Colombia issues the first real digital bond using blockchain in Latin America while Bank of America, the second largest bank in the United States, opens bitcoin futures trading for selected clients. This and more news in this handy daily summary so you are always informed with most recent events that happen within the crypto world.
Bitcoin and Blockchain Adoption
📍Bank of America (BofA) announces Bitcoin futures trading. the american bank said that BTC futures trading is authorized for a number of selected clients of the entity. The bank acknowledged that the demand for bitcoin and cryptocurrencies, on the part of its clients is high, so it approved access to bitcoin futures to some clients. According to the report, some of the bank's clients are already trading BTC futures.
This announcement caused the price of bitcoin to rebound slightly in the markets. The cryptocurrency fell to $31.000 on Friday. At press time, the price of BTC is trading near $32.000 per unit.
📍Colombia, the first country in Latin America to launch bonds using blockchain. The Innovation Committee of the Financial Superintendence of Colombia (SFC) reported on the approval of the first bond issue using technology blockchain in the country. In the pilot test, which seeks to demonstrate the efficiency of the technology, interoperability, immutability and effectiveness in the issuance of bonds, the banks Davivienda, Banco de la República and the IDB Group will participate. Portafolio, a local media, points out that the country's Superintendency highlighted that this will be the first pilot test, at the Latin American level, to be carried out for the issuance of a real bond using blockchain. In 2020, Chile issued a digital bond, but using a simulated environment.
📍Terra Labs closes financing round for 150 million dollars. The Korean company focused on development DeFi announced that the round was led by large industry investors such as Pantera Capital, Galaxy Digital, XRP Capital and BlockTower Capital. The round, which closed at $150 million, will help boost Terra Labs' protocols and projects built on its Terra blockchain. LUNA, Terra's native token, is trading at press time with a value of $6,5 per unit.
CBDC and Central Banks
📍The Central Bank of China reports that it has carried out transactions with the digital yuan for more than 5.000 million dollars. In a Valid identity document issued over the weekend, the People's Bank of China (PboC) noted that transactions successfully carried out with the digital yuan until the end of June exceeded a value of 5.000 billion dollars. The total number of transactions carried out amounts to 70,7 million transactions while the number of wallets used exceeded 24,5 million. Of these, 21 million wallets were personal and 3,5 million wallets were business. The bank also reported that its sovereign digital currency will be compatible with smart contracts.
Miners
📍Russia promotes cryptocurrency mining on its territory. The Russian Association of Cryptoeconomics, Artificial Intelligence and Blockchain (RACIB) announced the launch of a project to transfer global cryptocurrency mining computing resources to the Russian Federation. According to the statement, Russia is among the top 5 countries in the world for energy production, making it one of the most favorable jurisdictions for the development of crypto mining. In addition to this, the country's energy surplus and its cold climate favor activity. Russia will guarantee miners a constant supply while its low temperatures will help reduce cooling costs for mining equipment.
The Association's statement also highlights Russia's vast land expanses, which favor the deployment of large energy and infrastructure facilities to support crypto mining.
Development and Technology
📍Harmony developers host a hackathon to combine the potential of traditional finance with DeFi. On its Twitter account, Harmony indicated that it will award up to $1.000.000 in prizes and grants to combine the potential and appeal of traditional finance with decentralized finance, known as DeFi. The goal is to help understand the potential of blockchain technology to contribute to the development of DeFi to drive its future growth.
The hackathon will take place from August 15 to September 30.
📍Cardano continues to move forward to integrate smart contract functionality into the network. The developer organization that supports Cardano, IOHK, reported on Twitter that the Alonzo White testnet is now active. According to the publication, Alonzo White brings Cardano even closer on his journey towards the smart contracts, a feature that the development team has been working on for a long time. Now, a larger number of developers will be able to test smart contract features before moving to its final testnet, Alonzo Purple.
Rules and Regulations
📍This Monday, the US Treasury Department will convene the President's Working Group on Financial Markets to discuss stablecoins. The meeting led by Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen will focus on analyzing and examining the need for regulation of stablecoins. During the meeting, the possible risks of stablecoins will be discussed, as well as their possible benefits for the US financial system.
📍Ripple achieves a new victory over the SEC. Judge Sarah Netburn denied the SEC's motion to suppress the testimony of William Hinman, former director of the SEC's Division of Corporate Finance, so Hinman could be called to testify his consideration and reasoning about ether, which is not seen as a security in the United States.
Ripple Labs, which has been facing a lawsuit from the SEC since December, alleging that its XRP token was traded as an unregistered security in the country, has been seeking the SEC to explain why ETH is not considered a security by the regulator. financial, except for XRP.
📍Restrictions in China on cryptocurrencies force Bishijie to close its doors. The Cryptocurrency News Agency said which had received a closure order from regulators after violating cryptocurrency laws imposed by the Central Bank in the country. A few weeks ago, China indicated that no company in its territory can promote, in any way, cryptocurrencies and digital assets.
Beijing-based software development company Beijing Qudao Cultural Development was also ordered by the Central Bank of China to cease all operations and close its website. As the announcement explained, the company was involved in cryptocurrency trading.
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