If last week’s eye-grabbing move was by Bitcoin (BTC), this week’s breakout story belongs to the meme coin Shiba Inu (ticker SHIB). SHIB has rallied a whopping 140% in the last seven days to break into the top 10 cryptocurrency list by market capitalization and is currently neck-to-neck with its primary meme coin competitor Dogecoin. Meanwhile BTC found strong support near the $58,000 region after days of bearish outlook to bounce back to the $61,000 level as a few investors were prudent to buy BTC at a discount. Ethereum (ETH) also briefly put in a new all-time-high today at $4,400. The outlook for the crypto market remains bullish in the short to mid term. In this article, we will take a look at some of the major stories that impacted the crypto markets.
Sensing an opportunity presented by the price drop in Bitcoin, El Salvador has bought an additional 420 BTC at an average price of $58,800 bringing the country’s total Bitcoin reserves to 1,120 BTC. The president of El Salvador confirmed the purchase through Twitter indicating his belief that Bitcoin remains undervalued in the global market.
The third-largest Bitcoin whale, a term that refers to individuals or entities that hold large amounts of BTC, purchased 596 BTC this week, its first activity since a sell-off in the $50,000-$55,000 region.
In what may be a game changer for the crypto ecosystem in India, officials from the Indian Finance Ministry have revealed this week that the government looks to regulate the cryptocurrencies as an asset and hinted that the proposed legal framework for the same might fruition around February 2022 paving the way for broader adoption. India currently has more than 15 millions investors who have exposure to cryptocurrencies.
In a major win for the crypto ecosystem, global payments platform Mastercard has announced that any of the thousands of banks on its payments network can soon integrate crypto into their products. To facilitate this, Mastercard is partnering with global crypto exchange Bakkt to provide custodial services for those partners who want to add crypto services to their arsenal.
Tesla, a company owned by Elon Musk, has revealed in its Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) filing that it might restart the practice of accepting cryptocurrency payments for their products and services. In another separate statement, adding disappointment to the SHIB holders, Elon Musk revealed that he has exposure to Bitcoin, Ethereum and Dogecoin only.
The Wharton school, a premier business school in the United States, will reportedly accept BTC and other cryptocurrencies for the tuition fees of its Blockchain program. The institute will use Coinbase Commerce, to handle the crypto transactions.
Layer 2 protocol Polygon has paid $2 million in bounty to a white hat hacker for presenting a solution to a potential bug found on the network. According to security firm Immunefi, Polygon’s Plasma bridge, which is used to transfer assets back and forth between Ethereum and Polygon network, had a vulnerability that could have compromised $850 million of user funds.
Disclaimer:This article was authored by Giottus Cryptocurrency Exchange as a part of a paid partnership with The News Minute. Crypto-asset or cryptocurrency investments are subject to market risks such as volatility and have no guaranteed returns. Please do your own research before investing and seek independent legal/financial advice if you are unsure about the investments.