The past year was a challenge across the globe. Financial markets plunged deep into the red, affecting millions, if not billions, of people worldwide. Inflation rose. For crypto, it has arguably been the worst year since Bitcoin’s (BTC) inception. It has been more of an ice age than a crypto winter , and bad actors and weak project s have dominated headlines — including FTX, Voyager, Celsius, Terra, Hodlnaut , and this week, Nexo . In 2023, the purge could continue with projects that — like Tezos, Lisk and EOS — do not develop any new technology, nor do they …

The crypto community has voiced their opinions on Sam Bankman-Fried’s latest “pre-mortem overview” of the collapse of FTX, published on Jan. 12 as a letter on substack. https://t.co/XVd0BPHxEU — SBF (@SBF_FTX) January 12, 2023 As previously reported by Cointelegraph, the former FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried denied allegations made against him in his lengthy letter, dubbed as a "pre-mortem overview",. In the letter, SBF maintained that FTX US had been "fully solvent" at the time the firm filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy, with approximately $350 million in cash available. Bankman-Fried further stated that FTX International had a substantial amount of assets, …

The crypto and blockchain space has had a turbulent past year, but that is not stopping users and enterprises from looking into the industry. A new survey from CasperLabs and Zogby Analytics revealed that the sentiment around blockchain adoption is especially positive among enterprises. The poll was conducted via 603 business enterprise “decision makers” in the United States, the United Kingdom and China. Nearly 90% of the businesses surveyed reported deploying blockchain technology in some capacity, with 87% saying they plan to invest in blockchain in the next year. This is particularly pronounced in China, where over half of the …

Cryptocurrency broker Genesis Global allegedly owes its creditors more than $3 billion, according to a new report published by the Financial Times on Jan. 12. Its parent, Digital Currency Group (DCG), which also owns Grayscale Investments and its series of digital asset trusts, seeks to sell part of its venture capital holdings to offset the shortfall. According to people familiar with the matter, DCG's venture arm has more than 200 crypto-related projects "such as exchanges, banks, and custodians in at least 35 countries" with a total valuation of around $500 million. Cointelegraph previously reported on Nov.16, 2022, that Genesis Global …

Chinese billionaire and Alibaba founder Jack Ma will no longer control the fintech giant Ant Group as part of recent changes to the company’s corporate structure. Ant Group officially announced that Ma has agreed to give up control of Ant Group as part of the company’s further corporate governance optimization and restructuring. Prior to the change, Ma was the control person in Ant, exercising control over the company through related entities in addition to his 10% stake in Ant. Once the restructuring process is complete, no single shareholder will have control over Ant, the company said in a statement. Major …

Setting aside the criminal investigations of failed crypto businesses like FTX, Celsius, 3AC, Terra and others, 2022 set the record in illicit on-chain transactions. According to a yearly report published by Chainalysis on Jan. 12, the total cryptocurrency value received by illicit addresses reached $20.1 billion in the last year. The numbers aren’t final, as the measure of illicit transaction volume grows over time as the analysts identify new addresses associated with criminal activity. Moreover, it doesn’t include proceeds from non-crypto native crimes like drug trafficking and the funds on the balance of those failed companies, which are now under …

This year saw the crypto market rocked by numerous crises while the bearish climate was a constant presence. Considering this, many traders have lost confidence in traditional CEX trading and are looking to diversify their strategies. Turning to alternative trading patterns and products is a way to minimize risk and reduce losses. Cointelegraph’s interview with Eightcap contains more about derivatives trading in the crypto space. Q: FTX has become one of the biggest crypto disasters lately. What could have been done to avoid that? The collapse of FTX has taught investors and crypto providers major lessons about security, transparency and …

A new crypto wallet address scam that tries to take advantage of user carelessness has been on the rise, according to the MetaMask team. In an announcement, digital wallet provider MetaMask warned users of what is called an “address poisoning scam,” where attackers “poison” transaction histories by sending users tokens that are worth $0 to their wallets. The scammers will use wallet addresses generated from vanity address generators and match the first and last characters of their victim’s wallet address. This is done in hopes of getting unsuspecting users to send their funds to the wrong copycat address. A new …

The blockchain gaming industry is experiencing a "massive shift," with the once-popular play-to-earn (P2E) model falling out of favor and focus directed now at improving gameplay experience, a new survey has found. The survey results were included in a newly released annual report from the Blockchain Game Alliance (BGA) on Jan. 12, which was conducted with 347 professionals, representing 252 different projects or companies in the blockchain sector. Most of the respondents were young adult males working for blockchain gaming companies in middle and top management positions, according to BGA. One of the trends gleaned from the report was an …

'Degen' season smells like pixelated feet Feetpix.wtf’s newly launched nonfungible token (NFT) collection, “Feetpix” has seemingly taken the NFT community by storm with surging trading volumes, prompting some to suggest the return of “degen” season. Feetpix.wtf’s collection soared ahead of the likes of Bored Ape Yacht Club (BAYC) on Jan. 11 with the fifth-highest trading volume recorded on NFT marketplace OpenSea. The project — which released 10,000 Feetpix NFTs — has traded over 825 Ether (ETH)($1,157,000) across nearly 18,000 transactions since its release on Jan. 8. Crypto Twitter is still split on what inspired the surge in foot fetish-NFT trading …

Ava Labs, developer of the Avalanche network (AVAX), has partnered with Amazon Web Services (AWS) to implement new features intended to make running a node easier, according to a January 11 blog post from Ava Labs. The new features include one-click node deployment through the AWS Marketplace, AWS GovCloud integration for Dapp developers concerned about compliance, and the ability to create Avalanche subnets with just a few clicks. It’s official! @Amazon #ChoseAvalanche to bring scalable blockchain solutions to enterprises and governments #AWS fully supports Avalanche’s infrastructure and dApp ecosystem, including one-click node deployment, offering the best tooling for these high …

When Axie Infinity launched in 2018, play-to-earn gaming became a sensation. The game turned into a viable source of additional funds for numerous low-income families in the Philippines. However, as Axie Infinity grew and took over the global blockchain-gaming space, the rewards ratio quickly started dwindling. The main reason for this significant cut in returns for players hides in the design of the game itself. One of the major challenges play-to-earn projects face is creating a self-sustainable in-game economy. Currently, most P2E games start out strong and offer lucrative rewards to players. However, increased in-game token issuing, as more players …