A federal court in the United States has imposed sanctions on the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), accusing it of “bad faith” in a legal battle against the firm Debt Box.
This decision stems from the SEC’s attempt to dismiss a case it had initiated, which was rebuffed by Judge Robert J. Shelby.
Shelby criticized the agency for misleading the court over the evidence it presented to obtain a temporary restraining order (TRO) and an asset freeze against Debt Box in August.
Judge Shelby condemned the SEC’s actions as a “gross abuse of the power” granted by Congress, stating that these actions severely compromised the integrity of the judicial process.
He highlighted that the evidence the SEC claimed to have obtained had no factual basis and was presented in a way that was “deliberately false and misleading.”
As a consequence of this misconduct, Shelby determined that imposing sanctions on the SEC, specifically covering attorneys’ fees and costs incurred due to their actions, was justified.
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He remarked, “The bad faith is inextricable from the abusive conduct and a sanction of attorneys’ fees and costs for all expenses resulting from that conduct is appropriate.”
“The SEC had accused Debt Box of engaging in a $50-million fraudulent cryptocurrency scheme, seeking a TRO and an asset freeze on the grounds that the company had transferred funds overseas and planned to flee to the United Arab Emirates.
However, Shelby later found that the SEC had misrepresented the facts regarding the $720,000 transfer, which had actually occurred within the United States.
Following these revelations, Shelby issued a “show cause order” to the SEC in December, demanding an explanation for their misleading conduct.
Although the SEC admitted its lack of transparency, it contended that sanctions were unwarranted.
Shelby criticized SEC attorney Michael Welsh for his role in misleading the court, noting that Welsh’s failure to correct false statements represented an attempt to obscure the truth.
Austin Campbell, a founder of Zero Knowledge Consulting, argued that SEC staff involved in this misconduct should face termination and emphasized the need for agency reform.
He advocated for personal liability for SEC lawyers, stating, “What is described here is unconscionable for those entrusted with such authority by law.”
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In the last 24 hours, an astonishing transfer of half a trillion Shiba Inu (SHIB) tokens by anonymous “whales” has caught the crypto community’s attention.
The question on everyone’s mind is: What’s the strategy behind these massive movements, and is there a connection among these whales? Analyzing transaction data could shed some light on the matter.
Diving into the specifics, it appears that a handful of significant players are orchestrating these shifts, moving SHIB across various wallets and exchanges.
A notable transaction includes the movement of 77.18 billion SHIB to a Coinbase wallet.
Additionally, 205 billion SHIB were shuffled between different wallets, with a substantial 53.06 billion SHIB transfer directed to Robinhood’s wallet.
The interconnectedness of these transactions remains unclear, yet the synchronicity hints at potential coordination.
The SHIB/USDT chart by TradingView highlights SHIB’s volatile price journey, currently hovering around the $0.000027 mark.
After experiencing a sharp increase, SHIB seems to be in a minor retreat.
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Presently, the critical support level is at $0.000019, which SHIB has successfully maintained above in recent times.
This stability offers a glimmer of hope for the future. SHIB faces resistance at approximately the $0.000030 level.
Surpassing this barrier could signal the beginning of another upward trend, potentially reaching new highs.
Looking forward, SHIB’s potential to capitalize on recent transactions and a general market shift towards bullishness could set the stage for a significant price increase.
With the market showing signs of recovery after a recent downturn, SHIB’s trajectory might be poised for an upward movement, spurred on by the mysterious yet impactful actions of these anonymous whales.
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The United States Department of Justice (DOJ) has filed a significant antitrust lawsuit against Apple, accusing the technology behemoth of employing its app market regulations to illegally suppress competition and stifle innovation.
Filed on March 21 in a New Jersey federal court, and supported by 16 state attorney generals, the lawsuit claims that Apple maintains a monopolistic position in the smartphone market.
This, the DOJ contends, allows Apple to coerce developers into exclusively using its payment system, thereby locking in developers and users to its platform.
Central to the DOJ’s accusations are Apple’s App Store guidelines and developer agreements, which are criticized for their complex and variable rules.
These restrictions, according to the DOJ, enable Apple to charge excessive fees, hinder innovation, compromise user experience security, and limit competitive alternatives.
The lawsuit suggests that such practices notably restrict the functionality of crypto-based apps on iOS devices, impacting competition not only in the smartphone sector but also in financial services and other industries.
The DOJ specifically criticizes Apple for excluding alternative payment systems in a manner deemed anticompetitive and exclusionary.
Highlighting the controversial 30% commission, often referred to as the “Apple tax” on apps and in-app purchases, the complaint outlines how this policy and Apple’s fiat-only payment systems effectively block the integration of cryptocurrencies into apps, rendering it economically unfeasible for crypto-based applications to offer in-app purchases.
Additionally, the complaint notes that while Apple permits certain customers to distribute apps through custom app stores, it restricts iPhone users and developers from accessing these alternatives.
This restriction aims to protect Apple’s revenue from its App Store fees.
The DOJ accuses Apple of inconsistently enforcing its App Store rules to penalize developers leveraging technologies that could challenge Apple’s market dominance.
Specific examples include the disabling of functionalities in nonfungible token (NFT) marketplaces like OpenSea, and the social app Damus being forced to remove a Bitcoin tipping feature after Apple removed it from the App Store for circumventing its payment system.
Moreover, the DOJ alleges that Apple’s control extends to web apps, as it mandates the use of its WebKit engine for all iOS web browsers, further restricting competition.
In defense, an Apple spokesperson refuted the DOJ’s allegations, asserting the lawsuit is baseless and vowing to “vigorously defend against it.”
Apple argues that the lawsuit threatens to give the government undue influence over technology design, potentially compromising user privacy and security.
This defense comes as Apple faces pressure from regulations like the European Union’s Digital Markets Act, which mandates offering alternative browser engines and app stores, despite Apple’s concerns for user safety.
Following the lawsuit’s announcement, Apple’s stock price dropped by 4% to around $171, with no significant recovery in after-hours trading, as reported by Google Finance.
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In a striking rebuttal to a proposed sentence of up to 50 years for former FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried (SBF), his legal representatives argue that such a penalty reflects an outdated, “medieval” approach to justice, misaligning with the actual severity of his offenses.
Attorneys Marc Mukasey and Torrey Young expressed their objections in a letter to Judge Lewis Kaplan, dated March 19, responding to the sentencing proposal made by the government on March 15.
Describing the prosecution’s narrative as overly harsh, Mukasey and Young accused it of painting Bankman-Fried as a “depraved super-villain” based on a skewed “loss” narrative.
This came after the United States prosecutors, on March 15, advocated for a sentence between 40 and 50 years for Bankman-Fried, who had been convicted of fraud and money laundering in November 2023.
This sentence, according to his lawyers, equates to a life sentence, a punishment they deem excessively harsh and unjust.
Arguing for leniency, Bankman-Fried’s lawyers proposed a significantly shorter prison term of five to six years. They disputed the claims of actual financial losses, pointing to the ongoing bankruptcy proceedings expected to fully compensate affected customers and lenders.
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Contrary to the depiction of Bankman-Fried as driven by greed, his legal team highlighted his philanthropic efforts and modest living, challenging the portrayal of him as a risk for future offenses due to low recidivism rates among similar offenders.
Moreover, they criticized the prosecution for allegedly unsupported allegations and misleading comparisons with sentencing in similar fraud cases, stressing that non-violent offenders rarely, if ever, face sentences as severe as 40–50 years.
Highlighting the personal and professional losses Bankman-Fried has already suffered, they suggested a more appropriate sentence range would be five to six and a half years.
This, they argued, would be more in line with justice, especially if the government believes in a chance for Bankman-Fried’s eventual reintegration into society.
The jury had found Bankman-Fried guilty on all seven counts nearly a year after FTX’s downfall, sparking a debate over the appropriate consequence for one of the most high-profile figures in the cryptocurrency industry.
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In an astonishing twist of fate, a trader’s early exit from a memecoin investment on the Solana network resulted in missing out on nearly a million dollars in potential earnings.
Initially investing $8,000, the trader sold their stake in the frog-themed memecoin, Book of Meme (BOME), for $131,000—a substantial profit by any standard.
However, this decision came just one day before the token’s value soared, an opportunity flagged by blockchain analytics firm Lookonchain on March 14.
The firm highlighted the trade of “shatter.sol,” who had bought approximately 170 million BOME tokens with 50 SOL, only to sell them before a dramatic price increase.
According to CoinGecko, BOME’s value escalated from $0.00005848 to $0.005833 between March 14 and 15, propelling its market capitalization over $320 million.
Consequently, the tokens sold by “shatter.sol” would have been valued around $993,000 had the trader held on for just one more day.
This incident has divided opinions among the crypto community, with reactions ranging from considering it a missed opportunity for “generational wealth” to acknowledging the profit made.
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Meanwhile, other traders have experienced significant success in the volatile memecoin market. Influencer Moataz Elsayed, known as “Eljaboom,” highlighted a case where an investment of 420.69 SOL (approximately $80,000) turned into $5.7 million within 48 hours.
This success story aligns with a presale investment claim by the anonymous trader “Sunday Funday,” who asserts to be the leading tokenholder of BOME.
The launch of the Book of Meme project by the pseudonymous art producer Darkfarms has drawn considerable attention, despite its experimental nature and the “weird allocation” during its presale.
Darkfarms expressed surprise at the level of participation in the memecoin’s early stages.
The broader Solana ecosystem has seen a resurgence of interest, particularly in November 2023, with an 80% increase in the value of its token.
This revival has sparked a frenzy around Solana memecoins, including Bonk, Dogwifhat, and Silly Dragon, which have all experienced significant gains, reflecting the unpredictable yet potentially lucrative nature of memecoin investments.
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Grayscale‘s spot Bitcoin ETF, a pioneering financial product in the U.S. since its inception on January 11, has experienced a significant market share drop, marking the first time it has fallen below 50%.
According to Dune Analytics, as of March 12, the Grayscale Bitcoin Trust (GBTC) managed $28.5 billion, constituting 48.9% of the combined $56.7 billion in assets under management (AUM) across ten U.S. Bitcoin ETFs.
Initially, Grayscale dominated the market, with its fund representing approximately 99.5% of the total AUM of the first ten U.S. spot Bitcoin ETFs.
However, the landscape has shifted dramatically due to persistent daily withdrawals from GBTC, which averaged $329 million per day in the preceding week.
These outflows, particularly pronounced in the initial month post-launch, with $7 billion exiting the fund, have gradually decelerated.
Yet, a mid-February court decision enabling crypto lender Genesis to sell off approximately $1.3 billion in GBTC shares reignited the outflow trend. To date, GBTC has seen over $11 billion in outflows, as reported by Farside Bitcoin ETF flow data.
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Grayscale’s fund transitioned from a trust to an ETF following a successful legal battle with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and subsequent approvals of other spot Bitcoin ETF applications.
This transformation allowed institutional investors engaged in GBTC arbitrage to permanently withdraw or reallocate their capital to other Bitcoin ETFs offering lower fees.
The market initially reacted negatively to GBTC’s outflows. However, optimism has been renewed by significant net inflows into other ETFs, such as BlackRock’s iShares Bitcoin ETF (IBIT) and the Fidelity Wise Origin Bitcoin Fund (FBTC), which have collectively attracted $16.9 billion in inflows since their launch.
Market analysts attribute the substantial inflows into these new ETFs as a key factor behind the recent surge in Bitcoin’s price, which hit a record high of $72,900 on March 11.
BlackRock’s ETF now holds over 200,000 BTC, valued at roughly $14.3 billion, underscoring the shifting dynamics within the cryptocurrency investment landscape.
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In a notable development within the cryptocurrency market, a pseudonymous analyst known as Rekt Capital pointed out that the meme-based cryptocurrency FLOKI could be on the brink of a significant price increase.
Rekt Capital, sharing insights on the platform X, highlighted, “FLOKI is in the process of retesting its final major resistance as new support (black).
Successful retest would send #FLOKI to new highs. Needs to continue to hold here.
Retest is in progress.” This statement sets the stage for FLOKI’s potential market performance.
The analysis included details on FLOKI facing two pivotal resistance levels at $0.000021 and $0.0000625. In the realm of technical analysis, resistance levels are thresholds where the sell-off pressure surpasses buying interest, thus capping the asset’s price increase.
Breaking through a resistance level could transform it into a support level, indicating a strong buying interest that prevents further price declines.
Rekt Capital suggests that FLOKI has surpassed a significant price challenge and is now testing this boundary as a support level, potentially solidifying its position and preventing further declines.
The spotlight on FLOKI also comes at a time when the coin has engaged in significant token burning activities, effectively reducing its circulating supply.
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Recently, over $1 million worth of FLOKI tokens were burned, followed by another substantial burn amounting to $3.2 million.
This reduction in supply has been further supported by the FlokiFi Locker, a DeFi protocol that purchases and burns FLOKI tokens, aiding in the scarcity of the asset.
Additionally, data from Santiment, an analytics platform, indicates an increase in social dominance for Floki, hinting at a growing interest and potentially positive market sentiment towards the coin.
Another cryptocurrency analyst, Inmortal, also conveyed optimism about FLOKI’s future, drawing parallels to another meme coin’s success. Inmortal stated on X, “PEPE pumped.
FLOKI next. Muscle memory, contagion. Call it what you want, but it works.”
This sentiment underscores a broader belief in the meme coin’s market dynamics and potential for substantial gains.
At the time of the report, FLOKI’s trading value stood at $0.0002771, marking a 6.46% increase over the preceding 24 hours, signaling positive market movement for the meme cryptocurrency.
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In a recent turn of events, despite Binance’s decision to withdraw its operations from Nigeria, two high-ranking officials from the cryptocurrency exchange remain detained in Abuja, Nigeria’s capital.
Tigran Gambaryan, the head of Binance’s criminal investigations team, and Nadeem Anjarwalla, the regional manager for Africa based in Kenya, have been held without their passports for two weeks, as of March 12, according to a report by Wired.
The detention of Gambaryan, a former U.S. federal agent with a focus on cryptocurrency, and Anjarwalla began on February 26, 2024.
Despite the lack of clarity on the presence of criminal charges, the families of both executives have expressed their concern and uncertainty about their loved ones’ wellbeing and future.
Yuki Gambaryan, Tigran’s wife, voiced her frustration, saying, “There’s no definite answer for anything: how he’s doing, what’s going to happen to him, when he’s coming back.”
A Binance spokesperson confirmed the ongoing detention of the executives in Nigeria and stated, “While it is inappropriate for us to comment on the substance of the claims at this time, we can say that we are working collaboratively with Nigerian authorities to bring Nadeem and Tigran back home safely to their families.” Emphasizing their professional integrity, the spokesperson expressed confidence in a prompt resolution.
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The backstory to their arrest follows an invitation from the Nigerian government to discuss a dispute over Binance’s operations in Nigeria, which were deemed unlawful by Nigerian authorities.
Gambaryan and Anjarwalla arrived in Abuja on February 25 to meet with officials and discuss the government’s blockade of Binance and other crypto exchanges, accused of contributing to the devaluation of Nigeria’s currency, the naira, and facilitating illicit financial flows.
However, following their initial meeting, the executives were escorted from their hotel to a guesthouse managed by Nigeria’s National Security Agency, where their passports were seized.
Since then, they have been held there against their will, allege their families.
Both Gambaryan and Anjarwalla have received visits from officials of the U.S. State Department and the U.K. Foreign Office, respectively, though their discussions were overseen by Nigerian government guards, restricting private conversation.
This incident unfolded shortly before Binance formally announced its exit from the Nigerian market on March 5, following a series of measures restricting its operations, including the suspension of naira withdrawals and the removal of trading pairs involving the naira, as part of its phased withdrawal strategy.
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Starknet, a prominent Layer-2 scaling protocol, is set to enhance the benefits of reduced costs for rollups following the Dencun hard fork on Ethereum, scheduled for March 13.
The Starknet Foundation has unveiled plans for additional fee-reduction measures that will align with the Dencun upgrade, marking a significant evolution in Ethereum’s infrastructure since its transition to proof-of-stake in October 2022.
The Dencun upgrade, featuring the Ethereum Improvement Proposal (EIP-4844), is poised to revolutionize the way Ethereum rollups store data on the mainnet.
It introduces “blob space” as an alternative to the traditional use of call data for storage, addressing the high costs associated with the latter due to the perpetual on-chain processing requirement by all Ethereum nodes.
This new approach, known as proto-danksharding and inspired by its proposers, allows for more economical data storage in blocks without permanent accessibility or processing by the Ethereum Virtual Machine, with data automatically expiring after 18 days.
David Silverman, Vice President of Product at Polygon Labs, has emphasized the significant cost advantages and maintained security guarantees of this method for rollups.
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As Starknet anticipates immediate fee reductions, there may be initial delays as layer-2 solutions adjust their contracts to utilize the new blob space.
In line with the Dencun hard fork, Starknet is preparing to release version 0.13.1, transitioning from the costly call data method to blobs for data transactions, promising substantial fee savings, given call data’s dominant role in Starknet’s gas expenditures.
Ilia Volokh, a StarkWare product manager and blockchain researcher, explained that Starknet’s SHARP prover, responsible for transmitting state differences to Ethereum, will adopt blob space, leading to a prompt reflection of fee reductions post-Dencun’s launch.
Volokh highlighted the immediate impact on users, stating, “A byte of data will be priced in accordance with Ethereum’s blob prices.”
Further boosting Starknet’s efficiency, a new hash system to be introduced in early 2024 will enhance the protocol’s transaction capacity through improved proof bundling technology.
This development underscores Starknet’s commitment to leveraging Ethereum’s evolving ecosystem to deliver cost-effective, scalable solutions.
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A prominent cryptocurrency analyst, known by the pseudonym Bluntz, has recently expressed optimism regarding the potential of a decentralized storage altcoin.
Bluntz, who boasts a following of nearly 240,000 on the social media platform X, highlighted the peer-to-peer file storage network Filecoin (FIL), suggesting it is primed for significant growth following a lengthy period of accumulation.
Bluntz remarked, “FIL is on the cusp of the most outrageous pump, two-year accumulation range almost cleared.”
He pointed out that FIL has surged past its diagonal resistance, setting it on a trajectory to surpass its multi-year high of $11.390.
At the moment of reporting, Filecoin was valued at $11.57, reflecting a notable 14% increase in just 24 hours.
Filecoin’s inception in October 2020 was met with enthusiasm, backed by major crypto venture firms, including Winklevoss Capital.
This venture capital firm, co-founded by Bitcoin billionaires Tyler and Cameron Winklevoss, who also established the cryptocurrency exchange Gemini, has played a significant role in Filecoin’s development.
Additionally, Bluntz reiterated his forecast for the Solana-based meme token dogwifhat (WIF), predicting a climb to $3.
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He anticipates WIF will emulate the price trajectory of Nosana (NOS), a crowd-computing platform’s native asset. Bluntz shared, “Visual representation (below) of what I think happens.”
Furthermore, the analysis extends to Sei (SEI), a competitor to Solana, which Bluntz believes is on the brink of a fifth-wave surge, potentially reaching $1.40.
He enthusiastically stated, “Let the god candle commence.”
This prediction is grounded in the Elliott Wave theory, a method of technical analysis that forecasts future market movements by analyzing investor psychology and market cycles.
This theory suggests that a bullish asset will experience a five-wave surge before undergoing a three-wave correction.
Currently, SEI is trading at $0.904, experiencing a slight dip of more than 1% in the past day.
Bluntz’s insights reflect a deep understanding of market dynamics and the potential for specific cryptocurrencies to achieve significant gains, drawing on both technical analysis and the underlying strengths of the projects mentioned.
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