Banks and financial institutions have started experimenting with tokenized bank deposits, bank balances recorded on a blockchain, but the technology is doomed to lose out to stablecoins, according to Omid Malekan, an adjunct professor at Columbia Business School. Overcollateralized stablecoin issuers, who must maintain 1:1 cash or short-term cash equivalent reserves to back their tokens, … Read more
U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent marked the 17th anniversary of the Bitcoin white paper on Friday with a post on X praising the network’s resilience and adding a jab at Senate Democrats, saying the system “never shuts down” and implying lawmakers could “learn something from that.” The comment doubled as a policy signal and a … Read more
European Central Bank (ECB) president Christine Lagarde released a statement on Friday touting the digital euro, a central bank digital currency (CBDC), as a unifying force in the European Union (EU) and said the ECB is aiming to launch it “as early as possible.” “As much as banknotes will continue to circulate, we want cash … Read more
Tesla and Space X CEO Elon Musk says X will ship a standalone “X Chat” in the coming months while keeping Chat embedded in X, adding that its peer-to-peer encryption approach is “similar to Bitcoin” and that the system avoids advertising hooks. Speaking on Friday’s “Joe Rogan Experience,” Musk said X has “rebuilt the entire … Read more
On October 31, 2008, an anonymous entity called Satoshi Nakamoto released a nine-page white paper titled “Bitcoin: A Peer-to-Peer Electronic Cash System”. It introduced something the world had never seen before: a decentralized digital currency that operates entirely without intermediaries that truly worked as intended. About 17 years later, Bitcoin has grown from a cryptographic … Read more
Speaking with CNBC’s Sara Eisen at the sidelines the 2025 edition of the Future Investment Initiative in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, Circle Internet Group (CRCL) Jeremy Allaire described Arc as “an economic OS for the internet,” arguing that core financial workflows are moving on chain and need predictable costs and performance. He said Arc is built … Read more
Maximal extractable value (MEV), the process of miners or validators reordering transactions in a block to extract profits, is preventing financial institutions from adopting decentralized finance (DeFi), which hurts retail users, according to Aditya Palepu, CEO of DEX Labs, the lead contributor to decentralized crypto derivatives exchange DerivaDEX. All electronically-traded markets suffer from maximal extractable … Read more
The ongoing U.S. government shutdown is already the second-longest in the nation’s history, and may break the record for longest next week. That isn’t promising for crypto legislation’s chances of actually becoming law in the near future. You’re reading State of Crypto, a CoinDesk newsletter looking at the intersection of cryptocurrency and government. Click here … Read more
Ripio, a Latin American crypto exchange with more than 25 million users, has launched a new stablecoin pegged to the Argentine peso. The token, called wARS, is now live on Ethereum, Coinbase’s Base, and World Chain, local news outlet La Nacion reports. The peso-backed token allows users to send and receive funds around the world, … Read more
Bitcoin closed October lower, snapping its six-year “Uptober” streak while BNB eked out a gain as a mid-month jolt left most majors stuck below early highs. The shock landed Oct. 10, when President Donald Trump threatened steep new tariffs on China amid rare-earth tensions, touching off a broad risk-off move. Bitcoin slid from roughly the … Read more