The Taliban-controlled Afghan government arrested 8 cryptocurrency traders in the city of Herat on the northwestern side of the country. In August 2022, the Central Bank of Afghanistan banned the use of cryptocurrencies and closed more than 30 cryptocurrency-related businesses in the region. The government described digital currencies and Forex trading as "haram". 🚫 A trader stated that he earned 1-2% commission from selling USDT and could barely feed his family. Traders who claimed that their crypto assets were not seized said that the government arrested some traders by taking all their digital assets.

Cryptocurrency exchange Backpack has hired a Citibank expert as its head of audit. Backpack, founded by former FTX employees, has appointed banking veteran Laurence King as head of audit to underscore its commitment to transparency and audit integrity. King served as head of audit at Citibank in various APAC regions. With King's involvement, Backpack aims to increase transparency to users and set new auditing standards in the industry. 📈

ArcBlock's native token, ABT, increased by over 20% in the last 24 hours, reaching $0.31 and later falling to $0.25. Transaction volume also increased by 450%, reaching 8.3 million dollars. However, ABT is still 44% below its all-time high of $4.7. ArcBlock makes it easier to develop and deploy decentralized applications by combining blockchain technology and cloud computing. 🚀#cryptocurrency#ArcBlock

Alameda-backed crypto miner Genesis Digital Assets is meeting with advisors about launching a pre-IPO financing round in the coming weeks. Texas-based Bitcoin mining firm GDA is considering an initial public offering (IPO) in the US despite a large investment from Alameda Research. The company is actively meeting with advisors to accelerate its IPO plans. It is unclear whether GDA plans to complete the IPO by the end of 2024. GDA operates with a power capacity of over 500 megawatts in 20 data centers. 📈

A judge in the US has granted software firm Consensys' request to expedite the company's lawsuit against the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). In a July 1 filing, Judge Reed O’Connor approved a timeline in which the court will now consider the merits of Consensys' lawsuit against the regulator. Consensys senior attorney Bill Hughes shared some details of the judge's decision on X on July 2. He granted our request to have the SEC consider the merits of our case on an expedited basis as to whether it has the authority to regulate MetaMask as a securities broker and issuer. Hughes believes a decision is likely to come in December. 🏛️

Having completed a busy month in June with an increase in Bitcoin mining and a 2x increase in hashrate compared to December, CleanSpark is “laser focused” on increasing its hashrate and generating more revenue while other miners are facing difficulties. 📈 “We continue to maximize efficiency at our existing sites and look forward to opportunities in Wyoming and Tennessee,” said CEO Zach Bradford. CleanSpark acquired the GRIID facilities in a $155 million deal and H.C. Wainright analysts are bullish on CLSK stock.

Mike Novogratz, founder and CEO of Galaxy Digital, said on CNBC's 'Squawk Box' program that the US crypto sector will undergo positive regulations regardless of the outcome of the upcoming elections. Despite the current state of crypto regulations in the US, Novogratz believes that the next administration will take a positive stance and help the industry grow. “No matter who wins the next election, we will get a positive crypto law – I know that,” he said. 📈

Robinhood is considering offering cryptocurrency futures in the US and Europe, but an official launch date has not yet been announced. 📈 The commission-free trading app aims to use the licenses of Bitstamp, which it plans to acquire in a $200 million deal scheduled to close next year. Robinhood plans to introduce Bitcoin (BTC) and Ether (ETH) futures based on CME in the US. However, they noted that they have no plans to launch a bid immediately and discussions are ongoing, so final plans may change. This announcement follows Robinhood's acquisition of Pluto Capital, an artificial intelligence research platform. The company aims to provide users with more customized investment strategies and analysis. Robinhood made this move to expand its crypto presence and attract institutional customers. Robinhood is now expanding its services to include crypto, retirement products and credit cards. The company works with individual investors to develop their crypto portfolios. Robinhood has not announced an official date for when futures trading will begin.

OpenLedger, the sovereign data blockchain for AI, raised funding in an $8 million seed round. The funds will help OpenLedger grow its team and expand its operations, with the official testnet launch expected at the beginning of the fourth quarter of 2024. 🚀 OpenLedger offers a permissionless platform that users can use to gain control over personal data. With this funding, the team can further address the bottlenecks that come with the AI ​​boom. Investors include venture capital firms such as MH Ventures, Finality Capital, HashKey Capital, Mask Network and WAGMI Ventures. OpenLedger was built by a team of experts from global brands such as Sony and Walmart.#blockchain#cryptocurrency #AI

Bonk stands out as the leader of the memecoin market with an increase of 8%. But the project, which is down 21% this month and 42% from its all-time high in March, is showing relative strength among all memecoins. Experts think Bonk's strong recovery could usher in the next memecoin season. 📈 On the other hand, the new multichain memecoin Base Dawgz raised $2.3 million in pre-sale. Time is limited for investors to purchase Base Dawgz at the current pre-sale price.#cryptonews#Bonk #BaseDawgz

Nycrypto Labs, a blockchain development center aiming to accelerate the transition from Web2 to Web3, announced that it has successfully secured $800,000 in pre-seed funding. This funding success coincided with the launch of Nycrypto's core product, Tidus Wallet. This wallet serves as the only multi-chain wallet that allows cross-chain borrowing, lending, and staking within the app. 🚀 Tidus Wallet reduces the risk of click fraud by offering multi-chain compatibility. It also provides decentralized security and privacy, educational resources, and seamless integration with native Dapps. Tidus supports networks such as Ethereum, Solana, Base, TON, Optimism, Arbitrum, Polygon and Bitcoin.

USDT stablecoin commodity Tether announced that it signed a partnership agreement with think tank BTguru to evaluate crypto initiatives in Turkey. Tether and BTguru aim to explore various tokenization use cases among Turkish financial institutions. 🤝 Tether appears to be focusing on asset tokenization. However, it is unclear whether Tether has already initiated talks with Turkish banks about real-world asset tokenization (RWA) initiatives. This could lead to trillions of dollars being allocated. This partnership coincides with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan signing a new bill regulating the crypto industry and setting penalties for non-compliance. Under the new law, crypto exchanges that want to operate legally in Turkey must be licensed by the Capital Markets Board. Additionally, crypto providers must implement and report measures such as seizures.

Despite Bitcoin's strong start at the start of 2024, crypto mining stocks have outperformed BTC post-halving, with Hut 8 and Bitfarms delivering the highest returns. 😮 The fourth Bitcoin halving event, which affected small mining companies more severely, led private equity firms to consolidate small companies by combining their infrastructures. However, despite recent headwinds for Bitcoin itself, this strategic interest has led to marked outperformance in mining stocks. Analysts state that Hut 8 (HUT) and Bitfarms (BIT) stocks provided the highest returns of 86% and 34% respectively. In comparison, Bitcoin fell 3.62% after the halving.

Iggy Azalea launching her own token on Pump.fun, along with the creation of over a million other tokens, could be bad news for investors and the overall market. Pump.fun launched in January, and the website looks poised to generate $265 million in annual revenue, according to DefiLlama data. However, this rapid growth and speculation may not be sustainable and could have negative impacts on whether the overall crypto market bull run continues. 😟

Singapore's largest bank, DBS Group, will provide escrow services to stablecoin emitter Paxos. Paxos has received full approval from the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS). 🎉 DBS Bank, we are pleased to support Paxos' new chapter in Singapore. Trust and security are key to wider acceptance of stablecoin. Paxos has cut 20% of its staff as it gains access to its third market after the US and UAE. Paxos focuses on regulated blockchain infrastructure and has raised approximately $540 million in funding from multiple investors.

Beta Finance (BETA) operates a money market that provides access to a wide range of assets and focuses on ease of use. It is currently worth $0.08017, up 94% in the last 7 days. However, BETA's value has continued to decline since 2022, falling almost 98% overall. BETA's price increase may be largely due to positive market sentiment towards DeFi tokens in general and recent developments in the project. BETA is in its second phase called Omni, a currency used for rewards such as platform discounts and liquidity mining incentives. However, BETA's future may be bright, but it is currently in a volatile state that could easily make a strong move in either direction. 📉

South Korea's cryptocurrency association said local trading platforms are unlikely to engage in "mass delistings" as they repurchase 1,333 tokens over the next six months. Starting July 19, approximately 20 local cryptocurrency exchanges will undergo a six-month review period of 1,333 tokens in response to recent recommendations from South Korean authorities. 📉#crypto#SouthKorea

According to Santiment data, XRP whales have accumulated between 1 million and 10 million XRP tokens in the last 30 days. There are currently 1,583 whale wallets. 🐳 XRP price, RSI, stock market activity and whale activity are still stable. XRP's market cap is currently $26.6 billion. XRP's inflow on the exchange increased from 58.66 million to 76 million tokens. However, the amount of XRP leaving the exchange increased by 564% during the same period. This suggests that new owners are hoarding the cryptocurrency. The supply of XRP on the exchange has been decreasing since January 30. There are currently 2.82 million XRP tokens on exchanges. XRP's Relative Strength Index (RSI) is currently at 43. This suggests that the XRP price is not overheating and a potential price increase can be expected.

In June, Chainlink saw a huge increase in developer activity, rising to second place behind decentralized oracle network Hedera, according to Santiment data. While Hedera remains at the top of cryptocurrencies in terms of GitHub activity, developer data from Chainlink's GitHub repository showed an increase in the number of events over the past 30 days. 🧑‍💻 This led to the project rising to 2nd place. However, the market performance of these projects varied depending on developer activity. Despite the overall market decline, high developer activity for these projects indicates potential product growth and user adoption. The Chainlink team released an acceptance update for last week. This shows that Chainlink services are integrated into 8 blockchain networks.

Popular analyst Captain Faibik predicts a bull market for Ethereum. KangaMoon, one of the ERC-20 meme coins, is expected to rise significantly. 🚀 There are speculations that Ethereum's bull run will start earlier. In this case, KangaMoon and Pepe coins stand out as memecoins ready to take off alongside Ethereum. KangaMoon may be among the most bullish altcoins as it completes its presale. Ethereum is expected to follow a positive trend in Q3. KangaMoon's presale has ended and listing on BitMart and MEXC is expected. KangaMoon appears to have surged 400% to $0.025 in presale. This provides an excellent entry point for investing in the KangaMoon token. KangaMoon is predicted to be one of the top new memecoins for massive crypto profits in Q3 and Q4. Pepe coin stands out as the ERC-20 memecoin with the highest bullish sentiment of the year. KangaMoon has a good chance of surpassing $1 this year.