Trump announces Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy will lead US government efficiency department
According to Trump campaign adviser Alex Bruesewitz on the X platform, US President-elect Trump announced that Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy (Trump agent) will lead the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE for short).
Trump hints at SEC chairmanship via 'recess appointment', bypassing Senate review
According to Cointelegraph, U.S. President-elect Donald Trump hinted that he would bypass the Senate's confirmation process to appoint members of his administration, which also seems to include replacing Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) Chairman Gary Gensler. In an X post on November 10, Trump said that only he had the right to choose which U.S. senator would serve as Senate Majority Leader starting when the new Congress is sworn in in January 2025. The Republican said he hoped that potential majority leaders would agree to make appointments during the recess to bypass the confirmation process and put people in important positions "immediately" instead of undergoing questioning and review by members. According to the U.S. Constitution, the president "has the power to fill all vacancies that may arise during the recess of the Senate by granting commissions that will expire at the end of the next session." During Trump's first term, this power enabled him to appoint some people who might not have been approved by the Senate. Recess appointments are supposed to be temporary and are not a substitute for Senate approval. Trump has not yet publicly nominated any potential replacement for Gensler. During the campaign, Trump promised the cryptocurrency industry that he would fire SEC Chairman Gensler on "Day 1" if he was re-elected, but experts say he can't remove Gensler from the commission without good cause. In some cases, regulators have resigned when the White House party changes, but Gensler has not indicated that he will leave.
Trump Nominates Pro-Bitcoin TV Host Pete Hegseth as US Secretary of Defense
According to Jinshi.com, Trump said he would nominate TV host Pete Hegseth (born June 6, 1980) as US Secretary of Defense. Pete graduated from Princeton University and holds a graduate degree from Harvard University. He is a US Army veteran and has hosted a show on Fox News for 8 years. It is reported that Pete Hegseth adheres to the decentralized value of Bitcoin and promises not to sell Bitcoin.
Fed Governor Waller: Stablecoins must be regulated to address bank run risks
According to Jinshi, Fed Governor Waller said that stablecoins are basically a "synthetic dollar" that may bring benefits to the financial system. However, he emphasized that stablecoins must be regulated to deal with potential bank runs.
US prosecutors seek to seize FTX founder SBF’s crypto
According to Cailianshe, a year ago, FTX founder SBF was convicted of fraud. In a document submitted to the New York court on Tuesday, the US prosecutors filed a lawsuit to confiscate SBF's cryptocurrency. Its cryptocurrency is stored in an account, including Solana and Ripple, which is worth $8.6 million as of December 12, 2023. It has appreciated to $18.5 million in the past 11 months, mainly due to the sharp increase in the price of Solana.
Italy plans to reduce 42% tax on cryptocurrency transactions, the League proposes to limit it to 28%
According to Bloomberg, citing people familiar with the matter, the government led by Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni may approve a proposal by coalition partners to reduce the tax increase on cryptocurrency transactions. A copy of the proposal shows that the League, as a junior partner in Meloni's ruling coalition, has proposed an amendment to limit the tax rate on crypto transactions to 28%, which was originally proposed to increase to 42% in last month's budget. The current tax rate is 26%. In addition, another ruling coalition party, Forza Italia, proposed another amendment that aims to completely cancel the tax increase and cancel the tax exemption for gains of 2,000 euros (2,120 US dollars) or less. As part of the amendment proposed by the League, Italy will establish a permanent working group composed of digital asset companies and consumer associations to educate investors about cryptocurrencies. Two people familiar with the matter said that the government is likely to approve the League's proposal, although no final decision has been made and it may be modified.
World Liberty Financial (WLFI), the Trump family’s crypto project, announced on the X platform that WLFI token sale participants can now add WLFI tokens to their wallets.
PayPal’s stablecoin PYUSD begins using LayerZero to transfer between Ethereum and Solana
According to The Block, PayPal's U.S. dollar stablecoin PYUSD is now using LayerZero to simplify transfers between Ethereum and Solana, according to a statement released on Tuesday. The statement said: "This integration eliminates liquidity fragmentation and ensures that transactions for users and businesses are fast, secure and cost-effective." Data shows that the market value of PYUSD on Ethereum has been relatively stable in recent months, at about $350 million. However, the supply of the stablecoin on Solana has plummeted from more than $660 million in August to $186 million.
Canary Capital Submits First Hedera HBAR Spot ETF Application to SEC
According to The Block, Canary Capital has filed an application with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) for the Hedera HBAR spot ETF, marking the first such cryptocurrency fund. The crypto investment company filed an S-1 registration statement with the SEC on Tuesday. According to the filing, the fund aims to "provide exposure to the value of the native assets of the Hedera network." According to the filing, the Canary HBAR ETF intends to hold HBAR directly without using derivatives, futures or other financial instruments. Custodians and management agencies are not mentioned in the S-1 filing. The company also previously launched the HBAR Trust for qualified investors in October. Canary Capital was founded by Steven McClurg, who previously founded Valkyrie Funds, which owns other spot cryptocurrency ETFs. Canary Capital has previously filed registration statements for spot Litecoin ETFs, Solana ETFs and XRP ETFs. Coingecko data shows that the price of HBAR briefly broke through $0.07 in the early morning and has now fallen back to $0.06501, with a 24-hour increase of 11.1%.
Zerion officially launches gas-free Layer 2 solution ZERO Network
According to The Block, Zerion launched its Ethereum Layer 2 solution ZERO Network, allowing Zerion Wallet users to waive Gas fees when trading, minting, exchanging and cross-chain. ZERO Network uses smart accounts and Paymasters functions to support free transactions through account abstraction, providing users with a "zero-fee" on-chain experience. ZERO Network is built on ZKsync technology and is part of the Elastic Chain ecosystem. It uses a dynamic scoring system "Onchain DNA" to evaluate whether an address is eligible for Gas-free transactions. In addition, Zerion also announced that it has received investment support from a number of angel investors, including Yearn developer Banteg, NBA player Duncan Robinson, and angel investors from projects such as Lido, OpenSea and ETHGlobal.
ZetaChain and Google Cloud Partner to Advance Bitcoin Applications and Universal Blockchain
According to ZetaChain's official announcement, ZetaChain has reached a cooperation with Google Cloud to jointly promote the widespread application of Bitcoin in Web3 and the development of general blockchain. In this cooperation, Google Cloud will serve as ZetaChain's verification node, responsible for the verification of the main network and test network, and help build a decentralized verification network composed of institutions and communities. ZetaChain will use Google Cloud's Protocol Accelerator tool to provide developers with enterprise-level node management, test network faucets, and data indexing services to improve development efficiency. At the same time, ZetaChain will entrust a total of 1 million ZETA tokens to 5 nodes running on Google Cloud to further promote the development of the Web3 ecosystem. ZetaChain core contributor Brandon Truong pointed out that ZetaChain provides the ability to natively access Bitcoin, allowing Bitcoin to interact directly with dApp without wrapping or bridging.
Coinbase launches COIN50 index and offers perpetual contracts with up to 20x leverage
According to The Block, Coinbase has launched a new index, COIN50, to track the top 50 digital assets that meet basic criteria. The index is also available for trading in the form of COIN50-PERP perpetual contracts, supporting up to 20x leverage. The COIN50 index aims to provide crypto investors with a broad representation of the market, including mainstream assets such as Bitcoin and Ethereum. Its constituent assets are weighted by market capitalization, with Bitcoin accounting for 50.3%, Ethereum 27.5%, and Solana, XRP and Dogecoin accounting for about 11.2% in total. Compared with existing crypto indices, COIN50 covers multiple crypto fields more comprehensively, not just infrastructure assets. The COIN50-PERP perpetual contract allows traders to hold positions indefinitely and is suitable for institutions and advanced users in specific regions. Coinbase plans to continue exploring more ways for users to access the index.
Crypto AML Company Notabene Completes $14.5 Million Series B Funding, Led by DRW Venture Capital
According to CoinDesk, crypto anti-money laundering (AML) startup Notabene has completed a $14.5 million Series B financing round, led by DRW Venture Capital, with participation from Apollo, Nextblock, ParaFi Capital and Wintermute. Notabene aims to help cryptocurrency trading companies comply with AML regulations and provide a SWIFT-like crypto transaction information network for virtual asset service providers (VASPs). 165 companies including Copper, OKX and Ramp have used its platform. As Europe incorporates updated funds transfer regulations (TFR) into crypto transactions, Notabene CEO Pelle Braendgaard expects the platform's trading volume to increase significantly, currently processing an average of about $2 billion in transactions per day. He pointed out that Europe's compliance requirements will push the global crypto industry into a stricter regulatory framework. Braendgaard predicts that the United States, under the future Trump administration, may follow Europe's TFR and MiCA policies to attract crypto transactions back to the United States.
Bitcoin’s strong rally pushed El Salvador’s BTC value to over $500 million on Monday, while tiny Bhutan’s BTC holdings also topped $1 billion, CoinDesk reported. Data from El Salvador’s Bitcoin Office shows the country holds just under 5,932 bitcoins. At press time, Bitcoin is worth about $516 million at $87,000. Bhutan, with a population of just 800,000 (El Salvador’s population is 6.4 million), holds 12,574 bitcoins, worth $1.1 billion at current prices, according to Arkham Intelligence. In other words, Bhutan’s bitcoin holdings are worth more than a third of the country’s GDP, which is just under $3 billion. El Salvador’s $500 million in bitcoins is just 1.5% of its GDP. In September, Arkham reported that Bhutan was likely to become the fourth-largest bitcoin holder.
USDT exchange daily net inflow exceeds $1.3 billion again
According to CryptoQuant data, USDT exchange daily net inflows exceeded $1.3 billion for the second time in just six days, setting a new record. This large-scale inflow of stablecoins brings significant purchasing power to the market, which may drive up demand for Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies, especially when the funds are deployed strategically.
According to Onchain Lens, in the past 14 hours, a new wallet accumulated 4,007.89 BTC from Binance, worth $353.41 million, with an average purchase price of $88,178. Shortly thereafter, the whale transferred 3,991.59 BTC to a separate wallet, leaving 15.89 BTC (worth $1.41 million) in the main wallet.
