Only days after reports of United States regulatory scrutiny of Paxos and Binance USD (BUSD), cryptocurrency exchange Binance has minted nearly $50 million worth of TrueUSD (TUSD). The transaction took place on Feb. 16, according to data from Etherscan, and also comes two days after Binance CEO Chanpeng 'CZ' Zhao said in a Feb. 14 Twitter Spaces that Binance would look to “diversify” its stablecoin holdings away from BUSD. We're live! Tune-in to our Twitter Space AMA with @cz_binance below https://t.co/bXIztCKdry — Binance (@binance) February 14, 2023 Despite minting nearly $50 million in TUSD from the TrustToken platform’s smart contract …

Decentralized finance (DeFi) has been a rapidly growing sector of the cryptocurrency industry, but it has also faced significant regulatory challenges. With regulators struggling to keep up with the pace of innovation, the lack of clarity around regulations tends to create uncertainty for DeFi projects. Cointelegraph spoke to Alastair Johnson about regulatory challenges facing the DeFi industry. Johnson is the CEO of an identity “super-wallet” called Nuggets that seeks to deliver verified self-sovereign decentralized identities to users. He said that one of the main regulatory challenges is DeFi platform anonymity, which makes it difficult to comply with Anti-Money Laundering (AML) …

An investigative report has suggested that major cryptocurrency exchange Binance was behind transferring roughly $400 million in funds from a Binance.US account to a trading firm managed by Changpeng Zhao. According to a Feb. 16 Reuters report, an investigation of Binance’s banking records and company messages showed more than $400 million was sent in a series of transactions starting in 2020 from an account controlled by Binance.US to trading firm Merit Peak. The United States Securities and Exchange Commission reportedly launched a probe into potential connections between Binance.US and the same trading firm in February 2022. Reuters reported that a …

The Government of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People’s Republic of China (HKSAR Government) announced on Feb 16 that it had issued HK$800 million in tokenized green bonds, under the Government's Green Bond Program (GBP). The bonds were underwritten by four banks and priced at a yield of 4.05%. According to the announcement, the platform used Goldman Sachs' tokenization protocol GS DAP for the bond, which uses a private blockchain network to settle security tokens representing the beneficial interests of bonds in a T+1 payment-vs-payment (DvP) manner, and cash tokens representing claims on the HKMA's Hong Kong …

Blockchain video delivery network Theta Labs has partnered with the artificial intelligence (AI) platform FedML to enable collaborative machine learning on content recommendation and generative AI. In an announcement sent to Cointelegraph, the two firms said that the partnership would focus on the collaborative training of large-scale generative AI models, allowing the Theta TV community to contribute personal preferences and compute resources in training and deploying AI models to enhance personalized recommendations and advertisements through FedML. According to the FedML team, Theta’s Edge Network, which is operated by many decentralized nodes across the globe, is a good fit for distributed …

Technology is a powerful force that has significantly influenced the future. It has enriched our lives in innumerable ways, from boosting productivity and efficiency to bridging geographical distances. Artificial intelligence (AI), machine learning (ML), robotics and 5G networks are reshaping industries, opening up new applications, and altering our way of life. For instance, precision medicine is enabling patient-specific therapies, and driverless vehicles promise to decrease traffic accidents and increase mobility. However, technology poses new problems such as employment displacement and cybersecurity concerns, but with good planning and management, technology can continue to advance and help create a better future for …

Developers of one of the earliest Android-based mobile browsers are working to bring online communication to the next level by introducing it to Web3. Sending Labs, a new startup focused on decentralized communications protocol, has secured $12.5M in seed funding to launch the Web3 communications stack. The new platform takes on the mission of building accessible and secure infrastructures for Web3 communication for developers and the community, applying end-to-end decentralization of core of its products. With the new offering, Sending Labs aims to enable privacy-preserving communications and guarantee ownership and transfer of digital assets within community chats. The seed funding …

Binance, the world's leading crypto exchange by trading volume, will temporarily suspend bank transfers in U.S. dollars. The exchange stated in a tweet on Feb. 6 that no other trading methods would be affected. The announcement came with no explanation. However, exchange CEO Changpeng Zhao noted in a tweet that only 0.01% of the exchange’s total users will be affected by the suspension while assuring that they are looking to resolve the issue soon. Recently, Binance encountered related financial issues in the U.S. On Jan. 21, its SWIFT transfer partner, Signature Bank, announced that, as of Feb. 1, it would …

Wyoming lawmakers have passed a bill that will prohibit courts in the state from forcing someone to disclose their digital asset private keys, with one minor exception. The bill was passed through the Wyoming House of Representative in the state’s 67th general session of 2023 on Feb. 15. The law will officially come into effect on Jul. 1, 2023. “No person shall be compelled to produce a private key or make a private key known to any other person in any civil, criminal, administrative, legislative or other proceeding[s]” in the state of Wyoming, the incoming law reads. The law includes …

A five-member panel of the United States Securities Exchange Commission (SEC) has voted 4-1 in favor of a proposal that may make it more difficult for cryptocurrency firms to serve as digital asset custodians in the future. The proposal, which is yet to be officially approved by the SEC, recommends amendments to the “2009 Custody Rule” will apply to custodians of “all assets” including cryptocurrencies, according to a Feb. 15 statement from SEC Chairman Gary Gensler. Gensler stated that currently, some crypto trading platforms that are offering custody services are not actual “qualified custodians.” According to the SEC, a qualified …

Sam Bankman-Fried, the former CEO of crypto exchange FTX may no longer be able to play League of Legends and other video games if newly proposed changes to his bail conditions from United States prosecutors are approved. In a Feb. 15 letter to United States District Judge Lewis Kaplan, U.S. Attorney Damian Williams asked the courts to further expand restrictions surrounding Bankman-Fried’s electronic device usage. They pointed to Bankman Fried’s recent device usage as cause for concern, and agreed with the court’s intuition that it was “shortsighted” by focusing only on apps, adding: “There is now a record before the …

Bankrupt crypto lender Celsius Network has chosen NovaWulf Digital Management as the sponsor for its proposed Chapter 11 restructuring plan which will see the investment advisory firm take over the operations of a new company, and most customers estimated to recover up to 70% of their funds. Celsius presented the plan on Feb. 15 in a filing to the United States Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of New York. The proposed plan has the support of the Celsius Official Committee of Unsecured Creditors (UCC) — a body representing the interests of Celsius account holders. The plan sees the creation …