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Bitcoin.com, one of the world’s leading cryptocurrency wallet developers and news portals, has partnered with the Busan International Film Festival as a major sponsor. The Busan International Film Festival (BIFF), held annually in South Korea, is one of the most significant film festivals in all of Asia. By sponsoring the event Bitcoin.com seeks to support artistic endeavors and reach new audiences. The 28th Busan International Film Festival will take place on October 4-13, 2023 at the Busan Cinema Center in Busan, South Korea. The festival will showcase the best of Asian cinema and feature various events and programs, such as master classes, open talks, hand-printing ceremonies, and awards ceremonies. The opening film will be Because I Hate Korea by Jang Kun-jae, and the closing film will be The Movie Emperor by Ning Hao. The festival will also honor Hong Kong star Chow Yun-fat with the Asian Filmmaker of the Year award. You can find more information about the festival on its offici

U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) Chairman Gary Gensler has explained why the securities regulator is taking a litigation-heavy strategy to regulate the crypto industry. The SEC chair insisted that enforcement actions against crypto firms are not brought with a political agenda, emphasizing that he is protecting the American public. “This is a field where the American public is at risk and being harmed every day on these platforms that are commingling and often trading against their customers,” he cautioned. Gensler Reveals Why SEC Focuses on Litigation in Regulating Crypto The chairman of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), Gary Gensler, testified before the House Financial Services Committee on Wednesday. During the hearing, several members of Congress raised questions about cryptocurrency and the regulation of crypto tokens. Congressman John Rose (R-TN) asked Gensler: “Regarding cryptocurrencies … I’m interested in why you have pursued a litigation-hea

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission’s former head of internet enforcement says former U.S. President Donald Trump’s anti-crypto stance may change dramatically . He further predicted that if a Republican is elected U.S. president, a Republican-appointed SEC chair would, at a minimum, approve a bitcoin exchange-traded fund (ETF) and “may even slow down considerably SEC crypto-related enforcement efforts.” Former SEC Official on Donald Trump’s Anti-Crypto Stance Former U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) official John Reed Stark has argued that former President Donald Trump could “dramatically” change his position on cryptocurrencies. Stark is currently president of cybersecurity firm John Reed Stark Consulting. He founded and served as chief of the SEC Office of Internet Enforcement for 11 years. He was also an SEC enforcement attorney for 15 years. Trump is running for president in 2024. “Former President Trump is on record as being strongly anti-bitcoin and anti-c

Rich Dad Poor Dad author Robert Kiyosaki has predicted that bitcoin will “become priceless” when the Federal Reserve launches a central bank digital currency (CBDC). He warned that privacy will be destroyed, emphasizing that “Big Brother will be watching.” The famous author urged investors to start accumulating bitcoin now “before it’s too late.” Robert Kiyosaki’s CBDC Warning, Urges Investors to Start Saving Bitcoin Now The author of Rich Dad Poor Dad, Robert Kiyosaki, has warned about the risks of the Fed launching a central bank digital currency (CBDC). Rich Dad Poor Dad is a 1997 book co-authored by Kiyosaki and Sharon Lechter. It has been on the New York Times Best Seller List for over six years. More than 32 million copies of the book have been sold in over 51 languages across more than 109 countries. Kiyosaki explained in a post on social media platform X Friday that the Federal Reserve’s central bank digital currency is coming and when that happens, privacy will be gone. “B

In the wake of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission’s (SEC) call to depose Terraform Labs creator and former CEO Do Kwon, the SEC unveiled an alleged exchange between him and his former associate Daniel Shin. The ex-Terra boss reportedly claimed he could fabricate transactions on the Terra blockchain to render them authentic and accrue fees, further penning that he could strive to render the doctored transactions “indiscernible.” ‘I Can Just Create Fake Transactions’ — SEC Publishes Leaked Chat Between Kwon and Shin Court filings submitted by the SEC show a purported conversation between the Terraform Labs founder and former CEO Do Kwon and his business partner the former CEO of Chai, Daniel Shin . “Kwon perpetrated a scheme to fabricate Chai transactions on the Terraform blockchain to make it appear more active, all to dupe investors,” the SEC filing claims. The U.S. securities regulator added: For instance, in an extensive private chat between Kwon and Daniel Shin2 duri

Bitcoin miners have been steadily clearing the mempool of unconfirmed transactions since the number almost reached 700,000 on September 6, 2023. Currently, the number of unconfirmed transactions has dropped to just over 153,000 pending confirmation. Transaction Backlog Shrinks as Bitcoin Miners Face Fewer Inscriptions On September 15, 2023, just over 500,000 unconfirmed bitcoin transfers lingered, awaiting miner confirmation, a decrease from the nearly 700,000 a week prior. Yet, as the curtain fell in September, the tally of unconfirmed transactions dwindled to a smidge over 153,000 . Data from both mempool.space and Johoe’s mempool statistics reflect that a substantial portion of the unconfirmed transfers have been processed. A couple of factors have augmented the miners’ capacity to navigate through the immense sea of unconfirmed transactions in the queue. Firstly, block times have been shaving off a fraction of their 10-minute average, clocking in at around 8 minutes and 48

A calendar has been set for the upcoming trial of United States v. Bankman-Fried, with jury selection beginning October 3, 2023. The FTX founder, Sam Bankman-Fried, was denied temporary release from prison but will be allowed to use an “air-gapped,” internet-disabled laptop for note-taking in the courtroom. In the coming month and a half, the public will likely hear testimonies from FTX senior personnel such as Zixiao (Gary) Wang, Caroline Ellison, Nishad Singh, and Ryan Salame. The Bankman-Fried Trial Kickoff Next week, the co-founder and former FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried is set to face trial following charges leveled by the U.S. government. The litany of accusations against him includes wire fraud conspiracy, wire fraud, commodities fraud conspiracy, securities fraud conspiracy, and money laundering. The charges are associated with FTX’s collapse after the once-$32 billion crypto empire failed in November 2022. Bankman-Fried is the only one named in the lawsuit and on September 2

U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has postponed its decisions on the spot bitcoin exchange-traded funds (ETFs) proposed by several companies. The delays of the applications of financial powerhouse Blackrock, asset manager Valkyrie and others come ahead of an expected government shutdown that would affect the SEC. U.S. Securities Regulator Pushes Back Verdicts on Multiple Bitcoin ETF Applications The future of a number of attempts to issue spot bitcoin ETFs in the United States remains unclear after the country’s regulatory body overseeing the securities market delayed its decisions again. The move concerns the high-profile application of investment giant Blackrock as well as those of Valkyrie, Bitwise, and Invesco, according to filings on Thursday. The development follows the postponing of the verdict on the Ark 21shares and Global X spot bitcoin ETFs earlier this week. The first was jointly proposed by Cboe BZX Exchange, 21shares, and Ark Invest, while the second was

Virginia’s Democratic representative Don Beyer has ushered in a fresh bill mandating the documentation of off-chain transactions and over-the-counter (OTC) crypto engagements by cryptocurrency exchanges, to be catalogued in a repository under the purview of the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission. New Legislation Targets Off-Chain Transfers in Crypto Industry Representative Don Beyer (D-VA), has unveiled a new legislative piece reportedly aimed at safeguarding stakeholders in the digital assets arena. Titled the “Off-Chain Digital Commodity Transaction Reporting Act,” this bill mandates “trading platforms to report all transactions to a repository registered with the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC).” Beyer posits that crypto trading platforms bear the responsibility for “reporting all such transactions to a registered digital asset repository of transactions as soon as technically practicable after the execution of each such transaction.” Under Beyer’s legislatio

Numerous reports foretell an imminent U.S. government shutdown, given the anticipated failure of a spending bill to secure passage by Saturday evening — a measure meant to sustain operations till mid-November. On the cusp of this shutdown, bitcoin ( BTC ) has been on an ascent, catching the eye of many. Coinshares analyst Luke Nolan notes a buoyant sentiment among some traders, who view the government’s looming closure with a favorable lens. Bitcoin Rides the Wave of Uncertainty as U.S. Braces for Government Shutdown The U.S. government could shut down this weekend if Democrats and Republican policymakers can’t come to an agreement on spending. Currently, there’s a bill on the table that aims to extend the government’s pay until mid-November, but a number of Republicans and Kevin McCarthy, the current House of Representatives speaker, are not budging on negotiations. The two chambers find themselves at a deadlock, and should the bipartisan proposal aimed at averting a shutdown fai

Su Zhu, a founding member of the now-insolvent Three Arrows Capital, was apprehended in Singapore at Changi Airport on Friday, as per the firm’s liquidator, Teneo. Zhu received a four-month prison sentence for failing to cooperate in the bankruptcy proceedings, Teneo revealed. Crackdown at Changi Airport: 3AC’s Su Zhu Detained, Associate Kyle Davies Fugitive Teneo, overseeing the liquidation of Three Arrows Capital, reported that co-founder Su Zhu was seized and sentenced to four months’ incarceration. His associate, Kyle Davies, remains at large; however, Teneo confirmed he was given an identical penalty. Zhu allegedly tried to flee Singapore when he was intercepted at Changi Airport, situated approximately 25 miles east of Singapore’s Downtown Core. The Singapore court decreed that Zhu and Davies had not been collaborating with the liquidation procedure – an issue previously reported by the media months prior to his apprehension. The defunct Singapore-based cryptocurrency hedge

Amid the soaring network difficulty, Bitcoin’s hashrate remains resilient, firmly holding above the 400 exahash per second (EH/s) frontier. A total of 43 mining pools channel their hashpower at the Bitcoin blockchain, yet, it’s Foundry USA’s pool that ruled the roost this month, seizing a 29.36% share of the total hashrate over the past 30 days. Bitcoin Miners Unfazed: Hashrate Remains Strong Despite Soaring Difficulty The forthcoming difficulty adjustment, slated for October 3, 2023, looms, yet the climb to a formidable 57.12 trillion in difficulty hasn’t swayed miners. Metrics spanning seven days signal that the hashrate has averaged at a robust 417 EH/s, especially after cresting to an all-time high (433 EH/s) on September 19 concerning seven-day averages. On Friday, September 29, a collective of 43 mining pools are channeling their SHA256 hashrate into the network. A mere two days ago, Bitcoin’s hash price index dipped beneath the $60 per petahash daily marker, yet with BTC ’s

The Venezuelan government has officially announced the extension of the restructuring period for Sunacrip — the national cryptocurrency watchdog — by six months more due to the link of its former head with a corruption scheme. Asonacrip, a national crypto association, is asking Sunacrip to open communication channels with the community affected by its actions. Venezuelan Government Extends Sunacrip Intervention by Six Months The Venezuelan government has announced the extension of the restructuring of Sunacrip, the cryptocurrency watchdog of the country, by six months more. The executive order, which extended the intervention, also ratified each member of the restructuring board in their charges. Sunacrip will now have until next March to complete its restructuring processes. Sunacrip was intervened in March due to the arrest of its former head, Joselit Ramirez, who was arrested due to alleged links with a corruption scheme where the institution would have served as an intermedia

Meta Platforms, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram, launched its own chatbot based on artificial intelligence (AI) technology. Meta AI provides an alternative to products like Openai’s Chatgpt and is setting out to offer interaction tailored to attend to different interests and solve specific tasks. Zuckerberg Unveils Meta AI Chatbot, AI Personas at Meta Connect Event Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced the launch of the U.S. tech giant’s new AI-powered assistant in a keynote speech at the Meta Connect developers conference on Wednesday. The chatbot will compete against the already established player in the space, Chatgpt, and other offerings like Google’s upcoming Gemini. It became clear from Zuckerberg’s presentation that Meta’s approach to the development of AI differs from the rest of the industry in that the company does not believe in a “singular superintelligence” for everyone. In its view, most people would rather have a number of AIs for different purposes or eve

Following the letter of intent to acquire Fortress Trust, Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse announced the company has decided “not to move forward with an outright acquisition.” Garlinghouse didn’t cite specific reasons for dropping the deal but said Ripple planned to remain an investor in Fortress. Garlinghouse Announces Ripple’s Withdrawal From Fortress Trust Deal On Thursday, Ripple’s CEO confirmed the company has shelved its plans to purchase crypto custodian firm Fortress Trust. The Nevada-licensed financial services provider, founded by Scott Purcell, former CEO of the now-defunct crypto custodian Prime Trust , caught Ripple’s interest in early September 2023. At the time, Garlinghouse expressed Ripple was “excited to bring on this team and its technology to accelerate our business.” Garlinghouse has since addressed the public on social media platform X, explaining the deal isn’t proceeding. “A few weeks ago, we signed a letter of intent to acquire Fortress Trust – we’ve since ma

In a recent interview, the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development’s (EBRD) chief economist, Beata Javorcik, highlighted a notable trend: Russia’s growing inclination to transact in the Chinese yuan. This shift, the economist emphasized, could challenge the dominance of the U.S. dollar. “[The] increase in the usage of the Chinese currency is coming at the expense of the U.S. dollar,” Javorcik remarked on Wednesday. EBRD Report, Chief Economist Beata Javorcik Emphasizes Russia’s Shift to Chinese Yuan Beata Javorcik, the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development’s (EBRD) lead economist, touched on Russia’s increasing preference for the Chinese yuan in trade dealings. Her observations coincide with a period where the U.S. dollar’s stake in global reserves has slipped below 60% . Concurrently, Russia and numerous BRICS countries are veering away from leveraging the greenback in trade. “You see that this increase in the usage of the Chinese currency is coming at the exp

Coinbase has received a regulatory stamp of approval to start offering perpetual futures trading to retail crypto traders outside the U.S., opening up access to the $5.5 trillion global derivatives market. Coinbase Extends Perpetual Futures Trading to Retail Traders Abroad The Bermuda Monetary Authority (BMA) granted Coinbase International Exchange, the company’s new non-U.S. exchange, a license last week to extend its futures trading services to retail investors across the world, except residents in the U.S. With the approval, Coinbase is poised to expand its derivatives services to more customers globally through its Coinbase Advanced platform in the coming weeks. “As the most trusted and safest name in crypto, Coinbase will operate with maximum transparency, employ a robust risk framework, and meet the high-bar regulatory and compliance standards of the BMA,” the Coinbase announcement said. The company sees regulatory approval as an opportunity to further its mission of updat

PRESS RELEASE. September 28, 2023 – The 2023 Global Digital Mining Summit (WDMS) concluded successfully in Singapore, exploring the future trends and investment opportunities in the Web 3.0 mining ecosystem. During the event, Bitmain unveiled its latest high-hashrate miner, the S21, and commenced accepting pre-orders. As Bitmain’s exclusive cloud mining partner, BitFuFu platform has opened the S21 miner pre-purchase. The S21 miner boasts an impressive energy efficiency rating of only 17.5 J/T, significantly enhancing mining efficiency. Furthermore, the S21 miner offers a hashrate of up to 200 T/TH, marking a new performance peak and solidifying its position as one of the world’s most powerful BTC miners. BitFuFu is introducing an attractive product package, combining mining machine purchases with hosting services: The platform supports purchases starting from just one miner, offering an integrated service of machine procurement and hosting by BitFuFu, which includes transportatio

While both attackers and smart contract auditors are motivated to find vulnerabilities in code, according to Eyal Meron, the co-founder and CEO of Spherex, the former “is always more incentivized as the protocol’s total value locked (TVL) grows.” To overcome this challenge, Meron told Bitcoin.com News that decentralized protocols will need to put in place what he called “asymmetric countermeasures.” Human Error and Smart Contract Vulnerabilities The Spherex boss also suggested deploying an exploit prevention solution as another way protocols can prevent attackers from using errors in code to steal digital assets worth millions. Meron, a senior veteran of the elite Israeli 8200 cyber unit, nevertheless admits that most smart contract vulnerabilities are often the result of human error which in many cases is “inevitable.” One common error, which according to Meron is almost impossible to detect, often occurs when developers “overlook how every code line affects the contract dependin

Four U.S. lawmakers have called on the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to immediately approve spot bitcoin exchange-traded funds (ETFs). “Following the Court of Appeals’ decision, there is no reason to continue to deny such applications under inconsistent and discriminatory standards … We urge you to approve the listing of spot bitcoin ETPs immediately,” the lawmakers told SEC Chair Gary Gensler. Lawmakers Want Spot Bitcoin ETFs Approved U.S. Representatives Mike Flood (R-NE), Tom Emmer (R-MN), Wiley Nickel (D-NC), and Ritchie Torres (D-NY) sent a letter to U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) Chairman Gary Gensler on Tuesday urging the regulator to immediately approve applications for spot bitcoin exchange-traded funds (ETFs). The lawmakers wrote: We write to ensure the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) does not continue to discriminate against spot bitcoin exchange traded products (ETPs). The letter cites a recent decision by the Court of Appeals

Cryptocurrency exchange Kraken announced new achievements in implementing its strategy to pursue expansion on the European market. The U.S. trading platform for digital assets said it has received regulatory nods from the monetary authorities of Ireland and Spain, two of the EU nations with relatively clear rules for the industry. Another Major U.S. Crypto Exchange, Kraken, Strides On With European Expansion Digital asset exchange Kraken has obtained authorization from the Central Bank of Ireland as an e-money institution (EMI) and has registered with the Bank of Spain as a virtual asset service provider (VASP). In a press release on Tuesday, the San Francisco-based company emphasized that the regulatory approvals highlight its commitment to growing its business in Europe. With the EMI license, which has been granted to Kraken’s subsidiary in Ireland, the exchange will be able to partner with European banks in order to expand its euro fiat services for clients in the EU’s 27 member