Bitcoin Price: US$19,056.80 (-1.32%)
Ethereum Price: US$ 1,276.72 (-2.67%)
Crypto exchange volumes grew 16% in September after a 3-month lull
- September’s trading volumes saw the first notable increase since May of this year, The Block’s Data Dashboard shows.
- September’s exchange trading volume jumped to $733 billion, or a 16% month-over-month increase.
- The Block’s Legitimate Volume Index reported volumes of $629 billion for June, $633 billion for July and $630 billion for August.
- Coinbase has fixed a technical problem that caused it to temporarily halt payments and withdrawals involving U.S. bank accounts.
- The crypto exchange said on Sunday at 12:41 p.m. New York time (4:41 p.m. UTC) that the “incident has been resolved,” according to its system status page.
- A few hours earlier, the company had said that, for unspecified technical reasons, “we are currently unable to take payments or make withdrawals involving US bank accounts. Our team is aware of this issue and is working on getting everything back to normal as soon as possible. You may use a debit card or PayPal account to make direct buys on your account should you wish.”
Instagram and Facebook Users Can Now Share and Crosspost NFTs
- Meta first enabled select creators and NFT collectors to post their NFTs on Facebook and Instagram at the end of August.
- Now, the digital collectibles feature is available to all Facebook and Instagram users in the US and 100 international countries where the Instagram roll out initially took place.
- Users can unlock the feature by connecting a supported digital asset wallet to their social media accounts, including Rainbow, Trust Wallet, Dapper, Coinbase Wallet and MetaMask wallets.
- The main perk is getting to share NFTs to Instagram or Facebook feeds, and cross-post any digital collectibles across both platforms for zero fees. Credit can be given to the artists behind an NFT by tagging them in the post.
- Some of the creators chosen to test out the feature during the August roll out included Steve Aoki and emerging digital artists such as Jesse Smith Art.
Paraguay Senators Reject President’s Bitcoin Mining Law Veto
- Paraguayan lawmakers this week rejected the president’s veto of a major Bitcoin mining regulation bill.
- A total of 33 senators on Wednesday voted to reject President Mario Abdo Benitez’s decision to veto the bill, which wants to regulate Bitcoin mining in the South American country.
- In July, Paraguay’s legislature approved the bill to create a clear-cut tax and regulatory framework that would allow miners to know where they stand while operating in the country.
Robert Kiyosaki calls Bitcoin a ‘buying opportunity’ as US dollar surges
- Robert Kiyosaki, businessman and best-selling author of Rich Dad Poor Dad, has called Bitcoin (BTC), silver and gold a “buying opportunity” amid the strengthening United States dollar and continued interest rate hikes.
- In an Oct. 2 Twitter post to his 2.1 million followers, the author noted the prices of the three commodities — sometimes referred to as “safe haven” assets — would continue getting lower as the United States dollar strengthens, proving its worth once the “FED pivots” and drops interest rates.
- In a post the day before, Kiyosaki predicted this “pivot” could happen as soon as January 2023, which would see the U.S. dollar “crash” in the same way as the recently collapsed British pound.
Ethereum Merge spikes block creation with a faster average block time
- The Merge upgrade for Ethereum, which primarily sought to transition the blockchain into a proof-of-stake (PoS) consensus mechanism, has been revealed to have had a positive impact on the creation of new Ethereum blocks.
- The Merge was considered one of the most significant upgrades for Ethereum. As a result of the hype, numerous misconceptions around cheaper gas fees and faster transactions plagued the crypto ecosystem, which were debunked by Cointelegraph. However, some of the evident improvements experienced by the blockchain post-Merge include a steep increase in daily block creation and a substantial decrease in average block time.
DEX dev Uniswap Labs looks for new funding at unicorn valuation: Report
- Major decentralized exchange (DEX) Uniswap (UNI) is in the early stages of raising significant funds to further expand its decentralized finance (DeFi) offerings, according to a new report.
- Uniswap Labs, a DeFi startup contributing to the Uniswap Protocol, is engaging with a number of investors to raise an equity round of $100 million to $200 million, TechCrunch reported on Sept. 30.
- The startup is working with investors like Polychain and one of Singapore’s sovereign funds as part of the upcoming funding round, the report notes, citing two anonymous people familiar with the matter. According to the report, Uniswap would be valued at $1 billion, but the terms of the deal are subject to changes as the discussions around the round have not been finalized.
- The new funding reportedly aims to bring more DeFi tools and nonfungible token (NFT) offerings to Uniswap. At the time of writing, Uniswap’s daily trading volumes amounted to $1.1 billion, or about 57% of all trading across global DEXs, according to data from DefiLlama. By comparison, Curve, the second-largest DEX after Uniswap by volumes, has about $205 million in daily volumes.
45% of ETH validators now complying with US sanctions — Labrys CEO
- According to the CEO of blockchain development agency Labrys, Lachan Feeney, approximately 45% of all Ethereum blocks currently being validated run MEV-boost relay flashbots and comply with United States sanctions.
- Speaking to Cointelegraph in an interview on Sept. 30, Feeney noted that while reports have stated that 25% of all blocks validated since the Merge complies with United States sanctions, this is a lagging indicator and the current number is likely to be closer to one out of every two blocks.
- Feeney pointed out that MEV-Boost relays are regulated businesses, often U.S.-based, and are “censoring certain transactions in the blocks that they build, particularly transactions from Tornado Cash.”
- The CEO also pointed out validators have a financial incentive to use MEV-Boost relays, which would drive an uptick in their usage, noting:
- “The issue, is that from the validators perspective, these guys are paying them to sort of do this. So if you want to make more money, you just turn this feature on and as a validator, you sort of boost your yield.”
