OTC’s Weekly Retrospect 26/09–30/09/2022

Each week we bring you a round-up of the most important Bitcoin and virtual asset-related stories making waves in the cryptosphere.­­­­

Major news stories this week;

1. Bankrupt crypto lender Voyager to sell assets to Sam Bankman-Fried’s FTX for $1.4 billion
2. Estonia Issues First License to Crypto Service Provider Under New Regulation
3. Developers can now issue assets like stablecoins on Bitcoin
4. Spain’s largest telecom brand dives deep into Web3
5. BlackRock preps ETF targeting metaverse companies: Bloomberg

Story Summaries;

1. TX, the bitcoin exchange founded by billionaire Sam Bankman-Fried, is set to buy Voyager Digital’s assets after winning a bankruptcy auction.
   FTX’s bid was valued at roughly $1.4 billion, the companies said in a statement late Monday. Voyager has hinted at a possible transition of its customers over to FTX U.S.
2. Estonia’s Financial Intelligence Unit has issued its first license to a crypto service provider under the country’s new regulatory framework that entered into force in March. “Striga Technology OÜ is the first entrepreneur, who is authorized for the first time to provide a virtual currency service since the amendments of the Money Laundering and Terrorist Financing Prevention Act,” the regulator detailed.
3. Lightning Labs on Wednesday released the first version of the Taro open-souce software to enable minting, sending and receiving assets on the Bitcoin blockchain. Taro daemon’s alpha release enables developers to issue tokens on testnet, an alternative Bitcoin blockchain made specifically for public testing. It allows developers to test applications with testnet coins instead of actual BTC with the additional benefit of not exposing the actual Bitcoin blockchain (mainnet) to any risks. Projects usually go live on mainnet only after extensive tests and bug fixes have been made.
4. Telefónica, the multinational telecom company based in Madrid, Spain, has enabled payments with cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin (BTC), Ethereum (ETH), Litecoin (LTC), USD Coin (USDC) and many others on its online tech marketplace called Tu. The firm integrated a crypto payment feature provided by the Spanish crypto exchange Bit2Me to receive crypto in exchange for their tech products. The exchange teased the integration during its Telefónica Metaverse Day event.
5. BlackRock, the world’s largest asset manager, is planning a new ETF aimed at capitalizing on metaverse-facing companies, Bloomberg reported. The new fund, the iShares Future Metaverse Tech and Communications ETF, is the latest foray into the blockchain ecosystem for the New York-based investment giant. The company just launched the iShares Blockchain Technology UCITS ETF that tracks the New York Stock Exchange FactSet Global Blockchain Technologies capped index, targeted towards European customers.

And that’s all for this weeks news! Wishing you a great weekend and as always, Happy Friday!