Grayscale Investments, a major cryptocurrency investment firm, has filed a new application with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) for a new spot Bitcoin exchange-traded fund (ETF). This filing is part of Grayscale’s ongoing efforts to convert its Grayscale Bitcoin Trust into a spot Bitcoin ETF. The move comes after Grayscale recently won an SEC lawsuit regarding its spot Bitcoin ETF review. The court of appeals ordered the SEC to explain why it rejected Grayscale’s application in June 2023. In addition to the spot Bitcoin ETF filing, Grayscale has also filed with the SEC to list an Ether futures ETF in September.
New York’s attorney general has filed a lawsuit against cryptocurrency firms Gemini, Genesis, and Digital Currency Group (DCG) for allegedly defrauding more than 23,000 investors through the Gemini Earn investment program. The lawsuit claims that Gemini assured investors that the program was a low-risk investment, but investigations carried out by the attorney general’s office found that Genesis’ financials were risky. The lawsuit also charges Genesis’ former CEO, Soichiro Moro, and its parent company’s CEO, Barry Silbert, with defrauding investors by attempting to conceal more than $1.1 billion in losses. The court case seeks to ban Gemini, Genesis, and DCG from operating in the financial investment industry in New York.
Nishad Singh, the former engineering director at now-defunct crypto exchange FTX, has pleaded guilty to fraud charges and faces up to 75 years in prison. Singh is charged with defrauding users of the crypto exchange. During his testimony, Singh revealed that he felt “suicidal for some days” when liquidity issues at FTX began in November 2022. He also claimed that FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried made purchasing decisions for Alameda Research, the exchange’s affiliated trading firm, on his own.
Binance has announced that its Visa debit card services will be shutting down in the European Economic Area in December. This is the latest setback for the exchange, which recently restored euro deposits and withdrawals after a month-long hiatus. Binance is still not onboarding new users in the United Kingdom due to the loss of a third-party service provider.
Elon Musk, Mark Cuban, and others have joined forces to contest the SEC’s trial strategies in a legal challenge to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. The challenge centers around the SEC vs. Jarkesy case, in which George Jarkesy argues that the SEC’s internal proceedings, which lack a jury, violate his Seventh Amendment rights. The amicus brief claims that the SEC’s current approach contradicts the constitutional rights of defendants.
In the cryptocurrency market, Bitcoin is currently priced at $29,590, Ether at $1,607, and XRP at $0.52. The total market cap is $1.12 trillion. Among the top 100 cryptocurrencies, the biggest gainers of the week are Bitcoin SV (59.00%), Stacks (25.91%), and MX TOKEN (25.26%). The top losers of the week are Conflux (-8.03%), Frax Share, and Sui (-6.35%).
In terms of predictions, there is speculation that Bitcoin’s price will continue to rise and potentially break $32,000 soon. However, market participants argue that a weekly candle close is needed to confirm the rally’s staying power.
In other news, the Fantom Foundation, developer of the Fantom network, has been hacked for over $550,000 worth of cryptocurrency. The majority of the stolen funds belonged to other users, and the foundation assured that 99% of its funds remain safe. TrueUSD (TUSD) announced a potential leak of certain user data after one of its third-party vendors was compromised. The impact of the attack and the extent of the data leak are still being determined. Additionally, the development team behind gaming project FinSoul allegedly carried out an exit scam, siphoning $1.6 million from investors through market manipulation.
As zero-knowledge-proof technology becomes more prevalent in the crypto world, there is curiosity about what Bitcoin inventor Satoshi Nakamoto thought about it. Initially, Nakamoto showed a passing interest in the technology, but it has since become a major part of the crypto landscape. Finally, Ethereum restaking continues to be a topic of discussion and interest in the crypto community.
