Japan’s Financial Regulator Wants Crypto Industry to ‘Grow Under Appropriate Regulation’ 7107

The commissioner of Japan’s financial regulator the Financial Services Agency (FSA) said that the agency wants the cryptocurrency industry to “grow under appropriate regulation,” in an interview with Reuters August 22.

Toshihide Endo, commissioner of Japan’s FSA, told Reuters he sees the agency’s goal for developing the crypto industry as finding a “balance” between consumer protection and technological innovation. The commissioner added:

“We have no intention to curb [the crypto industry] excessively. We would like to see it grow under appropriate regulation.”

In July, the FSA had been considering changing the legal basis for regulating crypto exchanges to oversight by the Financial Instruments and Exchange Act (FIEA), instead of its current legal foundation, the Payment Services Act.

Earlier this month, the FSA published the results of its on-site inspections of a number of cryptocurrency exchange operators, noting that in the inspections it gives “priority to investor protection.”

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Moondance Labs Introduces Tanssi ContainerChains: The Next Phase in Appchain Deployment 4689

Moondance Labs, the company developing the Tanssi appchain infrastructure protocol, announced today ContainerChains, a more efficient and developer-friendly solution to deploying application-specific blockchains (appchains).

The rise of appchains is valued for their dedicated blockspace, customizability, and adherence to blockchain’s core tenets: security, governance capabilities, and decentralization. Yet, their intricate deployment demands often complicate projects, leading to higher costs and delays.

Developers need more flexible options. While smart contracts offer speedier launches, they compromise on depth of customization and scalability. On the other hand, rollups, despite their popularity, have decentralization concerns due to their reliance on centralized sequencers and face challenges like data availability and transaction ordering.

To easily overcome these obstacles, Tanssi’s ContainerChains provide immediate access to a wide set of infrastructure resources. By simply connecting an appchain to the Tanssi network, it is transformed into a ContainerChain. This drastically simplifies the deployment process and reduces it from months to just under an hour, delivering the benefits of appchains along with the ease of smart contract deployment.

“Tanssi is the only protocol that allows developers to deploy a secure and decentralized appchain in just hours. While the appchain and rollup sectors have grown considerably, there’s a glaring need for an automated yet uncompromised approach,” said Francisco Agosti, CEO of Moondance Labs and Co-founder of Tanssi. “With the launch of ContainerChains, we aim to fill this gap without sacrificing decentralization, security, or native composability, upholding the fundamental values of web3.”

ContainerChains: Advancing Appchain Capabilities

Tanssi ContainerChains are anchored in the Substrate framework, known for its modular architecture that promotes advanced customization. Substrate’s versatility is a strength, but can also present a steep learning curve. Using pre-built templates with essential components pre-installed for compatibility with Tanssi’s protocol eases developers into the Substrate and Polkadot ecosystem. Developers can deploy these templates directly or modify them to fit their specific needs. For those accustomed to the Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM), EVM-compatible templates are available.

When an appchain connects to Tanssi and evolves into a ContainerChain, it benefits from the following:

  • Collation-as-a-service: Block-builder assignment to ContainerChains is overseen, with managed incentives to ensure continuous, secure chain activity.
  • Data-retrieval-as-a-service: Equipping developers with the capability to retrieve the complete chain history for ContainerChains.
  • Key integrations: Seamless integration with top wallets, indexers, and explorers, including EVM-compatible platforms like Frontier, is a feature of the nodes.
  • XCM integrations: While mastering XCM for cross-chain communications can be intricate, built-in templates simplify this with pre-configured XCM support and potential predefined connections.
  • Chain-Management tooling: ContainerChain management tools cover initialization, monitoring, easy upgrades, migrations, and maintenance, ensuring performance and efficient troubleshooting.

In addition to these extensive features, Tanssi’s connection with Polkadot’s Relay Chain leverages the advantages of Polkadot’s shared security and inherent interoperability.

Accessing ContainerChains: Join the Dancebox TestNet

Dancebox, Tanssi’s first public TestNet, paves the way for broader ContainerChains adoption. Over 40 projects, including RMRK (NFT infrastructure), LeverFi (DeFi), and Galaxia Studios (gaming), have joined the Tanssi ecosystem and will be onboarded to Dancebox.

As Tanssi’s early ecosystem grows, the community can expect enhanced cross-chain integration, user-friendly tools, and expanded features.

“Connecting RMRK with Tanssi’s Dancebox highlights our drive for chain-level customizations, a necessity that goes beyond what typical EVM L2 rollups can deliver,” said Bruno Škvorc, RMRK Founder. “Thanks to Tanssi’s pioneering approach to appchain infrastructure, our expansive vision for NFTs is taking shape. We can focus on constructing entire universes of interactive, evolving assets and refining these complex functionalities without infrastructure management distractions.”

In May, Moondance Labs secured a $3M seed round led by Arrington Capital and supported by renowned VCs such as Fenbushi, Borderless Capital, Hashkey Capital, among others.

Developers keen to explore the future of appchain deployment can delve into Tanssi ContainerChains via the Dancebox Testnet. Supported by comprehensive documentation from Moondance Labs, the platform is designed to facilitate a seamless onboarding experience for all.

About the Tanssi Network

Currently under development, Tanssi is an appchain infrastructure protocol designed to simplify and accelerate appchain deployment, making it more secure and efficient. This stands in contrast to the lengthy and complex processes associated with traditional appchain implementations. Through Tanssi’s permissionless and developer-friendly protocol, appchains can be deployed in under an hour — a stark improvement over the usual months-long timelines. Additionally, Tanssi leverages the shared security and native interoperability of the Polkadot relaychain. Learn more at tanssi.network.

Paxos Regulated Stablecoin Platform Reaches Five-Year Milestone, Has Issued $120B+ in Stablecoins 5349

Paxos, the leading provider of blockchain infrastructure for enterprises, celebrates the five-year anniversary of its regulated stablecoin platform. Over the past five years, the company has issued and redeemed more than $120 billion in USD-backed stablecoins across its offerings while setting the market standard for regulatory oversight. All Paxos stablecoins have been issued from the company’s New York trust with prudential oversight from the New York State Department of Financial Services.

Paxos debuted the first regulated, fully redeemable USD-backed token in 2018. In the five years since, the company has grown its tokenization capabilities into a suite of platform offerings that power stablecoin solutions for global enterprises like Mercado Libre and Mastercard. In August, Paxos launched PayPal USD (PYUSD), now available to more than 100 million PayPal users and throughout the crypto ecosystem. By partnering with PayPal, Paxos is enabling a new level of adoption and utility that will define the next wave of stablecoin growth.

Walter Hessert, Head of Strategy at Paxos, commented, “Stablecoins will become a trillion-dollar asset class as blockchain technology expands across the applications used everyday by consumers. The Paxos platform empowers our enterprise partners to enable payments, settlement, remittances and other real world use cases of stablecoins for hundreds of millions of end users. We offer the safety, security and oversight that enterprises need to enter this new frontier with confidence.

Paxos has been instrumental in establishing and increasing the integrity of blockchain and digital asset markets by setting the standard for reserve disclosures and securing prudential regulation for each of its individual tokens. Moving forward, Paxos will continue to set the standard in stablecoin operations with robust consumer protections, frequent regulatory examinations, monthly independent attestations and monthly reserve reporting. This compliance-driven approach has proven indispensable to global brands like PayPal, Mastercard, Interactive Brokers, Mercado Libre, Nubank and others as they begin their journey into digital assets. Today, Paxos infrastructure powers more than 12 million active wallets globally through its enterprise partnerships.

The Paxos stablecoin platform leverages Ethereum and will expand into multiple other blockchains as it helps to create a more open, accessible economy for all. Paxos stablecoins are always backed one-for-one by cash and cash equivalents, with all customer assets held in segregated accounts and protected from bankruptcy as a New York State regulated Trust company. Paxos stablecoins USDP and PYUSD are issued by Paxos Trust Company and regulated by the New York Department of Financial Services. Financial institutions around the world have adopted Paxos’ scalable, interoperable institutional grade blockchain products, including white label stablecoins, digital asset-enabled wallets, custody and settlement solutions. With a strong balance sheet, prudential oversight and robust compliance programs, Paxos’ blockchain infrastructure is tailor-made to serve the needs of sophisticated global enterprises with billions in assets and millions of customers to protect.

About Paxos

Paxos is the leading regulated blockchain infrastructure and tokenization platform. Its products are the foundation for a new, open financial system that can operate faster and more efficiently. Today, trillions of dollars are locked in inefficient, outdated financial plumbing that is inaccessible to millions of people. Paxos is replatforming the financial system to enable assets to instantaneously move anywhere in the world, at any time, in a trustworthy way.

Paxos partners with leading global enterprises to tokenize, custody, trade and settle assets. Its blockchain solutions are used by institutions like PayPal, Interactive Brokers, Mastercard, Mercado Libre, Nubank, Bank of America and Societe Generale. It is the issuer of numerous regulated digital assets including PayPal USD (PYUSD), Pax Dollar (USDP) and Pax Gold (PAXG). Prudentially regulated by the NYDFS in the US and the MAS in Singapore, Paxos is a top-funded fintech company with more than $540 million raised from leading investors including Oak HC/FT, Declaration Partners, Founders Fund, Mithril Capital and PayPal Ventures. With offices in New York, London and Singapore, Paxos takes a global approach to modernizing the financial system.

Solar Dex to relaunch on Quai Network 6167

While many solutions for blockchain scalability have been proposed, they remain unable to crack the blockchain trilemma, sacrificing security and decentralization. Quai is the first blockchain protocol that is simultaneously decentralized, censorship resistant and infinitely scalable. Quai, in contrast to traditional cryptocurrencies, functions as a network of many interoperable blockchains braided together. Due to a breakthrough discovery that occurred during research on proof-of-work, Quai Network utilizes a new consensus mechanism, proof of entropy minima (PoEM), which eliminates all consensus-based forks and enables all Quai nodes to remain in “perpetual consensus.”

Solar Dex began as the first United States-based decentralized exchange on Solana, and will now be pivoting to build on Quai as one of its first DEXs. Due to a loss of TVL on Solana and many Solana-based projects moving strictly to NFTs, the Solar team has decided to get ahead of the DeFi curve and take advantage of Quai’s low-cost, high-speed decentralized network in order to better position Solar Dex for the next bull run. The team at Solar is building on top of Quai Network to “ensure a more sustainable future for Solar Dex.”

Roy Fardin, chief business officer, said: “After talking to the Quai Network team, we have never been more bullish about a layer 1 with scalability and its passion for growth. It was a clear eye-opener that they care about DeFi and want other projects that utilize this network to succeed. The vision behind Quai brings the best of Ethereum and Solana all together into this new network.”

Solar Dex will be reworking the DEX into several components as it builds on Quai. The DEX will not only support traditional swaps, but also add in customizable swap themes. In addition, Solar Dex’s Solar Sentries NFTs will allow staking as a yield opportunity derived by all exchange fees earned from Sentry Mode projects.

Richard, CEO of Solar Dex, said: “On top of traditional DEX swaps, Solar Dex will be adding limit orders on Quai. “We’re doing a total revamp of the website and DEX which should be very aesthetically pleasing and simplistic to onboard new users to DeFi and also Quai.”

With Quai’s Iron Age Testnet beginning in September 2023, Solar Dex will be prioritizing its deployment on Quai for the coming months. There will be incentives to beta-test Solar DEX on Quai and additional generalized rewards will be provided by Quai for participating in the Iron Age Testnet. On top of this, the Solar team will be adding a surprise feature to the DEX to build excitement for Quai’s testnet launch, as well as utilizing its incentive program to reward holders.

With backing from Polychain Capital and an expert team with backgrounds at Apple, GridPlus, Tesla, Consensys, Circle and more, Quai is excited to usher in a new generation of innovative applications that don’t sacrifice decentralization.

Concordium Enables a New Standard of Age Verification Amidst Growing Privacy Concerns 6270

Concordium, the Layer 1, science-backed blockchain creating a safer digital world, proudly unveils Web3 ID: a cutting-edge identification platform offering age-verification capacities designed to prioritize user privacy for both individuals and businesses. Concordium’s age verification tooling works to protect minors online amidst growing global privacy concerns and explicit data-harvesting from technology organisations.

Web3 ID harnesses Concordium’s Zero-Knowledge Proof technology to offer a novel approach to age verification – without ever compromising user data or privacy. By uploading a government-issued form of identification to their wallet, Web3 ID users can drastically reduce the amount of data they disclose during online identity verification, regaining control over any sensitive information.

Mikael Breinholst, Head of Product at Concordium, spoke to the widespread concern surrounding existing online age-verification tools, stating: “Current age verification tools online are a grave area of concern for many. Age-restricted sites have little to no barrier to entry, exposing underage consumers to a universe of adult themed content. Blockchain technology, and Web3 ID specifically, enable businesses to request proof of an individual’s age, without storing their data or selling it to advertisers. With Web3 ID, users maintain autonomy and safety over their personal information while benefiting from blockchain technology’s inherent security.”

Concordium´s built-in ID layer and Zero-Knowledge-Proof technology ensures a user’s online identity is verified in a secure and decentralized manner, all while maintaining privacy. Only strictly relevant information is requested of users when transacting on the Web3 ID platform, while unrelated details are held on a decentralized wallet. Web3 ID users are also granted an increase in transactional security through Concordium’s compliance-friendly technology. In result, individuals and businesses are empowered with complete control over their information, effectively countering the data ownership issues associated with centralized legacy systems.

Kåre Kjelstrøm, CTO & CPO at Concordium, commented: “Concordium’s Web3 ID is intuitive and easy to build upon, offering seamless usability while being cost-effective, shrinking online identification processes. Further to preventing children from accessing age-restricted sites, Web3 ID is capable of sharing specific medical information without the recipient having access to the entirety of an individual’s medical history, proving a user’s driving credentials, or simply ensuring user data is genuine and not the result of bots. This model addresses many of the shortcomings surrounding ID safety caused by big tech’s data monopoly.”

The creation of a new standard of age verification promotes Concordium’s mission of supporting a regulated future for new and existing organisations building on blockchain technology. This achievement follows recent partnerships such as AI service provider 2021.ai, and carbon offset management platform Aqualibre.

For more information on Concordium’s Web3 ID platform, please visit: Concordium.com

About Concordium

Concordium is a permissionless green layer 1, a science-backed blockchain that balances privacy with accountability through its ID layer and Zero-Knowledge-Proofs. Creating trust with ID is key to scaling businesses. Concordium provides a fast, secure, and high-scale blockchain platform that makes building use cases and using dApps easy. Concordium differs by having verified ID and instant finality with high throughput and low transaction fees pegged to FIAT. With leadership from Fortune 500 companies, Volvo, IKEA, Credit Suisse, Uber, and successful Fintech platforms, the team is scaling the chain to its extensive network of the world’s biggest enterprises. For more information: concordium.com

One Trading Launch Instant Trade 6854

One Trading, the crypto asset exchange formerly operating under the Bitpanda Pro brand, today announced its new product, Instant Trade.

Having recently raised €30M and fully separated from Bitpanda, Instant Trade is another step forward for One Trading as it diversifies its offering and establishes its footprint as a household name providing crypto assets to both retail and institutional investors in Europe.

With backers including the likes of Peter Thiel’s Valar Ventures, MiddleGame Ventures, Speedinvest, Keyrock and Wintermute Ventures, One Trading is drawing a lot of attention.

Led by TradFi heavyweight and ex-JP Morgan exec Josh Barraclough, One Trading aims to address the lack of regulated venues in Europe by offering more sophisticated crypto products, including derivatives and spot trading, to both institutions and retail customers. With many traditional finance players lacking experience in the crypto market, there is a significant gap in providing long-term product confidence and success.

The latest product being launched is Instant Trade. Josh had the following to say about Instant Trade: “We’re really excited to be unraveling our latest product, Instant Trade, which brings our OTC product, typically reserved for institutional clients, to all customer types. Our customers can now trade 100+ pairs between crypto-assets and fiat seamlessly with great fiat on and off ramps at the click of a button, and commission-free trading. Most brokers charge a dealing fee when customers buy or sell assets, however, Instant Trade will have 0% commission, meaning there is no additional dealing fee charged on Instant Trade aside from the market spread applied. We’ve built up a deep pool of liquidity with a range of partners over the years, which everyone can access without having to trade hundreds of millions a day or hold ecosystem tokens.

We have a simplified, really easy to use UI and customers can even trade up to ten million euros in one trade. We’ll also be regularly adding new assets and our customers can rest assured that with our VASP license, we are a safe, secure, and regulated service, for anyone that isn’t a customer, you can test out Instant Trade on our website and compare our prices.

We’re really excited to hear feedback from our customers so do let us know what you think via our socials and community channels. We will also be releasing an article on the One Trading blog page specifically about Instant Trade, so keep an eye out for that on the website.”

“We want to make crypto trading safe and accessible for all and bridge the gap to provide an institutional-grade platform for all customer types. We have been rolling out a rebrand and a number of big infrastructure changes. We will be going live shortly with what we believe to be the fastest and most scalable exchange (< 250-microsecond order create/cancel) based on real-world metrics available to a shared retail and institutional audience. We aim to become a utility for large liquidity providers to exchange unlimited amounts of risk under a membership model instead of pay-per-trade and have low fees and deep books for retail with a number of liquidity protections. We will then start listing more products with appropriate controls and vetting as we move into derivatives. Above all we want a regulated, institutional-grade platform where people feel safe to trade with unique product options”. Josh Barraclough, CEO, One Trading.

One Trading intends to operate as a MiFID Trading Venue, which will augment its existing VASP license, and would allow its platform to offer capital-efficient spot and derivative products for all customer types. It also offers a higher level of protection for customers who will be vetted through stringent anti-money laundering (AML) and Know-your-customer (KYC) procedures as well as client appropriateness checks. The full-scale MiFID license will also allow One Trading to list financial instruments – removing the debate over whether a DLT asset is a token or a security – and will permit new products to be designed from the ground up with appropriate vetting, transparency and customer protection in mind.

One Trading’s platform also offers access to a high-touch and secure OTC trading service, enabling high-net-worth individuals and institutions access to a wide range of digital assets, with competitive fees, and deep pools of liquidity.

About One Trading

The One Trading team is based and headquartered in Europe with offices across Amsterdam, London, Milan, and Vienna. One Trading is regulated in the EU and has built its product and venue to meet the needs of European customers. One Trading’s mission is to bridge the gap between crypto and traditional asset trading with a single regulated trading platform for all customer types and all products.

Users can learn more about One Trading at their website: www.onetrading.com

Bitcoin Price at 2011 Levels Returns as Bitcoin BSC Launch Provides Chance to Earn Free Bitcoin Clone Tokens 7320

Back in 2011, the Bitcoin price was $1, but today, following the launch of the Bitcoin BSC coin crypto presale on the BNB Smart Chain, buyers can acquire the token at a similarly low price and earn free Bitcoin clone tokens too.

Bitcoin, the world’s leading cryptocurrency, is struggling right now after bulls were trapped as enthusiasm at the prospect of the SEC spot bitcoin ETFs getting speedy approval receded. The price retraced below the $26k level, but it has been a different story for Bitcoin clone derivative coins.

During the past three months, for example, the Bitcoin Cash (BCH) fork from Bitcoin is up 73%, while Bitcoin has fallen -2.3% in the same time period.

Meanwhile, a similar staking-based bitcoin derivative coin to Bitcoin BSC, BTC20, which launched a month ago, is up 52%.

In fact, BTC20 hit an all-time (ATH) intraday high of $6, equating to a 688% 7x gain on its $1 presale and listing price.

Yet another bitcoin clone derivative, this time BTC2.0, rose to an ATH of $1.06 to register a return of 538x, although the price has retraced markedly from its peak.

Earn free Bitcoin clone tokens with stake-to-earn Bitcoin BSC coin

Bitcoin BSC aims to match, or beat, the success of all of these Bitcoin clone coins, and to achieve that end it has a not-so-secret weapon – staking.

While the performance of BTC2.0, not to be confused with BTC20, since its heights has been somewhat underwhelming, there has been more of a steady-as-she-goes approach by the likes of BTC20.

That’s probably largely down to the ballast effect of staking, which bears down on any selling pressure that may emerge at listing.

In this way, Bitcoin BSC seeks to emulate BTC20 by adopting a similar design and strategy, providing the price with a stable platform for takeoff.

Like BTC20, Bitcoin BSC has staking utility built into its design from the outset.

However, it should be noted that there is one important difference between Bitcoin BSC and BTC20 – Bitcoin BSC is a BEP-20 BNB Smart Chain-compliant token, and BTC20 is an ERC-20 Ethereum-compliant token – hence the BSC in the name.

Staking has been popular in the crypto DeFi space, but enthusiasm waned in the aftermath of high-profile implosions of staking ecosystems such as Terra Luna.

However, the attractiveness of transparent staking that has a clearly defined source of yield, unlike the opaque algorithms in use on Terra Luna, has not gone away.

With $BTCBSC, which runs on the BNB Smart Chain, the yield is paid out over a 120-year period, in line with Bitcoin block confirmations. Altogether, 69% of the total token supply is allocated to distribute as rewards.

Staking provides token holders with a way of earning token rewards in proportion to how many coins of the total pool they deposit into a staking smart contract and the time they choose to stake for.

It is this staking feature that will deliver price support while offering both positive capital returns and income yield to network participants.

Bitcoin BSC staking is operative now, even before the coin lists on the decentralized exchange PancakeSwap.

You can keep an eye on how many token holders are staking by visiting the real-time Bitcoin BSC staking dashboard.

You can snap up Bitcoin BSC at the low Bitcoin 2011 price of $0.99

$BTCBSC can be bought today for $ 0.99 – the same price the Bitcoin was at back in its 2011 early days, and a far cry from the $25,7000 it will cost you to purchase Bitcoin at today’s prices.

Bitcoin BSC’s comparatively low price means contributors to the presale could be sitting on substantial upside potential when the Bitcoin halving bull run takes off.

The four-yearly event that sees block rewards halved on the original Bitcoin network has previously ushered in mind-melting bull runs.

This halving is expected to have the effect of lifting all boats – especially the prices of quality Bitcoin clone derivative coins such as $BTCBSC.

Bitcoin BSC has the same total token supply as Bitcoin – 21 million. Of that total supply, 29% is up for grabs through the presale of 6,125,000 tokens, meaning BTCBSC has an initial market cap of $6,063,750.

Two percent of the supply is reserved for DEX liquidity provision to guarantee smooth trading at launch and beyond.

The remaining 14,455,000 BTCBSC tokens (69% of supply) is reserved for staking rewards, which are paid out every 10 minutes as new blocks are added to the chain.

At that token emission rate, the maximum supply will be reached in about 120 years – the same time frame as Bitcoin.

Presale and post-presale investors can buy and stake tokens at any time with a 7-day lock on withdrawals.

Bear in mind that because BTCBSC runs on the BNB Smart Chain, to buy and stake in the presale, you will need to use BNB for your purchase. However, those buying with ETH today can start staking after the presale ends.

Faster, cheaper, more powerful and expandable than other Bitcoin clones

Still, staking is not the only advantage BTCBSC has over Bitcoin and the larger-cap clone coins such as Bitcoin Cash, and Bitcoin SV.

For one thing, $BTCBSC uses a proof-of-stake protocol, which means it runs on a much more scalable blockchain that is also cheaper and more efficient to transact on.

Because BTCBSC is built on the BNB Smart Chain, transaction fees are less than $0.10, compared to around $10 on Bitcoin and approximately $20 on Ethereum, depending on network conditions.

Another advantage BTCBSC has is its fast transaction speeds, which are typically less than 5 seconds compared to 10 minutes for Bitcoin, BCH, and BSV.

BNB Smart Chain is capable of running applications, too, so there’s no limit to future development possibilities for Bitcoin BSC.

Bitcoin BSC has a lot going for it, and with only $3,960,000 being raised in the presale, demand is sure to be robust.

Crypto market prices are generally becalmed, but there are waters where the current is much healthier. In the Bitcoin derivative clone sector, there’s all to play for as far as bagging out 10x gains goes.

Get in early, and the rewards will not just accrue to long-term stakers earning a generous APY, but also to those who want the chance to access life-changing returns.