Weekly Digest: Facebook Gives Up on Diem, Russia Decides What to Do with Crypto

What happened with the crypto market this week

Andrei Lugovoy, deputy chairman of the Security and Anti-Corruption Committee, said it is impossible to ban turnover of cryptocurrency as this will drive the market into a gray zone. He added:

"Let those who want to ban explain how they plan to do this from a practical point of view so that we will not be the laughingstock all over the globe."

The Bank of Russia claims that Russians investing in cryptocurrencies are withdrawing capital from the country's economy:

"Instead of investing in deposits, stocks and bonds that provide financing for the economy of our country, citizens buy cryptocurrencies that actively service payments in the illegal economy."

The Ministry of Finance proposed to carry out all transactions with cryptocurrencies through Russian banks. The ministry also suggested identifying and dividing the participants of the cryptocurrency market into qualified and unqualified investors.

The Diem Association (formerly known as Libra) is in talks to sell off its assets to California cryptocurrency bank Silvergate Capital Corp for $200 million. People close to the matter say that Meta (formerly known as Facebook) owns a third of Diem, with the rest held by various tech companies and venture capitalists. According to the Diem official website, Andreessen Horowitz, Union Square Ventures, Ribbit Capital, Thrive Capital, and Temasek Holdings Pte. are partners in the project.

The Ethereum ecosystem rebranded its terminology from "ETH 2.0" terminology into "consensus layer." The developers decided to rebrand the ecosystem as its initial terminology created "a broken mental model for new users." They also claim that the numerical sequence of terms can mislead users or make them believe that ETH1 ceases to exist once ETH2 exists.

Despite the rebrand, the roadmap to scale Ethereum in a decentralized way remains the same.

Unknown attackers hacked several crypto bloggers' YouTube accounts and posted a video on their behalf asking for money, analyst Mr. Whale reported. According to him, BitBoy Crypto, The Moon, Crypto Banter, MMCrypto, Altcoin Buzz, CoinMarketCap, aantonop, Boxmining, FloydMayweather and Moralis Web3.se have been victims of the attack.

Users on Reddit revealed the scam video is called ONE WORLD CRYPTOCURRENCY. The authors suggest sending Ethereum, Binance Coin, USDT or USDC apparently to receive the new crypto OWCY.

Tesla's profits increased 7-fold last year to $5.5 billion, while revenue posted a 42% increase to $53.8 billion. In 2020, the company reported its annual results for the first time.

At that time, the company's profits rose to $721 million, while revenues stood at $31.5 billion. Car deliveries were up 87% compared to 2020, a record growth for the company.

Musk also revealed that in 2022, Tesla will not launch new models, but will focus on increasing production of existing models. Tesla will also choose a site for the construction of a new plant by the end of the year and launch production of self-designed batteries.

Unknown attackers hacked the decentralized finance industry (DeFi) project called Qubit Finance and removed assets worth approximately $80 million from its pool, cybersecurity and auditing firm PeckShield reported.

A spokesperson for Qubit Finance confirmed the attack and said the team is tracking the stolen assets.

El Salvador should remove bitcoin's legal tender status over large risks associated with the use of the cryptocurrency on financial stability, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) wrote in a recent press release. The organization added that even though digital wallets like Chivo boost financial inclusion, executive directors highlighted the need for strict regulation and oversight. Directors also expressed concern over the risks associated with issuing bitcoin-backed bonds.