Welcome to the first edition of the weekly FUD, here we talk about the biggest FUD of the week, and try to clarify it with facts and truth as you know twitter tends to overreact and news/media outlets are the first to push fake news.
Binance is not based in Malta, not based anywhere CEO says
So earlier this week Cointelegraph dropped some news that left many confused. Apparently The largest exchange in the world, Binance, which everyone believed to be based in Malta is not registered there. The claim came following a press release by the Malta Financial Services Authority (MFSA) stating it has never approved Binance nor any other exchange to operate in the country.
The confusion increases when trying to understand where it is actually based. As CZ said on twitter: “We are decentralized” this in itself is confusing, as an exchange one must be regulated, the term decentralized means nothing to regulators.
The reality here is that Cointelegraph jumped the gun, Malta has not issued any exchange licenses for anyone, Binance Holdings as an entity is registered in Malta however they have not been given an exchange license to operate within Malta, that does not restrict their global activity. Binance has licenses in every country it operates in through subsidiaries including China, the US, and Singapore. They also possess other licenses for fiat ramps through acquisition such as in Australia.
Justin lies about giving Warren bitcoin
Justin Sun finally had met Warren Buffet after he blew almost 5 million for the meal. He claimed he gave him Bitcoin and explained to him the value of cryptocurrency and why it is not vaporware, shortly after CNN reports Warren does not own Bitcoin or any other cryptocurrency and is still not interested in it.
Obviously social media blew up. Based on his track record of exaggerating news and partnerships twitter found it easy to believe Justin lied. What twitter forgot is that the mainstream media are bigger sources of fake news than crypto figures. Udi Wertheimer tried to defend Justin only to get roasted by many, Mike Dudas overreacted calling him a liar and a CSW supporter; however, as always, the truth eventually came out – unfortunately, in this case, you guy were wrong.
Justin did not lie, he gave Warren Bitcoin but Mr. Buffet decided to give it away to charity and that’s why he no longer owns Bitcoin, it was the mainstream media lying and pushing fake news to get engagement this time, not Justin.
Trace becomes a shitcoiner
I remember listening to Trace back in 2012, he gave me the fundamentals I needed to understand the value of bitcoin. He was one of the most respected names in Bitcoin and he had done some major contributions to the thought leadership behind Bitcoin fundamentals. To my surprise this week he decided it was appropriate to shill a shitcoin at a bitcoin-only event. Unconfiscatable is a major Bitcoin only event where thought leaders discuss how to take this space forward, Trace decided it was appropriate to shill Mimblewimble Coin, there is even a report of him saying “Use your bitcoin to buy Mimblewimble Coin and hold it, it will be better than Bitcoin” I am very disappointed,
I tried to give him the benefit of the doubt and figure out an excuse for his actions or at least let him voice his side of the story, but all the evidence shows he did it and he has not even defended himself which to me indicates guilt, unfortunately, it is not the first time a Bitcoin thought leader crosses to the other side, greed can ruin anyone. While I hope this is a misunderstanding we all know if it sounds like a duck, looks like a duck then it’s probably a duck. Hopefully, this “rumor” gets debunked.
Libra is back????
Last year all the talk was about Facebook’s revolutionary idea, Libra, which was thought by many to be dead due to regulatory pressure. Well it seems to be coming back after major firms pulled out of the federation, two new members were announced this week; Shopify and Tagomi. Libra has been promising to make waves in this space, the mission seems to be synergistic with Shopify, as it gives people who previously had no access to Shopify due to a lack of banking services access.
There has been chatter about a shift in what Libra has been attempting to do, mostly around pegging the currency to USD rather than a basket of currencies. This would reduce regulatory pressure as I believe the main risk Libra poses is reducing the strength of the US Dollar. Now, none of this is confirmed and Libra has always maintained that it will be backed by a basket that could potentially contain Bitcoin.
Libra as a concept is pretty exciting, I will definitely be reporting more on this as I find out more, it gives a lot of validity to the space, however, the major concern has always been, do we really want the largest data miner in history to have our financial data too?
