Get your daily, bite-sized digest of cryptoasset and blockchain-related news – investigating the stories flying under the radar of today’s crypto news.
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Regulation news
- The US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) announced it settled charges against tech company NVIDIA Corporation for “inadequate disclosures concerning the impact of cryptomining on the company’s gaming business.” They said that the company failed to disclose that “cryptomining” was a significant element of its material revenue growth from the sale of its graphics processing units (GPUs) designed and marketed for gaming, while NVIDIA agreed to a cease-and-desist order and to pay a USD 5.5m penalty
- The US Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) sanctioned Bitcoin (BTC) mixer Blender, which they say is used by North Korea to “support its malicious cyber activities and money-laundering of stolen virtual currency.” As a result of this, all of Blender’s property in the US is blocked and must be reported to OFAC.
- Chinese crypto mining hardware maker Canaan disclosed it has come under the gaze of the SEC for its ties to Beijing. The issue at hand was Canaan’s use of an auditor for its 2021 annual report that the US Public Company Accounting Oversight Board could not fully inspect or investigate, and the company must file documentation with the SEC to prove that it is not “owned or controlled” by a foreign government, they said.
- The Central Bank of the Argentine Republic announced that it has barred banks in the country from facilitating for clients the use of cryptoassets. The statement says banks are prohibited from offering services for any digital assets not regulated by the central bank, and since there are currently no digital assets thus regulated, the move amounts to a de facto ban.
Decentralization news
- Social network Twitter’s decentralized social media project Bluesky has released its first batch of code and committed to content moderation on the network. While the platform will be decentralized, Bluesky outlined that it is “not possible to have a usable social network without moderation,” and intends to build a moderation model for the network dubbed “speech and reach.”
Investments news
- Venture capital firm Sfermion is raising USD 100m for a new fund that will invest in non-fungible tokens (NFTs) that can be used in crypto games, Bloomberg reported.
- Asset management firm Valkyrie’s XBTO Bitcoin Futures Fund has received approval from the SEC.
- Financial services firm Block announced it had total net revenue of USD 3.96bn in the first quarter of 2022, down 22% year-over-year, driven
by a decrease in bitcoin revenue. BTC revenue was USD 1.73bn in this period, down 51% year-over-year. Bitcoin gross profit was USD 43m, or approximately 3% of BTC revenue, they added. - Blockchain gaming platform Cometh raised USD 10m in a funding round to develop future games and blockchain software. The funding round was led by venture capital firm White Star Capital and decentralized autonomous organization (DAO) Stake Capital.
- NFT protocol Zora announced it has raised USD 50m in a funding round led by Haun Ventures, valuing it at USD 600m. They added that this is the first fundraising round led by the fund started by Katie Haun, formerly of Andreessen Horowitz (a16z).
Security news
- NFT marketplace OpenSea announced that an attacker posted malicious links in several of their Discord channels, but that the attack had “limited impact”, with less than 10 wallets impacted and the stolen items not exceeding ETH 10 (USD 27,000).
Source: Cryptonews
