Alpaca Finance Institutional Newsletter #58
Highlights
- Innovative approach to off-chain smart contracts on Bitcoin
- Former Alameda CEO testifies against SBF in FTX trial
- Brazilian Committee recommends indicting Binance CEO and executives
BitVM, proposed by Robin Linus, enables advanced off-chain smart contracts in Bitcoin without a soft fork. It’s based on Ethereum’s optimistic rollups and Merkle tree advancements, allowing Turing-complete contracts. BitVM executes contract logic off-chain, similar to Ethereum’s approach. While promising, it has limitations, and further development is required. It relies on the Taproot soft fork and is influenced by Ethereum’s research. Prominent Bitcoin figures show cautious excitement, but some advise tempering expectations.
During Sam Bankman-Fried’s trial, Caroline Ellison, his former associate and girlfriend, testified that she committed fraud at Alameda under his direction. She accused him of setting up systems that allowed Alameda to take approximately $14 billion from FTX user funds. Their relationship is central to the allegations against him. Bankman-Fried faces charges for using FTX user funds for purchases and political donations without consent. The defense tried to shift some blame onto Ellison during the trial, suggesting she ignored instructions about hedging investments.
A Brazilian congressional committee has recommended the indictment of Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao (CZ) and three local Binance executives for financial crimes linked to pyramid schemes. The accusations include fraudulent management, unauthorized operations, and offering unapproved securities trading. The committee also recommends investigating 45 other individuals connected to crypto companies. These are non-binding suggestions, and local authorities will decide on any further actions. Binance has expressed its commitment to collaborate with the committee and Brazilian law enforcement.
News
- Ripple’s chief financial officer steps down amid SEC lawsuit
- Bitcoiner drops BitVM paper to bring Ethereum-like contracts to Bitcoin
- Caroline Ellison blames Sam Bankman-Fried for misuse of FTX user funds at trial
- Immutable links with AWS in latest Web3 gaming push
Products
- Uniswap launches Android wallet beta for Google Play
- Circle rolls out native USDC tokens on Polygon
- CoinMarketCap launches ChatGPT plugin
- ProShares prepares to launch unique Short Ether Strategy ETF
Regulation
- Binance, OKX to comply with new financial promotions rules in UK
- Cyprus to tighten crypto regulations in accordance with FATF
- Brazil’s Congress puts Binance CEO CZ in crosshairs for indictment
- European regulator: DeFi comes with significant risks as well as benefits
Funding
- Crypto-powered, fantasy horse racing startup raises $5 million
- Web3 affiliate marketing protocol Fuul enters private beta from stealth
- Uniswap, Galaxy and others back crypto on-chain analytics platform Parsec in $4M round
