More regulations keep coming and yes, Elon Musk bought Twitter. Aside from that, BitcoinBitcoin is the first decentralized digital currency. It was created in 2009, by an anonymous founder or group of founders... More and the cryptocurrencyA digital currency running on a blockchain and built with cryptography. Contrary to central-bank issued currency, cryptocurrency issuance rules are... market are in a bearish territory (for now). But there’s more. So, let’s explore how April was for the cryptocurrency world.
On the markets
- Bitcoin (BTCAn abbreviation for Bitcoin.) decreased by over 17% during April. And it wasn’t alone. Ethereum (ETH) also went down by 22%, and the top ten coins followed on decreases. Beyond the stablecoins, XRP lost 25%, BNB descended by 13%, Solana (SOL) declined a 37%, Terra (LUNA) vanished 28%, and Cardano (ADA) decreased by 36% [CoinMarketCap]. All of them were probably dragged by Bitcoin.
- There were a few bullish coins last month. The native token of the GameFi app STEPN (GMT), and the currency of the Bored Ape Yacht Club (BAYC), the ApeCoin (APE), top the list. GMT gained 39% during April, while APE increased by over 40% —in the wake of their new metaverse.
- Elon Musk bought Twitter in late April, which caused some bullish peaks on dog-themed coins since he’s a known promoter of Dogecoin (DOGE). DOGE increased by over 41%, while Shiba Inu (SHIBA) gained 9% —both of them just briefly. Other lesser-known coins gained even more. For example, CyborgShiba (CBS) increased by over 681% in April, and ShibaNFT gained 543% [CoinMarketCap].
- Inflation is going up in the United States and Europe. The first country has now its larger inflation rate in over 40 years (8.5%). Meanwhile, Europe hit a record high for the sixth month in a row, with over 7.5% in April —due to energy concerns about the Ukrainian-Russian war. China doesn’t have good news either. A new outbreak of COVID-19 might cause a global supply chain crisis.
All of this could affect the cryptocurrency market positively or negatively. The inflation rates could push the investors into crypto (specially stablecoins) to protect their money. On the other hand, the general crisis could set the markets on “risk-off”: the investors bet only on safer assets like gold, and avoid the riskier assets like cryptocurrencies.
Regulations on crypto
- The UK government revealed its intentions to adopt stablecoins as a regulated payment method. Besides, they’re already planning to launch their own Non-Fungible Token (NFT). This would be possible by introducing new flexible regulations for this kind of asset.
- Russia is working to embrace cryptocurrencies, but with strict limits. Their new bill, “On Digital Currency”, might include detailed measures for crypto companies, miners, and Russian citizens. They’d be able to buy barely $600 in crypto annually if they don’t qualify. In the meantime, the European Union is trying to impose further sanctions to ban the bigger crypto exchanges from operating in Russia.
- Bitcoin is going legal in several countries and other small regions. This currency is now officially a legal tender in the Central African Republic, which becomes the third country (after El Salvador and Ukraine) to establish the same. For their part, Panama and Cuba approved new laws to embrace crypto as a payment method and regulate the exchanges; while Brazil is on the way to doing so.
Other small jurisdictions are joining worldwide. Prospera, an enhanced Special Economic Zone located on the Island of Roatan (Honduras), started to accept the first cryptocurrency as legal tender. Also, the Peruvian city La Molina and the autonomous region of Madeira (Portugal) are planning to do the same.
- Kazakhstan, as one of the countries with the most Bitcoin miners, is planning to increase its taxes for the activity. This way, if the price of BTC surpasses $40,000, then the taxes would also increase for the miners.
- Even Decentralized Exchanges (DEXs) are complying with regulations. Uniswap and dYdX have been blocking some user accounts in April. They’re alleging that the blocked addresses are related to suspicious activities; or come from sanctioned jurisdictions or the United States. This goes against their policies.
Hacks and scams
- US Agencies blamed the Lazarus Group (North Korea) for the great hack against Axie Infinity in March. In the meantime, Sky Mavis (the company behind the game), is raising funds from investors to repay the victims. They’re accountable for $625 million.
- The DeFi protocol Beanstalk was hacked by over $181 million in late April. The culprit kept around $76 million after paying on-chain fees and loans and donated $250,000 to the Ukrainian government. Currently, Beanstalk is offering a reward to anyone who helps to recover any amount of the stolen funds.
- Beyond Beanstalk, at least other five DeFi platforms were attacked: Inverse Finance ($15 million), Elephant Money ($22.2 million), DEUS Finance ($17.9 million), Zeed ($1 million), and Bored Ape Yacht Club ($13 million). In the last case, the funds were stolen in the form of 91 expensive NFTs and over 765 ETH.
- Two alleged (and millionaire) crypto scams are being investigated in Spain and Argentina. Adhemar Capital, likely a Ponzi scheme with BTC, is accused of stealing around $400 million from investors in Argentina and beyond. Meanwhile, the so-called Nimbus, another Ponzi scheme in Spain, might’ve subtracted around $138 million from investors.
Other news
- Despite the great hack, Axie Infinity Origin is now ready to play for free (without any real NFTs). This is an early version, so, there won’t be any token rewards yet and the final version will be based on the comments. It’s only available on Mavis Hub (for desktop).
- The last update for the main client of Bitcoin (Bitcoin Core 23.0) is already available for download. It offers now greater compatibility with other clients, changed the estimation of fees by the nodes, and improved the graphical user interface (GUI). This update is a collaboration by over 120 developers worldwide.
- Due to environmental concerns, Mozilla and Wikimedia will stop accepting donations in Bitcoin and other cryptos. Mozilla will only accept coins that work with Proof-of-Stake (PoS) from now on, while most members on Wikimedia voted against accepting any kind of crypto.
- The story of Ethereum will have its own non-documental movie. Based on the book “The Infinite Machine” by Camila Russo, the film will be produced by Ridley Scott, Tom Moran, and Vera Meyer of Scott Free Productions. As a celebration, Russo also launched a new NFT collection about it on OpenSea.
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