Month: July 2022

Kiffmeister’s #Fintech Daily Digest (20220707)

~ kiffmeister

Binance brings Bitcoin trading fees to zero

Binance will cut Bitcoin (BTC) trading fees to zero worldwide on July 8, to coincide with the exchange’s five-year anniversary. It will remain in place until further notice. Zero-fee trading will cover the following 13 spot trading pairs: BTC/AUD, BTC/BIDR, BTC/BRL, BTC/BUSD, BTC/EUR, BTC/GBP, BTC/RUB, BTC/TRY, BTC/TUSD, BTC/UAH, BTC/USDC, BTC/USDP and BTC/USDT. [Read more]

Disclosure, Dapps and DeFi

A paper by Chris Brummer and Agnes N. Williams highlights, with respect to decentralized finance (DeFi) in a U.S. context, the ambiguities inhabiting legacy disclosure obligations and offers a conceptual roadmap for assisting developers and regulators. Furthermore, it introduces a series of crypto-native tools to modernize disclosure delivery in DeFi systems. [Read more]

The decentralized finance (DeFi) dead pool

Last week I started a list of articles about the DeFi dead and dying and I’ve continued to add more, including some on collateral damage:

Upcoming events I’m affiliated with:

The CBDC Think Tank, in partnership with the International Monetary Fund and George Washington University, is hosting a full-day in-person CBDC Masterclass on October 12 in Washington DC. The sessions are designed as instructional deep dives with full presentations and Q&A components.  [Register here]

Kiffmeister’s #Fintech Daily Digest (20220705)

~ kiffmeister

FYI I’ve updated my tabulation of retail central bank digital currency (CBDC) explorers. Mostly updated links and some shuffling among categories. https://kiffmeister.com/jurisdictions-where-retail-cbdc-is-being-explored/

ECCB launches DCash in Anguilla

The Eastern Caribbean Central Bank (ECCB) DCash central bank digital currency (CBDC) pilot expanded to Anguilla, and now the digital version of the EC currency is legal tender in all eight ECCB member countries. Liberty Co-operative Credit Union (LCCU) is the first financial institution in Anguilla to join the Pilot and will begin processing DCash applications for both merchant and consumer wallets for their customers. Citizens and residents who are not customers of LCCU may obtain a DCash value-based wallet by signing up through the app.  [Read more]

According to the just-released ECCB Annual Report, As at end-March, the value of DCash in circulation amounted $2.27 million, or 0.16% of the $1,407.14 million currency in circulation. More than 20 of the region’s financial institutions and 11 agencies, both groups being key channels for customer onboarding, are now participating in the pilot. Also there has seen steady increase in the merchant base. The second phase of the pilot will see the introduction of government-to-consumer (G2C) payments and an e-commerce functionality to support wider use of DCash. [Read more]

Big tech interdependencies – a key policy blind spot

A BIS paper assesses the interdependencies inherent in big tech business models based on publicly available information on Alibaba, Amazon, Grab, Jumia, Mercado Libre and Rakuten. Big tech interdependencies come with specific risks, in particular to operational resilience, and may require the development of specific entity-based rules for big tech operations in the financial sector. The paper outlines the regulatory implications of how big techs provide financial services and the tools financial authorities have at their disposal now to address related risks. [Read more]

The decentralized finance (DeFi) dead pool

Last week I started a list of articles about the DeFi dead and dying with a few written by David Gerard (“Attack of the 50 Foot Blockchain“) and Amy Castor (see below). I’ve added a few more from others, including some collateral damage:

Upcoming events I’m affiliated with:

The CBDC Think Tank, in partnership with the International Monetary Fund and George Washington University, is hosting a full-day in-person CBDC Masterclass on October 12 in Washington DC. The sessions are designed as instructional deep dives with full presentations and Q&A components.  [Register here]

Kiffmeister’s #Fintech Daily Digest (20220704)

~ kiffmeister

Central African Republic Dives Into Crypto With The Sango

Central African Republic (CAR) President Faustin Archange Touadera reportedly announced the creation of the Sango Coin and a zero-taxation crypto-hub. The currency is named after Sango, which with French is one of the country’s two official languages. Through a platform called Crypto Island, the Sango will become “the catalyst for tokenizing (CAR’s) vast natural resources,” Touadera declared, providing no timeline or other details. In April Touadera’s office had announced that the CAR had adopted Bitcoin as legal tender alongside the CFA franc, a currency the country shares with five other central African economies. [Read more]

Tether Continues to Reduce Commercial Paper Holdings

Tether announced further progress towards reducing its commercial paper portfolio. As of July 1, Tether had 8.4 billion of these holdings, of which 5 billion will expire on July 31. The goal remains to bring commercial paper holdings down to zero, switching them into short-term U.S. Treasury securities. [Read more]

Upcoming events I’m affiliated with:

The CBDC Think Tank, in partnership with the International Monetary Fund and George Washington University, is hosting a full-day in-person CBDC Masterclass on October 12 in Washington DC. The sessions are designed as instructional deep dives with full presentations and Q&A components.  [Register here]

Kiffmeister’s #Fintech Daily Digest (20220702)

~ kiffmeister

Meta to Shut Down Novi Service in September in Crypto Winter

“The remainder of the Diem [which started out as Libra] Facebook [now Meta] backed cryptocurrency project is officially shutting down. Novi — a money-transfer service using the company’s own cryptocurrency digital wallet — will end on September 1.  Both the Novi app and Novi on WhatsApp will no longer be available. Starting July 21, users will no longer be able to add money to their accounts, and users are advised to withdraw their balance as soon as possible. Users won’t be able to access their transaction history or other data after the pilot ends.” [Read more]

Crypto collapse latest: the DeFi dead and dying list

David Gerard (“Attack of the 50 Foot Blockchain“) and Amy Castor are doing a great job of tracking the decentralized finance (DeFi) “Dead Pool”. I highly recommend following them if you want to keep track of DeFi shenanigans, and some of the nonsense that gives crypto-assets and distributed ledger technology (DLT) a bad name. Here’s the latest:

Is Crypto in Terminal Decline?

And for a bit of balance, Project Syndicate has put together a collection of opinions that makes for a good short read. [Read more] My favorite quote is from Anne Sibert, former member of the Central Bank of Iceland’s Monetary Policy Committee:

Both unbacked cryptocurrencies and national currencies are fiat money without intrinsic worth. They have value because of self-fulfilling expectations. But cryptocurrencies have benefits for users that national currencies do not. Rules, rather than political whim, determine their supply. For Bitcoin, the supply is capped. Payments can be made directly from one party to another instead of requiring a trusted intermediary, and can be anonymous. Their portability is helpful to those in precarious circumstances.

Upcoming events I’m affiliated with:

The CBDC Think Tank, in partnership with the International Monetary Fund and George Washington University, is hosting a full-day in-person CBDC Masterclass on October 12 in Washington DC. The sessions are designed as instructional deep dives with full presentations and Q&A components.  [Register here]

Kiffmeister’s #Fintech Daily Digest (20220701)

~ kiffmeister

Decision Making Model for Digital Tenge implementation is developed

The National Bank of Kazakhstan (NBK) and NBK’s Payment and Financial Technologies Development Center published a paper describing its Digital Tenge central bank digital currency (CBDC)  implementation model. Based on results of the study obtained with the use of this model, a final decision will be made by the end of 2022 whether to implement CBDC in Kazakhstan, following end-to-end testing of the technological platform with market participants and consumers during the 4th Quarter of 2022. [Read more]

Coinbase’s conflation of USDC in-house stablecoin, US dollar sparks liquidity concerns

Coinbase announced that the platform will be “unifying USD and USDC order books,” adding that “USDC order books will be merged under USD order books to create a better, more seamless trading experience with deeper liquidity for USD and USDC.” USDC (aka USD Coin) is the stablecoin issued by Centre, a consortium of Circle and Coinbase. This may provide a ‘more seamless’ experience, but it also gets Coinbase out of a potential fiat liquidity crunch, in the wake of massive customer USD withdrawals during the current crypto crash. [Read more]

Upcoming events I’m affiliated with:

The CBDC Think Tank, in partnership with the International Monetary Fund and George Washington University, is hosting a full-day in-person CBDC Masterclass on October 12 in Washington DC. The sessions are designed as instructional deep dives with full presentations and Q&A components.  [Register here]