miners who unlock tokens on the blockchain via a complex, energy-intensive process.&#8221;



Halving previously occurred in 2012, 2016 and 2020, and is programmed directly into the bitcoin ecosystem to occur every four years, with the fourth instance widely expected to come Saturday, or within a few days, cutting the amount of bitcoins available for mining each day from 900 to 450.



Between 19 million and 20 million bitcoins now exist, with only&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/digital-assets/article/the-21-million-question---is-bitcoin-supply-really-capped/?sh=16f31a4a7984">21 million</a>&nbsp;tokens ever programmed to exist, and halvings are designed to keep the supply of bitcoin limited, and maintaining the decentralized currency’s storage of value.



By lowering the supply, some expect the 2024 halving will drive demand for bitcoin, and therefore its price, which happened in the immediate aftermath of the three other events.



Bitcoin&nbsp;<a href="https://www.coindesk.com/learn/bitcoin-halving-explained/" rel="noreferrer noopener" target="_blank">rose</a>&nbsp;8,069% in the 12 months after the 2012 halving, 284% following the 2016 halving and 559% after the 2020 halving.“It’s pretty much Economics 101” that bitcoin prices go up after halving, according to Sevens Report analyst Tom Essaye, who explained that so long as demand doesn’t decrease and new supply goes down, the “only thing left to move is price.”



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-contra">CONTRA</h2>



It’s far from a given that bitcoin demand will stay steady or increase, and three halving data points hardly make enough of a trend to definitively declare how bitcoin prices will behave during this halving cycle. It’s often hard to sift through the opinions of bitcoin revilers and zealots, but the former will tell you that bitcoin is already overvalued considering its limited use cases. But bitcoin’s ludicrous market-beating returns in recent years are hard for even the biggest pessimist to dismiss: The $61,000 per token bitcoin fetched Wednesday is roughly seven times its price at the 2020 halving, 90 times its 2016 level and 4,000 times its 2012 level.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-so-why-are-bitcoin-prices-down">SO WHY ARE BITCOIN PRICES DOWN?</h2>



Bitcoin is about 17% below its all-time high of $73,768 set last month, with Saturday’s flash&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/tylerroush/2024/04/13/bitcoin-plummets-after-iran-launches-attack-on-israel/?sh=14a5c6681f70">10% crash</a>&nbsp;as Iran launched a drone attack on Israel exemplifying the fragile nature of the rally. Bernstein analyst Gautam Chhugani explained to clients Wednesday that it’s actually “new demand catalysts” overlapping with prior halvings that helped drive price increases, explaining that the current cycle’s catalyst actually already happened: January’s approval of spot bitcoin exchange-traded funds, which unlocked billions of dollars of new capital into bitcoin and contributed most strongly to the positive price action, as bitcoin remains up nearly 300% dating back to the beginning of last year. Chhugani expects bitcoin to reach as high as $150,000 next year, a highly bullish forecast that is more than double even its all-time high.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-tangent">TANGENT</h2>



Halvings are likely a boon for bitcoin holders, but it’s a major challenge for miners, considering it quite literally halves their potential revenue stream – imagine if regulation allowed McDonald’s to sell Big Macs but no fries. Shares of CleanSpark (up 38%), Marathon Digital (down 36%) and Riot Platforms (down 48%), the three most prominent publicly traded American bitcoin miners, have all underperformed bitcoin this year, Chhugani noted, adding that the halving may actually be a good thing for investors as the pressure can lead to consolidation and more profitable companies.

Crypto in Tbilisi as Devotees Begin to Contemplate a Market Bottom

Bitcoin Halving: Here’s Why Some Expect Prices To Soar

<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-topline">TOPLINE</h2>



A Binance executive detained in Nigeria last month escaped from custody over the weekend, as the West African country filed charges of tax evasion against the cryptocurrency exchange and some of its executives in the latest public scandal for the firm.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-key-facts">KEY FACTS</h2>



Binance executives Tigran Gambaryan, a U.S. citizen, and Nadeem Anjarwalla, British-Kenyan citizen, were both taken into custody in Nigeria in February but not charged with any crimes until Monday.



The executives and the crypto company were charged with alleged non-payment of value-added tax (VAT) and company income tax, failure to file tax returns, and complicity in assisting customers to evade taxes through its platform, Nigeria’s Federal Inland Revenue Service announced Monday, according to&nbsp;<a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2024-03-25/nigeria-announces-charges-against-binance-after-executive-flees" rel="noreferrer noopener" target="_blank">multiple</a>&nbsp;<a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2024/03/25/binance-executive-escapes-nigerian-custody-as-authorities-file-new-tax-charges.html" rel="noreferrer noopener" target="_blank">outlets</a>.



The charges come days after Anjarwalla reportedly escaped from where he was being detained after guards watching him took him to a nearby mosque for prayers, The Premium Times, a Nigerian news outlet,&nbsp;<a href="https://www.premiumtimesng.com/news/top-news/680617-nigerian-govt-confirms-escape-of-binance-executive-arrests-personnel-guarding-him.html" rel="noreferrer noopener" target="_blank">reported</a>.



Nigeria is in talks with Interpol to get an international arrest warrant for Anjarwalla, Nigeria’s national security adviser&nbsp;<a href="https://www.reuters.com/technology/nigeria-files-tax-evasion-charges-against-binance-tax-agency-says-2024-03-25/" rel="noreferrer noopener" target="_blank">told</a>&nbsp;Reuters.



Binance confirmed Anjarwalla was no longer in Nigerian custody.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-crucial-quote">CRUCIAL QUOTE</h2>



“Our primary focus remains on the safety of our employees and we are working collaboratively with Nigerian authorities to quickly resolve this issue,” Binance told Forbes in an email.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-key-background">KEY BACKGROUND</h2>



Gambaryan and Anjarwalla have been in Nigeria since Feb. 26 when they&nbsp;<a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/africa/binance-executives-remain-detention-after-nigeria-court-appearance-families-say-2024-03-20/" rel="noreferrer noopener" target="_blank">reportedly</a>&nbsp;arrived to discuss the country’s decision to ban some cryptocurrency trading websites, including Binance, Coinbase and Kraken. The office of the National Security Adviser in Nigeria detained the pair and seized their passports,&nbsp;<a href="https://www.ft.com/content/1507509b-7bbc-48a1-9828-d777036fff2b" rel="noreferrer noopener" target="_blank">according to</a>&nbsp;the Financial Times. Both of their families have since&nbsp;<a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/africa/binance-executives-remain-detention-after-nigeria-court-appearance-families-say-2024-03-20/" rel="noreferrer noopener" target="_blank">pleaded</a>&nbsp;with authorities to release the executives. Ahead of their detention, Olayemi Cardoso, Nigeria’s central bank governor,&nbsp;<a href="https://www.ft.com/content/1507509b-7bbc-48a1-9828-d777036fff2b" rel="noreferrer noopener" target="_blank">told</a>&nbsp;reporters in February officials were concerned about “illicit flows” going through a number of crypto platforms, according to the Financial Times. He went on to say that in one year, $26 billion passed through Binance Nigeria “from sources and users who we cannot adequately identify.” Days later, the Binance executives were detained. The concerns about crypto trading come as Nigeria struggled with currency devaluation. In the past year, the value of the Nigerian currency, the naira, has fallen 70%&nbsp;<a href="https://www.marketwatch.com/investing/currency/ngnusd" rel="noreferrer noopener" target="_blank">against</a>&nbsp;the U.S. dollar.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-tangent">TANGENT</h2>



The tax evasion charges and detentions follow high-profile problems Binance has faced in recent years. In November, Changpeng Zhao, the company’s founder, pleaded guilty to Justice Department charges of breaking anti-money laundering laws and violating sanctions and <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/tylerroush/2024/02/23/judge-approves-binances-43-billion-settlement-for-anti-money-laundering-sanctions-violations/?sh=9d34b8d44758">agreed</a> to pay more than $4.3 million in fines and restitutions for doing so. In June, the Securities and Exchange Commision <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/anafaguy/2023/06/05/sec-sues-binance-for-multiple-us-rule-violations/?sh=74a7467d7fcb">sued</a> Binance for operating an illegal exchange in the U.S. Months before that, in March, regulators <a href="https://www.cftc.gov/PressRoom/PressReleases/8680-23" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">alleged</a> that Binance and Zhao evaded Commodity Futures Trading Commission rules. The crypto company <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-06-06/us-probes-binance-over-token-that-is-now-world-s-fifth-largest" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">reportedly</a> remains under investigation from the SEC over whether the company illegally sold digital coins when it started out in 2017. Binance isn’t alone: other crypto firms, including Beaxy and Kraken, have also been hit with civil lawsuits recently as regulators crack down on the industry.<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/anafaguy/"></a>

In this photo illustration, the Binance logo is displayed on

Binance Executive Flees Nigerian Prison Amid New Charges

Metaverse Concept in the real city,  Futuristic digital design for Smart city and technology in the future

Exposing The Myth Of Decentralization

Two years ago, non-fungible tokens were sizzling hot, as art aficionados and speculators pushed blockchain-based images to $27 billion in value. Now that the market has crashed, a much less ambitious version of NFTs are finding a welcome home in the marketing departments of corporate America.



<abbr>I</abbr>n the first week of October, non-fungible token (NFT) trading fell to its lowest weekly level since 2020, according to data from TheBlock, with only $50 million worth of digital collectibles exchanged on secondary markets. It was a bleak month for NFTs, whose trading volume plummeted from a record $3.2 billion a week in 2022 as prices slid to fractions of their crypto-boom highs.



The tepid activity came two weeks before Nike planned to sell more than 30,000 pairs of its popular Dunks sneakers in a collection linked to NFTs, with an increasingly popular twist that allowed non-blockchain buyers to get in on the action. Unlike virtually all of the previous efforts, buyers could pay by credit card instead of using cryptocurrency, snagging a custom-sized pair of Dunks in one of three color combinations, white and blue, black and purple and black and red.



Appealing to its traditional youthful buyers worked out for Nike, with the sale bringing in $7 million, or an average of about $230 a pair, and each Dunk owner would own a digital version of the sneaker on the ethereum blockchain. It’s a release model that has proven to be a useful marketing maneuver—in August 2022 Nike offered a 10-piece leisure apparel collection through its CloneX NFT line. The Beaverton, Oregon company, famous for its long relationship with Michael Jordan, has been selling NFT-related apparel since December 2022, when it released the auto-lacing CryptoKicks iRL collection of sneakers. Pieces from that inaugural offering that sold for about&nbsp;<a href="https://etherscan.io/tx/0x85e587dd74fa74b6b2e9fed91cf7be33b58ba79b6052db978c16e83d84af2bf6" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">$900&nbsp;</a>can now fetch up to $3,000 on sneaker resale sites like&nbsp;<a href="https://stockx.com/nike-rtfkt-cryptokicks-irl-ice" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">StockX</a>.



The Dunk Genesis collection “was a huge success,” says Steven Vasilev, co-founder of NFT studio RTFKT (pronounced “Artifact”), which was purchased by Nike in December 2021. “Even though the market is still down, our products are still bringing in new people.”



Non-fungible tokens are created, bought and sold on blockchains, like cryptocurrencies such as bitcoin and ether. But while each currency’s tokens are alike, every NFT is unique and can be used to reward users with various perks or be linked to objects in the real world. They can also be traded on numerous secondary markets like OpenSea.



The NFT landscape has drastically shifted in the two years since the tokens became part of mainstream art and pop culture. Barely more than a year ago, CryptoPunks, a collection of thousands of pixelated head shots and the cartoon simians of Bored Ape Yacht Club commanded multi-million-dollar price tags at auction. Now, the most expensive rarely trade for over $100,000. NFTs selling for over $10 million disappeared last year and companies born out of NFT collections, like Rektguy and Bored Apes purveyor Yuga Labs, are struggling to pivot their business models away from&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/digital-assets/2023/09/17/requiem-for-royalties-nft-exchanges-abandon-recurring-compensation-for-artists/?sh=5574c80d65da">royalty payments&nbsp;</a>generated by secondary sales. The overall market shrank to $9.5 billion of revenue last year from $26.7 billion in 2022, according to&nbsp;<a href="https://www.cryptoslam.io/nftglobal?headerPeriod=all&amp;timeFrame=year" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">CryptoSlam.</a>&nbsp;Emerging from the aftermath of the NFT craze are major companies that are embracing the tokens as a cutting-edge marketing device, helping them get closer to existing customers and woo new ones.



<hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity"/>



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-wither-nfts">Wither NFTs</h2>



Non-fungible token sales peaked in 2022 as digital images inscribed onto blockchains were at the center of pop culture. Two years later, sales are languishing.



<hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity"/>



“Where Nike serves athletes, we serve creators,” says Vasilev, who is a member of the Forbes 2023&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/profile/steven-vasilev/?sh=754795392b81">30 Under 30 Retail and E-Commerce&nbsp;</a>list. “We don’t like the word NFT,” he adds, “We believe it&#8217;s too technical and confuses a lot of customers. So we prefer to call them ‘digital collectibles.’”



<hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity"/>



Sneaker companies like&nbsp;Nike are at the forefront of NFTs’ second coming, but they are not alone.



While eking out meaningful revenue or profit is a long way off, Corporate America is finding useful ways to employ the unique blockchain-based tokens in their marketing arsenals.



Some companies like Nike are incorporating NFTs into their products, bringing virtual images to physical reality. Credit-card giant Mastercard, for example, partnered with crypto neobank Hi to allow NFT users to showcase their own NFTs on the plastic cards in their wallet.



“The card designs and cards you use for payment are a reflection of who you are,” says Christian Rau, head of Mastercard’s crypto and fintech operations in Europe when the partnership launched in October 2022. Digital art on a credit card “basically allows consumers to display a physical manifestation of an NFT they really care about.”



Beyond physical branding, others have included blockchain elements into existing marketing strategies. Coca-Cola added NFTs to its global Masterpiece advertising campaign in June, in which the company’s iconic red-and-black bottles were passed around by animated versions of well-known artworks like Edvard Munch’s “The Scream” and Vincent Van Gogh’s “Bedroom in Arles.” In August, the company launched a series of digital artworks on Coinbase’s Base blockchain that put combinations of the famous paintings and contemporary works onto its soda bottles in a series of digital images linked to NFTs. Coca-Cola’s&nbsp;<a href="https://www.coca-colacompany.com/media-center/coca-cola--masterpiece--collection-fetches-more-than--500-000-in" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">drop</a>&nbsp;brought in $543,000 from the sale of 80,000 tokens.



The virtual tactic taps into the existing markets of Coca-Cola superfans and vintage container collectors, some of whom are willing to spend up to&nbsp;<a href="https://www.coca-colacompany.com/about-us/history/collecting-coca-cola-bottles" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">$4,000 at auction</a>&nbsp;for the rarest bottles. Coke’s NFTs, in comparison, allowed collectors the chance to buy in for $25 worth of ether to collect at the time of August 2023 sale.



There are also companies that are using NFTs to breathe new life into their loyalty programs. Starbucks, for example, launched a test version of its Odyssey loyalty program in December 2022, giving a select group of users access to online games and quests that generate NFT rewards. The tokens offer holders exclusive programs, including bonus Starbucks stars (the company’s loyalty points), access to specialty drinks, online cocktail-making classes and vacations.



Rewards are already coming in for existing Odyssey members. The top 20 points holders as of January 2024 will be invited to go on an all-expense paid trip to Costa Rica, where Starbucks owns its only coffee farm, according to a post on X by Odyssey executive&nbsp;<a href="https://x.com/NFTbark/status/1740080645588889872?s=20" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Steve Kaczynski</a>.



Germany’s Lufthansa has taken a similar approach to loyalty, delivering commemorative NFTs for certain trips or destinations to users of the airline’s Uptrip platform, acting somewhat like digital stamps for passenger’s digital wallets. The service creates NFTs on the Polygon blockchain that can be&nbsp;<a href="https://lh-innovationhub.de/wp-content/uploads/2023/09/uptrip_pr_en.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">redeemed</a>&nbsp;for free in-flight WiFi, access to airport lounges and airline miles.



Technically, this kind of loyalty programs does not need to rely on blockchain technology to run, but using it could make the process cheaper, plus it gives Lufthansa&#8217;s customers the impression that the company embraces the latest tech. “Companies can have a lot of the tools of a loyalty program without having to build as much infrastructure,” says Paul Brody, global blockchain lead at consulting firm Ernst &amp; Young.



Because the goal of these collectibles is largely to keep users loyal to the issuing company, trading is discouraged, so you won&#8217;t see many of these NFTs racking up volume on marketplaces like OpenSea and Blur.



Still, Brody says, “it can turn out to be really great advertising…Your blockchain wallet is gonna become a bit like your public trophy case.”



The biggest hurdle companies may face in marketing– and expanding their markets–using NFTs may come from the nature of crypto assets. Getting hold of NFTs often includes adding browser extensions, obtaining a crypto wallet, creating lengthy passwords and transacting in digital currencies like ether, which can be daunting for the uninitiated.



That is part of the reason Nike’s Vasilev avoids the term NFT. It is also why RTFKT added an option to buy the physical sneaker first (without the NFT) using traditional credit card payment options instead of crypto. Doing so in the Dunk Genesis drop brought in new customers, Vasilev says, as 93% of buyers who bought the physical sneakers before the NFTs were first-time customers to RTFKT products. “We think this is a huge way to onboard new people,” he adds.



<hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity"/>



Sneaker companies may&nbsp;represent the perfect marriage of NFT technology and brand marketing, in particular because top brands already cultivate young buyers via an active collectibles market. Following Nike, Adidas and Puma are launching their own blockchain-compatible collections.



German athleticwear giant Adidas has taken a combined physical and digital approach to using NFTs. In August, the company partnered with Japanese streetwear brand BAPE to release a limited 100-pair edition of virtual white sneakers that could be used to buy the physical counterpart. In partnership with MoonPay, a crypto payment platform, users bid on the 100 items for 72 hours, before collecting their digital pair. Each NFT was tradeable, but they could also be redeemed for Adidas’ Forum Low 84 sneakers in an exclusive Triple White color pattern for holders willing to burn, or destroy, the NFT. The highest bid for a single pair of sneakers was almost $4,000, according to&nbsp;<a href="https://etherscan.io/tx/0xce3e4c4da6d1835dd0730df56bba440843d2e68a56b43a6512f010d62d9cd378" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Etherscan</a>.



<hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity"/>



<abbr>M</abbr>ost of Adidas’ NFT&nbsp;explorations have remained within the virtual walls of the metaverse, releasing goods on gaming platforms and participating in<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/mariagraciasantillanalinares/2023/04/02/as-a-list-designers-peddle-metaverse-merch-decentralands-fashion-week-makes-a-muted-return/">&nbsp;Metaverse Fashion Week&nbsp;</a>in 2023.



Puma has adapted strategies used by both of its rivals. After experimenting with made-to-order sneakers for physical versions of an NFT collection it released earlier in 2022, it pivoted to first selling tokens that could be redeemed for a limited editions version of an existing running shoe called Fast-RB. For now, however, it is focusing on uses for its Puma Pass, a token that gives users early access to more NFT collections and on digital wearables to be used on gaming platforms.



“Just creating a profile picture collection or a loyalty program is low-hanging fruit,” says Ivan Dashkov, head of emerging technologies at Puma, who sees creativity as the key to blockchain success. “You really need to think of new, novel ways to use [blockchain] technology to reach, to interact with your customer.”



The use of NFTs as a marketing tool is still in its infancy. Almost no existing corporate marketing program has taken steps to implement permanent NFT programs, says Brody.



The emphasis is on experimentation and consumer use and, as trading on once-sizzling hot marketplaces like OpenSea continues to languish, no one is talking about the secondary market for NFTs.



Says Brody, “We&#8217;re headed for a future that is more and more NFTs as souvenirs and as public trophies and not as transferrable financial assets.”

BRITAIN-BLOCKCHAIN-NFT-TOKENS

Forget BoredApes And CryptoPunks, NFTs Are Making A Corporate Comeback

Nigeria has eased its stringent stance on cryptocurrency transactions, introducing guidelines to govern operations after two years.



The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) recently released comprehensive guidelines to govern the operations of bank accounts for Virtual Assets Service Providers (VASPs), signaling the end of a two-year ban on cryptocurrency transactions. This information is detailed in a circular titled Guidelines on Operations of Bank Accounts for Virtual Assets Service Providers, issued by Haruna B. Mustafa, Director of the Financial Policy and Regulation Department at the CBN.



While the ban lasted, Nigerians defied the odds with the volume of crypto transactions in Nigeria growing 9% year-over-year to $56.7 billion between July 2022 and June 2023, according to New York-based blockchain research firm Chainalysis in a September report. Nigeria is also reported to have the highest peer-to-peer (P2P) exchange volume, according to the 2023 Geography of Cryptocurrency Report. A recent study from KuCoin found that 35% of Nigerians aged between 18 and 60 are investing or trading bitcoin or other cryptocurrencies.



In February 2021, the CBN initially imposed restrictions on banks and financial institutions, preventing them from engaging with cryptocurrency service providers reportedly due to concerns related to money laundering and terrorism financing risks.



In the latest circular, the CBN acknowledges global trends indicating the need to regulate the activities of VASPs, including cryptocurrencies and crypto assets. &#8220;Following this development, the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) in 2018 also updated its Recommendation 15 to require VASPS to be regulated to prevent misuse of virtual assets for ML/TF/PF.&#8221;



&#8220;Furthermore, Section 30 of the Money Laundering (Prevention and Prohibition) Act, 2022 recognizes VASPs as part of the definition of a financial institution. In addition, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) in May 2022 issued Rules on Issuance, Offering and Custody of Digital Assets and VASPS to provide a regulatory framework for their operations in Nigeria,&#8221; adds the CBN.



In response to these developments, the CBN explained that it issued the new guidelines to provide clear directives to financial institutions under its regulatory purview regarding their banking relationships with VASPs in Nigeria.



The guidelines supersede previous circulars. However, it emphasizes that &#8220;banks and other financial institutions are still prohibited from holding, trading, and/or transacting in virtual currencies on their own account&#8221;.



The directive concludes with a firm call to action, stating, &#8220;Accordingly, all banks and other financial institutions are hereby required to immediately comply with the provisions of the Guidelines.&#8221;



Nigerian analyst, Kolawole Oyebola, expresses his views on the CBN&#8217;s decision, highlighting the positive implications for the burgeoning cryptocurrency market in the country. Oyebola commends the regulatory clarity provided by the comprehensive guidelines, stating that it will instill confidence among investors and industry players.



&#8220;This move by the CBN is a welcomed and long-awaited step in the right direction. The comprehensive guidelines not only signal a pragmatic approach to regulating the cryptocurrency space but also demonstrate the recognition of the importance of digital assets in the evolving global financial landscape,&#8221; Oyebola tells FORBES AFRICA.



The CBN&#8217;s ban, during its implementation period, had raised concerns within the cryptocurrency community and sparked debates about the future of digital currencies in Nigeria. Analysts had been vocal about the need for a balanced regulatory framework that encourages innovation while addressing potential risks associated with cryptocurrencies.



&#8220;Now that the ban has been lifted, we can anticipate increased interest and participation in the cryptocurrency market. The guidelines provide a roadmap for both VASPs and investors, promoting transparency and accountability,&#8221; Oyebola adds.



Already, pan-African cryptocurrency trading platform, Yellow Card, is exploring opportunities to capitalize on its first-mover advantage by pursuing licensing.



While Oyebola opines that challenges may persist, noting the need for continuous dialogue between regulators and industry stakeholders, he remains optimistic about the future of cryptocurrency in Nigeria.



&#8220;The CBN&#8217;s decision to lift the ban and introduce comprehensive guidelines reflects a proactive stance that could pave the way for a more robust and inclusive digital financial ecosystem in the country.&#8221;

Cryptocurrency Mining In Africa As Poor Sheperdherder Proves A Point

Nigeria Resumes Cryptocurrency Transactions With New Guidelines For VASPs

<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-topline">TOPLINE</h2>



The price of Bitcoin fell below $26,000 Thursday—its lowest level since June—amid a broader crypto market slump after the&nbsp;Wall Street Journal&nbsp;<a href="https://www.wsj.com/tech/behind-the-curtain-of-elon-musks-secretive-spacex-revenue-growth-and-rising-costs-2c828e2b?mod=hp_lead_pos5" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">reported</a>&nbsp;that SpaceX has taken a significant write-down on its Bitcoin holdings and sold the cryptocurrency.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-key-facts">KEY FACTS</h2>



The price of the world’s most valuable cryptocurrency stood at $26,400 early on Friday, down nearly 8% in the previous 24 hours and 10% compared to last week.



Earlier on Thursday evening, the price of Bitcoin had dropped even lower, to around $25,400 before a slight recovery.



Ether, the world’s second-largest cryptocurrency, also took a similar hit and fell to $1,680—down 6.6% in the previous 24 hours.



Other major tokens like Binance’s BNB, Cardano and Solana are also down more than 6%



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-big-number">BIG NUMBER</h2>



16%. That’s how much the price of Ripple’s XRP token has fallen in the past 24 hours, significantly worse than all other major cryptocurrencies. XRP’s steeper fall is a result of a federal judge’s&nbsp;<a href="https://www.wsj.com/livecoverage/stock-market-today-dow-jones-08-17-2023/card/judge-in-sec-ripple-case-opens-path-to-partial-appeal-after-july-ruling-Qj9YAsJsOP72ufpmQfCx" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">decision</a>&nbsp;on Thursday to allow the SEC to partially appeal a&nbsp;<a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/newsletters/2023-07-13/what-does-ripple-xrp-ruling-in-sec-case-mean-for-crypto" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">ruling</a>&nbsp;in its case against Ripple.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-key-background">KEY BACKGROUND</h2>



Thursday evening’s crypto selloff began after the&nbsp;Wall Street Journal&nbsp;<a href="https://www.wsj.com/tech/behind-the-curtain-of-elon-musks-secretive-spacex-revenue-growth-and-rising-costs-2c828e2b?mod=hp_lead_pos5" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">reported</a>&nbsp;that Elon Musk’s SpaceX wrote down the value of its bitcoin holdings by a total of $373 million in the previous two calendar years. The company has also sold off its crypto holdings, the report added, although it is unclear when this sale happened. Musk and his companies have been a key mover of cryptocurrency prices, with the market often seeing significant movement based on the billionaire’s tweets. However, the SpaceX selloff follows a similar move by Musk’s other company, Tesla, which&nbsp;<a href="https://tesla-cdn.thron.com/static/EIUQEC_2022_Q2_Quarterly_Update_Deck_J8VLIK.pdf?xseo=&amp;amp;response-content-disposition=inline%3Bfilename%3D%22tsla-q2-22-update.pdf%22" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">disclosed in an earnings report last year</a>&nbsp;that it had sold 75% of its Bitcoin holdings.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-further-reading">FURTHER READING</h2>



<a href="https://www.wsj.com/tech/behind-the-curtain-of-elon-musks-secretive-spacex-revenue-growth-and-rising-costs-2c828e2b?mod=hp_lead_pos5" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">A Rare Look Into the Finances of Elon Musk’s Secretive SpaceX</a>&nbsp;(Wall Street Journal)



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<a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-08-18/bitcoin-plunge-spurs-liquidations-as-spacex-s-token-sale-weighs?srnd=premium" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Bitcoin Plunge Spurs Liquidations as SpaceX’s Token Sale Weighs</a> (Bloomberg)

Bitcoin Drops To Lowest Level Since June Amid Wider Crypto Sell-Off

Exploring the emerging trend of using cryptocurrency as a hedge against inflation, highlighting real-world applications and driving economic growth in South Africa.



Cryptocurrencies have had a tumultuous history, often marred by speculation and fraudulent activities. However, the recent decline in public interest has allowed for more realistic applications to emerge, along with appropriate regulation. This maturation of the crypto space has led to an exploration of cryptocurrencies as a potential hedge against inflation.



Ahren Posthumus, CEO of Momint, a tech startup based in Cape Town, believes the reduction in hype has allowed for a focus on real-world projects that are auditable and have a real background. &#8220;We&#8217;re seeing this [crypto as a hedge against inflation] quite a lot&#8230; But not only is it being used as a hedge, it’s also being used as a mechanism to drive the bottom line and solve real problems that South Africa is facing right now,” he says to FORBES AFRICA.



Another notable advantage of cryptocurrency as a hedge against inflation is stablecoins. Since stablecoins are backed by the US dollar, owning them is equivalent to saving in dollars. Storing funds in USDT or earning in other stable tokens like USDC can help keep finances protected from devaluation.



According to Peter Mureu, Marketing Director at Yellow Card, “The rand has dramatically lost its value over the past decade. From ZAR10 for $1 in 2010 to almost ZAR20 for the same amount now, the purchasing ability of the rand has nearly been cut in half. Investing in crypto, especially USDT will allow for that risk to be halved and increase the ability to purchase alternative power sources to deal with the current power issues/load-shedding. For those earning in USDT, even the lack of power is an easily surmountable problem because the USDT is constantly appreciating regardless of the state of the rand.”



One such problem is South Africa’s current energy crisis. The combination of large tax rebates for investments in renewable energy, coupled with platforms such as Momint, has seen large growth in realistic applications for cryptocurrencies. “Our tokenized, fractionalized solar investments qualify for Section 12 rebates… this is massive,” continues Posthumus.



Lerato Lamola, consultant and crypto specialist at Webber Wentzel, notes that South Africa’s legislative process seems to be in line with this, with the country classifying crypto as a financial product rather than a security. This allows crypto to be managed more easily within the framework of existing financial instruments.



“South Africa is really focusing on the man in the street,” says Lamola. “South Africa is now focusing more on how crypto is impacting retail consumers.”



Cryptocurrencies and blockchain technology are emerging as potent tools for socio-economic development in Africa, particularly South Africa. By facilitating low-cost remittances and microloans, they&#8217;re creating meaningful changes that uplift the economy.



Posthumus sees the burgeoning sector as a vehicle for innovation and economic growth, asserting that cryptocurrencies could engender a more equitable financial system by enabling secure and cost-effective transactions.



In Africa, cryptocurrencies and blockchain technology are no longer theoretical concepts; they have become practical tools driving tangible change. Platforms such as Momint are already realizing this – one such example is the ability for users to fractionally invest in renewable energy projects, allowing investors to generate returns, take advantage of renewable investment tax breaks, and invest in sustainable development.



Cryptocurrencies in South Africa and Africa are increasingly seen as more than just volatile investments, but as powerful tools.



&#8220;The biggest thing for us is about having a product that people can use and understand. It’s about education, and we need to be building that trust with the consumer,” adds Posthumus.

Bitcoin on digital circuit board and graph

Crypto As Inflation Hedge: South Africa’s Innovative Approach To Digital Assets

Business fund investor planning for investment in crisis

Crypto Winter Watch: All The Big Layoffs, Record Withdrawals And Bankruptcies Sparked By The $2 Trillion Crash

An upcoming Christie’s auction has collectors starry-eyed:&nbsp;<a href="https://onlineonly.christies.com/s/deep-impact-martian-lunar-other-rare-meteorites/lots/2134" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Deep Impact</a>, featuring 65 of the rarest meteorites to ever hit Earth runs until February 23—and prices are expected to be astronomical. The only non-meteorite, the Aguas Zarcas Doghouse, which was struck by Carbonaceous chondrite rock in April 2019 (and just barely missed hitting its resident, a German shepherd named Roky) has a pre-sale estimate of $200,000 to $300,000.&nbsp;



Meteorites and other extraterrestrial objects have always attracted the attentions of Earthly stars—Elon Musk, Steven Spielberg and Nicolas Cage are reportedly collectors—but now a growing number of crypto investors are entering the market.



“Last year, a lot of people were cashing out of crypto and going into meteorites,” says Christie’s specialist James Hyslop, head of the Scientific Instruments, Globes &amp; Natural History department. A February 2021 Deep Impact sale became the most successful meteorite auction ever, according to Christie’s, with all lots selling—and 72 out of 75 going for above their high estimate.



“These really appeal to anyone who has looked up to the night sky in awe,” he adds. “There are museums buying, there are collectors, but we also have clients that are bidding in antiquity sales, post-modern art&#8230;The fascination of these objects really is universal.”&nbsp;



<div class="wp-block-image"><figure class="aligncenter is-resized"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="https://imageio.forbes.com/specials-images/imageserve/620d2bad4bc024874b14ade6/meteorite3/960x0.jpg?fit=bounds&amp;format=jpg&amp;width=960" alt="meteorite3" width="627" height="269"/><figcaption>The Deep Impact auction features such hard-to-find treasures as a Gibeon &#8220;sculpture,&#8221; a carbonaceous&nbsp;&#8230; [+]&nbsp;CHRISTIE&#8217;S</figcaption></figure></div>



With many lots listed with no reserve, meteorite auctions typically draw a much younger, more international crowd than an average Christie’s sale. There is also a more even gender balance. According to the auction house, 73 percent of last year’s bidders were first-timers.



Part of the rocks’ appeal is in their rarity. “If you took all the meteorites on earth and put them on a scale, it would weigh less than the annual output of gold,” said Hyslop. Once sold, they’re often kept private: Of the 64,000 meteorites in the world’s collections, <a href="https://www.christies.com/features/A-collectors-guide-to-meteorites-8231-1.aspx" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">it’s estimated</a> about two-thirds will never be available to the general public.



Values are calculated from previous sales, as well as a meteorite’s size, shape, scientific makeup and story, says Hyslop. And while stunning specimens such as&nbsp;<a href="https://onlineonly.christies.com/s/deep-impact-martian-lunar-other-rare-meteorites/gibeon-meteorite-singular-exotic-sculpture-outer-space-62/142846?ldp_breadcrumb=back" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Lot 62</a>, a Gibeon meteorite, which he likens to a Henry Moore sculpture, are likely to draw the eyes of museums and private investors alike, it’s the doghouse that’s drawing much of the attention in next week’s sale.&nbsp;



<div class="wp-block-image"><figure class="alignleft is-resized"><img decoding="async" src="https://imageio.forbes.com/specials-images/imageserve/620d266e2e9c9b8442f05d4f/66744894-JPEG-large/960x0.jpg?fit=bounds&amp;format=jpg&amp;width=960" alt="66744894_JPEG large" width="-361" height="-420"/><figcaption> CHRISTIE&#8217;S</figcaption></figure></div>



While the current bid is well below the $300,000 estimate—it’s at a down-to-earth $1,600—the price is expected to soar. The actual meteorite that struck Roky’s home is also up for auction. It has a pre-sale estimate of $40,000 to $60,000 and the current bid is $2,200.



Star-crossed items such as this are rare, which makes them lucrative:&nbsp;<a href="https://www.bonhams.com/auctions/15648/lot/15/?category=list" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">A mailbox from Claxton, Georgia</a>, sold for $83,000 in 2007 thanks to the meteoric damage it sustained in 1984. And a&nbsp;<a href="https://meteoritecar.com/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">1980 Chevy Malibu</a>&nbsp;with a crater in its trunk from the 4.4 billion-year-old, 26-pound meteorite that smashed into it in 1992 turned into quite the investment: The owner sold the car, originally purchased from her grandmother for around $400, for $69,000 after the collision—and in 2010 it went for $230,000.&nbsp;



“Despite our huge imprint on the planet, manmade structures are a pretty small target for a meteorite falling from space,” says Hyslop. “There are only a handful of objects impacted by these falling rocks that are available to collectors.”



By Isabel Lord, Forbes Staff

Screenshot 2022-03-07 at 15.34.39

Meteorite Auction Prices Skyrocket Thanks To Crypto—Including A $300,000 Dog House

<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-topline">TOPLINE</h2>



In the latest example of Netflix quickly pouncing on a true-crime tale, the company said Friday it had ordered a docuseries on alleged cryptocurrency launderers Ilya “Dutch” Lichtenstein and Heather Morgan—who only came to public attention with their arrest Tuesday.&nbsp;



<figure class="wp-block-image size-full"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="1024" height="683" src="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/GettyImages-1231249886.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-52704" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/GettyImages-1231249886.jpg 1024w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/GettyImages-1231249886-300x200.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/GettyImages-1231249886-768x512.jpg 768w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px" /><figcaption>BRAZIL &#8211; 2021/02/18: In this photo illustration the Netflix logo seen displayed on a smartphone screen. (Photo Illustration by Rafael Henrique/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images)</figcaption></figure>



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="key-facts">KEY FACTS</h2>



Lichtenstein and Morgan–the latter of whom has attracted attention as much for her awkward rap videos as their alleged crimes– have been accused by federal prosecutors of attempting to launder $4.5 billion in bitcoin, $3.6 billion of which was recovered in what the Department of Justice says was its largest financial seizure ever.&nbsp;



While Netflix and other streaming services have been churning out more ripped-from-the-headlines “insta-docs” and reality content for years, the pandemic gave the trend&nbsp;<a href="https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/tv/tv-news/coronavirus-tiger-king-reality-producers-double-down-docuseries-1288063/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">more impetus</a>: viewers were stuck at home with nothing to do but watch TV and producers could make use of archival footage instead of risking their health to shoot something new.&nbsp;



Last week Netflix put out&nbsp;The Tinder Swindler, a documentary about a man who was arrested in 2015 for allegedly defrauding women he met on dating apps of money, and this month will also release documentaries about Bubba Wallace’s 2021 NASCAR season and the 2018 and 2019 Boeing Max 737 crashes.&nbsp;



Friday the scripted series&nbsp;Inventing Anna&nbsp;premiered on Netflix, Shonda Rhimes’ fictional take on the real story of Anna Sorokin, a woman who pretended to be a Germain heiress and was&nbsp;<a href="https://www.cnn.com/2019/04/25/us/anna-sorokin-found-guilty/index.html" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">found guilty</a>&nbsp;in 2019 of stealing over $200,000 from banks and people she socialized with.



Last year, several documentaries were released about recent scandals, including the downfall of WeWork, the college admissions scandal, and Rudy Giuliani’s Four Seasons and Total Landscaping post-election mistake.&nbsp;



The Crypto Couple docuseries will be directed and executive produced by Chris Smith, who was behind Netflix true-crime hits&nbsp;Fyre: The Greatest Party That Never Happened&nbsp;and&nbsp;Tiger King, and will also be executive produced by Nick Bilton, of&nbsp;HBO’s The Inventor: Out for Blood in Silicon Valley—works that made&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/aaronkwittken/2019/01/22/catching-fyre-what-marketers-can-learn-from-mini-madoff-mcfarland/?sh=3a41b2c26140">Billy McFarland</a>,&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/lisakim/2022/01/28/tiger-king-star-joe-exotic-resentenced-to-21-years-in-prison-for-murder-for-hire-plot-one-year-less-than-original-term/?sh=6f92178d59c0">Joe Exotic</a>&nbsp;and&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/marisadellatto/2022/01/03/elizabeth-holmes-found-guilty-on-wire-fraud-charges/?sh=6ab26e6f46b6">Elizabeth Holmes</a>&nbsp;household names.&nbsp;



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="key-background">KEY BACKGROUND</h2>



Since the success of Netflix’s 2015 hit&nbsp;Making A Murderer, the platform and other streaming services have ramped up production of true-crime documentaries, docuseries and fictional spinoffs of real-world stories. In 2016,&nbsp;<a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/netflix-is-a-documentary-powerhouse-heres-why-2017-3#" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">68 million people</a>&nbsp;watched documentaries on Netflix, and 73% of their subscribers watched at least one. After being released at the onset of the pandemic,&nbsp;Tiger King&nbsp;became the most popular show on the streaming services in 2020. Netflix is one of the biggest buyers in the world of unscripted TV programming,&nbsp;<a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-11-11/netflix-hbo-amazon-buying-up-reality-tv-shows-for-streaming-services" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Bloomberg</a>&nbsp;reported in November. And as pop culture remains fixated on true crime and scammers, there is no sign the streamer plans to slow down.&nbsp;



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="tangent">TANGENT</h2>



Lichtenstein and Morgan, a married couple living in New York City, were charged with conspiracy to commit money laundering and and conspiracy to defraud the United States for attempting to launder billions of dollars worth of Bitcoin that was stolen during a 2016 Bitfinex hack, though they haven’t been charged over the hack itself. The couple worked their way into entrepreneur and tech circles, with Morgan writing as a contributor&nbsp; for Forbes.com on business and entrepreneurship, until she was cut in September 2021. The government alleged the couple used fake identities and other &#8220;sophisticated laundering techniques&#8221; to launder the cryptocurrency. As news of their arrest and the seizure broke, Morgan’s odd rap videos posted on YouTube&nbsp; under the stage name Razzlekhan became an object of fascination. A lawyer for the couple&nbsp;<a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2022/02/10/frozen-embryos-will-keep-accused-bitcoin-money-launderers-from-fleeing.html" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">said</a>&nbsp;in a court filing Thursday that Lichtenstein and Morgan would not flee the U.S. if allowed on bail because the couple has frozen embryos in a NYC hospital and wouldn’t want to jeopardize “access to their ability to have children.”



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="further-reading">FURTHER READING</h2>



<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/jonathanponciano/2022/02/08/feds-seize-36-billion-in-stolen-bitcoin-arrest-couple-five-years-after-massive-crypto-exchange-hack/?sh=3e4163b97c95">Feds Seize $3.6 Billion In Stolen Bitcoin, Arrest Couple Five Years After Massive Crypto Exchange Hack&nbsp;</a>(Forbes)&nbsp;



<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/davidjeans/2022/02/09/heather-morgan-ilya-lichtenstein-bitcoin-seizure/?sh=30bab60a1ea2">How The Crypto Couple Went From Wannabe Tech Luminaries To Targets In The Biggest Financial Seizure In Justice Department History</a>&nbsp;(Forbes)&nbsp;



<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/cyrusfarivar/2022/02/10/heather-morgan-ilya-lichtenstein-cat-bitcoin-raid/?sh=c64b9e7405a0">Hollowed-Out Books, Fake Passports And Burner Phones: What Led To The Feds’ Raid On The Crypto Couple</a>&nbsp;(Forbes)



By Marisa Dellatto, Forbes Staff

In this photo illustration the Netflix logo seen displayed

Netflix Orders Series On Crypto Couple Only Three Days After They Came To Fame, Highlighting Rise Of ‘Insta-Doc’

<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-topline">TOPLINE</h2>



Digital assets firm Jump Crypto said Thursday it replaced the $325 million worth of tokens allegedly stolen from its portfolio company Wormhole Portal, a platform that helps users transfer cryptocurrency between the Solana and Ethereum blockchains, in one of the biggest hacks ever to hit the booming—and largely unregulated—decentralized finance space.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="key-facts">KEY FACTS</h2>



Jump Crypto, the cryptocurrency-focused investment arm of quant trading firm Jump Trading, which has&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/rebeccaszkutak/2021/09/14/jump-capital-raises-350-million-and-doubles-down-on-crypto/?sh=68875db226de">raised</a>&nbsp;more than $700 million in capital,&nbsp;<a href="https://twitter.com/JumpCryptoHQ/status/1489301013408497666" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">tweeted</a>&nbsp;Thursday afternoon that it had &#8220;replaced&#8221; 120,000 stolen Ethereum-based tokens &#8220;to make community members whole&#8221; and support Wormhole but provided no further details about the bailout.



Jump&#8217;s tweet came hours after blockchain platform Wormhole, which launched last August and holds roughly $1 billion in deposited funds,&nbsp;<a href="https://twitter.com/wormholecrypto/status/1489232008521859079?s=20&amp;t=IYFEdB9yWoO4mM2okL7SgQ" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">confirmed</a>&nbsp;on Twitter that funds involved in the hack had been &#8220;restored,&#8221; and said on Telegram that &#8220;all funds are safe.&#8221;



Wormhole previously notified users of a possible hack on Twitter at about 4 p.m. ET Wednesday,&nbsp;<a href="https://twitter.com/wormholecrypto/status/1488976115750383626?s=20&amp;t=Iw5TGKo9Cp8f6gfWDIqPUA" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">saying</a>&nbsp;its network was down for maintenance as the firm looked into a potential attack.



About an hour later, Wormhole&nbsp;<a href="https://twitter.com/wormholecrypto/status/1489001949881978883?s=20&amp;t=Iw5TGKo9Cp8f6gfWDIqPUA" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">said</a>&nbsp;its network had been exploited and claimed about 120,000 tokens of a cryptocurrency known as wrapped ether, which tracks the value of the world&#8217;s second-largest cryptocurrency, ether, had been stolen—representing some $325 million in value.



In a message embedded onto the Ethereum blockchain, Wormhole offered the attacker a $10 million bounty to return the funds,&nbsp;<a href="https://www.elliptic.co/blog/325-million-stolen-from-wormhole-defi-service" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">according</a>&nbsp;to blockchain analytics company Elliptic, which called the Wednesday incident the fourth largest cryptocurrency hack ever.



Soon after the heist, analysts at blockchain security firm CertiK said the hack represented the largest-ever attack on the Solana network and an &#8220;unfortunate reality&#8221; for the booming decentralized finance space, which has heated up among investors alongside the broader cryptocurrency industry over the past year, despite a growing number of similar hacks.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="crucial-quote">CRUCIAL QUOTE</h2>



&#8220;[Jump] believes in a multichain future and that @WormholeCrypto is essential infrastructure,&#8221; Jump, which&nbsp;<a href="https://thefullfx.com/jump-trading-buys-certus-one/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">acquired</a>&nbsp;Wormhole&#8217;s parent company for an undisclosed amount in August, tweeted Thursday, referring to the type of protocol Wormhole uses to allow users to swap tokens between different blockchains. &#8220;That’s why we replaced 120k ETH to make community members whole and support Wormhole now as it continues to develop.&#8221;



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="tangent">TANGENT</h2>



Even though the space only started gaining traction in 2020, there have been more than $2 billion in direct losses suffered by decentralized finance services due to hacks and exploits, according to Elliptic on Wednesday. In August, hackers&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/jonathanponciano/2021/08/10/more-than-600-million-stolen-in-ethereum-and-other-cryptocurrencies-marking-one-of-cryptos-biggest-hacks-ever/?sh=70c80e727f62">breached</a>&nbsp;blockchain-based platform Poly Network and extracted more than $600 million in cryptocurrencies, marking DeFi&#8217;s biggest hack ever. Those funds were&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/jonathanponciano/2021/08/12/hacker-finally-returns-nearly-all-600-million-stolen-in-ethereum-other-tokens-after-major-crypto-heist/?sh=5cd80c6c19cb">eventually</a>&nbsp;returned .



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="what-we-don-t-know">WHAT WE DON&#8217;T KNOW</h2>



It&#8217;s still unclear who the alleged hacker is and whether Wormhole is still working to retrieve the stolen funds.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="big-number">BIG NUMBER</h2>



$192 billion. That’s the market value of all decentralized finance tokens, according to cryptodata&nbsp;<a href="https://defillama.com/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">website</a>&nbsp;DeFi Llama. The space shot past a $250 billion valuation for the first time ever in December but has since fallen amid a&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/jonathanponciano/2022/01/10/looking-ugly-crypto-market-crash-intensifies-after-300-billion-sell-off-how-low-can-bitcoin-prices-go/">broader</a>&nbsp;cryptocurrency market sell-off.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="key-background">KEY BACKGROUND</h2>



Securities and Exchange Commission Chairman Gary Gensler has repeatedly said the decentralized finance industry, also known as DeFi, deserves more government scrutiny. Such platforms largely sidestep traditional intermediaries like central banks and exchanges for financial services and instead rely on blockchains and cryptocurrencies to process transactions. Gensler has said the practices can implicate securities, commodities and banking laws, and last year&nbsp;<a href="https://www.sec.gov/news/public-statement/gensler-aspen-security-forum-2021-08-03" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">called</a>&nbsp;on Congress to ramp up its authority over the cryptocurrency industry, which he likened to the “Wild West.”&nbsp;



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="further-reading">FURTHER READING</h2>



<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/jonathanponciano/2021/08/12/hacker-finally-returns-nearly-all-600-million-stolen-in-ethereum-other-tokens-after-major-crypto-heist/?sh=5cd80c6c19cb">Hacker Returns Nearly All $600 Million Stolen In Ethereum, Other Tokens After Major Crypto Heist</a> (Forbes)



By Jonathan Ponciano, Forbes Staff

Millennial generation boy on smart screen

Jump Crypto Fronts $325 Million In Stolen Crypto One Day After Solana’s Biggest Hack Ever

<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-topline">TOPLINE</h2>



Bitcoin tumbled 16% overnight Saturday amid a wider plunge of cryptocurrencies as investors pared riskier bets with financial markets unsettled by the spread of the omicron coronavirus variant.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">KEY FACTS</h2>



Bitcoin, the No. 1 cryptocurrency by market value, was trading at $47,558.47 as of 9:30 a.m. Saturday, down 16% from a day earlier, according to<a href="https://www.coingecko.com/en" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">&nbsp;CoinGecko</a>.



It had fallen as much as 20% before recovering some of its losses.



As of Saturday morning, Ether, the second-largest digital token, was off 13.1%; Binance Coin, the third-largest token, was down 11%; Solana, the fifth-largest token, had given up 17.2%, according to<a href="https://www.coingecko.com/en" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">&nbsp;CoinGecko</a>.



Meme coin Dogecoin <a href="https://www.coingecko.com/en" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">shed</a> nearly a fifth of its market value and Shiba Inu coin declined 14.9%.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">KEY BACKGROUND</h2>



The drop in cryptocurrencies came after a volatile week in financial markets. The omicron variant has led countries around the world to restrict travel amid worries that vaccines may not be as effective against the strain. Fed Chairman Jerome Powell indicated earlier this week the central bank could accelerate the tapering of its pandemic bond-buying program, with inflation looking more persistent than policy makers had believed.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">FURTHER READING</h2>



<a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/bitcoin-price-tumbles-after-wall-street-selloff-11638621435" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Bitcoin Price Tumbles After Wall Street Selloff</a>&nbsp;(Wall Street Journal)



<a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-12-04/bitcoin-plunges-more-than-20-amid-tumble-in-cryptocurrencies?sref=X2kHL3Gj" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Bitcoin Plunges Over 20% in Another Sign of Global Market Nerves</a> (Bloomberg)



By Lisa Kim, Forbes Staff

Bitcoin and candlestick chart

Bitcoin And Other Digital Tokens Plunge Amid Volatility In Financial Markets

It’s everyone’s dream to get paid to do nothing. Bitcoin miner Layer1 is turning that dream into reality — having figured out how to make money even when its machines are turned off.&nbsp;



Layer1 is a cryptocurrency startup backed by the likes of billionaire&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/profile/peter-thiel/#20734ccc533a">Peter Thiel</a>. In recent months, out in the hardscrabble land of west Texas,&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/christopherhelman/2020/02/28/why-is-this-peter-thiel-backed-startup-mining-bitcoin-in-west-texas/#57cf2dc55174">the company has been busy</a>&nbsp;erecting steel boxes (think shipping containers) stuffed chockablock with high-end processors submerged inside cooling baths of mineral oil. Why west Texas? Beause thanks to a glut of natural gas and a forest of wind turbines, power there is among the cheapest in the world — which is what you need for crypto.&nbsp;



“Mining Bitcoin is about converting electricity into money,” says Alex Liegl, CEO and co-founder. By this fall Layer1 will have dozens of these boxes churning around the clock to transform 100 megawatts into a stream of Bitcoin. Liegl says their average cost of production is about $1,000 per coin — equating to a 90% profit margin at current BTC price of $9,100.&nbsp;



So it’s odd how excited Liegl is about the prospect of having to shut down his Bitcoin miners this summer.&nbsp;



Already this year west Texas has seen a string of 100-degree days. But the real heat and humidity don’t hit until August, which is when the Texas power grid strains under the load of every air conditioning unit in the state going full blast. During an intense week in 2019, wholesale electricity prices in the grid region managed by the Electricity Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) soared from about $120 per megawatthour to peak out at $9,000 per mwh. It was only the third time in history that Texas power hit that level. And although the peak pricing only lasted an hour or so, that’s enough to generate big profits. Analyst Hugh Wynne at research outfit SSR figures that Texas power generators make about 15% of annual revenues during the peak 1% of hours (whereas in more temperate California grid generators only get 3% of revs from the top 1%).



Turns out that running a phalanx of Bitcoin miners is a great way to arbitrage those peaks. Layer1 has entered into so-called “demand response” contracts whereby at a minute’s notice they will shut down all their machines and instead allow their 100 mw load to flow onto the grid. “We act as an insurance underwriter for the energy grid,” says Liegl, 27. “If there is an insufficiency of supply we can shut down.” The best part, they get paid whether a grid emergeny occurs or not. Just for their willingness to shut in Bitcoin production, Layer1 collects an annual premium equating to $19 per megawatthour of their expected power demand — or about $17 million. Given Layer1’s roughly $25 per mwh long-term contracted costs, this gets their all-in power price down 75% to less than 1 cent per kwh (just 10% of what residential customers pay).&nbsp;



It may seem like grid operators are paying Layer1 a lot for something that might not even happen, especially with coronavirus reducing electricity demand, but it makes total sense, says&nbsp;<a href="https://uh.edu/uh-energy/about-uh-energy/energy-fellows/blog-posts/ed-hirs/index.php" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Ed Hirs</a>, a lecturer in energy economics at the University of Houston and research fellow at consultancy BDO: “It’s a lot cheaper option than building a whole new power plant or battery system just to keep it on standby.”&nbsp;



And although this may be a new concept for cryptocurrency miners, it’s been done before. Two decades ago industrialist Charles Hurwitz bought up power-hogging aluminum smelters in the Pacific Northwest and&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/forbes/2001/0402/053.html#34cccc1d3da9">made more money reselling electricity</a>&nbsp;than making metal. “It used to be called load management,” says Dan Delurey, a consultant with&nbsp;<a href="http://www.wedgemere.com/team/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Wedgemere Group</a>. “In old commercial buildings you might still find telephone wires connected to air conditioning systems so that grid operators could send a signal to shut off.” More recently we’ve seen companies install radio-based devices to control hot water heaters and lighting systems. Indeed, grid management is a hot enough area that in 2017 Italy’s power giant Enel bought Boston-based Enernoc for $250 million and Itron&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/companies/itron" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">ITRI</a>&nbsp;bought Comverge for $100 million. What’s emerged are entities, like Layer1, that Delurey calls the “prosumer” — producing consumer.&nbsp;



As for Layer1, Liegl says his next step is to vertically integrate into financial products, including Bitcoin derivatives and more. “We are building an in-house energy trading division to leverage this into being a virtual power plant.”&nbsp;



His message to any pikers still trying to mine cryptocurrencies from their bedroom PC or even via cloud services: “I can’t think of something more irrational at this point. It’s like if I wanted to dig a hole in my backyard and try to get oil out of the ground.”&nbsp;



&#8211;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/christopherhelman/">Christopher Helman</a>, Forbes Staff, <a href="https://www.forbes.com/energy">Energy</a>

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How This Billionaire-Backed Crypto Startup Gets Paid To Not Mine Bitcoin

Yele Bademosi is passionate about helping his home continent of Africa. Born into a missionary home in Ibadan, Nigeria, Bademosi’s mother and father used to deliver medical services and bibles to the Yoruba tribes-people in the forests surrounding&nbsp;his home-town, often going from hut to hut. When he and his sisters were old enough, they helped. “That is my earliest memory in terms of thinking about how to give back,” he says, “But as I grew older, I changed my views to thinking about, how do you actually help people at scale?”&nbsp;



Last year, Bademosi became a director at the venture capital arm of the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange Binance, which trades $1.5 billion in crypto assets each day. And today he is excited because he’s launching Bundle, one of six African startups the Malta-based crypto exchange is now funding, and the first it launched. The startup is being run by Africans in an effort to get Africans to use cryptocurrency, not as an investment vehicle, but as a global means of exchange. Bundle is essentially a social payments app, similar to Venmo or Square’s Cash App.



It lets users send, receive and spend bitcoin, ether, and Nigerian naira with little more than the recipient’s phone number. Unlike Square though, Bundle will also let users spend Binance coin (BNB), the exchange’s native cryptocurrency, which has been doled out to loyal and active traders using its crypto exchange. In the near future they’ll be able to spend and (more importantly) save Binance U.S. dollars (BUSD), stablecoins backed by U.S. dollars and regulated in the United States.



Bundle joins numerous tech giants working on ventures in Africa. Facebook <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/michaeldelcastillo/2020/04/16/libra-compromises-undermine-original-facebook-promise/#41334dc02737">intends</a> to co-launch a cryptocurrency targeting the unbanked and Square’s founder Jack Dorsey recently announced plans to immigrate to the continent. “Regardless of your geography, you should have access to the best financial services. And unfortunately, your geography today defines the quality of financial services that you have,” says Bademosi, who is also Bundle’s CEO. “The same way the internet created freedom of information, I think blockchains create freedom of quality of financial services.”



Born in 1991, the only boy among five sisters, Bademosi always knew entrepreneurship was in his future. Perhaps rebelling from his bossy sisters, he knew he didn’t want to work for others. Bademosi’s first experience with a computer was at an internet cafe. As a child, he’d walk up a flight of stairs to the second floor of his local shopping center, push open a sliding door and frantically scan for cheat codes to his favorite computer games in 30-minute chunks, before his money ran out.



It wasn’t until 2007, when Bademosi was 16-years-old, that he finally got his first computer, an Acer Aspire One Series his parents got for him when he started classes at Lansdowne College, a preparatory school for University, similar to a high-school, in Westminster, England. For the first time, he had unlimited online access and an outlet to focus his burgeoning interests. By the time he graduated two years later, the 6’ 6” Bademosi had not only competed on the school’s football and basketball teams, but studied biology, chemistry, psychology and mathematics. “There&#8217;s a huge difference between what you learn in college in a structured environment and what you can learn online,” he says. “It felt like what I imagined the Enlightenment period felt like for people who lived when the printing press was first available.”&nbsp;



Growing up in Nigeria, he says, meant that students who did well in school were pushed into the sciences. When his youngest sister decided to go into economics, or what he called “liberal-type accounting,” he was in shock. In spite of his entrepreneurial aspirations, he knew he would be expected to either to become a medical doctor like his father, an engineer or an architect. He hated physics though, so passed on engineering, and architecture was out because as he put it, “I couldn&#8217;t draw straight lines.” His father convinced him that even if he didn’t end up practicing medicine,&nbsp;the University of London’s accelerated three-year program meant he’d have extra time afterwards to find a path of his own, and he enrolled in 2009.



In his first year of medical school his father died of kidney-failure. His father’s death gave him the courage to rebel. He had always found that he was more interested in computers than medicine so he dropped out of medical school with plans to build apps for Apple’s OS.&nbsp;After a few unsuccessful months building a social media app Bademosi flew back to Nigeria.



<figure class="wp-block-image"><img decoding="async" src="https://specials-images.forbesimg.com/imageserve/5ea0b91d8c2caa0006e71892/960x0.jpg?fit=scale" alt="Yele Bademosi, Bundle"/><figcaption>Bademosi works in his company&#8217;s office.&nbsp;BINANCE / YUSUF</figcaption></figure>



There he got a job as manager of Starta, devoted to helping African companies get off the ground by providing education, tools, and networking opportunities. After developing a taste for helping startups get off the ground, Bademosi founded his own angel investing firm called Mircotraction. His venture had well connected backers: Nigerian energy and real estate tycoon, Tunde Folawiyo; the CEO of Y-Combinator, Michael Siebel, and Google’s head of ecosystem for sub-Saharan Africa, Andy Volk.



Lagos-based Microtraction is now among the most active investors in Western Africa, having funded 15 companies, including 54gene, an African genomics research startup that recently attracted $15 million from Adjuvant Capital, Y-Combinator and others.



Bademosi had learned about bitcoin in college but it wasn’t until 2017 after he read a book called Master Switch by Columbia professor Tim Wu, that he began to see blockchain as a way to let networks of individuals compete against the likes of Facebook, Amazon, Google, and Apple using a shared technology infrastructure. “We’re not there yet,” he says. ‘But I believe that blockchain and decentralized technologies can open up the internet again, and create a new playing field that new entrants could play on.”



While the jump from medicine to blockchain may seem big , Bademosi sees them as strongly related. “The similarity really is the fact that you have individual organisms, whether that&#8217;s a cell or a human or a computer, acting in their own best interests towards what&#8217;s still a common goal, and there are a bunch of rules they all have to obey.”



Just a few months after founding Microtraction in August 2017, Bademosi bought his first bitcoin and as its price fluctuated wildly he became hooked on crypto asset investing. That led him to Binance, which was, founded in China, and is now doing business from Malta. In November 2018, Binance published a ten-point <a rel="noreferrer noopener" href="https://medium.com/@benjaminrameau/10-reasons-why-binance-labs-is-fully-committed-to-africa-3aeaaa32fe9e" target="_blank">thesis</a> on why it was dedicated to the continent and launched a subsidiary in Uganda. Number four on Binance’s list was Bademosi’s childhood mantra: scalability. 



“For me, blockchains are as big as the internet,” says Bademosi. “And can you imagine Bill Gates or Larry Page or, Mark, Zuckerberg coming to Africa less than one year after the company was started?” He was impressed. So much so, that by January 2019, he had pitched his vision for what Binance should be doing in Africa and instead of taking him up on his advice, the company hired him, making him the first director at Binance Labs focused on investing in Africa-based blockchain startups and leading the Africa chapter of the organization’s incubation program.



So far Binance Labs has invested in five African startups, one from South Africa, one from Kenya, one from Ghana and three from Nigeria, all serving different aspects of the content’s growing crypto economy. Notably, Lagos-based Yellow Card is a way to buy bitcoin even without a bank via local agents, and Flutterwave is the same fiat-to-crypto bridge that lets Binance customers buy cryptocurrency with naira.



<figure class="wp-block-image"><img decoding="async" src="https://specials-images.forbesimg.com/imageserve/5ea0b97cbed92b0006690434/960x0.jpg?fit=scale" alt="Bundle team"/><figcaption>Bundle backend engineer Kenny Shittu (left) meets with blockchain engineer Oluchi Enebeli, user experience designer Ugo Ifezue, backend engineer Seyi Ajonibode and operations associate Chinny Eze at Bundle&#8217;s offices on March 9, 2020   BUNDLE / YUSUF</figcaption></figure>



Binance and its new Bundle have Western competitors in Africa. Facebook’s Libra has its sights set on banking the unbanked. Another potential competitor using cryptocurrency to serve the unbanked is Akon, the Senegalese-American musician whose Akoin project announced recently that it would be the exclusive currency of the Mwale Medical Technology City in Kenya.&nbsp;“Our goal is for akoin to be the official currency of the continent,” says Akon.



To give an idea of the total market up for grabs here, even if the average account holder might only own a fraction of what Western banks require to open an account, the World Bank estimates that 1.7 billion adults around the world are without such access. Fifty-seven percent of adults in sub-Saharan African, or about 350 million people, don’t have bank accounts, according to the World Bank. To help close that gap nearly&nbsp;$700 million was invested in fintech in Africa last year, according to media firm WeeTracker.&nbsp;Of the 1.2 billion people living in Africa, Bademosi estimates only 1.4 million are already using crypto.&nbsp;



In two weeks Bundle expects to add BUSD, a stablecoin pegged to the U.S. dollar, created by blockchain startup Paxos, regulated by the New York Department of Financial Services, and spendable anywhere in the world. One possible financial product that could eventually be offered using this technology would be what amounts to a savings account denominated in U.S. dollars for people living in Nigeria, and eventually other African nations. Instead of Nigerians losing 12% to inflation at current rates by keeping their cash in a savings account, they could be paid interest denominated in U.S. dollars for funds held in custody elsewhere. “Being able to save in stablecoins and earn interest per annum is huge,” says Bademosi. “And we can offer that up to anyone anywhere.”



Users will also be able to cash in and cash out using local fiat currencies. Longer term plans include a physical debit card and the ability to purchase U.S. stocks, Nigerian mutual funds and agriculture debt, and unspecified incentive programs designed to jumpstart the cryptocurrency economy in Africa, according to internal documents provided to&nbsp;Forbes. The documents compare Bundle to Mosaic, the internet browser invented by Marc Andreessen, and credited for weaving together the previously esoteric processes required to use the internet into a single, intuitive browser.&nbsp;



In September 2019, Bundle quietly raised $450,000 from Binance, Pave Investments and other African investors. “We believe Bundle can become one of the key projects that will support Binance&#8217;s mission of scaling the adoption of crypto on the continent,” says Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao (CZ). To help do that, Bundle will be free at launch, with plans to eventually charge 0.5% to 2% per transaction on all short term trades and 3% of assets under management on yearly gains, for longer-term investing. While the finer details of how that works have yet to be announced, we can look to Binance for some intriguing clues.&nbsp;



After creating BNB in July 2017, the asset has grown to a total market value of $2.2 billion, making it the eighth largest crypto-asset according to&nbsp;CoinMarketCap.com, the widely used cryptocurrency markets site Binance recently acquired for a&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/billybambrough/2020/03/31/bitcoin-and-crypto-world-rocked-by-massive-400-million-binance-bid-for-coinmarketcap-report/#34f2d302247f">reported</a>&nbsp;$400 million. But it’s the way Binance uses that asset, which users acquire in exchange for making transactions on-site, that Bundle perhaps has the most to learn from.&nbsp;



Binance’s users are allowed to pay their fees on the site using the same BNB cryptocurrency they are rewarded for being regular users, and a new platform, called LaunchPad, lets users raise capital via initial coin offerings (ICOs) also payable in BNB, establishing what cryptocurrency news site CoinDesk <a rel="noreferrer noopener" href="https://www.coindesk.com/the-unbelievable-brilliance-of-binance" target="_blank">called</a> “a virtuous cycle by which its users were incentivized to stay within its platform.” Bademosi, it would seem, has learned his lessons well, a promising sign for the future. “Bundle does an excellent job of putting fiat and crypto side by side,” he says. “And then nudging the user to use some of these digital currencies or assets in innovative ways.”



&#8211;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/michaeldelcastillo/">Michael del Castillo,</a>Forbes Staff, <a href="https://www.forbes.com/crypto-blockchain">Crypto &amp; Blockchain</a>

Tag: crypto

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