Scenius Sync (Issue #43)

Bitcoin White Paper Hiding Inside Every Apple MacOS, US Treasury's Report on DeFi, & Thai Opposition Leader Promises Air Drop if Elected Prime Minister

Scenius: The intelligence and the intuition of a whole cultural scene. The communal form of the concept of genius.

Welcome to The Scenius Sync.

Our mission with this concise publication is twofold:

1. Share the essential stories driving the crypto industry and markets.

2. Highlight innovative applications and mainstream adoption of crypto and blockchain technology.

If you find this newsletter valuable, please subscribe and share The Scenius Sync with your network 💪

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Essential News 🗞

1. Apple Has Included Bitcoin Whitepaper in Every Version of macOS Since 2018

   • In every copy of macOS that has shipped since 2018, Apple has included the original Bitcoin whitepaper by Satoshi Nakamoto, and no-one seems to know why.

2. Treasury Releases 2023 DeFi Illicit Finance Risk Assessment

   • The US Treasury released a report entitled “Illicit Finance Risk Assessment of Decentralized Finance” on the use of decentralized finance protocols for illicit activity. The report provides the first-ever analysis of potential risks from DeFi and recommends a number of steps to enhance anti-money-laundering capabilities across the industry. Here is a summary from TRM Labs.

3. ‘Hubris’, Hot Wallets and Missing Millions: FTX’s New Bankruptcy Report

   • A new report addressing “Control Failures” related to the bankruptcy of FTX and its affiliated companies provided fresh detail as to how dysfunctional Sam Bankman-Fried’s global crypto empire was. FTX’s current management identified private keys for different wallets, including one with over $100 million in “Ethereum assets”, stored in plain text without encryption and easily accessible. Separately, private keys to billions of dollars-worth of additional digital assets were stored within an Amazon Web Services password manager that “many FTX Group employees” had access to and could transfer those assets by themselves, whenever they wanted to. 

4. Winklevoss Twins Infuse Gemini with $100M Personal Loan

   • The reported loan came amid regulators scrutinizing Gemini’s activities. In January, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission charged Gemini, as well as Genesis Global Capital, with offering unregistered securities through the exchange’s Earn program. New York’s Department of Financial Services also reportedly began investigating the exchange following reports many Gemini users claimed assets in their Earn accounts had been afforded FDIC protection.

5. Binance Australia's Derivatives License Cancelled Following Request by Exchange

   • The Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) has cancelled Binance Australia's derivatives license, according to a press release. Binance's spot crypto exchange in Australia will continue to operate. In a statement, Binance Australia said that it was "winding down" its derivatives product to "pursue a more focused approach."

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Innovation & Adoption 💡📈

1. MetaMask Launches New Fiat Purchase Function for Cryptocurrency

   • The new “Buy Crypto” feature enables MetaMask users to purchase a wide range of cryptocurrencies using various payment methods, including debit or credit cards, PayPal, bank transfers, and instant ACH (Automated Clearing House). The service will be rolled out to users in over 189 countries and will offer more than 90 tokens across eight different networks, including Ethereum, Polygon, Arbitrum, BNB Smart Chain, Avalanche Contract Chain, Fantom, Optimis and Celo.

2. Head of Thailand’s Opposition Party Promises $300 Crypto Airdrop if Elected Prime Minister

   • A contender to be the prime minister of Thailand is promising every citizen 10,000 Thai baht (approximately US$300) in digital currency if his party forms a government following a general election scheduled for May.

3. Unreleased David Bowie Recording to Debut as Music NFT

   • On April 14th, 40 years to the day after “Let’s Dance” originally debuted, Gala Music will release 3,003 NFTs, each featuring a piece of Bowie-inspired artwork, that will unlock the holder access to the unheard version of “Let’s Dance” that Dvoskin produced with Bowie in 2002. The never-before-heard version of Bowie's hit song will be sold via pay-what-you-want NFTs and will benefit charity.

4. Tokenized Gold Tops $1 Billion Market Cap Amid Banking Crisis Concerns

   • It's a tight race for the title of top tokenized gold asset. The market capitalization for PAX Gold is currently almost $523 million, while Tether Gold's is nearly $499 million. PAX Gold and Tether Gold, as the names imply, are tokens pegged to the price of gold. Because they utilize the same distributed ledger technology as Ethereum, they offer investors and traders the ability to easily self-custody and trade on centralized exchanges.

5. MicroStrategy Adds to Massive bitcoin Bet, Takes Total to 140,000 BTC

   • MicroStrategy purchased an additional 1,045 bitcoin. The firm now owns 140,000 bitcoin with an aggregate purchase price of $4.17 billion. The software firm's average purchase price is now $29,803. MicroStrategy’s stock is up 105% year-to-date and rose 1.3% in pre-market trading.