Evening News | Crypto market maker Wintermute loses $160 million in hacker attack; Nasdaq plans to launch institutional crypto custody services

Organizer: Cookies, Chain Catcher

"What Important Events Happened in the Last 24 Hours"

1. Crypto Market Maker Wintermute Lost $160 Million in Hacker Attack, Involving 90 Assets

Wintermute founder Evgeny Gaevoy tweeted that Wintermute lost $160 million in a DeFi hacker attack, while its CeFi and OTC operations remain unaffected. Among the 90 assets hacked, only two have a nominal value exceeding $1 million (not exceeding $2.5 million).

Additionally, Evgeny Gaevoy stated that Wintermute's current solvency is twice the remaining equity, and its services may be disrupted today and in the coming days, but will return to normal afterward. (Source Link)

2. Wanxiang Blockchain's Xiao Feng: The Application Layer Protocols of Blockchain Will Experience a Major Boom

At the 8th Global Blockchain Summit hosted by Wanxiang Blockchain Lab, Xiao Feng, Vice Chairman and Executive Director of Wanxiang Holdings and Chairman and General Manager of Wanxiang Blockchain, delivered a keynote speech titled "New Stage of Blockchain: Major Boom in Application Protocols." He stated that whether in the internet protocol stack or the blockchain protocol stack, all application layer protocols are flourishing, and there will be a major boom in blockchain application layer protocols in the future.

He also mentioned that the Ethereum merge event a few days ago is the third significant historical moment following the release of the Ethereum white paper and the launch of the mainnet, marking an important moment for the blockchain industry. It signifies that the global blockchain infrastructure construction phase is nearing completion, and the commercial application phase of blockchain is about to begin. (Source Link)

3. Alameda Plans to Repay Approximately $200 Million Loan to Voyager by September 30 and Recover $160 Million in Collateral

According to a document submitted to the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of New York, Alameda Research plans to repay approximately $200 million in outstanding loans to Voyager by 5 PM New York time on September 30, in order to recover about $160 million in collateral, currently awaiting court approval.

The loans were issued in Bitcoin and Ethereum, with collateral in FTT and SRM. Currently, Alameda Research has made payments including: 1972.60 VGX, 319.55 LTC, 3550.68 LINK, 1301917.81 DOGE, 45912.32 SAND, 7939.72 LUNC, 493150.68 USDC. (Source Link)

4. Aptos Announces AIT3 Reward Changes and Launches Longevity Testnet

The public chain Aptos announced the participation status of Incentivized Testnet 3 (AIT3), which completed over 800 million transactions in less than two weeks, achieving over 4000 TPS.

In terms of testing rewards, a 50% increase in rewards has been added for participants, raising the maximum token reward from 800 to 1200 tokens. Token rewards will be assessed in phases, with those meeting ≥ 50% staking rewards receiving 800 tokens, and those meeting ≥ 9% staking rewards or having zero governance votes receiving 500 tokens.

Additionally, Aptos stated that the recently launched testnet NFT series APTOS: ZERO marks the launch of its Longevity testnet, indicating confidence in its software and deployment architecture status. The Longevity testnet NFTs will be retained for a long time, unlike the previous weekly resets.

Aptos plans to make no significant changes to Move, transactions, and APIs, and there will be no data resets, as effective partnerships can be established between DApps and other entities. Aptos will continue to roll out changes to the devnet weekly and perform weekly resets. (Source Link)

5. Nasdaq Plans to Launch Institutional Crypto Custody Service

According to multiple sources cited by The Block, Nasdaq plans to launch an institutional crypto custody service, with the new product currently awaiting regulatory approval. Nasdaq will also establish a new crypto department. (Source Link)

6. BendDAO Community Proposes to Sell 1 Billion Tokens to Create an Investment Fund Valued at $80 Million

According to The Block, the NFT lending platform BendDAO community submitted a proposal to sell its 1 billion tokens to raise approximately $8 million to create an investment fund with a post-investment valuation of $80 million. If approved, the fund will serve as a sub-fund for NFT lenders. The sub-fund will invest at least 50% of its funds in distressed assets.

It is reported that the 1 billion tokens represent 10% of the total supply of BendDAO (BEND) tokens. Of this, 60% will be allocated to venture capital investors. The remaining allocation will be evenly distributed to investors from the DAO and interested blue-chip NFT projects. Each VC, NFT, or individual investor can hold a maximum of 2% of the tokens sold by the fund.

BendDAO is considering two options for token allocation to investors. The first option has no vesting requirements, but the DAO will deposit an equivalent amount of ETH generated from the token sale into its liquidity pool for staking rewards. The second option has a six-month vesting schedule, followed by a two-and-a-half-year linear unlock. (The Block)

7. Binance Completes ETHW Token Distribution, Deposit and Withdrawal Functions Enabled

Binance announced that it has completed the distribution of Ethereum Proof of Work (ETHW) tokens to eligible ETH and WETH holders. Users can confirm receipt of these tokens through the distribution page under their transaction history. Additionally, the deposit and withdrawal functions for ETHW have been enabled.

It is reported that the ETHW snapshot was taken at Ethereum mainnet block height 15,537,393 (September 15, 14:42:42 Beijing time). BETH holders are not eligible for the distribution of Ethereum Proof of Work (ETHW) tokens. (Source Link)

8. Coinbase to Implement New Fee Structure Starting September 21, Reducing Trading Fees for Some Large Clients

Coinbase announced today that it will implement a new fee structure on September 20, 2022, around 5 PM Eastern Time (September 21, 5 AM Beijing time) to respond to changes in global crypto trading volume and asset prices, lowering the monthly trading volume required to qualify for mid-tier fees. The new fee schedule will be implemented on Coinbase Exchange, Pro, and Advanced Trade.

Additionally, according to Bloomberg analysis, this fee structure adjustment may increase costs for some users, with some Coinbase clients with monthly trading volumes of $15 million to $250 million potentially paying fees up to 2 basis points higher than the current plan. At the same time, this move reduces costs for some high-volume clients, with those exceeding $250 million in monthly trading volume potentially seeing slightly lower fees. (Source Link)

9. Ministry of Industry and Information Technology: China's Blockchain Patent Applications Account for 84% of the Global Total

According to data from a press conference held by the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology on "Vigorously Developing the New Generation of Information Technology Industry," the information technology service industry achieved a revenue of 3.03 trillion yuan from January to July this year, a year-on-year increase of 12%. The software industry accounted for 65.5% of the total revenue.

In terms of sub-sectors, the cloud computing industry has an average growth rate of over 30%, with a global market share of 14.6%. Emerging technologies such as cloud computing, big data, and blockchain are accelerating innovation, and the number of international patent applications is steadily increasing, with blockchain patent applications accounting for over 84% globally. The pace of enterprises moving to the cloud is accelerating, with over 3.6 million enterprises having moved to the cloud nationwide. (Caixin)

10. BitConnect Executives Sentenced to 38 Months in Prison for Cryptocurrency Fraud, Fined a Total of $80 Million

In a Ponzi scheme, the cryptocurrency company BitConnect swept over $2 billion globally, trapping more than 4,000 retail investors from nearly 100 countries. Recently, a U.S. federal court released a ruling on a cryptocurrency fraud case. Glenn Arcaro, an executive of BitConnect, was sentenced to 38 months in prison and fined a total of $80 million for participating in a large-scale fraudulent cryptocurrency investment scheme.

In February of this year, the U.S. Department of Justice filed a lawsuit against BitConnect founder Satish Kumbhani, accusing him of orchestrating a Ponzi scheme worth $2.4 billion. Kumbhani is charged with conspiracy to commit wire fraud, conspiracy to manipulate commodity prices, operating an unlicensed money transfer business, and conspiracy to commit international money laundering. If convicted on all charges, he faces a maximum of 70 years in prison. (Source Link)

"What Exciting Articles Are Worth Reading in the Last 24 Hours"

1. "In Conversation with Wang Feng: Optimistic About Functional NFT Direction, The Only Gap Between Element and OpenSea is Time"

In mid-August, the NFT aggregation trading platform Element 2.0 officially launched, marking a significant shift and advance for Wang Feng into the Web3 field. At this important juncture, Chain Catcher invited Wang Feng for an exclusive interview, discussing his experiences and insights in entering the NFT industry, as well as the development path of Element. Wang Feng believes that although Element lags behind OpenSea in several data dimensions, the main difference is the timing of their respective starts, and he plans to surpass OpenSea in usability at the tool level while seeking to capture new opportunities in a changing landscape.

2. "Vitalik: DAOs Are Not Companies, Decentralization in Autonomous Organizations is Very Important"

Idealists of DAOs naively believe that the ideal of egalitarian decentralization can perform better; however, such attempts in traditional corporate sectors have only achieved limited success at best. This article argues why this stance is often incorrect and discusses its importance from three perspectives: decentralization is meant to make better decisions in concave environments, resistance to censorship, and credible fairness.

3. "Web3 3A Game Selling Pre-Sales, Will Leveraged Development Models Reduce High Costs?"

Ho Ying-tung invented the pre-sale model, starting to sell houses as soon as he acquired the land, with buyers purchasing based on blueprints. The proposal drew criticism from the real estate sector, labeling him a fraud selling air. Web3 3A blockchain games share some similarities with real estate, as construction is time-consuming and costly, involving numerous stakeholders. How to satisfy the interests of all parties, incentivize them, and improve the efficiency of capital turnover may be a domain where Web3 has its own solutions for many idealistic practitioners.