PA Daily | House Financial Services Committee expects to review draft stablecoin legislation on April 2; Haun Ventures plans to raise $1 billion for two new funds
Reprinted from panewslab
03/22/2025·2MToday's news tips:
1. U.S. regulators remove the "reputation risk" assessment clause, which will alleviate the problem of "disconnection" of banks in the crypto industry
2. The US Treasury Department officially lifts sanctions on Tornado Cash
3. Germany's BaFin stopped the token issuance of Ethena stablecoin USDe, saying it has major compliance flaws
4. Bloomberg: The U.S. House Financial Services Committee is expected to review draft stablecoin legislation on April 2
5. Zoth was stolen and lost $8.32 million, and the attacker's funds came from ChangeNOW
6.Tether CEO: It is negotiating with a major accounting firm on reserve audit
7.AUCTION was suspected to have been pulled by a whale/institution and then fell back. The whale/institution currently holds a total of 20% of the total tokens.
8. Crypto Ventures plans to raise $1 billion for two new funds
Regulatory/Macro
According to reporter Eleanor Terrett, one of the key factors that led to "debanking" in the past is that regulators require banks to consider so-called "reputation risks" when evaluating whether customers can access financial services. The Fed had directed employees in an internal manual to pay attention to whether bank executives made "controversial remarks", but Fed Chairman Powell had promised to remove the clause last month.
The latest developments show that the US Currency Supervision Agency (OCC) has officially removed "reputation risk" from its bank inspection standards, emphasizing that it will focus on more transparent risk areas in the future.
According to the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) announcement, its crypto task force held its first "Spring Crypto Regulatory Sprint" series of roundtables at its headquarters in Washington at 13:00 ET on March 21, with the theme of "How do we get to this point and how will we get out of the dilemma - define securities attributes." The meeting will be broadcast live to the public through the SEC official website.
The meeting focused on discussing whether crypto assets constitute securities and focused on clarifying regulatory paths. The guests attended the conference included general counsel for major law firms and institutions such as a16z, Delphi Ventures, Cooley, BakerHostetler, etc., covering academic, regulatory, venture capital and policy advocates. Former SEC committee member Troy Paredes was the director.
U.S. Treasury Department formally revokes sanctions on Tornado Cash
According to the U.S. Treasury Department announcement, OFAC (Office of Foreign Assets Control) has removed Tornado Cash and its related Ethereum addresses from the sanctions list (SDN List), ending economic sanctions on the privacy currency mixing agreement since August 2022. This decision is based on the result of a government review of the applicability of financial sanctions in an evolving technical and legal environment.
However, the Ministry of Finance still stressed that it would continue to crack down on North Korean government-sponsored hacking groups and their illegal activities using crypto assets, and remain highly vigilant about all crypto transactions that may involve malicious behavior.
According to the announcement on BaFin's official website, the German Financial Regulatory Authority BaFin has stopped Ethena GmbH's new business of issuing USDe stablecoins in Germany, citing major organizational flaws and compliance violations in the MiCAR licensing process, including improper asset reserve management and failure to meet capital requirements.
BaFin has taken the following measures: freeze Ethena GmbH's asset reserves, limit management's disposal rights over assets, close related functions of its official website, and assign specialists to supervise the implementation. In addition, BaFin also suspected that Ethena GmbH illegally issued sUSDe securities tokens without providing the necessary prospectus.
At present, Ethena GmbH customers are temporarily unable to redeem USDe tokens, but secondary market transactions are not restricted. As of now, about 5.4 billion USDe tokens are in circulation. BaFin will continue to evaluate whether it will completely reject its compliance license application under MiCAR.
According to an official statement from Ethena, Germany's BaFin has notified its Frankfurt-based entity Ethena GmbH's MiCAR compliance application will not be approved, but the decision does not affect USDe's current exchange listing and its casting and redemption services through the British Virgin Islands entity Ethena (BVI) Limited.
Ethena stressed that USDe is still fully supported by assets and there is no "freeze". Other regulatory paths will be evaluated in the future and relevant terms of service will be revised in the coming week to reflect current changes. This event does not affect the normal usage process of most users.
Market News: Fidelity Solana Fund has been registered in Delaware, USA
According to market news, FidelitY SOLANA FUND has been registered in Delaware, USA.
According to Bloomberg, the U.S. House Financial Services Committee is expected to review the draft stablecoin legislation on April 2. Arkansas Chairman French Hill said last week that a well-regulated stablecoin market would “strengthen the dominance of the dollar, modernize our payment infrastructure, and promote the popularity of financial services without excessive government intervention.” But critics such as House Committee Democratic Leader Maxine Waters and Senate Banking Committee Elizabeth Warren argued that the bill was not enough to protect consumers, advocated banning tech companies from issuing stablecoins and other reforms. Critics also worry that if the stablecoins fail, there will be a lack of insurance like the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) as backing; while bankers warn that stablecoins may suck deposits and reduce credit channels.
Market News: Fidelity will launch tokenized funds to invest in US Treasury bills
According to Aggr News, Fidelity will launch a tokenized fund to invest in US Treasury bills to compete with BlackRock's BUIDL.
Previous news , BUIDL, a subsidiary of BlackRock, became the first on-chain fund with a management scale of over US$1 billion.
Viewpoint
SEC Commissioner Hester Peirce: Crypto startups should be allowed to use NFT to raise funds
Hester Peirce, head of the U.S. SEC cryptocurrency task force, said cryptocurrency projects like Stoner Cats (using NFTs as a fundraising mechanism to fund their work) should be exempt from securities regulation and may soon get this clear rule from regulators.
At the SEC’s first cryptocurrency roundtable, Peirce (who led the SEC’s work with Mark Uyeda, the acting chairman of the SEC) said NFT could be the next asset class the agency has processed through a similar exemption statement. She noted that if the SEC could provide a reference framework for NFT issuers, it would be "very helpful" to the industry development. However, not all NFT-containing projects are automatically exempt from supervision, and NFTs with structural securities attributes are still subject to regulatory constraints.
Previous news , the US SEC will hold a roundtable meeting on crypto asset supervision to focus on the definition of "security attributes".
Project News
GoPlus completes KYB verification, GPS repurchase plan is about to start
According to the announcement of GoPlus Security, GPS token repurchase has been delayed due to the need to open a Binance enterprise account. Its parent company has completed corporate identity verification (KYB), and the repurchase procedure is about to be started. Previously, the community has questioned due to the failure to communicate the progress of the process in a timely manner. GoPlus promised to strengthen information transparency in the future and simultaneously promote the development of cross-chain assets and product functions. The relevant results will be announced in a week.
According to Zoth's official announcement, its system has recently encountered a security attack, and the team has launched an emergency investigation and coordinated with its partners. Preliminary analysis points to the malicious replacement of the contract due to the permission leakage, and Zoth promises to publish a detailed report and take remedial measures as soon as possible. Users should avoid contract interaction and pay close attention to subsequent updates.
Zoth was stolen and lost $8.32 million, and the attacker's funds came from ChangeNOW
Slow Fog founder Cosine tweeted that the Zoth platform was replaced with a malicious contract due to the leakage of the administrator's permission private key, causing a loss of about 8.5 million US dollars.
According to MistTrack monitoring, Zoth suffered a total loss of about $8.32 million in attacks, and the stolen funds are now located at the address 0x7b0c…60cf. Tracking shows that the attacker's initial funding source is ChangeNOW platform address 0x3b33…01e5.
Binance Alpha adds AFT, BNB Card, Mubarakah and Plume
The Binance Alpha page shows that Binance Alpha has added AIFlow Token (AFT), BNB Card, Mubarakah and Plume (PLUME).
Binance Alpha adds Tell A Tale (TAT) and quq (quq)
The Binance Alpha page shows that Binance Alpha has added Tell A Tale (TAT) and quq (quq).
Binance will launch BRUSDT and PLUMEUSDT perpetual contract
According to Binance announcement, the platform will launch the BRUSDT perpetual contract at 20:45 on March 21, Beijing time, and the PLUMEUSDT perpetual contract at 20:50, both supporting up to 25 times of leverage.
Strategy raises STRF preferred shares issuance to $722.5 million for purchase of Bitcoin
According to the official announcement, Strategy has increased the issuance scale of STRF Series A's permanent preferred shares from US$500 million to US$722.5 million, with an issue price of US$85 per share, with an annual interest rate of 10%. It is expected to settle on March 25, with a net fundraising of approximately US$711 million for purchases of Bitcoin and general operations. STRF has a quarterly cash dividend mechanism, and compound interest will be calculated after the deadline, with the highest annualized interest rate reaching 18%. This time, it was underwritten by Morgan Stanley, Citi, etc., marks Strategy's continued promotion of the "Bitcoin Vault" strategy.
Kaito AI founder Yu Hu purchased 1 million KAITOs and pledged them all
Kaito AI founder Yu Hu said that he has purchased 1 million KAITO (about 1.4 million US dollars) through personal funds TWAP and pledged it all, becoming the second largest KAITO pledger on the chain. He also sets an unlocking mechanism: the agreement revenue reaches $50 million to unlock 50%, and the full unlocking is $100 million. Yu Hu stressed his long-term optimism about KAITO and will share its strategy and vision tomorrow.
MegaETH announces opening of public test network
MegaETH announced the opening of a public test network, supporting 20,000 TPS, 1.7 Gigas/s computing power and 10ms block production time. Yesterday at 14:06 EST, MegaETH airdropped ETH to more than 190,000 wallets, and completed it in just 15 seconds. Officials said that the network is based on the Ethereum Rollup architecture and will introduce parallelization, JIT compilation and optimized storage backend in the future to provide a true real-time on-chain experience. Users can visit testnet.megaeth.com to experience the testnet application, receive test ETH, and explore native integration with MetaMask.
Farcaster launches data layer Snapchain main network
Decentralized social media protocol Farcaster launches the main network of Snapchain's "blockchain-like" data layer, and simultaneously launches the "Airdrop Offers" incentive program to reward users who actively use the decentralized social media platform. According to co-founder Varun Srinivasan when he announced the launch of the Snapchain testnet in December, the new system can handle more than 10,000 transactions per second. It was reported that the system took only six months from conception to formal use.
Previous news , Farcaster plans to launch a new data layer Snapchain next Q1.
Bloomberg: Coinbase is in deep negotiations on acquisition of derivatives exchange Deribit
According to Bloomberg, people familiar with the matter revealed that Coinbase Global Inc. is in deep negotiations on the acquisition of crypto derivatives exchange Deribit, the world's largest Bitcoin and Ethereum options trading platform. It is not clear whether Coinbase has reached a final agreement with Deribit.
The two companies have informed Dubai regulators about the negotiations, which any acquirer can take over because Deribit holds a Dubai license. Bloomberg reported in January that Deribit's valuation could be around $4 billion to $5 billion. Deribit was founded in the Netherlands in 2016 by John Jansen and Marius Jansen. The company's early backers include crypto investment firm XBTO and growth equity investor 10T Holdings. Deribit, which offers options, futures and spot trading, nearly doubled its total trading volume last year to nearly $1.2 trillion.
Tether CEO: In talks with a major accounting firm on reserve audit
Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino said it is "working with one of the four major accounting firms" to promote audits of its reserves, Reuters reported. Tether has issued a USD pegged cryptocurrency worth more than $140 billion, and its reserves have only released quarterly reports and have not completed a full audit. Ardoino did not disclose which of the four major accounting firms Tether is in talks with PwC, Ernst & Young, Deloitte and KPMG, and declined to say when the audit will be held.
AUCTION fell more than 35% after breaking through $68 this morning and is now at $47.7
According to OKX market data, AUCTION broke through $68 this morning and approached a record high ($73), and then fell by more than 35% at one point and is now at $47.7. Coinglass data shows that AUCTION has lost $14.3335 million in the past 12 hours, second only to BTC's $11.3797 million in the past 12 hours.
Previous news , AUCTION was suspected to have been pulled by a whale/institution and then fell back. The whale/institution currently holds a total of 20% of the total tokens.
Bithumb will launch Across Protocol (ACX) won trading pair
According to the official announcement, South Korean crypto exchange Bithumb will launch the Across Protocol (ACX) Korean won trading pair, and trading is expected to be opened at 5 pm (UTC+8) on March 22.
Important data
Bitcoin spot ETF net inflows of US$83.0919 million yesterday, with net inflows lasting for 6 days
According to monitoring by on-chain analyst @ai_9684xtpa, the smart money (TOP6 holding giant whale) that was built at an average price of US$0.9559 three weeks ago was suspected of clearing the position and taking profit 5 hours ago. If sold, it will make a profit of US$1.704 million.
ENA market maker Amber Group tops up $10.35 million to Binance in the past 12 hours
According to monitoring by on-link analyst @ai_9684xtpa, one of the ENA market makers, Amber Group, has recharged ENA worth $10.35 million to Binance in the past 12 hours. Of the 6.96 million (USD 2.5 million) tokens were filed from Binance at an average price of USD 0.3979 two weeks ago, and the other 21.87 million (USD 7.85 million) tokens were received from the Ethena Claim address between April-July 2024.
According to monitoring by on-chain analyst @ai_9684xtpa, the address 0x80F...8b932 proposed 30 million BMTs (about 5.23 million US dollars) from Binance 2 hours ago, with a position building price of 0.1743 US dollars, becoming the top 1 on-chain positioning address.
Financing
Crypto venture capital Haun Ventures plans to raise $1 billion for two new funds
Former federal prosecutor Katie Haun is preparing two new crypto funds with a total scale of $1 billion, which is expected to complete financing in June, people familiar with the matter said. Of this, $500 million is spent on the early stages and $500 million is spent on the late stages.
Previously, Paradigm announced that it would set up its third $850 million fund in 2024, and Haun’s new fund is expected to be one of the largest funds in the crypto venture capital sector in the past two years. According to market trends, the company's overall financing target is lower than the last financing target, but two new funds may receive oversubscribe, according to sources close to Haun Ventures.
