updraftplus domain was triggered too early. This is usually an indicator for some code in the plugin or theme running too early. Translations should be loaded at the init action or later. Please see Debugging in WordPress for more information. (This message was added in version 6.7.0.) in /home/aonyeani76/cryptocurrencypanther/wp-includes/functions.php on line 6131hustle domain was triggered too early. This is usually an indicator for some code in the plugin or theme running too early. Translations should be loaded at the init action or later. Please see Debugging in WordPress for more information. (This message was added in version 6.7.0.) in /home/aonyeani76/cryptocurrencypanther/wp-includes/functions.php on line 6131wpforms-lite domain was triggered too early. This is usually an indicator for some code in the plugin or theme running too early. Translations should be loaded at the init action or later. Please see Debugging in WordPress for more information. (This message was added in version 6.7.0.) in /home/aonyeani76/cryptocurrencypanther/wp-includes/functions.php on line 6131Having passed through UK’s upper chamber, the new bill is close to law. The bill seeks to allow authorities to seize cryptocurrencies used for criminal activities.
On Tuesday, July 4, the UK’s Economic Crime and Corporate Transparency Bill, entered its final stages thereby becoming law, after being passed by the House of Lords. Basically, this bill seeks to empower British agencies to seize and freeze cryptocurrencies used for criminal activities such as money laundering or terror financing.
Additionally, the bill has introduced an amendment to ensure that courts can also ask the authorities to take action on crypto used for crime. In order to identify cryptocurrencies linked to criminal activities, Britain has introduced crypto tactical advisers and police departments nationwide.
In March 2023, the British government said that they would be combating the criminal use of crypto under the three-year economic agenda.
The new bill has passed through the UK’s upper chamber, bringing it closer to becoming a law. There are a few more steps remaining: a review by the lower chamber called the House of Commons, agreement on any further changes by both chambers and approval by King Charles III.
Over the past months, UK lawmakers included various additions to the bill. In November, they introduced provisions that allow public authorities to seize digital assets associated with terrorism and take control of properties that can help identify cryptocurrencies linked to criminal activities.
Britain first introduced the UK’s Economic Crime and Corporate Transparency Bill back in September 2022. Back then, Graeme Biggar, director general of the National Crime Agency, said:
“Domestic and international criminals have for years laundered the proceeds of their crime and corruption by abusing UK company structures, and are increasingly using cryptocurrencies. These reforms – long awaited and much welcomed – will help us crack down on both.”
In a statement released in September, the government mentioned that the Economic Crime and Corporate Transparency Bill will enhance the UK’s reputation as a favorable place for lawful businesses to flourish while also eliminating illicit money from the country. The reforms will require everyone registering a company in the UK to confirm their identity, addressing the misuse of companies for criminal purposes or by corrupt foreign officials.
The United Kingdom has initiated several measures to legitimize the use of digital assets. Recently, the UK Law Commission submitted a proposal to the government to provide a comprehensive legal foundation for cryptocurrencies. Last month, the UK government also passed legislation to promote the safe adoption of cryptocurrencies.
Bhushan is a FinTech enthusiast and holds a good flair in understanding financial markets. His interest in economics and finance draw his attention towards the new emerging Blockchain Technology and Cryptocurrency markets. He is continuously in a learning process and keeps himself motivated by sharing his acquired knowledge. In free time he reads thriller fictions novels and sometimes explore his culinary skills.
Information appears to have been made public under standard bankruptcy practice
According to Celsiusnetworth, a website that claims to rank each Celsius user according to their losses, a Cardano investor has lost over 60 million ADA to the Celsius crisis.
An investor named “Hirokhado Kohji” reportedly held 60,901,003 (60.9 million) ADA worth over $25.33 million before the crypto lender Celsius went out of business.
60 MILLIONS #ADA is stuck in Celsius belonging to 1 person. This is why you should be the ONLY PERSON controlling your COINS! pic.twitter.com/aVySWE98Mx
— Cardano 𝗦𝗛𝗔𝗠𝗥𝗢𝗖𝗞 (@PoolShamrock) October 10, 2022
More than 29,000 pages of court documents were uploaded to servers last week, exposing the financial information of millions of users who had money on the cryptocurrency lender Celsius.
The information appears to have been made public under standard bankruptcy practice as Celsius, which froze customer accounts in July, is currently going through the Chapter 11 restructuring process.
Ads
The disclosure affects almost 600,000 user accounts, exposing their wallet addresses, transaction histories, cryptocurrency holdings, most recent transactions and other data. The documents also showed how officials at Celsius were able to pull millions out of their accounts before the lender went bankrupt.
The business sought to have the names of its users withheld, but the judge only permitted the redaction of user email and home addresses.
The court documents that included information about Celsius users are reportedly the source of the Celsius Networth leaderboard. However, inaccuracies might occur as the site continues to aggregate data as a mix-up may occur in the identities of the individuals reported.
The largest Cardano NFT minting platform, NMKR, focused on CIP-066 in a series of tweets, which enables NFT collection creators to link their Decentralized Identifiers (DIDs) with NFTs.
Today is a historic day for #Cardano NFTs:
Decentralized Identities have finally arrived in NMKR Studio.
pic.twitter.com/TuS2lgZuOo
— NMKR (@nmkr_io) October 11, 2022
Creators can directly link their identities to their NFTs by making their own DIDs and linking them to their NFT collections. Done in connection with Atala Prism, NMKR thinks that this could be a crucial first step in reducing fraud, rug pulls and identity theft on the blockchain.
Several reactions have come from the crypto industry with the upcoming Ethereum upgrade, the Merge. The upgrade is expected to transit the Ethereum blockchain from using the Proof-of-Work (PoW) consensus mechanism to that of Proof-of-Stake (PoS).
This transition would change transaction validation processing from mining to staking. Hence, many people are getting different ideas on what to expect during and after the transition.
While there is a waiting period for the Merge, many have expressed concerns over some potential hard forks. In addition, the Ethereum network still has some miners operating on the system, creating more tension within and outside the community.
With the completion of the Merge, the miners could move over to Ethereum Classic, which is still operating as a PoW. But if they continue to work on the Ethereum blockchain, they would hard fork the chain.
In a recent report, some Ethereum miners have declared a technology for freezing liquidity pools. This came mainly from the ETHPOW group. This group of miners plans to hard fork the Ethereum blockchain after its transition.
The ETHPOW group has posted on its Twitter platform the plan to freeze some lending protocols and smart contracts.
In addition, the group revealed that there would be a compromise of customers’ ETHW tokens deposited in different liquidity pools. Some listed pools that could be affected include Aave, Compound, and Uniswap.
With its plan, the group revealed that its freezing action would not include any staking contract that deals with a single asset. However, the ETHW core advises customers to remove their deposits from all liquidity pools. This majorly concerns lending platforms and decentralized exchanges.
In its explanation, the group stated that its action is to ensure users’ protection from hackers and fraudsters. It mentioned that hackers and other bad actors could easily swap the deposited tokens with less valued WBTC, USDT, and USDC. Hence, it has decided to freeze smart contracts of lending pools pending a better solution from the platforms.
Following the post of the Ethereum miners, several people criticized the move. Most crypto big shots and influencers are not left out in the reactions. However, a developer and blockchain auditor, Foobar, questions the group’s capacity to perform its ridiculous plan.
Also, the CEO of Gamium Corp, Alberto Rosas, doubts the decentralization of the Ethereum blockchain. He maintained that this move is huge for a small group to accomplish. For him, the ETHW chain may end as a slow centralized chain with no market value.
It’s quite evident that the Ethereum miners are pressuring the entire ecosystem with their freezing plans.
Featured image from Pixabay, Chart from TradingView.com
First came Terra. Now comes Celsius.
On June 12, crypto lending platform Celsius froze withdrawals, transfers, and swaps for their users due to extreme market conditions. Crypto investors, already anxious after consumer prices spiked a staggering 8.6% in May, dumped tokens.
In the last 24 hours, Bitcoin has plunged almost 14% and Ethereum 16% in early morning trading New York time, according to CoinGecko. The crisis engulfing Celsius could pack the same wallop as the failure of Terra and its stablecoin UST in early May. Indeed, information came to light at the end of last month showing a possible link between Celsius and Terra.
There’s little doubt the funk in the markets has spurred a “run-on-the-bank” scenario, said Kevin Murcko, the CEO and founder of Coinmetro, an exchange based in Estonia.
“I would like to believe that Celsius is merely facing a liquidity squeeze and will return to normal business operations in the near future,” Murcko told The Defiant. “However, if the issue is not resolved quickly, we might see another blow of confidence similar to the one that followed Terra ecosystem’s collapse.”
In a memo, the Celsius team wrote that it took this action to be “in a better position to honor, over time, its withdrawal obligations.” Celsius assured customers that they will still accrue rewards during this pause. Celsius Network’s own token, CEL, lost 41% of its value on Monday.
On the morning of June 12, Celsius CEO Alex Mashinsky tweeted that talking about Celsius freezes was spreading rumors and “misinformation”.
Later on June 12, it was reported that Celsius sent over $320M worth of crypto to trading platform FTX. On May 27, Nansen released a report that Celsius was partly responsible for the crash of the Terra Ecosystem.
“I guess now you have to hope that they’re not bankrupt but they just put too much of customer funds into illiquid/locked places […] Then maybe they can wait it out and pay users back,” tweeted Cobie, a prominent crypto writer with 700,000+ followers.