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- 10/12/23: Chinese Bribery > Thai Prostitutes 🧧📄🗳️
10/12/23: Chinese Bribery > Thai Prostitutes 🧧📄🗳️
Top News
🧧 FTX bribed Chinese officials $150M to recover $1B in frozen funds
📄 ARK Invest & 21Shares amend spot BTC ETF filing - a good sign
🗳️ Gauntlet can’t vote in $40M grant due to incompatible wallet

⌐◪-◪ → When Chinese crypto exchanges OKX and Huobi froze $1B of FTX funds, the FTX team resorted to Thai prostitutes. Yes, that’s right, the team tried to funnel money through wallets owned by Thai prostitutes. When that plan failed, FTX simply bribed Chinese officials $150M. Sometimes its better to do things the old-fashioned way I guess.
⌐◪-◪ → ARK’s updated prospectus comes in response to an SEC email full of questions about accounting methods, risk valuation techniques, and surveillance-sharing arrangements. Meanwhile, the SEC’s decision deadline for Grayscale is Friday, and if they don’t appeal, we may see all Spot ETFs approved.
⌐◪-◪ → This is a perfect example of how far crypto still has to go on the UI/UX front. If one of the most technically-savvy organizations in crypto made a mistake like this, how can we expect “normies” to participate or even feel comfortable trying? This issue is especially impactful considering Gauntlet is the 7th largest delegate on Arbitrum, Ethereum’s largest Layer 2 network.

Peripheral Vision
⛓️ Crypto & DeFi
Google search volume for Bitcoin returns to 2020 levels
Bitcoin miners sell over 20k Bitcoin, largest sales since April
Lido Finances liquid staking pool faces 20 ETH slashing penalty
Ethereum gas fees hit new low for 2023 amid DeFi inactivity
Trezor launches hardware wallet aimed at new crypto users
Edward Snowden speaks at biggest European BTC Conference
Ex-PayPal President says, “BTC is the only neutral internet money”
Mark Zuckerberg “appreciates Bitcoin” according to Ex-Paypal Pres.
L2 zkEVM Scroll goes live on mainnet with $500k bridge so far
TangibleDAO real estate-backed stablecoin depegs
Platypus, StableSwap protocol, hit again with $2M flash loan attack
🏦 Wallstreet & VC
Grayscale spot BTC ETF deadline is this Friday
Fintech giant Plaid partners with Sei Labs, a recently launched L1
Jack Dorsey’s Block acquires HIFI, a music financial services startup
🏛️ Legal & Regulatory
BarnBridge DAO votes unanimously to comply with SEC order
Caroline Ellison broke down in tears yesterday, relieved to stop lying
SBF & Caroline tried to keep BTC under $20k, selling customer BTC
Caroline Ellison’s to-do list included sending regulators after Binance
Madoff’s prosecutor says SBF’s strategy to blame Ellison will backfire
FTX hired Thai Prostitutes in attempt to recover $1B from China
🌎 Rest of the World
🖼️ NFTs & Metaverse
Farcaster goes live on iOS with seamless onboarding
Magic Eden drops tokenized Pokémon Cards - I’m telling Gary 🤣
Cristiano Ronaldo drops exclusive NFT collection on Binance
Acumen Research predicts $4T metaverse market by 2032
Star Arena, Friend Tech competitor, recovers 90% of $3M hack
Yat now offering Yat Fantasy, a free-to-play fantasy collecting game
World of Women, NFT project, drops their own Monopoly game
NFT Now releases exclusive coverage on MoMA postcard project
THNDR, online gambling company, integrates with BTC Lightning
LayeZero’s “Gas Station” helps users purchase cross-chain NFTs

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