FEG ETH

James Cirrone

As the summer season officially concludes this Saturday, the outlook for crypto fundraising appears promising heading into the fall.



Eleven crypto startups raised a combined total of $115.5 million across a variety of disciplines this week. Gaming, though, took the cake.&nbsp;



Proof of Play, which describes itself as an on-chain game studio, raised $33 million in seed funding on Thursday. 



Numerous angel investors participated in the round, including Balaji Srinivasan, Justin Kan and many others.&nbsp;



A16z’s crypto arm led the round, giving high praise to Proof of Play founder Amitt Mahajan. Mahajan is no stranger to gaming, having co-created Farmville, the farming simulator that took Facebook by storm in 2009.&nbsp;



“Amitt and the entire Proof of Play team are committed to a gaming future where composability, interoperability and permanence are at the core of gameplay: you own your assets, and anyone can create their own game on top of another,” a16z wrote in a <a href="https://a16zcrypto.com/posts/announcement/investing-in-proof-of-play/">blog post</a> announcing the fresh <a href="http://twitter.com/ProofOfPlay/status/1704876956762956188">funding</a>. 



Proof of Play’s first game, Pirate Nation, is a role playing title that has NFT functionality and allows for developers to build on top of it thanks to “on-chain game contracts.” The game, which was released back in December, was built on Ethereum and Arbitrum Nova.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">Custody and digital assets infrastructure put up big numbers</h2>



A16z crypto also had its hand in raising $25 million for a startup called Bastion this week.&nbsp;



The firm, which emerged from stealth on Monday, is aiming to offer crypto custody, wallet management and digital asset trading mostly to corporations, Bloomberg <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-09-18/crypto-startup-led-by-former-andreessen-executives-raises-cash?utm_source=website&amp;utm_medium=share&amp;utm_campaign=twitter">reported</a>.



Nomura’s Laser Digital Ventures, Robot Ventures, Not Boring Capital and others kicked in capital to support the seed round.&nbsp;



Bastion was co-founded by two former a16z crypto executives. Riyaz Faizullabhoy and Nassim Eddequiouaq used to serve as the venture capital firm’s chief technology officer and chief security officer, respectively.



Separately, Jiritsu, a verifiable computing provider, <a href="https://finance.yahoo.com/news/jiritsu-raises-10-2-million-225200338.html">raised</a> $10.2 million from gumi Cryptos Capital with participation from Susquehanna Private Equity Investments, LLLP, Republic Capital, and others.&nbsp;



Alongside the eight-figure raise, Jiritsu is pioneering its asset tokenization platform called Tomei RWA. The platform uses zero-knowledge attestations to better manage crypto assets.&nbsp;



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">Other notable fundraises</h2>



<ul>
<li>Fuze, which operates chiefly in the Middle East and North Africa, <a href="https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/fuze-raises-14mn--largest-seed-round-for-digital-assets-start-up-in-middle-east-301932994.html">raised</a> $14 million to give financial institutions the ability to offer regulated digital assets products to customers.</li>



<li>Briya <a href="https://www.prnewswire.com/il/news-releases/briya-raises-11-5m-series-a-accelerates-us-rollout-of-blockchain-secured-data-exchange-platform-to-enhance-collaboration-between-hospitals-and-life-sciences-301931724.html">secured</a> $11.5 million in a series A round led by Team8. The company offers a blockchain-secured healthcare data exchange platform.</li>



<li>CoinScan, which bills itself as a competitor to cryptocurrency data sites like CoinMarketCap, raised $6.3 million in part from a DraftKings billionaire shareholder.</li>



<li>GRVT, a crypto exchange boasting features from CEXs and DEXs, raised $5 million in a seed round at a $39 million valuation.&nbsp;</li>



<li>Freatic <a href="https://medium.com/@freaticteam/freatic-emerges-from-stealth-with-a-3-6m-seed-round-led-by-a16z-crypto-9e1532d6c999">emerged from stealth</a> with $3.6 million in seed money to build “a decentralized ecosystem for information exchange.”</li>



<li>On-chain intelligence provider Bubblemaps raised 3 million euros ($3.2 million) in an oversubscribed seed round.  </li>



<li>Orb Technology, the team that built the Lens Protocol-based social platform Orb, successfully <a href="https://twitter.com/orbapp_/status/1704854208514830517">closed</a> a $2.3 million pre-seed round with help from Superscrypt and others.</li>



<li>Decentralized hackathon platform BeWater <a href="https://twitter.com/BeWaterOfficial/status/1704828641765671365">raised</a> $1 million in an angel round.&nbsp;</li>



<li>Alums from Sino Global, Coinbase and Libra started a $60 million Web3 fund called Oak Grove Ventures.</li>
</ul>



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Crypto funding: Startups raise $115M across gaming, custody, and institutional services

There’s a lot to catch up on from this week when it comes to professional moves across the industry.&nbsp;



Galaxy Digital appointed Leon Marshall CEO of Europe about five months after the crypto investment firm announced a plan to bring ETPs to Europe. 



In addition to his new role as a regional chief executive, Marshall will continue serving as global head of sales, a position he was hired for in June, according to a company <a href="https://finance.yahoo.com/news/galaxy-appoints-leon-marshall-chief-110000891.html?guccounter=1&amp;guce_referrer=aHR0cHM6Ly93d3cuZ29vZ2xlLmNvbS8&amp;guce_referrer_sig=AQAAAGITeywn_xghpcZdnDVhCwMZNAytIsfkQXiaDBydlw-n17u-EIMLbJPKmAAHQblHmHPqqmmuC5OBBi3-ROOzyTEowaZa0Y6WZ5e5SCJyKu6AkES3T_XskNjFe5dmGUR90GdtjNyP4XFOHrs0cAWD6IlsKcZPTjlAzwlW8dLqgZVY">release</a>.



Galaxy CEO Mike Novogratz called Europe “a region that is critically important to our growth strategy.”



Before making the jump over to Galaxy in June, <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/leon-marshall-a99b823a/">Marshall</a> was global head of sales at Genesis for over four years. Prior to his stint at the bankrupt crypto lender, he was in strategy and business development at Gnosis.



Read more: <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/galaxy-europe-etp-push">Galaxy links up With $821B asset manager as part of Europe ETP push</a>



Elsewhere, ex-Signature Bank chief information officer John Trainor <a href="https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/ex-signature-cio-joins-abelian-partners-to-lead-technology-vertical-301931855.html">found</a> a new gig at Abelian Partners where he’ll lead the financial services firm&#8217;s technology consulting practices.&nbsp;



Trainor was at <a href="https://blockworks.co/tag/signature">Signature</a> when <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/signature-silicon-valley-bank-made-whole">it joined Silicon Valley bank in failure</a> during March 2023. Silvergate was <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/silvergate-intends-wind-down-operations">the first major American bank to falter</a> among the three, and <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/first-republic-closure-crypto">First Republic closed its doors</a> on May 1, 2023.



While at Signature, Trainor led the bank’s blockchain payments initiative.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">Notable departures</h2>



Another crypto banking firm, BCB Group, is losing a key executive.&nbsp;



Chief banking officer Ian Moore will exit by the end of the month, leaving the firm after just over a year.&nbsp;



Moore’s CV lists him at four different companies throughout his career, with crypto experience from BCB Group and Paysafe.&nbsp;



But for most of his time in the workforce, <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/ian-moore-76207910/?originalSubdomain=uk">Moore</a> was firmly rooted in traditional finance. He started out at Citi in 1998, staying there for over eight years before moving to Deutsche Bank for over 13 years.&nbsp;



Separately, Jack Dorsey’s Block announced that Square CEO Alyssa Henry will step down on Oct. 2, per an <a href="https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1512673/000119312523236904/d479324d8k.htm">SEC filing</a>.&nbsp;



<a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/alyssa-henry-0905692/">Henry</a> has held the top job at Square, a business commerce platform under Block, for only about eight months, but has been employed at Block for over nine years.



Dorsey will take over as head of Square for the time being.&nbsp;



Finally, Linda Xie, the co-founder and managing director of Scalar Capital, <a href="https://twitter.com/ljxie/status/1703799316463198337">said</a> she would be transitioning out of her investor role at the crypto venture capital firm.&nbsp;



Additionally, Scalar won’t be deploying new capital “going forward”, Xie wrote in a post on X, formerly Twitter.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">More notable hires</h2>



<ul>
<li>Digital Currency Group <a href="https://twitter.com/DCGco/status/1703780052813389932">appointed</a> Tonya Evans, a law professor at Penn State’s Dickinson School, to its board of directors.</li>



<li>Obligate, a Zurich-based on-chain bond issuance platform, appointed Thomas Zeeb, former global head of exchanges, at SIX Swiss Exchange to its board.</li>



<li>Marieke Flament <a href="https://near.org/blog/the-continued-evolution-of-the-near-foundation">stepped down</a> as the NEAR Foundation’s CEO and will be replaced by General Counsel Chris Donovan. Flament will remain in a “council-only” position.</li>



<li>Outlier Ventures selected Stephan Apel as CEO. Apel will replace Jamie Burke, who will move into a chairman role after ten years as chief executive at the crypto VC.</li>
</ul>



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Crypto hiring: Galaxy Digital doubles down on Europe with new C-suite hire

Darren Kleine

If you can’t beat them, join them. Like, all of them.



In the fierce battle for the scalability trilemma crown, Solana, Ethereum and their accompanying ecosystems are often pitted against each other as mutually exclusive solutions.&nbsp;



Apparently, it doesn’t have to be this way. On the Bell Curve podcast (<a href="https://open.spotify.com/episode/5Flgxkd7ONTFV75aFrRxkQ">Spotify</a>/<a href="https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/makerdao-rally-reaction-round-up/id1641356619?i=1000628841606">Apple</a>), Blockworks co-founder Michael Ippolito details the recently revealed architecture of Eclipse. The rollup tech harnesses Solana’s speedy execution, Ethereum’s secure settlement, Risc Zero proofs and Celestia data availability in a “best of all worlds” team approach to scaling.



Ippolito says the <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/lightspeed-solana-zeta-markets">Solana Virtual Machine</a> or SVM holds some key advantages over Ethereum — outside of network effects — particularly in its ability to perform parallel executions. “The <a href="https://blockworks.co/tag/evm">EVM</a> (Ethereum Virtual Machine) has a single thread processor, which just limits its scale,” he says.



“You have very fast execution, really cheap [<a href="https://blockworks.co/news/lightspeed-layer2-enterprise">data availability</a>], and it still settles down to [Ethereum],” he says. “I think they&#8217;re going to use <a href="https://blockworks.co/price/eth">ETH</a> as the gas token as well. So, it&#8217;s kind of a very interesting blend of a whole bunch of different ecosystems.”



Read more: <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/risc-zero-zkevm">Risc Zero introduces ‘Type 0’ zkEVM to make zero-knowledge tech more accessible</a>



In addition, Neon — an EVM operating on <a href="https://blockworks.co/tag/solana">Solana</a> — will provide compatibility between Ethereum and Solana, Blockworks co-founder Jason Yanowitz explains. “If you want to easily deploy EVM <a href="https://blockworks.co/tag/smart-contracts">smart contracts</a> on Eclipse, you can do it through Neon.”



Yanowitz says it’s the first time he has seen a fully modular setup that brings “all these different providers together.”&nbsp;



Ippolito details some of the limitations of Ethereum’s main chain, noting its relatively low throughput and gas costs, in particular. Because of the base fee and computational resources that every transaction requires, “if there&#8217;s like a really hot <a href="https://blockworks.co/tag/nfts">NFT</a> mint, it can multiply the base fee,” he says. 



“That base fee gets applied to transactions on <a href="https://blockworks.co/tag/uniswap">Uniswap</a>. So the resources are coupled in a way that doesn&#8217;t really make sense.”



One solution is to put every single application on its own blockchain as a <a href="https://blockworks.co/tag/rollups">rollup</a>. “That&#8217;s the <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/coinbase-pessimism-base-security">OP stack</a> version of how to solve this problem,” he says. “The other way that you could solve it is to actually keep everything on one settlement layer and chain, but do what Solana did by creating local fee markets and parallel processing.”



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">The competition continues</h2>



Ippolito doubts that <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/ethereum-cancun-upgrade-blobs">upcoming danksharding upgrades</a> will reduce costs on Ethereum as significantly as some hope. “It&#8217;s not going to reduce costs that much, especially on the canonical rollups that still use Ethereum for data availability,” he says.



“You need one of these rollups to try something like the solution that Eclipse is pioneering here.”



Ippolito credits Eclipse founder Neel Somani with the “clever” modular design of Eclipse, adding, “it&#8217;s going to be down to his [business development] chops to actually go and recruit developers.”



<iframe loading="lazy" frameborder="0" height="200" scrolling="no" src="https://playlist.megaphone.fm/?e=BWG3959954961" width="100%"></iframe>







Somani will likely be forced to compete with Solana for developers who are familiar with the Rust programming language, Ippolito suggests. “These are Rust [developers], I think, that he&#8217;s hoping to bring over and build applications.”



It looks like the competitive rivalry that is so prevalent in blockchain will live on, after all.



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Eclipse takes a ‘best of all worlds’ approach to solve scalability trilemma

Casey Wagner

Peter Marton, the head of the virtual currency division at the New York State Department of Financial Services, will leave his position at the end of the month.&nbsp;



Marton, who started in the role in December 2021, is moving to the private sector, a spokesperson told the Wall Street Journal. Prior to joining the NYSDFS, Marton worked in digital asset strategy at IBM.&nbsp;



The NYSDFS spent several months looking to fill the deputy superintendent for virtual currency position prior to hiring Marton.&nbsp;



The virtual currency division is responsible for regulating crypto financial services and products, most <a href="http://blockworks.co/news/ny-wants-crypto-startups-to-pay-5-times-per-year-for-bitlicense">notably the state’s BitLicense program</a>, launched in 2015. The BitLicense is a required certification for businesses looking to engage in crypto business activities, including storing, selling and issuing digital assets in New York. 



The NYSDFS is currently looking for Marton’s replacement, according to a job <a href="https://www.dfs.ny.gov/system/files/documents/2023/09/dep_sup_vc_ns_ri_nyc_20231009.pdf">posting</a> from the agency.&nbsp;



The candidate should expect to be “responsible for overall management of Bitlicense applications process, examinations, and ongoing supervision of Bitlicense,” per the posting.&nbsp;



The news comes shortly after the NYSDFS <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/nydfs-coin-listing-guidelines-btc-eth-gusd">announced it was seeking public feedback</a> on a new proposed rule that would change its listing guidelines for digital assets.&nbsp;



“This coin-delisting policy must include robust procedures that comprehensively address all steps involved in removing support for a coin” and requires the company to tailor the policy to its “specific business model, operations, customers and counterparties, geographies of operations, and service providers; and to the use, purpose, and specific features of coins being considered,” the agency said.



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NY’s top crypto regulator is leaving office this month

Macauley Peterson

A Swiss non-profit working on the world’s first zero-knowledge light client for Bitcoin, has reached a major milestone towards bringing zero-knowledge proofs to the most valuable crypto network.



ZeroSync’s verifier for the Bitcoin network’s block headers makes it possible to build a zk proof-based light client for the network, the first step in a roadmap of permissionless innovation, according project lead Robin Linus.



In the near term, a light client might let you run a Bitcoin full node on, say, a mobile phone. But that roadmap includes a second-layer protocol on top of Bitcoin, that can bring tokens — such as stablecoins — to the Bitcoin network, along with a 20 to 50 times throughput increase, without requiring any sort of fork.



“What is cool about that solution is that, first of all, you can process about 100 transactions on the base layer,” Linus told Blockworks. “And in addition to that, we also get perfect privacy — you can encrypt both the transaction amounts and the transaction graphs, and then you basically get best-in-class privacy, comparable to Zcash.”



The privacy benefit is essentially a byproduct of the protocol’s use of STARKs, the proving system invented by <a href="https://blockworks.co/tag/starkware">StarkWare</a>, not a deliberate design choice.



ZeroSync received a grant from Geometry Research in 2022, one from StarkWare earlier this year, and has since formed the foundation. The group’s work is the first effort to use StarkWare’s Cairo programming language outside of the Ethereum ecosystem.



A soft fork would be required to enable trustless bitcoin bridging on the layer-2 network that ZeroSync envisions. Yet even without that, the network can permissionlessly support useful features, such as token transfers where the fees are paid in a stablecoins, removing the need for bitcoin (<a href="https://blockworks.co/price/btc">BTC</a>) to pay for transactions.



Bitcoin is resistant to change by design, requiring consensus from Core developers, and near-consensus from full node operators, including miners. The prior soft fork in 2021, called <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/anticipating-bitcoins-taproot-upgrade-heres-what-you-need-to-know">Taproot</a>, was years in the making and only activated after more than 90% of node operators signaled their assent.



“We want it to be hard to change so that it can be hard money, but some changes are necessary,” Linus said. “It seems to be that there is a consensus that at some point we do want to have some kind of [zk proof] verifier on Bitcoin.”



Linus sees ZeroSync’s role as helping figure out what kind of approach makes the most sense.



“We try to participate in the community and push that forward,” he noted. “Everything has to be free and open-source, otherwise it will never get into the main layer.”



Meanwhile, the chain state proof they’ve completed won’t require any kind of fork.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">Waiting for Bitcoin Simplicity</h2>



Zk proof technology is <a href="https://blockworks.co/tag/zero-knowledge-proof">still in its infancy</a>. There are many different proof systems available with various different tradeoffs to consider. Those choices have ramifications for virtual machines built on top. Linus recognizes it would be quite hard to reach consensus on just one.



Eric Wall, a board member of the StarkNet Foundation, and a bitcoin thought-leader, <a href="https://hackmd.io/6lwnNQf2RTmc3UQoWvAVQw">articulated</a> one of the challenges with Bitcoin’s decision-making process in this area.



“How is the Bitcoin community ever supposed to reach consensus on enshrining a specific zk-verifying opcode, when the zk community itself is not in any way in consensus on what type of zkVM would be ideal for Bitcoin for the next year, let alone the next 5 or next 100 years?”



Fortunately, Linus sees a likely solution coming via the <a href="https://blog.blockstream.com/en-simplicity-github/">Simplicity programming language</a>, first unveiled by <a href="https://blockworks.co/tag/blockstream">Blockstream</a> about five years ago.



Simplicity, a <a href="https://blockworks.co/tag/smart-contracts">smart contract</a> language similar to Solidity on Ethereum, <a href="https://blockstream-talk-23225031.simplecast.com/episodes/blockstream-talk-26-simplicity-bitcoins-last-soft-fork">has been described</a> as “Bitcoin’s last soft fork.” If it is activated, it will “vastly increase the scripting capabilities of Bitcoin,” Linus said.



“We are already starting to experiment with it because Blockstream just activated it on the <a href="https://blockworks.co/tag/liquid-network">Liquid</a> testnet…that will be the first step for us to experiment with a [zk proof] verifier on Bitcoin’s main layer.”



StarkWare’s co-founder, Eli Ben-Sasson, unsurprisingly <a href="https://twitter.com/EliBenSasson/status/1704564109386170433?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1704564109386170433%7Ctwgr%5Ed073aae1d5e00177a9df25e5c5e902d969faff95%7Ctwcon%5Es1_c10&amp;ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fblockworks.co%2Fnews%2Fzerosync-starkware-zero-knowledge-proofs-bitcoin">advocates</a> for the Cairo+STARK stack.



<figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-rich is-provider-twitter wp-block-embed-twitter"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="550" data-dnt="true">I agree that it suffices to pick one Turing complete VM, that can give you all other machines. I don&#39;t think setting the VM to be WASM is the right choice. My guess is that you lose 100-1000x on scale compared to picking Cairo to be the VM. Additionally, the Cairo+STARK stack is…&mdash; Eli Ben-Sasson (@EliBenSasson) <a href="https://twitter.com/EliBenSasson/status/1704564109386170433?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">September 20, 2023</a></blockquote><script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
</div></figure>



<a href=""></a>But Linus said the adoption of Simplicity would allow zk proof teams to sidestep the need to rely exclusively on one proof system or another.



“You can pretty freely choose what proof system you want to use…it&#8217;s a high level language for smart contracting and that allows you to do basically any kind of computation that you can do in regular programming languages,” he said.



“And so there wouldn&#8217;t be much drama anymore about the question of which [zk proof] verifier we want to activate — we would basically just implement what we think is best,” he added.



If anyone else thinks they have a better proof system, they’re free to implement it, without needing anyone’s permission.



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Bitcoin’s first zero-knowledge light client seeks to drive innovation

Former FTX US president Brett Harrison, now the founder and CEO of crypto infrastructure firm Architect, says there is “hope” US lawmakers and regulators will come to an agreement on fair and effective digital asset policy — but it’s going to take a lot of work.&nbsp;



“Regulators are in a difficult position that we have to empathize with,” Harrison said during a panel discussion at the Mainnet conference in <a href="https://blockworks.co/tag/new-york">New York</a> Thursday. 



Agencies are not only responsible for creating and enforcing policy, they also have to answer to the public when things go wrong, like the implosion of FTX last year, <a href="https://blockworks.co/tag/brett-harrison">Harrison</a> said. 



“It’s not presently really the time for pushing for innovation,” he added. “It’s about making sure this doesn’t happen again.” 



Architect, which Harrison founded this year, has had its own regulatory boxes to check.



Just this week the company received its introducing broker license for regulated derivatives, issued under the National Futures Association and independent from the Commodity Futures Trading Commission. Architect is now cleared to accept futures contract trading orders but cannot accept fiat currency or other assets to complete these orders.&nbsp;



“Derivatives markets require modern and secure technological entry points built for the disparate range of products they have come to encompass, physical and digital, in order to enhance and expand institutional participation,” Harrison <a href="https://x.com/BrettHarrison88/status/1704845804077203668?s=20">wrote</a> on X, formerly Twitter, after the announcement.&nbsp;



Harrison, <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/brett-harrison-leaving-ftx-us-moving-into-advisory-role">who left FTX.US in September 2022</a>, just ahead of its <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/ftx-bankrupt-hacked-investigated-a-timeline-of-events">parent company’s collapse</a> in November, added during the panel discussion that the future of crypto policy in the US does not solely depend on one agency.&nbsp;



“It’s wrong,” to say either the CFTC or the SEC should be the main agency in charge, Harrison said, especially given that there are many assets and areas of the industry that could likely fall under joint jurisdiction.&nbsp;



In terms of when the industry should expect to see some movement on Capitol Hill, Harrison said a lot is weighing on the upcoming election season.&nbsp;



“It really depends on the political dynamics at the time and whether or not [crypto policy] is seen as a priority next year,” he said.



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Former FTX US president sees the glass half full on crypto regulation

Ben Strack

While some consider Tether&#8217;s decision to resume lending as questionable, one industry executive believes it won&#8217;t meaningfully disrupt what is currently the most liquid stablecoin.



Tether (USDT), a stablecoin with a market capitalization of roughly $83 billion, is intended to maintain a value of $1 and can be redeemed for US dollars at any time.&nbsp;



Its issuer began accommodating short-term loan requests during the second quarter, a Tether spokesperson <a href="https://www.wsj.com/finance/currencies/tether-is-lending-its-stablecoins-again-b11705f2">told </a>the Wall Street Journal Thursday. These loans — to be eliminated by 2024 — were made to clients with which the company has “long-standing relationships,” the representative added.



It remains unclear who exactly these borrowers are.



The company’s fulfilling of loan requests comes after Tether said in a December 2022 blog <a href="https://tether.to/en/tether-addresses-fud-around-secured-loans-reveals-plans-to-reduce-these-to-zero-in-2023/">post</a> that it would “reduce secured loans in Tether’s reserves to zero” throughout 2023.



James Butterfill, head of research at CoinShares, said Tether had improved transparency via quarterly independent audits and <a href="https://tether.to/en/tether-slashes-commercial-paper-to-zero/#:~:text=Today%2C%20Tether%20announced%20that%20it,the%20management%20of%20Tethers%27%20reserves.">saying</a> in October 2022 that it was replacing commercial paper in its reserves with US Treasury bills.



“It is a little disappointing to see them take a step backwards like this,” he told Blockworks in an email. “That said…we don&#8217;t think it will materially impact their robustness as a stablecoin, as investors still have a much clearer idea as to their holdings.”



Tether’s total assets amounted to roughly $86.5 billion, while total liabilities were about $83.2 billion, as of June 30, according to a July auditor <a href="https://assets.ctfassets.net/vyse88cgwfbl/63oJePOHqIvrcnXWMPZ1M0/4cfaf2e7cdf80c30b17fdc70faaf741f/ESO.03.01_Std_ISAE_3000R_Opinion_30-06-2023_BDO_Tether_CRR.pdf">report</a>. Roughly $55.8 billion of its assets — or nearly 65% — were in US Treasury bills, it notes.&nbsp;&nbsp;



Tether’s secured loans — amounting to $5.5 billion, as of June 30, are “fully collateralized by liquid assets…and are measured at [amortized] cost,” the report adds.&nbsp;



“You would have to assume a very high default rate to consume all of their cushion,” Butterfill said.



Read more: <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/stablecoin-issuers-book-big-profits">Stablecoin issuers like tether may book big profits soon</a>



“Anyone with a minimum understanding of financial markets would see how a company having $3.3 billion in excess equity and on track to make a yearly profit of $4 billion is in all effects offsetting the secured loans and retaining such profits within the company balance sheet,” Tether said in a Thursday <a href="https://tether.to/en/challenges-plague-banking-industry-as-tether-demonstrates-strength-and-commitment-to-high-quality-principles-amidst-scrutiny-from-wsj/">statement</a> in response to the Wall Street Journal story. “Tether is still committed to removing the secured loans from its reserves.”



A spokesperson did not return Blockworks’ request for further comment.&nbsp;&nbsp;



Matt Levine, a former investment banker at Goldman Sachs, wrote in an opinion <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2023-09-21/tether-keeps-lending-tethers?srnd=undefined">column</a> for Bloomberg News Thursday that there is no financial reason for Tether to want these loans.



“Everyone involved in Tether can get dynastically wealthy and live an easy life by putting all the money in Treasury bills,” he wrote.&nbsp;



The Tether spokesperson told the Wall Street Journal that the company seeks to help borrowers prevent the need to deplete customer liquidity or sell their collateral at potentially unfavorable prices.



“If big crypto firms get margin calls and have to dump their assets, that will drive down the prices of crypto assets,” Levine wrote. “Lending them money is not just good for them, it’s good for the crypto ecosystem broadly; it prevents fire sales that might drive down prices.”



The revelation that Tether has resumed lending comes at a time when its market share has been rapidly increasing amid a regulatory crackdown against US-based competitors, Butterfill noted.



USDC’s market capitalization, for example, which peaked around $55 billion in late July 2022, stood at roughly $25.7 billion on Friday.



Read more: <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/usdc-market-cap-falls">Why USDC’s market cap is half of what it was a year ago</a>



“Tether remains the most liquid stablecoin out there,” Butterfill said.



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Tether’s return to lending a ‘step backwards’ but unlikely to hurt USDT: Research exec

Jack Kubinec

While DAOs toy with novel systems to fix sclerotic DAO governance, a16z’s Miles Jennings suggests looking backwards — to Niccolo Machiavelli.&nbsp;



Likening today’s clamoring Discord channels to 15th century Italian city-states, the a16z general counsel and head of decentralization penned two essays using Machiavelli as a jumping off point to propose a series of reforms for DAO governance.&nbsp;



Jennings believes DAO leaders should be held accountable to members, and he thinks governance can be fixed by people doing less of it.&nbsp;



Perhaps the most unique aspect of Jennings’ argument is the notion that DAOs should reduce subjective human decisions in governance wherever possible. Instead, decisions could be made by third-party clients of DAOs, and users can govern by choosing where to do business while protocols remain neutral — if DEX A’s fees are too high, users are free to switch to DEX B without the protocol’s <a href="https://blockworks.co/tag/dao-governance">governance</a> ever getting involved.



Machiavelli was famously pessimistic on human nature, and Jennings believes DAOs should be, too. Starting from the premise that a leadership class will arise in any governing body, Jennings outlines a wonkish bicameral governance structure for <a href="https://blockworks.co/tag/daos">DAOs</a> that would see proposals introduced by one council and approved by the other. 



Jennings advocates direct elections and term limits for some of the “stakeholders” in the legislative councils.



Ultimately, in Jennings’ view, DAOs need to get real about greed.



“Machiavelli’s philosophy was developed with a pragmatic understanding of the struggle for social power,” Jennings wrote, and such realpolitik is needed when decentralization can tend to be for show while insiders profit.&nbsp;



For Jennings, Machiavellian DAOs present a chance at the sort of stakeholder capitalism that seems beyond reach in traditional finance. Jennings’ proposed reforms would wrest some power away from whales and ruffle feathers in the process — but perhaps it’s better for DAOs to be feared than loved.



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DAOs should learn from Machiavelli, says a16z crypto’s Jennings

Katherine Ross

The fraud trial for former FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried is set to begin on Oct. 3 with a jury selection. The six-week trial will take place less than a year after the FTX collapse.



Bankman-Fried is accused of fraud and conspiracy in connection to the now-bankrupt FTX.



A <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/sbf-bail-decision">judge revoked Bankman-Fried’s bond</a> back in August following a petition from the prosecutors. As part of the petition, prosecutors cited Bankman-Fried’s contact with a New York Times journalist as a tipping point.&nbsp;



<a href="https://blockworks.co/tag/sam-bankman-fried">Bankman-Fried</a> was accused of leaking former colleague — and ex-girlfriend — Caroline Ellison’s diary entries to the reporter. The government argued at the time that Bankman-Fried had shown a history of witness tampering, including attempting to contact an unnamed witness — the “current General Counsel of FTX US who may be a witness at trial” — via Signal.



Judge Lewis Kaplan, who will oversee the trial, said there was probable cause to believe that Bankman-Fried violated the terms of his bail in his attempts to allegedly tamper with the witnesses.&nbsp;



Since then, Bankman-Fried has been held at the Brooklyn Metropolitan Detention Center. He will remain there for the duration of his trial, as a panel from the Second Circuit Court of Appeals rejected his appeal for release on Thursday, Sept. 21.



The judges wrote that they agreed with Judge Kaplan’s findings that Bankman-Fried had probably attempted to tamper with witnesses.



Bankman-Fried’s lawyers claimed that he was denied a vegan diet.



Read more: <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/brady-dale-sam-bankman-fried">Drowning in Sam Bankman-Fried: A survival guide</a>



In addition to the appeal denial, Bankman-Fried’s legal team suffered a second setback on Thursday after <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/sam-bankman-fried-witness-reject-judge-lewis-kaplan">Judge Kaplan barred seven</a> of Bankman-Fried’s expert witnesses from testifying in October. The government had <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/sam-bankman-fried-doj-discovery-testimonies">previously moved to toss the testimonies</a>.



However, some may be able to take the stand to rebut the prosecution’s witnesses if Bankman-Fried files an additional disclosure, though the government is able to object.



During the trial, the government is expected to call multiple ex-FTX employees and former Bankman-Fried pals to the stand, including Ellison, former FTX Chief Technology Officer Gary Wang and former engineering director of FTX, Nishad Singh.&nbsp;



Ahead of the trial’s start date, here’s a look at what’s happened since Bankman-Fried was arrested in December of last year.&nbsp;



The Department of Justice and the Securities and Exchange Commission announced <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/sec-charges-sam-bankman-fried-with-defrauding-investors">charges against Bankman-Fried on Dec. 13</a> of last year. He was initially charged with eight counts of fraud, money laundering and campaign finance offenses.&nbsp;



US Attorney Damian Williams <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/us-attorney-sbf-perpetrated-largest-financial-fraud-in-american-history">referred to Bankman-Fried’s</a> alleged crimes as “one of the biggest financial frauds in American history.”



However, in July, the <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/campaign-finance-charges-against-sbf">DOJ announced that it would be dropping</a> the charge in a letter to the judge because the Bahamas did not extradite Bankman-Fried on the charge.



The charge drop came in May after lawyers representing Bankman-Fried moved to <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/sam-bankman-fried-sbf-charges">dismiss most of the criminal charges</a> against him unsuccessfully.&nbsp;



A month later, the <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/sam-bankman-fried-new-charges-pleads-not-guilty">DOJ handed down seven fraud and conspiracy charges</a>, all of which Bankman-Fried pleaded not guilty to.



An <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/breaking-sam-bankman-fried">indictment on Aug. 14</a> alleges that Bankman-Fried used $100 million of stolen customer funds to donate to various political candidates and political action committees (PACs).



In late August, Bankman-Fried and his team went back and forth with the government through legal filings after prosecutors handed over roughly 8 million documents from Bankman-Fried’s Google accounts.&nbsp;



The government argued that the tardy discovery was due to a mishap with Google. The defense, in return, <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/sbf-lawyer-temporary-release">argued that the additional discovery</a> was “fundamentally unfair” and that the trial prep time was “entirely inadequate.”



Judge Kaplan, in a hearing, <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/sam-bankman-fried-hearing-discovery-extension">pushed for the defense to consider</a> asking for an extension, though he made no promise to grant one. Bankman-Fried’s team did not file for such a request.



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Sam Bankman-Fried’s trial starts Oct. 3: What you need to know

Bessie Liu

Eclipse will use Solana’s tech stack for its upcoming mainnet launch, the Ethereum layer-2 network project announced. Eclipse’s mainnet is expected to go live before the end of the year.



By design, a blockchain stack contains four different layers: execution, settlement, consensus and data availability.



Blockchains, such as Bitcoin, Ethereum and Solana, carry out all these tasks in a single layer. This means that when a transaction is made, the blockchain executes, settles, reaches consensus, and ensures data availability all within the same layer.&nbsp;



Modular blockchains, on the other hand, are designed to focus on specific tasks.&nbsp;



Neel Somani, founder of Eclipse, notes that he believes all layer-2s — validiums, optimiums and zk-rollups — should be considered “modular blockchains.” 



“At a minimum, they&#8217;ve all separated execution from settlement,” he said.&nbsp;



Notably, Eclipse will use <a href="https://blockworks.co/tag/solana">Solana</a> Virtual Machine (SVM) for execution on its upcoming mainnet. The execution layer is the blockchain layer that holds the code and rules of a transaction; it enables transaction signing and smart contract execution.&nbsp;



On <a href="https://blockworks.co/tag/ethereum">Ethereum</a>, for example, transactions are executed sequentially. On Solana, however, there is a parallel execution environment. This means that more transactions can be processed at a lower cost.&nbsp;



“That&#8217;s probably the biggest difference,” Somani said. “Another benefit is the ‘local fee markets,’ meaning if one application gets a ton of activity, it doesn&#8217;t impact fees for other apps. It is a smaller set of ‘opcodes,’ and it&#8217;s register-based which makes [zero-knowledge] proving easier.”



Elsewhere, Eclipse will use <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/risc-zero-zkevm">Risc Zero</a> for proving. Settlement, like most rollups today, will take place on Ethereum — meaning that it will utilize Ethereum’s security properties to validate transactions. Data availability (DA) will be derived from Celestia. 



Read More: <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/data-availability-ethereum">Why data availability sampling matters for blockchain scaling?</a>



Unlike many rollup solutions today, Celestia’s DA layer utilizes Data Availability Sampling (DAS) over having a Data Availability Committee (DAC), meaning there are fewer trust assumptions.&nbsp;



That said, the team at Eclipse will continue to keep a close eye on <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/ethereum-cancun-upgrade-blobs">Ethereum’s EIP-4844 upgrade</a> and consider migrating to Ethereum’s DA in the future.&nbsp;



“It&#8217;s become clear that the single-threaded EVM is not sufficient to scale Ethereum, which is why apps are turning to their own app-specific rollups,” Somani told Blockworks. “Yet even the most sophisticated designs like Arbitrum are now seeing fee spikes — and it&#8217;s all because of the lack of parallelism and local fee markets.”



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Eclipse is using Solana’s virtual machine to launch an Ethereum L2

Europe-based CoinShares has launched a hedge fund division as part of its expansion into the US.



It’s a notable move, given that other industry firms are departing the US as regulatory uncertainties around crypto persist.



The expansion marks the first time the crypto investment firm will make its products available to qualified American investors, though CoinShares itself isn’t new to the hedge fund space.



The Jersey-based firm began as a commodity hedge fund called Global Advisors that founded the regulated Global Advisors Bitcoin Investment Fund in 2014. That fund operated until 2017.



CoinShares is perhaps better known today for its crypto ETPs, as well as its research and venture arms.&nbsp;



Lewis Fellas is set to lead the new unit, called CoinShares Hedge Fund Solutions. Fellas joined CoinShares in March after founding and working as chief investment officer of Larks Leaf Asset Management, according to his LinkedIn profile.&nbsp;



CoinShares CEO Jean-Marie Mognetti said in a statement that the demand for actively managed exposure to digital assets is a “natural progression” amid a macro environment marked by inflation.&nbsp;



The Federal Reserve has raised the federal funds rate repeatedly over the last 18 or so months to tackle inflation. Though the <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/federal-reserve-rate-decision-bitcoin-ether">US central bank chose this week to keep rates steady</a>, it signaled the possibility of another rate increase by the end of the year.



“The long-awaited return of interest rate-driven volatility is a great opportunity that we plan to capture with our novel fund products,” Fellas said in a statement. “Each product that will be offered is designed to mitigate counterparty risk whilst providing investors with clearly defined asset class and strategy exposures.”



<a href="https://coinshares.com/hedge-fund-solutions">Funds</a> being made available to US investors include vehicles based on Bitcoin and Ethereum, a spokesperson told Blockworks.&nbsp;



The bitcoin fund, called Bitcoin Integrated Strategies, “deploys multiple strategies such as call overwrite, quantitative and arbitrage to generate alpha above the performance of bitcoin,” according to the company’s website.&nbsp;



CoinShares’ Ethereum Integrated Strategies fund uses the same methods, “but optimized for Ethereum.”



A spokesperson did not immediately comment further on the company’s plans in the US.&nbsp;&nbsp;



Expansion to the US market comes as others have abandoned their plans in the country.



Crypto exchange <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/bittrex-us-shutdown">Bittrex said in March it would shut down its US operations</a>, citing “regulatory uncertainty” and an unwillingness by lawmakers to embrace innovation.&nbsp;&nbsp;



The US Securities and Exchange Commission <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/sec-sues-coinbase">sued Coinbase and Binance</a> in June in part for allegedly operating as unregistered securities exchanges — claims the companies deny.&nbsp;



Dave Hirsch, the crypto unit chief within the <a href="https://blockworks.co/tag/sec">SEC’s</a> enforcement division, <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/sec-hirsch-faces-the-music">said that month</a> the regulator intended to continue “pursuing claims for the unregistered offer and sale of securities.”



CoinShares had signaled in a July filing that it was <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/coinshares-pushing-into-active-management">laying the groundwork for hedge funds open to accredited US investors</a>.&nbsp;



“Today’s investors seek more than passive exposure to digital assets and are demanding increasingly sophisticated investment alternatives,” the company wrote in its first quarter <a href="https://s3.amazonaws.com/a.storyblok.com/f/155294/x/97c813bc14/coinshares_q1_23_report.pdf">report</a>.&nbsp;



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As others depart the US, CoinShares expands via new hedge fund unit

Google Cloud has added 11 more blockchains to public data sets on BigQuery, the tech giant’s data analytics service originally launched in 2010.



Users can now query data from Avalanche, Arbitrum, Cronos, Ethereum Goerli, Fantom, Near, Optimism, Polkadot, Polygon, Polygon Mumbai and Tron, according to a Thursday blog post. 



Google called these blockchains “in-demand” and says that users can now retrieve information about “the flow of assets from one wallet to another, which tokens are most popular, and how users are interacting with smart contracts.”



It also <a href="https://cloud.google.com/blog/products/data-analytics/data-for-11-more-blockchains-in-bigquery-public-datasets">said</a> that customers are often asking things like how many NFTs were minted on specific chains or how transaction fees compare across chains. 



Read more: <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/google-loosens-ad-guidelines-for-nft-game-providers">Google loosens ad guidelines for NFT game providers</a>



Google added that having more access to a wider array of networks can help curious individuals answer questions like those “without the overhead of operating nodes or maintaining an indexer.”



Back in 2018, Google’s cloud segment added support for Bitcoin and Ethereum on BigQuery. And with the advent of ordinals, essentially Bitcoin NFTs, coming to the network in January 2023, Google is also now allowing developers to query satoshis and/or ordinals from the Bitcoin dataset on BigQuery.



Previously, in 2019, six other chains were <a href="https://cloud.google.com/blog/products/data-analytics/introducing-six-new-cryptocurrencies-in-bigquery-public-datasets-and-how-to-analyze-them">added</a> to BigQuery beyond the big two, including Bitcoin Cash, Dash, Dogecoin, Ethereum Classic, Litecoin, and Zcash.



Google’s commitment to advancing blockchain isn’t limited to maintaining large blockchain datasets. Blockworks previously reported that <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/layerzero-google-cloud-oracle-operator-messaging">Google Cloud has become an oracle operator for LayerZero</a>, a cross-chain messaging protocol.



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Google Cloud adds data support for 11 more blockchains

ByBit is suspending services in the UK starting in early October as the UK implements new crypto marketing regulations.



“Bybit has made a choice to embrace the regulation proactively and pause our services in this market. The suspension will allow the company to focus its efforts and resources [on] being able to best meet the regulations outlined by the UK authorities in the future,” a blog post said.



UK customers will no longer be able to create new accounts on ByBit starting on Oct. 1. The company will cease new deposits and position buys on Oct. 8.&nbsp;



“UK Customers who are implicated by these measures are strongly encouraged to take action by Jan. 8, 2024,” the post <a href="https://announcements.bybit.com/en-US/article/announcement-bybit-to-suspend-services-in-the-uk-blt286daa9208c8f3aa/?category=latest_bybit_news&amp;channel=pr_&amp;medium=organic_social&amp;source=twitter&amp;sa_utm_ci=107&amp;pid=Social_twitter&amp;dtpid=16953838071898884&amp;campaign=enannouncement_16953838071898884&amp;utm_source=twitter&amp;utm_medium=organic_social&amp;c=enannouncement_16953838071898884&amp;sa_utm_channel=pr_&amp;sa_utm_tcn=16953838071898884&amp;is_retargeting=true">said</a>.&nbsp;



ByBit cited a June posting from the FCA outlining the new approach as part of its choice to suspend its services in the UK market.



The June FCA <a href="https://www.fca.org.uk/publications/policy-statements/ps23-6-financial-promotion-rules-cryptoassets">post</a> said that the regulation directly impacts consumers buying crypto, FCA-registered crypto companies, those attempting to register and overseas companies marketing to UK customers.&nbsp;



The announcement comes a day after the <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/uk-fca-warning-crypto-firms-unregistered-risk-warnings">UK gave crypto companies a “final warning.”</a>



In the Sept. 21 letter, the FCA cited “poor engagement from many unregistered, overseas crypto asset firms who have UK customers…” It stated that some had “refused to engage with the FCA”, despite the authority&#8217;s outreach attempts. Out of over 150 firms approached, only about 24 responded to a survey.



According to Lucy Castledine, the director of consumer investment, <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/uk-fca-deadline-crypto-marketing-regulation">the regulatory framework requires that crypto firms in the UK</a> present their offerings to UK customers “clearly, fairly and honestly. And they must provide risk warnings people understand.”



The regulations also require certain technical changes, such as the introduction of a cooling-off period. Firms registered within the UK have the option to request an extension of these deadlines until early January.



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ByBit to suspend UK market activity in early October

Shalini Nagarajan

Venture capitalist Tim Draper has launched a venture studio to boost budding crypto and Web3 startups.



Alon Goren, board member of projects like LunarCrush and Ownera, and David Bleznak, who recently worked on Coinbase&#8217;s institutional offerings, join Draper as founding members of the new studio called Draper Goren Blockchain (DGB).



The team indicated that their launch is strategically timed to align with bear market conditions, as they believe many crypto projects will benefit from support to thrive and succeed, according to a <a href="https://www.dgb.vc/">statement</a> published Sept. 20.



“It’s a cliche that bear markets are a time for builders to build, but that means there are incredible projects currently being developed that are in need of capital and support,” Draper said.



Draper is a well-known venture capitalist and entrepreneur, recognized for his contributions to the tech and crypto industries.



In the early 1980s, he founded Draper Associates, a venture capital firm known for its successful investments in prominent tech companies such as Skype, Tesla and Baidu.



Still, he was one of the early backers of the blood-testing startup Theranos, which, as we all know, turned out to be a <a href="https://www.ft.com/content/ccaf2dbd-473f-4b1f-8724-79ca735bb07b">big flop</a>.



In 2014, he <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/us-government-dumps-bitcoin-silk-road">bought</a> around 30,000 bitcoin (worth around $798M at current prices) in a government auction for roughly $18 million, making him an early bitcoin investor.



“With DGB, we are reinforcing our dedication to amplify crypto projects that are advancing the industry in anticipation of an influx of millions of new users and institutions in the coming months and years,” he said.



Draper <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/tim-draper-loves-decentralized-world">told</a> Blockworks last year that his firm chose not to invest in FTX and BlockFi.&nbsp;



Despite the challenges faced by the crypto industry in 2022, he emphasized that his investment strategy remained unwavering, as he continued to hold a strong affinity for the decentralized realm.



In a video <a href="https://twitter.com/AlonGoren/status/1704552918819684657">posted</a> on X, DGB founding member Goren was optimistic about the crypto space despite industry uncertainties, emphasizing the trio’s long-term commitment.



“We&#8217;re in the midst of a crazy bear market for all sorts of circumstances. But we were here early, and we&#8217;re going to be here often,” he said.



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Tim Draper ventures forth as bear market bites

Blockchain data analytics platform Nansen recently suffered a security incident that exposed some users&#8217; email addresses and passwords.



The breach appears to have originated from a third-party vendor whose system was compromised, allowing an attacker to obtain admin rights to an account used for granting customer access to Nansen.



Nansen CEO Alex Svanevik stated that the company became aware of the attack on Sept. 20. Initial investigations indicate that about 6.8% of its users are affected by the breach.



“These users had their email addresses exposed, a smaller portion also had password hashes exposed, and a last, smallest group also had their blockchain address exposed,” Svanevik <a href="https://twitter.com/nansen_ai/status/1705137387838574904">said</a> in an X post on Friday.



“We have informed our users via email if and how they’ve been affected,” he added.



<figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-rich is-provider-twitter wp-block-embed-twitter"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="550" data-dnt="true">🚨 Important update from us at Nansen. Please take a moment to read this. <a href="https://t.co/syKE0sNnC6">pic.twitter.com/syKE0sNnC6</a>&mdash; Nansen 🧭 (@nansen_ai) <a href="https://twitter.com/nansen_ai/status/1705137387838574904?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">September 22, 2023</a></blockquote><script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
</div></figure>



A Nansen spokesperson declined to disclose the name of the vendor, but said it has asked them to communicate on the incident publicly in case others are affected.



Nansen contacted affected users via emails sent from its official support@nansen.ai email address on Sept. 21 between 5 pm and 9 pm UTC, instructing them to reset their passwords.



The team also informed users that while their passwords are not stored in plaintext, malicious attackers could still attempt to gain access to accounts using the compromised password and email address.



Data breaches have become increasingly frequent in the industry of late.



NFT platform OpenSea <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/opensea-warns-of-phishing-attacks-due-to-data-breach">told users about a data breach</a> in June last year when staff discovered that email addresses had been shared with an external party.



Last month, ConsenSys <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/metamask-security-breach-consensys-says">disclosed</a> that about 7,000 MetaMask users had their private information, including email addresses, compromised between Aug. 2021 and Feb. 2023.



Also in August, embattled crypto companies BlockFi and FTX also <a href="https://blockworks.co/news/block-ftx-data-breach-kroll">reported being indirectly impacted</a> by a cybersecurity breach related to third-party claims administration platform Kroll.



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Nansen alerts users to security breach involving vendor

Sebastian Sinclair

Options contracts for the quarter on the leading global crypto derivatives exchange are due to expire at month&#8217;s end, a timeframe that has traditionally seen heightened market volatility.



The week ahead marks the month-end and quarter-end expiry date for bitcoin (BTC) and ether (ETH) options contracts for Deribit, with nearly $5 billion notional expiring on Sept. 29.



Luuk Strijers, Chief Commercial Officer at Deribit, told Blockworks the figures this September are consistent with this year’s trend when compared to the previous June&#8217;s $5.4 billion and March&#8217;s $5.2 billion expiries.



The current quarter&#8217;s expiries account for 35% of the platform&#8217;s open interest, involving 113,000 BTC and 1.1 million ETH options contracts, <a href="https://metrics.deribit.com/options/BTC">Deribit data</a> shows.



“Quarterly expiries are typically the most significant, in terms of volume and value,” Strijers said. “In the past month, we have seen stable markets while the Gamma of the September expiries has increased gradually as a function of time.”



In simple terms, Gamma measures how sensitive an option&#8217;s price is to a change in the price of the underlying asset, in this case, BTC and ETH. A rising Gamma means that, as the asset&#8217;s price changes, the option&#8217;s price will change quickly.



In spot markets, a rising Gamma in options can have a ripple effect. When Gamma increases for options, market participants holding those options may have to adjust their positions more frequently to hedge their risks.&nbsp;



Adjustments often involve buying or selling the underlying in the spot market. If Gamma is rising and the price of BTC increases, an option holder might need to buy more BTC in the spot market to remain hedged. Conversely, if BTC&#8217;s price falls, they might need to sell BTC.&nbsp;



The effect of an options expiry depends on the open interest for particular strike prices and how they relate to the current market price, Strijers said.&nbsp;



If a position has a strike price significantly different from the current price, it will likely expire worthless, lessening its impact on trading.&nbsp;



On the other hand, if the strike price is close to the current market price, it could attract more trading activity, potentially leading to increased price fluctuations and volatility, the Deribit executive added.



“The impact of an uneven distribution of Gamma amongst traders would have [previously] resulted in much more volatility as compared to what we have seen these days,” Strijers said. “Therefore we don&#8217;t anticipate strong market moves in the coming week.”&nbsp;



The consensus around September’s expiry is forecasted to have little effect on digital asset spot prices, according to other analysts Blockworks spoke with.



Le Shi, head of trading at Auros said lower volatility in crypto is affecting institutional interest, implying a stable crypto market is likely, especially when juxtaposed with other financial markets that offer higher returns.



“Lower implied volatilities are reflective of the market consensus that not much is expected to happen in the near term,” Shi said.



Markus Thielen, Head of Research and Strategy at Matrixport agreed, adding there existed waning interest in options trading, specifically the decline in premium prices for option sellers.



“While volatility tended to trade at a hefty premium, the decline in premium is now synonymous with picking up pennies in front of a steamroller, Thielen said. “The potential approval of a US-listed bitcoin ETF has added event risk to the mix that is tough to manage for option sellers.”



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