🪙Bitcoin Flips Ethereum for the First Time in 24-Hour NFT Sales Shift

⚡️ The trend for Bitcoin NFT transactions has seen an upward trajectory lately, and just three days ago highlighted that Bitcoin had secured the runner-up spot for NFT sales across a week. In a significant first, Bitcoin’s Ordinal innoscriptions, its unique brand of NFTs, exceeded Ethereum’s sales over a 24-hour time frame on Wednesday.

⚡️ NFT connoisseur Leonidas, the founder of Ord, documented this unprecedented event onchain, marking the occasion when Bitcoin-based NFTs leaped ahead of their Ethereum counterparts for the first time in history. Leonidas said:

🗣 Breaking – Ordinals just flipped Ethereum NFTs for the first time. So of course I had to inscribe it into Bitcoin forever.

➡️ Looking at a week’s performance in NFT sales, Ethereum has seen an increase, netting $79.61 million since Wednesday, November 1, 2023, which represents a 45.66% rise from the previous week, as reported by cryptoslam. In comparison, Bitcoin’s weekly NFT sales also enjoyed a rise, boasting a 661.60% increase from the prior week with sales hitting $55.52 million.

⚡️ US Lawmaker: Crypto Is Not the Problem, Bad Actors That Exist in Every Industry Are

➡️ U.S. Senator Cynthia Lummis (R-WY) defended crypto in response to an article on Forbes about how misinformation on Hamas and crypto fooled nearly 20% of Congress.

❕ “Crypto accounts for < 1% of all illicit finance activity and would be even less if we created a regulatory structure to allow the crypto industry to operate in America instead of unregulated foreign markets,” the senator from Wyoming wrote on social media platform X Friday. She stressed:

❕ Recently, several news outlets reported that Hamas had raised millions of dollars in cryptocurrency. However, blockchain analytics firm Elliptic has debunked the reports, stating: “There is no evidence to suggest that crypto fundraising has raised anything close to this amount, and data provided by Elliptic and others has been misinterpreted.”

📣 Despite Elliptic’s efforts to set the record straight, these reports prompted 100 U.S. lawmakers, including Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), to push the Biden administration to address crypto-financed terrorism.

🔊 Robert Kiyosaki: Fiat Money Isn’t Safe, Investors Must Protect Themselves From Central Bankers

The famous author wrote on X Saturday:

❕ Central banks like Fed are buying gold. Does this mean fiat money is safe? Hell no!

➡️ bankers are saving themselves from their own incompetence, that’s why they buy gold. Their job is to protect the banks not you. Get smart. Protect yourself from central bankers: Save gold, silver, bitcoin,” Kiyosaki advised.

⏺ Central banks around the world maintained their appetite for gold in the third quarter, with purchases totaling 337 metric tons, according to the World Gold Council. This surge in buying has propelled year-to-date purchases to a record high of 800 metric tons.

❕ Kiyosaki has consistently issued warnings regarding fiat currencies, referring to them as “fake money.” In contrast, he calls gold and silver “God’s money” and considers bitcoin as “people’s money.” In September, he said “crypto is the future,” noting that fiat money is “toast.” He has urged investors to get into gold, silver, and bitcoin as soon as possible.

👉 The renowned author has also repeatedly warned about the demise of the U.S. dollar. He blames the Federal Reserve for causing inflation and collapsing the U.S. economy. In July, he predicted that the end of the USD is near. In April, he said America is dying, warning of the impending death of the U.S. dollar. Moreover, he expects BTC to become priceless when the Fed starts issuing a central bank digital currency (CBDC).

🇷🇺 Report: US Crypto Exchange Coinbase Fined for Refusing to Localize Russian Users’ Data

➡️ A court in Russia recently imposed a fine of just over $11,000 on the U.S. cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase. The court said the fine relates to Coinbase’s alleged refusal to localize data on Russian nationals who use the crypto exchange platform.

📝 According to a report from one online media outlet, Coinbase’s non-adherence with Russia’s data regulations means the crypto exchange is guilty of an administrative offense under Part 8 of Art. 13.11 of the Code of Administrative Offenses of the Russian Federation.

💩 Since the end of May, Russia’s Federal Service for Supervision of Communications, Information Technology and Mass Media or the Roskomnadzor (RZN) has required foreign companies to “localize databases of Russian users.” Already, representatives of more than 600 foreign companies are believed to have complied with the requirement.

❕ A few global corporate giants including Spotify, Apple, Whatsapp, Match Group (which owns Tinder), and Airbnb have been penalized for defying the requirement. Passed in 2014, the data localization law is seen by some opponents of President Vladimir Putin as a weapon being used by Russia against mainly Western organizations.

🪙 Bitcoin Achieves Lifetime Record With Over 710,000 Daily Transactions Confirmed on Sunday

👑 This recent weekend marked a record-breaking moment for the Bitcoin network. Operating at a robust hashrate of 480 exahash per second (EH/s), the network verified an unprecedented total of 710,579 transactions – a new peak in Bitcoin’s storied history. This surpassed the previous high set on September 15, 2023, when bitcoin (BTC) miners verified 703,692 transactions.

📈 Furthermore, on November 12, 2023, the daily transaction volume (703,327) nearly eclipsed the former record, now ranking as the third highest in history. All of these days featured unparalleled levels of innoscription-based transactions, with the most recent record established on Sunday accounting for 475,249 innoscriptions.

➡️ Sunday emerged as the second most prolific day for innoscription-based transactions, slightly trailing the record set on November 12, which saw 505,345 innoscriptions. As of 2:40 p.m. Eastern Time on November 20, 2023, the day’s data remains incomplete, yet 411,723 transfers have already been processed by bitcoin miners, with 300,452 being innoscriptions.

⚡️ Innoscriptions have surged recently after a brief dip, sparking a rise in miners’ fees due to a backlog of more than 200,000 transactions, which has driven up the cost of block space. Concurrently, as miners set new benchmarks in transaction processing, the network’s hashrate has soared to an unparalleled peak of 480 EH/s, based on the seven-day moving average.

🪙 Bitcoin User Unwittingly Pays $3.1 Million in Single Transaction Fee

➡️ Block 818,087 stands out in Bitcoin’s ledger for recording the largest fee for a single transaction in its history. This block encapsulated around 4,179 transactions. Besides the standard reward of 6.25 newly created BTC, Antpool earned an additional 85.216 BTC in fees from this block.

💲 The extraordinary transaction fee amounted to 83.65 BTC, transferring 55.77 BTC, valued at approximately $2 million based on current exchange rates. This incident surpasses the previous record, where an excessive fee of about 19.8 BTC – worth $738,639 today but approximately $500K at that time – was paid.

❕This earlier record was set in block 807,057, mined by F2pool, which earned 20.0127 BTC in total fees from the block. The 19.8 BTC transfer was later identified as a transaction by Paxos. In a gesture of goodwill, F2pool chose to refund the company, demonstrating that miners have the discretion to reimburse addresses in cases of apparent errors.

🇳🇬 Nigeria Law Enforcement Nab Politician Who Laundered Funds Stolen From Crypto Exchange

🔗 The Nigerian police have arrested a politician who is accused of seeking to launder digital assets that were stolen from the crypto exchange platform Patricia Technologies earlier this year. According to the police, Wilfred Bonse had fraudulently transferred more than $60,000 from the $750,000 in stolen funds to his bank account.

❗️Patricia lost digital assets worth more than $2 million after hackers breached its platform. The theft left the crypto platform with a financial hole which forced Patricia to seek funds to refund affected users.

❕ In his remarks after announcing the politician’s arrest, Prince Olumuyiwa Adejobi, the spokesperson for the Nigerian police, said:

❕ Having registered his involvement in the complex crime. Wilfred Bonse, conspired in laundering the sum of Fifty Million Naira (N50,000,000) originating from the fraudulent diversion of Six Hundred and Seven Million Naira (N607,000,000) from Patricia Technology company’s account to his bank account through a cryptocurrency wallet.

➡️ The spokesperson, however, said investigations are still ongoing and vowed to bring those behind the hacking to justice.

❌ In a post on X (formerly Twitter), Patricia praised Nigerian law enforcement agencies behind Bonse’s arrest. The CEO Hanu Fejiro said the recovered funds will “go a long way to soothe Patricia users.”

🆕 BNB’s Tech Roadmap for Opbnb Targets 10,000 Transactions per Second

🖥 On Nov. 29 the BNB chain unveiled what it called a tech roadmap for Opbnb, a layer two (L2) solution within its ecosystem. The goal of the roadmap is to make “blockchain more accessible, with the design principles based on making the Opbnb network more efficient for users and developers.” To achieve this, the roadmap is targeting 10,000 TPS (transactions per second) for transfers as well as “a price reduction of ten times on Opbnb.”

➡️ The unveiling of the six-month roadmap came just days after the transaction count on Opbnb tapped a new all-time high of 5.47 million. This milestone was achieved when “the network handled the full capacity of 100M gas per second smoothly in a single block.” This is said to have resulted in the network processing 645 minting transactions per second.

➡️ Meanwhile, in a statement, the BNB Chain core development team praised the Opbnb community for being instrumental in the L2’s success so far. The team also noted that the community’s efforts can prove to be potentially vital in the development of decentralized applications.

💵 As explained in the statement, Opbnb is also aiming to reduce transacting fees from $0.005 to $0.001 in the last quarter of 2023. In the first quarter of 2024, the objective is to increase capacity from 100M to 150M. Between Q2 and Q3 of 2024, the goal is to lower the gas limit per block increase from 100M to 200M and achieve a transaction per second milestone of 10,000.

🚀Dogecoin (DOGE) And Pepe (PEPE) Blast Off: Embark On The Bullish Journey 🌙

🔥DOGE and PEPE Making Waves
Dogecoin (DOGE) and Pepe (PEPE) are capturing the market's attention with their latest developments. DOGE is on a mission to the moon, funded by the DOGE community, while Pepe is transferring tokens to Binance for future campaigns. Both tokens are experiencing price fluctuations as a result of their strategies.

💰 Scapes Mania (MANIA) Gains Attention
Scapes Mania (MANIA) is gaining attention as a promising project in the crypto space, adding to the excitement in the market.

📈 Analyzing DOGE and PEPE Prices
Analysis of Dogecoin (DOGE) prices suggests a positive trend with caution, while signals for Pepe (PEPE) are ambiguous. Traders should be mindful of support and resistance levels for their trading strategies and manage risks wisely in the crypto market.

Are you ready to embark on this bullish journey with DOGE and PEPE? Stay tuned for more updates and ride the wave of excitement in the crypto market! 🚀🌙

🐳 Mystery Bitcoin Whale Resurfaces, Transfers 1,000 BTC Worth 41M From String of 2010 Era Addresses 🐳

⚡️ The famous Bitcoin whale has struck again, transferring 20 block rewards equivalent to 1000 bitcoins (41.87 million). This isn't the first time this whale has made such a move - similar transactions were made at the beginning of the bull market in late 2020 and in 2021.

🪙 The whale's activity involved 20 addresses that stored block rewards from as far back as 2010, with each wallet spending 50 BTC at block height 819,796. The addresses were created in August, September, October, and November of 2010.

💰The total value of the 1000 BTC transferred amounts to 41.87 million, all of which was moved to another wallet. There's a high likelihood that this whale is the same early adopter identified by Bitcoin News back in 2020. From late 2020 to March 2021, Bitcoin tracked this same whale as they spent over 10,000 BTC using identical spending methods.

📊 It's always intriguing when a Bitcoin whale resurfaces, especially one with such a significant amount of BTC from the early days. The mystery surrounding their identity and the reasons behind these large transactions adds an air of excitement to the crypto space.

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⚫️In conclusion, the resurgence of this mystery Bitcoin whale and their hefty transactions from decade-old addresses has once again captured the attention of the crypto community. Stay tuned for more updates on this fascinating story!

📉 Crypto Exchange Binance Drops Abu Dhabi License Application as Global Needs Shift

🌐 Cryptocurrency exchange Binance has reportedly withdrawn its application with Abu Dhabi’s financial regulator. A spokesperson for Binance said on Thursday: "When assessing our global licensing needs, we decided this application was not necessary."

📝 According to Binance’s website, Abu Dhabi-based Binance (AD) Ltd. received conditional financial services permission from the Financial Services Regulatory Authority (FSRA) on Nov. 15 last year to provide crypto custody services. The regulator’s website details: “Binance (AD) Limited is not permitted to deal with retail clients, as defined in the FSRA’s Conduct of Business Rulebook (COBS).”

💼 Last month, Binance founder Changpeng Zhao (CZ) resigned as CEO after pleading guilty to violating U.S. anti-money laundering laws, and the crypto exchange agreed to pay over 4.3 billion as part of the settlement with U.S. authorities.

🌍 This year, Binance withdrew from a licensing process in Germany, retracted from Cyprus, and announced its exit from the Netherlands. The decision to withdraw from Cyprus was explained as a strategic move to concentrate on fewer regulated entities in the EU, with a focus on France, Italy, and Spain, in anticipation of the European Union’s crypto asset regulations rollout.

🔍 Moreover, regulators in Australia revoked the financial services license of Binance’s derivatives business. In the Philippines, the securities regulator initiated the process of blocking Binance last week.

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🚀The Binance spokesperson emphasized on Thursday that the crypto exchange would continue to work with regulators “to provide world-class services and offerings in the Middle East and beyond.”

⭐️ Palau Declares First Phase of Stablecoin Pilot a Success

📊 Results and Popularity of PSC

The pilot, which launched in June 2023 with the involvement of 200 volunteers, used Ripple Ledger technology as a backbone for controlling wallet transactions. The Ministry of Finance (MOF) of Palau informed that more than 700 transactions were completed during this phase, with more than 400 being payments to retail merchants.

👍Positive Feedback from Participants and Retailers

The report states both participants and retailers had good experiences during the pilot and that PSC was positively received as a digital payment system, even after facing opposition from some government officials.

🚀 Plans for Future Phases

While there is no explicit mention of a second phase for the PSC pilot, the MOF stated that “the long-term objective is to implement PSC nationally as a convenient and cost-effective way of payment,” hinting at the continuation of the project in the short term.

🎯 Improving Reach and Compliance

For this objective, the pilot will aim to improve its reach, allowing more financial institutions, retail businesses, and individuals to participate in the payments network. The report also calls for the organization of educational campaigns to show the general public the benefits of using this digital cash alternative. Further, the MOF declares that subsequent phases of the pilot will focus on compliance, given that the PSC is a dollar-pegged digitized token.

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The first phase of Palau's stablecoin pilot has shown promising results, with positive feedback from participants and retailers. As the project moves forward, the focus on improving reach and compliance, as well as establishing a legal framework for security and transparency, will be crucial for the successful implementation of PSC nationally.

🌟 Treasury Secretary Yellen's Economic Outlook 🌟

In a recent interview with CNBC, U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen discussed the state of the U.S. economy, emphasizing the progress made in reducing inflation. She also addressed the potential risk of a recession and the likelihood of a soft landing for the economy in 2024.

📉 Inflation and Consumer Spending

Yellen acknowledged that while inflation has come down, there is still work to be done to reach the Fed's 2% target. However, she highlighted the solid nature of consumer spending, indicating optimism for economic stability.

💰 Soft Landing and Growth Outlook

The Treasury Secretary expressed confidence in the U.S. economy's ability to achieve a soft landing, with a reasonable chance of continued growth in 2024. This positive outlook reflects her belief in the gradual improvement of economic conditions.

📈 Interest Rates and Federal Reserve Policy

Yellen discussed the potential for interest rate cuts next year, noting that as inflation decreases, it is natural for interest rates to follow suit. She emphasized the Federal Reserve's dual mandate of managing inflation and economic strength.

🌍 US Ambassador Hails Bitcoin Miner’s ‘Genius’ Flared Gas Power Generation Plans

👉 The United States Ambassador to Argentina, Embajador Marc R. Stanley, has praised bitcoin miner Unblock Computing’s plan to generate electricity using flared gas. According to Stanley, Unblock Computing and its partner Crusoe Energy Systems’ ingenious plan not only helps the South American country attain its climate goals but also saves energy.

🔍 The remarks by Stanley, which he shared via X (formerly Twitter), followed reports that the Argentine Bitcoin miner had secured a $15 million investment to power its operations at Vaca Muerta. Located in the Neuquén Basin in northern Patagonia, Vaca Muerta is said to hold one of the world’s largest shale gas reserves.

➡️ Expressing his delight at the two companies’ unique way of generating electricity, the U.S. Ambassador said:

"Love seeing U.S. [and] Argentine companies work together to solve problems and help the environment. The geniuses at Crusoe [and] Unblock Global figured out a way to combust methane and generate electricity. This not only helps Argentina meet its climate goals, but also saves energy and makes money. Brilliant."

🌱 Meanwhile, in a Dec. 13 post on X, Tomas Ocampo, the founder of Unblock Computing, said the $15 million investment is set to help Crusoe Energy Systems and its partners produce $200 million worth of oil with fewer emissions.

⚡️Ripple Executive Predicts ‘Breakout Moment’ for Crypto Institutional Adoption

❕Ripple’s president, Monica Long, has made some bold predictions about the future of crypto and blockchain over the next 12 months. She highlighted the increasing involvement of traditional financial players in the crypto space, emphasizing partnerships and integrations with crypto-native companies by major names like Fidelity, Blackrock, Paypal, and Visa.

➡️ Long envisions a "happy marriage" between blockchain and traditional banks, emphasizing that blockchain will not replace banks but will offer benefits such as instant cross-border payments without hefty fees. She foresees that crypto can provide unparalleled utility for institutions, benefiting both merchants and consumers.

💡 Key Insight: Long emphasized that while many companies appreciate the benefits of crypto, they prefer it to work seamlessly without requiring them to become experts in it. She believes that 2024 could be the breakout moment for institutional adoption of crypto for real-world utility, provided a compliance-first mindset is embraced.

🚀 Long predicts that in 2024, the industry will break the speculative hype cycles and pave the way for real-world utility at scale, focusing on compliance, usability, and integration with existing systems. She also anticipates a pioneering breakthrough in compliance for decentralized finance.

👉 Expert Perspectives: Other Ripple leaders and firms such as Bitwise and Vaneck have also shared their crypto outlook for 2024, aligning with Long's vision of the industry's direction.

📎In summary, Long believes that the current "crypto winter" presents an opportunity for serious builders to work on solving real-world problems in the financial infrastructure with blockchain, emphasizing the need for a compliance-first approach and building compliance tooling in a decentralized environment.

📣 U.S. Crypto Community Rallies Against Proposed Ban

🚀 Cry for Innovation: Digital Currency Aficionados Rebel!
A digital uproar is underway! The "Stop The Crypto Ban" petition on Change ignited by the Chamber of Digital Commerce is erupting like a blockchain volcano. Nearly hitting 10,000 signatures – it's the voice of the people chanting for their crypto rights!

🔥 The People's Ledger Against Legislative Battle
“No to the Crypto Ban!” – that's the battle cry of the concerned netizens. Taking a stand against the Digital Asset Anti-Money Laundering Act championed by 19 senators, it's like David vs. Goliath in the digital realm.

🤝 Uniting for a Future Woven with Digital Threads
Senator Warren and her posse might have their sights on regulation, but the Chamber is lighting the torches of innovation. They're shouting from the rooftops – "Don't let this bill snuff out America's digital flame!"

🌐 Championing the Digital Domain
The chamber isn’t holding back. They’re painting a future splashed with digital currencies enhancing the economy, kindling innovation, and safeguarding user freedom. “We won't vote for any senator backing this bill in its current form,” they vow, defending the digital universe with every signature.

✊ A Call to Dollars and Sense
With a united voice, the crypto crusade demands – "Senators, herald innovation, don't hamper it. Shape the future, don't shrink it." The question now – will the digital chorus sway the hearts of the legislative titans?