Hodder Law Weekly Newsletter - December 30, 2022
Hello everyone,
I hope you are all having a great week! The price of Bitcoin as of Friday, December 30 at 3:45 p.m. EST is $16,534.
Headlines.
MicroStrategy To Launch Bitcoin Lightning Solutions In 2023. Great news for the development of the Lightning ecosystem. MicroStrategy, (one of the largest holders of Bitcoin) will explore services like online content monetization and enterprise marketing through the Lightning network. Providing large companies with practical use applications is a crucial step forward for Bitcoin.
FTX execs hid $8 billion in liabilities in a customer account that Bankman-Fried referred to as 'our Korean friend's account.' Ex-girlfriend and Alameda CEO Caroline Ellison and FTX co-founder Gary Wang have both pled guilty and are cooperating with the Feds in their case against SBF.
North Korean Hackers Have Stolen $1.2B in Crypto Since 2017. Economic sanctions appear to have emboldened the rogue state toward cybercrime efforts. North Korea’s nuclear missile projects rely on this funding, so it needs to be stopped, however banning crypto mixers like Tornado Cash isn’t going to solve the problem when there are other options available.
Russia Close To Legalizing International Trade In Bitcoin. The embattled nation’s finance committee chairman has approved the use of cryptocurrency payments to help bolster trade activities. Chairman Anatoly Aksakov also clarified there would be no plans to encourage cryptocurrency usage as a means of payment within Russian territory.
2023: The Year of Regulation vs. Decentralization. The SEC and CFTC will both look to push the boundaries of acceptable regulation in the crypto sector. Unfortunately, their regulation by enforcement policy doesn’t appear to be changing with the new year.
Bitcoin Bullish Signal? Small Investors Show Rapid Accumulation. The crypto winter has contributed to many new retail investors aggressively pursuing bitcoin. Digital wallets holding 0-1,000 bitcoins have sharply increased, while ‘whale holders’ with over 1,000 bitcoins have sharply decreased.
Crypto Exchange Binance Dispels FUD of A 'Financial Black Box'. A major concern for many is that Binance hasn’t hired one of the ‘big four’ auditing firms. Others are concerned about Binance’s lack of financial disclosure. Binance claims to be self-sufficient and as they aren’t a publicly traded company they aren’t obligated to provide a detailed financial statement.
Binance Failing to Get US Exchange Listings for BNB Is Yellow Flag for Crypto Analysts. With all the anxiety around centralized exchanges over the past weeks, the worse could be yet to come for Binance. The BNB token was initially distributed as an airdrop, so it would require a new precedent for the SEC to say that an airdrop somehow required the "investor" to make an "investment of money" to satisfy the the first prong of the Howey Test.
HODLCast
This week's episode of the HODLCast features:
BlockFi update for user's with funds in non-interest-bearing wallets.
Celsius legal fees and leaked data.
Binance's move to purchase Voyager's distressed assets.
FTX update
Crypto miner Core Scientific Bankruptcy
Check out the HODLCast YouTube channel and subscribe for the juicy crypto content!
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“The blockchain technology that underlies Bitcoin is a major technical breakthrough that could, in time, revolutionize both the Internet and the financial industry as we know them, and the first steps of that potential revolution are now underway.” — Jon Evans
Make it a great week!
Sincerely,
Sasha Hodder
Hodder Law
