October 2021: Cryptocurrency news
News headlines from the broad cryptocurrency and digital currency field in October 2021 covered a wide range of developments, including: Australia’s moves into Bitcoin mining; India’s crypto industry growth, and regulatory concerns; Mastercard’s moves into embracing cryptocurrencies; the $1BN Binance accelerator fund; and many more.
Crypto and digital currency news is also featured in Startup news Asia’s daily technology news feeds, delivered across social media, by email newsletter and by mobile app.
- ICYMI: US City of Miami plans advance to allow city employees to be paid using Bitcoin, and to let residents pay fees and potentially taxes using the cryptocurrency
- Square payments giant’s next venture to be bitcoin mining, following hardware wallet moves, stepping into competition with China-based BTC mining giants Bitmain, Canaan
- Asia’s tech news, issue 098: Vietnam & blockchain gaming, Huawei & EVs, Philippines voting tech, Australia & Bitcoin mining…
- ICYMI: Greater financial instability, fraud and funding of terrorism likely unless governments toughen supervision of cryptocurrencies, says International Monetary Fund
- ICYMI: US city of Miami has so far generated over $8M from issuing local-use MiamiCoin cryptocurrency
- “…stablecoins, which act as a bridge between national currencies and the cryptocurrency market, should be regulated as financial market infrastructure alongside payment systems and clearing houses…”
- Available to download: Q3 Quarterly Review from CoinDesk – trends driving the digital asset markets, focusing on Bitcoin, Ethereum, DeFi and more (pdf)
- ICYMI: Andreessen Horowitz – a16z – raises $515M for second crypto fund, Crypto Fund II, targeting investments in next-gen payments, DeFi, new monetization models and Web3
- ICYMI: Genopets raises $8.3M with NFT-driven ‘move-to-earn’ game where players are rewarded for physical steps they take in real life, pulling data from phones and wearable devices
- Stablecoins: What are they for – and how stable are they?
- An overview of how Ethereum may be set to become “…the platform of choice for…Web 3.0, where a series of decentralised apps could one day challenge Big Tech’s offerings…”
- ICYMI: “Central & Southern Asia and Oceania is the 4th largest crypto market…$572.5BN in value between July 2020 and June 2021, 14% of global transactions…”
- Download: Bloomberg Crypto Outlook, October 2021 edition
- Australia: Byron Bay to host Australia’s largest Bitcoin mining operation, running on green energy
- China: “Beijing has cracked down hard on bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies, but China still has a thriving ecosystem of startups and entrepreneurs working on decentralized finance…”
- Australia: Western Bulldogs AFL team ink two-year partnership extension with CoinSpot, the country’s largest cryptocurrency exchange
- Asia’s tech news snapshot: Korean metaverse moves, Final Pitch Philippines, Microsoft Code Without Barriers, University of Tokyo startups fund…
- New Zealand: Easy Crypto raises $17M, setting sights on overseas markets including Indonesia, the Philippines and other parts of Asia
- ICYMI: “Dolce & Gabbana’s NFT Experiment Is A Million-Dollar Success Story”
- India: Stader Labs raises $4M with crypto staking platform, allowing users to earn rewards for holding certain cryptocurrencies, similar to depositing money in a bank
- India: Chingari short-video platform to launch its own crypto token, aiming for the $GARI token to be tradeable on cryptocurrency exchanges
- India: “Blockchain…will also attract billions of dollars of investments…However, a regulatory grey zone around cryptocurrency is certainly blocking our opportunities…”
- “India’s cryptocurrency market expanded 641% in the past year, driving growth of digital currencies in central and Southern Asia…”
- South Korea: Opposition People Power Party preparing proposal for 12-month delay to implementation of crypto tax legislation in bid to soften impact
- BollyCoin: A decentralised community-owned marketplace for Bollywood NFT assets – download the whitepaper here
- Crypto in Australia, from the Finder Cryptocurrency Adoption Index, ranking the most popular cryptocurrencies across 22 countries
- ICYMI: Mastercard partners Bakkt to allow all banks and merchants to offer cryptocurrency and related services including wallets, crypto rewards and more
- 93% of all Singaporeans had heard of crypto and 43% owned it, with adoption highest among 26-45 year-olds. 66% of respondents in that group said they owned some crypto’
- ICYMI: US City of Miami plans advance to allow city employees to be paid using Bitcoin, and to let residents pay fees and potentially taxes using the cryptocurrency
- ICYMI: UK’s Action Fraud centre for fraud and cyber crime finds £146M lost to crypto fraud since the start of 2021, near 30% more than reported lost in entirety of 2020
- MP in Kingdom of Tonga, Polynesia, to propose accepting Bitcoin as legal tender to improve remittances for disapora communities
- China: A look at Huobi cryptocurrency platform’s moves in response to the government’s banning of all crypto-related activities
- India: Biconomy blockchain-based transaction platform adds 12K new token holders via token listing, generating $11.5M
- China’s Powerbridge Technologies to deploy 2600 high-performance bitcoin and ether mining rigs in Hong Kong
- A brief look back at the recent world-first Crypto-Fashion Week
- China’s Binance cryptocurrency exchange launches $1BN accelerator fund in bid to boost adoption of Binance Smart Chain blockchain platform
- New Zealand: Christchurch Cryptocurrency & Blockchain Meetup set for October 27th, hosted by Axia Labs and Cryptocurrency NZ
- ICYMI: Visa to launch Universal Payments Channel, platform enabling central bank digital currencies to transfer between blockchains, and also allowing stablecoins to operate on different blockchains
- Japan: A look at the growth of opportunities for NFTs in the Manga space, touching on projects including Shueisha Manga-Art Heritage, Startbahn and Shroom Chan
- Philippines: Axie Infinity blockchain-based play-to-earn gaming firm to launch a decentralized exchange, making it easier to move tokens off the platform to trade them
- Asia’s tech news, latest issue: Korea’s vertical farms, Australian agri-tech, Indonesian investing app, Huobi in China, NFTCon…
- Philippines: Yield Guild Games partners Merit Circle decentralized autonomous organization to expand play-to-earn scholarship model for developing countries
- New Zealand: Reserve Bank publishes ‘Future of Money – Central Bank Digital Currency’ issues paper, inviting public comment on whether a CBDC is right for the country
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