HTX-BTC perpetual contract is now reported at $95600. According to market contract position analysis, the main force lacks confidence in the future market, and the price may decline. Please hold positions reasonably and control risks
The co-founders of Hashflare, a crypto mining ponzi scheme that stole $577 million from hundreds of thousands of investors around the world, both pleaded guilty on Wednesday to conspiracy to commit wire fraud.See all newslettersSergei Potapenko and Ivan Turõgin, both 40, were arrested in their native Estonia in November 2022 and extradited to the U.S. on an 18-count indictment. Yesterday, both men pleaded guilty to one count each of conspiracy to commit wire fraud, which carries a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison.Between 2015 and 2019, Potapenko and Turõgin convinced Hashflare’s investors to rent a percentage of the scheme’s crypto mining operations in exchange for a percentage of the cryptocurrency Hashflare produced. But, according to court documents, Hashflare had only a tiny fraction of the mining equipment it purported to have – less than 1% of the computing power Potapeno and Turõgin had sold. When investors tried to claim their proceeds, prosecutors say the two men either resisted making payments by making excuses or paid them back with crypto purchased on the open market.Read more: Two Estonians Charged With Running a Series of Crypto Scams Totaling $575MPotapenko and Turõgin’s lawyers say that none of Hashflare’s investors suffered financial harm, telling CoinDesk that the men’s only crime was lying about the size of Hashflare’s mining operation.“Ivan and Sergei ran successful businesses, providing real services, employing almost 100 Estonians, and doing charitable work in Estonia. As Ivan admitted [Wednesday], one of his and Sergei’s businesses promised to mine crypto and did in fact mine crypto, but not as much as it had promised; instead, it sometimes repaid customers with crypto it had purchased on the open market,” said Andrey Spektor, partner at Norton Rose Fulbright US LLP and counsel to Turogin.Importantly, however, as we will show at sentencing, no customer has suffered any harm. Ivan and Sergei look forward to returning to Estonia and resuming their lives.”According to court documents, the men used their victim’s money to make dozens of real estate investments and purchase luxury cars. As part of the plea agreement, Potapenko and Turõgin agreed to forfeit assets valued over $400 million, which will be used to pay back investors.Potapenko and Turõgin will be sentenced in a Seattle court on May 8.
According to BlockBeats, on February 14th, Zach Pandl, the head of research at Grayscale, stated in an interview that "it is temporarily impossible for the Federal Reserve to cut interest rates He pointed out that in the short term, this is unfavorable for risky assets such as Bitcoin, as the market is further digesting the expectation of the Federal Reserve delaying interest rate cuts. Pandl believes that the January CPI data exceeded expectations (up 3% year-on-year), and core inflation also rose to 3.3%, indicating that inflation remains stubborn. Pandl also warned that if inflation continues to exceed expectations, the Federal Reserve may even reconsider raising interest rates, which will have a greater impact on market sentiment.
JPMorgan analysts estimate that only 66% to 83% of Tether’s reserves meet proposed U.S. stablecoin regulations, requiring potential restructuring.Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino dismissed the JPMorgan analysts’ concerns, saying their assessment discounts the company’s $20 billion group equity.Momentum for a Federal Reserve audit is building, driven by growing social media support for long-time central bank critic Ron Paul to spearhead the effort and even be considered for the role of Chair.
MetaDAO's push to revolutionize governance via markets-based decision-making is getting a boost from the creator of its creed: Robin Hanson.The crypto group on Thursday hired Hanson – a George Mason University economics professor who created the notion of futarchy a quarter century ago – as a paid advisor. His addition gives an intellectual and likely optical edge to the year-old project that commands a throng of Solana crypto-governance wonks.See all newslettersFutarchy rests on the premise that markets are better at determining optimal outcomes than politicians or even their voters – the popular power centers of modern politics. Futarchaic systems of governance look more like a prediction market than a ballot box.How it works, at least in metaDAO's version, is perhaps best understood by examining the way metaDAO addressed the question, "Should MetaDAO hire Robin Hanson as an advisor?" To do so, the project spun up markets where traders could speculate on the price of META tokens if Hanson were to be hired, and if he weren't.'The Goal Is Number Go Up': Inside a DAO’s Radical Governance ExperimentHanson is being hired because MetaDAO traders pushed the price of META higher in the scenario where he was brought on board. Essentially, that his participation would be more beneficial to the project than his absence, and well worth the 20.9 META ($24,000) he'll be paid over two years.Hanson's not in it for the money but rather the "glory." He devised futarchy because he believes governance is fundamentally broken. In his mind, and MetaDAO's, markets where people have a financial incentive to make good decisions reach better outcomes than political systems do"If we could actually have a better governance mechanism, we could change the world," he said.The pseudonymous co-founder of MetaDAO, who goes by Proph3t, has been talking with Hanson about their creation's design for at least a year. Proph3t brought the effort to formally hire Hanson before MetaDAO earlier this week.His work will "primarily be mechanism design and strategy advice," according to the proposal page. It may also see Hanson co-author blog posts with MetaDAO about "new futarchic mechanisms."MetaDAO debuted at last year's Solana hacker house mtnDAO in Salt Lake City. It was a hit among the crypto builders there who froze work on their own projects to trade its decision markets en masse. MetaDAO's governance markets have since been adopted by a growing number of projects in the Solana ecosystem, including Jito.MetaDAO isn't the only futarchy-focused project that Hanson is engaging with, but he said its the farthest-along public effort. Crypto adherents are especially open to futarchy because it aligns with the innovation-tinged stories that he said they tell themselves when grasping for the meaning behind their wealth."When people make money in the world they need to tell themselves a story about why they made the money," Hanson said, "crypto people tell themselves it's their insight to potential innovation and changing the world."
Nasdaq-listed Zoom Communications (ZM), a stock market high-flyer during the pandemic boom that's faced tougher times since, should embrace a bitcoin (BTC) strategy to shake up sluggish stock performace and provide value to shareholders, said Eric Semler, chairman of medical technology firm Semler Scientific (SMLR).See all newsletters"Once a pandemic darling, Zoom is now stuck in a highly competitive, slow-growth market," Semler said in an X post Thursday. "By leveraging its $7.7 billion cash pile, $2 billion in annualized free cash flow, and ready access to low-cost debt, Zoom could rapidly become one of the largest corporate holders of Bitcoin," Zoom shares are down about 85% from their 2020 peak even as the Nasdaq and S&P 500 have continued to push to new record highs.Semler's comments came from experience as his company adopted a BTC treasury strategy last year after studying the example of Michael Saylor's Strategy (MSTR), formerly known as MicroStrategy, on how to provide value for the company's shareholders. Semler since has converted most of its cash holdings to bitcoin and tapped capital markets for more cash with which to acquire tokens. As of the most recent update, it's accumulated 3,192 BTC, worth $305 million at current prices.Even as SMLR shares have struggled in recent weeks alongside bitcoin's poor price performance, the stock price has still more than doubled since the company disclosed its first bitcoin purchases in mid-2024.Zoom Communications, said Semler, is "Zombie Zone" company number one, and he promises more such picks in the future.Semler Scientific Studied MicroStrategy’s Success Before Adopting Bitcoin Strategy