Asia

April 24, 2019 @ 2:08 pm By Cali Haan  |  

The Wall Street Journal has reported this week that, on the advice of “a Bitcoin evangelist,” Softbank founder Masayoshi Son invested big in Bitcoins at the height of the market, then lost $130 million when he sold his position as the coin began to crash…. Read More

April 24, 2019 @ 12:00 pm By JD Alois  |  

TrustToken is all in on Stablecoins having just announced four new Stablecoins each backed by fiat currency. TrustToken is launching the following stablecoins: TrueAUD, TrueEUR, TrueCAD, and TrueHKD. As one would expect, these coins represent Australian Dollars, Euros, Canadian dollars and Hong Kong Dollars. TrueAUD… Read More

April 24, 2019 @ 7:57 am By JD Alois  |  

Gifto, a company that completed a $30 million initial coin offering (ICO) in less than a minute, has bailed on Ethereum. In a blog post, Gifto said they have “tremendous respect for the Ethereum community,” but that respect apparently does not transfer over to confidence… Read More

April 23, 2019 @ 12:15 pm By Cali Haan  |  

The Japanese agency responsible for overseeing the country’s banking, insurance and securities sectors conducted flash on-site inspections last week at local offices of the Huobi cryptocurrency exchange and at the FISCO Virtual Currency Exchange (formerly Zaif), Reuters Japan reports. Regulators from the Financial Services Agency… Read More

April 23, 2019 @ 8:10 am By Samantha Hurst  |  

Binance, the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange by volume, has officially launched its services in Singapore. According to TechCrunch, the launch of the service comes just six months after the crypto exchange received an investment from Vertex, a VC firm that is backed by Singapore-based sovereign… Read More

April 22, 2019 @ 9:53 pm By JD Alois  |  

This one is a bit of a mess. Recently, Crowdfund Insider tripped across a press release from a company named “VToken”. In the release, the company claims to have obtained a “US STO License”. To quote the release: “On March 18, 2019, VToken, a world-renowned… Read More

April 21, 2019 @ 9:55 pm By Samantha Hurst  |  

Just a little over seven months after being hacked for an estimated ¥6.7 billion yen ($60 million), Japanese cryptocurrency exchange Zaif is reportedly set to resumed activity. As previously reported, the infamous hack occurred on Friday, September 14th, when the hackers broke into Zaif exchange… Read More

April 21, 2019 @ 6:32 pm By Cali Haan  |  

Relatives of Chad Elwartowski, a “pure libertarian” wanted by the Thai government for setting up a “seasteading” platform on an abandoned oil rig within the country’s waters say they are concerned about his well-being. Elwartowski’s sister, Delynne Elwartowski, told the Detroit Free Press that her… Read More

April 21, 2019 @ 4:24 pm By Cali Haan  |  

The Reserve Bank of India’s (RBIs) Draft Enabling Framework for its Regulatory Sandbox program shows that cryptocurrency and crypto asset startups may be excluded from participating in the program. According to the document, the RBI established an inter-regulatory Working Group (WG) in July 2016, “to… Read More

April 20, 2019 @ 3:00 pm By Xu Gao  |  

PBC to launch the second-generation credit rating system The People’s Bank of China (PBC) is going to launch the second-generation credit rating system from May 2019. PBC will start using the new system for inquiry purpose, with the two systems running concurrently. After data uploaded… Read More

April 19, 2019 @ 7:48 am By Cali Haan  |  

The recent loss of $190 million CAD by the now-defunct Canadian cryptocurrency exchange QuadrigaCX appears to have alerted regulators across the globe to additional complexities affecting the safe storage of cryptocurrencies at relevant businesses. Quadriga has claimed it lost access to the funds following the… Read More

April 18, 2019 @ 11:40 pm By JD Alois  |  

Smart Valor, a Swiss blockchain based startup, has listed its native crypto “Valor” on South Korea based Bithumb. Earlier this week, Bithumb apparently hosted an Airdrop for Valor and distributed 1 Valor per 2,000,000 KRW to its most active traders. Smart Valor announced last fall… Read More

April 18, 2019 @ 10:56 pm By Cali Haan  |  

A libertarian “seasteading” venture launched by a Bitcoin-rich American and his Thai wife off the coast of Phuket has induced a national security response from the Thai Navy, Bangkok Post reports. Chad Andrew Elwartowski and Supranee Thepdet (aka “Nadia Summergirl”) have reportedly established “a living… Read More

April 17, 2019 @ 2:34 pm By Samantha Hurst  |  

MetLife Korea announced on Wednesday the seven finalists selected for its open innovation program, collab 5.0. The program is looking for insurtech companies globally to scale their business with MetLife while solving some of the insurer’s biggest innovation challenges across its Korean business. According to… Read More

April 17, 2019 @ 12:00 pm By JD Alois  |  

AlphaPoint, a blockchain company focused on enabling asset tokenization and trading in a compliant manner, has partnered with Elevated Returns to launch a “secondary market for $1 billion USD tokenized real estate shares.” The exchange will focus on the Southeast Asian property markets. Elevated Returns… Read More

April 17, 2019 @ 1:29 am By Cali Haan  |  

Ongoing regulatory uncertainty in India regarding the use and trading of cryptocurrencies has caused a number of related firms there to close or relocate. Most recently, reports Economic Times, Indian crypto trading platform Unocoin has made additional staff cuts, and it’s total workforce now sits… Read More

April 16, 2019 @ 11:00 pm By JD Alois  |  

Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group (MUFG), via MUFG Innovation Partners (MUIP), has invested in Chainalysis – a provider of cryptocurrency compliance solutions. MUIP invested $6 million into Chainanalysis as part of a $36 million Series B funding round. The Series B was announced in February. Mitsubishi… Read More

April 16, 2019 @ 8:44 am By JD Alois  |  

Welendus (PTP Funding Limited), a peer to peer lending platform, has received an investment from the Unicorn Ascension Fund (UAF) for an undisclosed amount. The investment was said to be used for future expansion into India. Other early-stage investors in the company include Pontaq, a… Read More

April 13, 2019 @ 4:00 pm By Xu Gao  |  

China Implements First National Standard for Insurance Sector On April 11th, China has implemented its first national standard for the insurance industry. The national standard incorporates 817 entries of professional terms, serving as a fundamental standard for various terms in the insurance sector, according to… Read More

April 12, 2019 @ 12:27 pm By Cali Haan  |  

In the wake of increasing Chinese state reticence towards a once supported industry, the biggest Chinese crypto mining firms have been steadily expanding or relocating to Canada, the US and Iceland, Chinese crypto news outlet 8BTC reports. But small and mid-size Chinese crypto miners have… Read More