This week in crypto, Kraken said that February could be a green month, BTC climbed above USD 45k with analysts seeing a bull long-term too, while JPMorgan said its fair price is USD 38,000, then a survey predicted the doubling of ETH price this year, XRP rallied as new court orders offered hope that the Ripple-SEC case may end soon, AXS and SLP moved up as Axie Infinity drastically reduced the daily issuance of SLP, LEASH jumped as Shiba Inu entered metaverse, and we looked at what’s behind the KPMG bitcoin and ethereum hype, as well as if it’s early or too late to invest in bitcoin, per Wells Fargo. Meanwhile, Tesla reported USD 101m of impairment loss from BTC investments in 2021. As Ukrainian hacker groups and traditional resistance movements are increasingly using crypto, two individuals were arrested for an alleged conspiracy to launder BTC stolen in the 2016 Bitfinex hack, and the UN said that North Korea is still hacking crypto exchanges to fund its weapons program, but the country denied it and called the US the world’s ‘king of hacking and theft’. Meanwhile, crypto exchanges are now the largest consumers of Bitcoin block space.
Aave and Twitter’s Bluesky moved towards a new, decentralized social media standard, Gartner predicted that people ‘will spend 1 hour a day in metaverse in four years’ time, Coin Metrics found that the NFT prices are ‘relatively independent’ of the broader crypto market, a Florida home is set to be auctioned off as an NFT, and five crypto platforms and one DAO are set to air ads during the Super Bowl Sunday in the US.
As the FTX boss testified that more regulatory clarity would attract crypto investors to the US, a US House hearing on stablecoins and crypto revealed a sharp divide on the approach to regulation. The Russian government is set to launch a bill that calls bitcoin and crypto a currency analog, Hong Kong regulators and the government are thinking about introducing new rules to police the crypto sector, and El Salvador is thinking about BTC bond issuance in March and BTC loans for SMEs, while a state-owned bank there is handed out a 1.5m loan to a crypto firm accepting 200 bitcoin ATMs as collateral. Also, it appears that not all Olympic Games attendees have been blown away by the digital yuan’s usability. The Russian government estimated that imposing a tax on crypto-related transactions may generate USD 13.3bn in revenue, Kazakhstan unveiled measures aimed at taxing the Bitcoin mining sector, and some crypto transactions could be hit with a 20% tax in Venezuela as a new law passes. Meanwhile, US Senator Debbie Stabenow raged over Bitcoin’s less than 0.08% carbon footprint, while a Polish miner commercialized technology using solar panels for mining Bitcoin while heating the house.
Let’s laugh at some jokes now, selected just for you.
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GM, CT! How are you feeling this week?
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Let’s check out some thoughts on BTC.
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Meanwhile, in the markets:
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Ready position.
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That’s steep….
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‘Have you heard about our savior Satoshi?’
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At the speed of lightning!
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Look, if Morgan Freeman says it, it’s practically science.
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A very mundane event, if you will.
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Try making crypto videos.
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We can always try.
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Non-fungible indeed.
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Just a glimpse really.
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In the words of a wise commenter: “When Prius?”
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Heeere’s bitcoin!
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The truest words ever spoken.
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In addition to your rapping and Web 3 developing careers of course.
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Damn! That’s a lot.
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What an exquisitely random question. Accompanied by an accurate reply.
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And here’s the actual footage of catching the suspected BTC-laundering duo.