Singapore, Singpore, 19th October, 2022, Chainwire
The Bank for International Settlements (BIS) Innovation Hub and Bank Indonesia under the Indonesian G20 Presidency announced the winners of their jointly organized G20 TechSprint competition last week during a live award ceremony in Jakarta. This third edition of the TechSprint aims to catalyze the development of central bank digital currency (CBDC). Twenty-one finalists from more than 100 applicants worldwide developed and submitted innovative best-in-class CBDC solutions.
Dragonfly Fintech Pte. Ltd. from Singapore won the coveted “Effective and robust means to issue, distribute and transfer CBDCs” category ahead of about 100 participants globally, including some Fortune 500 companies. The other finalists for this category included BitMint, FIS, Mastercard Asia Pacific, R3, Ripple, Roxe CBDC, S.e.A.(Stellar, eCurrency and ANZ).
Other competition categories were “Enabling Financial Inclusion and “Improving Interoperability.” Eleven global expert judges conducted rigorous evaluation and scoring to decide the winners.
With the announcement of this year’s winners, Cecilia Skingsley, Head of the BIS Innovation Hub, said:
“This TechSprint has allowed us to improve our practical work on CBDCs. These technological solutions add to the central banks’ toolbox and provide a springboard for the further development of CBDCs. Our heartiest congratulations to the winning teams.”
Dragonfly’s winning production-ready solution showcased an effective and robust means for the issuance, distribution, and transfer of CBDC for wholesale and retail usage. The submitted solution included the following:
- nCore: Dragonfly’s proprietary blockchain infrastructure, designed for digital banking, enabling regulatory compliance, privacy and control, direct correspondent banking, and interoperability with legacy systems.
- Central Bank Solution: Integrated with an independent central bank-controlled network, a central bank can securely issue and distribute CBDC, execute monetary policy, and have complete oversight over CBDC in circulation. Onboarded financial institutions (FIs) can leverage the network to settle multi-currency transfers.
- mWallet: Integrated with an independently controlled FI network, Dragonfly’s mobile banking solution comes with a modularized backend operating management system that can quickly scale into a full-fledged digital bank.
Dragonfly followed key design principles to make CBDC SIMPLE, with its solution being:
- Scalable: The distributed multi-network design can quickly scale to serve a national CBDC rollout and facilitate cross-border payments.
- Interoperable: Operators can integrate with existing core banking ledgers and external payment and settlement rails.
- Modular: New digital banking modules can easily be plugged in using APIs and SDKs available in multiple common coding languages.
- Programmable: High programmability facilitates the design of innovative services, giving operators a competitive edge.
- Layered: The solution is a ready-to-use stack of future-proof layer one and two technologies.
- Extensible: A multi-touchpoint experience with dual offline capabilities that can serve the unbanked.
Dragonfly’s founder and CEO, Lon Wong, gave his thoughts on the optimal implementation for CBDC:
“For any country to embark on CBDC, I believe an implementation must be able to converge with the existing web of legacy financial systems. The financial burden for a significant CBDC rollout, especially for a vast and spaced-out archipelago like Indonesia, should be minimized through distributed and decentralized technology, preferably in a cloud environment, enabling the lowest possible cost of ownership with no single point of failure.“
Board member and advisor of Dragonfly, Jeswant Gill, outlined next-steps for the company:
“Our avant-garde platform infrastructure allows us to continue building more plug-ins, features, and functions. The modular design facilitates continuous innovation enabling our solution to advance and mature at an accelerated pace, staying the course as a market leader. A key focus moving forward is to engage and collaborate with the Indonesian government to pilot our CBDC solution.“
Winning this challenge serves as an affirmation that cutting-edge technology can be implemented cost-effectively. Dragonfly is inspired to bring its practical solution to emerging economies globally.
About Dragonfly Fintech
Dragonfly Fintech offers groundbreaking technology that is optimally cost-effective and easily accessible. Its customizable blockchain-powered fintech solutions help companies grow revenue and expand offerings while keeping costs at bay. Dragonfly solves legacy problems like complex infrastructure, slow transactions, and low interoperability with a technology suite that allows enterprises and governments to leverage blockchain technology, deploying cutting-edge fintech solutions with fast time-to-market and maximum accessibility.
To find out more about Dragonfly’s products, visit www.dfintech.com. Get in touch by emailing enquiry@dfintech.com.
Contact
Executive Director
Nicholas Watson
Dragonfly Fintech Pte Ltd
nicholas.watson@dfintech.com
The Tel Aviv Stock Exchange (TASE) (TASE.TA) said on Monday it would reshape its ownership structure and also create a blockchain platform to allow more trading of crypto currencies in an effort to match international standards.
TASE, which went public in 2019, said it would create a new publicly traded holding company that will own 100% of the bourse, which will become a private firm. Subsidiaries of the exchange will be units of the new holding company.
It said its board had given the nod to the plan but approval from the regulator and TASE shareholders were still awaited.
Under its five-year plan, TASE said it would focus on organic growth and bring in foreign investors through the expansion of international products traded and cleared on the bourse, including a relaunch of derivatives futures, it said.
Just 8% of daily share trading comes from foreign investors.
The exchange said it would create a platform for digital assets using blockchain, or distributed ledger technology. This would allow the trading of digital assets while exporting proprietary technological services to smaller foreign exchanges.
As a result, the TASE said it expects a compounded annual growth rate from revenue of 10% to 12% through 2027.
“We will leverage our home court advantage in Israel to adopt and develop fintech and position TASE as a hub of services and products,” said TASE’s chief executive Ittai Ben Zeev.
Over the first half of 2022, the bourse earned operating profit of 47 million shekels ($13 million) versus 55 million in all of 2021.
NEARStarter, a DAO-governed incubator on Near and Aurora, will be providing its incubation services to Meteor Wallet, a simple and secure wallet on the Near Protocol.
The NEARStarter incubator is a decentralized autonomous organization (DAO)-governed incubation program for early-stage projects launching on Near and Aurora.
In its two years of life, the popularity of nonfungible tokens (NFTs), decentralized finance (DeFi), gaming and other Web3 projects on the Near Protocol has grown significantly, forcing the adoption of high-quality incubators to support them.
As an incubator, NEARStarter not only helps projects like Meteor Wallet receive proper funding to benefit from liquidity but also introduces them to a significant and international crypto network, as well as increasing their social media presence by participation in AMAs or contests.
Meteor Wallet, one of the up-and-coming incubated projects on NEARStarter, is a simple and secure Wallet on the Near Protocol that allows users to collect NFTs, access DeFi and explore the Near Ecosystem. Jonathan Myburgh, head of growth at Meteor Wallet, noted:
“It’s pretty crazy to think that this all started from an NFT collection (Near Tinker Union) with the aim to build products that benefit the Near ecosystem. We started by building a no-code NFT launchpad but soon realized that Near lacked a wallet that matched its UX ambitions to help transition Web2 over to Web3.
Our goal is to be the go-to wallet that makes the Near blockchain simple and secure for users within one super wallet app (identity, financial, social, your gateway to the chain).
Edward Chew is the founder of Near Tinker Union NFT and leads the technical nature of Meteor Wallet. He previously worked at one of the largest e-wallet companies in Asia.
We are grateful for the NEARStarter team that has been alongside us from the early stages of the project.”
The incubator program aims to serve as the Near and Aurora ecosystem’s top growth engine. To do so, they have so far been successful in helping several projects to develop in the Near market with great partners and international Guilds that NEARStarter is collaborating with.
The wallet was founded by an all-star team that also developed top-notch projects like Near Tinker Union, a top five NFT project on Near in terms of volume, and Enleap, a leading NFT launchpad platform on Near.
Ramiro Gamen, head of accelerator at NEARStarter, shared:
“At NearStarter, we see tremendous potential in Meteor’s tech and community, but even more in their founders. They’ve harnessed their experiences from Near Tinker Union and their collective knowledge of the industry to develop an amazing tool for Near users to securely store, manage and exchange their digital assets, with unique features that prove ideal to new users coming into the Near ecosystem or blockchain in general.”
Moreover, NEARStarter incubates other projects, including a lending 2.0 protocol and a Web3 Career Hub.
The NEARStarter acceleration program is already recognized as one of the leaders in the Near ecosystem and has established partnerships with crucial projects, including Paras, Roketo, Shitzu, Fluxus and Decentral Bank among others.
Since the market is expanding at an unprecedented speed, NEARStarter, as an incubator, must constantly seek ways to enhance the services it offers. Future plans for the platform include continuing to expand the utility of the “Vicious Fishes” NFT collection, supporting incubated projects through additional high-quality partnerships, and launching the NSTART initial decentralized exchange offering soon. NEARStarter’s energy is in full swing to keep shaking the Near and crypto ecosystem.
More about NEARStarter
NEARStarter is a DAO-governed incubator acting as the ultimate growth engine for the Near and Aurora ecosystem.
Follow NEARStarter’s social media channels to be at the forefront of the Near ecosystem:
Telegram | Discord | Twitter | Blog | Website
The U.S. Justice Department on Wednesday sued the indicted founder of a cryptocurrency “mixer” to recover a $60 million civil penalty that was imposed on him in 2020 by U.S. financial regulators for alleged failures to maintain an effective anti-money laundering program.
The lawsuit was filed in Washington, D.C., federal court against Larry Harmon of Ohio who ran a cryptocurrency “mixer,” or “tumbler” called Helix, an anonymizing service that U.S. authorities said could send virtual currency in a way that concealed the source or owner.
The Financial Crimes Enforcement Network, a bureau of the U.S. Treasury Department, in October 2020 imposed a $60 million civil money payment on Harmon for alleged violations of the federal Bank Secrecy Act (BSA). FinCEN, as the bureau is known, alleged that Harmon was operating an unlicensed money transmitting business in connection with Helix.
Last year, Harmon pleaded guilty to a money laundering conspiracy charge in U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. He has not been sentenced.
Charles Flood of Houston’s Flood & Flood, a lawyer for Harmon in the criminal case, did not immediately reply to a message seeking comment on Thursday.
In court filings in the criminal case, Flood said “Harmon never set out to break the law and if he had known in 2014 that operating a bitcoin tumbler was illegal, he never would have done it.”
A spokesman for the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Columbia declined to comment. A representative from FinCEN did not immediately respond to a message seeking comment.
In a statement in 2020, FinCEN said its “investigation demonstrated that Mr. Harmon deliberately disregarded his obligations under the BSA and implemented practices that allowed Helix to circumvent the BSA’s requirements.”
FinCEN said Harmon failed to “collect and verify customer names, addresses, and other identifiers” on more than 1.2 million bitcoin transactions from June 2014 to December 2017 valued at the time at $300 million.
In the criminal case, Harmon agreed to a $311,000 restitution order, court records show. The authorities seized various bitcoin “wallets” from Harmon as part of the criminal investigation.
Harmon’s sentencing was deferred, pending cooperation with the U.S. that the government said last month “remains active and ongoing.”
Operated by Banyan Collective, Near Hacks successfully debuted in Lisbon, bringing together 18 builders and founders on Near Protocol under one roof. The Near Hacks Founders House by Supermoon Camp boasted a space for collaboration and creativity, while guests shared impressive projects and ideas.
Guests enjoyed the full Nearcon experience, with top panels and interviews alongside Supermoon gatherings. Supermoon Station, Supermoon’s media arm, met with the guests of Near Hacks House and Nearcon participants for a series of interviews uncovering the latest projects in the Web3 space.
As a part of the Near Hacks Founders House experience, Supermoon Station interviewed builders and founders from the Near ecosystem, including Alejandro Betancourt from Metapool, Robert Chen and Alex Donn from Ottersec, Mitchell Gildenberg from Switchboard, Odyssey co-founders Edward Bramanti and Parker Allen, Seung Hyun Lee from Coineasy, Kevin Mazi from Near Africa’s regional hub, Chad Ostrowski from Aha Labs and Luke Devern from Invoker Labs.
A few special guests attended Nearcon as well, including Nearverse founder William Bear and Baron Davis, a former NBA player who works on applications in the Web3 space.
The series of interviews culminated in a chat with Cameron Dennis, founder of the Banyan Collective, who shared the importance of fostering spaces for Web3 founders to organically connect: “The positive potential of decentralized ecosystems is undeniable. However, decentralization can lack coordination to scale long-term. Through the Near Hacks Founders House, we are starting to create the information highways for key players in the Near ecosystem to multiply their growth and win with other change-makers.”
Near Hacks runs hacker houses and hackathons to promote Near-native project development in the United States. Builders on Near can expect curated spaces to collaborate and learn, scaling their projects from MVP to seed and beyond. Near Hacks is operated by Banyan Collective, a grant recipient of the Near Foundation with the goal of providing Ecosystem-as-a-Service to Near-native projects and businesses. Follow Near Hacks on Twitter to learn more about its U.S. tour.
Powered by the Supermoon Camp team, Supermoon Camp organizes high-impact events with elevated networking experiences for talented professionals, founders and builders from different ecosystems with a mission to elevate the Web3 space.
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The U.S. Treasury Department said on Tuesday that cryptocurrency exchange Bittrex Inc had agreed to pay $29 mln in fines for “apparent violations” of sanctions on certain countries and anti-money laundering law.
The Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) and Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) had levied fines of about $24 million and $29 million, respectively, on Bittrex.
But according to terms of the settlement, FinCEN would transfer $24 million to OFAC after it receives its $29-million payment from Bittrex, as some of the violations stem from the “same underlying conduct” as the OFAC investigation.
Effectively, Bittrex will have to pay a penalty of about $29 million.
Bittrex failed to prevent people located in the sanctioned jurisdictions of Ukraine’s Crimea region, Cuba, Iran, Sudan and Syria from using its platform between March 2014 and December 2017, according to OFAC.
FinCEN said its investigation found that from February 2014 through December 2018, Bittrex did not maintain an effective anti-money laundering program.
“Bittrex’s AML program failed to appropriately address the risks associated with the products and services it offered, including anonymity-enhanced cryptocurrencies,” it added.
Cryptocurrencies and other digital assets have soared in popularity over recent years and are getting increasingly intertwined with the regulated financial system, saddling policymakers with monitoring risks in a largely unregulated sector.
Bittrex in an emailed statement to Reuters said it was “pleased to have fully resolved” the matter with OFAC and FinCEN on mutually agreeable terms.
A growing number of funds are betting on the long-term appeal of bitcoin and ether, a gritty gambit in the depths of a crypto winter.
Unfazed by a collapse in prices over the past 11 months, investment firms have unleashed a flurry of exchange-traded funds, anticipating that elite cryptocurrencies and their underlying technology will eventually prevail.
Of more than 180 total active crypto exchange traded products (ETPs) and trust products globally, half have launched since the bitcoin bear market started, Morgan Stanley said in a note published this month. The proliferation came even as the total value of assets in the market slumped 70% to $24 billion in that period as crypto prices tanked.
About 95% of those 180 funds are focused on the top two coins, bitcoin and ether, Morgan Stanley said.
“Naturally when the market is slower, prices are lower, people have lost money, the intensity of the appetite does diminish,” said Chen Arad, co-founder of crypto risk monitoring firm Solidus Labs. “But it’s not the case in the long run. As a whole, I don’t think anyone is giving up.”
The attraction of ETPs is that they provide exposure to digital assets on a regulated stock exchange, so retail and institutional investors don’t have to worry about securely storing their crypto and eluding hacks and heists.
In terms of money, cryptocurrency investment products have attracted about $453 million in net inflows this year with much of it going into bitcoin and investment vehicles that include the biggest cryptocurrencies, according to a report from digital asset manager Coinshares.
“There is more asset allocation towards baskets that combine the top five or 10 crypto assets by market cap. It’s a flight to quality compared to alternative assets in the crypto industry,” said Eliezer Ndinga, director of research at 21shares.
Other major cryptocurrencies include solana, cardano and ripple .
Most active crypto ETP products are registered outside the United States, though, with Switzerland, Canada, Australia and Brazil racing ahead with spot crypto offerings.
One reason is that U.S. regulators have turned down several applications for spot bitcoin funds, which mirror the cryptocurrency’s price movements tick-by-tick, citing multiple reasons including a lack of surveillance-sharing agreements with regulated markets relating to the spot funds’ underlying assets.
Investors in futures-based funds must often shoulder the additional cost of the futures rollover as contracts approach settlement day, to maintain their position.
Bitcoin has lost 17% in the past three months, while ProShares Bitcoin Strategy’s ETF , which tracks bitcoin futures, has shed about 21%. The world’s largest bitcoin fund, Grayscale Bitcoin Trust (GBTC.PK), is down 34% in the same time.
ProShares Bitcoin Strategy ETF, has seen assets under management (AUM) shrink to just over $600 million as of the end of September, according to Refinitiv Lipper data. At its debut a year ago it pulled in over $1 billion in a matter of days.
At Grayscale’s Bitcoin Trust, the AUM have tumbled to $12.2 billion from over $30 billion at the end of 2021, data from the firm showed.
Will Peck, head of digital assets at WisdomTree, whose spot bitcoin ETF was blocked by U.S. watchdogs last week, said he wasn’t surprised by the decision, but expressed hope that an agreement could be reached.
“I think we’ll ultimately get there. But we’ll be in a holding pattern for the foreseeable future.”
Wemade, a South Korean gaming company, announced its plan to issue a stablecoin on its mainnet a few months ago. Currently, it’s servicing 16 blockchain games on its platform, WEMIX Play.
The company revealed the detailed mechanism of the stablecoin, WEMIX$. With the launch date of its own mainnet WEMIX3.0 set on Oct. 20, the crypto market is likely to see a brand new stablecoin very soon.
“Stablecoin is the hottest topic in the crypto scene right now,” said Henry Chang, CEO of Wemade. “It is ‘the one who must not be named’ these days,” referring to the Terra crash from which the crypto market still hasn’t recovered.
However, there are three requirements that a successful stablecoin should meet, and WEMIX$ has them all, he went on to argue.
First, a stablecoin must be stable. That may sound obvious, but we’ve seen stablecoins that were unstable. However, WEMIX$ is stable because it will be issued 100% reserved by USD Coin (USDC$1.00), he explained.
He argued that another requirement for a stablecoin is “stable and native reflexivity,” which means when the demand for WEMIX$ increases, the value of WEMIX, the native coin of the Wemix3.0, should rise as well. That, in return, will expand the WEMIX3.0 ecosystem, and it will increase the volume of trade using WEMIX$.
To secure this positive cycle, a portion of every fee generated by WEMIX$ trades and WEMIX$-based trades will be allocated to the WEMIX holder community. Specifically, the WEMIX team plans to create a staking program and continue to distribute a certain portion of the WEMIX$ fees created in the WEMIX3.0 ecosystem to the staking program.
The third requirement he mentioned is scalability. For the ecosystem to grow, the total volume of its stablecoin must grow accordingly. In other words, the size of the ecosystem’s economy could be limited by its stablecoin’s trading volume.
To tackle this and peg problem, the WEMIX team devised its DIOS protocol for issuing and burning stablecoins. When high demand for WEMIX$ raises its price over 1 USDC, DIOS will issue additional WEMIX$ and swap with USDC to pull the price back to $1. Since the WEMIX$ price was higher than $1, there will be a surplus of USDC, which will be put in reserve, and additional WEMIX$ will be issued to keep the WEMIX/USDC ratio at 1:1. This newly issued WEMIX$ will go to the aforementioned staking program. This process also expands the total volume of WEMIX$ and USDC reserves.
If the price goes below $1, the DIOS protocol will be activated and take USDC from the reserve and buy WEMIX$ on decentralized exchanges. The protocol will burn the WEMIX to pull up its value. Then, the surplus of USDC will be put back into the reserve again, and additional WEMIX$ will be issued to match the 1:1 ratio.
“In order for the digital blockchain economy to operate and become successful, stablecoins are essential, and three requirements are needed to create a successful stablecoin, which are stability, stable and native reflexivity and scalability.” He concluded adding, “WEMIX$ will become a new history of stablecoins, and that history will be the cornerstone of the digital blockchain economy.”
London, UK, 18th October, 2022, Chainwire
Today, Kora, the app which pays users to reduce their carbon footprint, announced an investment from the Tezos Foundation as well as their use of the energy-efficient Tezos blockchain to power their app.
The Kora app rewards climate-positive actions and helps individuals, companies, and organizations measure and reduce their carbon footprint. Users earn Koras for actions that reduce their carbon footprint such as biking, switching to renewable energies, or taking public transportation.
Tezos, an energy-efficient open source blockchain network powered by a globally decentralised network of users and validators, will provide data and payment security for the Kora app.
In commenting on the reasons behind its selection of Tezos, Kora CEO & Co-Founder Gilad Regev comments, “Kora is becoming the most accurate real-time platform for measuring and validating behavior change. Ensuring that our users’ data and payment information is safe and secure has been a critical milestone in developing our platform.
Furthermore, the low-carbon Tezos blockchain enables secure validation of climate action. As a pioneer of the Proof-of-Stake blockchain revolution, and with one of the lowest carbon footprints in the industry with an annual footprint equal to that of 17 persons, Tezos was the obvious blockchain of choice for Kora.”
Gilad continues, “The support from the Tezos Foundation of Kora is a pivotal moment in the growth of Kora, one which will help propel it as both an app- and a movement- to new heights and we look forward to working with Tezos in this exciting chapter of our development. ”
Companies and builders around the globe leverage Tezos for projects exploring the potential for blockchain to be a tool for sustainable innovation. Recently, Cambridge University announced that the Cambridge Centre for Carbon Credits (4C) is building a trusted decentralised marketplace on Tezos that links corporate funders to conservationists via automated and transparent global oracles. Using this marketplace, purchasers of carbon credits will be able to confidently and directly fund trusted nature-based projects.
As part of its partnership, Kora joins the Cambridge Centre for Carbon Credits (4C) as another leading carbon reduction initiative building on the Tezos blockchain.
Learn more about Kora at Kora.app
Explore Tezos at Tezos.com
About Kora:
Kora exists to stop climate change. With a goal to reduce 2.5-3.5 gigatons of carbon emissions annually, Kora works by rewarding the reduction of C02. Koras are earned for every 100 grams of CO2 users reduce. The in-app Kora wallet allows users to keep track of their Kora earnings and send and accept payments from other Kora users or partners and participating businesses, and trade redeem the koras in the low carbon focused Kora marketplace.
About Tezos:
Tezos is smart money, redefining what it means to hold and exchange value in a digitally connected world. A self-upgradable and energy-efficient Proof of Stake blockchain with a proven track record, Tezos seamlessly adopts tomorrow’s innovations without network disruptions today. For more information, please visit www.tezos.com.
About Tezos Foundation:
The Tezos Foundation is a Swiss non-profit foundation that supports the development and long-term success of the Tezos protocol, an energy efficient blockchain with the ability to evolve by upgrading itself. For more information, please visit www.tezos.foundation.
Contact
Tal Dotan
pr@marketacross.com
Banks that accept deposits from cryptocurrency companies should be aware of increased liquidity risks, particularly if firms are highly interconnected with other digital asset businesses, said Michael Barr, the Federal Reserve’s vice chair of supervision, in a speech on Wednesday.
Barr said the Fed is working with the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp to highlight the risks to banks of concentrating their deposits in the crypto industry, warning that banks could experience deposit fluctuations linked to price swings in the broader crypto market.
“The recent volatility in crypto markets has demonstrated the extent of centralization and interconnectedness among crypto-asset companies, which contributes to amplified stress,” he said.
“While banks were not directly exposed to losses from these events, these episodes have highlighted potential risks for banking organizations.”
Speaking at DC Fintech Week, Barr said the banking regulators’ engagement with financial institutions on the risks of accepting deposits from crypto firms is “not intended to discourage banks from providing access” to banking services for crypto companies, but instead on making sure that any risks are appropriately mitigated.
Barr’s comments mark his first full remarks on cryptocurrency and fintech since taking the top regulatory post at the Fed in July. In the speech, Barr said regulators need to balance supporting innovation while providing guardrails that protect consumers and guard against systemic risks.
Barr also warned that crypto companies making misrepresentations about deposit insurance can confuse customers, and may lead to increased withdrawals at crypto-aligned banks that provide such services during periods of heightened stress.
Those comments follow action the FDIC took in August in which it ordered crypto exchange FTX, along with several other crypto firms, to halt what it called “false and misleading” claims an FTX official had made about whether funds at the company are insured by the government.