Month: March 2023

Global economic conditions are tightening; interest rates are in flux; and inflation has yet to be curbed. Considering the economic headwinds, the fact that Silvergate Bank, Silicon Valley Bank and other banks are breaking is not surprising.  But why now? Quickly rising interest rates are extremely disruptive to banking models, but the collapse of these
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After the fall of Silvergate Bank, Silicon Valley Bank (SVB), and Signature Bank (SNBY), First Republic Bank, a commercial bank and wealth management services provider, is the latest financial institution to receive a bailout. Close to a dozen lenders announced they will deposit $30 billion into the beleaguered bank’s coffers to shore up liquidity. U.S.
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In 2023, Bitcoin (BTC) and Cathie Wood’s Coinbase (COIN) investment are finally outperforming Warren Buffett’s popular “crypto bet” in Brazil’s fintech giant Nubank (NU).  Bitcoin vs. crypto-exposure stocks NU, COIN As of March 17, Bitcoin’s price is up nearly 55% year-to-date (YTD). In comparison, Nubank has risen by only 26%. Meanwhile, another crypto-exposure asset, namely Coinbase stock (COIN), has
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Bitcoin (BTC) software firm Lightning Labs and blockchain startup Tari Labs have agreed to convert a court-ordered temporary restraining order that halts the development of Lightning’s Taro protocol. In a March 15 filing, lawyers for both Lightning and Tari proposed converting the restraining order to a preliminary injunction — a temporary order that prevents a
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Cryptocurrency investment firm Grayscale Investments is taking more time to decide whether it should acquire and sell post-Merge forked Ethereum tokens. Grayscale announced on March 16 that the company intends to extend the review period for evaluating the market environment to determine whether it can acquire EthereumPoW (ETHW) tokens — the forked asset that emerged after Ethereum’s
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The Ethereum layer two (L2) scaling solution Arbitrum has launched a native governance token named ARB and a self-executing decentralized autonomous organization (DAO) governance model. The ARB token will have an initial supply of 10 billion, and coins will be airdropped to the Arbitrum DAO treasury, Offchain Labs (the company behind Arbitrum), Offchain Labs investors,
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A bank health check is a comprehensive assessment of a bank’s financial condition, performance and risk management practices. It is conducted by banking regulators or independent auditors to evaluate the bank’s ability to withstand adverse economic conditions and potential risks, including credit risk, market risk, liquidity risk and funding risk. The bank’s financial statements, including
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The target date for the highly anticipated Shanghai hard fork on Ethereum has now been set: April 12. Ethereum core developers approved the target deadline during the All Core Developers Execution Layer #157 call on March 16. The Shanghai mainnet upgrade features five Ethereum Improvement Proposals, including EIP-4985, which will enable staked Ether (ETH) withdrawals
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Our weekly roundup of news from East Asia curates the industry’s most important developments. Chinese billionaire arrested in U.S. for $1B financial fraud  According to an announcement published by the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) on Mar. 15, Chinese billonaire Ho Wan Kwok (aka Miles Guo and more commonly as Guo Wengui), has been arrested
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During the Execution Layer Meeting streamed on March 16, 2023, Ethereum developers announced that the blockchain is scheduled to upgrade on April 12, in 27 days. The upgrade, known as the Shanghai-Capella upgrade or Shapella, will include the implementation of Beacon chain push withdrawals. This will enable Ethereum network validators to support withdrawal operations following
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