The biggest crypto news and ideas of the day |
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Disney Does Digital 'Pins' |
Disney, the iconic, century-old brand known almost as much for its pursuit of technical innovation as much as its continually expanding catalog of entertainment products, is taking another stab at NFTs. This time it’s through a partnership with Dapper Labs, the Vancouver-based blockchain firm with experience building successful, consumer-facing Web3 apps including NBA Top Shot. The platform, called Disney Pinnacle, is now accepting people to join a waitlist and will launch in the coming months. Digital collectibles, called "pins" will feature IP from Star Wars, Pixar and other Disney properties. |
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I Am the SOL, I Am the Moon |
Wallets linked to bankrupt crypto exchange FTX continue to move millions of dollars worth of SOL tokens, amid a massive 150% rally. On-chain analysists at PeckShield flagged some FTX-labeled addresses transferring 250,000 SOL, worth just over $13.5 million at the time, and $4 million in USDT stablecoins to crypto exchange Binance and trading firm Wintermute. These wallets are controlled by a debtor group that is in charge of handling the FTX bankruptcy proceeding, and previously received permission to start liquidating the defunct exchange's holdings. |
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Lens Protocol, a decentralized social media platform a sister project to the DeFi protocol Aave, has released its "V2" upgrade on Polygon's main network, introducing features including multisig-managed profiles and tipping. According to founder Stani Kulechov, Lens V2 moves "progressively towards a more modular" design, giving users "greater autonomy and flexibility" in their social media experiences. It also includes more monetization options for users. Unveiled in February 2022, the Lens project raised $15 million from investors including IDEO CoLab Ventures, General Catalyst, Blockchain Capital and Palm Tree as well as individual contributions from Uniswap CEO Hayden Adams, OpenSea co-founder Alex Atallah, entrepreneur Balaji Srinivasan and Polygon co-founder Sandeep Nailwal. |
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The native token of the OMG Network climbed to a six-month high after Ethereum creator Vitalik Buterin published a blog post on how Plasma, the technology behind OMG, has the potential to reduce transaction fees and improve security. The token rallied 16% to $0.77. "Plasma lets us completely sidestep the data availability question, greatly reducing transaction fees," Buterin wrote. OMG Network, formerly known as OmiseGO, was among the first layer 2 scaling products when it debuted with an ICO in 2017. It aimed to increase the efficiency of the Ethereum blockchain by using Plasma, a framework that bundles transactions together off of Ethereum and segments them into "child chains." |
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Confused by crypto taxes? CoinDesk rounds up expert opinion and analysis on new IRS reporting requirements, what you should be paying in taxes, how to avoid paying too much, and what to do if you are unsure, sponsored by TaxBit. What the IRS Gets Wrong About DeFi and Crypto in Its Latest Tax Reporting Proposal Given the negative impacts of the so-called "broker rule" for many non-custodial and open platforms, clear congressional authorization is required before the Treasury could expand the tax agency's remit, Marisa Coppel argued at a hearing. The IRS and the Rising Cost of Crypto Tax Compliance David Kemmerer anticipates the unintended consequences of proposed new regulations on brokers reporting crypto transactions. Expensive “tax experts” are set to benefit financially, he says, even if ordinary investors won’t. |
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| The Takeaway: Broken Broker Rule? |
The so-called broker rule, laid out by the IRS in a tax reporting proposal has been at times called unconstitutional, unprecedented in scope and an existential threat for the cryptocurrency industry. Indeed, by expanding the definition of a broker — a well-defined term in the context of traditional finance, with some analogues in the digital asset industry — to just about anything that touches code in crypto, the proposed rule would likely be “overbroad.” The rule has been officially adopted, the IRS is holding back-to-back hearings on the proposal, and has extended the public comment period — over 120,000 responses have already been filed. One of those public comments was filed by industry lobbyists at Coin Center, which argued the broker rule is not only impossible to comply with but also likely a violation of U.S. crypto users and developers’ civil liberties. CoinDesk reached out to Coin Center director of research Peter Van Valkenburgh to discuss where the IRS’ proposal comes from, how to fight it and whether there are any silver linings to this existential crypto crisis. What do you make of the thousands of comments submitted to the IRS?
Well, I mean, this important topic. For decades we've had certain types of third-party tax reporting where the person is obligated to do the reporting is in a position of trust (i.e. traditional securities brokers or other financial intermediaries), and this is the first time that, through rulemaking, the IRS would be extending third-party reporting obligations to people who don't have traditional financial customer relationships at all to software developers. I think rightfully a lot of people are alarmed about that. Some people filing comments might see their business become non-viable. They were just publishing software tools, and now have to create a relationship with customers in order to report information about their customers even though they didn't have customers before. For Coin Center, this is a clear civil liberties issue. Our comment letter focuses on the unreasonable violation of people's privacy and unreasonable obligation on software developers to be forced to collect information and report it, which is a type of compelled speech. A term that seems to be coming up again and again is unprecedented. I was wondering if there is anything like this in either U.S. tax law or global policy? It is unprecedented. It's important to articulate this clearly to people who haven't followed the debate, which started two years ago when Congress first passed the relevant statute in the Infrastructure Act that triggered this rulemaking. Coin Center and other advocates have no issue with third-party tax reporting. I've always said if it walks like a duck and it quacks like a duck, it's a duck. A typical digital asset brokerage, like Coinbase, has a bunch of contractual relationships under common law — the exchange is in a position of trust vis-à-vis its customers and its customers' assets. And so just like a typical securities broker, or broker dealer regulated by the Commodities Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), it makes sense to obligate a digital asset broker dealer with the same reporting obligations of a traditional asset dealer. We're not asking for special treatment. If anything, the IRS took too long to come up with common sense guidance for how obvious brokers in the crypto space like Coinbase should be obligated to report. The IRS already had the authority, they didn't need Congress to act. And then Congress acted… In early draft language of the Infrastructure Act, there was statutory text that specifically called out noncustodial and decentralized exchanges to report, leading to a big fight. They created terms for noncustodial or decentralized platforms that needed to be defined so people could understand their obligations under the law... Read the full interview on the web. – D.K.
@danielgkuhn daniel@coindesk.com |
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Simplicity: The Key to CoinEx's User-Centric Experience When the crypto industry began its rapid rise in 2017, CoinEx founder Haipo Yang found himself with a choice. Although he had designed CoinEx with the value of simplicity in mind, the rapid expansion of the industry has suddenly made it possible to create a product with a level of complexity previously unimagined. So this was his choice: He could build something for the expert, the crypto junkie who was already deeply immersed. Or, he could stick with his original values and build something for everyone. He could design for simplicity. Continue Reading |
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