Cryptocurrency

Bitcoin (BTC) and Ether (ETH) are trading above the psychologically important levels of $30,000 and $2,000 respectively. This suggests that the crypto winter may be on its last legs.  Some analysts are calling for an altseason to begin but it may be too early for that. When most of the crypto bears turn bullish, Bitcoin

Top Stories This Week Ethereum’s Shapella hard fork executed on mainnet The Ethereum blockchain’s mainnet, also referred to as the Beacon Chain, implemented the Shapella hard fork on April 12. The upgrade made fund withdrawals possible for those who have staked the network’s Ether (ETH) asset. Within the first hour of the hard fork, a

Ethereum’s long-anticipated Shanghai and Capella upgrade was activated on April 12 and the total withdrawals in the first 40 hours after the Shapella upgrade stood at 142,425 ETH, per Nansen data. This falls in line with previous estimates.  For a brief moment on April 12, when Shapella was activated, the deposits to ETH staking contracts

Ether (ETH) prices have topped the psychological $2,000 level following the Shapella upgrade this week and the result is a decline in Bitcoin (BTC) market dominance. According to data from the analysis site btctools.io Ether’s market share climbed to 19.8%, an over 1.1% boost in the last 24 hours while Bitcoin’s dominance slid by just

Ether (ETH) price has increased by 58% year to date, but it has far underperformed the market leader Bitcoin (BTC). In fact, the ETH/BTC price ratio has dropped to 0.063, its lowest level in 9 months.  Analysts believe that the majority of the movement can be attributed to the Ethereum network’s upcoming Shapella hard fork,

LayerZero is a communication method that facilitates cross-chain applications. Its low-level messaging capabilities enable the development of omni-chain functionalities on top of it, such as decentralized exchanges, money market protocols and numerous other DeFi applications that can benefit from cross-chain liquidity provisions. The LayerZero platform was launched in September 2021 with Stargate Finance, a cross-chain

Decentralized finance (DeFi) protocol SushiSwap recently suffered an exploit due to a smart contract bug, leading to over $3 million in losses. Members of the crypto community responded to the hack, with some thinking that there was something fishy about it.  On April 9, security firms detected unusual activities in the DeFi platform’s smart contract

The algorithmic stablecoin TerraUSD (UST) collapsed almost one year ago, but some Terra-related projects are still live and trying to overcome some issues. Terraport Finance, a decentralized finance (DeFi) exchange project based on the Terra Classic blockchain, suffered a breach on its liquidity wallet on April 10. Announcing the news on Twitter, Terraport said the

The long weekend has not produced any fireworks in Bitcoin (BTC) price, which continues to trade inside an ever-narrowing range. Bitcoin is on track to form a third consecutive Doji candlestick pattern on the weekly chart. This suggests that the Bitcoin bulls and the bears are not clear about the next directional move. It is

Bitcoin (BTC) has been trading below $29,000 for the past several days. The analyst community remains divided on the near-term prospects of Bitcoin. While some believe that Bitcoin could rise to $30,000, others are of the opinion that a local top has been made. Bloomberg Intelligence senior macro strategist Mike McGlone said that cryptocurrencies, along

Nonfungible token (NFT) marketplace LooksRare has upgraded to version 2, reducing fees by 75% and implementing several other features, according to an April 6 announcement from the company. ! Rolled out rn:– Fee dropped to 0.5%– Gas 50% cheaper than Blur– One-signature bulk listing– Buy 70+ NFTs at once– Sellers get ETH instead of WETH

The financial and advertising regulators of the United Kingdom have teamed up to send a warning to social media “finfluencers” telling them to stop promoting illegal “get rich quick” schemes or face law enforcement. The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) and the Advertising Standards Authority (ACA) made reference to cryptocurrencies and nonfungible tokens (NFTs) in its

Tether (USDT) continues to benefit from the ongoing turmoil in the U.S. dollar-backed stablecoin industry with its market capitalization growing significantly in Q1 2023 at other stablecoins’ expense. Tether market cap reaches $80 billion On April 6, the circulating market cap of USDT surpassed $80 billion for the first time since May 2022 with a

Masa Finance’s soulbound tokens will soon be available on Coinbase’s Base network, according to an April 4 announcement from Masa Finance. The new tokens will allow users to link identifying and reputational characteristics to their wallet addresses, making credit underwriting possible on the blockchain, the company said. @getmasafi to Launch Soulbound Token Protocol & Developer

Dakar, the capital of the West African nation of Senegal, now boasts an annual Pan-African Bitcoin conference, over 10 merchants accepting Bitcoin, a local peer-to-peer BTC exchange and a budding Bitcoin community. What’s more, the speed at which Bitcoin’s progress is unwinding is staggering. The city hosted the DakarBTC Days conference just 10 months after

Bitcoin’s (BTC) price initially dipped, but then recovered on April 3. The volatility happened after several OPEC+ members announced plans to cut oil production totaling 1.65 million barrels per day until the end of the year. Some analysts expect this move to tighten supply, resulting in higher prices at the pump. That may in turn

Paris Blockchain Week celebrated its fourth edition in spring 2023 against a backdrop of riots, protests and general civil malaise. The builders in the Bitcoin (BTC), crypto, and Web3 spaces were unfazed by protesters chanting and dancing on the doorstep of the conference venue.  The event took place against the backdrop of ongoing protests in

Top Stories This Week FTX EU launches withdrawal website to pay back European users The European arm of FTX has launched a website to allow customers in Europe to submit withdrawal requests. It comes nearly five months after the global trading platform collapsed and went bankrupt in early November. Meanwhile, in the United States, lawyers

A local court in South Korea denied the prosecutor’s request to issue an arrest warrant for Terraform Labs co-founder Shin Hyun-Seong, also known as Daniel Shin. This was the second attempt made by South Korean authorities to reign in Shin following the recent arrest of Do Kwon — Terra’s other co-founder. On March 23, Kwon

Data from the Personal Consumption Expenditures (PCE) index showed an uptick of 0.3% in February, which lower than the 0.5% increase seen in January. Economists had projected a rise of 0.4% and the PCE data suggests that inflation is gradually showing a decreasing trend.  Risky assets rallied in response to the data and some analysts

Seychelles-based crypto exchange OKX has signaled its intention to expand its crypto services to Australia, a country it believes is primed to take on the next wave of crypto adoption. The trading platform explained in a March 29 statement that Australia would be a key growth market for the firm moving forward. The firm states