CoinDesk Crypto

• Bitcoin (BTC) trading around $58,916.75 as of 20:00 UTC (4 p.m. ET). Slipping 0.02% over the previous 24 hours.
• Bitcoin’s 24-hour range: $57,973.35-$59,458.98(CoinDesk 20)
• BTC trades between its 10-hour and 50-hour averages on the hourly chart, a sideways signal for market technicians.

Bitcoin retreated after failing for a second day to break through price resistance at $60,000, a key psychological level that has also proven a formidable stopping point during this year’s powerful rally.

A major missing ingredient from the market recently? Spot trading volume.

Thursday’s volume has trended lower since bitcoin broke a record high on March 13, according to data from eight leading crypto exchanges tracked by CoinDesk.

Related: Retail Gains Amid Institutional Influx in Q1: CoinDesk Quarterly Review

“We still see the highest volume when the market sells off, which is a concern,” Arcane Research wrote in its weekly newsletter on March 30.

But to bitcoin bulls, the largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization is likely to test a new all-time high very soon.

“Bitcoin is poised to retest the $60,000 level again,” said Jason Lau, chief operating officer at San Francisco-based crypto exchange OKCoin. “The reason for this recent rally is that bitcoin and crypto have gone mainstream.”

Despite the effete price action over the past few weeks, there’s been little slowdown in news and developments related to mainstream adoption of bitcoin and cryptocurrencies: BlackRock disclosed it has been trading bitcoin futures, PayPal said it will enable crypto payments, Goldman Sachs is getting close to offering bitcoin to its wealth management clients, and burrito chain Chipotle is doing a bitcoin giveaway.

Related: CoinDesk Quarterly Review 2021 Q1

“The normalization of crypto in daily chatter and usage is increasingly obvious,” Lau said.

Read More: Bitcoin Newbies Are HODLing as Prices Rise, Blockchain Data Suggests

• Ether (ETH) trading around $1,974.18 as of 20:00 UTC (4 p.m. ET). Climbing 3.55% over the previous 24 hours.
• Ether’s 24-hour range: $1,888.64-$1,983.45 (CoinDesk 20)
• Ether trades above its 10-hour and 50-hour averages on the hourly chart, a bullish signal for market technicians.

Ether has outperformed bitcoin in the past 24 hours, which could be “a signal of crypto asset rotation,” according to OKCoin’s Lau.

Alternative cryptocurrencies mostly outperformed during the first quarter, based on CoinDesk 20 data. While bitcoin logged an extraordinary 102% return, that level of performance was only good enough for 14th place in the CoinDesk quarterly ranking.

Cardano (ADA) was the top performer in terms of percentage gains, with a staggering 560% return.

The token is now the No. 5 cryptocurrency by market capitalization, behind only bitcoin, ether, Binance’s BNB token and the stablecoin tether, per Messari data.

ADA, which is the native token for the smart-contract blockchain Cardano, tripled in February alone as traders bet on the success of “Ethererum Killers.”

In March, Cardano received a price boost thanks to the so-called Coinbase effect. The U.S. cryptocurrency exchange giant listed ADA on both its institutional platform Coinbase Pro and more retail-centered Coinbase exchange in March, sending the price higher.

Read More: Cardano Becomes a Multi-Asset Blockchain With Today’s Hard Fork

Other digital assets on the CoinDesk 20 are mostly in the green Thursday. Notable winners as of 20:00 UTC (4:00 p.m. ET):

• eos (EOS) + 22.94%
• tezos (XTZ) + 14.3%
• chainlink (LINK) + 8.58%
• kyber network (KNC) + 8.05%

One notable loser:

• omg network (OMG) – 4.63%

Equities:

• Asia’s Nikkei 225 closed in the green 0.72%.
• The FTSE 100 in Europe was up by 0.35%.
• The S&P 500 in the United States closed 1.18% higher.

Commodities:

• Oil was up 3.50%. Price per barrel of West Texas Intermediate crude: $61.23.
• Gold was in the green 1.24% and at $1728.48 as of press time.

Treasurys:

• The 10-year U.S. Treasury bond yield fell Thursday in the red 1.687%.

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Coinbase will begin the public trading of its stock on April 14, it said Thursday.

The crypto exchange will also hold a first-quarter earnings call on April 6, providing a financial outlook for 2021, Coinbase said in a press release.

There’s been much anticipation about the Nasdaq listing. Prices for the shares are predicted to fall between $300 and $350, valuing the trading platform at about $100 billion. The listing would put Coinbase atop an emerging class of publicly traded firms dealing in bitcoin. Further, a $100 billion debut would make Coinbase more valuable than traditional tech stocks such as Uber.

Related: Retail Gains Amid Institutional Influx in Q1: CoinDesk Quarterly Review

Based on the average price of $343.58 of shares traded on Nasdaq’s private market last month, CNBC calculated Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong’s 39.6 million shares will be worth $13.6 billion, catapulting him into the “decabillionaire” rankings alongside the likes of Jeff Bezos, Elon Musk and Bill Gates.

The price of bitcoin increasing tenfold over the course of the last year has caught the market by surprise, with banks and institutions now scrambling to get a piece of the action. 

Investors in Coinbase’s early fundraisings, a close-knit group of Silicon Valley investment firms and early crypto believers, have increased their investments by 100-fold in some cases. The windfall could spread much further, however: The endowment fund of Duke University will be a beneficiary of Coinbase’s public listing, CoinDesk reported last week.

Armstrong was paid a salary of $1 million last year, though his total compensation topped $59 million with all his option awards, CNBC also reported.

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Canadian digital asset manager 3iQ Corp announced Thursday it has inked an agreement with investment firm CoinShares to launch a new bitcoin exchange-traded fund (ETF). 

In an announcement, 3iQ Corp said CoinShares has partnered with the firm to launch the 3iQ CoinShares Bitcoin ETF. Trading under the ticker BTCQ, the vehicle for investing in bitcoin without holding the digital asset itself will be listed on the Toronto Stock Exchange (TSX) in early April, pending regulatory approval.  

Canada has taken the lead in North America in approving three bitcoin ETFs for crypto-curious investors. The Securities and Exchange Commission has been reticent to give the green light to a similar vehicle in the U.S., having shot down dozens of proposals in recent years. Last month, Brazil got into the act with the approval of its first bitcoin ETF.

Related: Retail Gains Amid Institutional Influx in Q1: CoinDesk Quarterly Review

3iQ has more than C$2 billion (US$1.59 billion) in assets under management and listed a bitcoin fund on the TSX in April last year. The 3iQ CoinShares Bitcoin ETF will have a 1% annual management fee.

In March, CoinShares began trading on the Nasdaq First North Growth Market, an alternative stock exchange for small and medium-sized growth companies in Europe, trading under the ticker CS.

Canada is ahead of the U.S. market with a number of bitcoin ETFs already listed on the TSX. In February, Evolve Funds Group and Purpose Investment both listed bitcoin ETFs on the exchange. 

CI Global Asset Management received regulatory approval earlier this month for its final prospectus for the “CI Galaxy Bitcoin ETF” – which is now listed on the TSX under the ticker BTCX.

Related: CoinDesk Quarterly Review 2021 Q1

“We have followed 3iQ’s incredible growth closely since they received a landmark decision in Canada to allow listed bitcoin vehicles,” CoinShares CEO Jean-Marie Mognetti said of the tie-up.

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Decentraland, the decentralized virtual world, has added usability with Ethereum layer 2 project Polygon to address gas fees that are currently plaguing Ethereum’s blockchain, according to a blog post Thursday. 

The move comes a day after decentralized finance (DeFi) firm Aave also said it was exploring scalable sidechains with Polygon. The Ethereum ecosystem continues to look for methods to avoid the congested network, where fees can sometimes be higher than the transactions themselves. 

“As of today, the Decentraland dapps suite now features an account portal where you can move your [Decentraland token] MANA from the Ethereum blockchain to Polygon’s Matic Network (and back),” the post states. 

Related: Retail Gains Amid Institutional Influx in Q1: CoinDesk Quarterly Review

The idea behind a layer 2 solution is that users can transfer their tokens to a sidechain link to the Ethereum blockchain, where they can transact more quickly and with much lower fees than on Ethereum itself. 

“Ethereum’s popularity and usage is increasing at an incredible rate, but this added demand on the network means users are forced to pay higher and higher gas fees in order to make sure their transactions are successful,” said Samuel Hamilton, Community and Events lead at Decentraland, in an email. “This is unsustainable for any dapp that makes use of thousands of microtransactions.”

Hamilton said users cannot be expected to pay tens of dollars (or more) for common, everyday actions, so dapp providers are looking for ways to scale their services. While this isn’t a new problem, he said, scalability solutions like Polygon’s are now able to provide the speed, affordability and usability (both for developers and end-users) to make a real difference.

The account portal is part of a more holistic effort to integrate all Decentraland dapps with Polygon. with the goal of letting users claim, buy, sell and trade wearables for their avatars entirely on Polygon without transaction fees. 

Related: CoinDesk Quarterly Review 2021 Q1

“While today’s release adds the ability to transfer assets in Decentraland from Etherum to Polygon, we won’t see the full effects until Decentraland’s Builder and Marketplace have been updated to support transactions on Polygon, which we can expect to see this coming May,” continues the post. 

“At that point, the wearables marketplace will be open to all creators with new wearables being minted on Polygon’s Matic network.”

Hamilton said the use of sophisticated L2 solutions like those provided by Polygon are a key component of providing applications with a true use-value, and their adoption is a trend we will see continue.

“Games and virtual worlds especially benefit from the higher throughput of sidechains,” he said. “Yes, the Ethereum developer community is taking steps toward more sustainable and manageable gas fees, and yes, we are on the way toward PoS, but [layer 2] solutions still have a role to play.”

The post contains further details about how to use the portal. 

(Note: Digital Currency Group, parent of CoinDesk, is an investor in Decentraland.)

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Mainstream finance professionals are making the move into crypto in growing numbers, from middle-size asset managers to the high ranks of the Financial Action Task Force. A Russian bank executive is the latest to make the leap.

Konstantin Shulga, former head of brokerage at Russia’s largest bank, Sber (formerly Sberbank), joined crypto over-the-counter (OTC) service Finery Markets in late March as its new chief executive. The firm is building an institutional peer-to-peer trading marketplace, Shulga told CoinDesk in an interview. 

He went full crypto after more than a decade in institutional finance in Russia, including at a branch of UniCredit, the Moscow Exchange and Sber, which is the leading retail bank in Russia and is half-owned by the country’s central bank. 

Related: Retail Gains Amid Institutional Influx in Q1: CoinDesk Quarterly Review

Sber itself is actively exploring the blockchain space and recently announced launching a digital settlement token for corporate clients, but Shulga wouldn’t say if those efforts sparked his curiosity for crypto.

He first bought bitcoin during the bull run of 2017 but sold it at around $18,000, he said, with no second thoughts afterward. 

“I don’t really have time for gambling, so I don’t regret [selling],” Shulga said.

He joined Finery at the invitation of his former coworker at the asset manager ATON, Finery co-founder Ilia Drozdov. Finery’s small team, according to LinkedIn, now employs a handful of former ATON and Moscow Exchange employees. 

Related: CoinDesk Quarterly Review 2021 Q1

Finery Markets is a Cyprus-based startup that aims to be something like LocalBitcoins for institutional investors. Except it’s not just bitcoin – Finery is offering funds and asset managers trading pairs between a number of cryptocurrencies and fiat currencies including U.S. dollars, euros, pound sterling, Canadian dollars and Japanese yen, Shulga said. 

He said that since its launch in April 2020, Finery has brought on 30 clients so far, including asset managers, high-frequency trading firms, crypto exchanges and crypto-related services, mostly in Europe. 

Using Finery, the firms’ trading volume in March reached $200 million, Shulga said. Growth has been steady: in January, volume was only $100 million, Shulga said.

Finery’s main competitors are centralized exchanges and OTC desks, Shulga said, which are also catering to institutional investors. However, “we want to convert them into our allies,” he added, explaining that integrating with Finery would provide them with more liquidity options. 

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• Bringing Bitcoin Experts, Developers and Learners Together; The MIT Bitcoin Club Shows How They Do It

Bitcoin miners collected $1.5 billion in revenue in March, a monthly record for the 12-year-old blockchain network, as the price of bitcoin (BTC) broke above $50,000.

• “Few had anticipated the scale of this bull run in September 2020. Back then, the monthly miner revenue sat at $329 million. Since then, the revenues have increased by 373%,” according to a new report by Arcane Research, a Norwegian analysis firm.
• Miners are awarded bitcoin whenever they add a new block of transactions to the blockchain, which they can later sell on the market to fund operating costs or simply just to cash out. Transaction fees are another source of revenue.
• “The recent mining revenue spike is rewarding miners who already had a well-established setup before the bitcoin bull run, or great foresight in Q3 2020.”
• New mining equipment is estimated to be delivered around November 2021 and January 2022, which could contribute to greater computational power (hashrate) used to mine and process transactions, according to Arcane.
• Publicly listed mining stocks have largely tracked the price of bitcoin in March. RIOT Blockchain, a bitcoin mining company (NASDAQ: RIOT), is up about 23% versus BTC’s rise of 26% for the month to date at the time of writing.

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Cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase has signed a sponsorship deal with Counter-Strike: Global Offensive (CS: GO) esports tournament organizer BLAST Premier. 

Headquartered in Denmark, BLAST Premier’s CS: GO professional esports league launched in 2020. It is primarily based in two regions: North America and Europe. The series is split up into two seasons, the Spring and Fall seasons.

In an announcement, BLAST Premier said the partnership means the Coinbase branding will feature across the Spring Showdown from April 13-18 and the finals from June 15-20.

Related: ‘There’s a Sense of Vindication’: A NFT Pioneer Looks to the Future

Last year, BLAST Premier was live streamed around the world in 105 territories to over 151 million households, according to the esports media network.

Coinbase’s sponsorship of the CS: GO events is yet another sign of the recently increasing integration of the cryptocurrency industry into the mainstream sports – and now esports – worlds alike. 

In March, Crypto.com secured a partnership with the National Hockey League’s Montreal Canadiens to have its logo brandished on the ice at its home arena, the Bell Centre.

Earlier this week, crypto exchange FTX secured the naming rights to the arena that houses the Miami Heat, the city’s professional basketball team. 

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“Esports and cryptocurrency both share a strong relationship with technology and innovation. BLAST Premier is enjoyed on a global scale with an audience that is known to be tech savvy,” said Oliver Clarke, head of brand partnerships for BLAST.

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A new atomic-swap powered wallet, Liquality, just released a feature for users to spend bitcoin and other coins at online crypto merchants without having to manage addresses or QR codes.

Liquality is a browser extension wallet like Metamask, except instead of supporting only ether and its tokens, Liquality can hold bitcoin, ether, crypto dollars like DAI, USDT, USDC and UNI, and now “bitcoin DeFi” tokens from the RSK network. 

The ConsenSys-backed wallet launched last autumn and allows users to swap coins in their wallet, thanks to an old trick known as “on-chain atomic swaps.” These swaps use complex cryptography to trade assets from different blockchains between two or more parties without a user having to relinquish their keys to a counterparty.

Related: ‘There’s a Sense of Vindication’: A NFT Pioneer Looks to the Future

For Liquality, this means its users can trade between bitcoin and ether (or crypto dollars like USDC) right on the wallet.

“Our goal has always been to give people secure and easy tools to interact with this new digital economy,” the wallets founder, Alex Min, told CoinDesk.

With this update, the wallet now also provides “one-click” transactions with popular bitcoin-accepting gift-card vendor Bitrefill and payment portal OpenNode, among others. When checking out using these services, the wallet automatically fetches the receiving address for the user.

The one-click pay feature works with any wallet that has integrated URI schemes for bitcoin, Min told CoinDesk. This includes popular open-source processor BTCPay Server, as well.

Related: Uniswap’s ‘Token’ Issue

“We believe this upcoming release will not only improve the in-browser bitcoin experience for users, merchants and app developers (most of whom are still transacting on-chain), but also help the nascent Bitcoin web app ecosystem grow with an easy-to-use-and-develop-with, in-browser hot wallet,” Min said.

Liquality currently acts as the counterparty for the wallet’s swaps. Min told CoinDesk the wallet processed $4 million in swap volume in March from 4,000 active weekly users. 

When asked if Liquality will look to adding Lightning Network support in the future, Min said it’s not high up on the wallet’s roadmap.

In lieu of Lightning, Liquality recently integrated with RSK, a Bitcoin sidechain built by IOV Labs, and supports the dollar on chain (DOC) crypto dollar from Sovryn, a decentralized lending market built on RSK.

These networks offer cheaper, faster transactions than Bitcoin’s primary network using special trade-offs and tricks; Lightning is a tech stack built on top of bitcoin that is trustless and non custodial, while RSK is an independent network run by a federation of trusted counterparties.

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Morgan Stanley is giving a handful of its mutual funds the ability to invest indirectly in bitcoin through cash-settled futures contracts and Grayscale’s bitcoin trust.

According to Thursday regulatory filings, ‘’certain funds” now have the go-ahead to seek “exposure to bitcoin indirectly.” The initial rollout features five Morgan Stanley fund families: Institutional Fund, Institutional Fund Trust, Europe Opportunity Fund, Insight Fund and Variable Insurance Fund.

Each fund may invest up to 25% of its total assets in bitcoin, the filings state. It was not clear at press time if any had begun. Morgan Stanley did not return requests for comment.

Related: ‘There’s a Sense of Vindication’: A NFT Pioneer Looks to the Future

Read more: Morgan Stanley Sees Cryptocurrencies on Path to Investable Asset Class

The green-light underscores Morgan Stanley’s increasing interest in bitcoin as an asset class even if, for now, it is keeping the crypto at arm’s length through indirect exposure. Last month, it debuted bitcoin investment fund products but only for high-net-worth clients.

Even yesterday the megabank put out its first hiring call for a cryptocurrency and blockchain lead analyst.

Grayscale is owned by CoinDesk parent company Digital Currency Group.

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The Oakland A’s is the first baseball team to have sold a luxury box for bitcoin.

• A’s President Dave Kaval tweeted Wednesday that crypto broker Voyager Digital had become the first buyer of a full-season suite at the Oakland Coliseum.

• The team announced March 14 it was selling private suites for the full 2021 season for either $64,800 or 1 BTC.
• The bitcoin paid by Voyager Digital was worth about $59,240 at the time of Kaval’s tweet.
• However, one must wonder what the firm’s cost basis was for the transacted bitcoin. Voyager Digital’s Stephen Ehrlich started as CEO in January 2018, when bitcoin was trading around $12,000.
• Kaval told Bloomberg on March 26 the A’s would hodl any bitcoin received from such sales and not convert it into fiat.
• “The price of a season suite may fluctuate depending on when it’s purchased, which adds to the excitement,” Kaval said when the scheme was announced.
• The A’s start the 2021 baseball season tonight in a home game against the Houston Astros.

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Cryptocurrency markets have matured in the past 12 months, with macroeconomics and blockchain-technology developments influencing prices more than ever and new Wall Street firms buying in seemingly every other day.

So it’s refreshing that dogecoin (DOGE), which was created in 2013 as a joke, continues to be a source of amusement even as it, too, shows signs of leaving its playful puppy days behind.

The digital token, symbolized by the Shiba Inu dog breed, shot up to a six-week high Thursday after a tweet by Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk, the billionaire entrepreneur whose DOGE-friendly announcements earlier this year have also led to rapid price increases.

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“SpaceX is going to put a literal dogecoin on the literal moon,” Musk tweeted at around 10:25 UTC (6:25 a.m. ET) today. Musk’s tweet did not explain how this seemingly impossible feat would be accomplished, as by definition digital currencies have no physical structures and therefore aren’t literal anythings. Perhaps the tweet being sent on April Fool’s may have had something to do with it.

April Fool’s Day joke or not, the tweet by the noted DOGE whisperer sent the cryptocurrency bounding from roughly $0.053 to $0.070, according to data provider CoinGecko. The 32% rise took the cryptocurrency to the level last seen on Feb. 13 and marked the end of a week-long slumber in the range of $0.050-$0.055. The token’s market capitalization is now $8.2 billion.

Musk has previously called dogecoin “the people’s crypto” and the cryptocurrency of Mars.

The billionaire investor also warned of too much concentration in the cryptocurrency in February, triggering a price drop. Last month, Musk supported the idea of DOGE’s listing on the U.S.-based Coinbase exchange.

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While it appears as though the price of dogecoin is at the mercy of Musk’s usually humorous tweets, largely because of the publicity he’s given it, the digital token is now actually being used for purposes that are not just about speculation and yuks.

Also read: Dogecoin Bounds Onto 1,800 ATMs in the US

Companies such as medical-supplier CovCare, sports brand Wooter Apparel and basketball team Dallas Mavericks have adopted dogecoin as an alternative means of payment. Meanwhile, the surge in the token’s price has caused technical development on the cryptocurrency to resume, threatening to turn the lighthearted token into a much more serious breed of DOGE.

Should that happen, the world of crypto will have a little less joy in it.

The cryptocurrency’s price had already started returning to Earth as this story was being written: As of press time, the price had fallen back to 6.1 cents, trimming the day’s gains to 14%.

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American-Senegalese rapper and R&B singer Akon has launched AkoinNFT, a non-fungible tokens (NFTs) platform to “supercharge and empower artists” and brands. 

Music mogul Akon, whose birth name is Aliaune Damala Badara Akon Thiam, announced the Akoin team behind the cryptocurrency AKN has partnered with Taqo.io to launch the AkoinNFT platform for NFTs.

It has been a challenging time for creatives, with many unable to resume activity due to the COVID-19 pandemic. In response, NFTs have seen growth by creating opportunities for struggling artists and their fans.

Related: ‘There’s a Sense of Vindication’: A NFT Pioneer Looks to the Future

NFTs are cryptographic assets that can have variable features. They have been used to represent a wide range of unique tangible and intangible items, from art to collectible sports cards to virtual real estate and even digital sneakers.

The AkoinNFT platform will be used for the creation, design, minting and distribution of NFTs for artists who are keen to capitalize on this latest digital art movement.

“We believe in artists of all talents. We support artists for we are artists and there’s never been a better time to put the power back in our collective hands to create a greater connection with fans,” said Akon. 

The Taqo team behind the technology and minting of the digital assets said its platform is built on Web3 architecture, the decentralized web adopted by the Ethereum ecosystem. 

Related: Uniswap’s ‘Token’ Issue

Akon announced his intention to launch Akoin and its cryptocurrency AKN back in 2018 as a means to bring about a “real-life Wakanda” (referring to the city prominently featured in the “Black Panther” film and comics).

Lately, a number of musicians have been turning their attention to NFTs. In March the rock band Kings of Leon trotted out “golden tickets” as part of its NFT album release. Rapper Post Malone’s concert streaming service, AUX Live, began minting Fyooz-based NFTs that blur the line between art and experience.

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There’s a new generation of bitcoin HODLers.

New research from Glassnode, an on-chain data platform, shows continued growth in bitcoin (BTC) held between one month and six months, indicating strong conviction behind the recent price rally.

These coins were accumulated throughout the recent bull market, which means new HODLers (meaning, those holding crypto) are sitting on a near 500% increase since October.

• These HODLers were “forged in the dynamic market rallies brought on in 2020 and 2021,” according to Glassnode. “Many are on their way to becoming classified as long-term holder coins.”
• BTC purchased between $10,800 and $58,800 now represents 25% of the total supply with no sign of slowing down, based on Glassnode’s data.
• This means HODLers have continued to accumulate BTC throughout this bull market.
• “HODLed coins are beginning to mature, and continued outflows from exchanges demonstrates accumulation is not slowing down,” according to Glassnode.

Related: ‘There’s a Sense of Vindication’: A NFT Pioneer Looks to the Future

Also, more BTC investors are moving their holdings into storage, which suggests less interest in short-term trading. Over the past 12 months, over 3% of the circulating BTC supply has migrated out of exchanges and into third-party wallets, according to Glassnode.

“Only two major exchanges have seen aggregate positive inflows (increased balances), Binance and Gemini. Gemini inflows will also correlate with Gemini’s institutional custody solutions, which further adds to the supply held in long-term storage.”

“Strong signals of accumulation show a supply vs. demand balance that is unlike any bull cycle we have seen before,” wrote Glassnode.

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NFT Investments, an investment company focusing specifically on non-fungible tokens (NFTs) said it plans to list on the Aquis Stock Exchange Growth Market (AQSE) in London later this month.

• According to the announcement Thursday, NFT Investments expects its market capitalization to be around £25 million (US$34.4 million).
• NFT Investments plans to raise around £10 million ($13.8 million) through the sale of 200 million shares at 5 pence apiece.
• The company claims it will be the first investment company focused solely on the NFT market to launch on a stock market in a major jurisdiction.
• The proceeds from the flotation will be spent on identifying new investments, both in NFTs directly and in companies or funds that provide exposure to them.
• NFT Investments’ board includes co-founders of Argo Blockchain Jonathan Bixby and Mike Edwards as executive chair and non-executive director respectively.

See also: Crypto Investment Firm CoinShares Begins Trading on Nasdaq Nordic

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• Bitcoin News Roundup for April 1, 2021
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Bitcoin (BTC) continues to struggle near the $60,000 resistance level. The cryptocurrency traded in a tight range during Asia hours, with initial support around $57,000 and $58,000.

• BTC’s oversold bounce from $50,000 support remains intact on the hourly chart, which fully retraced the near 15% selloff last week.
• Buyers are taking profit around $60,000 as upside momentum slows.
• The relative strength index (RSI) on the hourly chart is back in neutral territory, which occurred during previous support levels this week.
• Buyers will need to defend initial support around $57,000 and $58,000 to sustain the intraday uptrend.

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Ahead of its public listing expected in April, U.S. cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase has hired Morgan Stanley’s global anti-money laundering counsel.

According to a report by Bloomberg Law on Wednesday, Ian Rooney will head Coinbase’s enterprise compliance team to ensure a smooth run in the lead-up to the exchange’s direct listing, recently pushed back from March to April.

Coinbase, like other large U.S. cryptocurrency exchanges, wants to appear completely above board in the eyes of regulators, particularly around sensitive areas like money laundering, which is often seen as naturally suited to crypto. The addition of Rooney should also be helpful as virtual asset firms face an onerous set of anti-money laundering (AML) rules courtesy of the Financial Action Task Force (FATF), with progress to be reviewed in June.

Related: ‘There’s a Sense of Vindication’: A NFT Pioneer Looks to the Future

Earlier this month, Coinbase’s intentions for a direct listing reportedly faced a review by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). Around the same time, it was reported Coinbase agreed to a $6.5 million settlement with the Commodity Futures Trading Commission over allegations the exchange “self-traded” digital assets between 2015 and 2018.

Rooney’s hiring comes after the exchange nabbed former SEC official Brett Redfearn on Tuesday as the vice president of its capital markets division. Coinbase also has hired a former executive of payments company Stripe, Melissa Strait, in February to head its compliance efforts.

See also: Coinbase Snags Former SEC Director Brett Redfearn Ahead of Public Listing

Coinbase Class A shares will be listed on the Nasdaq Global Select Market under the ticker “COIN,” and is expected sometime this month.

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• Bitcoin Miners Saw a Monthly Record $1.5B Revenue in March

Ahead of its public listing expected in April, U.S. cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase has hired Morgan Stanley’s global anti-money laundering counsel.

According to a report by Bloomberg Law on Wednesday, Ian Rooney will head Coinbase’s enterprise compliance team to ensure a smooth run in the lead up to its direct listing that was recently pushed back from March to April.

Coinbase, like other large U.S. cryptocurrency exchanges, wants to appear completely aboveboard in the eyes of regulators, particularly around sensitive areas like money laundering which is often seen as naturally suited to crypto. The addition Rooney should also be helpful as virtual asset firms face an onerous set of anti-money laundering (AML) rules courtesy of the Financial Action Task Force (FATF), with progress to be reviewed in June of this year.

Related: NFT Investments Plans Listing on London Stock Exchange Growth Market

Earlier this month, Coinbase’s intentions for a direct listing reportedly faced a review by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). Around the same time, it was reported that Coinbase settled $6.5 million with the Commodity Futures Trading Commission over allegations the exchange “self-traded” digital assets between 2015 and 2018.

Rooney’s hire comes shortly after the exchange nabbed former SEC official Brett Redfearn on Tuesday as the vice president of its capital markets division. Coinbase also has hired former executive of payments company Stripe, Melissa Strait, in February to head its compliance efforts.

Coinbase Class A shares will be listed on the Nasdaq Global Select Market under the ticker “COIN,” and is expected sometime this month.

See also: Coinbase Snags Former SEC Director Brett Redfearn Ahead of Public Listing

• Bitcoin Steady at Resistance; Support Around $57K-$58K
• Filecoin Surges 42%, Replaces Litecoin as the 9th Largest Cryptocurrency
• Japan to Adopt FATF Travel Rule for Crypto

Decentralized storage network Filecoin’s FIL token has entered the list of top 10 coins thanks to increased institutional demand.

• FIL is trading near $217 at press time with a market capitalization of $13.72 billion, having printed a record high of $220 early Thursday, as per data source Coingecko.
• The cryptocurrency has surged by 42% in the past 24 hours and 150% in seven days, replacing litecoin (LTC) as the ninth-largest digital asset by market capitalization.
• Inflows into the Grayscale Investments’ Filecoin Trust picked up the pace on Thursday, lifting the cryptocurrency higher.

• The trust has raked in 45,500 FIL tokens since the launch on March 17, of which 29,550 were added today, data provided by bybt.com shows.
• The world’s largest digital asset manager has become the preferred avenue for institutional investors to gain exposure to cryptocurrencies, starting with its early bitcoin trust. It is owned by Digital Currency Group, the parent company of CoinDesk.
• On March 17 Grayscale also launched trusts dedicated to basic attention token, chainlink, decentraland and livepeer, expanding its existing product suite.
• Bitwise, the cryptocurrency asset manager, tweeted Thursday that Filecoin entered its Bitwise 10 Large Cap Crypto Index as of the March 31 monthly index reconstitution.

Also read: LINK, MANA Token Prices Spike as Grayscale Unveils New Trusts

• Exchanges’ Bitcoin Withdrawals to Cross $60B Per Month
• Teletubbies Crypto and Other April Fools’ Day Jokes
• Elon Musk Says Dogecoin is Going to the Moon – Literally
• Morgan Stanley Approves Bitcoin Exposure for Select Mutual Funds

Decentralized storage network Filecoin’s FIL token has entered the list of top 10 coins on the back of increased institutional demand.

• FIL is trading near $217 at press time with a market capitalization of $13.72 billion, having printed a record high of $220 early Thursday, as per data source Coingecko.
• The cryptocurrency has surged by 42% in the past 24 hours and 150% in seven days, replacing litecoin (LTC) as the 9th largest digital asset by market capitalization.
• Inflows into the Grayscale Investments’ Filecoin Trust picked up the pace on Thursday, lifting the cryptocurrency higher.

• The trust has raked in 45,500 FIL tokens since the launch on March 17, of which 29,550 were added today, data provided by bybt.com shows.
• The world’s largest digital asset manager has become the preferred avenue for institutional investors to gain exposure to cryptocurrencies starting with its early bitcoin trust. It is owned by Digital Currency Group, the parent company of CoinDesk.
• Grayscale has also launched trusts dedicated to basic attention token, chainlink, livepeer on March 17, expanding its existing product suit

Also read: LINK, MANA Token Prices Spike as Grayscale Unveils New Trusts

• NFT Investments Plans Listing on London Stock Exchange Growth Market
• Bitcoin Steady at Resistance; Support Around $57K-$58K
• Coinbase Taps Morgan Stanley Lawyer to Head Up Enterprise Compliance
• Japan to Adopt FATF Travel Rule for Crypto