Blockchain Morning Post| A&TCapital completes a $100 million fundraising; Meta launches AI project

Today's Highlights:

• 1 The SPC issued a criminal justice interpretation on illegal fund-raising: adding new types of illegal ways of absorbing funds, such as virtual currency transactions
• 2 EU member states plan to have crypto companies regulated by eu anti-money laundering agencies by 2024
• 3 Blockchain venture capital fund A&T Capital completed a $100 million fundraising
• 4 Sotheby's canceled the auction of 104 CryptoPunks due to the collector's remorse before the auction began
• 5Meta launches an artificial intelligence project aimed at building the future of the metacosm
• 6 Bloomberg will integrate with crypto company Elwood to provide institutional crypto trading capabilities
• 7Cosmos developer Tendermint renamed "Ignite"
• 8 Data: The 24-hour clearing volume of the deFi mortgage lending market on the whole network is as high as 17.19 million US dollars

Today's topic: Sotheby's auctioned Kobe Bryant jerseys and related NFTs for $277,200

On February 23, the auction of the late basketball star Kobe Bryant jersey and its animated NFT ended at Sotheby's, which was finally auctioned for $277,200. The auction collection is a kobe bryant jersey, accompanied by an animated NFT of kobe bryant's 81-point game, with a starting price of $200,000. In 2006, Bryant wore the jersey to score 81 points against the Toronto Raptors, the second highest single-game score in NBA history. What do you think about Kobe Bryant jerseys and related NFT auctions? Feel free to leave a message in the comments section, we will select 3 people from the comments to reward 10 Q coins each.

Regulatory messages

The SPC issued a new revision of the Criminal Justice Interpretation on Illegal Fund-raising: adding new types of illegal ways of absorbing funds, such as virtual currency transactions

According to Jin Shi citing the Supreme People's Court, today, the Supreme People's Court issued the "Decision on Amending the Interpretation of the Supreme People's Court on Several Issues Concerning the Specific Application of Law in the Trial of Criminal Cases of Illegal Fund-Raising". After the revision, the "Interpretation" retains the four characteristics and elements of the crime of illegally absorbing deposits from the public, namely illegality, openness, inducement, and sociality, combined with new judicial practices and new forms of crime, to increase the new types of illegal absorption of funds such as online lending, virtual currency transactions, and financial leasing, and at the same time, in view of the prominent problems of illegal fund-raising in the field of pensions, add the situation of "illegally absorbing funds by providing 'pension services', investing in 'pension projects', selling 'elderly products'" in order to punish P2P in accordance with the law. Provide a basis for illegal fund-raising crimes such as virtual currency transactions and pension fields.

EU member states plan to have crypto companies regulated by eu anti-money laundering agencies by 2024

PANews reported on February 24 that some EU member states led by Germany, including the Netherlands, Spain, Austria, Italy and Luxembourg, plan to bring cryptocurrency companies under the jurisdiction of the new EU anti-money laundering agency AMLA. It is reported that the agency first proposed in July 2021 that the organization will start operations in 2024 and be fully operational in 2026.

An EU diplomat reportedly said that putting crypto companies on the agenda of anti-money laundering regulators aims to provide clearer coverage of crypto transactions in line with EU regulations on financial services. The official wants the EU's anti-money laundering agency to focus on high-risk cross-border transactions facilitated by crypto service providers as well as banks and other financial institutions. However, the official's proposed framework has not yet been discussed by EU member states.

The U.S. House of Representatives Financial Services Committee will hold a digital currency hearing in March

According to Jinshi, the US House of Representatives Financial Services Committee announced a hearing in March, which focused on the possibility of developing the Fed's digital currency.

Governor of the Central Bank of Ukraine: Prohibition of the issuance of electronic money and recharge of electronic wallets

According to Jinshi, the governor of the central bank of Ukraine said that the issuance of electronic money and the recharge of electronic wallets are prohibited.

The U.S. FBI is looking for software to track the top 95% of cryptocurrencies by market capitalization

On Friday, the FBI issued a Request for Proposal (RFP) calling for the use of state-of-the-art tracking and analysis software as well as software licenses to detect illegal use of cryptocurrencies by criminals, Forbes reported. The Division of Criminal Investigations (CID) Money Laundering, Forfeiture and Bank Fraud (MLFBU) explained that the reason for the proposal was that changes in the use of virtual currencies by illegal actors led to the FBI's need to acquire a tool that could track large amounts of cryptocurrency.

The proposal requires private contractors to provide software for tracking virtual currencies, graphing, clustering, and attributing virtual currency transactions, and licensing the software to the FBI.

The proposal also requires the software to be able to track the top 95% of virtual currencies on Coinmarketcap.com market capitalization. In addition, the software needs to support the following "blockchains and related virtual assets" described in the tracking proposal: BTC, BCH, LTC, ETH, and all ERC-20 tokens.

NFT

Sotheby's recanted canceling the auction of 104 CryptoPunks before the collector started auction

The collector who previously announced that he would auction 104 CryptoPunks with Sotheby's on February 23 0x650d repented before the auction began, posting "Sorry, I decided HODL", which led to the cancellation of the auction.

According to the official announcement of Sotheby's auction house, Sotheby's will auction 104 Cryptounks on February 23, and the NFT price of this auction is expected to be between $20 million and $30 million according to the price at that time. According to the announcement disclosure, these Punk NFTs were purchased by anonymous collectors in August 2021 0x650d, and Sotheby's allowed the winning bidder to pay in cash or cryptocurrency.

Former Universe

CCTV Quick Watch Official Micro released a meta-universe related video

CCTV Quick Watch official Weibo released a meta-universe video today. In the video, Professor Shenyang of the School of Journalism and Communication of Tsinghua University explains "what is the metacosm": 1. Upgrade the current Internet from two-dimensional to three-dimensional; 2. The linkage of natural people, virtual people and robots; 3. Through the adjustment of economic rules, realize the creator economy of the meta-universe. In addition, Yin Jian, a research assistant to Professor Shenyang's team, explained that "the metacosm is not a virtual world or a video game": the metacosm is a fusion of reality and virtuality. The metacosm doesn't have to be immersed in the virtual. Metaverses aren't necessarily video games either. Professor Shenyang also stressed that we should not only pay attention to the dynamics of Facebook, he believes that zuckerberg's public speech is still focused on the virtualized metaverse, which will allow everyone to understand the metacosm one-sidedly. "Although the word 'universe' is not very accurate, it expresses that its scope is very broad.

Meta launches an artificial intelligence project aimed at building the future of the metaverse

According to Reuters, Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook co-founder and current CEO of Meta, said Meta is working on artificial intelligence to allow people to have more natural conversations with voice assistants, which is a step toward the way people communicate with artificial intelligence in the metaverse. Zuckerberg said the company's AI project, CAIRaoke, is "a complete end-to-end neural model for building device assistants." Meta says it's using the model in its video call Portal devices and plans to integrate it into devices with augmented reality (AR) and virtual reality (VR).

In addition, Zuckerberg announced that Meta is developing a universal speech translator designed to provide instant inter-speech translation across all languages.

Project dynamics

Digital asset management firm Valkyrie announced a money management service for blockchain projects

Digital asset management firm Valkyrie Investments announced a money management service for blockchain projects with the aim of enabling blockchain projects to better manage their balance sheets. Money management services will provide cash flow management, proprietary investments and advanced reporting.

Bloomberg will integrate with crypto company Elwood Technologies to provide institutional crypto trading capabilities

According to CoinDesk, Elwood Technologies, a crypto technology company owned by well-known hedge fund manager Alan Howard, announced a strategic integration with Bloomberg, which will be open to institutional clients of Bloomberg Asset and Investment Manager AIM. AIM is a buyer's order management system that is used by about 15,000 customers who collectively manage more than $17 trillion in assets.

The two companies plan to integrate Elwood's machine cryptocurrency trading capabilities with Bloomberg's data analytics and workflow tools by the second quarter to enable a unified investment process.

Previously, Alan Howard had led the investment in cryptocurrency custody company Copper for $25 million.

Bnyon Mellon Bank of New York has partnered with Chainalysis to track crypto transactions

According to Cointelegraph, Bnyol Bank mellon announced a partnership with blockchain data platform Chainalysis to help track crypto transactions and analyze cryptocurrency products for its users. As part of the partnership, Bank of New York will leverage the Chainalysis software to track, record, and leverage data around crypto assets.

New York Mellon Islean is the world's largest custodian bank and currently manages $46.7 trillion in assets.

Chainalysis is a blockchain data analytics platform that provides services to traditional financial institutions to help large companies easily manage the legal risks posed by cryptocurrencies.

Coinbase will launch My Neighbor Alice (ALICE)

Coinbase announced that it will launch My Neighbor Alice (ALICE), which has now opened deposits. If liquidity conditions are met, trading will begin on or after 01:00 AM Beijing time on February 25.

It is reported that My Neighbor Alice is a multiplayer construction game, where users can purchase virtual land, build facilities, social networking, etc.

Stablecoin issuer Circle launches business accounts for USDC trading

Stablecoin USDC operator Circle has launched a new account service designed to help businesses transact using cryptocurrencies.

The company announced Wednesday that the new Circle account allows corporate customers to top up, withdraw, receive and store cryptocurrencies, and settle all payments with stablecoin USDC. Circle's new account capabilities enable businesses to seamlessly integrate crypto payments into their operations and use digital assets as collateral. Account holders can send and receive USDCs through eight blockchains, including Ethereum, Algorand, Solana, Stellar, Tron, Hedera, Avalanche, Flow. In addition, accredited investors can also participate in the Stablecoin Lending Program using a Circle account. The program, known as Circle Yield, offers investors an annual return of 4% to 6%.

Cosmos developer Tendermint renamed "Ignite"

Tendermint, a core contributor to the Cosmos project, is changing its name to "Ignite" because its current name is being used by one of its founders for a new project. Tendermint was founded in 2014 by its then-founder and CEO, Jae Kwon. But after years of deteriorating relationships, he left the company in early 2020 to work on a new project called Virgo, and now it appears that Kwon is taking back ownership of the Tendermint brand.

Peng Zhong, CEO of the renamed Ignite, said the name change did not involve a major change in the company's roadmap or leadership, but rather that the brand renewal was intended to symbolize a shift toward "product centricity," a name reminiscent of "the beginning of change and action."

Financing messages

Blockchain venture capital fund A&T Capital completed a $100 million fundraising

Blockchain venture capital fund A&T Capital completed the full fundraising of $100 million. Investors include partners from the world's largest fintech groups, well-known venture capital funds, and entrepreneurs with outstanding achievements in the field of web2 and web3.

Over the past year, A&T Capital has completed more than $19 million in investments involving 30 projects, including Amber Group, Cobo, Nestcoin, Infstones, Consensys and Commonwealth. With a focus on Web3 and fintech, A&T Capital is discovering and investing in early-stage innovative blockchain technology infrastructure and a rapidly growing application layer.

A&T Capital was established in April 2021 with overseas offices in Germany, Singapore and the United States. Its three founding partners have been involved in early-stage investments in projects such as Algorand, Avalanche, Ethereum and Polkadot.

Important data

Report: The global fintech blockchain market will reach $8.7 billion by 2026

According to PR News Wire, global industry analyst firm (GIA, StrategyR) said in its report "Fintech Blockchain – Global Market Trajectory and Analysis" that the global fintech blockchain market is estimated at $1.3 billion in 2022 and is expected to reach $8.7 billion by 2026, with a compound annual growth rate of 44.8%.

In addition, the report said that blockchain technology is changing the way various industries, including financial services, operate. The combination of blockchain and fintech is becoming the most promising technology portfolio with the potential to transform the fintech industry. Fintech blockchain is a fintech application of blockchain technology that provides solutions, software, and various fintech blockchain services that businesses use to provide improved and automated financial services. The growth of the global fintech blockchain market can be attributed to factors such as growing consumer demand for owning and investing in Bitcoin, increasing demand for cheaper and faster cross-border payment systems, better compatibility with the financial services industry ecosystem, and escalating requirements for integrated security mechanisms.

Data: The 24-hour liquidation volume of the deFi mortgage lending market across the network is as high as 17.19 million US dollars

OKLink data shows that in the past 24 hours, the net-wide DeFi mortgage loan liquidation amount totaled $17.19 million, up 2535% from the previous day, hitting a new high in nearly 30 days. Among them, the top three projects in liquidation amount are Aave ($11.89 million), Venus ($3.3 million) and Composite ($1.04 million).

Gold broke through $1970 an ounce and silver rose above $25.5

The market shows that spot gold has risen nearly $12 in the short term and has now broken through $1970 / ounce, up 3.2%. This is the highest since November 2020. Spot silver rose short-term, up more than 4% during the day, up more than $25.5 for the first time since August 2021 and now at $25.51 an ounce.