Elektra, the first retail chain to accept Bitcoin payments in Mexico, will integrate the Lightning Network next month. This and more news is in this handy daily summary so that you are always informed with the latest events that occur within the crypto world.
Bitcoin and Blockchain Adoption
📍Elecktra will integrate Lightning Network into its Bitcoin payment service. Mexican retail chain Elektra, owned by billionaire Ricardo Salinas, will integrate the Bitcoin scalability network, Lightning Network, to facilitate faster and cheaper payments with BTC in its stores. The company said that BTC transactions through LN will be enabled by next March.
The integration of Lightning Network to Elektra was announced for the first time by Salinas in September of last year, when the Mexican businessman pointed out that soon Elektra's consumers and clients would be able to enjoy payments with Bitcoin through this scaling network. Elektra enabled BTC payments last December.
📍New Hampshire, United States, is preparing to delve deeper into the cryptocurrency industry. Christopher Sununu, Governor of the State of New Hampshire appointed a Commission to investigate everything related to the industry of cryptocurrencies, and technology blockchainThe newly created group will be in charge of analyzing the current situation of the crypto market, as well as the existing regulation, to evaluate the best strategies that promote the healthy development of this industry within the state, according to the executive order issued by Sununu.
New Hampshire’s governor wants to create a regulatory regime that encourages integration of the current system and cryptocurrency innovation, to create a clear and favorable environment that encourages investment and technological development. The commission is made up of the state’s attorney general, the commissioner of the Department of Banking, representatives from the Senate, the Bankers Association and the Credit Union Association of the state, as well as representatives and people with extensive experience in the crypto and blockchain industry.
NFT and DeFi Markets
📍OnlyFans joins the list of networks that integrate NFTs into their user profiles. The subscription-based adult content app, OnlyFans, will allow its users and content creators to configure NFT verified as profile photos, according to the statements OnlyFans CEO Amrapali “Ami” Gan told Reuters. Gan said the integration of NFTs is OnlyFans’ first step to empower its creators and explore new opportunities within the app. For now, the app will only feature NFTs created on the blockchain. Ethereum.
CBDC and Central Banks
📍Digital yuan transactions surpass Visa's at Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics According to the Wall Street Journal, a person familiar with the matter said that the digital yuan, the currency CBDC created by the People's Bank of China, has displaced Visa as the payment method at the current Winter Olympics. The digital yuan was implemented as the official payment method at the games, which are currently being held until February 20.
According to report, transactions made with China's digital currency have surpassed those made through Visa. It should be noted that the facilities created by the Chinese government to carry out the Olympic Games function as a kind of health "bubble" to keep athletes isolated and minimize the risks of Covid contagion. Within these bubbles, authorized merchants only accept payments with Visa, cash yuan or e-CNY digital yuan.
Development and Technology
📍Acala launches aUSD, its first decentralized stablecoin on the Polkadot network. The Acala Network protocol has just launched its first decentralized stablecoin developed on the Acala network. Polkadot, called aUSD. According to the developers of the stablecoin aUSD, is a multi-collateral stablecoin that will help boost the ecosystem DeFi which is built on Polkadot and its Kusama testnet.
Cybersecurity
📍Optimism fixes critical bug in its code. The developers of Ethereum scaling solution Optimism fixed a critical bug in the Geth fork code, which allowed the creation of ETH coins by calling a function within their smart contract. In their report, the developers note that the bug, discovered by developer Jay Freeman, was not exploited by any hacker and has already been fixed earlier this month. Freeman received a $2 million bounty for discovering the bug.
Rules and Regulations
📍The European Commission will present a regulatory framework for the digital euro early next year. The European Union's financial stability commissioner and finance chief, Mairead McGuinness, said the European Commission will present a draft law for the regulation of the digital euro in 2023, according to reported the middle Political.
Europe is preparing for the creation and issuance of a digital currency for the euro. The European Central Bank (ECB) authorized in August last year the study and research phase for the development of the digital currency, which could be ready in the next 4 years and will serve as a complement to the current fiat money.
📍The US CFTC wants to exercise greater regulatory power over cryptocurrencies. Rostin Behnam, current chairman of the US Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), called on the Senate to give his agency greater powers to regulate the cryptocurrency industry. During his last audience Before the Senate Agriculture Committee (SAC), Behnam requested that the CFTC be the regulatory body charged with overseeing, monitoring and controlling the unsupervised spot market for crypto assets.
Behnam's statements come just days after the country's Justice Department will announce the seizure of more than 94.000 bitcoins, valued at around $3.600 billion, linked to the 2016 Bitfinex hack.
Continue reading: Bit2Me will distribute 8 million B2M in a new Airdrop to celebrate its partnership with Polygon
