Author: Coindesk
Ex-Valkyrie CEO Leah Wald’s Investment Firm Buys Four Validators, Including Solana Network’s, for Nearly $18M
The Toronto-based firm, formerly known as Cypherpunk Holdings, will buy the validators from Cogent Crypto, a high-performance validator operating within the Solana ecosystem, according to a statement on Thursday. The total value of the investment is nearly $18 million, broken into three tranches: $1 million cash and about $1 million in company shares at the closing of the deal, and the rest distributed over three years in shares, Sol Strategies said. Read the full article here
The last decade of Web3 has battle-hardened a stack of distributed architecture and incentive games. While too complex for individuals to operate at scale, this technology is primed for AI and the agentic internet, says Outlier Ventures’ founder and Chairman, Jamie Burke. Read the full article here
UK Government Plans Pilot for a Digital Gilt Instrument Using Distributed Ledger Technology
Finance Minister Rachel Reeves will unveil the digital gilt instrument pilot, a “Financial Services Growth and Competitiveness Strategy,” measures to regulate Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) ratings providers and measures to regulate pension mega funds during her first Mansion House speech on Thursday. Gilts are U.K. issued government bonds. Read the full article here
Tether’s ambition to venture into asset tokenization, a red-hot trend at the intersection of crypto and traditional finance, has been well-documented as the company strives to diversify from its highly-profitable stablecoin business. The company issues the $126 billion dollar stablecoin USDT and the $600 million gold-backed token XAUT, and reported f $7.7 billion in group-wide net profits this year so far, in large part from the yield on its $80 billion stockpile of U.S. Treasuries. It has used the profits to invest in startups, bitcoin mining, energy production and AI. Read the full article here
Asset manager Grayscale, in a report in April, argued that Ethereum is “meaningfully decentralized and credibly neutral for network participants, likely a requirement for any global platform for tokenized assets” and, therefore, has the best chances among smart contracts to benefit from tokenization. Read the full article here
Aaron Brogan, a crypto industry lawyer, said that hypothetically, a company could strengthen IP address blocks by incorporating GPS data from users’ mobile devices, “but this might be impractical in commercial use.” A customer using a laptop without a GPS, for example, might have a hard time logging on without two-factor authentication. Read the full article here
SocGen Crypto Arm to Bring Its Euro Stablecoin to XRP Ledger, Lays Out Plan for Going Multichain
Stablecoins, which are cryptocurrencies with their price anchored to government-issued currencies, are increasingly popular for payments across the globe, offering a more efficient and cheaper way to move money. As countries roll out regulations for the asset class, more banks are getting interested in issuing their own stablecoin. Spanish bank BBVA, for example, said it plans to issue a stablecoin on Ethereum next year using payment firm Visa’s tokenization platform. Read the full article here
Trump-Supported World Liberty Financial Taps Chainlink Data Services as DeFi Platform Takes Shape
World Liberty Financial is spearheaded by Zachary Folkman and Chase Herro, who worked previously on DeFi platform Dough Finance, which saw $2 million of crypto assets drained through a July exploit. Members of the Trump family, including Donald Trump, publicly championed the project on social media, with the former president being titled as “Chief Crypto Advocate.” for the platform. Two of his sons, Eric Trump and Donald Trump Jr., are involved as “Web3 Ambassadors,” while his other son Barron Trump is listed as “DeFi Visionary.” Read the full article here
What Does a 60/40 Portfolio Look Like if We Replace Bonds With Bitcoin, a Lot Better: Van Straten
For equities, Curvo chose iShares Core MSCI World UCITS ETF USD in the MSCI World Index and for the bonds, they take Xtrackers Global Sovereign UCITS ETF 1C EUR hedged in the FTSE World Government Bond – Developed Markets index. Since the beginning of 2014, an initial investment of euro 10,000 ($10,500) investment would have returned just above euro 20,000 ($21,000), essentially doubling in 10 years. Which seems like good returns. Read the full article here
Missing Crypto Influencer, Under Investigation by Canadian Regulator, Found Dead in Montreal: Report
The 25-year-old has been missing since he was abducted along with three others from a condo in the city on June 21. The other abductees, two women and one man, were located by police hours later. In August, Joanie Lepage, 32, was charged with first-degree murder of Mirshahi and the abduction of Mirshahi and the three others. It is not known if her actions are linked to Mirshahi’s cryptocurrency ventures. Read the full article here