Yes, the bear market weeds out the bad actor, but it also forces the existing players to rethink their business strategies to offset resultant losses. In this effort, crypto exchange Bybit announced mass layoffs for the second time in 2022. Ben Zhou, the co-founder and CEO of Bybit, announced a reorganization plan amid a prolonged bear market, which involves a steep reduction in the workforce. The “planned downsizing” will affects employees across the board: “We are all saddened by the fact this reorganization will impact many of our dear Bybuddies and some of our oldest friends.” Independent reporter Colin Wu …

Front-running scam bots are significantly gaining traction on YouTube, with the number of dubious videos increasing six-fold in 2022 according to a new report from blockchain security firm CertiK. In the firm's Dec. 1 report, CertiK explores how a wave of front-running bot scams are promising free returns as high as 10X a day, but ultimately end up swiping people's funds. Notably, CertiK’s analysis found 84% of videos on YouTube mentioning “front running bot” were scams, with the number increasing 500% from 28 videos in 2021 to 168 videos in 2022: “There are common themes in all of these videos: …

Cryptocurrency exchange CrossTower Inc has agreed to buy digital asset trading platform BEQUANT, which comes after months of window shopping by CrossTower for crypto companies, including a recently revised offer for Voyager Digital's assets. The Nov. 28 acquisition will provide CrossTower with over 600 new professional exchange clients in addition to its existing clientele. The incoming clients are based across the United States, Europe, Asia, and Latin America and are collectively making over $400 billion annually. The purchase comes as CrossTower CEO Kapil Rathi stated on Nov. 24 that CrossTower has long been on the lookout to buy digital asset …

Bitcoin (BTC) bulls were hopeful that the Nov. 21 dip to $15,500 would mark the cycle bottom, but BTC has not been able to produce a daily close above $17,600 for the past eighteen days. Traders are clearly uncomfortable with the current price action and the confirmation of BlockFi's demise on Nov. 28 was not helpful for any potential Bitcoin price recovery. The cryptocurrency lending platform filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in the United States a couple of weeks after the firm halted withdrawals. In a statement sent to Cointelegraph, Ripple's APAC policy lead Rahul Advani said he expects the …

A handful of government-backed financial institutions have been exploring tokenization use cases to revolutionize traditional financial systems. For instance, El Salvador’s Bitcoin Volcanic bond project has been in the works for over a year and aims to raise $1 billion from investors with tokenized bonds to build a Bitcoin city. The Central Bank of Russia has also expressed interest in tokenized off-chain assets. In addition, the Israeli Ministry of Finance, together with the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange (TASE), recently announced the testing of a blockchain-backed platform for digital bond trading. Cointelegraph Research’s 2021 Security Token Report found that most securities …

Crypto derivatives exchange Bybit has launched a new support fund to help institutional traders access liquidity in the wake of the FTX collapse — an event that triggered a fresh wave of panic selling across the digital asset space. The support fund, valued at $100 million, is available to market makers and high-frequency trading institutions struggling with financial or operational difficulties following the collapse of FTX earlier this month, Bybit disclosed on Nov. 24. The funds will be distributed to eligible applicants at a 0% interest rate. To be eligible, institutional traders must be active on Bybit or other exchanges. …

Crypto exchange CrossTower Inc., which is currently bidding for the assets of Voyager Digital, is reportedly window shopping for other crypto company acquisitions. In a Nov. 24 Bloomberg report, CrossTower CEO Kapil Rathi revealed that the company is looking to pick up firms with a “good set of customers” and a “good balance sheet” despite the current bear market, stating: “We’re in a great place to either acquire entities who have a good set of customers with them and a good balance sheet [...] so we are openly looking at different types of companies from an organic growth perspective.” In …

The crypto market has witnessed a turbulent few weeks after the FTX collapse but Lido Finance, a liquid staking protocol, has been a bright spot amidst the chaos. According to Data from DeFiLlama, Lido protocol has earned $1 million or more in fees daily since October 26. Lido fees and revenue over time. Lido has collected over $1M in fees every day since October 26th pic.twitter.com/GHkzSzYIOo — DefiLlama.com (@DefiLlama) November 18, 2022 Let’s analyze the on-chain fundamentals to see why this trend has continued. What’s behind Lido Finance’s growth? Lido’s growth started in May 2021, pre-FTX collapse. The fees reached …

Before we get into the nitty-gritty of how one simple rule created the kind of insane return on investment noted in the headline — during one of the worst Crypto Winters in recent history — let’s be clear on one thing. You can’t copy this now. But anyone with access to Cointelegraph Markets Pro in 2022 could have. This is not a mere backtested strategy. It’s a real-life strategy — although you’re about to see historical results. This is no longer a thought experiment or proof-of-concept; it is an actual way to make money in crypto trading. For our purposes, …

Companies become industry giants when they provide the best user experience in the simplest form possible. Google, for example, has the most advanced search engine on the whole planet. And how does it provide that sci-fi-level technology to the user? By a simple, one-line search bar. Apple’s motto is removing the hardware from the user experience (UX) as a layer. It means that when users forget that they are holding a smartphone and browsing an app while scrolling down memory lane, Apple succeeds. Technology needs to hit the perfect balance between utility and usability — comprehensive features and ease of …

The FTX hacker that drained over $450 million worth of assets just moments after the doomed crypto exchange filed for bankruptcy on Nov. 11, continues to drain assets from the exchange, four days after the hack was first flagged. Crypto analytic firm Certik in a Tweet noted that the hacker wallet is still draining crypto assets from the wallets associated with the FTX and FTX.US. The FTX hacker wallet currently holds $62 million worth of assets. Since Nov. 12 the hacker wallet has received and swapped 3.2 billion meme tokens and sent 2.8 billion of these tokens to popular addresses. …

Up until the start of this week, Bitcoin (BTC) had been demonstrating record-low volatility, and this gave altcoins enough latitude to paint some nice technical setups. At the same time, on-chain data and technical analysis were beginning to suggest that BTC was midway through carving out a bottom, and many analysts believed that brighter days lay ahead. Fast forward to the present, and the volatility spike the market received actually turned out to be a black swan event. As you already know, FTX is kaput. Alameda Research is kaput. BlockFi has put a stop to withdrawals, citing an inability to …