Daily Digest - 24th April 2023

Headlines

▌Biden Administration’s New Communications Director Banned from Access to Former Encryption Clients

U.S. President Joe Biden will bar his new communications chief, Ben LaBolt, from participating in legal matters, investigations or contracts involving cryptocurrency or technology companies he previously represented, including Meta Platforms Inc., venture capital firm Haun Ventures LLC and Shopify Inc.

However, LaBolt would be allowed to advise the president on his approach to regulating cryptocurrencies and social media companies.

In addition, a document from the U.S. Office of Government Ethics shows that LaBolt is a holder of BTC and ETH. When he was working at Bully Pulpit Interactive, his clients included Andreessen Horowitz (a16z) and Uniswap.

He has also served as spokesman for West Street, the family office of Meta chief executive Mark Zuckerberg and his wife Priscilla Chan.

Policy

▌Circle EU Policy Leader: An obvious regulatory principle should be a standard non-negotiable practice

Patrick Hansen, head of EU policy at Circle, tweeted that an obvious regulatory principle that should be standard non-negotiable practice, but unfortunately is not, is that regulatory thresholds and limits, whether for AML, taxes, or other purposes, are inflation-adjusted.

Otherwise, simply through inflation, these regulatory thresholds are effectively lowered every year, without any democratic decision-making process or legislation passed.

▌Venezuela BTC miners forced to stop due to anti-corruption investigation

A major Bitcoin miner in Venezuela is set to shut down its mining rigs amid an alleged corruption case.

Investigators have accused some leaders of President Maduro's political movement of being involved in the scheme.

Authorities have also ordered other cryptocurrency businesses, including exchanges and payment platforms with SUNACRIP licences, to cease operations while the investigation is underway.

Law enforcement officers also checked that miners had the authorization and up-to-date documents needed to operate in the country.

It is unclear when Venezuelan cryptocurrency entities will be able to resume operations and how long the investigation will last.

Some think President Maduro may restructure SUNACRIP or design a new regulator from scratch.

▌Binance resumes support for Russian bank card transactions

Cryptocurrency exchange Binance has resumed support for Russian bank card transactions, including credit cards from the Visa and Mastercard payment systems.

Russian cardholders can top up their accounts in Rubles, Turkish Lira, British Pounds, Euros, Kazakh Tenge, Australian Dollars, Ukrainian Hryvnias, Czech Koruna, etc.

USD deposits are not offered.

In addition, an unauthorized user of the online platform, allegedly located outside the Russian Federation, was informed that deposits with Russian-issued bank cards are not supported.

On the fiat currency deposit page, you can only recharge in rubles through the Advcash and Payeer payment systems.

▌The Aave community will start voting today on the ARFC proposal on "Abandoning the Aave V2 AMM Market"

The Snapshot voting page shows that the Aave community will start voting on the ARFC proposal on "abandoning the Aave V2 AMM market" at 21:00 today, and it will end on April 29.

The proposal stated that considering the low usage rate of the AMM V2 market and the fact that the only unfrozen assets are the main assets (DAI, USDC, USDT, WBTC, ETH) available on V2 ETH and V3 ETH, it is recommended to abandon AMM V2 market.

This includes setting the liquidation threshold to zero for all LP tokens and freezing all other assets (DAI, USDC, USDT, WBTC, ETH).

Freezing assets does not liquidate positions. Setting LT to zero liquidates the affected accounts (users borrowing against LP token collateral), currently there are about $150,000 in LP token deposits on the Aave V2 AMM market.

If the Snapshot vote is passed, the AIP proposal is released, with sufficient notice time for users to adjust their positions as needed.