Weekly review of the key events of the crypto market 08-12 May 2023
1. Liechtenstein will allow paying for public services with Bitcoin
Liechtenstein plans to accept bitcoins as payment for public services, and then immediately convert them into Swiss francs.
A similar approach to bitcoin payments is used by Swiss Zug and Lugano. There, local authorities have taken steps to make bitcoin payments legal to pay certain taxes and utility costs.
This news is not the first time Liechtenstein has hit the headlines because of its crypto-friendly policy.
2. Fidelity Investments: Customer service in the virtual world
Boston-based investment management company Fidelity Investments has filed trademark applications that specify plans for customer service in a virtual world based on digital currencies.
Three patent applications revealed Fidelity's plans to explore marketing, placement, recruiting, and reference services for investment and financial planning in the metaverse. The company is also considering the possibility of creating an NFT trading platform where it would be possible to buy, sell and exchange digital goods.
3. Coinbase and Gemini launch International platforms
The actions of the exchanges are notable for three reasons. Firstly, international expansion is the latest example of how American crypto companies seek to insure themselves against an unfavorable regulatory framework in the United States.
Secondly, these international platforms are an attempt to take away market share from the international leader Binance.
Finally, the calculations of perpetual contracts will be calculated in each exchange's own stable coin. Coinbase and Gemini transactions will be nominated and calculated in USDC and gUSD, respectively. This will help increase the demand for exchanges' own stablecoins and allow them to increase their interest income from the underlying collateral (US Treasury obligations and their equivalents).
4. German company Fintech Unstoppable Finance will launch Europe's first DeFi-Native Bank
Thanks to the adoption in the EU of a new bill on crypto asset markets (MiCA), Berlin-based fintech startup Unstoppable Finance announced the deployment of Europe's first "DeFi-native bank" along with a stable coin that will be pegged to the euro.
It is important that the reserves to secure the new stablecoin will be stored not in commercial banks, but directly in the European Central Bank.
The Ultimate DeFi wallet developed by the company will allow users to interact with the Ethereum and Solana protocols and trade cryptocurrency from their smartphones.
The exact launch date of DeFi-Native Bank has not yet been set.
5. Institutions will launch the global Canton Network
A number of large financial organizations have announced their plans to launch the Canton Network, the industry's first functional privacy-enabled blockchain network designed for financial markets.
Canton Network members include 3Homes, ASX, BNP Paribas, Broadridge, Capgemini, Cboe Global Markets, Cumberland, Deloitte, Deutsche Börse Group, Digital Asset, The Digital Dollar Project, DRW, Eleox, EquiLend, FinClear, Gambyl, Goldman Sachs, IntellectUU, Liberty City Ventures, Microsoft, Moody's, Paxos, Right Pedal LendOS, S&P Global, SBI Digital Asset Holdings, Umbrage, Versana, VERT Capital, Xpansiv and Zinnia.
So far, public networks with smart contracts have not received significant distribution among financial institutions and other enterprises due to three significant drawbacks:
- Lack of confidentiality and control over data. Currently, there are no public blockchains that could provide data protection or control at any level of their network.
- Scaling difficulties: Public blockchains suffer from limited bandwidth.
Canton Network removes these obstacles by uniquely balancing network decentralization with the privacy and control necessary to operate in a secure and reliable regulatory environment.
Canton Network participants will begin testing the possibilities of interaction in a number of applications in July 2023.
