Montana Senate approves crypto mining protection bill, prevents unfair utility rates for home miners

The Montana State Senate has approved a bill to protect cryptocurrency miners from a range of possible actions against the industry, including discriminatory utility rates and zoning restrictions. The proposed legislation passed 37-13 in the Senate and now awaits approval in the state's House. The bill aims to protect at-home mining and prevent local governments from retroactively shutting down active operations through zoning laws. It also states that cryptocurrency used as payment will not be subjected to extra taxes. Montana Senator Daniel Zolnikov (R) stated that "these protections will send a message that we are open to embracing the digital asset mining industry."  More here.

Australian Securities Regulator Reviews Binance's Derivatives Business

Australia's securities regulator, the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC), has initiated a "targeted review" of Binance, the world's largest cryptocurrency exchange. The review will focus on Binance's local derivatives business, including its "classification of retail clients and wholesale clients." A Binance representative confirmed that the exchange had closed the derivatives positions of some Australian users who were incorrectly classified as wholesale investors, affecting 500 users. The company will compensate the affected customers for any losses incurred. While Binance tweeted about the closure, the ASIC said that Binance had not yet reported the matter to the regulator as required by its Australian financial services license. However, a Binance spokesperson said that the exchange is "committed" to following all relevant Australian laws.  Details here.

Decentralized Finance Protocol Platypus To Refund 63% of Funds Lost in Recent Exploitation

Days after Platypus suffered major exploitation, resulting in a loss of $9.1 million from three separate attacks, the decentralized-finance (DeFi) protocol announced that a minimum of 63% of the funds will be distributed to users, regardless of any further update on fund recovery. On Feb. 16, at 7:16 pm UTC, Platypus was exploited, resulting in a significant loss of $9.19 million. The first attack resulted in the theft of approximately 8.5 million assets, which included USD Circle, Tether, USDC.e, USDT.e, DAI.e, and BUSD. The second attack resulted in approximately $380,000 worth of assets being mistakenly sent to the Aave v3 contract, and the third attack resulted in the theft of assets valued at approximately $287,000..

Former School Facilities Worker Faces Arrest for Allegedly Running Secret Crypto Mining Operation

An ex-facilities worker accused of setting up a covert cryptocurrency mining operation inside a crawl space in a Massachusetts school is now facing arrest for missing a court hearing. Nadeam Nahas was expected to appear for arraignment on Feb. 23, facing charges of damaging a school and fraudulent use of electricity. A default warrant, which is issued when a person fails to show up in court or comply with an order, has been authorized for Nahas' arrest. The accused, a former employee of the facilities department for Cohasset town, Massachusetts, is said to have stolen nearly $18,000 worth of electricity to run his crypto mining operation between April 28 and Dec. 14 of 2021. Full report here. 

Huma's On-Chain Factoring Market Enables Borrowing Against Future Income

The US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has charged former NBA player, Paul Pierce, for touting EMAX tokens on social media without disclosing the payment he received for the promotion and for allegedly making false and misleading statements about the crypto asset. The SEC on Friday announced that Pierce has agreed to settle the charges and will pay $1.409 million in penalties, disgorgement, and interest. According to the SEC, Pierce failed to disclose that he was paid over $244,000 worth of EMAX tokens to promote the tokens on Twitter. The agency stated that Pierce tweeted misleading statements related to EMAX, including sharing a screenshot of an account showing large holdings and profits without disclosing that his personal holdings were much lower. More here.

Sam Bankman-Fried Requests More Time to Negotiate Bail Terms

Former FTX executive, Sam Bankman-Fried, has requested more time to negotiate the terms of his ongoing bail dispute. His lawyers filed a letter on Friday requesting a federal judge to grant him until March 3rd to hash out the details of his bail dispute and find a suitable technology expert to educate the court. In the letter, Bankman-Fried's lawyers said, "We respectfully request that the court grant the defense an extension of time to file our proposal for the court's technical consultant and additional bail conditions." Prosecutors have asked Judge Lewis Kaplan to tighten Bankman-Fried's bail terms and curtail his internet access.  More here.

CryptoSlam Detects Over $577 Million Worth of Wash-Traded NFTs on Blur.io Platform

Blur.io, an emerging NFT marketplace, has been identified by NFT data tracker CryptoSlam to have been involved in wash trading non-fungible tokens (NFTs) worth at least $577 million. The unusual activity was detected after the platform started airdropping its native tokens to users on Valentine’s Day. Scott Hawkins, a data engineer at CryptoSlam, said that the detected wash trades were suspicious and pointed towards NFT resales within a short period at prices close to the assets' initial transactions. Hawkins believes that this practice has artificially inflated sales volumes in a deceitful manner, which may damage the entire NFT market.  Read More

Solana Blockchain Resumes Operations After Network Restart: Engineers Monitor Performance

After experiencing downtime on multiple occasions due to its focus on supporting high transaction throughput, the Solana blockchain suffered another outage on February 25th. This left transactions unable to process as expected. Engineers attempted to fix the issue through a network restart but were unsuccessful in their first attempt. However, after a second restart at 01:28 UTC, the network was restored and closely monitored to ensure smooth performance. Despite its recurring downtime issues, Solana remains a popular blockchain technology for its transaction capabilities. Read More.

Bitcoin and Ether Continue Downward Momentum Amidst Regulatory Jitters: Weekly Crypto Market Update

Bitcoin and Ether both experienced declines on Saturday, with both cryptocurrencies falling 6.4% over the past week amidst macroeconomic uncertainty and regulatory concerns. While Bitcoin was trading at $23,001, down 0.8% over the past 24 hours, Ether was down 1.4% at $1,586. Altcoins and memecoins also saw a tough week, with XRP falling 4.7%, Cardano declining 11.3%, and Dogecoin declining 9.1%. However, the STX token of Stacks was the biggest winner of the week, rising 101% over the past seven days. The week also saw a decline in Coinbase shares by 10%, while Microstrategy declined 9.7%, and Silvergate's shares fell 21%. Meanwhile, Cathie Wood's Ark Invest continued to buy the dip, adding more shares throughout the week.