Crypto market update
The situation in the crypto market worsened in the past 24 hours as Bitcoin dropped below the level of $60,000 for the first time since late October. Aside from a few exceptions, most of the altcoins bled out as well, with massive price dives from Binance Coin, Solana, Cardano, Terra, Litecoin, and more. Thus, the crypto market cap is down by $100 billion once again to $2.7 trillion on CoinGecko.
Bitcoin (BTC) is now trading at 60,681 USD (all data from Coingecko.com)
Ethereum (ETH) is now for 4,267 USD
PlatonCoin (PLTC) is now for 0,383 USD
Total marketcap is currently at 2.766 trillion USD
Daily news update
Bitcoin and whales: Blockchain.com notes an unknown wallet transferred more than 15,078 Bitcoin for a fee of only 0.00001660 BTC, worth about $0.99 at time of writing, earlier this week. The sending wallet now holds zero Bitcoin but would currently be the 53rd-richest Bitcoin address in the world were it not for the transfer, according to BitInfoCharts.
KuCoin and metaverse: KuCoin Labs, the company behind the world’s sixth-largest cryptocurrency exchange by trading volume with more than 500 crypto assets listed, announced on Wednesday that it would be launching a $100 million metaverse fund for early-stage projects. The money is also available for entities that develop blockchain-based games, nonfungible tokens, and decentralized applications. In addition, Kucoin will also provide business incubation services, branding, incentives, and business partnerships for developers selected into the fund.
China and metaverse: Chinese internet tech giants are stepping into the metaverse, particularly with games and social media. Last week, Tencent also said it has “a lot of tech and capability” to approach the metaverse, and has reportedly built a new studio for developing metaverse-related business. In addition, the entertainment giant ByteDance, which owns TikTok, has acquired VR glasses manufacturer Pico as a part of its metaverse strategies.
Russia and CBDC: Bank of Russia is preparing for a prolonged trial of the digital version of the national fiat to ensure this is a “full-fledged ruble,” the head of the monetary authority has emphasized. The regulator has put forward some conditions for the implementation of the new currency project. The monetary authority’s first requirement is that the digital currency be freely convertible to the other two forms of Russian fiat, cash and bank money, at a one-to-one ratio. The governor also remarked that another key condition for the success of the digital ruble is to make sure it does not accelerate inflation.