Crypto.com Goes DeFi, Pomp’s New Fund, 1st Wave Of Tokenized Whiskey + More

Source: Adobe/Cagkan

Get your daily, bite-sized digest of cryptoasset and blockchain-related news – investigating the stories flying under the radar of today’s crypto news.

Exchanges news

  • Crypto.com said it launched DeFi Swap, “a decentralized protocol deployed on the Ethereum blockchain” for swaping and “farming” DeFi coins. It is a fork of the Uniswap V2 decentralized exchange with Triple Yield incentives provided for liquidity providers, powered by CRO, the company added.
  • Rakuten Wallet, the crypto exchange run by the Japanese e-commerce giant Rakuten, is set to diversify its offerings in a bid to attract more customers. Per Coin Post, the exchange is set to introduce new services, including margin trading options. The platform operator stated that it had added a solution that allows customers to make deposits using a wide range of Japanese banks. Initially, the wallet exclusively used Rakuten Bank fiat on/off ramps.
  • Kraken has announced that Jeremy Welch, the co-founder and former CEO of crypto security specialist Casa, joined the exchange as vice president of product. The announcement said that Welch will be in charge of launching strategic improvements across Kraken’s product suite and of new features that would improve the existing user experience. He will also continue to serve as an advisor to Casa.

Investments news

  • Anthony Pompliano (Pomp), Co-founder of Morgan Creek Digital, has announced a new rolling fund that he said will be backed by “a group of successful investors across Silicon Valley and Wall Street.” According to his announcement, rolling fund structure will provide him with flexibility that, he finds, will result in “a significant advantage” when investing in early-stage technology companies, as well as “significantly increase” average person’s access to the venture capital asset class.

Tokenization news

  • Wave Financial Group has received its first round of investment from clients and has bought 1,000 barrels of Kentucky bourbon whiskey from the Wilderness Trail distillery, they said in an emailed press release. Investors will benefit from the potential rise in value throughout the whiskey’s ageing process, they claimed, while its unique characteristic will be the tokenization of the holding in year two, in order to facilitate a potential exit should any investors wish to sell before the full 5 to 6 year ageing period before bottling.

Privacy coins news

  • The US Internal Revenue Services (IRS) will pay people up to USD 625,000 if they manage to crack the privacy-oriented monero (XMR) and other privacy coins: USD 500,000 for developing and proving a working concept of a privacy crack tool, then another USD 125,000 following a completion of a pilot test and a government approval. Private contractors and individuals are currently invited to submit a working prototype of how they plan to crack monero by September 16, said the published proposal.

Blockchain news

  • Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey’s payment company Square has launched the Cryptocurrency Open Patent Alliance (COPA), a non-profit the goal of which is to fight patent trolls by pooling patents into a library and ensuring an open, democratic access to blockchain technologies developed by participating companies. The library “lets members use each other’s patents as needed defensively, giving even small companies a shield with which to protect themselves against patent aggressors,” said Square.
  • The local government leader of Seocho, one of Seoul’s most affluent districts, has proposed launching a blockchain-powered voting platform for residents. According to UpDown Korea, the head of the Seocho regional government Cho Eun-hee has also spoken about launching a variety of projects that make use of blockchain technology at a local government level. Cho added, “I hope that Seocho’s efforts will be the foundation for a nationwide [blockchain adoption drive].”
  • The South Korean parliament said new legislation may be needed for the police’s successful blockchain-powered driver’s licenses. Per Fn News, a legal framework is lacking for the new smartphone-based licenses, issued by the National Police Agency and the Road Traffic Agency. Parliamentarians have argued that other nations that make use of digital driver’s licenses have introduced legal amendments. They also claim that police officers currently have no protocols for what to do if a QR code or barcode is unscannable, if the owner’s mobile is damaged and other scenarios.