Today's news tips:
Bloomberg: China begins taxing overseas investment income of super-rich
Hong Kong police cracked down on a fraud gang under the guise of "cryptocurrency investment", involving a total amount of HK$360 million
Sonic Announces Token Economics: 6% of Initial Total Supply Will Be Provided for Airdrops
Upbit will list CARV (CARV); Coinbase will list Degen (DEGEN)
Bitcoin staking platform Solv Protocol raises $11 million at $200 million valuation
The total net inflow of the US Bitcoin spot ETF yesterday was US$556 million, and the ETF net asset ratio reached 4.75%
Base Network becomes Ethereum Rollup with the largest TVL, slightly surpassing Arbitrum's $2.39 billion
Japanese listed company Metaplanet increased its holdings by 106.976 BTC
Regulatory News
Harris' new policy includes "protecting black men's cryptocurrency investments"
According to KOIN 6 News, U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris announced a policy on Monday to provide more economic opportunities and other development opportunities for black men. The main contents include: 1. Provide 1 million fully forgivable loans to black entrepreneurs, up to $20,000 each, for starting a business. 2. Support education training and mentoring programs to provide high-paying employment opportunities for black men, including a path to becoming teachers. 3. Protect cryptocurrency investments to ensure that black men who invest know that their funds are safe. 4. Launch a national health program that focuses on diseases that disproportionately affect black men. 5. Legalize recreational marijuana and create opportunities for black Americans to succeed in this emerging industry.
However, Harris did not provide further details on a “regulatory framework” for cryptocurrencies in a speech in Erie, Pennsylvania, later on Monday.
Bloomberg: China begins taxing overseas investment income of super-rich
According to Bloomberg, citing people familiar with the matter, China has begun to tax the overseas investment income of its super-rich. Some wealthy people in major Chinese cities have been asked to self-assess or have been summoned by tax authorities to attend meetings to assess potential taxes payable, including arrears in the past few years. Mainland investors may pay a 20% tax on investment income, and may face fines if overdue payments are involved. The final amount can be negotiated. The report also pointed out that mainland China implemented the common reporting standard as early as 2018 to avoid tax evasion, but local regulators have pointed out from time to time that mainland residents must be taxed on global income, including investment income. Some of the targeted people have at least US$10 million in assets overseas, and others are targeted at people who own listed companies in Hong Kong and the United States.
FinCEN accuses TD Bank of failing to report suspicious crypto activity in $3 billion money laundering fine
According to The Block, the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) accused banking giant TD Bank of failing to report suspicious activities of an unnamed customer group when conducting international cryptocurrency transactions. FinCEN said that TD Bank processed more than 2,000 transactions in nine months for a company called "Customer Group C", which was identified as "allegedly engaged in the sales of financial and real estate industries". Customer Group C lied to TD Bank about its planned international wire transfer activities, saying that annual sales would not exceed $1 million. In fact, Customer Group C allegedly conducted more than $1 billion in transactions through TD Bank. In addition, 90% of Customer Group C's funds came from a British cryptocurrency exchange, and 60% of the funds flowed to financial institutions in Colombia that provided digital asset-related services. Customer Group C did not list Colombia as one of the jurisdictions it was dealing with when working with TD Bank, and continued to work with "high-risk industries and companies" in regions such as the Middle East. Earlier news, TD Bank in the United States became the first bank in history to conspire to launder money and will pay a $3 billion fine.
Hong Kong police cracked down on a fraud gang under the guise of "cryptocurrency investment", involving a total amount of HK$360 million
According to Hong Kong 01, the Hong Kong police smashed a local fraud group and arrested 27 people. They were suspected of defrauding many local and overseas victims during the operation of about one year, with a total amount of defrauded up to HK$360 million. The investigation revealed that the group used a number of young people with relatively high education, divided the group members into different teams to defraud, provided them with "training manuals" and instructed them on how to fake tragic life stories to attract victims to develop online relationships with them, and then defraud money by "investing in cryptocurrency". They also set up a "performance list" to encourage group members to "rush for performance". The team that topped the list defrauded more than US$266,000 (more than HK$2.06 million) in the past month. Senior Superintendent Fong Chi-kin of the New Territories South Regional Criminal Headquarters pointed out that the fraud group that was busted hired graduates majoring in digital media from local universities as "technology specialists", and collaborated with overseas fraudsters and IT professionals to set up a fake cryptocurrency investment platform. They also used deepfake technology to create characters that were quite attractive in appearance, personality, occupation, and academic qualifications, develop online relationships with the victims, and then trick them into investing in cryptocurrency.
Project News
deBridge will conduct TGE on October 17, and liquidity bootstrapping is ongoing on Jupiter’s LFG launchpad
According to The Block, ahead of Thursday's token generation event, the liquidity bootstrap for the upcoming DBR governance token from cross-chain service deBridge is being conducted through the LFG launchpad of Jupiter, a decentralized exchange aggregator for Solana. DBR LFG is hosted by the deBridge Foundation, and this issuance is unique compared to previous issuances, offering a fixed price for all participants. Eligible whitelist participants can collectively deposit up to $5 million in USDC stablecoins before the official launch to bid for DBR's initial price of $0.025/token. This brings the project's fully diluted valuation to $250 million. The deposit limit for each whitelist address is $25,000 (USDC). The DBR token is based on Solana, with a total supply of 10 billion. The LFG vault will be open until 16:00 Beijing time on October 16. It is available to participants who have used the deBridge application for at least 10 days before the deadline on July 23, 2024, and those who have staked at least 690 JUP tokens at the time of the snapshot. deBridge’s token generation event is scheduled for October 17 at 16:00 Beijing time, with trading starting at $0.03 per DBR — a $300 million FDV. The team confirmed that tokens obtained through the LFG issuance will be issued immediately at the TGE in the form of 50%, and the remaining 50% will be issued six months later. deBridge token holders can stake their DBR tokens to participate in the DAO’s governance votes on protocol parameters. DBR tokens can also be used to stake to support deBridge validators once deBridge’s delegated staking and slashing modules are activated. Overall, deBridge’s token distribution will allocate 20% of the supply to its community, with a circulating supply of 1.8 billion DBR at launch. Of the remaining supply, 26% is allocated to ecosystem support, 20% to core contributors, 17% to strategic partners, 15% to the deBridge Foundation, and 2% to validators.
Australia’s first Ethereum spot ETF is now listed on Cboe
According to Cointelegraph, Australia's first Ethereum spot ETF Monochrome Ethereum ETF (IETH) has been listed on Cboe Australia, with total net assets reaching $176,600 (AUD262,500) as of 2 pm local time. The fund has a management fee of 0.50% and provides physical applications and redemptions, allowing cash or ETH transactions. It is the only dual-access spot Ethereum ETF in Australia. BitGo and Gemini are the cryptocurrency custodians of the ETF, while State Street Australia is the fund manager.
Sonic Announces Token Economics: 6% of Initial Total Supply Will Be Provided for Airdrops
Sonic Labs released a simplified white paper (Litepaper), disclosing that it is introducing token economics based on a community governance proposal. The key points are as follows: At the time of official launch, S's circulating supply will be approximately 2.88 billion, and the total supply will be 3.175 billion, which is comparable to the supply of FTM; six months after launch, the network will provide 6% of the initial total supply for airdrops to reward Opera and Sonic users, and vesting will be done within nine months after the airdrop; six months after launch, the network will mint 1.5% of the initial total supply each year for six years to fund growth and destroy any unused tokens; starting four years after the launch of Sonic, the annual inflation rate will be 1.75% to reward validators.
Upbit will list CARV (CARV)
According to the official announcement, South Korean crypto exchange Upbit will launch CARV (CARV) in the KRW, BTC, and USDT markets, and trading support will start at 15:00 local time on October 15.
Vitalik suggests reducing the Ethereum validator staking threshold from 32 ETH to 1 ETH
According to Cryptobriefing, Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin proposed a major update to Ethereum's proof-of-stake consensus mechanism, suggesting that the validator staking threshold be reduced from 32 ETH to 1 ETH. According to Buterin, "lowering the minimum staking amount to 1 ETH will solve the problem of preventing more people from staking individually," democratizing staking and enhancing the decentralization of Ethereum. Currently, Ethereum requires 32 ETH to become a validator, a limit designed to balance security, decentralization, and indirect costs. However, Buterin's new proposal believes that this high threshold is a barrier for smaller participants and individual holders who want to contribute to the security of Ethereum but cannot afford a large amount of lock-up. Lowering the threshold to 1 ETH will greatly reduce the entry barrier, encourage more individual stakers to join the network, and may reduce the degree of staking centralization. Buterin believes that this will be in line with Ethereum's long-term vision of allowing more users to use it. A major challenge in lowering the threshold is to maintain efficiency without overburdening the network. Buterin pointed out that lowering the threshold will increase the number of validators, which may slow down finality or increase the operating costs of running nodes. To solve this problem, Buterin also proposed the concept of "single-slot finality", which will speed up the confirmation of blocks and reduce the finalization time from the current 15 minutes to about 12 seconds. This will not only improve the user experience, but also ensure that the security of Ethereum remains strong even if the number of validators increases.
Sui Foundation: The seller of $400 million SUI is not an insider, but an infrastructure partner
Sui Network, a public chain project, said on the X platform that in response to the accusation that "Sui insiders sold $400 million worth of tokens during this rally", the Sui Foundation would like to respond directly to this person: 1. During this period, no insider, foundation, or Mysten Labs (including the founder of Mysten Labs) employees or ML investors sold $400 million worth of tokens individually or in combination. Insiders did not engage in any preemptive selling or violations of the lock-up period and circulation supply plan. 2. Although the poster did not provide a wallet address, we believe that the possible owner of the wallet is an infrastructure partner who owns the tokens according to the lock-up period. All token lock-up periods are executed by qualified custodians and continuously monitored by the Sui Foundation, and the partner complies with the regulations.
BlackRock CEO: Bitcoin is an asset class in itself, and is discussing with global institutions how to allocate assets
Eric Balchunas, senior ETF analyst at Bloomberg, disclosed on the X platform that Larry Fink, CEO of BlackRock, said in a third-quarter earnings call: "I'm not sure whether the (U.S.) president or other candidates will have a significant impact on the situation. But I do believe that the use of digital assets will become increasingly popular around the world. We are in dialogue with institutions around the world about how they should view digital assets and how they should allocate assets. I think Bitcoin is an asset class in itself, and it is an alternative to other commodities such as gold. Therefore, I think the application of this form of investment will expand to blockchains such as Ethereum, because blockchain can grow significantly. So, if we can improve the acceptance, transparency and related analysis of these assets, then their application will expand. However, I don't think it depends entirely on the strengthening or relaxation of regulation. I think it depends more on a combination of liquidity and transparency. Just as when we started to develop the mortgage market and the high-yield market many years ago, the initial progress Slowly, but as we build better analytics and data, the market gradually gains more acceptance and continues to expand. I firmly believe that we will see a boom in these digital asset markets. Then, we will see how each country views its own digital currency. This is a very different asset than Bitcoin itself. But I believe that as we build better analytics, we will witness things like regulatory issues, how do we view the role of a digitized dollar in this country and what role does it play? This is a very different issue from Bitcoin and other things like that. But all of these issues will be discussed. In other countries, we have seen countries like India, Brazil and others have achieved great success in digitizing their currencies for different reasons. But we believe that these blockchain technologies will have a huge added value. Then, combined with artificial intelligence and better data analysis, the applicability and scope of these markets will expand.”
Coinbase will list Degen (DEGEN)
Coinbase Assets announced on the X platform that Coinbase will add support for Degen (DEGEN) on the Base network. Do not send this asset through other networks, otherwise your funds may be at risk of loss. If liquidity conditions are met, trading will begin on or after 9:00 a.m. Pacific Time on October 15 (0:00 a.m. Beijing Time on October 16). Once the asset is in sufficient supply, the DEGEN-USD trading pair will start trading in stages.
Tether is exploring the possibility of lending to commodity trading firms
According to Bloomberg, Tether is exploring the possibility of providing loans to commodity trading companies.
Trump family-backed crypto project WLFI whitelist registration exceeds 100,000
According to The Block, World Liberty Financial (WLFI), a decentralized financial project supported by the Trump family, announced that its whitelist registration has exceeded 100,000 people, and hired Paxos co-founder Rich Teo as head of stablecoins and payments. It is not clear whether he has left his position at Paxos. WLF's token WLFI will be officially sold to the public on October 15, aiming to raise $300 million and a total token valuation of $1.5 billion. A "golden document" will also be released on Tuesday. The first phase of the WLF plan is to launch a decentralized lending platform similar to Aave on the Ethereum Layer 2 network Scroll, supporting lending transactions for Bitcoin, Ethereum and stablecoins. Subsequent stages include integration with exchanges, user KYC verification, and the segmentation and compliance of real assets. Donald Trump Jr. (Trump's eldest son Donald Trump Jr.) criticized the traditional U.S. banking system in a live broadcast, calling it a "Ponzi scheme" and emphasizing that decentralized finance can bring a more inclusive financial system. In terms of token distribution, 63% of WLFI tokens will be sold to the public starting Tuesday, October 15. The remaining 17% will be used to reward users and 20% will be used to compensate the team. WLFI will be open to qualified investors in the United States, qualified investors in the United Kingdom, and investors outside of these countries.
Former Paxos CEO joins Trump family crypto project WLFi as head of stablecoin and payments
According to The Block Pro, former Paxos CEO Rich Teo has joined the Trump family’s crypto project World Liberty Financial (WLFI) as head of stablecoins and payments.
Japanese listed company Metaplanet increased its holdings by 106.976 BTC
Metaplanet, a Japanese listed company, announced that it purchased 106.976 bitcoins worth 1 billion yen at an average price of 9,347,891 yen per bitcoin (about 62,631 U.S. dollars). After this purchase, the company's total bitcoin holdings reached 855.478, with a cumulative investment of 7.965 billion yen (about 53.22 million U.S. dollars).
Financing News
Bitcoin staking platform Solv Protocol raises $11 million at a valuation of $200 million, with participation from OKX Ventures and others
According to CoinDesk, Bitcoin staking platform Solv Protocol has raised $11 million from companies such as Nomura Securities subsidiary Laser Digital, Blockchain Capital and OKX Ventures, with a valuation of $200 million. Solv Protocol's SolvBTC product has currently deployed more than 20,000 bitcoins (about $1.3 billion) on 10 major blockchain networks. Bitcoin staking platforms have developed rapidly in recent years, aiming to invest hundreds of billions of dollars of Bitcoin capital in other networks for returns. Solv co-founder Ryan Chow said that Bitcoin's staking rate is much lower than Ethereum's 28%, and if it can reach a similar level, it will release about $330 billion in value.
Important data
The total net inflow of the US Bitcoin spot ETF yesterday was US$556 million, and the ETF net asset ratio reached 4.75%
According to SoSoValue data, yesterday (October 14, Eastern Time), the total net inflow of Bitcoin spot ETFs was US$556 million. Yesterday, Grayscale ETF GBTC had a single-day net inflow of US$37.7734 million, and the current historical net outflow of GBTC is US$20.150 billion. Grayscale Bitcoin Mini Trust ETF BTC had a single-day net inflow of US$4.6766 million, and the current historical total net inflow of Grayscale Bitcoin Mini Trust BTC is US$406 million. The Bitcoin spot ETF with the largest single-day net inflow yesterday was Fidelity ETF FBTC, with a single-day net inflow of US$239 million, and the current historical total net inflow of FBTC is US$10.225 billion. The second is Bitwise ETF BITB, with a single-day net inflow of US$100 million, and the current historical total net inflow of BITB is US$2.248 billion. As of press time, the total net asset value of the Bitcoin spot ETF was US$61.895 billion, the ETF net asset ratio (market value as a percentage of the total market value of Bitcoin) reached 4.75%, and the historical cumulative net inflow has reached US$19.363 billion.
Wintermute: 40% of Solana’s transaction volume comes from Meme coins
Wintermute released a market report stating that Solana's weekly on-chain transaction volume increased by 50% to $39 billion, and 40% of Solana's transaction volume came from Meme tokens, of which pumpfun accounted for 35% of Solana DEX's total transaction volume. Solana is currently dominating token generation, with market share rising from 60% in early September to 86%, and weekly token generation surging from 45,000 to 110,000. Meme coins have always led the market in almost every price reversal this year, and the growing interest of institutions in Meme coins may indicate a change in perception.
FTX/Alameda’s SOL staking address redeemed 178,631 SOL, equivalent to approximately $28 million
According to the monitoring of on-chain analyst Ember, FTX/Alameda's SOL staking address H4y...gFZ redeemed 178,631 SOL (about 28 million US dollars) 4 hours ago. According to previous transfer records, these SOL will be distributed to multiple addresses, most of which will flow into Coinbase or Binance later. Their SOL transfer is currently quite regular: they will redeem and transfer out about 170,000 SOL on the 12th to 15th of each month. At present, the H4y...gFZ address still has 7.09 million SOL (about 1.107 billion US dollars) in staking.
The nonprofit organization that received a large donation of ELON tokens from Vitalik three years ago started selling the tokens nine hours ago
According to on-chain analyst @ai_9684xtpa, the non-profit organization Methuselah Foundation (@mfoundation), which received 432 trillion ELON from Vitalik three years ago, has started selling tokens. On May 13, 2021, the organization received 432 trillion ELON donated by Vitalik (accounting for 43% of the total tokens). 9 hours ago, they added 83 trillion tokens of one-sided liquidity to Uniswap and will start selling when the price is above $0.00001207.
Solana Ecosystem Meme Coin Total Market Value Exceeds $11 Billion
According to SolanaFloor data, the total market value of Solana ecosystem Meme coins has exceeded US$11 billion.
Polkadot Q3 financial report: treasury balance of US$153 million, expenditure of US$27 million, and marketing expenditure dropped significantly
According to the third quarter 2024 treasury report released by the Polkadot official governance forum, the balance of the Polkadot treasury is 33.3 million DOT (about 153 million US dollars), and the surplus after deducting liabilities is 32.4 million DOT (about 149 million US dollars). The treasury's expenditures in the third quarter totaled 27 million US dollars (5.2 million DOT), a significant decrease from 58 million US dollars (8 million DOT) in the second quarter. Among the specific expenditures, marketing-related expenses fell the most, from 27 million US dollars to 9.9 million US dollars; development expenses grew steadily to 11.9 million US dollars; operating expenses fell slightly to 1.4 million US dollars; talent and education expenses increased to 3.8 million US dollars; and research expenses fell to 310,000 US dollars.
Base Network becomes Ethereum Rollup with the largest TVL, slightly surpassing Arbitrum's $2.39 billion
According to The Block, Base, the Ethereum Layer 2 network developed by Coinbase, has now become the Ethereum Rollup with the largest total locked value (TVL), reaching $2.49 billion, slightly exceeding Arbitrum's $2.39 billion. Base's current locked value is distributed among 366 protocols, of which the decentralized exchange Aerodrome has contributed more than $1.3 billion in deposits. Base is also among the top five blockchain networks in terms of TVL, second only to Ethereum, Tron, Solana, and BNB Chain. In addition, Base leads in user activity, with about 1.5 million active addresses per day and the network processing about 70 transactions per second.
