This week in the crypto world Fidelity finally filed for a Bitcoin ETF, Prime Trust’s scandalous mismanagement was laid bare, and Binance had reasons to laugh and cry.
Just a standard week then.
Fidelity Joins the Bitcoin ETF Bandwagon
Asset management giant Fidelity surprised no one this week by filing for a spot Bitcoin ETF, bringing the number of applications to seven, with five applied for in the last two weeks alone.
Speculation had been rife that Fidelity was on the verge of refiling for a Bitcoin ETF following BlackRock’s surprise application earlier this month and yesterday it followed through, more than a year after its previous effort was rejected.
Fidelity aims to partner with Cboe Global Markets in order to offer the ETF, which it hopes will satisfy the SEC’s concerns over market surveillance.
Prime Trust Lost Wallet Access in 2021 and Owes $155 Million
Bitcoin custodial company Prime Trust this week was found to have lost access to some of its crypto wallets containing customer bitcoin in 2021 and attempted to buy them back with incoming funds, according to Nevada’s Financial Institutions Division.
The authority filed on Tuesday to take over the company and freeze all of its businesses, revealing in the filing that Prime Trust lost access to its ‘legacy wallets’ containing an unspecified amount of bitcoin after outsourcing its storage to Fireblocks.
As a result, the company owes its clients over $85 million in fiat and a further $69.5 million in crypto.
Yikes!
Binance Endures Happy/Sad Week
It’s been tough times for Binance recently, so the company could be forgiven for jumping off the proverbial corporate bridge when Belgium and Germany both said the exchange was no longer welcome, having received the same treatment from France and the Netherlands in recent weeks. Add to this the fact that it has also pulled its application for a UK license and it could have been a string of blows for the exchange this week alone.
However, Israel’s National Bureau for Counter Terror Financing this week singled out Binance for praise after it helped the agency confiscate $1.7 million from cryptocurrency accounts linked to Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps’ Quds Force, the elite military intelligence group of the country, and the Iran-backed terrorist organization Hezbollah.
Still, five steps back and one forward doesn’t seem great for business long term.
