Frank Holmes
Crypto SWOT: Ether continues to struggle one year after the merge
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Strengths
- Of the cryptocurrencies tracked by CoinMarketCap, the best performer for the week was Compound, rising 19.43%.
- One of crypto’s biggest decentralized lenders has doubled down on its decision to invest billions of dollars in U.S. government bonds, propelling its token to an 18-month high. MKR, the governance coin of the MakerDAO protocol, has soared 77% this quarter to reach its highest level since April 2022, writes Bloomberg.
- Asset manager Valkyries started buying Ether (ETH) futures contracts, after getting approval to convert its existing Bitcoin futures exchange traded fund (ETF) to a two-for-one investment vehicle, according to Bloomberg.
Weaknesses
- Of the cryptocurrencies tracked by CoinMarketCap, the worst performer for the week was IMX, down 12.68%.
- Binance said it exited its Russian business by selling it to CommEX, a crypto exchange that says it officially launched on Tuesday. “As we look toward the future, we recognize that operating in Russia is not compatible with Binance’s compliance strategy,” wrote the CCO in a blog post according to Bloomberg.
- One year after “the Merge” that transformed Ethereum into a proof-of-stake blockchain, the native token has defied hopes that the seminal event would trigger a rally. It is little changed since then and has underperformed bigger Bitcoin, writes Bloomberg.
Opportunities
- Binance is seeking to launch stablecoins denominated in the dollar, euro, and yen in Japan next year, as the embattled global crypto exchange pushes into the nation’s nascent market, writes Bloomberg. Binance Japan wants to introduce the three tokens and potentially more in 2024 through a partnership with Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group’s trust banking arm.
- Coinbase global said it earned regulatory approval to offer perpetual futures to retail customers outside the U.S., finally giving it an entrée into what has grown to be crypto’s largest market, according to Bloomberg.
- Kraken plans to offer trading in U.S.-listed stocks and exchange-traded funds (ETFs). Kraken will initially offer trading in the U.S. and UK through a service built by a new division called Kraken Securities, writes Bloomberg.
Threats
- The U.S. Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) has sanctioned an Ethereum wallet tied to Jimenez Castro, a Mexican male with ties to the Sinaloa cartel. The wallet in question was first active in January of this year and received around $740,000 in deposits to Binance in a two-month period, according to Bloomberg.
- Crypto exchange Gemini withdrew hundreds of millions of dollars from Genesis Global Holdco several months before the lender froze deposits and ultimately filed for bankruptcy, writes Bloomberg.
- AirBit Club co-founder Pablo Renato Rodriguez was sentenced on Tuesday to 12 years in prison, plus three years of supervised release, for his role in orchestrating a $100 million global cryptocurrency pyramid scheme. A U.S. district judge ordered Rodriguez to forfeit $65 million, along with millions of dollars’ worth of real estate and other property, reports Bloomberg.
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