Farcaster community-created token Degen (DEGEN) jumped 17% after the blockchain-based social platform confirmed it raised $150 million in its latest funding round. The Series A round was led by venture firm Paradigm with participation from Andreessen Horowitz, Haun, USV, Variant and Standard Crypto. Farcaster founder Dan Romero said in a May 21 X post the funds will “support our…

A decade-old research paper seen as a “blueprint” for the first practical use of zero-knowledge proofs (ZK-proofs) has received an award from the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE), the world’s largest technical professional organization. According to an announcement shared with Cointelegraph, the “genesis paper” — “Zerocash: Decentralized Anonymous Payments from Bitcoin” — helped pave the way for…

On May 20, the price of Ether surged over 18% after Eric Balchunas, a senior analyst at Bloomberg, raised the approval odds for the Ethereum exchange-traded fund (ETF) from 25% to 75%. Balchunas noted that the United States Securities and Exchange Commission likely faced political pressure, as their previous position showed little engagement with ETF applicants. Balchunas further…

An Ethereum Foundation researcher’s decision to take a paid adviser role for the foundation behind EigenLayer has sparked criticism on social media, with one commentator suggesting it could create “conflicted incentives.” In a lengthy May 19 X post, Ethereum researcher Justin Drake disclosed he had taken an adviser role at EigenFoundation that “comes with a significant…

The conviction of Alexey Pertsev, a developer of coin-mixing protocol Tornado Cash, comes from a chilling interpretation of criminal liability likely to have wider ramifications for crypto. The Dutch court’s guilty verdict means Pertsev must now serve a sentence of five years and four months for money laundering through Tornado Cash. This is despite the…

Professor Massimiliano Sala, of the University of Trento in Italy, recently discussed the future of blockchain technology, as it relates to encryption and quantum computing, with the crew at Ripple as part of the company’s ongoing university lecture series. Sala’s discussion focused on the potential threat posed by quantum computers as the technology matures. According to the…

Cryptocurrency wallet Phantom Wallet has now secured the third position on the Apple App Store in the utility category, just behind Google and Google Chrome Apps. Crypto commentators are speculating that the rise could be a bullish indicator for Solana, given that Phantom Wallet initially launched as a Solana-only wallet. “Seems like the SOL season is…

LayerZero Labs has officially announced that the sybil self-reporting phase of its solution to address sybil activity, or “airdrop farming,” is over. According to LayerZero, addresses that meet the criteria will receive 15% of their anticipated token allocation, while the remaining 85% will be redistributed to eligible users. Following the review, a total of 803,093 addresses…

Despite unfavorable odds from several crypto analysts and the broader crypto community regarding the approval of spot Ether exchange-traded funds (ETF) by the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), some analysts suggest that “there is room for surprise.” “If by some chance the SEC decides to approve then so many will be caught severely…

Tether’s USDT, the world’s largest stablecoin, has minted another $1 billion, bringing its market capitalization above $110 billion, which could catalyze Bitcoin’s next move to new all-time highs. Will more USDT boost Bitcoin’s price? Tether’s treasury has minted $1 billion worth of USDT during the past 24 hours, bringing its yearly total to $31 billion. The…