Blaine Luetkemeyer, a House Representative from Missouri, revisited the issue of major companies exerting control over vast swaths of the Internet, something he expressed concerns about encroaching in the crypto space. Speaking at a Wednesday hearing on digital assets with the The House Committee on Financial Services, Luetkemeyer addressed Bitfury CEO and former Acting Comptroller of the Currency Brian Brooks in saying that major tech firms including Instagram, Facebook — now Meta — and Twitter “control people on their platforms.” Luetkemeyer asked whether this level of control could extend to undue influence for the rollout of a digital dollar. “The …

In his monthly crypto tech column, Israeli serial entrepreneur Ariel Shapira covers emerging technologies within the crypto, decentralized finance (DeFi) and blockchain space, as well as their roles in shaping the economy of the 21st century. Sometimes a project’s name tells you all you need to know about it, no matter how niche. Take Kryptomon, for example, the NFT game that recently completed a 24-hour sale in one second. You understand, based on its name, that some kinds of cutesy monstrosities evolving and fighting one another must be involved, and you know it must be blockchain-based. Clear, concise and to …

Decentralized leveraged trading platforms are growing in popularity but fail to provide an ideal experience for traders. These platforms often charge high fees on leveraged trades, are subject to scams and often don’t provide the actual price of a crypto asset. Instead, leveraged trading platforms have users investing in a derivatives contract over the actual asset. gTrade developed by Gains Network is a decentralized leverage trading platform looking to solve the problems with traditional leveraged trading platforms. A median offering gTrade is a decentralized leveraged trading platform enabling users to speculate on the real spot price of listed assets as …

On Monday, the Bank of International Settlement, or BIS, a financial institution owned by central banks worldwide, published a report scrutinizing the development of the decentralized finance, or DeFi, industry. The article opened by saying, "There is a "decentralization illusion" in DeFi since the need for governance makes some level of centralization inevitable, and structural aspects of the system lead to a concentration of power." It continued: If DeFi were to become widespread, its vulnerabilities might undermine financial stability. These can be severe because of high leverage, liquidity mismatches, built-in interconnectedness and the lack of shock absorbers such as banks.' …

The endless cookie settings that pop up for every website feel a bit like prank compliance by an internet hell-bent on not changing. It is very annoying. And it feels a little bit like revenge on regulators by the data markets, giving the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) a bad name and so that it might seem like political bureaucrats have, once again, clumsily interfered with the otherwise smooth progress of innovation. The truth is, however, that the vision of privacy put forward by the GDPR would spur a far more exciting era of innovation than current-day sleaze-tech. As it …

In her monthly Expert Take column, Selva Ozelli, an international tax attorney and CPA, covers the intersection between emerging technologies and sustainability, and provides the latest developments around taxes, AML/CFT regulations and legal issues affecting crypto and blockchain. On Nov. 14, Tezos-based nonfungible token (NFT) marketplace Hic Et Nunc — which in Latin means “here and now” — abruptly shut down. Artists became worried about their NFTs on exhibit at the Hermitage Museum’s first-ever NFT exhibition, “Ethereal Aether” (Nov. 10 to Dec. 10), as well as Art Basel Miami’s first-ever NFT exhibition, “Humans + Machines: NFTs and the Ever-Evolving World …

Nearly every segment of the crypto sector underwent explosive growth in 2021. The steady inflow of institutional funds could possibly be interpreted as a signal that the best is yet to come. For new users, figuring out how to obtain cryptocurrency can be a tedious task, and the challenge of securing the assets off exchanges is another hurdle some investors find difficult to overcome. Here’s a rundown of some of the most used cryptocurrency soft wallets that support a wide swath of tokens and offer users access to decentralized finance (DeFi), nonfungible tokens (NFTs), staking opportunities and airdrops. MetaMask MetaMask …

Welcome to the latest edition of Cointelegraph’s decentralized finance newsletter. A week packed with positive advancements in the DeFi space including nine-figure fund raises, successful product launches and soaring token prices was somewhat tarnished by the news of two severe security exploits. Read on to get the full scope of developments across the week. What you’re about to read is the smaller version of this newsletter designed for brevity. For the full version of DeFi’s developments over the last week, drop your email below. Borderless Capital launches $500M fund to support Algorand ecosystem Capital venture firm Borderless Capital announced the …

0x protocol and Celo blockchain have announced a joint partnership to allocate $4.5 million — consisting of $3 million CELO and $1.5 million ZRX — towards the growth of 0x’s ecosystem via its community-centric decentralized autonomous organization (DAO). The news follows an agreement penned in mid-November between the two firms to integrate a zero-cost 0x API functionality on the Celo blockchain to enhance the experience of DeFi developers seeking to access multi-chain aggregated decentralized exchange (DEX) liquidity services. Celo is an open-source collective of tech, nonprofit and nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) unified to promote greater global access to decentralized applications (dApps) …

The revolutionary world of decentralized finance comes with its own set of harsh realities. One of them being, the unpredictable nature of yields on lending platforms that are often reliant on real-time market demand and supply dynamics. To offset the risk involved in permissionless lending, DeFi lending platforms typically require collateral that even exceeds the borrowed amount. Not only does this create an “artificial limit” on demand for loans, but it also leads to low yields that are exceeded by those offered on centralized platforms. Moreover, while the premise of decentralized lending was meant to eliminate middlemen that benefit from …

“My mom cried when I got the job as valet at the Bored Ape Yacht Club, one of the preeminent social clubs for apes. She hooted and grunted and peeled open one of our finest bananas. ‘Jenkins,’ she said, ‘you’re going to rub shoulders with some of the finest apes from around the world.’ I rolled my eyes. She had a knack for embellishment, and I was only going to be a valet after all.” Jenkins the Valet is a wide-eyed, brown-furred service ape rather ordinary in appearance, but in the attire of his work vest and Irish boho hat, …

IDEX, a decentralized cryptocurrency exchange (DEX) based in San Francisco, has announced the upcoming launch of its v3 Hybrid Liquidity DEX on Polygon. The hybrid model will merge traditional order book functionalities with automated market maker (AMM) liquidity pools in a bid to cultivate higher financial returns for the services liquidity providers, as well as provide typical investing tools such as stop-losses, limit orders and real-time execution. According to the platform, operating on the Polygon network enables lower transaction costs to the value of "10,000-100,000x cheaper" than typically witnessed on Ethereum layer-1, in addition to benefitting from the networks full-stack …