PA Daily｜Microstrategy purchased another 6,455 bitcoins; Bank of China Hong Kong Branch considers providing services to crypto companies in Hong Kong

Today's news tips:
U.S. Congressman Tom Emmer has reintroduced the Blockchain Regulatory Certainty Act to Congress
Binance will open AI NFT generator Bicasso again on the 29th
Shanghai Huangpu: Provide financial support for key technology research projects in key areas such as Metaverse, Blockchain, and AI
Microstrategy buys another 6,455 Bitcoins
Bloomberg: Hong Kong branches of Bank of Communications, Bank of China and Shanghai Pudong Development Bank may consider providing services to crypto companies in Hong Kong
Twitter says part of its source code has been leaked and has launched an investigation
Data: The US government has seized $5.6 billion worth of Bitcoin, about 1.06% of the circulating supply
CoinShares: Digital asset investment products saw a net inflow of $160 million last week, the largest inflow since July 2022
Regulatory News
U.S. Congressman Tom Emmer has reintroduced the Blockchain Regulatory Certainty Act to Congress
U.S. House Majority Representative Tom Emmer announced Thursday that he has reintroduced the Blockchain Regulatory Certainty Act to Congress, which would ensure that developers and non-custodial service providers in the crypto space are not considered remitters and are not subject to the same level of regulation as custodial cryptocurrency exchanges. The bipartisan bill is co-led by Representative Darren Soto. Emmer first introduced a similar bill in 2018.
“By their very nature, cryptocurrency and blockchain technology do not fit easily into the frameworks that policymakers have considered in the past when crafting regulations,” said Emmer. “For too long, federal regulators and lawmakers have shoehorned the blockchain ecosystem into meaningless statutory definitions. The longer we delay providing this common-sense clarification, the greater the risk that this transformative technology will be pushed overseas, depriving domestic users and investors. This bill will help the United States maintain its technological leadership in the cryptocurrency space.”
The proposal was reportedly first introduced in Congress on August 17, 2021, but was not advanced further. The bill seeks to establish guidelines to remove certain obstacles and requirements for “blockchain developers and service providers.”
South Korean prosecutors again seek to arrest Terra co-founder Daniel Shin
According to Bloomberg, the Seoul Prosecutor's Office in South Korea confirmed on Monday that they are again seeking to arrest Terraform co-founder Daniel Shin, but did not provide further details. Shin's lawyer did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Shin's lawyer previously stated that Shin separated from Terraform Labs in 2020 and has not been involved in its operations since then.
Earlier in December last year, a South Korean court rejected an arrest warrant for Terra founder Daniel Shin. Seoul prosecutors said last year that Shin faces charges of fraud, dereliction of duty, violation of capital market laws and illegal fundraising. Do Kwon was recently arrested in Montenegro, and both South Korea and the United States are seeking his extradition.
NFT
The 1inch community rejected Solidity.io’s proposal to create an NFT aggregation market for it, but passed another similar proposal
The Snapshot voting page shows that the 1inch community rejected the proposal by Solidity.io to create an NFT market for the community with a 68.78% vote against rate. Some community members said that there were problems with the format, planning, and execution of the proposal. For example, the proposal did not add "1IP-#" at the beginning of the proposal title, and the implementation of the plan required cooperation with the 1inch Foundation. However, the statement of the proposal misled the community, and the two parties did not reach a cooperation.
In addition, another proposal of the community, 1IP-21, was passed with 71.44% support. The proposal also proposed to create an NFT aggregation market for the community. The development services will be outsourced to Blockchain App Factory (BAF). BAF will be aligned with the 1inch architecture and BE team to lead the development and execution of the proposed NFT market. The budget for the proposal is approximately US$387,000.
Luxury giant Gucci has reached a cooperation with Yuga Labs and may participate in Otherside this week
According to BusinessOffashion, luxury giant Gucci announced a partnership with Yuga Labs, which aims to "explore the interaction between fashion and entertainment in the metaverse and expand the interaction between the communities of the two companies." According to Robert Triefus, senior executive vice president of Gucci's corporate and brand strategy and CEO of Gucci Vault & Metaverse Ventures, Gucci will play a role in the ongoing narrative of Otherside and 10KTF. Last year, Gucci and 10KTF launched the "Gucci Grail" project, and Gucci is expected to participate in Yuga Labs' metaverse game Otherside this week.
Binance will open AI NFT generator Bicasso again on the 29th
Binance announced that it will make Bicasso available to everyone for free on March 29. The platform will be open for 12 hours and will limit the minting of 100,000 AI NFTs on a first-come, first-served basis. From 12:00 (UTC) on March 29, 2023 to 00:00 (UTC) on March 30, 2023, all eligible users with a Binance account can use Binance Bicasso to mint NFTs.
original universe
Baidu Wenxin Yiyan upgrades, enterprise-level large model service platform "Wenxin Qianfan" is released today
According to the Science and Technology Innovation Board Daily, the reporter learned from customers who attended the closed-door exchange meeting of Baidu Smart Cloud today that Baidu has officially launched the "Wenxin Qianfan" large model platform, which is a platform that Baidu provides enterprise-level large language model services to customers.
It is understood that the Wenxin Qianfan big model platform includes not only Wenxin Yiyan, but also Baidu's full set of Wenxin big models and corresponding development tool chains. In the future, Wenxin Qianfan will also support third-party open source big models.
In the real-time demonstration, Wenxin Qianfan can make PPT in three minutes, sell goods through digital live broadcast, book air tickets and hotels, etc. In terms of charging mode, Wenxin Qianfan's reasoning service call is charged at 0.012 yuan/1000 tokens, and the payment is based on the total number of words input and output.
Shanghai Huangpu: Provide financial support for key technology research projects in key areas such as Metaverse, Blockchain, and AI
According to Tonghuashun, the Huangpu District Science and Technology Committee and the Huangpu District Finance Bureau of Shanghai issued the "Huangpu District Policy Opinions on Accelerating the Development of Digital Industries", which pointed out that support for the agglomeration of digital industries and the creation of an industrial innovation ecosystem. Support the empowerment of digital technology and expand the application of digital scenarios. For projects that have obtained the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology's artificial intelligence industry innovation task list, Shanghai's special funds for promoting high-quality industrial development, etc. (informatization-related fields), district-level matching will be provided at a maximum of no more than 1:1, with a maximum of no more than 2 million yuan. For projects that are in line with the district's digital industry development orientation, independent research and development or joint industry-university-research cooperation in key areas such as artificial intelligence, integrated circuit design and manufacturing, metaverse, software and algorithms, quantum computing, new generation networks, and blockchain, after evaluation, for advanced, innovative, breakthrough or subversive projects, a one-time support of no more than 30% of the total project investment will be provided, with a maximum of no more than 2 million yuan.
Project News
Microstrategy buys another 6,455 Bitcoins
Microstrategy purchased 6,455 bitcoins for a total of approximately $150 million, with an average price of $23,238 per bitcoin. As of March 23, 2023, MicroStrategy, together with its subsidiaries, held approximately 138,955 bitcoins, with a total purchase price of approximately $4.14 billion and an average purchase price of approximately $29,817.
FDIC: First Citizens Bank has acquired Silicon Valley Bank and assumed all of its deposits and loans
The Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) announced on its website that it has signed a purchase and assumption agreement with First–Citizens Bank & Trust Company for all deposits and loans of Silicon Valley Bridge Bank. The 17 former branches of Silicon Valley Bridge Bank will open as First Citizens Bank & Trust Company on March 27, local time.
As of March 10, 2023, SVB Transition Bank had total assets of approximately $167 billion and total deposits of approximately $119 billion. Today’s transaction includes the purchase of approximately $72 billion of SVB Transition Bank, National Association’s assets, for a discounted price of $16.5 billion. Approximately $90 billion of securities and other assets will remain in receivership pending disposition by the FDIC. In addition, the FDIC has acquired equity appreciation rights in First Citizens BancShares, Inc., with a potential value of up to $500 million of these common shares.
The FDIC estimates that the failure of Silicon Valley Bank caused losses to its Deposit Insurance Fund (DIF) of approximately $20 billion. The exact cost will be determined when the FDIC terminates its receivership.
Bloomberg: Hong Kong branches of Bank of Communications, Bank of China and Shanghai Pudong Development Bank may consider providing services to crypto companies in Hong Kong
According to Bloomberg, people familiar with the matter said that the Hong Kong branches of China Communications Bank, Bank of China, and Shanghai Pudong Development Bank may have begun to provide banking services to local cryptocurrency companies or are investigating the field. People familiar with the matter said that in at least one case, a Chinese bank sales representative went to the office of a cryptocurrency company to promote its services.
Bank of China, Bank of Communications and Shanghai Pudong Development Bank did not respond to requests for comment as of press time.
The initiator of the XRP buyback proposal proposed the creation of an "XRP bank", and a former Ripple executive warned that this might be a scam
According to u.today, Jimmy Valle, the author of the XRP buyback proposal, proposed to create an XRP bank, allowing investors to deposit their XRP in the bank and then buy gold. If everyone in the XRP community agrees that 1 XRP is worth $10,000, then the bank will be one of the most valuable financial institutions.
However, this idea was criticized by Matt Hamilton, the former director of developer relations at Ripple, who even said that Jimmy Valle's proposal might be a scam. He pointed out that whether it is Bitcoin or XRP, the price is determined by the market, and it is not realistic to buy back XRP and directly link it to gold. Another well-known member of the XRP community, "Crypto Eri", holds a similar view, saying that this is not the game she wants to play with her assets. Ripple's current CTO David Schwartz also holds a similar view. Schwartz explicitly called this proposal a scam. He said that if someone promises high returns with low risks, they are likely to blackmail you.
Security company: Kokomo Finance experienced a Rug Pull, stealing about $4 million
According to security company CertiK, the lending protocol Kokomo Finance (KOKO) experienced a Rug Pull, stealing about $4 million in user funds. The project has now deleted all social media accounts.
Twitter says part of its source code has been leaked and has launched an investigation
According to a legal document cited by The New York Times, part of Twitter's source code has been leaked online. The report said that Twitter sent a copyright infringement notice to GitHub, an online collaboration platform for software developers, which posted the code last Friday, demanding the removal of the code. GitHub has deleted the code, adding that it is unclear how long the code has been leaked, but it may be at least several months. Twitter also asked the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California to order GitHub to identify the people who shared the code and downloaded it. The newspaper cited two people familiar with the internal investigation as saying that Twitter has launched an investigation into the leak.
Celsius creditors: Customers can file proof of claim against debtors by April 28
Celsius’ official Unsecured Creditors Committee (UCC) tweeted: “In a recent ruling on customer claims, Judge Martin Glenn stated that customers can only bring contractual claims for cryptocurrency against Celsius Network LLC, but Judge Glenn’s decision does not prevent customers from bringing non-contractual claims against all debtors, such as fraud, negligent misrepresentation, or other statutory or common law claims. In addition, in light of this court ruling, debtors now have a reopened deadline. Customers can file proofs of claim against any debtor until April 28.”
LaunchZone's early contract Bscex SwapX had a vulnerability that led to the theft of nearly $7.8 million in funds, and more than 34,000 addresses were at risk
According to Scam Sniffer, LaunchZone's early contract Bscex SwapX has a vulnerability, and $7,799,856 in funds have been stolen. Users who approved the contract in the early stage are at risk. 34,065 addresses are at risk. Users are requested to check and revoke authorization as soon as possible.
Yu Xian, the founder of SlowMist, commented: “Who would have thought that a wallet address authorization project 2-3 years ago would have a loophole, and many users have not cancelled the authorization. Some hackers have been constantly monitoring these wallet addresses with authorization risk exposure, and once they find funds, they will steal them.”
PANews reminds users that they can use revoke.cash to cancel contract authorizations that are not used recently.
Lawyer: Summary judgment in US SEC v. Ripple case may be announced this week
According to Coingape, the lawsuit between the US SEC and Ripple Labs is waiting for the US District Court to announce a summary judgment, and John Deaton, the "friend of the court" lawyer in the lawsuit, said that the judge's ruling will be announced in the next few weeks, and a summary judgment may be announced this week. This statement was issued when Ripple and the defendant submitted a written notice of supplemental authorization to support the fair notice defense.
Attorney Deaton added that XRP has the most attractive risk/reward ratio at the current point. If the court rules in favor of Ripple, it will be clear that XRP is not a security, which will significantly affect its price.
Important data
Data: The US government has seized $5.6 billion worth of Bitcoin, about 1.06% of the circulating supply
According to current statistics, as of March 25, 2023, the U.S. government holds 205,515 bitcoins worth $5.6 billion, accounting for approximately 1.06% of the circulating supply.
These bitcoins mainly come from three confiscations starting in 2020, including 69,369 BTC related to the Silk Road dark web seized in November 2020, 94,643 BTC seized from the Bitfinex hacker in 2022, and 51,326 BTC seized from James Zhong. According to a report released by Glassnode on March 9, 2023, some of these bitcoins have been transferred, reducing the total from 215,338 BTC to 205,515 BTC.
In addition, the amount of Bitcoin seized by the US government is second only to Grayscale (643,572), but exceeds the 132,500 BTC held by Microstrategy.
CoinShares: Digital asset investment products saw a net inflow of $160 million last week, the largest inflow since July 2022
According to CoinShares weekly data, digital asset investment products saw a net inflow of $160 million last week, the largest inflow since July 2022. After six consecutive weeks of outflows of $408 million, there was a clear turnaround. Among them, Bitcoin investment products were the main beneficiaries, with an inflow of $128 million, and investment products that shorted Bitcoin also saw an inflow of $31 million. Ethereum suffered an outflow of $5.2 million last week. A large number of altcoins saw inflows, the most notable of which were Solana, Polygon, and XRP, which received inflows of $4.8 million, $1.9 million, and $1.2 million, respectively.