@scottmelker
Franklin Templeton To Heavily Into Altcoins?
 
Franklin Templeton, a prominent asset manager, is reportedly considering launching a private fund focused on altcoins for institutional investors. This move would expand its current crypto offerings beyond Bitcoin and Ether. The new fund is expected to include staking rewards, although specific altcoins have not been disclosed. The firm has shown particular interest in Solana, noting significant growth in its decentralized exchange volume. As of March 2024, Franklin Templeton manages $1.64 trillion in assets.
 
Additionally, Franklin Templeton announced the integration of USD Coin (USDC) for investments in its Benji Investments platform, specifically for its blockchain-recorded Franklin OnChain U.S. Government Money Fund. This conversion will be supported by Zero Hash, with the fund currently managing $357 million in assets.

@WatcherGuru
 
JUST IN:  Donald Trump calls himself a "crypto president" at San Francisco tech fundraiser.
 

@Raph_Bloch
Le rachat de @Bitstamp par @RobinhoodApp pour 200 millions $ est une grosse information pour 2 raisons
 
1/ Bitstamp est la première plateforme européenne
 
2/ La valorisation de Bitstamp semble assez basse. Le deal la valorise à 50$ par client (contre + 600$ pour Coinbase)

Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump presented himself as a champion for cryptocurrency and slammed Democrats' attempts to regulate the sector during a San Francisco fundraiser on Thursday, three sources present told Reuters.
 
Trump raised $12 million from the fundraiser hosted by tech venture capitalists David Sacks and Chamath Palihapitiya at Sacks' home in the swanky Pacific Heights neighborhood.
"He said he would be the crypto president," Trevor Traina, a San Francisco-based tech executive and former Trump ambassador to Austria, told Reuters.
The crypto industry is increasingly trying to influence U.S. politicians as it faces heightened scrutiny from regulators, especially since bankruptcies at major crypto firms in 2022 spooked investors, exposed fraud and misconduct, and left millions of investors out of pocket.
 
Trump touted crypto as important and stressed that he was very supportive of the sector, said Republican National Committeewoman Harmeet Dhillon.
Dhillon said Trump, who is running to unseat Democratic incumbent Joe Biden in a Nov. 5 election, did not offer specifics on his proposed crypto policy.
Biden signed an executive order in 2022 aimed at ensuring the responsible development of digital assets, which led to reports urging regulators such as the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission to issue guidance and rules to address risks in the crypto ecosystem.
 
The White House under Biden has also said that it is eager to work with Congress to develop a regulatory framework for cryptocurrencies.
In a statement to Reuters, White House spokesperson Robyn Patterson said the Biden administration had supported innovation in digital assets while seeking to protect consumers from "risks associated with new technologies."
 
While San Francisco is heavily liberal, a growing number of high-profile local venture capitalists and crypto investors have thrown their support behind Trump, with several citing what they deemed excessive regulation among their reasons.
"President Trump made clear that the Biden-Gensler crusade against crypto will grind to a halt within one hour of a second Trump administration," said Jacob Helberg, an adviser to data analytics provider Palantir, referring to SEC Chair Gary Gensler.
Executives from crypto exchange Coinbase (COIN.O), opens new tab, crypto investor twins Tyler and Cameron Winklevoss and other crypto leaders attended on Thursday, Dhillon added.
A spokesperson for Gemini, the company founded by the Winklevoss twins, did not immediately comment.
Sacks and Palihapitiya have talked publicly about their investments in crypto, especially in bitcoin.
The founder of the now-bankrupt FTX cryptocurrency exchange, Sam Bankman-Fried, was found guilty last year of stealing from customers. Prosecutors allege he used those funds to donate more than $100 million to U.S. political campaigns.

@AxelAdlerJr
 
Coinbase currently accounts for 46% of all spot trading. The average trading volume has decreased from 25K BTC/day to 9.7K BTC/day.  
 
In a bull market, this represents a lack of selling pressure (yellow bars), which can stimulate growth.

NEAR Foundation announces today that NEAT, a rollup protocol designed for scaling AI applications on NEAR, has received 1 million $NEAR token staking delegation from NEAR Foundation. All NEAR token rewards from the delegation will be redistributed to $NEAT stakers, producing approximately 120-200% APY.

NEAT is a rollup scaling solution built on the NEAR inscription standard, specifically designed to facilitate AI and machine-learning applications on NEAR. NEAT offers an innovative approach for rollups to be built on NEAR. With off-chain indexer nodes for execution and NEAR L1 as the data availability layer, NEAT eliminates the need for rollups to deploy smart contracts or run verification logic on the L1. This streamlined process drastically reduces transaction costs for rollups, making NEAT particularly well suited for computationally intensive applications such as AI and gaming. Additionally, NEAR Catalog, powered by NEAT, is currently developing an advanced indexer that aims to provide projects and applications in the NEAR ecosystem with cost-effective and flexible indexing and querying capabilities.