Author: Coindesk

The chief economist at the European Central Bank (ECB), Philip Lane, said Europe needs a digital euro to counter the foothold that dollar-linked stablecoins and U.S. electronic payments systems are gaining in region’s the financial system.The prevalence of electronic payments provided by Big Tech firms, such as Apple Pay, Google Pay and PayPal, “exposes Europe to risks of economic pressure and coercion,” Lane said, according to the text of a speech at University College, Cork in Ireland on Thursday. “The digital euro would provide a secure, universally accepted digital payment option under European governance, reducing reliance on foreign providers,” Lane…

Gotbit founder Aleksei Andriunin struck a plea deal with U.S. prosecutors on Wednesday that will see him serve no more than 24 months behind bars for his role in what prosecutors described as a “wide-ranging conspiracy” to manipulate token prices for paying clients.Andriunin, a 26-year-old Russian national, was extradited to the U.S. from Portugal last month and charged with two counts of wire fraud and conspiracy to commit market manipulation and wire fraud – charges which carry a maximum combined sentence of 25 years in prison. In exchange for a reduced sentence, Andriunin pleaded guilty to all three counts. He also…

Another company has elected to add bitcoin (BTC) to its balance sheet.Christian Angermayer, the chairman of Germany-based biopharmaceutical company atai Life Sciences (ATAI) announced today that the firm would develop its own bitcoin treasury strategy.“In an era of persistent inflation and volatile markets, I find myself asking an important question for biotech companies looking to preserve and optimize the capital they have: Could allocating a portion of treasury cash to bitcoin help preserve, optimize, and even extend a company’s runway and hence contribute to its success,” Angermayer wrote on Substack.The company will initially invest $5 million in bitcoin, Angermayer said,…

A year ago, restaking was one of the hottest areas of crypto, and projects like EigenLayer were heralded as the next big thing.Fast forward to mid-2025 and total value locked (TVL) has fallen across the sector and the hype that surrounded point farms has withered away.Through it all, Ether.fi, the market leader, has stayed steady, helping users generate yield through liquid staking tokens (LSTs) that can be staked across the decentralized finance (DeFi) ecosystem.Now, Ether.fi is looking to expand with plans to become a neobank for crypto companies and users.Ether.fi’s dominanceEther.fi, which is based in the Cayman Islands, benefited from…

Paul Atkins, the nominee to take over the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, is set for a U.S. Senate confirmation hearing next week, putting President Donald Trump’s pick for the SEC chairmanship on track to start working as soon as next month.At the same March 27 hearing, the Senate panel is also weighing the nomination of Jonathan Gould to take over the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, which oversees U.S. national banks — a key area of interest for crypto firms that have fought a long battle for banking access, the Senate Banking Committee announced in an email…

U.S. national banks have been told by the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency that they’ll no longer have to answer how controversial customers might damage their reputations — a point that had been criticized by crypto companies and insiders arguing that it contributed to them being debanked.The OCC is removing that factor from its supervision handbook, the agency said in a Thursday statement.“The OCC’s examination process has always been rooted in ensuring appropriate risk management processes for bank activities, not casting judgment on how a particular activity may fare with public opinion,” said Acting Comptroller of the Currency…

Proof-of-work cryptocurrency mining does not trigger federal securities laws, according to a Thursday staff statement from the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) which told mining operators they do not need to register their transactions with the regulator.The statement, published by the SEC’s Division of Corporation Finance, declared that both solo proof-of-work crypto mining and pooled proof-of-work crypto mining do not meet the definition of a securities transaction under the Howey Test — the legal framework used to determine whether a transaction represents an investment contract — because they are “not undertaken with a reasonable expectation of profits to be derived…

Tether, the crypto company behind the largest stablecoin USDT, said it would rank as the seventh largest net buyer of U.S. Treasury securities in 2024 among countries.The firm purchased a net $33.1 billion worth of U.S. Treasury securities last year, according to a compilation posted on Thursday by CEO Paolo Ardonio using data from Tether’s reserve reports and the U.S. Treasury Department.That puts the stablecoin issuer above countries like Canada, Mexico and Germany in the ranking, while Japan and China were net sellers by significantly reducing their U.S. Treasury holdings.U.S. Treasury securities purchases by Tether and foreign countries (Tether) The…

Bitcoin miners are facing renewed financial pressure as declining transaction fees and a hashprice drop push operational costs higher, according to TheMinerMag’s February 2025 report​.Bitcoin’s hashrate climbed 3.8% in February to 810 EH/s, showing a slowdown in mining competition growth. However, the hashprice (the revenue that miners earn per unit of computing power) slipped to $45/PH/s, wiping out gains from the U.S. election-driven price surge. At this level, inefficient miners are feeling the strain.Transaction fees made up just 1.3% of total block rewards in February, marking their lowest share since the last bear market bottom in 2022. March is trending…

Stock and other traditional financial asset traders across the world are wanting to be able to buy and sell assets around the clock, resulting in two of the biggest stock markets in the U.S., Nasdaq and the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) making moves to offer round-the-clock trading soon.Продолжение Читайте Ниже“We definitely see that this is where the markets are moving,” said Giang Bui, Nasdaq’s head of U.S. Equities & Exchange-Traded Products, speaking at the Digital Asset Summit in New York on Thursday. “There’s a lot of demand globally for U.S. stocks and people want to trade within the hours…