Chinese cows have been assigned with blockchain-powered ID cards, according to Fnews (thru East Money). The project is part of a pilot being conducted in Changji, Xinjiang province. This pilot involves 1,000 animals that are being monitored via the Internet of Things (IoT) and sensor-enabled identification solutions, with data about “each cow’s life cycle” shared on a blockchain network. The data includes growth stats, information on how long cows have spent sitting down, standing up, and so on, the amount of “exercise” each cow has completed in a day, and how much weight it has put on (or perhaps lost, with all that exercise).
Blockchain mortgage platform Figure has closed a USD 100m financing facility for conforming and jumbo mortgages from investment giant JPMorgan said the platform owner Figure Technologies. As mentioned in the press release, this is the fifth financing facility for its online lending business, which has now closed almost USD1.5bn in total. This USD 100m loan facility is a chance for Figure to progress fueling the growth in its mortgage lending. They added that with the business growing nearly 50% month over month in the fourth quarter of 2020.
Utopia Genesis Foundation, the organization formed to support the development of an open platform for the music industry, has announced its move from Ethereum (ETH) to a Polkadot (DOT) parathread this year, aiming to provide interoperability, consensus, scalability, and security to its users. Per the emailed press release, this expansion will allow Utopia Genesis, which is currently running on a proof of authority (PoA) blockchain with Ethereum interoperability, to offer its ecosystem applications with the full economic security of Polkadot’s validator set.
Regulation News
A petition has been sent to the European Parliament, filed by lawyer Jonathan Levy on behalf of the victims of crypto crime (fraud, piracy, and extortion), which is demanding for the implementation of a “regulatory scheme to compensate victims” as “no cryptoasset funding has been set aside to compensate the victims of directly related criminal activities,” it said. So far, 44 supporters have signed the petition.
Bitcoin News
German bitcoin exchange-traded product (ETP) from ETC Group has garnered volumes matching those of popular European funds, as BTCetc Bitcoin Exchange Traded Crypto (BTCE) has reported average daily trading amounting to EUR 57m (USD 68.9m) in the first 11 days of January, per published by the Financial Times, citing data from Deutsche Börse. The structure of the bitcoin ETP had “increased the appeal of cryptocurrency investments for institutional investors,” who can trade the asset without having to set up a specialized infrastructure or use an “unregulated” crypto platform, Stephan Kraus, head of Deutsche Börse’s ETF segment, is quoted as saying.
Strategists at one of the world’s largest wealth managers, UBS Global Wealth Management, declare that “there is little in our view to stop a cryptocurrency’s price from going to zero when a better-designed version is launched or if regulatory changes stifle sentiment.” “Netscape and Myspace are examples of network applications that enjoyed widespread popularity but eventually disappeared,” according to the strategists.
Institutional platform Tokensoft has announced a partnership with qualified custodian Anchorage, to develop xBTC on Stacks 2.0, which is a blockchain that enables apps and smart contracts on Bitcoin (BTC), stated the press release. They will provide institutional-grade custody and programmability of new digital assets on Stacks 2.0 via Wrapped, enabling BTC to be natively wrapped on the Stacks 2.0 blockchain, which the partners find an important step toward native decentralized finance (DeFi) on Bitcoin and a move that could help activate some USD 627bn in largely passively held capital on the network.
Financial Services News
Numerous major commercial South Korean banks are growing increasingly keen on offering crypto custody services. According to Yonhap News TV, KEB Hana is also thought to be considering a move into the sector. Cryptonetwork.news has earlier reported that Woori Bank is also mulling kicking off its services, while rivals Kookmin, Shinhan, and NongHyup have already unveiled their plans.
As cited by EBN, The South Korean blockchain firm Delio has closed a deal with the Chinese blockchain consulting firm Wenergy, and expects to target the Chinese market. Delio presently offers a range of financial services tied to digital assets, including lending, depositing, swapping, and yield farming. Last month, the South Korean company began offering BTC lending using hash power as collateral, claiming that it had started lending to hash power providers “such as Bitfury mining pools.”
Mining News
Publicly traded digital asset management firm Galaxy Digital launched Galaxy Digital Mining, a new business unit dedicated to providing Bitcoin miners with a comprehensive suite of financial services and products. Per the press release, Galaxy Digital Mining has also established its proprietary Bitcoin mining operation, hosting its machines at a third-party datacenter in the US. Leading the new business is Amanda Fabiano, who joined Galaxy from Fidelity Investments.
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