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States likely to adopt Bitcoin reserves first: Report
States are likely to adopt Bitcoin reserves before the US federal government does, Senator Cynthia Lummis reportedly said on Feb. 28 during the Bitcoin Investor Week conference in New York.
“My bets are that you’ll see a state have a Bitcoin strategic reserve before the federal government,” Lummis said, according to a Bloomberg report.
In July 2024, Lummis, a Wyoming Republican, proposed legislation that would require the US federal government to create a national Bitcoin stockpile.
Her bill, dubbed the BITCOIN Act, calls for the US Treasury Department to gradually accumulate 1 million BTC, ultimately acquiring “a total stake of approximately 5% of total Bitcoin supply, mirroring the size and scope of gold reserves held by the United States,” according to Lummis’ website. Read More
PayPal Planning Big Expansion of PYUSD Adoption via the Payment Giant’s 20,000,000 Merchants in 2025: Report
Online payments giant PayPal is reportedly eyeing to expand the user base of its US-dollar-backed stablecoin by integrating the asset into several of its products this year.
Bloomberg reports that the California-based firm is targeting its more than 20 million small-to-medium-sized merchants to use PayPal USD (PYUSD) by giving them the option to use the stablecoin to pay vendors through the company’s bill-pay product that will be launched by the end of 2025.
PayPal’s small business and financial services group general manager Michelle Gill says the idea is to encourage merchants to invite their vendors to use the PayPal network for easier transactions.
“A lot of the payments we’re expecting are going to be cross-border because merchants in the US are seeking to pay vendors and suppliers abroad.
The thesis was: Can we facilitate that on PYUSD rails so as not to have the currency conversion, the friction, as well as time?”
PayPal also plans to add PYUSD as a global payment option for the payout platform Hyperwallet, which the company bought for $400 million in 2018. Read More
New collaboration brings crypto spending to everyday payments: Here’s how
A new partnership aims to bridge crypto and fiat with a multicurrency debit card, allowing users to spend both digital and traditional currencies globally without manual conversion.
Popular crypto wallet imToken has partnered with Swiss blockchain-powered bank Fiat24 to launch a multicurrency Mastercard debit card, allowing users to spend crypto like fiat.
Cryptocurrencies, with their decentralized nature, enable borderless transactions at a fraction of the costs and processing time typically seen in TradFi. This once-niche industry has seen rapid adoption, quickly establishing itself in mainstream finance.
Yet, on/off-ramp systems, tools that connect crypto and fiat currencies, remain a critical bottleneck. The liquidity inefficiency between on/off-chain systems and traditional finance is primarily due to technical barriers, regulatory and compliance obstacles, fragmented liquidity and differences in trust mechanisms, limiting capital efficiency and market development potential. The growing on-chain liquidity cannot seamlessly integrate into daily life. The fund inflows and outflows face compliance risks, complex operations, and slow processing steps (transfer cycles).
Fintech solutions are stepping in to bridge this divide, merging the security of traditional banking with the efficiency of blockchain technology. Read More
Ethereum Foundation forms external council to uphold core blockchain values
The Ethereum Foundation has created the “Silviculture Society,” a group tasked to ensure that Ethereum upholds its core values.
The Ethereum Foundation (EF), the nonprofit organization supporting Ethereum’s ecosystem, announced the creation of an external advisory group dedicated to preserving the blockchain network’s core values.
On Feb. 28, the foundation introduced the “Silviculture Society,” a collection of individuals from outside the EF. It said the group will provide informal counsel to the EF and tend “to the (dark or otherwise) forests in the infinite garden of Ethereum.”
The nonprofit said the group would work to ensure that Ethereum sustains its core values of open source, privacy, security and censorship resistance. The EF said the network’s success depends on having committed developers who build with these values in mind.
The EF tagged 15 individuals who were part of the council, including researchers, developers and project founders. Read More
The $1 billion blueprint for tokenized real estate: RWAs shaping Dubai
The real estate industry is undergoing a digital transformation, and Dubai is at the forefront of this revolution.
In this episode of Decentralize with Cointelegraph, Amira Sajwani, managing director at Damac Properties, and John Patrick Mullin, co-founder and CEO of Mantra, discuss their $1 billion plan to tokenize real-world assets (RWAs) and reshape global property investment.
One of the biggest misconceptions about asset tokenization is its association with cryptocurrency volatility. Sajwani addresses this concern head-on:
I think a lot of people associate tokenization to the volatility of cryptocurrencies. I'd love to dispel the fact that when you're buying a tokenized asset, yes, it's on the blockchain, but your volatility is linked to the asset that is being tokenized, not the actual, let's say, currencies or crypto myths that exist in the market.
Unlike cryptocurrencies, tokenized real estate assets derive their value from physical properties, offering stability and real-world utility to investors.
Tokenized real estate is still in its early stages, but industry leaders believe its potential is enormous. Mullin envisions a future where trillions of dollars of real-world assets will be brought onto the blockchain:
If you're looking at the base ecosystem right now, it's still a drop in the ocean compared to where we expect this to go in the mid to long term. It's in the tens of billions. We're expecting this to go into potentially trillions of dollars of assets on chain. So we still have a very, very long way to go.
For this industry to thrive, it will require strong market participants, innovation and regulatory clarity. Mantra’s open approach to collaboration aims to accelerate adoption and competition within the space. Read More
A New Crypto Category Has Emerged. What Impact Will it Have…Will It Evolve Into A Significant Narrative?
US-based cryptocurrency initiatives have historically been reticent about their origins. However, during Gary Gensler's tenure, they became vulnerable to aggressive scrutiny from the SEC, and numerous projects found themselves in the regulatory crossfire. Being a US-based project has often been a liability rather than a benefit in recent years.
The cryptocurrency industry has been electrified by the outcome of the U.S. Presidential election, with Donald J. Trump's victory sparking widespread anticipation. The regulatory shifts expected under Trump's leadership are poised to grant the crypto sector unprecedented freedom in the United States.
A new cryptocurrency category has surfaced amid this enthusiasm: "Made in the USA." This category includes cryptocurrencies that are closely linked to the United States, whether through headquarters located in the US or ties to notable American personalities. With Trump backing crypto, this category could see substantial growth, likely surpassing many others.
This has the potential to evolve into a significant narrative; thus, this article explicitly addresses cryptocurrencies based in the United States, the reasons this narrative could gain prominence, and the cryptocurrencies that may benefit from a Trump administration. To commemorate President Trump's inauguration, a newly established cryptocurrency category titled 'Made in USA' has been incorporated into price tracking platforms, including CoinMarketCap and CoinGecko. Read More
The next frontier for crypto will be decentralizing AI
As AI dominance grows, crypto projects should aim to decentralize the technology, but they face significant challenges in competing with Big Tech.
Opinion by: Zain Jaffer, co-founder of Vungle
Artificial intelligence is the latest frontier in the centralization vs. decentralization battle. As Bitcoin and Ethereum were built to resist government and corporate control, so are crypto AI projects pushing back against Big Tech’s growing dominance over AI models.
The question is: Can they compete, or are they just another layer built on top of the same centralized infrastructure they claim to disrupt?
AI, crypto and the decentralization dilemma:
One of the core tenets that drives traditional fans of crypto is decentralization. It directly opposes the US Securities and Exchange Commission’s Howey test, which defines investment contracts as relying on a “common enterprise” and the “efforts of others” for profit. Most securities are tied to centralized corporations, but Bitcoin, Ethereum and other sufficiently decentralized networks are designed to function without a central authority.
Why does this matter? Because of control. The Bitcoin white paper famously describes a “purely peer-to-peer” system that enables transactions without going through a financial institution. This Libertarian ideal (two parties transacting freely without interference) has driven crypto’s evolution.
As AI becomes more and more mainstream, the same decentralization ethos is extending to it. Crypto advocates worry that AI, if left in the hands of a few tech giants, will become another walled garden controlled by companies like Google, Microsoft and OpenAI. Read More
Uniswap partners with Robinhood, MoonPay, Transak to turn crypto into cash
Decentralized exchange Uniswap has entered into a partnership with trading platform Robinhood and a number of payment platforms to facilitate crypto-to-fiat transactions.
Starting on Feb. 27, users in more than 180 countries can sell supported crypto assets to deposit funds directly into their bank account through Robinhood, MoonPay and Transak, Uniswap announced.
It added that the fiat onramping and offramping was live in the Uniswap wallet on both Android and Apple iOS and would be coming to the Uniswap extension and the web app soon.
Moving between crypto and cash has “historically been frustrating,” Uniswap stated, because users need to sign into centralized exchanges and deal with crypto addresses. However, it can be done with “just a few clicks” using the DEX wallet, it added.
The move comes a few days after the US Securities and Exchange Commission dropped its investigation into Uniswap Labs.
On Feb. 25, the SEC stated that it had concluded its investigation and had no plans to pursue enforcement action against the firm. Uniswap received a Wells notice from the SEC in April during Gary Gensler’s tenure. “This is a huge win for DeFi,” said Uniswap Labs. Read More
SEC dismisses lawsuit against crypto exchange Coinbase
The US Securities and Exchange Commission has dismissed its lawsuit with crypto exchange Coinbase on Feb. 27, filings show, ending the case permanently.
The SEC agreed to voluntarily dismiss all litigation tied to Coinbase and Coinbase Global with prejudice, which included withdrawing from its initial June 2023 lawsuit and its request for an interlocutory appeal with the US Court of Appeals, a Feb. 27 court filing shows.
It comes after the two parties announced an agreement to end the legal dispute on Feb. 21.
The SEC said that “the dismissal will facilitate the Commission’s ongoing efforts to reform and renew its regulatory approach to the crypto industry.”
Under the former Gary Gensler-led commission, the SEC adopted a strict regulation-by-enforcement approach to crypto, which saw Coinbase and other industry heavyweights hit with unexpected lawsuits.
“It’s time for the Commission to rectify its approach and develop crypto policy in a more transparent manner,” said the SEC’s acting chair, Mark Uyeda.
One day after US President Donald Trump was inaugurated on Jan. 20, the SEC established a Crypto Task Force led by SEC commissioner Hester Peirce to support this new approach.
The SEC’s decision to drop Coinbase’s lawsuit follows earlier ones from Consensys, Robinhood, Gemini, Uniswap and OpenSea over the last week. Read More
US Lawmakers Delay Timeline for Crypto Legislation
During a Wednesday meeting, lawmakers and industry experts expressed less urgency to speed-run new crypto reforms.
Lawmakers are pushing back their timeline for passing digital assets market structure legislation in the latest sign policymakers are struggling to honor their pro-crypto election promises.
During the U.S. Senate Banking Subcommittee on Digital Assets’ inaugural meeting on Wednesday, Sen. Cynthia Lummis (R-WY) said a bi-partisan group of pro-crypto legislators is aiming to pass a comprehensive framework targeting the industry by the end of this year.
That’s several months later than Republican policymakers’ previously announced timeline for advancing critical crypto market structure reforms through Congress.
“Many members of the Senate are still trying to wrap their heads around ‘what is a Bitcoin;’ ‘what is a digital asset,’ ‘what is a stablecoin,’” Lummis said at the meeting. “I hope we can get … legislation to President Trump for his signature this year.” Read More
FBI Links North Korea to $1.4 Billion Bybit Crypto Heist
The FBI has officially attributed last week's $1.4 billion crypto theft from Bybit to North Korean hackers, labeling the operation "TraderTraitor" in a public service announcement released Wednesday.
These threat actors are working fast to cash in on their plundered crypto, the FBI said, acknowledging that they have since converted some of the stolen assets to Bitcoin and other crypto.
Those assets are now dispersed across “thousands of addresses on multiple blockchains,” the agency said.
From the outset of the theft, the crypto community had widely suspected Lazarus Group, but the FBI's confirmation ties the attack to Kim Jong Un's regime, which increasingly funds its weapons programs through cybercrime.
Hackers managed to gain control of Bybit's Ethereum cold wallet during a routine transfer operation on February 21, perpetrating what is now considered the largest publicly disclosed crypto hack on record. Read More
Disclaimer: These articles are provided for informational purposes only. They are not offered or intended to be used as legal, tax, investment, financial, or any other advice.
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