Block 1: Breaking News
Binance Taking On All Fronts
Everything seems to be going well for the giant in the cryptocurrency world. First, Binance announced their registration with the Swedish Financial Supervisory Authority (FSA) to maintain their regulation in seven European Union countries, including France. Secondly, Binance.US, the American arm of the platform, announced that they would buy assets from the defunct company Voyager Digital, for a total of $1 billion. This will allow clients to retrieve some of their deposits during Voyager’s bankruptcy process. Third, Binance also declared that they would be hiring 3,000 people in various roles before 2023.
Avalanche Blockchain Partners With Amazon
The tech giant Amazon Web Services (AWS), Google’s cloud computing platform, has partnered with the Avalanche blockchain, “to accelerate blockchain adoption by businesses, institutions, and governments.” The goal is to make the whole of humanity happy. This partnership will allow Avalanche’s ecosystem (decentralized apps, network nodes and subnets) to be connected directly with AWS. It remains to be seen in the coming months how this alliance will come together, but it raises concerns about a possible progressive centralization. The crypto enthusiasts love the idea of decentralization.
Polygon Blockchain Joins With Mastercard
After establishing alliances and partnerships with companies like Walt Disney, BMW, Mercedes, Adobe, Adidas, and Starbucks, Polygon has joined forces with the payment giant Mastercard. At the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas, the company also announced the creation of an accelerator for music artists. How does this all relate to Polygon? The Artist accelerator will include a limited edition NFT called “The Mastercard Music Pass”, which will give holders access to “exclusive gear, unique resources, and other physical and virtual experiences.” This collection will be supported and backed by the Polygon blockchain. More details of this project will be revealed in the upcoming months. It’s clear, though, that Mastercard is eager to be part of the crypto world.
Sam Bankman-Fried Explains Himself Again
The disgraced former head of FTX denied having concealed billions of dollars in a long new post published on Substack last Thursday. He also gave his view on the failure of his platform. FTX and its sister company, Alameda Research, lost money due to a market crash which was not properly hedged. “I did not steal funds and I certainly did not hide billions of dollars,” Bankman-Fried writes. He also stated that he “has not been running Alameda in recent years.” We’ll find out more bizarre explanations from SBF at his trial date on October 2, 2023.
Coinbase Cuts 950 Jobs
After regulators required the taxpayer to pay $100 million to ensure compliance last week, the cryptocurrency platform announced that it would lay off 950 more employees this week. This follows 1,100 layoffs six months earlier. Coinbase also declared that it would drop any projects deemed to have a “low probability of success” in order to cut back on expenses. As the chart below indicates, Coinbase has been competing with CryptoLayoffs.com in terms of layoffs since 2022.