ChainCatcher news, executives from the digital asset industry are joining the ranks of tech company executives to meet with U.S. President-elect Donald Trump at Mar-a-Lago. Crypto.com CEO Kris Marszalek met with Trump at Mar-a-Lago on Monday.According to a source familiar with the matter, the two discussed appointments related to the crypto industry, including the Treasury Department, Congress, and the incoming administration. The source said they also talked about appointments related to Bitcoin reserves. A spokesperson for Crypto.com stated, "We look forward to working with the new administration to establish and advance clear regulations for the crypto industry, so that the U.S. can become a global leader in digital assets and innovation."

ChainCatcher news, according to Cointelegraph, a California court has ordered five individuals involved in the IcomTech "Ponzi scheme" to pay over $5 million for fraud and misappropriation of stolen funds through a fake Bitcoin trading scheme.The U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) stated in a press release on December 11 that a default judgment found David Carmona, Juan Arellano Parra, Moses Valdez, and David Brend liable for all violations of the Commodity Exchange Act and CFTC regulations alleged in the complaint, while Marco A. Ruiz Ochoa received a consent order.

ChainCatcher news, according to The Block, former Binance executive and current managing partner of Nomad Capital, Erick Zhang, announced the launch of the ICO platform BuidlPad, intended for KYC-compliant users in non-restricted areas.It is reported that Eirck was responsible for Binance's token issuance platform Binance Launchpad during his tenure at Binance, and residents from restricted areas such as the United States and China will be excluded from ICO sales conducted through this platform.

ChainCatcher news, crypto lawyer John Deaton stated that SEC Chairman Gary Gensler, while refusing to meet with U.S. cryptocurrency executives like Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong and Kraken CEO Jesse Powell, held a private meeting with FTX's SBF. He questioned whether the $10 million donation from SBF to politicians was related to the special regulatory treatment he received and demanded that the SEC make the relevant meeting records public.

ChainCatcher news, according to official sources, Binance has announced a new batch of executives for its compliance team, including:Former PayPal executive Todd McElduff as Director of Corporate Compliance;Former Kraken Head of Risk and Compliance and UK Chief Compliance Officer Lana Sinelnikova as Director of Business Compliance and Enterprise-Wide Risk Assessment (EWRA);Former cryptocurrency professional investigator and trainer Céline Inial as Special Investigation Expert for the French market;Caner Akyürek, who held senior positions at Europol, as Special Investigation Expert for Turkey;Former HSBC Hong Kong Wealth and Private Banking Senior Compliance Manager Pauline Chan as Regulatory Audit and Examination Compliance Expert for Binance's Global Audit Issues Management Team.

ChainCatcher news, according to Sifted, based on documents submitted to the UK Companies House this month, the crypto wallet Deblock, created by former executives from Revolut and Ledger, has completed an additional £13.3 million (approximately $16.8 million) in seed funding. Another document from October shows that Headline, Hoxton, 20VC, and Chalfen are the main investors in this round of financing. Sifted previously reported that this startup quietly raised €12 million last year.It is reported that in August 2022, former Revolut cryptocurrency head Jean Meyer, payment head Aaron Beck, and former Ledger engineering head Mario Eguiliuz co-founded Deblock. Later that year, the startup poached Revolut's Chief Operating Officer for European Banking, Adriana Restrepo, to serve as its fourth founder.Deblock CEO Jean Meyer declined to comment on this round of funding. According to its website, the Deblock application is currently only available in France, where it is regulated as an electronic money institution and a digital asset service provider.According to RootData, Deblock is an integrated current account with a non-custodial wallet, allowing users to deposit, withdraw, spend, and exchange euros or cryptocurrencies.

ChainCatcher news, according to Jinshi reports, 8 informed sources revealed that Trump's transition team is considering a former Uber executive and three current or former Republican congressmen (one of whom is now a Fox News host) to lead the U.S. Department of Transportation.Three sources stated that Trump's donor, tech entrepreneur with social ties to Musk, and former Uber executive Emil Michael has emerged as a leading contender.Seven sources mentioned that other candidates include Missouri House Representative and Chair of the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee Sam Graves, outgoing Louisiana Republican Congressman Garret Graves, and former Wisconsin Congressman Sean Duffy, who is currently a Fox News host.

ChainCatcher news, according to Bloomberg, former executives from Millennium Management LLC and Pacific Investment Management Company (Pimco) are starting a consulting business in the digital asset space. Benoit Bosc, who previously served as a portfolio manager at Millennium, and Michael Bressler, who recently held the position of executive vice president at Pimco, left their roles in October and August respectively to establish the digital asset consulting firm x2B. The company is set to launch in November and already has 10 clients, charging based on a mix of future tokens and cash for projects.The firm will provide consulting services for crypto projects, including fundraising, token issuance, financial management, and market-making arrangements. Bosc previously served as the U.S. general manager at digital asset market maker GSR, while Bressler was the global head of sales at the company for a year and a half. In an interview, Bressler stated, "Few people understand the complex dynamics of token issuance at the intersection of high-end traditional finance and digital finance." Bosc noted that the industry will benefit from "more professional and transparent practices," adding that x2B plans to encourage "various market participants and service providers involved in these issuances to take on more responsibility."

ChainCatcher news, November 7, Elon Musk suggested to Trump before the U.S. presidential election to hire well-known executives from SpaceX as senior government employees, including employees from the Pentagon. Musk's proposal indicates that after becoming one of Trump's largest donors, he may play a key role in the Trump administration.

ChainCatcher news, according to The Block, the U.S. government is negotiating with several political action committees (PACs) to return up to $13.25 million in political donations made by former FTX executives.The request has been approved by Judge Lewis Kaplan, who is overseeing the FTX case, and the government will continue discussions with the PACs regarding the forfeiture of these funds until January 15.Data shows that the donations were made by FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried or former engineering chief Nishad Singh, who testified that some of the donations were made at Bankman-Fried's request and that he had signed blank checks.

ChainCatcher news, the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California has dismissed a fraud lawsuit filed by two former executives against the Bitcoin mining and data center operator Northern Data. According to court records, the case was terminated earlier this month after plaintiffs Joshua Porter and Gulsen Kama voluntarily withdrew their claims. Porter and Kama previously served as the Chief Operating Officer and Chief Financial Officer of the company's U.S. division, respectively.In the lawsuit filed in April, the two accused Northern Data of falsely exaggerating its financial condition and allegedly evading tens of millions of dollars in taxes.Additionally, Northern Data recently announced that it is considering divesting its Bitcoin mining subsidiary Peaking Mining to focus on artificial intelligence and cloud computing businesses.Previous news, Tether-backed Northern Data was accused of fraudulent activities by two former executives.

ChainCatcher news, Fox Business reporter Eleanor Terrett posted on X platform that today, Ripple will submit its C form (civil appeal document), outlining its main appeals against the SEC's case in the Second Circuit Court. Given that we saw the SEC appeal nearly everything it lost at the district court level last week, Ripple expects to appeal only the one matter it lost: the district court's ruling that the XRP tokens sold by the company constitute the sale of unregistered securities.Last week in Miami, when I interviewed Brad Garlinghouse (Ripple CEO) and Stuart Alderoty (Ripple Chief Legal Officer), they emphasized their strong confidence in Ripple's victory in the Second Circuit Court. Alderoty stated, "I feel very good about our case at the district level. And for a variety of reasons, I feel even better about our case in the Second Circuit. The Second Circuit traditionally does not favor the SEC. They also do not like overregulation. Statistically, if they lose, the likelihood of the Second Circuit overturning the original ruling is about 10% or lower. So, I feel, as a litigator, I am a bit superstitious; I don’t like to predict outcomes, and certainly won’t guarantee them, but I feel very good about the outcome in the Second Circuit. I believe they will not only support Judge Torres, but I think they will go even further. I believe they will strengthen her ruling. At that point, the SEC will once again find itself in a losing position, and whether to appeal this case to the Supreme Court will be up to them."When I asked Garlinghouse about the possibility of the case being appealed all the way to the Supreme Court, he told me, "I am very confident we will win the appeal, which will really deliver a fatal blow to Gary Gensler's entire cryptocurrency regulatory agenda." He added, "Honestly, I am not worried about it at all. I am confident because I believe we stand on the side of legal justice. I think we stand on the right side of history."

ChainCatcher news, citing Bloomberg via Tree News, reports that the Nigerian government has dropped charges against Binance executive Tigran Gambaryan.

ChainCatcher news, the Bitcoin Voter Project, a political action committee (PAC) supported by executives from the crypto mining industry, has launched two ads for Republican candidate Ted Cruz.Members of the PAC include executives from cryptocurrency mining companies Marathon Digital Holdings, CleanSpark, and Riot Platforms. The ads claim that Ted Cruz understands "embracing Bitcoin," but do not explicitly mention any policies of his opponent Colin Allred.

ChainCatcher news, according to DL News, Youssef Amrani, co-founder and general manager of Atom Accelerator DAO, was dismissed last week, with the core issue of controversy being the planned performance bonuses. On September 25, the employees of Atom Cooperative unanimously voted to remove general manager Youssef Amrani, with September 30 being his last day in the organization.Atom Accelerator co-founder Ryan Orr refused to continue leading the organization and suggested either dissolving it or finding someone "willing to drive the community update plan" to take over. Communications head Syed Choudhury stated he would leave by the end of this year, and CFO Patricia Mizuki also announced her departure.It is reported that Atom Accelerator has distributed millions of dollars in funding to support the Cosmos cryptocurrency, and the organization was founded by Amrani and Orr in 2023, with a small number of employees mostly funded by Cosmos Hub.

ChainCatcher news, the banking-as-a-service (BaaS) platform OpenPayd has made two senior appointments in London, hiring Lux Thiagarajah and Richard Usher from the cryptocurrency major broker FalconX. Thiagarajah joins the payment company as the Director of Growth, while Usher will serve as the Director of Trading.The new employees will maintain their connections with FalconX, where they joined in May as consultants to help the company expand its foreign exchange trading products.

ChainCatcher news, according to Cointelegraph, Ledger's Chief Experience Officer Ian Rogers emphasized the importance of maintaining security awareness during bull market cycles in an interview at the Token2049 conference in Singapore. Rogers stated, "In every bull market cycle, there are always people who find seemingly reasonable justifications to compromise on security or self-custody." He specifically mentioned that during periods of rapid market expansion, many cryptocurrency holders tend to store their assets on centralized exchanges rather than opting for self-custody.In response, Rogers emphasized, "If you are not doing self-custody, then what is the point of choosing cryptocurrency?" He warned investors against over-relying on centralized exchanges, especially during market downturns, and cited the now-defunct cryptocurrency exchange FTX as an example. "What they did was simply hand over funds to someone in the Bahamas and then add a column of data on a spreadsheet. That is not called cryptocurrency; that is called fraud."Beyond the cryptocurrency space, Rogers also pointed out the rising trend of global cybercrime. He predicted, "From now on, you can say every year that this year is the worst year for cybercrime, and that statement will always be accurate." To address this increasingly severe threat, Rogers suggested achieving secure self-custody of digital assets through hardware solutions and clear signature technology, ensuring that users fully understand the transactions they are authorizing.

ChainCatcher news, Standard Chartered's Head of Foreign Exchange and Digital Assets Research, Geoff Kendrick, stated that after the Federal Reserve's recent decision to cut interest rates by 50 basis points, Bitcoin and the broader digital asset market are expected to receive a sustained boost.Kendrick believes that macroeconomic factors will drive the prices of digital assets higher, a trend that is unaffected by the upcoming results of the U.S. presidential election.He noted that Bitcoin and other digital assets performed strongly after the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) cut rates on Wednesday. Kendrick stated that the steepening of the U.S. Treasury yield curve is favorable for digital assets, and he anticipates inflows into spot Bitcoin ETFs in October.Kendrick reiterated his previous prediction that Bitcoin will reach new highs by the end of the year, with a target price of $125,000 if Trump wins, and $75,000 if Harris wins.

ChainCatcher news, Bitcoin staking L1 network Core executive Rich Rines stated that Core plans to enter the U.S. exchange-traded fund (ETF) market within the next five years.Rines said, "We launched our first income-generating ETP earlier this year, and this is just the beginning of the Core institutional story. Our goal is to launch an ETF in the U.S. as soon as regulatory frameworks allow."

ChainCatcher news, according to The Block, Blockdaemon's International Director and Vice President Andrew Vranjes stated that Hong Kong regulators may approve the staking feature for Ethereum spot ETFs within this year. Currently, the Blockdaemon team is closely collaborating with local spot crypto ETF issuers and regulators in Hong Kong to develop viable staking solutions.Vranjes pointed out that the staking feature is expected to be approved "within a specific framework," potentially opening first to qualified investors. He added that the team has made progress and expects relevant announcements to be released soon.