Bitcoin went more than two hours without producing a block
The Bitcoin network went just over two hours without producing a block on Jan. 7, the longest time the network had experienced a delay of that length in over two years.
According to data from Bitcoin explorer Mempool, between block heights 824717 and 824718, the Bitcoin network experienced a total interval of 122 minutes.
The Bitcoin network typically produces a new block roughly every 10 minutes. However, due to variability in mining difficulty and total hash rate, the time to produce a new block can vary by up to an hour or two.
There have been numerous occasions over the past few years where the Bitcoin network has failed to produce a new block for more than an hour. A time that exceeds two hours stands at the longer end of the spectrum.
According to the pseudonymous Bitcoin Ordinals developer Leonidas, a gap between blocks as long as two hours only occurs every 179,872 blocks, which is roughly every three and a half years.
Bitcoin ETF is not “sell the news,” says CoinShares exec
The expected approval of a spot Bitcoin (BTC) exchange-traded fund (ETF) won’t be a sell-the-news event, according to CoinShares chief strategy officer Meltem Demirors.
In a Jan. 5 interview with CNBC, Demirors said that the fresh inflows into crypto exchange-traded products (ETPs) in the final weeks of 2023 points to outsized buying in the wake of a spot Bitcoin ETF being approved.
“If we look at what happened in the last week of 2023, there were $243 million of flows into crypto ETPs and $2.2 billion for the year,” she said.
IT'S TIME FOR FEE WARS https://t.co/V1nMY0Whzg
— Meltem Demirors (@Melt_Dem) January 6, 2024
In Demirors’ view, the real “battleground” following an expected Bitcoin ETF approval will emerge from the fight over fees attached to investment in their respective ETFs.
Fidelity is offering 0.39% fees on its Bitcoin ETF, which Demirors described as “quite low” considering it’s a specialty product. Meanwhile, Inveso and Galaxy aren’t charging any fees until their respective ETFs reach $5 billion in assets under management. Grayscale stands above the rest with 2.5% fees on its ETF offering.
While BlackRock is yet to announce its Bitcoin ETF-associated fees, Demirors said she believes the firm will come out with a 0.8% fee, which would see it go toe to toe with ARK Invest. ARK already announced a 0.8% fee in November 2023.
“The fee game is going to be an interesting one. How much will brand matter and how much of this will be about fees?”
Investors should have a boring portfolio of assets: Vitalik Buterin
Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin believes under-diversifying one’s portfolio is “terrible advice” and that investors should have a boring portfolio of diverse assets.
In response to a Jan. 6 post on X (formerly Twitter) that advised investors to go all-in on a single investment, Buterin said the opposite would be more useful.
Buterin said that those looking to invest wisely should avoid leverage trading, diversify their portfolios, and prioritize saving to a point where they could cover two years of expenses.
This is awful advice. Some actual financial advice:
— vitalik.eth (@VitalikButerin) January 7, 2024
* Diversification is good.
* Save. Get to the point where you have enough to cover multiple years of expenses. Financial safety is freedom.
* Be boring with most of your portfolio.
* Don't use >2x leverage. Just don't. https://t.co/CIvDJcD3UG
Despite preaching the benefits of diversification, Buterin’s public crypto portfolio is — unsurprisingly — skewed significantly toward a single outsized allocation in Ether (ETH).
According to data from blockchain data provider Arkham Intelligence, Buterin holds a total of 245,920 ETH, which is worth $540.26 million at current prices. Buterin’s Ether holding dwarfs the next largest asset in his portfolio, which is $533,000 worth of the Kyber Protocol’s native token, KNC.
Someone sends $1.2 million to Satoshi’s genesis wallet
The crypto community on X has continued to speculate after an unknown Bitcoin holder sent $1.2 million to the genesis wallet, a wallet address on the Bitcoin network linked to the blockchain’s pseudonymous creator, Satoshi Nakamoto.
The 26.9 Bitcoin — worth $1.17 million at the time of publication — was transferred on Jan. 5, with the sender incurring $12 in fees for the one-way transaction.
Any funds sent to a Satoshi-linked wallet address are widely viewed as a one-way transaction, as Nakamoto hasn’t touched their holdings since Bitcoin’s launch more than 15 years ago.
The genesis wallet has always contained an unspendable 50 Bitcoin mined from the Genesis Block. At the time of publication, the wallet holds 99.7 Bitcoin, worth $4.4 million.
The move has sparked more than a few theories on X.
Crypto attorney Jeremey Hogan speculated the transfer could have been part of a move to oust the identity of Nakamoto under the new crypto tax laws imposed on citizens living in the United States.
Someone just sent Satoshi's genesis wallet $1.2 mil. in BTC.
— Jeremy Hogan (@attorneyjeremy1) January 7, 2024
Why?? The only thing that makes any sense is that the sender is flushing Satoshi out.
Under the new IRS rules, you have to report any receipt of crypto over $10k. So, Satoshi has to dox himself, OR break the law. pic.twitter.com/S4vBkSdX21
Other pundits suggested that Satoshi had resurfaced and purchased $1.2 million worth of BTC on Binance, sending it to their old wallet.
Other news
Crypto capital markets firm Digital Currency Group (DCG) announced that it had settled its $700 million debt with crypto lending platform Genesis. The clearing of its short-term loans brought DCG up-to-date with its planned repayments, with the firm agreeing to repay all outstanding loans to Genesis by April 2024.
The world’s largest asset manager, BlackRock, will axe roughly 3% of its global workforce in the next few days. According to a Dec. 6 report from Fox Business, approximately 600 employees will be laid off as part of routine internal adjustments. The layoffs will be determined by employee performance over the last 12 months.
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