CoinDesk Crypto

Binance’s regulatory woes worsened Friday as Malaysia ordered it to halt operations in the country, and the cryptocurrency exchange said it’s planning to wind down futures and derivatives products across Europe, starting with Germany, Italy and the Netherlands.

• Malaysia’s Securities Commission (SC) issued a public reprimand against the company and ordered it to disable the website and mobile apps in the country.
• According to the commission, Binance is “illegally operating a digital asset exchange.” The country’s laws demand that all such exchanges must be registered by the SC.
• Binance also needs to halt marketing activities and prevent Malaysian investors accessing its Telegram group.
• In Europe, Binance said users in Germany, Italy and the Netherlands will be unable to open new futures and derivative positions on the platform with immediate effect.
• Existing positions will have to be closed by an as-yet undetermined date.
• The decision is its latest move to distance itself from products and services that have drawn the scrutiny from regulators in a slew of different markets.
• Earlier this week, Binance announced it was stopping crypto margin trading involving sterling, the euro and Australian dollar. This followed just hours after CEO Changpeng Zhao tweeted that the company was reducing the maximum leverage users can use to trade futures contracts from 100x to 20x.
• Binance has fallen foul of Malaysia’s markets regulator in the past. Along with eToro, it was added to a list of companies not permitted to operate in the country in July last year.

Related Stories

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• Binance reduce el límite de apalancamiento a 20x, un día después de que FTX anunciara lo mismo
• Binance’s CZ Is Looking for His Replacement as Exchange Gets Regulatory House in Order

Australian startup Loda, a crypto-collateralized lending platform, has completed its first liquidity pool with the help of some decentralized finance heavyweight investors.

According to a press release on Friday, Loda attracted over 15 investors who poured $15 million into the lender’s first of three completed institutional liquidity pools.

The two remaining pools, which are currently live, will be completed once demand calls for it, Dion Dalton-Bridges, CEO and founder of Loda, told CoinDesk via Telegram on Friday.

Related: Blockchain Australia Recommends Safe Harbor Provision for Crypto Providers

Participation came from the likes of Framework Ventures, Spartan Capital, One Block, Mechanism Capital, Liquefy Labs, Apollo Capital, Maven 11, Ledger Prime, and Cluster Capital.

Signum Capital, X21, Flow Ventures, Autonomy Capital, KardiaChain, as well as angel investor Georgi Georgiev also participated.

Loda’s initial iteration (V1) is one of the first of its kind in the country allowing users “one of the only ways” to borrow Australian dollars against crypto, said Dalton-Bridges.

The platform allows users to park their crypto assets on the platform in exchange for dollars as a means of accessing immediate capital.

Related: Alabama Issues ‘Show Cause’ Order to BlockFi

While banks don’t accept crypto as collateral to borrow money for a home, car, boat, or holiday, Loda is attempting to provide its users the means to do just that.

“An example of a traditional collateralized loan is when someone uses a house to borrow more money. All that is happening here is we are introducing a new form of collateral, which is the crypto itself,” said Dalton-Bridges.

Those that believe in cryptocurrency as a long-term investment may borrow the cash in the short-term and still benefit, as the person who takes the loan “still captures all the potential upside” of an appreciating cryptos price.

“This is appealing to crypto holders who want access to cash but don’t want to sell,” said Dalton-Bridges. “The benefits of borrowing against crypto are namely that you are not selling your crypto but are still able to access cash in the here and now, and at low-interest rates.”

The founder estimates a flat rate across all loans will be placed somewhere in the 5% range once the platform goes live sometime in August.

Related Stories

• Australia’s Zip to Launch Crypto Services in a Year: Report
• Australia’s Mawson Infrastructure Increases Count of Bitcoin Mining Machines in US Operation

ARK Investment Management snapped up stock and crypto trading platform Robinhood’s shares hours after they made their debut on the Nasdaq exchange.

• The New York-based investment manager picked up a total of 1,297,615 shares via its ARKK fund, which typically invests in tech improvement.
• Robinhood shares, trading under the ticker symbol HOOD, fell 8.4% to close at $34.82 each after opening Thursday around $38 per share.
• Earlier this month, Robinhood began unconventionally offering a portion of its IPO to users via its app which some considered as a risky gamble.
• ARK, which actively trades shares on a continual basis, is heavily invested in crypto and blockchain-centric businesses, among other areas.
• In April, the firm made a significant purchase in Coinbase stock shortly after it too debuted on the Nasdaq exchange. COIN’s share price is also down considerably from its opening bid of $381.

Related Stories

• Robinhood Falls in Trading Debut
• Robinhood IPO Priced at Lower End of Range, Valued at $32B
• Robinhood Reportedly Testing Feature to Protect Crypto Investors From Volatility
• Robinhood Under Investigation for Finra Registration Violation

The head of Ireland’s central bank, who has likened the purchase of cryptocurrencies to collecting stamps, foresees a digital euro.

• Central Bank of Ireland Governor Gabriel Makhlouf said that although the eurozone has yet to decide on a central bank digital currency, the development is “very likely” to happen.
• “In my view, it’s not a question of if but rather how and when,” the governor wrote in a bank blog post on Thursday.
• Introducing a digital euro would represent a “fundamental shift” in the financial architecture of the eurozone, Makhlouf noted.
• The governor was less kind to cryptos, which he said were accompanied by an “unhelpful and misleading descriptor,” as they don’t fall under the definition of a currency.
• Some cryptos have no anchor to provide stability, Makhlouf wrote, but he added that “on the other hand, on the evidence some people do like to collect them, just as some like to collect other things (such as stamps, for example). Buying such items can be profitable, but it can also be loss-making.”
• Makhlouf also took aim at stablecoins, saying the cryptos that are pegged to a stable currency like the U.S. dollar were only “as good as the governance behind the promise of the backing.”
• The governor, who became governor of Ireland’s central bank in September 2019, is a British economist. He was previously the New Zealand Treasury’s secretary and chief executive, according to his LinkedIn page.
• In March, Ireland’s central bank warned that companies operating in the republic would have to comply with anti-money laundering rules, and in May, it warned investors about the risk of cryptos.

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• Bank of America Calls CBDCs ‘More Effective’ Than Cash in Research Note
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The head of Ireland’s main monetary authority has likened the purchase of cryptocurrencies to collecting stamps, while praising the potential for a digital euro.

• Central Bank of Ireland Governor Gabriel Makhlouf said that while the Eurozone has yet to decide on a central bank digital currency, the development is “very likely” to happen.
• “In my view, it’s not a question of if but rather how and when,” the governor wrote in a bank blog post on Thursday.
• Introducing a digital euro would represent a “fundamental shift” in the financial architecture of the Eurozone, Makhlouf noted.
• The governor was less kind to cryptos, which he said were accompanied by an “unhelpful and misleading descriptor,” as they fell out of the definitions of currency.
• Some cryptos have no anchor to provide stability, wrote Makhlouf, but “on the other hand, on the evidence some people do like to collect them, just as some like to collect other things (such as stamps, for example). Buying such items can be profitable but it can also be loss-making.”
• Makhlouf also took aim at stablecoins, saying the pegged cryptos were only “as good as the governance behind the promise of the backing.”
• The governor, who took up his position in September 2019, is a British national. He was previously the New Zealand Treasury’s secretary and chief executive, according to his LinkedIn page.
• In March, Ireland’s central bank warned companies operating in the republic would have to comply with anti-money laundering rules. It also warned against the risk of crypto to investors in May.

Related Stories

• Bank of America Calls CBDCs ‘More Effective’ Than Cash in Research Note
• Bank of Estonia Finds ‘Unlimited’ Potential in Digital Euro Test
• Nigeria’s Central Bank Digital Currency Pilot to Start Oct. 1
• India’s Central Bank Considering Pilot Programs for CBDC: Report

Banco de Bogotá, Colombia’s first commercial bank, plans to test allowing deposits and withdrawals with a crypto exchange. 

As part of a government-sponsored pilot to test banking services for crypto platforms, Banco de Bogotá will allow bank customers to send and withdraw money from Chilean crypto exchange Buda.com in August, said Alejandro Beltrán, Colombia country manager for Buda.com. 

Although the service is scheduled to start early in the month, both parties are still defining the terms and conditions of the contract, Beltrán told CoinDesk. 

Related: Colombia Central Bank Launches Blockchain Bond Project

“Banco de Bogotá has been very detailed and careful in this process, which is understandable since it is entering a new world and they want to understand it in all its dimensions,” said the executive. 

In January, Colombia’s financial watchdog, the Financial Superintendency of Colombia (SFC) – announced that nine crypto firms (out of 14 applicants) were chosen to test banking services for crypto platforms as part of a yearlong project.

The agreement between Buda.com and Banco de Bogotá would be the second to be launched. Crypto exchange Bitpoint started operating with Colombian fintech Movii in July, along with crypto exchange Panda.

Banco de Bogotá will also operate with Mexican crypto exchange Bitso, although that partnership has not yet started either, Beltrán said. 

Related: Colombia’s Capital Unveils $750K Blockchain Investment Plan

Among the nine exchanges chosen by the SFC is Binance, which will operate with Colombian bank Davivienda and fintech Powwi, while Gemini plans to operate with Bancolombia. 

Until the adoption of the pilot, banks had restricted money transfers to exchanges due to financial regulations, although people have been making them without specifying that they were crypto operations, Beltrán added. 

While the pilot isn’t intended to lead to new regulations, it will allow exchanges to partner with large banks that have broad coverage and more experience, said Beltrán, who added that it also allows the SFC to understand how the crypto industry works. 

The Colombian government also launched a regulatory sandbox in September 2020 to expand its fintech regulatory testing environment, while regulators have issued crypto tax guidelines as well as anti-money laundering (AML) regulations.

The bank also began a pilot program to examine crypto asset-related business models earlier this year.

Beltrán said the pilot is not part of the regulatory sandbox and does not look to regulate the industry.

“We believe that in the future it can be a reference for regulation, but this test is not intended for that purpose,” he said.

Related Stories

• Colombia’s Crypto Use Soars, and Local Regulators Step In
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Business intelligence company MicroStrategy will continue investing in its “digital asset strategy,” the company’s CEO Michael Saylor said in its Q2 earnings announcement Thursday.

• Saylor noted that the Tysons Corner, Va.-based company’s latest funding had allowed the firm to increase its digital holdings to more than 105,000 bitcoins.
• “We continue to be pleased by the results of the implementation of our digital asset strategy,” he said, adding that “going forward, we intend to continue to deploy additional capital into our digital asset strategy.”
• The software firm has been purchasing enormous amounts of bitcoin since last August that it keeps in its treasury reserve.
• The non-GAAP (generally accepted accounting principles) calculation of the market value of MicroStrategy’s current bitcoin holdings as of June 30 was $3.653 billion, reflecting bitcoin’s market price of $34,763 at the time. The non-GAAP digital asset cost basis was $2.741 billion or $26,080 per bitcoin.
• MicroStrategy reported $125.4 million in revenue for the quarter, a 13.4% increase over its performance for the same period a year ago.
• Shares of MicroStrategy were down 2.2% to $611.48 in after-hours trading Thursday following the release of its results.

Related Stories

• Market Wrap: Bitcoin Stalls Near $40K as Buyers Take Profits
• Blockchain Data Shows Bitcoin’s Current Price Floor at $37.3K
• Bitcoin, on Cusp of Longest Winning Streak Since 2015, Struggles at $40K
• Bitcoin Overbought at $40K Resistance; Support at $34K-$36K

Bitcoin traded sideways on Thursday as buyers appeared to be exhausted near the $40,000 resistance level. The cryptocurrency is up about 23% over the past week, a gain driven by improving sentiment and short covering. 

Some analysts expect bitcoin to remain range-bound as the current rally takes a breather. 

“Our sense is that the market will keep looking to trade within this $30K-$40K range in the near term,” wrote QCP Capital in a Telegram chat. “Into Friday’s month-end expiry, we expect $40K-$42K to hold as the open interest peaks here.”

Latest prices

Related: Blockchain Data Shows Bitcoin’s Current Price Floor at $37.3K

Cryptocurrencies:

• Bitcoin (BTC) $39711.8, -1.45%
• Ether (ETH) $2312.1, +0.2%

Traditional markets:

• S&P 500: 4419.1, +0.42%
• Gold: $1828.2, +1.21%
• 10-year Treasury yield closed at 1.273%, compared with 1.233% on Wednesday

“Price levels to consider are the $40,000 psychological price level, and $44,000, which is the next resistance level BTC saw when Tesla announced they would accept BTC as payment back in February,” Jeffrey Wang, head of Americas at Amber Group, wrote in an email to CoinDesk.

In the bitcoin options market, “there is not much open interest between the $45,000 and $50,000 strikes for the August expiry,” Pankaj Balani, CEO of Delta Exchange, wrote in an email to CoinDesk. “We can see sharp moves here.”

Related: 6 Flagship Dapps Set to Go Live on Ethereum Scaling Project SKALE

Bitcoin is up about 35% year to date, double the S&P 500’s 17% gain over the same period. Both bitcoin and stocks are beating gold’s 5% loss year to date.

Bitcoin open interest

“Bitcoin open interest has also been picking up, breaking above its June highs and retesting support,” Stack Funds, a Singapore-based crypto asset management firm, wrote in a newsletter Thursday. (See chart below.)   

“Our expectations for a retest towards the mid/low $20K region is less likely,” Stack Funds wrote. The firm mentioned that a clear breakout in open interest is required in order to signal further upside in bitcoin.

Risk management

Although bitcoin remains in a secular bull market, the cryptocurrency has fallen by a minimum of 25% once in every calendar year since 2013, according to Panxora, a crypto investment firm.

“Often that fall averages more than 40% and this kind of drawdown makes cryptocurrency a challenging investment for those that have no way to manage this kind of volatility risk,” Panxora wrote on its website.

When managing risk, crypto investors can consider macro conditions such as economic growth and inflation, which tend to influence the prices of assets in both traditional and crypto markets.

“I think inflation fears will reemerge,” Gavin Smith, CEO of Panxora, said in an interview with CoinDesk. “And I think that will be the catalyst for a true move in the cryptocurrency, certainly bitcoin’s over the next six to nine months.

“From a longer-term perspective, I’m quite bullish on the environment, because what we’ve seen in the downturn is really people pulling away from the inflation narrative that we saw,” Smith said. “Personally, I think it’s too early to pull away from that.”

Smith said that Panxora and other institutions he spoke to are “entering the buy zone.”

“Even if they’re long-term bullish on bitcoin, what they do is they wait for these frequent sell-offs,” Smith said. “And then they use that to start accumulating their holdings, rather than chasing the market higher.”

Altcoin roundup

• Paxos discloses more investors: Paxos – a provider of blockchain infrastructure – said Bank of America, crypto exchange FTX, Founders Fund and Coinbase Ventures were among a heavyweight list of investors in its $300 million Series D funding round, the firm disclosed on Thursday. Oak HC/FT led the funding round, which the nine-year-old company announced in late April at a valuation of $2.4 billion. The round also included PayPal Ventures and Mithril Capital, among others. The firm has raised more than $540 million over multiple funding rounds.
• Traders bearish on AXS: Even though AXS, the governance token of Axie Infinity, has logged a year-to-date price return of over 7,000%, compared with bitcoin’s roughly 33% return and ether’s 212% return, some crypto traders are bearish toward the token. “The euphoric-herd mentality pushed the valuation to extremes, and as with any overcrowded trade, once the unwind takes place, the price swings will be extremely volatile,” Denis Vinokourov, head of research at London-based quantitative finance management firm Synergia Capital, told CoinDesk’s Muyao Shen. “The problem is market timing – timing the top of the market – is notoriously difficult.”
• FET Volatility: The price of Fetch.ai’s native token (FET) has endured a roller-coaster run over the last 24 hours following its listing on the U.S. cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase on Wednesday. It is not unusual for a coin being listed on one of the world’s best-known exchanges. Often dubbed the “Coinbase Effect,” the phenomenon is when a cryptocurrency experiences a sharp uptick in price preceding and following its listing. After the listing, though, a crypto’s price tends to cool as speculative traders look to cash in on the hype surrounding the crypto’s new home.
• Ethereum’s ‘Enterprise’ Play: As Ethereum celebrates its sixth anniversary, Joe Lubin, a co-founder of Ethereum and the CEO of ConsenSys, says the convergence between the public mainnet and corporate versions of the technology are now closer than ever. Lubin, who spoke today at the Enterprise Ethereum Alliance (EEA) anniversary event alongside Ethereum chief scientist Vitalik Buterin and Web 3.0 leader and angel investor Balaji Srinivasan, pointed to cryptocurrencies, decentralized finance (DeFi) and non-fungible tokens (NFTs) now entering pop culture.

Relevant News:

• Robinhood Falls in Trading Debut
• ProFunds Mutual Fund Gives Retails Investors Access to Bitcoin Futures
• State Street to Provide Crypto Fund Administration Services
• FTX US Affiliate Sees Record Daily Trading Volume in First Half of 2021
• Crypto Volatility Index 2.0 Rolled Out With USDC Support

Other markets

Most digital assets on CoinDesk 20 ended up higher on Thursday. 

Notable winners of 21:00 UTC (4:00 p.m. ET):

the graph (GRT) +5.05%

bitcoin cash (BCH) +4.38%

polkadot (DOT) +4.12%

Notable losers:

chainlink (LINK) -2.33%

eos (EOS) -1.71%

algorand (ALGO) -1.01%

Related Stories

• Bitcoin, on Cusp of Longest Winning Streak Since 2015, Struggles at $40K
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Legislation to provide a “comprehensive legal framework” to regulate the digital asset market was introduced in the House of Representatives Wednesday.

According to sponsor Rep. Don Beyer (D-Va.), chairman of the U.S. Congress Joint Economic Committee, the existing digital asset market structure and regulatory framework are too “ambiguous and dangerous for investors and consumers.”

Among its many provisions the measure would:

• Create statutory definitions for digital assets and digital asset securities and provide the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) with authority over digital asset securities and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) with authority over digital assets
• Require digital asset transactions that are not recorded on the publicly distributed ledger to be reported to a registered Digital Asset Trade Repository within 24 hours to minimize the potential for fraud and promote transparency
• Explicitly add digital assets and digital asset securities to the statutory definition of “monetary instruments,” under the Bank Secrecy Act (BSA), formalizing the regulatory requirements for digital assets and digital asset securities to comply with anti-money laundering, recordkeeping, and reporting requirements
• Provide the Federal Reserve with explicit authority to issue a digital version of the U.S. dollar, clarify that digital assets, digital asset securities and fiat-based stablecoins are not U.S. legal tender, and provide the U.S. Treasury Secretary with authority to permit or prohibit US dollar and other fiat-based stablecoins
• Direct the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC), National Credit Union Administration (NCUA), and Securities Investor Protection Corporation (SIPC) to issue consumer advisories on “non coverage” of digital assets or digital asset securities to ensure that consumers are aware that they are not insured or protected in the same way as bank deposits or securities

Related: The Senate Shoves a Dangerous, Last-Minute $28B Crypto Provision Into the Infrastructure Bill

According to Beyer, there are an estimated 11,000-plus separate digital asset tokens in existence, with a market cap of over $1.5 trillion, and that 20 million to 46 million Americans currently own bitcoin and other digital assets.

UPDATE (July 29 20:14 UTC): Adds details throughout. 

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Bitcoin, the leading cryptocurrency by market capitalization, has a price floor now of around $37,300, Chainalysis wrote Thursday in its latest market report. The blockchain data firm wrote that the market is holding the price floor well as demand from existing whale investors (large bitcoin holders) has returned.

“So demand is returning to the market,” the report concluded. “Supply, which has become more liquid since prices fell in May, is only as liquid as it was in December 2020. This all suggests the market is at least in a sideways state and is unlikely to enter an extreme price fall phase.”

Chainalysis estimates a temporary bitcoin price floor by calculating the average cost of bitcoin held by investors who entered the market in the past 12 months. Getting the data is possible because of blockchain’s transparency.

Related: Market Wrap: Bitcoin Stalls Near $40K as Buyers Take Profits

At press time, bitcoin was changing hands at 39,667.50, down 2.13% in the past 24 hours, according to CoinDesk’s Bitcoin Price Index.

Unlike the case in traditional markets, bitcoin’s price gains and losses have been concentrated in a short period of time, Philip Gradwell, chief economist at Chainalysis, wrote in the report. Data shows that since last year, 75% of bitcoin’s absolute price gains occurred in just 25% of the days when its price closed in green. A similar trend also occurs for bitcoin’s absolute losses.

That differs from traditional markets such as the S&P 500, where gains or losses are more equally distributed. For example, a little more than 75% of the S&P 500’s gains took place in more than 50% of the days.

Therefore, according to Gradwell, the so-called on-chain price floor is an essential metric for crypto traders and analysts to understand bitcoin’s market, which can be become extremely volatile in a short period of time.

Related: Bitcoin, on Cusp of Longest Winning Streak Since 2015, Struggles at $40K

“If an investor buys bitcoin at $40,000 and continues to hold, then we know that they value bitcoin at least at $40,000,” Gradwell wrote. “If the price were to go below $40,000, then it would be below their valuation and they may buy more.”

The chart below also shows that the on-chain price floor is a better indicator than the 200- and 50-day simple moving average (SMA) of the price to hint when a bull run may end.

Crypto traders and analysts have long been watching the “death cross” – the intersection of the 50-day moving average below the 200-day moving average – as a key technical indicator of a shift from a bull market to a bearish one.

But during the bull runs in late 2017 and this April, for example, the on-chain price floor flattened both times ahead of the appearance of a “death cross,” making it a “leading” indicator of a change in market trends.

“The on-chain price floor stops increasing the moment that investors stop buying in a price rally,” the report said, showing that a decline in bitcoin demand would soon lead to a bearish market trend.

Related Stories

• Bitcoin Overbought at $40K Resistance; Support at $34K-$36K
• Market Wrap: Bitcoin Expected to Pause Before Next Rally

Ethereum scaling project SKALE has announced which decentralized applications (dapps) will first go live on its network.

SKALE Labs CEO Jack O’Holleran told CoinDesk that teams will be releasing their dapps between now and the end of this summer. Boot.Finance, Covey, CurioDAO, Human Protocol, Ivy and Minds are the projects in the initial cohort.

The SKALE launch comes as projects looking to boost Ethereum’s usability rush to showcase themselves. From Reddit choosing Arbitrum to Uniswap tapping Optimism, scaling projects are touting various ways to get more transactions onto the world’s leading smart-contract platform.

Related: Market Wrap: Bitcoin Stalls Near $40K as Buyers Take Profits

“We hit a tech milestone and now we have hand-selected these use cases and partners to go live, paving the way for others to join,” O’Holleran said in an interview. “There are over 100 applications … that are currently being tested on SKALE.”

On July 20 the San Francisco-based SKALE Labs announced the release of the SKALE IMA bridge, which allows applications to increase speed and performance relative to the Ethereum mainnet.

“Unlike most layer 1 and layer 2 networks, the SKALE architecture is built to support an ever-expanding set of dapp-specific chains,” the firm wrote in its bridge announcement.

SKALE is backed by investors including Winklevoss Capital, Arrington XRP Capital, Blockchange, ConsenSys Labs, Hashed, HashKey and Multicoin Capital.

Related: The Node: Cats Clog Ethereum, the Sequel

O’Holleran highlighted Boot.Finance, which is a decentralized liquidity protocol launching on SKALE in August, describing it as a “quintessential Ethereum DeFi project with a proven team.”

“There are many DeFi projects going on SKALE after and they [Boot.Finance] are leading the way. We will be announcing new partnerships in the future,” said O’Holleran.

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Bitcoin has notched an eight-day winning streak, taking the price above $40,000. The cryptocurrency was trading at $30,000 as recently as July 21 and has been climbing since.

If it ended the day in the green, bitcoin would ink its longest winning streak since October 2015. 

But as of press time, the largest cryptocurrency was down slightly since 0:00 coordinated universal time on Thursday, slipping back below $40,000.

Related: Bitcoin Overbought at $40K Resistance; Support at $34K-$36K

“After this eight-day rally, bitcoin may well need to reset as there is a bearish divergence appearing on the short-term frame,” said Laurent Kssis, managing director of ETPs at 21Shares AG. 

On bitcoin’s daily chart, price action is playing out as the right shoulder of a head-and-shoulders top formation in a $28,000 to $42,000 range, said Imran Yusof, technical analyst at Quantum Economics. 

Yusof noted that head-and-shoulders top formations are typically bearish.

“This range matches the same range in the left shoulder period from Christmas 2020 to early February, also on the daily chart,” he added. 

Related: Market Wrap: Bitcoin Expected to Pause Before Next Rally

In order for the bitcoin rally to continue, “more interest is needed from corporate America,” said Edward Moya, senior analyst at Oanda. He said that acceptance of bitcoin as a means of payment and more firm commitments from institutional investors will further the rally. 

The steady rise in bitcoin is a “clear sign that institutional investors are gradually scaling into their longer-term positions,” Moya said.

Moya said planned cuts in the maximum allowed leverage on bitcoin derivatives trades on the Binance and FTX cryptocurrency exchanges might help to dampen price volatility, which could help to draw in new investors who were leery of the elevated risk.   

The cuts in the leverage limits  “should be very supportive for bitcoin‘s longer-term outlook,” Moya said. 

“The significance of eight straight days of gains is outweighed by the significance of the aforementioned range, i.e. the will of bitcoin bears pressuring above the $42K resistance versus the will of bitcoin bulls supporting below $28K,” Yusof said.

“If bitcoin can come down and hold above $35K, there’s a better chance that renewed bullish sentiment alone can drive it through $42K later,” he added. 

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Over $1 billion worth of crypto short positions were liquidated in a 24-hour span amid Bitcoin's rally over $40,000 this week.

Shares of stock trading app Robinhood were trading down about 4% in its stock market debut on Thursday afternoon.

• Shares priced on Wednesday evening at $38 a share, towards the low end of its trading range and valuing the company at $32 billion. The company sold 52.4 million shares and raised $1.89 billion.
• Trading was volatile at the start and shares initially fell as much as 10%. But the stock was more recently trading down 3.7% to $36.49. The company is trading on the Nasdaq under the ticker symbol HOOD.
• The company has significant crypto ambitions, with 17% of its overall revenue coming from crypto transactions in the first quarter of the year. Customers can currently buy and sell bitcoin, ether and dogecoin.
• Robinhood unconventionally offered a portion of its IPO to users via its app — a strategy some consider to be a risky gamble.

UPDATE (July 29, 17:45 UTC): Updated with additional information throughout.

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• Robinhood IPO Priced at Lower End of Range, Valued at $32B
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• Robinhood Crypto Expects to Pay $30M Fine to NY State Regulatory Body

The non-fungible tokens (NFT) platform AlchemyNFT has raised $6 million from investors including billionaire Mark Cuban, Crypto.com Capital, Framework Ventures and Mechanism.

• Funding will be used to add staff and build out the company’s systems, including its AutographNFT.io platform that allows payments for celebrities and artists who wish to sign NFTs and donate the proceeds to charities such as Save the Children.
• Cuban, owner of the Dallas Mavericks National Basketball Association team, has also backed the NFT marketplace Mintable, which raised $13 million in Series A funding earlier this month.
• AlchemyNFT is a project of the team behind crypto wallet AlphaWallet, including CEO Victor Zhang and CTO Weiwu Zhang.
• One of the first participants was Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin, who used his Twitter ID to sign an NFT entitled “The Alchemist” by the artist Mladen Petronijevic on July 24.
• That work was specifically chosen to mark the launch of the project, Victor Zhang, AlchemyNFT’s founder, told CoinDesk.
• AutographNFT.io uses Ethereum virtual machine (EVM) smart contracts and TokenScript technology for the NFTs.
• Other investors in the fundraising round included DRF, Fenbushi Capital, Free Company, Hash Global, HashKey, LongHash Ventures, Mask Network, Puzzle Ventures, SevenX Ventures, Huobi Ventures and OKEx Blockdream Ventures.

Read more: Shopify to Allow Merchants to Sell NFTs Directly Through Their Stores

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• The Node: Cats Clog Ethereum, the Sequel
• ConsenSys Chief Joe Lubin: Ethereum’s ‘Enterprise’ Play Is Evolving
• AS Roma Football Club Signs $42M Deal With Blockchain Fintech Zytara Labs
• Shopify to Allow Merchants to Sell NFTs Directly Through Their Stores

ProFunds, an asset manager that manages $60 billion worldwide, has registered a mutual fund based on bitcoin futures with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). 

The SEC is reviewing more than a dozen bitcoin exchange-traded fund (ETF) applications and has delayed decisions on several of them. The launch of a bitcoin futures-focused mutual fund slightly increases retail access to the crypto market for retail investors, though it won’t be as efficient or attractive for investors as an ETF might be.

Mutual funds give retail investors access to professionally managed portfolios, but they can only be bought or sold once daily and cannot be traded throughout the day as stocks and ETFs can. 

Related: Global X Joins Firms Filing Bitcoin ETF Application With SEC

To the crypto industry, however, a bitcoin futures mutual fund is like a music artist releasing an album on CD instead of a music streaming service, said Bloomberg Intelligence ETFs analyst Eric Balchunas.

“Admittedly, we were paying a little less attention to the mutual fund side because the ETF side is where the real prize is,” Balchunas said. “This thing is holding futures in a mutual fund wrapper, and it’s likely not going to be tax efficient. What people really desire is a physically backed bitcoin ETF, in an ETF wrapper that is tax efficient.”

The move is positive for funds that hold bitcoin futures, but may not mean anything for applications that aim to create funds that hold physical bitcoin, Balchunas said. 

This mutual fund was filed under The Investment Company Act of 1940 (1940 Act) whereas the bitcoin ETF applications are being filed under Securities Act of 1933 (1933 Act) which has less investor protections, Balchunas added. 1940 Act funds are required to invest in securities, and bitcoin isn’t a security, Balchunas said. Because the mutual fund holds Treasurys for margin, those can count as securities for a 1940 Act requirement. 

Related: Viridi Funds Launches ETF Focused on Cleaner Energy Crypto Miners

Bitcoin Strategy ProFund (BTCFX) aims to “invest all or substantially all” of its assets into CME bitcoin futures contracts. During “unusual market conditions,” however, the mutual fund may invest assets into Canadian bitcoin ETFs, such as Purpose Bitcoin CAD ETF or CI Galaxy Bitcoin ETF. 

The filing noted that the fund won’t invest any more than 10% of its assets into these ETFs. 

“The Fund does not take temporary defensive positions,” the filing said. “The Fund will generally hold its bitcoin-related investments during periods in which the value of bitcoin is flat or declining as well as during periods in which the value of bitcoin is rising. For example, if the Fund’s bitcoin-related investments are declining in value, the Fund generally will not exit its positions except as needed to meet redemption requests.”

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Leading Indian cryptocurrency exchange CoinDCX is in talks to raise $100 million to $120 million in a funding round led by Facebook co-founder Eduardo Saverin’s B Capital Group, India’s Economic Times reported Thursday, citing three people with knowledge of the matter.

• The round would value CoinDCX at more than $1 billion, according it so-called unicorn status.
• Polychain Capital and Coinbase Ventures are also set to participate. Both invested in the firm last year as part of a $2.5 million funding round.
• CoinDCX had 1.5 million users as of last month, up 700% since March 2020. It plans to expand by acquiring smaller exchanges in other markets, a spokesperson told the newspaper.
• As many as 15 million Indians are now trading crypto, according to a report last month by blockchain analytics firm Chainalysis. The report also said that investment in crypto in India has surged over 600% in the past year from $923 million to $6.6 billion.

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As Ethereum celebrates its sixth anniversary, Joe Lubin, a co-founder of Ethereum and the CEO of ConsenSys, says the convergence between the public mainnet and corporate versions of the technology are now closer than ever.

Lubin, who is speaking today at the Enterprise Ethereum Alliance (EEA) anniversary event alongside Ethereum chief scientist Vitalik Buterin and Web 3.0 leader and angel investor Balaji Srinivasan, pointed to cryptocurrencies, decentralized finance (DeFi) and non-fungible tokens (NFTs) now entering pop culture.

“In my opinion, this is a moment where we can start to think of the paradigm shift towards a new trust foundation,” Lubin told CoinDesk in an interview. “We’ve been proclaiming for years that it’s coming, and now it’s moving fast.”

Related: 6 Flagship Dapps Set to Go Live on Ethereum Scaling Project SKALE

Lubin’s ConsenSys has become a cornerstone of enterprise blockchain, having taken on stewardship of the permissioned Quorum network, a fork of Ethereum created by mega-bank JPMorgan in 2016.

In terms of the convergence narrative, Lubin said banks like JPMorgan and Goldman Sachs are “not just paying a lot of attention to the public mainnet, but are starting to do things around digital assets.”

That said, the EEA now finds itself in increasingly active discussion about just what “enterprise blockchain” is in 2021, Lubin said. 

“So, in the context of the EAA, is Polygon an enterprise?” Lubin said. “Is the Maker Foundation an enterprise? The definition of ‘enterprise’ is evolving.”

Related: The Node: Cats Clog Ethereum, the Sequel

EEA Chairman John Whelan said he looks forward to Ethereum sidechains and layer 2 systems that are specifically enterprise-related. 

Whelan, whose day job is leading Banco Santander’s blockchain lab, said that when he first joined the EEA, he was asked if enterprise Ethereum and the public mainnet would remain separate concepts. 

“The answer is no,” he said.

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State Street is to offer crypto and digital asset fund administration services to its private-fund clients.

• Working in partnership with software provider Lukka, State Street will offer collection, reconciliation, processing and reporting related to cryptocurrency and other digital assets, an announcement Thursday said.
• State Street will use Lukka’s middle and back office software to incorporate digital assets alongside private clients’ other alternative investments.
• This news is the latest sign of the incremental adoption of crypto assets among Wall Street’s vanguard, following on from State Street’s recent launch of a cryptocurrency division.
• The U.S.’s second oldest bank with around $40 trillion in assets in custody or administration launched State Street Digital in June to incorporate cryptocurrency, digital currencies, blockchain and tokenization into its platforms.
• State Street is also providing the infrastructure for a new crypto trading platform called Pure Digital and has said it intends to eventually start using the platform for trading. 

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U.S. clients of Compass Mining can now avoid tax on the bitcoin they mine by buying mining hardware through their individual retirement accounts (IRAs).

• Through an agreement with Choice IRA, a crypto-friendly retirement offering by digital asset custodian Kingdom Trust, Compass clients can mine bitcoin without triggering a taxable event.
• Compass provides individual miners with a hosting facility and operates their hardware for them, in what could be seen as an Airbnb-esque model for mining facilities.
• The miners might be discouraged by having to pay tax twice: once as income on the bitcoin they mine and again on the capital gains when they sell.
• The Compass arrangement allows clients to circumvent this requirement by buying mining hardware with funds in their Choice IRA, which then receives the payouts.

CORRECTION (JULY 29, 16:01 UTC): Corrects that mining hardware needs to be bought through the IRA.

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