Arab Bank Switzerland announced Tuesday that it will integrate staking, trading and custody services onto the Tezos blockchain’s native token (XTZ) in a bid to provide a digital asset environment for institutions, corporations and high net-worth individuals.  The 50-year old establishment partnered with Tezos in the hope of benefiting from the ecosystem's inherent focus on energy conservation, low-gas fees and fast upgrades.  Managing Director of Arab Bank Switzerland, Rani Jabban commented on the institution’s ambitions following the announcement:

Alternative investment firm Colchis Capital has partnered with infrastructure provider Bison Trails to explore the potential utility of Provenance blockchain in enhancing real estate management services, demonstrating yet another promising use case for distributed ledger technology. Through the partnership, Bison Trails will provide the San Francisco-based Colchis Capital with node infrastructure that can be used to enhance its business operations, the companies announced on Tuesday. As a key infrastructure provider to Provenance blockchain, Bison Trails will also aid Colchis Capital in utilizing the technology to bring more efficiency and transparency to real estate investment management. The investment manager is developing its own technology stack to provide interoperability with Provenance. The technologies will work together to provide investors with real-time reporting on cash flows and yields without the associated costs of generating large data streams. The partnership also paves the way for Colchis to begin exploring asset tokenization in the future.

Decentralized finance (DeFi) wallet and browser extension MetaMask has partnered with three crypto-focused custodians as part of a broader effort to attract more institutional capital to the digital asset market.  On Tuesday, the company announced new partnerships with BitGo, Qredo and Cactus Custody centered around MetaMask Institutional — a new product offering that gives institutional investors access to the large sums of collateral in the DeFi market. ConsenSys, the Ethereum developer behind MetaMask, introduced MetaMask Institutional in May. When asked about how MetaMask Institutional works alongside existing product functionalities, a spokesperson told Cointelegraph:

Gary Gensler, the head of the U.S. The Securities and Exchange Commission has confirmed that his agency does not have the authority or intention to ban cryptocurrency. While responding to questions during an Oct. 5 House Committee on Financial Services hearing, Gensler emphasized that prohibiting crypto does not fall within the SEC’s mandate, stating: “That would be up to Congress.” “It's a matter of how we get this field within the investor consumer protection that we have and also working with bank regulators and others — how do we ensure that the Treasury department has it within anti-money laundering, tax compliance,” Gensler said.

U.S. Bank, the fifth-largest retail bank in the United States, announced Tuesday that it is launching a cryptocurrency custody service for institutional investors, potentially setting the stage for wider mainstream acceptance of digital assets. As CNBC reported, U.S. Bank has partnered with New York Digital Investment Group, or NYDIG, to provide custody services for Bitcoin (BTC), Bitcoin Cash (BCH) and Litecoin (LTC). Gunjan Kedia, a senior executive at U.S. Bank’s wealth management and investment division, told CNBC that support for other cryptocurrencies like Ether (ETH) will be rolled out over time. Fund managers and other institutional investors have been increasing their exposure to cryptocurrencies for most of the year. Their participation has grown significantly since the May 2020 Bitcoin halving event, which triggered renewed bullish sentiment for the leading digital asset and, by extension, the broader cryptocurrency market.

Hedge fund billionaire Ken Griffin and former U.S. President Donald Trump have both slammed digital currencies as a threat to the U.S. dollar. Griffin, the founder of the $38 billion hedge fund Citadel LLC, told the Economic Club of Chicago on Oct. 4, that crypto is "a jihadist call that we don't believe in the dollar."  He expressed his dismay over the younger generation working on dollar alternatives in the crypto sector: "I wish all this passion and energy that went to crypto was directed towards making the United States stronger," he added.

International Monetary Fund, or IMF, managing director Kristalina Georgieva said more than half of all central banks in the world are exploring how to launch digital currencies. Speaking at a virtual conference hosted by Bocconi University on Oct. 5, Georgieva said the IMF was looking at central bank digital currencies, or CBDCs, and digital currencies as a whole from the perspective of macroeconomic stability. She said the technology had given people the opportunity to make “seamless, and less costly” transfers, and called CBDCs the most reliable form of digital currency, given they had “backing of the state” and were generally regulatory compliant. “We did a survey of our membership, and it was very impressive: 110 countries are at some stage of looking into CBDCs,” said the managing director.

Cross-chain decentralized exchange THORSwap has concluded a $3.75 million private token sale backed by leading venture funds within the blockchain industry, offering further evidence that investors are keen to back market-ready DeFi platforms.  The funding will be used by THORSwap to continue building its development and operational resources, including the launch of new products on top of THORChain, the decentralized liquidity network powering the exchange. The private token sale was led by IDEO CoLab Ventures with participation from True Ventures, Sanctor Capital, Nine Realms, Proof Group, 0xVentures, Qi Capital, THORChain and others. THORSwap currently supports Bitcoin (BTC), Bitcoin Cash (BCH), Litecoin (LTC), Ether (ETH), Binance Coin (BNB) and ERC-20 and BEP-20 standard tokens.

North Carolina House Representative Patrick McHenry has proposed a bill that would amend one of the laws governing the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to provide a safe harbor for certain token projects. In a draft of the “Clarity for Digital Tokens Act of 2021,” provided by the House Committee on Financial Services, McHenry suggested amending the Securities Act of 1933 to establish a safe harbor for token development teams. He proposed letting projects offer tokens without registering for up to three years, during which time teams would be given the opportunity to create a fully decentralized network. McHenry’s bill seemingly builds on an initiative from SEC commissioner Hester Peirce, who has called for the creation of a safe harbor for projects that raise funds to build decentralized networks after first floating the concept in 2019. Peirce’s proposal likewise suggests granting network developers a three-year grace period to build a decentralized network without threats of legal action from the SEC.

The International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) has identified a major crypto criminal among those exposed to have funneled funds into shadowy tax havens in its “Pandora Papers.’ According to an Oct. 3 ICIJ document summarizing the organization’s findings from its Pandora Papers investigation, offshore assets belonging to a so-called “Bitcoin czar sentenced for money laundering in connection with the largest cyberheist in history” were identified to be handled by one of the firms. The Pandora Papers comprise a 2.94 terabyte data trove spanning 11.9 million records from 14 different offshore services providers. The documents claim to expose the hidden assets of more than 330 politicians and high-ranking public officials from 90 different jurisdictions, including 35 country leaders and more than 130 billionaires.

Block production on Blockstream’s Liquid network has resumed after technical problems related to a functionary upgrade caused many transactions to queue for hours. In a Monday update from a Liquid oversight board member identified only as Wiz, Liquid’s failsafe mode was activated yesterday as “an unexpected issue occurred causing block signer nodes failing to validate certain parameters against each other.” As a result, the network stopped producing blocks and transactions steadily queued in the Liquid mempool for roughly 22 hours, starting at approximately 5:19 pm Eastern Time on Monday. Wiz reported Liquid developers have upgraded 10 of the 15 functionaries, with block production expected to resume once one more has been fixed. Pending Liquid transactions had been queued in the mempool until the nodes were upgraded, which was completed on Tuesday as the network reported blocks were coming in.

Laos has become the latest nation to begin exploring a central bank digital currency (CBDC), announcing upcoming research on the subject in partnership with Japanese distributed ledger technology (DLT) firm Soramitsu. According to an Oct. 3 report from Nikkei Asia, the project is expected to begin this month and follows the signing of a memorandum of understanding between Laos’ central bank and the Japan International Cooperation Agency to study the development of CBDC. The study will assess the operations of banks and other financial intermediaries within the financial system, in addition to assessing the broader transactional needs of the Laotian public

The Cosmos cross-chain network has been growing steadily along with the projects that run on top of it and it’s just reached a milestone in terms of activity. The Inter Blockchain Communication protocol (IBC), which is the backbone of the Cosmos ecosystem, has seen a surge in activity over the past month with more thanone million transfers logged. Cosmos launched the IBC in March to enable cross-chain decentralized finance and interoperable nonfungible token transfers. Over the past six months, it has grown substantially, onboarding new projects and blockchains into the ecosystem.

According to data from eth.btc.com，ethereum network's hashrate is710,415.07 GH/s，mining difficulty is9,507.41T. ETH's price ：$ 3,539.70 Avg Gas Price：378.00Gwei Pending Txs ：13816

Blockchain analytics firm Chainalysis has purchased cybercrime investigative company Excygent for an undisclosed amount, hinting that the two will continue to work together to help “dismantle ransomware operations.” In a Tuesday announcement, Chainalysis CEO Michael Gronager said the firm had collaborated with Excygent on the seizure of cryptocurrency connected to the now-defunct darknet market Silk Road, shutting down a major child abuse website, disrupting campaigns related to the financing of terrorism and other projects. Gronager said staff from Excygent would join the firm’s Investigations and Special Programs team to support investigations of thecryptocurrency used in cybercrimes. “Following the flow of ransomware payments on the blockchain is instrumental for law enforcement to understand and dismantle ransomware operations,” Gronager said to Cointelegraph. “As paradoxical as it seems, it can actually be beneficial to investigators when bad actors choose to use cryptocurrency when committing crimes.”

Following an overwhelmingly positive response to a Twitter poll on Sept. 21, CEO of AMC Theater Adam Aron announced Wednesday that the chain would officially accept Dogecoin payments for digital gift cards via BitPay Wallet.  The Dogecoin community — notoriously passionate for adoption initiatives — tweeted in droves to advocate for the asset's integration within the theater's payment options. Following their success, users can now purchase up to $200 worth of digital gift cards per day. These cards can then be redeemed by theatergoers in cinemas across the United States. Aron was pleasantly surprised by the mass attention, reporting over 6 million views and 140,000 votes on his post, including distinguished Doge fanatics Elon Musk and Mark Cuban. He also claimed that the viral tweet was his “most retweeted, most replied, most liked tweet ever.”

Consumer entertainment products giant MGA Entertainment is moving into the nonfungible token (NFT) industry by turning its best-selling toys into digital collectibles on blockchain. The American toy giant is preparing to roll out an NFT functionality for its world-famous brand L.O.L. Surprise, allowing fans to mint NFTs, display their character collection, and buy, sell and trade digital collectibles online. To enable the new feature, MGA has partnered with Ioconic, a London-based partnership business for brand owners, offering exposure to the NFT and digital asset industry. The startup will enable an online gaming hub for the L.O.L. Surprise trading card game, letting fans and collectors replicate physical purchases using QR codes.

Financial services company, MoneyGram International, has partnered with the Stellar Development Foundation to enable consumers to send money using Circle’s popular stablecoin, USD Coin (USDC) and convert directly to and from fiat. Per a 6 Oct. announcement, MoneyGram has integrated support allowing crypto wallets connected to the Stellar Network to access its global retail platform. Working alongside Circle, MoneyGram will also enable “near-instant backend settlement”, account funding, and local fiat withdrawals using the USDC stable token. United Texas Bank will act as the settlement bank to complete the process within the regulatory framework.

Dubai-based cryptocurrency trading platform BitOasis is expanding in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) with another major funding round. BitOasis closed a $30-million Series B funding round led by Chicago-based venture capital firm Jump Capital and Dubai-based VC company Wamda Capital, according to a Tuesday announcement. Wamda previously invested in BitOasis back in 2016, leading a seed funding round of an undisclosed sum. The latest round included new investors, such as Sam Bankman-Fried’s crypto trading firm Alameda Research, and Global Founders Capital, as well as existing investors, including Pantera Capital, Digital Currency Group and Belgium-based investment firm NXMH.

Bitcoin’s (BTC) meteoric rise above $50,000 this week is likely to continue well into the fourth quarter, as the psychological resistance flips to support during the next leg of the bull market, according to Bloomberg’s senior commodity strategist Mike McGlone. On Tuesday, McGlone circulated the October 2021 edition of the Bloomberg Galaxy Crypto Index, which provided an overview of where digital assets could be headed for the rest of the year. In the report, McGlone speculated that Bitcoin’s $50,000 resistance — a level that has proven impenetrable since the May dump — was about to flip support. “Bitcoin's $50,000 resistance point since May appears ripe to become the crypto's support value in 4Q,” he wrote, adding: