Canada’s Conservative Party elects pro-crypto Pierre Poilievre

Canada Symbolism

Pierre Poilievre, a staunch crypto advocate and Ontario Member of Parliament, has won the Conservative Party of Canada’s (CPC) leadership race by a major margin.

The Alberta-born lawmaker, who said he “wants to make Canada the blockchain capital of the world”, garnered 68% of the conservative vote. His closest rival, former Quebec premier Jean Charest, netted a meagre 16% of total votes.

As the new leader of the country’s main opposition party, Poilievre is...

12 September 2022 | Bitcoin

Ukraine details how it spent crypto donations

Ukraine has detailed exactly how it spent over $54 million in donations from the crypto community.

In the early days of the war, Ukraine began accepting cryptocurrency donations from kind-hearted folk around the world wanting to help the country defend itself from Putin’s war of aggression.

Yesterday, Ukrainian Vice Prime minister Mykhailo Fedorov posted a breakdown of how the crypto donations were spent:

“Every helmet, bulletproof vest, and night...

18 August 2022 | Altcoins

Ripple: Most financial institutions plan to use crypto within three years

A report by Ripple suggests that most financial institutions plan to start using crypto within the next three years.

Despite the bear market, financial institutions remain interested in the cryptocurrency space. Just this week, $10 trillion asset manager BlackRock launched a spot Bitcoin trust while saying that it’s also exploring “permissioned blockchains, stablecoins, cryptoassets, and tokenization.”

While BlackRock is exploring the potential financial benefits...

12 August 2022 | Altcoins

‘Free-for-all’ Nomad exploit drains $190M of crypto

Cross-chain bridge Nomad has fallen victim to a “free-for-all” exploit that drained around $190 million in crypto.

Just last week, Nomad announced that it had secured $22.4 million in seed funding from high-profile backers including Coinbase Ventures, Crypto.com Capital, and OpenSea. The company emphasised its focus on security following a spate of bridge hacks.

“With $1.5B in bridge hacks happening within the last 12 months, many people, protocols, and DAOs are...

2 August 2022 | Altcoins

Binance slapped with $3.3M fine by Dutch central bank

Cryptocurrency exchange Binance has been slapped with a $3.3 million fine by the central bank of the Netherlands.

The central bank, De Nederlandsche Bank (DNB), issued Binance Holdings with the fine after the exchange failed to gain regulatory approval to operate in the country.

Companies that want to offer crypto services in the Netherlands are obliged to register with the DNB under the Money Laundering and Terrorist Financing Prevention Act.

The fine for...

18 July 2022 | Altcoins

North Korea’s stash of stolen crypto has plunged in value

Victims of North Korea-linked crypto thefts may take some comfort in knowing that connected wallets have plunged in value.

Despite the recent drawdown, the exponential rise in the value of cryptocurrencies over the past decade has made them key targets. Hackers are regularly seeking to obtain cryptocurrencies through hacks and ransomware campaigns.

Fortunately, transactions on most blockchains are easy to track. Wallets connected with North Korean hacking groups like...

29 June 2022 | Altcoins

Coinbase Commerce adds seven cryptos, instant fee-free payments

Coinbase Commerce has added support for seven more cryptocurrencies and enabled instant, fee-free payments.

The largest US-based crypto platform says consumers tell it that fees are a key reason they choose not to pay in cryptocurrencies. Merchants, meanwhile, want to be paid instantly and not wait around for an on-chain transaction to complete.

By leveraging its position of having a large customer base as payers, Coinbase is able to use off-chain transactions for...

28 June 2022 | Altcoins

Crypto market falls to lowest capitalisation since January 2021

The global crypto market has tanked below one trillion dollars (£820 billion) for the first time since January 2021.

According to data from CoinMarketCap, Bitcoin is down 13 percent over the past 24 hours and Ethereum is down 16 percent.

The trend marks the twelfth consecutive week – apart from some minor respite in week ten – of price losses for Bitcoin, something the market has never seen before.

Falling from nearly £40,000 in March, the top...

13 June 2022 | Bitcoin

Tether depegs from $1 mark following TerraUSD and LUNA collapse

Tether (USDT)

It has been a rough week for crypto, but an even rougher week for stablecoins.

Tether (USDT), the stablecoin mainstay of the crypto space, snapped as low as $0.95 in the early hours of May 12 amidst wider market fears surrounding TerraUSD (UST).

Earlier in the week, UST depegged from its intended $1 mark, falling as low as $0.29.

In a desperate bid to restore UST’s price, Terraform Labs have been printing and selling millions of its stabilising token, LUNA,...

12 May 2022 | Bitcoin

Central African Republic adopts Bitcoin as legal tender

Bitcoin

The Central African Republic (CAR) has become the second country in the world to adopt Bitcoin as legal tender, following on from El Salvador's decision in September last year.

Despite being rich in mineral wealth, CAR is one of the world’s poorest countries and has suffered from decades of conflict.

According to DataReportal, CAR has the lowest internet penetration rates of any country in the world – excluding North Korea – at just 7.1%. As such, the incentives...

29 April 2022 | Bitcoin