ICYMI - Last week in crypto: The Late Queen's meme coins, Binance delisting and Updates on Voyager ⚡
Elizabeth Inu? Come on, rugpullers. Be inventive 💡💭
Last week, Binance announced it's decision to delist major stablecoin trading pairs and convert them to its own stablecoin—BUSD. Meanwhile, Voyager set to auction its assets to the highest bidder and new meme token seeks jail term for Do Kwon. The death of the Queen brought a time of mourning to many last week, but crypto con-artists seized it to launch cash-grab projects.
Binance set to delist major Stablecoins, convert them to BUSD
The largest cryptocurrency exchange in the world by volume, Binance, said last Monday that it was blocking three stablecoins that compete with its own Binance USD currency (BUSD). According to Binance, the move will increase exchange liquidity and capital efficiency.
Binance will begin automatically converting users' USD coin (USDC), Pax dollar (USDP), and true USD (TUSD) holdings into BUSD on September 29. On September 12, the exchange's payment provider Binance Pay will likewise stop supporting those coins.
Binance is closing all related trading pairs and suspending spot, future, and margin trading with the targeted coins. Users will reportedly still be able to withdraw money in USDC, USDP, and TUSD, just not on the exchange itself.
It's difficult to deny that BUSD is already well-liked, even though some who claim that this is an obvious power grab raise novel antitrust issues have a point. It is a strong substitute for the other stablecoins pegged to the US dollar. Without a doubt, the exchange's liquidity situation will become better.
Since Binance eliminated trading fees for bitcoin (BTC) on its platform this summer, BUSD has steadily increased its share of stablecoin trading volumes to become the third-largest stablecoin by market value.
With a valuation of roughly $52 billion, USDC from Circle, the most significant of the impacted coins, is the second-largest stablecoin. With capitalizations of slightly over $1 billion and just under $1 billion, respectively, TUSD and USDP rank sixth and seventh among stablecoins.
Binance will also restrict access to its loans, staking services, and decentralized finance (DeFi) accounts as part of the change. Contrary to popular belief, Circle CEO Jeremy Allaire stated in a tweet that the "converged dollar books on Binance... is a good thing" for the stablecoin.
Voyager Digital set to Auction Assets on Sept. 13
As part of its restructuring strategy, Voyager Digital has declared that it will auction off the remaining of its assets on September 13. The lending firm, amidst bankruptcy, will auction off its remaining assets over the course of September.
According to the publication, assets owned by Voyager will be sold to the highest bidder.
These plans were disclosed in a string of tweets sent out by the financially challenged crypto lending firm last week on September 7.
“We want to let you know that multiple bids were submitted as part of the company’s restructuring process,” Voyager wrote.
Voyager noted that after the auction is over later this month, it will "provide further information about the winning bidder" and the ramifications for customers.
On September 13, the auction is set to take place, and on September 29, a court hearing will approve the auction's outcomes.
Initial proposals have already been submitted to Voyager as the deadline for entries was September 6. According to reports from BNN Bloomberg, the company got many reasonable bids, forcing the impending auction.
The majority of the companies taking part in the bidding process are unknown. In July, FTX and Alameda Research submitted an unsolicited bid that Voyager rejected. Later, on August 4, a court document said that 22 parties were in active negotiations with Voyager and that 88 interested parties had contacted the company.
According to a different Coindesk article, Binance is one among the parties with an interest. Additionally, according to that story, FTX has not given up on the deal despite having previously rejected it.
Voyager first halted withdrawals on July 1st, more over two months ago. Early in August, it was granted authorization to resume withdrawals. It is unclear whether the business actually carried out its plans to allow withdrawals with a daily maximum of $100,000 on August 11 as stated at the time.
Regardless, Voyager's restructuring strategy should be advanced by the impending auction and it should be able to reimburse its clients.
JailKwon: New Meme token wants Do Kwon JAILED!
A cryptocurrency startup has released a token dubbed "JailKwon" in homage of Do Kwon, Terra's infamous leader. The project's team has referred to it as a meme coin.
Do Kwon is still a target for the cryptocurrency community months after Terra's stunning collapse.
A new cryptocurrency project dubbed "JailKwon" launched on BNB Chain on September 3 and is the most recent group to criticize the founder of the failed blockchain. The project's 12-page whitepaper states that the token intends to be the first cryptocurrency that users can learn to earn with. On PancakeSwap, it is now tradable under the ticker JKWON.
“Every time you see or hear Do Kwon, LUNA, [or] LUNC the Jail Kwon token will never be far from thought” the document reads, adding that Kwon’s infamy would provide the token with a lifetime of “free marketing and spontaneous pumps.”
Ironically, the project states that it would utilize the money to provide private lessons about cryptocurrency security and market analysis, despite the fact that the whitepaper is incredibly devoid of information. According to an official from JailKwon, the effort "wants to shed light on what transpired" in the Terra disaster.
In late 2021 and early 2022, Kwon rose to fame in the cryptocurrency community as Terra flourished despite a downturn in the overall market. Terra grew in popularity as Kwon and the Luna Foundation Guard developed a strategy to amass billions of dollars' worth of Bitcoin as a reserve fund for Terra, but he had a fall from glory when the blockchain's algorithmic stablecoin UST lost its peg to the dollar in May. The incident set off a death spiral that caused Terra's LUNA to almost completely collapse, wiping out the entire $40 billion cryptocurrency market in a matter of days. Numerous legal actions have been filed against Kwon and the Terra development firm Terraform Labs in both South Korea, the United States and other regions. Among other things, Kwon has been accused of tax fraud, racketeering, misleading investors, and running a Ponzi scheme.
JailKwon's flimsy whitepaper suggests that the initiative is unlikely to fulfill its educational claims, despite its seeming good intentions. It might suffer after the initial enthusiasm wears off, like most other meme coins. According to CoinGecko data, JKWON has increased 17.8% as at the time of writing. Similar parabolic surges in 2021 were memorable for other well-known meme coins like Dogecoin and Shiba Inu, but they crashed as the market trended downward. From their all-time highs, DOGE and SHIB are currently down 91.4% and 85.4%, respectively.
Crypto Vultures Capitalize on Queen Elizabeth's Death
Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II was confirmed dead by Buckingham Palace on Thursday. Although her loss triggered a global outpouring of sympathy and grief, it has also been exploited as a cash-grab.
Only a few hours following the Queen's passing, more than 40 meme tokens bearing her name were released.
The Queen is dead, but grift lives forever.
There are over 40 meme coins on Ethereum and the Binance Smart Chain thanks to Queen Elizabeth's passing (and at least one exploitative NFT collection).
While the news of the British monarch's demise was met with sadness by people all around the world, cryptocurrency scammers took advantage of the occasion to launch dozens of meme coins with Queen themes on Ethereum and Binance's BNB Chain.
“Queen Elizabeth Inu,” “Queen Doge,” “God Save The Queen,” “London Bridge Is Down,” “Queen Grow,” “Rip Queen Elizabeth,” “Elizabeth II,” and “Queen Inu II” are but a few of the crypto coins that were launched; other tokens named after the new monarch, King Charles III, have also made an appearance. At least 40 different meme coins seem to have been created in the last six hours, according to DexScreener.
The most liquid tokens, Save The Queen and Queen Elizabeth Inu, have already processed trade volumes of around $700,000 and $200,000, respectively, since their debut. At the time of writing, the price of Queen Elizabeth Inu is up 1,517%, while it has increased by 23,271% on Binance Smart Chain and 3,708% on Uniswap. Prices are incredibly unstable and exceedingly unlikely to hold.
The "Queen Elizabeth 69 Years NFT" NFT set has reportedly also been produced. One image is said to represent each year of the Queen's reign in the collection. The project's aims should be questioned in light of the fact that Elizabeth II reigned for 70 years, not 69.
The crypto community, which is known for its gallows humor typically, mainly reacted negatively to the initiatives. When told about the NFT collection, NFT aficionado ThreadGuy said, "You're going to hell." Trader Byzantine General declared, "We've got to stop this crypto stuff."
Queen Elizabeth was born in 1926. She was the longest-reigning British monarch in history and passed away in Balmoral Castle at the age of 96.
Chainalysis Helps to Recover $30M From Axie Infinity, Ronin Hack
With Chainalysis' assistance, more than $30 million that was stolen during an attack on the Ronin Network this year has been recovered.
Law enforcement has used chainalysis to retrieve $30 million in stolen cryptocurrency.
Erin Plante, senior director of investigations for Chainalysis, spoke about the investigation at Axie Infinity's AxieCon.
Plante stated that of the $600 million previously taken from Ronin Network, $30 million was recovered by law enforcement with the assistance of Chainalysis and other groups.
Most of the funds were stolen from Axie Infinity, a popular decentralized game built on Ronin Network. The $30 million of recovered funds represents 10% of the amount stolen from Axie Infinity, accounting for price differences over time.
The attack was carried out by Lazarus Group, an infamous state-backed hacking group based in North Korea. Plante stated that the recovery marks “the first time ever that cryptocurrency stolen by a North Korean hacking group has been seized.”
Chainalysis also detailed the process of the Ronin attack. It explained that Lazarus Group gained access to the private keys of Ronin Network validators, then withdrew and laundered funds. Tornado Cash, recently sanctioned by the U.S. Treasury, was one tool the group used to swap tokens and launder funds.
Also, Chainalysis cited that its ability to trace these transactions relied on blockchain transparency as well as cooperation between the public and private sectors. It said that its investigation would “never be possible in traditional financial channels.”
The attack on Ronin Network occured in March of this year. Lazarus Group was linked to be the culprits in the attack in April.
Other attempts to recover funds also occurred at that time. Leading crypto exchange Binance recovered $5.8 million from the attack in April. Meanwhile, Axie Infinity developer Sky Mavis dedicated a $150 million fundraiser to user compensation.
Ronin Network reopened in June, assuring users that its newly designed platform had undergone full security audits.
We’ve got big news coming up soon
Stay tuned and have a wonderful merge week!
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