Bitcoin Price: US$ 23,843.09 (+3.88%)
Ethereum Price: US$ 1,724.51 (+5.43%)
Democratic senators chide Fidelity Investments for BTC-exposed retirement funds
- Three United States senators have written to Fidelity Investments CEO Abigail Johnson demanding an explanation for the financial services company’s decision to include Bitcoin-exposed funds in its 401(k) retirement plans. “This decision is immensely troubling,” they wrote.
- Democrats Dick Durbin, Elizabeth Warren and Tina Smith sent their letter Tuesday. The letter, which is around a page and a half long, discussed Americans’ retirement savings habits in general terms with minimal statistics but numerous rhetorical flourishes and strings of adjectives. The money American consumers may invest in retirement funds is “hard earned,” for example, and their exposure to the “cryptocurrency casino” is “a bridge too far.” The authors of the letter asked:
- “When saving for retirement is already a challenge for so many Americans, why would Fidelity allow those who can save to be exposed to an untested, highly volatile asset like Bitcoin?”
Critic of Bitcoin’s ‘one-percenters’ still positive about future of digital assets
- A future without digital assets is hardly imaginable but Bitcoin (BTC) is far from being perfect by design, according to a finance professor at the London School of Economics (LSE).
- LSE financial professor Igor Makarov believes that digital money and digassets will undoubtedly be part of the future of finance and their efficiency will depend much on their design.
- In an interview with Cointelegraph, Makarov said that there has not been much evidence that Bitcoin can become a store of value as it has been extremely volatile over the past 10 years.
- Since Bitcoin’s volatility remains high despite its massive rise in value and increased liquidity, there is no guarantee that its price will become more stable one day, he said.
- “Without any government backing Bitcoin, the cryptocurrency’s value depends on the willingness of the general public to hold it, which, in turn depends on changing investor sentiment and its standing against other cryptocurrencies,” Makarov stated.
Japan’s crypto groups call for end of taxing paper gains
- Japan’s leading crypto lobby groups plan to submit a proposal to Japan’s financial regulatory body to address its high crypto taxes, which experts warn make Japan less competitive as a crypto hub.
- According to an internal memo seen by Bloomberg, the proposal will be submitted to Japan’s Financial Services Agency (FSA) this week, asking them to put an end to taxing unrealized gains on crypto holdings “if the firm owns them for purposes other than short-term trades.”
- The proposal also asks for the financial regulator to lower income tax rates on crypto earnings for individual investors to 20%, which is far less than the current rates that see some investors being taxed as high as 55%.
Pain ahead for algorithmic and non-cash backed stablecoins — IMF director
- The International Monetary Fund’s (IMF) director of capital markets believes there could be further failures of “coin offerings,” including algorithmic stablecoins amid the ongoing crypto winter.
- In the interview with Yahoo Finance on Wednesday, Tobias Adrian, director of monetary and capital markets for the IMF, stated that there could be further failures of some coin offerings, in particular, algorithmic stablecoins:
- “We could see further selloffs, both in crypto assets and in risky asset markets, like equities… there could be further failures of some of the coin offerings — in particular, some of the algorithmic stablecoins that have been hit most hard, and there are others that could fail.”
- The IMF director also noted on Wednesday that he saw “some vulnerabilities” for certain fiat-backed stablecoins, referencing Tether (USDT), which he claims are not “backed one to one” with the United States dollar.
- Adrian also mentioned that stablecoins need a “global regulatory approach” to better protect investors. Adrian stated that while it would be difficult to assess whether each cryptocurrency constitutes a security or not, regulators should first focus on ensuring that crypto exchanges and wallet providers do their due diligence on coins before marketing them.
Goerli/Prater Merge Announcement
- For the last testnet proof-of-stake transition, Goerli will merge with Prater. The combined Goerli/Prater network will retain the Goerli name post-merge.
- Bellatrix, the Prater upgrade readying it for The Merge will happen at epoch 112260, expected at 12:24PM UTC on August 4, 2022.
- After Bellatrix is activated, the Goerli/Prater merge will happen when Goerli hits a total difficulty of 10790000, expected between August 6-12, 2022.
- Post-merge, Goerli’s validator set will remain open for individual stakers to run testnets validators. Stakers who wish to start a Goerli/Prater validator can do so at the Prater Launchpad.
