First Mover Americas: Bitcoin Holds $67K, CRV Slides

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Bitcoin held its ground above $67,000 during the European morning following the Fed's hawkish interest rate projections on Wednesday. The U.S. central bank left rates unchanged on Wednesday and predicted just one reduction this year, which sent bitcoin lower. Following a dip toward $67,000 during the Asian morning, BTC ticked back upward swiftly before trading between $67,200-$67,800. At time of writing, bitcoin is sitting above $67,900, up 0.16% 24 hours ago. The CoinDesk CD 20, meanwhile, is down 0.34% in that time. Ether has fluctuated either side of $3,500, currently 1.1% down in the last 24 hours.

Paxos has laid off 65 people, amounting 20% off its staff, according to a report by Bloomberg. CEO Charles Cascarilla said that the layoffs “allows us to best execute on the massive opportunity ahead in tokenization and stablecoin" and the company is in a "very strong financial position to succeed." Paxos intends to gradually discontinue its settlement services in commodities and securities. Instead, it will concentrate more on asset tokenization and stablecoins, Bloomberg reported. Paxos has a balance sheet of around $500 million, according to disclosures from its various stablecoins. However, the company took a hit last year when the New York Department of Financial Services forced it to stop minting Binance's BUSD in early 2023, which had a market cap of $16 billion at its peak.

Curve’s CRV token plunged 30% in early Asian trading hours as some loan positions supposedly tied to its founder, Michael Egorov, started to automatically liquidate, leading to sudden selling activity. Data tracked by Lookonchain and Arkham show Egorov’s addresses have taken out a cumulative loan of nearly $100 million worth of stablecoins, mostly crvUSD, against $140 million in CRV collateral. A Debank profile tracking Egorov’s wallet shows he has borrowed from Inverse, UwU Lend, Fraxlend, and Curve’s LlamaLend using CRV tokens as collateral. Total holdings across tracked wallets are down 50% in the past 24 hours. In the early Asian hours, several loans were repaid on Inverse and Llamalend with FRAX, DOLA, and CRV tokens.

Chart of the Day

• The chart shows the number of CRV held in wallets tied to centralized exchanges spiked 57% early Thursday to record highs above 480 million.
• The rise shows investor intention to sell Curve's CRV token, which traded 30% lower at press time.
• Source - CryptoQuant

- Omkar Godbole

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