While we don’t have a strong view on crypto here at Equity Mates, we are fascinated to watch the story unfold. Read on for some of the most interesting Tweets, articles and memes from the past week below.
Prices of Top Cryptocurrencies
Tweets & Charts of the week
Articles & Videos
Video: Sam Bankman-Fried escorted out of Bahamas courthouse in handcuffs.
Sam Bankman-Fried has been denied bail by a judge in the Bahamas. US authorities charged SBF with “one of the biggest financial frauds in US history” on Tuesday. He is now expected to be extradited to the US. Just hours before his arrest, Bankman-Fried participated in a Twitter Spaces event and said “I don’t think I will be arrested.”
Binance has been hit hard by crypto outflows as the fallout from FTX’s collapse and SBF’s arrest continues. Net outflows of digital tokens from Binance amounted to about $US3.7 billion ($5.4 billion) in the past week, including almost $US2 billion in the last 24 hours. This puts serious pressure on Binance’s liquidity.
Right until the moment Bahamian police knocked on the door of his lavish penthouse apartment, Sam Bankman-Fried appeared to hold out hope that he could clean up his mess. In just a few chaotic days last month, Bankman-Fried’s $US32 billion ($46 billion) company fell apart. He’ll go down on record as the man who experienced the biggest wealth collapse in US history.
Celebrities that promoted Bored Ape NFTs are now facing a class action lawsuit. The list of defendants might as well be a Coachella lineup with names like Diplo, Snoop Dogg, Post Malone, and The Weeknd cited alongside Yuga Labs Inc.
A quick meme break
Back to it
FTX rival Changpeng Zhao of Binance — according to a recent Reuters report — is being investigated by the US Justice Department for possible money laundering. The boss of the biggest crypto exchange must be wondering if a truly decentralised exchange might serve crypto users better.
The “blockchain not bitcoin” chorus seems to be re-emerging, taking us back to the 2016-18 heyday of thematic and platform consortia convinced that the benefits of greater efficiency would overcome corporate competition. Bitcoin was an asset with no backing or clear utility, the implied argument seemed to go, whereas blockchain, well that was a technology. What’s going on? Is this part of a post-FTX “reset,” a cathartic back-to-basics? Or is something else in play?
Dozens of cryptocurrency pump and dump groups are active in Australia, with regulators powerless to intervene in feral markets where opportunists seek to artificially increase the price of coins, before dumping them on less sophisticated buyers. Encrypted messaging app Telegram is the preferred venue of choice for participants, with many pump channels boasting tens or hundreds of thousands of global members.
And another
In Focus: Pump and dumps
It has been a hot issue lately in the world of crypto and finance: crypto pump and dump schemes. Many examples can be found on social media, but they often disappear just as fast. This article explains what they are and how to avoid them.
[Read the article here]
In this week’s episode Trace & Blake discuss the FTX update which includes an arrest – finally! Plus Goldman Sachs lust for a bargain crypto businesses and Coinbase coaxing users from USDT to USDC. Plus are the celebs in hot water for promoting Board Apes?
[Listen to the episode here]
Some more of our favourite content
This is an excerpt from our Crypto Newsletter email. Once a week, for those investing in crypto or interested in learning more about this corner of the market, we’re featuring some of the most interesting content we’ve come across in this weekly email. No spam, we guarantee.