2024-06-27 08:19

Galaxy Digital inked a similar deal with DWS last year for the European market. The products will invest in crypto companies and spot and futures-based ETFs. Analysts say State Street will provide administrative and accounting services for the new fund. State Street Global Advisors and Galaxy Asset Management said they are working together to build crypto products that offer exposure to crypto companies as well as spot and futures-based exchange-traded funds (ETFs). State Street Global Advisors, a unit of financial services giant State Street (STT), filed an application with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to register a crypto-based fund called the SSGA Active Trust. Galaxy will be responsible for the day-to-day management of the fund’s investments, according to the filing. The company is affiliated with Galaxy Digital (GLXY), a financial services company that specializes in digital assets. Together, the companies "will provide investors access to the $2.4 trillion digital asset ecosystem through manager-directed strategies," the companies said in a statement. While the cryptocurrency industry has gained greater recognition since the U.S. approval of spot bitcoin ETFs in January, "investors are also seeking exposure to this growing asset class through investment options beyond pure spot bitcoin," they said. “We believe that the digital assets landscape is so much more than the single crypto components and that crypto native companies are best equipped to understand that ecosystem and its correlation with financial markets,” Anna Paglia, State Street Global Advisors chief business officer said in the statement. State Street and Galaxy's latest effort is a testament to crypto's growing popularity as an asset class. In April 2023, Galaxy Digital established a similar partnership in place with DWS to develop crypto management solutions for Europe. "The expectation is that State Street Bank and Trust would provide administrative and accounting services for the new digital assets ETFs that State Street Global Advisors and Galaxy jointly develop pursuant to this collaboration. The announcement appears short on detail," said Laurent Kssis, crypto ETF specialist at CEC Capital. https://www.coindesk.com/business/2024/06/27/state-street-galaxy-digital-to-develop-active-crypto-trading-products/

2024-06-27 06:46

The app allows users to generate passport zero-knowledge proofs (ZKs) to verify the uniqueness of individuals without revealing their identity The RariMe app, launched Thursday, aims to provide an alternative to Worldcoin's verification process. The RariMe team had earlier launched an anonymous, blockchain-powered referendum on the legitimacy of Vladimir Putin’s victory in Russia’s election. Rarimo has unveiled RariMe, a competitor to Worldcoin, and an app that allows users to generate passport zero-knowledge proofs (ZKs) verifying their uniqueness without revealing their identity, the company announced on Thursday. Unlike Worldcoin which uses orbs to scan eyeballs, Rarimo uses smartphones to scan passports and verify its users. Identify frameworks usually have a third party approve credentials but ZKs ensure no personal data is shared while verifying identities. "The same way that a decentralized application (Dapp) could gate something with proof of humanity, they can now do the same with proof of citizenship, or proof of age and simply request the proofs," Kitty Horlick, Director of Rarimo provider Rarilabs told CoinDesk. Rarimo was the tech team behind launching the anonymous, blockchain-powered referendum on the legitimacy of Vladimir Putin’s victory in Russia’s election earlier this year. The first demo use case will see Rarimo use passport ZKs to drop programmable airdrops to citizens of particular countries. "Privacy is freedom, and it no longer exists in online spaces," said Lasha Antadze, co-founder of Rarimo provider Rarilabs. "RariMe seeks to change this It will allow users to go incognito, interacting in a truly anonymous fashion across Web3." Read More: Exiled Russian Opposition Leader Launches Blockchain-Based Referendum on Vladimir Putin’s Election Win https://www.coindesk.com/policy/2024/06/27/rarimos-worldcoin-alternative-rarime-goes-live/

2024-06-27 06:13

If crypto-friendly Republican candidate Trump goes off the rails, Republicans may wince, but the GOP ticket will likely not change. Bitcoin and PoliFi tokens, TRUMP, TREMP and BODEN, suffered losses ahead of Thursday's presidential debate. Crypto traders will closely watch the debate, as Trump has made digital assets a vital issue in his presidential campaign. The consensus among the crypto community seems to be that a Trump victory would be favorable for the industry. The crypto market showed no signs of excitement ahead of Thursday's pivotal U.S. Presidential debate between incumbent Joe Biden and his crypto-friendly Republican candidate, Donald Trump. At 04:56 UTC, TRUMP, the first major token in the PoliFi sector, traded near $8.5, representing a 0.5% drop on a 24-hour basis. Its Solana-based counterpart TREMP traded 7.2% lower at 74 cents and the Joe Biden-themed BODEN coin was 16% at 13 cents, according to data source Coingecko. Meanwhile, bitcoin, the leading cryptocurrency by market value, traded 1% lower at $61,000. Per TS Lombard, the first presidential debate of 2024, set for Thursday at 21:00 ET, is likely to bring "a few voter surprises but has the potential to recast if not shape up a dead heat race." "If shaky Biden underperforms his rival, pressure from big Democrat donors to ditch his candidacy will surge, especially with Biden now trailing on fundraising for the second straight month. If Trump goes off the rails, Republicans may wince, but the GOP ticket won't change. Rather, the onus will shift to Trump's as-yet-announced VP pick to steady his campaign," TS Lombard said in a note to clients on Tuesday. "In both cases, the bar (set by the first truculent Trump-Biden debate) is low, but the stakes are high," Lombard added. The crypto industry has lobbied to ensure digital assets are discussed in the televised presidential faceoff, and potential comments from the two candidates could inject volatility into the market. Crypto traders will closely watch the debate, as Trump has made digital assets a vital issue in his presidential campaign by courting industry leaders and recently stressing the need to mine all remaining bitcoin in the U.S. As such, the crypto is now seen as a Trump trade, with Standard Chartered anticipating a record rally in BTC to $150,000 on a potential Trump victory. Meanwhile, Biden has been silent, having asked federal agencies to explore risks and opportunities, including the potential debut of a Fed-managed central bank digital currency. "Ahead of tonight's first presidential debate, crypto traders will be watching keenly for clues as to what November's election could mean for Bitcoin and the wider sector," said Neil Roarty, analyst at investment platform Stocklytics in an email to CoinDesk. "The consensus among the crypto community seems to be that a Trump victory would be favorable for the industry. Aside from the vocal support he’s given, bitcoin has tended to perform well during periods of political and economic uncertainty, and a second Trump presidency will likely see more of both," Roarty added. https://www.coindesk.com/markets/2024/06/27/polifi-tokens-btc-under-pressure-ahead-of-biden-trump-debate/

2024-06-27 02:21

Nearly all UMA token holders voted that Donald Trump's son Barron was not likely involved in the DJT meme coin. Polymarket says UMA got it wrong. In a rare move, Polymarket has contradicted its decentralized oracle service UMA with regard to the resolution of a market betting on whether Barron Trump was likely involved with the DJT token. Neither Barron Trump nor Donald Trump's campaign has made an official statement about the token. Polymarket has signaled it may overrule UMA, a decentralized oracle service that referees the fast-growing platform's crypto-based prediction markets. Controversy has been brewing for days since UMA resolved a market asking whether it was more likely than not that Barron Trump, son of the former U.S. president, was involved in a meme coin called DJT. The oracle service decided several times the answer was "no," and holders of "yes" shares protested. On Wednesday, Polymarket said it believed UMA got it wrong, and it would soon announce a fix. Polymarket's surprise move is the latest wrinkle in the two-week-long saga of DJT, a Trump-themed memecoin that neither the Trump campaign nor Barron has acknowledged or denied being involved in. "This market will resolve to 'Yes' if a preponderance of evidence suggests that Barron Trump was involved in the creation of the Solana token $DJT. Otherwise this market will resolve to 'No,'" the contract on Polymarket read. "Determination as to whether Barron was involved in the creation of $DJT will be made by this market's decentralized resolver, UMA, and will take into account all available evidence as of 12 PM ET, June 23." Whenever the outcome of a prediction market is disputed, UMA, a decentralized "optimistic" oracle, is brought in to resolve it with UMA tokenholders voting on the outcome. In the case of the DJT market, an overwhelming majority of UMA holders voted for the "no" resolution. In total, bettors put more than $1 million on the line, and amid the radio silence from the Trump family and campaign, Martin “Pharma Bro” Shkreli, a convicted felon, has been adamantly making public statements that Barron was involved. On Wednesday, Shkreli posted a series of screenshots on X purporting to show one of his associates saying that he's "trying to get Barron to come out of his shell," but that lawyers are likely advising the former president's son not to talk. This isn't the first time UMA as a method of contract resolution has faced controversy. Questions on what it meant to "find" the missing OceanGate submersible, which imploded near the wreckage of the Titanic, put its relationship with Polymarket in the spotlight last fall. In May, this relationship was once again tested when some bettors questioned if an Ethereum exchange-traded fund (ETF) was approved – UMA resolved the contract to yes – or if it was still working its way through the bureaucratic leviathan of the Securities and Exchange Commission. Polymarket CEO Shayne Coplan didn't immediately respond to a request for comment about what the fix for this current UMA controversy would be, or the timeline for its implementation. The DJT token is down 7% on-day, according to on-chain data. https://www.coindesk.com/markets/2024/06/27/polymarket-contradicts-its-oracle-service-in-rarity-for-prediction-market/

2024-06-26 20:41

Some in the industry have been pushing for host CNN to ensure digital assets come up in the televised presidential faceoff. This U.S. presidential election has been the first where cryptocurrencies have come up as a major policy issue, and the industry is lobbying (and bracing for) the possibility that President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump may bring it up when they face off in a Thursday debate. To that end, crypto advocacy group Stand With Crypto set up an online letter-writing campaign to convince hosts CNN to raise crypto as a talking point. A spokeswoman for the group said Wednesday that almost 2,300 people had signed and sent the notes "calling for a crypto question." "It would be a huge miss for CNN to punt this opportunity to let Americans know where the presidential candidates stand on this important economic issue," spokeswoman Sabrina Siddiqui told CoinDesk. She pointed out that the group's number of members in Georgia, where the 9 p.m. EDT (01:00 UTC) event will take place, far exceeds the gap between the candidates in their previous 2020 contest. The form letter from Stand With Crypto concludes: "Giving the major presidential candidates a chance to weigh in on this transformational technology in the first debate would go a long way towards educating the electorate and helping American crypto owners cast an informed ballot." Biden's record on digital assets is familiar to the industry, which need only review his executive orders, White House statements and the actions of the U.S. regulators he appointed, including at the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. Trump's administration didn't make significant moves in crypto, and his past position of skepticism has only recently turned toward glowing support of the technology. “It’s remarkable that we are discussing crypto as a possible topic on the biggest stage in presidential politics – and a marker of how much headway the industry has made in communicating its value to the national political debate," said Kristin Smith, CEO of the Blockchain Association, in an emailed statement. "The crypto industry – and its growing base of users – are eager for a sustained debate between the candidates on their approach to digital assets, and feel energized that it has emerged as an important topic in this election.” Trump has emerged as a vocal supporter of U.S. crypto mining and as an opponent of the U.S. issuing a central bank digital currency (CBDC), seeking to contrast himself with Biden's efforts to tax miners and his administration's interest in studying CBDCs. "We appreciate that candidates recognize the importance of not only debating how to regulate digital assets but also how to create responsible regulation that does not stifle innovation in the United States," said a spokesperson for the DeFi Education Fund. https://www.coindesk.com/policy/2024/06/26/crypto-insiders-hope-for-possible-mention-in-biden-trump-debate/

2024-06-26 20:05

The miner has mined 93 million of KAS tokens since Sept. 2023. Marathon has mined 93 million of KAS tokens since Sept. 2023, valued at about $15 million. The miner has brought 30 petahash worth of machines online to mine Kaspa, while 30 more will be starting by the third quarter. Bitcoin (BTC) miner Marathon Digital (MARA) is now a multi-coin crypto miner, after it started mining layer 1 protocol Kaspa (KAS) to diversify its mining revenue. Kaspa uses a proof-of-work (PoW) consensus mechanism called GHOSTDAG protocol, and unlike bitcoin, it allows multiple blocks to be produced simultaneously. This process helps make transactions faster and provides more block rewards for miners, according to a statement from Marathon. “By mining Kaspa, we are able to create a stream of revenue that is diversified from Bitcoin, and that is directly tied to our core competencies in digital asset compute,” said Adam Swick, Marathon’s chief growth officer in the statement. The Kaspa token's price has risen nearly 50% this year, while bitcoin climbed 44%. The broader CoinDesk 20 index is up nearly 16% in the same time period. Marathon started mining Kaspa in September of last year after bringing the first mining computer online. The miner has bought 60 petahash worth of mining machines that can generate profit margins of up to 95%, according to the statement. Marathon has 30 petahash worth of mining rigs operational in its Texas sites; the rest will be online by the third quarter. The company has mined 93 million KAS, which is valued at about $15 million. Bitcoin miners have been looking to diversify their revenue after crypto winter, and recent halving has made the industry more competitive. Many miners have pivoted to using their current infrastructure to allow for artificial intelligence (AI) and other computing needs. Meanwhile, some miners, including Marathon, have opted to monetize other layers of bitcoin to earn extra revenue. https://www.coindesk.com/business/2024/06/26/bitcoin-miner-marathon-mined-15m-kaspa-tokens-to-diversify-revenue/