FTX did not convince the ASIC of its operations. New details show that the exchange had been served 3 notices in eight months. The surfaced report claims that the ASIC had warned about the exchange in March, the first month it began operations there.
FTX was a huge red flag
The ASIC has been shown to express concerns about the Australian FTX subsidiary eight months before the November collapse. Via documents accessed by Guardian Australia, the regulators were concerned about how the exchange conducted its business there after obtaining an operation license via a company acquisition.
After taking over IFS Markets in December, the exchange acquired the operational license in 2021. However, it only opened for business months later, in March 2022. The ASIC noted red flags in how the exchange operated its newest entity as soon as it began operations there.
The documents obtained by Guardian Australia show that the ASIC issued a section 912C notice to FTX in March, requiring it to provide information about its operations to assess if it was meeting the AFSL license requirements. Such a notice allows the ASIC to monitor the kind of financial services the licensee engages in and determine if the person is fit to hold it.
The report by Guardian Australia confirmed that the ASIC and FTX engaged for several months, with three notices being issued to the exchange in the process. However, the operations of the business remained the same. Reports have it that the ASIC was still concerned by the exchange’s operations till late October.
Is ignorance what’s fanning crypto meltdown fires?
The ASIC had seen the red flags in the operations of the FTX subsidiary in the country but did not take any legal action like bans or fines. The ASIC is not the only regulatory body that has had clashes with FTX.
Recently, the CFTC expressed that it was concerned with venture capitalists (VCs) not taking charge of how their money was working in FTX. It said that it would make arrangements to question those VCs and figure out whether they ignored FTX red flags or needed to make an effort to know how their investments were fairing.
FTX is not the only meltdown that shows a great level of ignorance in the crypto space. Other organizations like Terra and crypto lenders like BlockFi and Celsius were never reported before they collapsed. That shows the lender never quite struck deals that allowed them to monitor how their investments were fairing or didn’t even care.
As such, it calls for all stakeholders in the financial sector to be vigilant and more active in streamlining financial vehicles like crypto and stocks. Keep watching FintechExpress for crypto and other finance-related news.
Silvergate has suspended its dividends due to financial constraints. It claims it is taking that step to preserve a highly liquid balance sheet following a significant loss in Q4 2022.
$1B loss drives Silvergate to desperate measures
It has been a hard time for SIlvergate as it struggles to stay afloat following a $1B loss in Q4 2022. It won’t pay its investors dividends in 2023 as the economic conditions worsen.
This is not the first harsh measure the bank has taken; lately, it even laid off 200 employees to cut its expenses. The California-based bank announced on Friday that it was halting its dividends pegged at 5.375% Fixed Rate Non-Cummulative Perpetual Stock, Series A, to preserve capital.
It outlined that the decision comes amid the continuation of a strong crypto winter but did express that investors shouldn’t be worried about the reserves. It said it has at least a 1:1 match of reserves and customer deposits.
“This decision reflects the Company’s focus on maintaining a highly liquid balance sheet with a strong capital position as it navigates recent volatility in the digital asset industry.”
The firm added that its Board of Directors would re-evaluate the payment of quarterly dividends as the market conditions evolve. This news had a harsh effect on the company’s stock prices, with SI-PA dropping by 22.71% to $8.85 and the common SI stock price plummeting by 3.765 to $13.58.
Zooming out, the two stocks have been declining in value over the past 12 months, with SI-PA dropping by 60% and SI stocks by 87.46%.
A looming economic collapse?
Silvergate isn’t the only company affected by the ongoing financial crisis. Post COVID-19 economy was expected to be harsh and weigh down on the average investors and people. Things have worsened, with multiple companies having massive layoffs, filing for bankruptcy, and others going into debt.
Countries are also battling record-high inflation rates and recession threats. Earlier in the week, the US hit its debt ceiling and still has an inflation rate of 6.5%. Although it has managed to battle it from 10%+, the hitting of the debt ceiling means a hard time ahead for the citizens. On the other hand, the UK is expected to undergo a ‘soft recession’ in 2023.
The financial decline is cutting across the globe, with China being in a better position as it only has a 1% inflation to battle with. Citizens from other countries should brace for more challenging economic times as the markets may shrink.
The price of Polygon Matic has risen by 48% in 2023, regardless of the ongoing crypto bear run. The price surge follows an increase in its usage of blockchain, becoming the second one in the most recorded daily transactions.
Polygon Matic price defies bear run
Ethereum’s scaling solution, Polygon, has been experiencing a surge in daily usage. As a result, its native coin, MATIC, is gaining in price. It has risen by 48% in 2023, with a 12% rise in the past 24 hours.
The Polygon team has been busy developing it and making strategic partnerships. In December, it announced that it had increased DAUs, which may be a reason behind its surge in usage and price of its crypto.
It is also anticipating the mainnet launch of its zero knowledge-EVM early this year following its successful test net launch in October 2022.
Uniswap users, particularly UNI holders, have preferred ditching Ethereum for rival smart contracting platform BNB Chain to deploy the V3 protocol in the latest voting. BNB Chain garnered 20 million votes to win the deployment temperature check.
Uniswap vote sways BNB chain’s side over Ethereum
The Uniswap community vote favors BNB Chain against the world’s largest open-source blockchain, Ethereum, for deploying the V3 protocol. The proposal was initially raised on Jan. 17 as a ‘temperature check’ on the Uniswap community, to which 80% of participants voted in favor of BNB Chain. The remaining 20% stood against BNB Chain, opting for Ethereum as the best network for the V3 protocol.
🦄 We’re excited to share that our @0xPlasma proposal to deploy @Uniswap v3 on @BNBCHAIN has passed the "Temperature Check" with 20M votes "YES" and 6,495 $UNI voters (the biggest number for the whole Uniswap Governance History). Moving forward to the final "Governance Proposal" pic.twitter.com/HoIJgY8mX1
Preference for BNB Chain among the Uniswap community was heavily influenced by the blockchain’s advantages over its rival counterpart Ethereum. Part of the reason for the deployment consists of the expiry of the v3 protocol’s contract with Ethereum.
Secondly, BNB Chain offers higher transaction speeds at a relatively cheaper cost than Ethereum, a feature that UNI token holders deemed handy for the V3 protocol. Additionally, BNB supports vital components such as staking and cross-chain transactions that could improve the user experience of the protocol in deployment.
The network crossover is expected to yield at least $1 billion in liquidity with an increase of 2 million new users. According to Uniswap’s official announcement and blog page, the transition is expected to last between 5 and 7 weeks. BNB Chain is also growing exponentially and increasing in popularity among DeFi devs.
BNB Chain has been recording immense progress since the year began. At the end of last year, the network registered more unique addresses than Ethereum. The BSC scanner recorded 233 million lectures, a 16 million difference from Ethereum, which had 217 million at the time the snapshot was taken.
Binance has announced that it will offer over 30K Web3 and crypto scholarships in 2023. This crypto exchange has been ramping up efforts to educate the masses and even started its Binance Academy to pass the knowledge to the world.
Binance to continue offering crypto education
Binance, the world’s largest crypto exchange, has revealed that it will offer over 30K Web 3 scholarships in 2023. Many colleges and universities have introduced crypto courses globally since the 2021 boom. Now, Binance wants to sponsor people to pursue these courses.
Some of the institutions Binance’s program will collaborate with include colleges in Australia, Germany, Cyprus, Ukraine, and Nigeria. It will also send some to the Women in Tech organization. Binance also revealed via an official blog that the 2023 scholarships program would be funded by its philanthropic arm, Binance Charity. It also explained its interest in spreading crypto knowledge to people via an official blog post.
An excerpt from the post reads:
“We recognize that digital education and skills development can be out of reach for many, resulting in a blockchain industry that lacks diversity and talent. The Binance Scholar Program changes all that, covering the costs of tuition and course fees at some of the world’s leading institutions.”
Binance
Crypto education becomes a key strategy for driving adoption
Crypto education has become a key tool to drive adoption globally, considering that the blockchain industry is relatively young. Few people have ample knowledge of how it works, making it get slower adoption as many tend to stay away from what they need help understanding.
As such, organizations like Binance have been dedicating their resources to the cause. Its blog revealed that it had over 82,000 applicants for this year’s scholarship program but will only come through about 37% of them.
On Dec. 30, 2022, the exchange also tweeted detailing the statistics around its crypto education program. It stated that it had spent over $15M educating people with over 300K beneficiaries. It also added that it reached out to 20 regions, dedicating 293,215 hours to crypto education. It also added that 71,205 people benefited from its scholarship program that year.
Our @BinanceBCF team has travelled across the globe this year, offering help and education to those in need.
These developments show a growing interest in crypto education, which means there will be more awareness surrounding the crypto industry. Keep watching FintechExpress for cryptocurrency and other finance-related news.
