Calls for an altseason continue to grow louder as the price action in the altcoin market has been on the rise for a few days. Meanwhile, Bitcoin continues to consolidate below its all-time high near the $62,000 support level. Oftentimes, moves in altcoins center around one specific sector of tokens such as meme coins or decentralized finance protocols, but the current market is seeing rises across all sectors, which is possibly a sign that altseason is in fact heating up. Data from Cointelegraph Markets Pro and TradingView shows that the biggest gainers over the past 24-hours were Secret (SCRT), Curve …

A developer working on DeFi darling OlympusDAO has launched a new protocol that seeks to facilitate stablecoin swaps without price curves. On Oct. 26, OlympusDAO developer “Ohmzeus” announced they had launched an experimental project dubbed Range comprising decentralized stablecoin pools that do not use a price curve. The programmer described Range as an “optimistic stablecoin swap protocol” designed to “abandon a pricing curve altogether.” Introducing Range, an optimistic stablecoin swap protocol. (Note: Range is unaudited. Use at your own risk with money you can afford to lose.) Let's run through what it does — Zeus Ω (3, 3) (@ohmzeus) October …

U.S. regulatory bodies have reportedly agreed that the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) will lead the United States’ efforts to regulate the stablecoin sector. According to an Oct. 26 Bloomberg report citing anonymous sources “familiar with the matter,” the SEC has reached an agreement with other U.S. agencies to take the reins on proposing legislation and overseeing the stablecoin industry. The sources add that the SEC’s newfound “significant authority” over the sector will be formally announced in the Treasury Department’s forthcoming stablecoin report that is scheduled to be published this week. The report will also clarify the regulatory jurisdiction of …

Many are quick to flock to stablecoins for their ability to de-risk cryptocurrency positions. A stablecoin can be pegged to any perceivably stable asset, for instance, a digital asset like Bitcoin (BTC) or a fiat currency like the US dollar. In theory, if a digital asset was pegged to the US dollar, $100 worth of the digital currency should mean $100 in the backed asset is held in a secure reserve like a bank account. Stablecoins are broad in utility; their uses include moving tokens between exchanges and protocols securely, lending out tokens or making payments. For this reason, they …

The biggest regulatory story of the week, if not the year, has been the United States Security and Exchange Commission’s lack of opposition to the launch of the first-ever Bitcoin (BTC) exchange-traded funds, which took eight long years to materialize. While the first ETFs are tracking CME-traded Bitcoin futures rather than the asset’s spot price, the crypto space is already anticipating a pure-Bitcoin ETF as a logical next step. This bar might prove to be immensely difficult to clear, however, as SEC Chair Gary Gensler seems far less convinced of the stringency of investor protections that such products offer. Below …

On the opening day of Messari Mainnet 2021, New York City’s long-awaited first crypto conference since the start of COVID-19, reports came blazing in via a viral tweet that the United States Securities and Exchange Commission had served a subpoena to an event panelist at the top of an escalator in broad daylight. While it’s still not entirely clear who was served (or why), this isn’t the first time the SEC has encroached upon the crypto industry in full view of the public. Let’s go back a mere two months. On July 20, 2021, SEC Chair Gary Gensler issued his …

Stablecoin project Diem has distanced itself from Facebook in response to senators calling for the immediate cessation of the firm’s Novi crypto wallet. Diem also claimed senior regulators had called it “the best-designed stablecoin project that the U.S. government had seen.” In a Tuesday letter sent to Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, the senators, including crypto critic Elizabeth Warren, voiced their “strongest opposition to Facebook’s revived effort to launch a cryptocurrency and digital wallet.” Earlier that day, the Novi wallet was launched in partnership with Coinbase, with a pilot in the United States and Guatemala to enable users to buy, send …

Bullish sentiment is running high across the cryptocurrency market on Oct. 20 as Bitcoin’s (BTC) surge to a new all-time high at $67,000 thrust the digital asset into uncharted territory, with investors closely watching to see how altcoins and decentralized finance (DeFi) tokens react to the move. The DeFi sector has also benefited from BTC’s bullish breakout, and today, the total value locked (TVL) across all DeFi protocols climbed to a new record high. According to data from Defi Llama, which collects data from DeFi protocols across all major blockchain networks, including Binance Smart Chain, Avalanche and wrapped Bitcoin (wBTC), …

A bounty of up to $1 million has been offered to anyone who can cast light on the precise backing of Tether’s reserves. That backing just got a little bit murkier after Celsius Network CEO Alex Mashinsky reportedly said that Tether mints new Tether (USDT) in exchange for crypto assets — which appears to conflict with Tether’s own terms and conditions. Forensic financial research firm Hindenburg Research tweeted on Wednesday to its 171,000 followers that it holds “doubts about the legitimacy of Tether” and offered a reward of up to $1 million for important details on Tether’s reserves, which it …

Five senators have called for the immediate closure of Facebook’s new crypto wallet just hours after it was launched in a partnership with Coinbase. Crypto skeptic Senator Elizabeth Warren was one of the five urging Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg to “immediately discontinue” the project. In a letter sent to Zuckerberg on Tuesday, the five senators wrote: “Given the scope of the scandals surrounding your company, we write to voice our strongest opposition to Facebook’s revived effort to launch a cryptocurrency and digital wallet, now branded ‘Diem’ and ‘Novi,’ respectively.” Diem is Facebook’s ambitious stablecoin project, formerly known as Libra, which …

A high-profile blockchain lobby group is urging United States lawmakers to adopt a “technology-neutral” approach when it comes to stablecoin regulation, arguing that dollar-pegged cryptocurrencies do not pose a system risk to the financial system. In a 17-page letter addressed to the President’s Working Group on Financial Markets, which includes regulators from the Department of Treasury and Federal Reserve, the Chamber of Digital Commerce outlined a six-point plan for future regulatory action involving stablecoins. According to the group, stablecoin laws should be technology-neutral, regulate in a manner that is proportionate to risk, ensure that the U.S. maintains a competitive advantage …

The year 2021 seems to be a big year for the blockchain world as several projects, such as nonfungible tokens (NFTs) and centralized decentralized finance exchanges (CeDeFis), are taking the central stage. Also at the forefront is Facebook’s Libra. Not too long ago, the media was rife with the news that the world’s largest social media network was developing plans for a global digital currency. Then, after a while, it looked like Facebook shelved plans for it. Disputes with regulators around the globe had a hand in delaying and redirecting Facebook’s plans a bit. Instead of backing out, Facebook decided …