Daily Crypto News
Ethereum’s Big Moment Is Coming With ‘The Merge.’ What It Means for Crypto —If Bitcoin BTCUSD –0.03% is crypto’s answer to gold, Ethereum is the closest thing it has to its own internet. Anyone who wants to mint a new token, launch a crypto app, or spend $150,000 on a Bored Ape nonfungible token, or NFT, probably uses the Ethereum network. More than $3 billion in transaction volume flows through Ethereum daily, traded in the network’s native token, Ether ETHUSD +0.04% About $60 billion in crypto assets sit on its blockchain through third-party apps. Aside from Bitcoin, no other network is more critical to crypto’s infrastructure or its future.
Blockchain Cardano’s Vasil Upgrade Confirmed for Sept. 22 — The Cardano blockchain’s Vasil hard fork upgrade is now scheduled to take place on its main network (mainnet) on Sept. 22, Input Output (IOG), the blockchain’s development lab, announced in a tweet thread on Friday.
As 10,000 Long-Dormant Bitcoins Finally Trade, Observers Wonder What’s Up — On Aug. 28, according to a post from crypto data analysis platform CryptoQuant, 5,000 BTC that hadn’t moved for at least seven years was transacted. The next day, LookIntoBitcoin’s data tracker showed another 5,000 BTC was transferred again.
Bitcoin gains as US unemployment rate rises to 3.7%, indicates inflation slowing — Bitcoin gained almost 2% on Friday after the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported that the unemployment rate in August rose to 3.7% from 3.5% in July. The figures suggest the U.S. economy is slowing, which may influence the Federal Reserve when it meets this month to decide on raising interest rates.
FIFA Embraces NFTs Tied to Classic Games Highlights for World Cup 2022 — Soccer’s governing body FIFA has chosen the occasion of the 2022 Qatar World Cup to launch an NFT-based (non-fungible token) collection of classic clips from the history of the international soccer tournament. FIFA+ Collect will launch later this month and allow soccer fans to own and trade “moments in time” featuring the greatest goals, saves, celebrations and more from World Cup and Women’s World Cup history, FIFA said.
US Job Growth Slowed in August; Bitcoin Gains — The U.S. added a robust 315,000 jobs in August, slightly more than expected but still revealing a slowdown in hiring amid rising interest rates and slowing economic growth.
Second Round of Layoffs at Brazilian Crypto Unicorn 2TM — 2TM — the holding company for Brazil’s largest crypto exchange by valuation, Mercado Bitcoin — laid off 15% of its workforce, or about 100 employees on Thursday. “The economic adversity continues,” said the company in a statement. It’s the second round of job cuts this summer for 2TM, which in June let go of more than 80 workers.
Bitcoin Trades Down After Initial Push Higher — Bitcoin declined 1.1% on Friday, after popping 1% in the hour the U.S. jobs report. The largest cryptocurrency by market cap was recently trading at just below $20,000, up a few fractions of a percentage point over the last 24 hours but well within the range it has occupied for the past week. Year to date, the price of bitcoin is down 57%
Bankrupt Lender Celsius Wants To Return $225Mil To Users — Celsius requested the judge’s permission to release cryptocurrencies in its custody program and withhold accounts, which are used for storage rather than generating returns. Roughly $210 million in assets are held in custody program accounts and $15 million in withholding accounts, according to reports. The company says those cryptocurrencies are owned by the customers, not the company. A hearing on the request is scheduled for October 6.
Hacker Steals Bill Murray’s Crypto After $185K NFT Charity Auction — Hours after the closing of Bill Murray’s NFT auction that raised 119.2 ETH (around $185,000) for charity Thursday, a hacker stole the funds. The hacker started to drain Murray’s personal wallet at around 7:00 p.m. ET on Thursday, according to on-chain data from Etherscan and details from Murray’s team. The unknown individual also attempted to take non-fungible tokens from the actor’s personal collection.