With the opening ceremony of the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics completed and all competing athletes currently in China, two members of Congress are warning of the potential dangers of using digital yuan at the events. According to a Friday report from Reuters, Pennsylvania Senator Pat Toomey sent a letter to Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen on Feb. 3 expressing concern that the Chinese government could use the games to promote greater adoption of its central bank digital currency, the digital yuan. The country has been conducting trials of the CBDC since April 2020, later announcing …

Though athletes and support staff arriving for the Beijing 2022 Olympics still have the option of using digital currency for payments at many venues, the international test run of China’s CBDC is reportedly facing hurdles due to the pandemic. According to a Monday report from CNN, athletes, officials, and journalists for the country’s olympics games are largely separated from the population of China in a quarantine “bubble” to prevent the spread of COVID-19. These precautions combined with the Chinese government deciding to limit the number of in-person spectators may result in far fewer people testing the digital yuan as a …

The Cyberspace Administration of China (CAC) announced the commencement of an in-house effort to expedite blockchain development and innovation across 15 zones and 164 entities. The initiative aims for the large-scale implementation of blockchain technology across businesses and government organizations in China. The CAC, along with other government agencies, directed the regulatory authorities to “promote the intensive and balanced layout of blockchain technology infrastructure in the region, form a large-scale production-level cross-chain data exchange support capability, and promote the formation of a multi-party collaborative blockchain industry ecology.” The notice also included a list of cities, companies and other entities — …

China’s food delivery giant Meituan has become the latest tech firm to integrate central bank digital currency (CBDC) payments for its services. Meituan users can link the digital yuan wallet to their service app and use it for a range of daily services such as booking hotels, cabs and paying at restaurants. The food delivery and daily services app recorded 660 million transacting customers last year, and the integration of e-CNY payments would only help the Beijing government to test its sovereign digital currency more widely. Over the past few months, major tech giants in the country such as WeChat …

Last week, Pakistan’s Sindh High Court held a hearing on the legal status of digital currencies that might lead an outright ban of cryptocurrency trading combined with penalties against crypto exchanges. Several days later, the Central Bank of Russia called for a ban on both crypto trading and mining operations. Both countries could join the growing ranks of nations that moved to outlaw digital assets, which already include China, Turkey, Iran and several other jurisdictions. According to a report by the Library of Congress (LOC), there are currently nine jurisdictions that have applied an absolute ban on crypto and 42 …

On Friday, CasperLabs, a blockchain software firm, announced a partnership with China's Blockchain-based Service Network, or BSN. Through the agreement, which has been minted as a nonfungible token, or NFT, as a sign of commemoration, Casper Network will be added as the blockchain of choice to the Fuzhou City Chain for use in public and private crypto infrastructure developments in the region — dubbed "Fuzhou Chain powered by Casper." RockTree Capital, an investment company, based in New York, played a critical role in bridging the entente between Casper and Fuzhou City. As told by stakeholders, the partnership's main goal is …

Beijing’s crackdown on crypto continued with the start of the new year as Chinese police froze nearly 6 million yuan ($1 million) worth of crypto and arrested eight people involved with it. As per a report published in Nikkei Asia, the public security bureau of Chizhou unearthed a crypto rug pull fraud that could be worth 50 million yuan ($7.8 million). The police began an investigation after an investor lost 590,000 yuan worth of crypto in June last year. The trail of the inquiry led to eight people living in different provinces. The police also seized luxury cars, villas and …

January 2022 continues to be rough for crypto investors as current markets see turbulent fluctuations in the price of Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies. Some have attributed the slump to recent federal intentions to introduce new rate hikes, and the political turmoil in Kazakhstan which significantly lowered the hash rate of bitcoin. On Jan. 14, the price of Bitcoin dipped below $42,000 as traders continued to hold out hope for bullish signals. NFT trading and blockchain games on the other hand seem to have resisted the dip. According to reports from DappRadar, NFT transactions continued to increase amidst declining crypto prices. …

At her confirmation hearing in front of members of the Senate Banking Committee, Federal Reserve board of governors member Lael Brainard said Congress would ultimately have to decide to move forward with a central bank digital currency, or CBDC. Addressing pro-crypto Senator Cynthia Lummis at the Dirksen Senate Office Building on Thursday, Brainard said the Fed would welcome Congress “taking a very important role” in updating the regulatory framework for cryptocurrencies and digital assets. When questioned as to the possible use of CBDCs to surveil users' financial activities — as Lummis alleged happens in China — Brainard again deferred the …

China is planning to draw a clear line between cryptocurrencies and nonfungible tokens (NFTs), pretty much the same way it did with its digital currency efforts, before the crypto crackdown in the country harms the local NFT industry. The Blockchain-based Service Network (BSN), a government-backed blockchain project in China, is working on infrastructure that would support businesses and individuals to build platforms and apps to manage NFTs, the South China Morning Post reported. Officially called the BSN-Distributed Digital Certificate (BSN-DDC), the project aims to support the deployment of non-crypto NFTs by offering application programming interfaces for the development of user …

Ether (ETH) has been an emotional rollercoaster over the past three months primarily because its price rallied twice. First it peaked at $4,870 on Nov. 10 and at $4,780 on Dec. 1. However, the double top was quickly followed by a harsh rejection which led to $490 million in long futures contract liquidations in 48 hours. Once again, hope was instilled on Dec. 8 after Ether commenced to rally 28.5% in 4 days to retest the $4,400 support. Soon after, the downtrend continued, leading to the $2,900 bottom on Jan. 10, which was the lowest ETH price seen in 102 …

The official digital yuan wallet app that was released as a pilot version to be used in select cities has still managed to top app store charts in its first week. Developed by the Digital Currency Research Institute of the People’s Bank of China (PBoC), the app became available for download on Chinese Android and Apple app stores last Tuesday. The app is still in an experimental phase and is only accessible to select individuals through authorized e-CNY service providers. While anyone in China could download the app, its usage is limited to select cities. Despite these limitations, the South …