cryptocurrency Archives

Ethereum decreased its annual CO2 emissions by over 21M tons

Over 109M more trees would have been needed to offset Ethereum’s CO2 emissions prior to its switch to a more efficient consensus.

Ethereum switched to a Proof-of-Stake (PoS) consensus last year in an event called The Merge. Regardless of personal views on Ethereum and the wider blockchain and web3 space, The Merge was broadly seen as an incredible feat of open-source engineering.

The Merge is the first major step on the road to Ethereum 2.0 which aims to tackle the...

23 January 2023 | Blockchain

Visa will ‘actively contribute’ to web3 development

Visa refuses to become a dinosaur and will “actively contribute” to developing the web3 and crypto ecosystem.

Aside from maximalists, few experts believe that crypto poses an existential threat to fiat currencies. Legacy payment processors like Visa and Mastercard have increasingly been joining the web2-era disruptors like PayPal and Square in supporting the web3 and crypto ecosystem.

Greater public adoption of “crypto” will likely come through CBDCs (Central...

20 December 2022 | Altcoins

Sam Bankman-Fried deepfake aims to scam FTX collapse victims

A deepfake of former FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried aims to scam victims of the exchange’s collapse.

FTX was the third-largest cryptocurrency exchange and Bankman-Fried was seen as the face of crypto in Washington. The exchange enjoyed many celebrity endorsements and secured a 19-year, $135 million sponsorship agreement with Miami-Dade county that included the local stadium being renamed the FTX Arena.

All of that success went up in smoke when concerns around the...

22 November 2022 | Altcoins

‘Solana killer’ Aptos soared to $100 on Binance before plunging

Aptos, a blockchain created by former Meta employees, debuted on Binance this week and soared to $100 before plunging to around $8.

The project has been called the “Solana killer” due to its claims of being able to process an incredible 130,000 transactions per second (tps).

As of writing, Aptos is processing around 24tps. This has led to many within the crypto community saying that Aptos’ performance claims are misleading.

Aptos co-founder Mo Shaikh has...

19 October 2022 | Altcoins

‘Most of crypto is going to go away’ says JPMorgan blockchain lead

JPMorgan head of blockchain and digital assets, Umar Farooq, has stated that the majority of crypto assets on the market today are “junk” and that it will take time for real crypto use cases to emerge.

During a panel at the Monetary Authority of Singapore’s Green Shoots Seminar on 30 August, Farooq also said that regulation in the digital asset space was not keeping up with the industry’s advances.

In his view, this is holding bacl many traditional finance...

30 August 2022 | Banking

Binance exec deepfake fools ‘highly intelligent’ people

A deepfake of Binance Chief Communications Officer Patrick Hillmann is reportedly fooling “highly intelligent” people.

The attackers are using what Hillman describes as an “AI hologram” of himself to fool representatives of various projects that the CCO is helping them get listed on the exchange.

In a blog post last week, Hillmann revealed that he received several online messages from project teams thanking him for taking the time to meet with them. However, it...

24 August 2022 | Blockchain

Alex Reinhardt, PLC Ultima: On building a crypto ecosystem for ‘daily life’

PLC Ultima aims to spread opportunity with an ecosystem that anyone can use in their daily lives.

The Block caught up with Alex Reinhardt, Founder of PLC Ultima, to learn more about the project and get the crypto expert’s views on the uncertain regulatory environment.

The Block: How is PLC Ultima bridging the gap between traditional business and crypto?

Alex Reinhardt: I originally conceived PLC Ultima as a universal financial instrument that can be...

23 August 2022 | Altcoins

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

Aave bans Justin Sun for receiving funds from Tornado Cash

DeFi protocol Aave has banned Tron founder Justin Sun for receiving funds from sanctioned crypto mixer Tornado Cash.

Tornado Cash enables criminals to launder cryptocurrency. Differing reports by crypto analytics platform Elliptic and the US Treasury estimate the mixer has been used to launder anywhere between $1.5 billion and $7 billion worth of digital assets, including by North Korean hacker group Lazarus.

While that’s no small figure, it’s a drop in the ocean...

15 August 2022 | Blockchain Applications

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...