The U.S. Federal Reserve (FED) recently initiated an attempt to reduce its $8.9 trillion balance sheet by halting billions of dollars worth of treasuries and bond purchases. The measures were implemented in June 2022 and coincided with the total crypto market capitalization falling below $1.2 trillion, the lowest level seen since January 2021. A similar movement happened to the Russell 2000, which reached 1,650 points on June 16, levels unseen since November 2020. Since this drop, the index has gained 16.5%, while the total crypto market capitalization has not been able to reclaim the $1.2 trillion level. This apparent disconnection …

Ethereum's native token, Ether (ETH), gained alongside riskier assets as investors assessed weak U.S. economic data and its potential to cool down rate hike fears. Ether mirrors risk-on recovery ETH's price climbed up to 8.31% on June 24 to $1,225, six days after falling below $880, its lowest level since January 2021. Overall, the upside retracement brought bulls 40% in gains, raising anticipation about an extended recovery in the future while alleviating fears of a "clean fakeout." For instance, independent market analyst "PostyXBT" projected ETH's price to close above $1,300 by the end of June. In contrast, analyst "Wolf" feared …

Bitcoin (BTC) was a response to the 2008 global recession. It introduced a new way to transact without depending on the trust of third parties, such as banks, particularly failing banks that were nevertheless bailed out by the government at the expense of the public. "The central bank must be trusted not to debase the currency, but the history of fiat currencies is full of breaches of that trust," Satoshi Nakamoto wrote in 2009. Bitcoin's genesis block sums up the intent with the following embedded message: "The Times 03/Jan/2009 Chancellor on brink of second bailout for banks." But while Bitcoin …

Natalie Brunell, the host of Coin Stories podcast, thinks that the recent incidents involving Terra (LUNA, now rebranded LUNC) and Celsius (CELH) and the following market sell-off will lead to regulatory action that will likely favor Bitcoin (BTC) over the rest of cryptocurrency. “I'm going to be watching for regulation developments, just signifying that Bitcoin is a digital property and that maybe there's more fair accounting that can be done to allow institutions to invest," she said in her latest interview with Cointelegraph. "And the other cryptocurrencies, I think will be deemed securities,” she continued. Brunell defines herself as a …

Many in the crypto world have been glued to their screens with eyes dead set on financial conditions this week. That isn’t the case for everyone though, as thousands are suddenly experiencing thewoes of sudden unemployment. Words of encouragement and sympathy also poured out across Twitter and LinkedIn consoling individuals released from their responsibilities. Some expressed frustration, confusion and anger while others expressed gratitude, renewed vision and reflections. My heart is with those recently laid off. I too have been one of the lucky ones to be spared by massive layoffs on days where friends have been let go. This …

Macro investor Raoul Pal is convinced that the current crypto bear market will end only once the Fed eases its hawkish monetary policy by halting interest rate hikes. That could happen in the next couple of months, according to Pal's predictions. “The Fed are unlikely to raise rates as far and as fast as people expect. My guess is they probably stop raising rates sometime in the summer and that will be it,” he said in an exclusive interview with Cointelegraph. Pal sees the combination of high interest rates and fear of an upcoming recession as the main macro factors …

Blockchain-based gaming has exploded in the last year. As technology continues to transform how users interact with digital assets, gaming has been at the center of all of the action. We have seen the rise of blockchain games without the need for traditional gamers. However, the existing gaming communities are an essential part of the future of gaming. A South Korean gaming company Wemade, the creator of the WEMIX platform, recognizes that blockchain game developers must bring the entire gaming community into the fold when enhancing the overall gaming experience. The vast majority of gamers would believe that the core …

Web3 has given rise to a number of innovative business models. In particular, decentralized autonomous organizations (DAOs) have started gaining traction as Web3 and the creator economy comes to fruition. Natalie Salemink, CEO and founder of Prismatic — a tooling and treasury management platform for DAOs — told Cointelegraph that DAOs are internet-native organizations that utilize smart contracts to facilitate coordination and governance in pursuit of a common goal. When it comes to traditional businesses, though, one of the most interesting aspects a DAO structure can provide is leadership based on computer-generated code rather than individual authority. The idea of …

In the less than two weeks since the European Commission opened its “Digital euro for the EU” initiative up to public consultation, more than 11,000 individuals and organizations have left their feedback on the website. The feedback section will be open until June 14. Besides the open-ended comments section on the website, there is a targeted consultation questionnaire that aims to collect information from the industry representatives, authorities and experts regarding such aspects of the prospective digital euro as privacy and data protection, Anti-Money Laundering (AML) and Combatting the Financing of Terrorism (CFT) rules, the impact on financial stability and …

Nonfungible tokens (NFT) have created an environment where artists can take control of their work and finances. Experts agree that artists and creators that tokenize their work and issue it as NFTs no longer have to deal with third-party intermediaries. Although galleries have traditionally done the leg work in attracting buyers, they are seeing their utility diminish as cheaper decentralized apps (DApps) make it easy for investors to connect directly with their favorite artists. This is creating a new paradigm in the creator economy driven by NFTs. As the creator economy has topped $100 billion with plenty of upsides, and …

Alex Gladstein, the CSO at the Human Rights Foundation, says that if Bitcoin was adopted as a global reserve currency, nation-states would be less incentivized to start wars. According to Gladstein, the U.S. was able to sustain its "forever wars" in Iraq and Afghanistan mainly by borrowing capital. That was possible largely because of the Federal Reserve's monetary policy, which has been keeping interest rates relatively low through quantitative easing. "We literally print money, we sell bonds to the open market for a promise to pay in the future and we use the income from the bond sales to pay …

As pointed out by Caroline Malcolm, Head of International Policy at Chainalysis, the transparent nature of blockchain technology makes it relatively easy for crypto intelligence companies to track funds related to sanctioned entities. “We're in quite a unique position because of the transparency and the permanency and the immutability of that public record”, explained Malcolm in an exclusive Cointelegraph interview. Governments around the world have expressed concerns that Russia could use crypto to evade sanctions imposed as a response to its military offensive against Ukraine. Addressing those concerns, Malcolm pointed out that in the last few years there has been …