Bitcoin finished up 9% last week as sales from the German Federal Criminal Police Office Bundeskriminalamt (BKA), which put pressure on bitcoin prices have concluded.
As reported by Coindesk it wasn’t actually the German government specifically that had been selling the bitcoin, but a small German state called Saxony,writes Simon Peters, cryptoasset eToro market analyst.
The state of Saxony had seized almost 50,000 bitcoin in January this year from the operator of pirate film website Movie2k.to, which was voluntarily transferred by the suspects to wallet addresses provided by the BKA. The BKA in turn had been selling these holdings as per standard practice for assets seized during criminal investigations, acting on instructions from the state.
According to on-chain analytics platform Arkham Intelligence, the sales have now finished and only 0.0048 bitcoin ($418) remains on the bitcoin address identified as belonging to the BKA.
With this round of bitcoin sales now concluded, could this now provide a foundation for a price rally back to $70,000 and beyond? We wait to see.
EYE-CATCHING STORIES
Cryptomarkets see a boost as investors see increased odds of Trump victory
Bitcoin has broken back above the $60,000 level as odds on a Trump presidential victory soared following last weekend’s events at the rally in Butler, Pennsylvania. Crypto-related stocks such as Microstrategy, Coinbase and bitcoin miners saw a boost to their prices also.
The Republican presidential candidate has been widely seen to be pro-crypto in this campaign despite his past scepticism, even recently accepting campaign donations in cryptos such as bitcoin and ethereum, a first for a major US political party.
Trump is due to speak at Bitcoin 2024, one of the largest conferences for bitcoiners, in Nashville, Tennessee on 27th July. Other notable speakers include Michael Saylor (Executive Chairman and Co-Founder of Microstrategy) and Cathie Wood (Founder and CEO of ARK invest).
Core Scientific becomes first bitcoin miner to procure Block’s new ASIC technology
Bitcoin miner Core Scientific announced last week an agreement to procure Block Inc’s new 3-nanometer application-specific integrated circuits (ASIC) miners to their operations, one of the largest agreements in the bitcoin mining industry in terms of new computing power or hashrate.
The purchase is expected to add nearly 15 exahashes per second (EH/s) of hashrate to Core’s mining capacity. To put into context Core Scientific’s current total capacity is a reported 24.6 EH/s.
From Block’s point of view, the agreement with Core Scientific represents a significant step forward for its mining chip program and its goal of increasing the decentralisation of bitcoin mining and increasing the resiliency of the bitcoin network.
The vast majority of ASICs used for bitcoin mining are currently manufactured by Chinese companies such as Bitmain, MicroBT and Canaan.
Goldman Sachs to launch three tokenisation projects by end of year
As reported by Fortune, Goldman Sachs is planning to launch three tokenisation projects by the end of the year targeting institutional clients.
Goldman Sachs already has experience in asset tokenisation. In 2022 the bank worked on a private blockchain bond issuance with the European Investment Bank, where the bond was issued, recorded and settled on GS DAP, its digital assets platform. Similarly in 2023 where it tokenised a green bond for the Hong Kong Monetary Authority.
Speaking to Fortune, Matt McDermott, Global Head of Digital Assets at Goldman Sachs, didn’t provide any specifics on the three tokenisation projects, but did say that one is focused on the fund complex in the US and another on debt issuance in Europe.
Furthermore, McDermott said that with the US presidential election and a potential change in the government’s regulatory approach toward crypto just a few months away, the bank’s opportunities in the space could expand, including being able to hold cryptoassets.
Bitfarms sets date for special meeting of shareholders
Bitcoin miner Bitfarms has set a date of 29th October for a special meeting of its shareholders, in response to Riot Platforms’ requisition made on 24th June.
The special meeting is to vote on reconstituting Bitfarms’ board of directors, with Riot putting up three new candidates to serve on the board. Riot currently owns 14.9% of Bitfarms, making it Bitfarms’ largest shareholder.
Riot had made a proposal back in April to Bitfarms’ board of directors to acquire all of the outstanding shares of Bitfarms. However, this was rejected.
The story (and potential acquisition) is ongoing.
