Tax Cuts, More Tether Controversy, and a CCN.com Podcast: This Week in Crypto

Make sure you check out last week’s post here, now let’s go over what happened in crypto this week. In addition to our normal weekly crypto update, we’ve gone ahead and launched a new podcast The Bitcoin Podcast by CCN.com. Check it out on iTunes and be sure to rate and subscribe!

Price Watch:

• Bitcoin is up 5 percent this week after the crypto market extended its latter-week rally into early July.
• Ethereum is up more than 2 percent this week amid the general market upswing but is trailing many other large-cap cryptocurrencies.
• The entire coin market cap is up about $13 billion after the June 30 rebound reversed an early week downtrend.

Governments:

• Fiat Withdrawals could become “impossible” in India, warns a major Indian cryptocurrency exchange, following the central bank’s decision to ban cryptocurrency. The move caused a slight price drop.
• South Korea denies rumors of a 10% tax on crypto trading profits after domestic news outlet Chosun claimed a “high-ranking government official” would raise the tax. The news created some FUD in the already uncertain South Korean markets.
• Ukrainian Police Arrest Four in Exchange Fraud after the team set up a fake exchange. The authorities say they used a simple CMS and pumped the site up with fake reviews.
• Japan Proposes lowering cryptocurrency taxes to around 20% by reclassifying them. Taxes currently stand at anywhere from 15% to 55% depending on income bracket.
• U.S. Justice Department seized $20M+ in Bitcoin from Drug Bust: Deputy Attorney General Rod J. Rosenstein touted that “Criminals who think that they are safe on the Darknet are wrong”. The seized bitcoin and mining equipment will likely be auctioned off.

Currencies:

• Tether becomes the 10th largest cryptocurrency after an additional 250 million tokens were issued. The token is extremely controversial in cryptocurrency circles and is supposed to be backed 1:1 with US currency.
• Zcash activates “Overwinter” hard fork, the first in a series of forks on the company’s two-year roadmap. The fork contains privacy enhancements and was implemented without making either chain vulnerable to replay attacks.

Startups:

• A16Z Launches $300 million crypto fund: The fund will have the first female managing partner in the firm’s history, Kathryn Haun, and will invest in everything from startups to big market cap coins like bitcoin and ethereum.
• 500,000 user reportedly pre-register for DX.Exchange launch. The exchange is the first major subscription-based exchange as opposed to taking a fee per transaction. The group also claims to have a partnership with Nasdaq in place.

Featured Image from Shutterstock

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Jake Sylvestre

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