Another very much range bound week with BTC +2% WoW still lingering below 20k and overall market cap scratching at the 1tn mark. Obviously the big news and still unfolding story was the ~600mm binance smart chain exploit and the chain halt. At the moment BNB only down -4% in the past 24h and flat WoW. The other big under-performer this week is Celcius token -24% about to drop out of TOP 100 coins as the deadline for bidding for assets approaches and new wrong doing allegations of former management surface. Outside of that the EU finalized MiCA wording and tightened restrictions on Russia now banning all crypto transactions while Kim Kardashian settled to pay SEC a 1.26mm fine for illegal crypto promotion activity in June last year. Regulation is coming our way. Enjoy reading!

Bat Tai Chi — [email protected]

Binance Smart Chain halted after exploit

Now this just happened so the story is still unfolding but I’m sharing what we (think) we know so far. It seems like there was a hack on a cross chain bridge that allowed for issuing more BNB. There were 2 withdrawals of 1mm BNB. The attacker then used these to swap into ETH and made away with so far ~100mm mostly via ETH. Expect these being tornadoed out. The overall scale could have been much larger but Binance Smart Chain has been halted now and even a potential rollback is being rumored. In the process of getting BNB out the attacker drained liquidity from many of the DEXs on Binance Smart Chain which can result in a domino effect. The attackers address has already been blacklisted by Teather. If you want to dig deeper into the technicals SamCZSun has a great twitter tread that is evolving. We will hear about this story for a while I feel.

EU finalized MiCA rules

The block has agreed on the full legal text of its Market in Crypto Asset (MiCA) regulation. It is providing a framework for harmonized regulation of our emerging asset class across the EU and it includes a law to reveal the identity of those making crypto payments. It imposes reserve requirement and other restrictions for stable coins that could limit access of US issuers and will de facto mean the end of unhosted wallets due to require ID collection for transfers in the name of limiting money laundering. The law likely will only come into effect in 2024 but that’s probably the only major +ve about it. Many fear it will drive off innovation from the continent and impede Europe’s ability to attract talent. In a separate ruling and just to give you a flavor of what could come post full MiCA implementation the EU also banned all crypto payments from Russia in a new sanction package. Previously up to EUR 10k was still allowed now no services or transactions are allowed with anyone from Russia.

Celcius’ last innings

So the final bid deadline for celsius assets auction will be 17th October. We will know whether Sam actually wants to get involved there too — CZ might be busy with other things atm. More court filings became public including a 14500 page document containing customer names, transaction types and amounts, which services the customer had used, types and quantities of tokens held, and more. Naturally this got wide spread attention on CT and serves just as another example of how Celcius seemed to have combined the worst of TradFi and Crypto. We also learned this week about Mashinsky and other seniors withdrawing millions in personal funds at Celcius just before general withdrawals were suspended. It’s really not looking good over there for them.

Namibia Central Bank: Crypto can now be accepted as payment by Merchants

This is one many had on their bingo cards for 2022. Another developing country opening up to Bitcoin and crypto assets. Now cryptocurrencies are not legal tender in the country so the Bank of Namibia has launched “virtual assets and virtual assets service providers under its Fintech Innovation hub.” The Central Bank said it is also considering “diligently amending applicable laws and regulations in the consultation with other relevant authorities.” These latest statements describe that even though privately issued digital currencies are still not legally recognized, vendors and traders may accept payment in this form. In effect allowing the use of stable coins and BTC amongst others. It’s a major step into the right direction.

Pause the Chain [Binance Smart Chain]. Freeze the funds. Roll it back. This is a bank with extra steps.

Ryan Sean Adams

The 80–20 split between treasuries and bonds remained the favored approach during the voting process. This showcases the opportunity associated with the move, and seeing such adamant support from the community is very exciting

Nadia Alvarez, Head of MakerGrowtw (MakerDAO)

Decoupling between inequality of comfort and inequality of power. The former will decrease, the latter will in some places increase, though democratizing technologies can provide a counterbalancing pressure. This has been happening for at least the last few decades already

Vitalik Buterin

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