Discussing Ethereum’s (ETH) hackathon in partnership with the Colorado State Lottery, Vitalik Buterin opined that in the future, such lotteries could benefit from Ethereum 2.0’s Verifiable Delay Function. No immediate use for Ethereum in the project The Ethereum creator will be one of the guests at the virtual opening ceremony for the Colorado State Lottery GameJam Hackathon. Jared Polis and Chainlink’s co-founder, Sergey Nazarov, will also be inattendance. Buterin does not believe that the Colorado Lottery will immediately start using the Ethereum blockchain for its games of chance, but suspects similar applications may utilize ETH 2.0’s randomness functions in the …

Avanti Bank & Trust, Wyoming-based pioneering financial institution planning to offer services to the crypto industry, has announced plans for a ‘stablecoin disruptor’ that’s designed to modernize U.S. dollar payments. In a July 23 announcement, Avanti said that the payment instrument, dubbed ‘Avit,’ is not a security and predicted it “will likely be treated as a cash equivalent” by regulators. Avit will be programmable via Avanti’s API. The firm believes Avit will see adoption among “institutional traders and corporate treasurers,” and described the monetary commodity as “a real-time payment settlement solution in US dollars that does not suffer from the …

The business of cryptocurrency custody is getting more competitive and lucrative by the day. The most recent announcement has come from Switzerland, where local family-owned bank Maerki Baumann announced on May 29 that it had expanded its cryptocurrency services through the introduction of crypto custody and trading. The private bank first announced its crypto initiatives in 2019 by extending business account services to blockchain companies. Thanks to regulatory approval from the Swiss Financial Market Supervisory Authority, Maerki Baumann will initially offer trading and custody services on five major cryptos including Bitcoin, Ether, XRP, Bitcoin Cash and Litecoin. The bank’s announcement …

On May 22, Wyoming’s Select Committee on Blockchain, Financial Technology and Digital Innovation technology convened in full for the first time, albeit virtually. Initially announced on May 17, the new select committee evolved from the previous Blockchain Task Force. Task force to select committee: What has changed? In today’s meeting, Chairman Chris Rothfuss commented on the committee’s new powers: “This is a select committee that is able to sponsor its own legislation. In the past, it was a task force that was not able to.” However, like a task force, a select committee has a limited timespan. Today’s agenda Speaking …

Cardano founder Charles Hoskinson has revealed why the University of Wyoming presented a more attractive choice than Harvard, MIT or Cornell for Input Output’s (IOHK’s) lab. IOHK, the company charged with the development of Cardano, donated $500,000 in ADA to the blockchain lab at the university earlier this year. The State of Wyoming is known for its progressive crypto legislation, which allowed former Wall Street executive Caitlin Long to establish the first crypto-native bank in the U.S. Hoskinson noted that the university was, “the first state institution in the entire United States to treat ADA like U.S. dollars.” Gender studies …

During Virtual Blockchain Week, Cointelegraph spoke with Caitlin Long — the founder and CEO of the upcoming bank that will service the crypto industry Avanti Bank & Trust, as well as the driving force behind regulatory changes in the state of Wyoming for allowing financial institutions to handle both crypto assets and fiat currencies. A Wall Street veteran, Caitlin Long ran Morgan Stanley’s pension solutions for a decade after holding a number of senior roles at Credit Suisse prior to transitioning to focus on the blockchain and crypto sector. Caitlin shared her perspective on the impact that the lack of …

Medici Land Governance, a blockchain subsidiary of retail giant Overstock, announced on April 13 that they will be developing a blockchain-based land registry platform for Carbon County, Wyoming. Per the signed Memorandum of Understanding with Carbon County, Medici will develop the platform in 2020 to provide a digital space for immutable records and a clear chain of title. The county then plans to transfer all existing information to the blockchain registry system. This marks Medici’s second achievement in bringing blockchain technology in land record maintenance. Earlier last year, they developed a similar platform for Wyoming’s Teton County, which made Teton …

Caitlin Long, a former Wall Street executive who has helped Wyoming enact 13 blockchain-enabling laws, is taking advantage of the progressive Wyoming legislature to establish a first crypto-native bank in the U.S. The bank’s name is Avanti, which means “forward” in Italian. Long made this announcement earlier today in a series of 29 tweets. She believes that “a critical piece of U.S. market infrastructure is missing – a regulated bank that can act as a bridge to the Federal Reserve for payments and [offer] custody for BIG institutional money.” 1/ INTRODUCING AVANTI BANK, a new US #bank to serve #digitalasset …

IOHK, the software company behind Cardano, announced on Feb. 14 a donation of $500,000 in Cardano (ADA) to support and develop the University of Wyoming’s (UW) Blockchain Research and Development Lab. Professor James Caldwell, Assistant Professor Mike Borowczak and Philip Schlump will co-direct the Advanced Blockchain Research and Development Lab. Professor Borowczak told Cointelegprah that IOHK’s donation will be used to support faculty and graduate students in developing practical applications for real-world blockchain use cases. He said: “This funding is meant to directly stimulate and develop a highly qualified workforce in the blockchain sector. Student researchers from undergraduate and graduate …

The United States’ state of Wyoming has unveiled a series of opt-in custody rules for its so-dubbed “blockchain banks,” covering areas such as forks, airdrops and staking. The rules were announced during the Fordham Law Blockchain Regulatory Symposium in New York on Nov. 11, according to a thread of tweets published by Wyoming Blockchain Task Force president Caitlin Long. “First-ever” regulatory provisions for crypto custodians in many areas Wyoming’s “blockchain banks” — legally known as “special purpose depository institutions” (SPDIs) — were approved by the Wyoming state legislature in February of this year and were introduced to serve those businesses …

Caitlin Long, a member of the Wyoming Blockchain Task Force, hinted at two new prospective state laws she believes will be highly popular among cryptocurrency developers and owners. In an interview during Peter McCormack’s podcast on Sept. 27, the 22-year Wall Street veteran and cryptocurrency activist reflected on the pioneering crypto legislation already passed — and reportedly planned — in her home turf, the United States state of Wyoming. New laws would protect blockchain developers as well as privacy of wallet keys According to Long, the first of the two new laws to reportedly be proposed will state that: “Anyone …

On Aug. 14, at least two American states introduced regulatory actions targeting the crypto space. First, Maryland’s attorney general announced that the state is participating in Operation Cryptosweep, a joint initiative of state and provincial securities regulators in the U.S. and Canada, wherein they launch probes into potentially fraudulent or noncompliant crypto investment programs. Then, the state of Nevada unveiled new requirements for crypto ATM owners, obliging them to obtain a transmission license. The first location granted by the license will cost business owners as much as $10,000, while every additional kiosk requires an extra $5,000 (however, bond requirements cannot …