by Fintech Express | Jun 20, 2023 | Blockchain
Key Points
- BNB Chain keeps growing with innovations, and now it’s welcoming a layer 2 testnet powered by Optimism
- The new L2 scaling solution will be called opBNB
BNB Chain has lived on to welcome innovations and increase its footprints in the crypto space. It’s now welcoming opBNB, an optimism-powered layer 2 scaling solution.
BnB Chain welcomes an Optimism powered layer 2 scaling solution
opBNB is set to help tackle the existing and growing scaling challenge facing BNB Chain as newer and more projects get built on the network. BNB Chain revealed this scaling solution on June 19, launching it as a testnet.
opBNB is based on the Optimism OP Stack, designed to add security and scalability to the Binance blockchain network. It is an Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) compatible layer 2 chain that works with Ethereum-based smart contracts, networks, and ERC-20 token standards.
Ethereum, in particular, has been plagued by congestion and high transactional fees due to the overloading of projects built on it. As such, they send in too many requests simultaneously, making the reciprocation much slower. This issue plagues most networks that allow applications to be built on. Since BNB Chain is one such network, it now seeks to treat the problem before it inevitably becomes a hindrance later.
BNB Chain claims around 2000 transactions per second with transaction costs of around $0.10. opBNB will increase support of up to 4000 transactions per second and an average cost of around $0.005.
Additionally, opBNB will allow for optimizing data accessibility, caching layer and adjusting the submission process algorithm to allow for simultaneous operation. In turn, it will allow the gas limit to 100 million per block from the 30 million that Optimism allows.
BNB Chain continued to note that the RPC (remote procedure call) service layer offered by opBNB simplifies the integration process by offering a user-friendly interface. As such, it allows developers to “focus on building applications without worrying about the complexities of Layer 2 scaling.”
Keep watching Fintech Express for updates on this and other fintech-related developments.
by Fintech Express | Jun 8, 2023 | Regulation, Follow up
Key Points
- Controversy has sparked again regarding SEC’s Gary Gnsler’s motivations behind charging Binance.US as lawyers allege he has a conflict of interest.
- Gary Gensler allegedly was rejected as Binance advisor in 2019, and his recent act of charging the exchange could be motivated by revenge.
- The crypto community continues hitting back at Gary Gensler’s ‘pretentious’ claim to care for investors.
Gary Gensler was rejected as Binance Advisor; Binance lawyers
Per Binance lawyers, Gary Gensler had applied to be an advisor for the exchange in 2019 but was rejected. They allege that the decision by the company to go with another person could have hurt Gensler and motivated him to go after the exchange after he was given power as the Chair of SEC.
Binance Lawyers say that Gensler is having a conflict of interest with the ongoing case as he seems to be motivated more by extorting money from the exchange rather than regulating the crypto industry fairly. They cited that the exchange is always ready to work with regulators and identify any issues that could arise from their services, a step that SEC walked all over before heading to court seeking to settle charges with the exchange.
More controversy over Gary Gensler’s motivations
Binance explains that it’s ready to comply with set regulations, and the regulators are also obligated to make the field level for all participants to foster growth and innovation and not chase it away to offshore nations. Now, SEC is seeking U.S. courts to freeze Binance.US assets, claiming that there are many parallels between Binance and the collapse of the crypto exchange FTX.
However, it has not gone unnoticed that SEC did nothing to prevent the collapse of FTX, like looking into how the exchange operates while it had been committing financial fraud under its nose for years. More controversy comes as Binance lawyers revealed that Gary Gensler was not fit to join SEC as he lied under oath during his testimony in July 2019 for Facebook’s proposed cryptocurrency and wallet.
They said that Gary stated the following words under oath.
“I do not advise any financial, technology, blockchain or other companies, nor do I own any cryptocurrencies.”
Days ago, Gensler said that the U.S. does not need more digital currencies as they are meant to be non-compliant.
“We don’t need more digital currency,” claiming that the crypto business model is “built on non-compliance.”
These comments from Gary Genslers show his interest in smothering cryptocurrencies rather than fostering their regulation and adoption. As such, the crypto community has raised their voices against him, with lawmakers telling him to prepare to appear ahead of Congress to explain why he thinks he has the power to decide for Americans.
Others have called for the crypto industry to pull their efforts together and fight the supposed “Operation Chokepoint 2.0,” which is meant to smother crypto in favour of a more state-controlled CBDC.
Keep watching Fintech Express for updates on SEC’s crypto regulation efforts and other Fintech-related developments.
by Fintech Express | Jun 7, 2023 | Cryptocurrencies
Key Points
- A crypto hack happened against Atomic crypto wallet, with at least $35 million being stolen.
- Experts believe that North Korea could be involved with the hack as they are a major suspect in crypto hacks for a long time
Atomic Wallet falls prey to North Korean hackers?
Atomic Wallet was hacked last week losing upwards of $35 million. Now, North Korea seems to have been caught in another crypto hacking controversy as experts believe that it could be the perpetrator. A report by CNN outlines that the hackers drained crypto assets from the accounts of several customers of Atomic Wallet, an Estonia-based company with 5 million users.
Atomic Wallet reported on Saturday that less than 1% of its monthly users appeared to have been affected by the hack. However, it did not outline the specific amount of money that might have been stolen or who was behind the hack.
This hack was a series of cyber attacks against crypto projects linked to Pyongyang. U.S. officials fear these funds are being used to fund several unregulated projects in North Korea, like the nuclear and ballistic weapons programs.
North Korean hackers have been notoriously terrorizing the crypto industry with billions of dollars most likely to have ended up in their pockets. The recent hack against Atomic Wallet might prove to be one of their ‘paydays’ as Elliptic, a crypto-tracking firm, has uncovered the money laundering techniques and tools that North Korea-linked hackers have been seen to use before.
While no hard proof is found yet to incriminate North Korea or most other hackers, crypto developers can only work to outsmart them and keep funds safer. Keep watching Fintech Express for updates on crypto and other Fintech-related news.
by Fintech Express | Jun 2, 2023 | Regulation
Key Points
- Twitter CEO Elon Musk has been sued for Dogecoin market manipulation
- The lawsuit says that Musk willingly used Dogecoin as the Twitter logo to drive its market numbers
- It’s not the first time that Musk has been served regarding Dogecoin Market manipulation claims
- The crypto community reacts to the story
Elon Musk is petting his favourite dog meme-coin to much-concerned parties
Twitter’s outgoing CEO Elon Musk has been sued regarding Dogecoin market manipulation. Some Dogecoin investors believe that Musk has been saying and taking some actions to drive the prices of Dogecoin for his gain.
According to an amended class action lawsuit, the tech billionaire allegedly engaged in insider trading and carnival-like market manipulation that hurt investors. The lawsuit highlights that Musk has repeatedly praised the coin, which ended up pumping and dumping very hard, at times affecting the investments of many unaware customers while profiting from the ensuing chaos.
The lawsuit highlighted a recent encounter where Elon Musk replaced the Twitter logo with the Doge dog breed meme to drive the price of Dogecoin high. The investors behind the lawsuit believe that Dogecoin is a security under SEC and seek to establish it to further their claims that Musk played the market with insider knowledge.
The initial complaint was first filed in June 2022, but Musk’s recent takeover of Twitter slowed things down, only to create a bigger tension in the Dogecoin Market.
Not the first time Musk has been under fire for endorsing Dogecoin
Elon Musk has been under criticism on several accounts for supporting a meme coin like DOgecoin and being public about it. Whenever Musk mentioned the coin in 2021 and 2022, its value skyrocketed until he was forced to say that he liked its fundamentals and even allowed Tesla to accept Bitcoin trading with its products.
Elon Musk was later sued for around $258B for praising DOgecoin and driving its prices up for his gain as he is an active holder of the coin. He, however, moved to quash the lawsuit claiming that it has no basis.
The crypto community has come out to express their reactions regarding Elon Musk’s actions with DOgecoin and the lawsuit that came as a result. Some have hit out at the complainants, saying it’s possibly the Dogecoin short sellers who are crying foul.
Others have defended him, saying that he has the right to post any meme that he sees fit, be it doge dog breed related or not. One user even said that the purpose behind the coin is having fun, meaning Musk should be let have his own.
Others hilariously tweeted that they would love to sue their neighbours for ‘false’ advertisement as a pun to mock the lawsuit against Musk.
Keep watching Fintech Express for updates on this and other fintech-related news.
by Fintech Express | May 9, 2023 | Regulation
Bittrex crypto exchange has revealed that they have filed for bankruptcy, and the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control is its largest creditor.
Bittrex to instigate more pain in the crypto space?
2022 was one of the hardest years for the crypto space as several companies went down, dragging the whole market with them. Some, like FTX and Terra ecosystems, brought fear to the crypto space due to huge instances of fraud being unearthed.
Other major organizations like Genesis, Celsius and BlockFi went down in the same year. Now, one more organization, Bittrex, has gone down. The exchange was under probe by the Securities and Exchanges Commission, which led to its charging in April because of running an unregistered securities exchange.
Bittrex went ahead to cease operations towards the end of April with plans to end its US-based platform’s presence in the market. However, it said that the bankruptcy proceedings in the US would not impact its international customers.
Its May 8 court filing shows that it was founded in 2014 and accrued 100K US-based creditors during its lifetime. It also stated that it has liabilities of between $500 million and $1 billion. Additionally, some US customers still have yet to withdraw their funds from the exchange.
Now that the bankruptcy proceedings have kickstarted via Yesterday’s filing, the US customers will have to wait longer before they can finally withdraw their funds. Keep watching FinTech Express for updates on finance and banking-related news.
