An explosive few days for crypto has seen Changpeng ‘CZ’ Zhao – Chief Executive Officer of leading crypto exchange Binance – sensationally resign last week after pleading guilty to money laundering as part of the deal that will end the criminal probe into the company. There was a massive $4.3bn fine imposed by the US court on Binance. Announcing his departure, the CEO said: “I made mistakes, and I must take responsibility.”
It was just about this time last year that turmoil at its rival giant FTX ravaged the industry. But will news of wrongdoings at Binance have the same impact?
In a statement, entrepreneur Zhao noted that “in our resolutions with the US agencies they do not allege that Binance misappropriated any user funds and do not allege that Binance engaged in any market manipulation.” Is there worse news to come, or is Zhao’s resignation the end of the matter? Either way, the stage is set for a potential crypto turmoil again.
For the time being at least, the news certainly appears to have been received with some indifference by investors and traders. Shockwaves from the details of the fine didn’t take long to hit crypto markets. Bitcoin losing two per cent and Ethereum falling four per cent in an hour.
But other than a few select coins, the bleed appears to have been relatively muted. The price of Bitcoin held onto its recent gains and Ethereum traded strongly. Solana, Cosmos and Polygon were among the worst hit, losing more than 10 per cent of their value while Cardano’s Ada remained steady at $0.37.
Binance wasn’t the only exchange in trouble last week, either. Cryptocurrency exchange Kraken – one of the oldest in crypto – was charged by the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) for operating as an “unregistered securities exchange,” as was alleged by SEC. With the news somewhat overshadowed by Binance’s travails, the question arises, could this also have big repercussions.
“Kraken’s choice of unlawful profits over investor protection is one we see far too often in this space,” said Gurbir S Grewal, the SEC’s director of its division of enforcement. He added: “And today we are both holding Kraken accountable for its misconduct and sending a message to others to come into compliance.”
Bankrupted crypto leading platform Celsius Network says it is to scale back various functions to focus purely on Bitcoin mining. Celsius chiefs said feedback from the US Securities and Exchange Commission had encouraged its post-bankruptcy plan to change course. The company filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in July last year. The Chapter 11 plan was lifted earlier this month, allowing Celsius to continue.
Also making some of the bigger news in the cryptocurrency market this month is little-known rewards token Assemble. The platform, where users and merchants can aggregate and spend rewards points with its ASM token, saw a 65 per cent leap in value over the last few days, and a rise of 20 per cent in 24 hours.
That brought ASM (Assemble protocol) up to a 150 per cent rise over a month. Last week, trading activity was at 63 per cent buy as 24-hour volume was up by almost 90 per cent for the three-year-old protocol as it reached a value of $0.05per token.
The basic idea behind the ASSEMBLE Protocol – which is a blockchain-based global point integration platform – is to provide its users an unrestricted opportunity to use their points, similarly as they use cash, anywhere in the world without any time or place constraints. (The writer is our foreign correspondent based in the UK)
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