Bitcoin Falls Below $40,000 | $100 Million Speeding Ticket

CRYPTO GETS DEALT ANOTHER BLOW

Bitcoin fell under $40,000 for the first time in two weeks Friday morning as investors reckoned with persisting macroeconomic and geopolitical tensions. The late week drop, bitcoin’s largest in a month, was exacerbated by muted long-term enthusiasm for the asset despite its recent surge. Crypto analytics firm Glassnode noted that investors appeared to be “deleveraging and utilizing derivatives markets to hedge out risk and buy downside protection, with a keen eye on the Fed rate hikes expected in March.” Accordingly, the global cryptocurrency market shed 5% to hit $1.79 trillion, according to Messari. Before the latest selloff, the market had been showing signs of recovery after cratering last month, with bitcoin’s price climbing above $45,000 last week.

Source: Forbes Digital Assets, powered by Nomics.  Prices as of 4:00 p.m. on February 18, 2022.

MONEY TRAIN WON’T STOP

Fresh off a record year for crypto funding deals, storied venture capital firm Sequoia Capital has launched a crypto-focused fund with between $500 million and $600 million in capital, becoming the latest Silicon Valley giant to plow money into the burgeoning cryptocurrency space. The Sequoia Crypto Fund will primarily invest in cryptocurrencies traded on third-party exchanges, serving as a subfund of the firm’s flagship Sequoia Capital Fund, which has invested in cryptocurrency companies like derivatives exchange FTX Trading and custodial platform Fireblocks. Though Sequoia didn’t disclose the tokens its new fund will purchase, it’s already bought approximately ten cryptocurrencies, including bitcoin, ether and two tokens launched by cryptocurrency startups in its portfolio, social media-focused Deso and storage network Filecoin.

$100 MILLION FOR “REGULATORY CLARITY”

BlockFi has agreed to pay $100 million to the Securities and Exchange Commission and 32 state regulators to settle charges over failing to register its retail cryptocurrency lending product, BlockFi Interest Account. According to SEC Chair Gary Gensler, “this is the first case of its kind with respect to crypto lending platforms.” Following the settlement, U.S. customers will no longer be able to open new interest accounts with the firm. Existing clients will continue receiving interest on their existing holdings but may not be able to add new assets to their accounts.

Addressing the matter, CEO Zac Prince said the move provides “regulatory clarity” for the industry. The company is now applying to register with the SEC to offer a new crypto savings product called BlockFi Yield, hoping to eventually move existing U.S. users over to the new service.

BLOCKCHAIN 50 SPOTLIGHT

Insurance giant Allianz uses blockchain to streamline cross-border auto insurance claims in Europe. Different teams and incompatible databases used to mean lots of back-and-forth emails. Claims could take months to settle. Now there’s a single source record of each claim. Processing time has been reduced to minutes and costs have fallen 10%. So far, it’s being used by 25 Allianz subsidiaries to settle 850,000 claims.

ELSEWHERE

SEC Probes Trading Affiliates Of Crypto Giant Binance’s U.S. Arm [Wall Street Journal]

NYSE Moves Closer To NFT Trading With Trademark Application [Reuters]

Circle To Double In Value To $9 Billion With Revamped SPAC Deal [TechCrunch]  

Steven Ehrlich
Editor 
Forbes CryptoAsset & Blockchain Advisor

Nina Bambysheva
Reporter
Forbes Money & Markets

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