Bitcoin’s ‘Great Accumulation,’ Binance.US resumes fiat withdrawals, and other news: Hodler’s Digest, June 18-24

Top Stories This Week

‘The Great Accumulation’ of Bitcoin has begun, says Gemini’s Winklevoss

Recently renewed optimism for an approved Bitcoin spot exchange-traded fund (ETF) is igniting “The Great Accumulation Race” for Bitcoin, according to industry pundits. Over the past week, Fidelity, Invesco, WisdomTree and Valkyrie have followed investment giant BlackRock in applying for a Bitcoin spot ETF with the United States Securities Exchange Commission, which some analysts believe is the reason for Bitcoin’s price surge in the past days.

Binance.US solves USD withdrawal issues but warns it won’t last long

Crypto exchange Binance.US informed customers that it has resolved U.S. dollar withdrawal issues after working with its banking partners, though it warned the relief may not last. The exchange suspended dollar deposits and notified its customers of an incoming pause to fiat withdrawal channels on June 9, amid its ongoing battle with the SEC. Binance.US has encouraged customers that have a failed withdrawal attempt to resubmit their requests. Any remaining USD balances held in customer accounts will be converted into Tether at a future date.

Atomic Wallet gives major update on hack but questions remain unanswered

Atomic Wallet users have been left wanting more answers, despite the decentralized wallet provider finally releasing a full “event statement” about the June exploit — which some estimate has run up to $100 million in losses. In the statement, Atomic didn’t point to what exactly led to the exploit, only laying out the four most “probable” causes, including a virus on user devices, an infrastructure breach, a man-in-the-middle attack or malware code injection. According to the company, “less than 0.1%” of app users were affected, but the figure is still rebuffed by many online.

UK government moves forward on financial markets bill for potential regulation of crypto

Lawmakers in the United Kingdom are moving forward with legislation that could help support the adoption of crypto in the country. First introduced to the U.K. Parliament in July 2022, the Financial Services and Markets Bill was aimed at ensuring the country maintained its place in the financial world following Brexit, including granting authority on digital asset regulation. The bill went through a third reading in the House of Lords, one of the final stages in passage before considering any additional amendments and being signed into law.

Fed sees stablecoin as form of money, wants ‘robust’ role in its oversight, Powell says

The U.S. Federal Reserve Board sees payment stablecoins as a form of money, Chair Jerome Powell said on June 21 when addressing Congress about the proposed stablecoin bill. Powell took a position that runs contrary to that of SEC chairman Gary Gensler. Last year, Gensler spoke at a Senate Banking Committee hearing saying that stablecoins may require registration and regulation with the SEC. Gensler has also consistently stated that all cryptocurrencies, except Bitcoin, are securities.

Winners and Losers

At the end of the week, Bitcoin (BTC) is at $30,697, Ether (ETH) at $1,896 and XRP at $0.49. The total market cap is at $1.19 trillion, according to CoinMarketCap.

Among the biggest 100 cryptocurrencies, the top three altcoin gainers of the week are Bitcoin Cash (BCH) at 83.66%, Pepe (PEPE) at 67.59% and Bitcoin SV (BSV) at 51.87%. 

The top three altcoin losers of the week are KuCoin Token (KCS) at -8.21%, Quant (QNT) at -6.51% and BitTorrent(New) (BTT) at -4.72% .

For more info on crypto prices, make sure to read Cointelegraph’s market analysis.

Most Memorable Quotations

“We do see payment stablecoins as a form of money, and […] it would be appropriate to have quite a robust federal role in what happens in stablecoin going forward.”

Jerome Powell, chairman of the U.S. Federal Reserve

“It is becoming very obvious Web3 financial rails are the future.”

Lisa Wade, CEO of DigitalX

“BlackRock breathed new life into the [Bitcoin ETF] race.”

Eric Balchunas, senior ETF analyst at Bloomberg

“If well designed, CBDCs can strengthen the usability, resilience, and efficiency of payment systems and increase financial inclusion in [Latin America and the Caribbean].”

International Monetary Fund

“Crypto will become the native currency of AI.”

Robby Yung, the CEO of Animoca Brands

“The Great Accumulation of bitcoin has begun.”

Cameron Winklevoss, co-founder of Gemini

Prediction of the Week 

Bitcoin ‘parabolic advance’ means BTC price all-time high in 2023 — Trader

Bitcoin will hit new all-time highs in 2023, and October is the favored month for it, a popular trader said. In a Twitter update on June 22, pseudonymous trader Credible Crypto argued that the next four months should deliver the bullish BTC price momentum needed to tackle $69,000.

“Whats clear with any parabolic advance is that momentum increases exponentially and peaks at the top. We can see this in both prior impulsive moves from 3k-14k and from 10k-60k,” he explained. This time around, Bitcoin has delivered a successful retest of support on monthly timeframes, with $25,000 now possibly a springboard for a new “parabolic advance.”

“I would expect that once expansion begins (which it looks like it has) we should see monthly moves of > 10k at a time, easily. From current levels to prior ATH is a $40,000 gap. This gap should then, logically, be covered within a few monthly candles if this is a parabolic advance,” he said.

FUD of the Week 

Prime Trust can’t honor customer withdrawals, says Nevada regulator

Prime Trust’s financial condition is “critically deficient,” and the crypto custodian has been unable to honor customer withdrawals since June 21, according to Nevada’s business regulator. In a cease and desist order, the regulator claimed Prime Trust’s is in an “unsafe or unsound condition” to continue business. The company now has 30 days to respond to the order and can request an administrative hearing to contest it. The move comes a few days after its subsidiary, Banq, filed for bankruptcy protection in the United States.

Apple removes malicious Trezor app from App Store

An apparent malicious app purporting to be crypto hardware wallet Trezor has been taken off Apple’s App Store, though a quick search has revealed that other copycat apps are still lurking. After a Twitter user warned the tech company, the app was quickly removed. Fake wallet apps on Apple’s App Store are nothing new. In 2021, one user reportedly lost $600,000 in Bitcoin after downloading a malicious Trezor app from the App Store.

Twitter suspends memecoin-linked AI bot after Elon Musk’s ‘scam crypto’ claim

Twitter has suspended the account of the popular memecoin-linked, AI-powered bot “Explain This Bob” after Elon Musk alleged it was a “scam crypto account.” The bot was created by Prabhu Biswal from India and used OpenAI’s GPT-4 model to comprehend and provide responses to tweets by those who tagged the account. It amassed over 400,000 followers before the suspension. The project was also linked to the ERC-20 memecoin Bob Token (BOB), which was launched in April. Since the suspension, the hashtag “FREEBOB” has circulated on Crypto Twitter.

Best Cointelegraph Features

Bitcoin 2023 in Miami comes to grips with ‘shitcoins on Bitcoin’

Bitcoin maximalists have started to rationalize the idea of NFTs and tokens on Bitcoin as being inherently better than those on Ethereum.

Crypto City guide to Sydney: More than just a ‘token’ bridge

“There’s a lot of innovation that’s coming out of this town — much more than you see on a global stage.”

Peter McCormack’s Twitter regrets: ‘I can feel myself being a dick’ — Hall of Flame

Bedford’s Monopoly millionaire only cares about Bitcoin, thinks CBDCs “are bullshit,” and has a love/hate relationship with Twitter.