The Disrupt

“The newly appointed majority whip did not mince words when blaming Sam Bankman-Fried and SEC Chair Gary Gensler for the industry’s current state. Emmer reiterated his belief that the issue was not with cryptocurrency or decentralized finance.

This is about centralized finance, which needs to be brought under a regulatory umbrella and Gary Gensler has done nothing to make that happen. Decentralized finance is not what it’s about. It’s not about the crypto industry, this is about Sam Bankman-Fried and regulators.

The congressman reserved much of his ire for the SEC chair, saying investigating these firms is what Gensler is supposed to be doing and asking where he was on Voyager and Celsius, Terra Luna, and more recently on FTX. The congressman then asked why the SEC chair was going after “good actors” in the community and working what he called “a backroom deal” with people doing nefarious things.

Sam Bankman-Fried was pushing special treatment legislation through Congress. We need to get to the bottom of this—we need to understand why Gary Gensler and the SEC were not doing their job.”

See Also: US Senators Demand Sam Bankman-Fried, FTX Execs Be Held Accountable to ‘Fullest Extent of the Law’
See Also: Howls Of Outrage After New York Times Confirms SBF To Speak Alongside Zelenskyy, Yellen
See Also: US Sen. Elizabeth Warren says crypto will ruin economy — Community responds

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“Genesis Global Capital confirmed that it has hired investment bank Moelis & Co. to explore how to shore up its crypto-lending business’ liquidity and address clients’ needs, days after halting withdrawals. Islim noted that other Genesis divisions remain fully operational, including its trading arm and custody businesses.

We’ve begun discussions with potential investors and our largest creditors and borrowers, including Gemini and DCG. We expect to expand these conversations in the coming days.”

See Also: Founder of EOS Developer Block.One Buys 9.3% of Crypto Bank Silvergate

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“Bitcoin (BTC) jumped about 1% after minutes from the Federal Reserve’s November meeting showed that the majority of central bankers prefer a slower pace of rate hikes going forward.

A substantial majority of participants judged that a slowing in the pace of increase would likely soon be appropriate

Traders in futures contracts on federal funds on the Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME) now see an 75% chance that the Fed will move ahead with a 50 basis point hike at the next meeting on Dec. 13-14, and a 25 basis point increase at the first two meetings in 2023.”

See Also: Institutional investors are buying through crypto winter: Survey
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See Also: Pre-Halving Rally? Litecoin Surges 43% to 6-Month High

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“A research paper published at Harvard university highlighted how central banks can use Bitcoin (BTC) to hedge against financial sanctions from fiat reserve issuers.

Ferranti argued that there’s merit for central banks to hold a small amount of Bitcoin even in normal circumstances. However, when there’s a risk of sanctions, the researcher said that it makes sense to hold a larger portion of BTC along with their gold reserves.

The researcher also pointed out that countries that were facing risks of sanctions from the United States have been increasing the share of their gold reserves much more than countries that had less sanction risk. If these central banks cannot acquire enough gold to hedge the risks of sanctions, the researcher argued that Bitcoin reserves are an optimal alternative.

Ferranti concluded that there are significant benefits in diversifying reserves and allocating portions to both Bitcoin and gold.”

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“El Salvador’s national assembly is considering a draft bill to regulate digital securities, indicating the country is going ahead with plans to issue bitcoin-backed bonds. The issuance of El Salvador’s “volcano bonds,” initially planned for March, was delayed with the country’s Finance Minister Alejandro Zelaya blaming the war between Ukraine and Russia.

The new rules, if passed into law, mandates the creation of a Bitcoin Fund Management Agency responsible for administering, safeguarding and investing ‘funds from public offerings of digital assets carried out by the State of El Salvador and its autonomous institutions‘ as well as any returns from these public offerings.“

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“The new law sets a two-year moratorium on new and renewed air permits for fossil fuel power plants used for energy-intensive proof-of-work (PoW) cryptocurrency mining.

The New York State Senate passed a bill targeting proof-of-work (PoW) mining in June this year an effort to address some of the environmental concerns about cryptocurrencies.”

See Also: New York AG pushes prohibition of crypto purchases via retirement funds

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“A crypto wallet attributed to the BTC-e exchange that’s been linked to the 2014 Mt. Gox hack burst into life Wednesday with its largest transaction since August 2017, sending a total of 10,000 bitcoin ($165 million) to two unidentified recipients. The distribution pattern is open to interpretation: It’s possible the wallet owner simply sent the money to other wallets of their own, sent it to other people or cashed out through an unofficial over-the-counter broker. The remaining 6,500 stayed put.

Mt. Gox, the first bitcoin exchange, was robbed of 744,408 BTC and shut permanently in 2014. Alexander Vinnik, alleged to be the operator of BTC-e – which he denies – was arrested in 2017 at a resort near Thessaloniki, Greece, at the request of the U.S. Department of Justice on money laundering and other allegations. Vinnik was extradited to France from Greece in 2020 and sentenced to five years in prison for money laundering. In August of that year he was extradited to the U.S. He is now at the Santa Rita Jail in Dublin, California.“

See Also: 3 Things We Learned at Tornado Cash Dev Alexey Pertsev’s Trial
See Also: Bitcoin Will Become ‘Less Important’ for Cybercrime Payments: Kaspersky
See Also: Aave proposes governance changes after failed $60M short attack

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