Coinbase and Consensys lay off, concerns about centralization in Ether staking[Top news from 1/7 to 1/13]| coindesk JAPAN | Coindesk Japan

The withdrawal of investors from the cryptocurrency market has become an existential crisis for Coinbase, which derives about 90% of its revenue from transaction fees.

The US District Attorney for the Eastern District of New York and the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) are investigating money transfers between Digital Currency Group (DCG) and its subsidiary Genesis. Bloomberg reported late on Jan. 6.

Federal prosecutors have asked DCG and Genesis for interviews and documents, and the SEC appears to be conducting an early-stage investigation as well, it said. The article also cites a person familiar with the matter as saying that the two companies were not “accused of wrongdoing.” DCG is the parent company of CoinDesk.

Traders may be skeptical of the continued health of cryptocurrency exchange Huobi, according to on-chain data.

Huobi Token (HT) slumped after Huobi admitted to cutting its workforce by 20%, withdrawing $64 million worth of crypto assets from the exchange in 24 hours. Data from blockchain analytics firm Nansen show that the weekly outflow exceeded $100 million, compared to rival Kraken’s $22 million. is obvious.

Canadian bitcoin mining company Hive Blockchain made $3.15 million last December by cutting down on its electricity usage. This equates to approximately 184 Bitcoins (BTC). On the other hand, the actual mining mined 213.8 bitcoins equivalent.

Web3 startups and trading-related services will dominate crypto VC investments in 2022 and are likely to continue to do so in 2023, said Alex Thorne, head of research at crypto investment firm Galaxy Digital. (Alex Thorn) said.

Mr. Thorn appeared on CoinDesk TV on January 9th, and in crypto asset VC investment in 2022, Web3 sectors consisting of NFT, DAO (Decentralized Autonomous Organization), Metaverse, online games, etc. accounted for 31%, and trading-related platforms reportedly accounted for 13%.

Flare Networks’ native token, “Flare” (FLR), finally went public on the night of January 9 after waiting nearly two years after being heavily debated among community members. (XRP) was airdropped (distributed) to holders. Many of the holders who received it appear to have sold it quickly.

US cryptocurrency trading giant Coinbase has announced that it will cut about 950 employees as part of a restructuring that is expected to be completed by the end of the second quarter of 2023.

That figure represents about 20% of the roughly 4,700 employees, according to the company’s website.

Coinbase said in a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) on Jan. 10 that it is responding to “continuing market conditions impacting the crypto economy.”

Coinbase is trying to find new possibilities in Europe as the “crypto winter” cools the US market. But expansion into Europe may not be enough to reverse the company’s fortunes.

On the morning of January 10, the company announced layoffs of another 20% of its staff and shut down most of its operations in Japan.

ConsenSys, which develops applications and infrastructure for the Ethereum blockchain, including cryptocurrency wallet MetaMask, is laying off more than 100 staff, a person familiar with the matter said.

The company currently employs about 900 people. Planned layoffs appear to be in the final stages of approval, but the exact number of layoffs is unknown at this time.

Tech investor Cathy Wood bought Coinbase shares for the first time this year.

According to an investor email from Ark Investment Management, led by Wood, 33,756 shares in the “ARK Innovation ETF” closed at about $1.45 million on January 10, 2023. 200 million yen) was added.

The investment fund has been buying Coinbase shares in recent weeks.

AWS (Amazon Web Services), a cloud platform, has partnered with Ava Labs to promote the introduction of blockchain technology to companies and government agencies. Both companies made the announcement on January 11.

AWS will support the Avalanche blockchain infrastructure and Dapps (decentralized apps), making it easy to open and manage Avalanche nodes on AWS. In addition, Avalanche’s subnet function has been added to AWS Marketplace, allowing users to easily create subnets.

Grayscale Bitcoin Trust (GBTC) discount rates are back to eight-week highs.

GBTC, which has over $10 billion in assets under management, is up 17.5% year-to-date, while Bitcoin (BTC) is up about 5% to around $17,300. As a result, GBTC’s discount to Bitcoin has shrunk from 45% at the end of 2022 to about 38% for the first time in eight weeks. The discount rate hit a record high of 50% in December.

London-based Bitcoin (BTC) mining firm Argo Blockchain’s mining margins have risen to 48% in December 2022, the highest in a year, the company said Tuesday. It was announced in a document submitted to the London Stock Exchange.

“Margin” is a measure of profitability that is not defined in international accounting standards, and its calculation method may differ from company to company. The company’s margins had fallen from 75% in April, the highest in 2022, to 20% in August.

Nearly four months after the Ethereum blockchain successfully transitioned to Proof of Stake (PoS), Etherscan data shows Beacon Chain’s stake has exceeded 16 million Ethereum (ETH). rice field.

This figure represents more than 13% of the total Ethereum supply, worth about $22.38 billion at current prices. In 2020, PoS network beacon chain was introduced in advance and staking started.

Short traders betting on a decline in the overall cryptocurrency market have found themselves in a situation where a broad rally over the past 24 hours has seen nearly $200 million in short positions liquidated.

The move came as Bitcoin (BTC) and Ethereum (ETH) broke through key support levels, while major coins like XRP and Solana (SOL) rose as much as 20% and liquidated earlier this week. Short positions exceeding $ 150 million (about 19.6 billion yen) will be liquidated. A similar level of liquidation has not been seen since October last year, according to data from CoinGlass.

BLOCKSMITH & Co. and Thirdverse announced on January 12 that the blockchain game “Captain Tsubasa -RIVALS-“, which utilizes the IP of Japan’s leading soccer manga “Captain Tsubasa”, which is popular among World Cup players, has started service. bottom. BLOCKSMITH & Co. is a subsidiary of KLab, a major mobile game developer, that manages Web3-related businesses.

Cryptocurrency financial services provider Blockchain.com has announced that it will lay off about 110 people, or 28% of its total workforce, spurring a terrifying week of bloodshed across the battered cryptocurrency industry. I put it on.

Blockchain.com was hit in July with a $270 million loan to failed crypto hedge fund Three Arrows Capital, leaving about 150 people behind. It has been forced to cut staff, and the staff cuts on January 13 will follow this.

The price of Bitcoin Cash (BCH) surged nearly 10% in the past 24 hours as traders turned to the potential of the network ahead of a May 2023 hard fork.

According to the price chart, BCH crossed the support level of $108 on Jan. 13 and climbed to $125. Depending on buyers’ willingness, the move could accelerate to the next resistance level at $150.

｜Text and editing: coindesk JAPAN editorial department
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