Coinbase NFT Launches Beta, AMC Theaters Introduces SHIB and DOGE Payments, and Blockchain.com Plans IPO: Hodler’s Digest, March 17-23 April
Come every Saturday Hodler’s Digest will help you keep track of every single important news that happened this week. Best (and worst) rates, launch and regulation highlights, leading coins, predictions and more – a week on Cointelegraph in one link.
Top stories of this week
The AMC Theaters mobile app accepts Dogecoin, Shiba Inu, and more
The most popular retail cinema chain, AMC Theaters, has updated its mobile app to support Dogecoin and Shiba Inu payments. Customers based in the United States using Apple or Android phones can both download the app and spend their highly volatile memecoins on movie tickets.
The company first teased the idea in January after introducing payment support for Bitcoin, Ether, Bitcoin Cash and Litecoin in November.
AMC is able to accept crypto payments through a partnership with BitPay, a bitcoin payment processor. It should be noted that merchants using BitPay do not receive crypto payments directly. Instead, BitPay converts crypto payments into fiat before depositing them into the merchant’s account.
Crypto startup Blockchain.com plans to go public in 2022
On Tuesday, it was reported that $14 billion crypto exchange Blockchain.com was in talks with banks to launch a possible initial public offering (IPO) this year.
Bloomberg’s unnamed sources indicated that the talks were very preliminary and could change at any time (particularly if those unnamed sources were instructed by Blockchain.com to release information to get a sense of public opinion before disclosing anything concrete). ).
If the company manages to clear all regulatory hurdles and go public via an IPO, it would join Coinbase as the only other US crypto exchange to do so. Binance.US is also exploring a possible similar path going forward.
Coinbase announces beta of socially engaged NFT marketplace
Speaking of the only US crypto exchange to go public, Coinbase rolled out an early beta of its NFT marketplace to a select number of testers this week. At this stage, Coinbase NFT early adopters can create online profiles and buy and sell NFTs.
In a blog post on Tuesday, Sanchan Saxena, Vice President of Product and Ecosystem at Coinbase, hinted that Coinbase NFT would be a hybrid platform, inheriting elements of social media services and marketplaces like OpenSea.
“While it’s true that buying and selling NFTs is a huge part of the ecosystem today, what we’ve learned from talking to many customers and developers is that there’s more to it than just buying and selling,” said Saxena. “There’s a community aspect to it.”
German banking giant Commerzbank is applying for a crypto license
One of Germany’s banking giants, Commerzbank, announced this week that it has applied for a crypto license, becoming the country’s first traditional financial institution to do so.
A spokesperson told local media outlet Boersen-Zeitung that it “applied for the crypto custody license in the first quarter of 2022.” The move would go a long way in helping crypto spread in the country as the bank serves over 18 million customers and 70,000 institutional clients.
Any company wishing to launch crypto services in Germany must first obtain approval from the Federal Financial Supervisory Authority, also known as BaFin.
Goldman Sachs reportedly intends to back the FTX Alliance with the help of regulators and listings
Goldman Sachs is reportedly seeking an alliance with top derivatives exchange FTX to send a strong signal of confidence in crypto in the banking sector.
According to the Financial Times, David Solomon, CEO of Goldman Sachs, and Sam Bankman-Fried, founder of FTX, met behind closed doors in March to discuss how a potential partnership could work for both companies.
Key areas of discussion are said to be compliance in the US, with Goldman Sachs offering to help FTX navigate the murky waters of regulation, in addition to assisting with future funding rounds.
Winner and Loser
At the end of the week, Bitcoin (Bitcoin) is at $39,628ether (ETH) at the $2,957 and XRP at the $0.71. The total market capitalization is at $1.85 Trillion, according to to CoinMarketCap.
Among the top 100 cryptocurrencies, the top three altcoin gainers of the week are STEPN (MEAN GREENWICH TIME) at 40.66%, 0x (ZRX) at 22.40% and Decred (DCR) at 18.98%.
The top three altcoin losers of the week are Helium (HNT) at -12.74%, Convex Finance (CVX) at -10.82% and Maker (MKR) at -10.81%.
More information on crypto prices can be found here Market Analysis by Cointelegraph.
Most Memorable Quotes
“I see Ethereum remaining the dominant L1 for years to come, while Bitcoin retains its status as the primary store of value on the blockchain.”
Lynn LissCo-Founder and Chief Operating Officer of Akoin
“It’s early days, but we’re encouraged by what we’re seeing and confident that blockchain games will continue to gain traction if they’re interesting and fun.”
Chris DeWolfeCo-founder of Myspace, CEO and co-founder of Jam City
“Crypto is dead. Long live crypto.”
Andre CronjeFounder of Yearn.finance
“NO! There are already digital means of payment! So what is CBDC for? […] Even more surveillance, preventing bank runs, addiction and the resulting enslavement of mankind? This does not prevent money laundering; this already exists on a large scale for the top 10,000 in many tax havens, e.g. [the] Cayman Islands, Macau, Dubai etc.”
Anonymous
“One of the guiding principles of blockchain is that it is a public ledger that is shared and accessible to anyone with a little computing power. [including] Prosecution. So the Secret Service has not done anything that was not the original intent of the blockchain. We only use the same tracking and tracing mechanisms that were intended.”
DavidSmithDeputy Chief Investigator for the United States Secret Service
“NFTs present an opportunity for game developers to develop games with player-owned economies; where the community of owners are both the early supporters of the game and the key players in its development and true stakeholders in its success.”
Sebastian BorgetCo-founder of The Sandbox
“It is very unlikely that all countries would ban non-custodial wallets or any other aspect of Bitcoin’s peer-to-peer network on this matter.”
Stepan UherikChief Financial Officer of SatoshiLabs
“My worldview before bitcoin was pretty narrow. Life looked like school, work, retirement, death. Today I think a little differently. The ultimate goal [now] could be better described as entrepreneurship and self-determination.”
Mr. ERBbloggers
“The point of DeFi cannot just be trading DeFi tokens.”
Arthur BreitmanCo-founder of Tezos
forecast of the week
BTC could fall to $30,000 in 2 weeks, trader warns, as gold surges to $2,000
The price of bitcoin fell below $40,000 on April 17th Cointelegraph’s BTC price index. The asset then fell to almost $38,500 the following day, followed by a subsequent surge above $41,000 during the same session. As of Thursday, the asset had risen to around $43,000, although a move down followed that same day, with the asset then falling below $40,000.
Pseudonymous trader “Crypto Ed” posted a YouTube video on Monday talking about the BTC price action. Looking back, his expectations for the asset have proven to be pretty accurate. He expected $37,500 to act as a bounce point for BTC, followed by a possible spike to $43,000 if the asset surpassed $40,000. He noted that $43,000 may just have been a local high, with the asset facing downward price pressure thereafter. The past week shows BTC moving pretty much in line with Crypto Ed’s comments.
However, he also mentioned that BTC could reach around the $30,000 price level in the next two weeks (from the date of his Monday video).
FUD of the week
Beanstalk Farms offers perpetrators a plea deal for a $76 million exploit
After credit-based stablecoin protocol Beanstalk Farms was hacked for around $76 million earlier this week, the team offered a 10% bounty if the hacker returned the funds.
Blackhat hacker bounty offers are becoming a common method for DeFi platforms lately as they seem to be the most viable way to get the project’s funds back up and running as quickly as possible.
Notably, the project’s founders, Benjamin Weintraub, Brendan Sanderson, and Michael Montoya, admitted during a podcast interview Monday that flaws in Beanstalk’s design “ultimately led to its demise.”
MetaMask warns Apple users about iCloud phishing attacks
Crypto wallet provider MetaMask warned the community about potential Apple iCloud phishing attacks that could become very costly.
The security issue is related to the default device settings on Apple devices that see a user’s seed phrase or “Password-Encrypted MetaMask Vault” stored in iCloud if the user has enabled automatic backups for their MetaMask application data.
MetaMask’s warning came in response to reports from an NFT collector known on Twitter as “revive_dom” stating that his entire wallet of $650,000 worth of digital assets and NFTs was wiped out by this particular security issue.
FBI and CISA issue warning of North Korean cyberattacks on crypto targets
On Monday, the U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) issued an alert on North Korea’s state-sponsored cyberattacks.
The alert was issued in response to last month’s Ronin Bridge hack, believed to have been carried out by North Korean hackers. The FBI and CISA emphasized that hackers are targeting DeFi protocols and play-to-earn games in particular, with spear phishing and malware being the methods of choice.
“These actors are likely to continue to exploit vulnerabilities in cryptocurrency technology firms, gambling companies, and exchanges to generate and launder funds in support of the North Korean regime,” CISA wrote.
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https://cointelegraph.com/magazine/2022/04/23/coinbase-nft-launches-beta-amc-theatres-shib-doge-payments-blockchain-com-eyes-ipo-hodlers-digest-april-17-23 Coinbase NFT Launches Beta, AMC Theaters Introduces SHIB and DOGE Payments, and Blockchain.com Plans IPO: Hodler’s Digest, March 17-23 April