KuCoin Halts Bitcoin and Litecoin Mining Pools Amidst Strategic Shift

Global crypto exchange platform KuCoin has announced the arrival of “KuCoin Thailand” (to be also known as “KuCoin TH”) in the Southeast Asian country. In a press release publicizing the development, the company outlined that the new platform has been formed following a rebranding of ERX, the first virtual currency exchange to be licensed and supervised by Thai regulator, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).Photo by Bharath Mohan on UnsplashGlobal infrastructure enhancing service deliveryERX has rebranded to KuCoin Thailand, but the exchange will continue to be operated by ERX Company Ltd, while collaborating with KuCoin and benefiting from KuCoin’s global market presence and global exchange infrastructure. Commenting on what KuCoin brings to the partnership, ERX CEO Att Tongyai Asavanund stated: “With the global infrastructure and resources supporting us, we’re enhancing our ability to deliver localized solutions tailored for the Thai market. KuCoin Thailand reflects our continued mission — strengthened by strong technology and a broader global vision.” ERX Board Director Henry Chen said that the objective is “to build a leading digital asset platform in Thailand with global vision, institutional grade service and state-of-art technology.”Southeast Asian expansionFounded in China in 2017, although operating on a global basis, KuCoin continues to have stronger ties to Asia. Following the implementation of restrictions on crypto trading in China a few years ago, the company moved its headquarters to Singapore, subsequently opting to establish itself in the Seychelles. This latest development further strengthens KuCoin’s credentials within the Asian region. In a blog post, the company marked the event as a “key step forward” in its strategic expansion across Southeast Asia. Existing ERX users have already been migrated over to the new platform. The company has placed a notice on its website advising users to download the KuCoin TH app, which has been made available via Android and iOS. Last month ERX announced that it had received approval from the Thai SEC to activate its Crypto Exchange License. The company was first established in Thailand in 2019. It has been under the supervision of the local regulator since 2020.  The ERX platform was originally built out using AlphaPoint white-label software. It received a digital assets exchange license from the SEC in July 2020. ERX parent company, New York-based digital asset management firm Elevated Returns, has been working within the real-world asset (RWA) tokenization arena for some time. In 2018, the company was involved in a $18 million deal to tokenize the St. Regis Aspen Resort, a luxury hotel and resort located in Colorado, United States. Previously, KuCoin had remained unlicensed in Thailand. In recent times, the Thai authorities have made efforts to block unlicensed exchanges from engaging with investors in Thailand. Last month Thailand’s SEC filed a lawsuit against KuCoin competitor OKX for allegedly running an unlicensed exchange. KuCoin Thailand will compete with eight other licensed exchange businesses within the Thai market. These include WAAN Exchange, Gulf Binance, Thai Digital Assets Exchange, InnovestX Securities, GMO-Z.com Cryptonomics, Upbit Exchange, Bitkub Online and Orbix Trade.

Scroll’s zkEVM Launches on Ethereum MainnetScroll, the Seychelles-headquartered project behind the Ethereum layer-2 network of the same name, has officially made its debut on the Ethereum mainnet.Photo by Zoltan Tasi on UnsplashAttempting to solve for scalabilityThe project team announced the development via a press release which was published on Tuesday. The network launch signifies the latest in a series of attempts by various layer-2 projects, including Polygon and StarkWare, to address the persistent challenges of high transaction fees and network congestion that have hindered Ethereum’s usability in recent times. Speaking to layer-2 development, co-founder Sandy Peng stated:“We see a future where the vast majority of value transfer takes place on Layer 2s on Ethereum. What will drive that adoption is improved user and developer experience.”After testing and refinement on its testnet, Scroll believes that it is in a good position to play an active role within the Ethereum ecosystem by providing a general-purpose, zero-knowledge Ethereum virtual machine (zkEVM) roll-up.The project has 900,000 wallet addresses in active use on its testnet, having executed seven million transactions since August. The testnet has seen over 55 million transactions during its year-long operation.At its core, Scroll’s mission is to combine Ethereum’s network security with reduced fees and lower latency, making it an attractive proposition for existing Ethereum projects. According to Peng, Ethereum developers can seamlessly deploy their projects on Scroll and harness the groundbreaking zkEVM technology.Incorporating bytecodePeng emphasized the significance of zkEVM’s ability to batch proofs efficiently, resulting in faster transaction speeds and cost reductions, thanks to its bytecode-level compatibility.Bytecode, in the realm of computer programming, simplifies intricate machine cryptography, making code more accessible for computer hardware. Scroll allows deployed smart contracts to store the bytecode of their transactions, which is then sent to a centralized zkEVM node. This node verifies the transaction’s accuracy without revealing its content. Once verified, the transaction’s status is updated on the Ethereum network, eliminating the need for re-execution. Peng pointed out:“Thanks to this feature, Ethereum devs can leverage all the same tools they are familiar with, ensuring that everything operates seamlessly right from the start.”Scroll’s mainnet code was subject to audits conducted by four major auditing firms, namely Zellic, Trail of Bits, OpenZeppelin, and KALOS, in an effort to ensure robust security and reliability.Efforts towards greater decentralizationWhile Scroll’s current implementation offers compelling features, the team is actively researching ways to further enhance the network’s decentralization. Currently, if the sequencer goes offline, the protocol halts, creating a potential vulnerability. To address this, the Scroll team is working on a protocol upgrade that will enable “forced batches.” This update will allow permissionless publication of batches through the base layer, even in the event of a sequencer halt.Peng elaborated on the team’s vision, stating: “Mid-term, the goal is to minimize the probability of a sequencer halt through decentralization.” This approach aims to bolster the network’s resilience and ensure a smoother user experience.While headquartered in the Seychelles, the project has its origins in China through its Chinese founders, Ye Zhang and Haichen Shen, alongside Peng, with many of its 60-strong project team based in mainland China and Hong Kong.

Linear Finance Dealing With LUSD ExploitLinear Finance, the Hong Kong-based DeFi protocol, made an announcement by way of a blog post published to the project’s website on Thursday, suggesting that the project’s native stablecoin, LUSD, has come under attack.Photo by Markus Spiske on UnsplashTaking precautionary actionThis security breach has prompted the team to take immediate action to safeguard user accounts and the project’s integrity. The project team is actively investigating the exploit attack on LUSD. It has issued a stern warning to its users, advising them against buying or trading LUSD until the team can confirm the situation’s status.This measure is aimed at preventing further complications and ensuring the community’s interests remain protected. Furthermore, the project has temporarily suspended liquidations to secure users’ accounts. This step has been taken to mitigate immediate concerns and ensure that no user faces undue losses as a result of the exploit.Assets disposed on PancakeSwap & AscendexAmid the ongoing investigation, Linear Finance’s team has pledged to provide timely updates as soon as more information becomes available. In explaining away the nature of the attack, the project team clarified:”The attacker was able to mint an unlimited supply of LAAVE and subsequently traded the liquid asset to LUSD on the Linear Exchange, prior to selling it on PancakeSwap and Ascendex.”Project responseIn its efforts to deal with the issue, the Linear Finance project team has engaged an on-chain data specialist to track down the attackers. The Linear bridge contract has been disabled relative to LUSD. All protocol contracts that allow tokens to be minted, exchanged, or burnt have been paused. Meanwhile, wallets identified as having been involved in the protocol exploit have been shared with the authorities and major cryptocurrency exchanges.Synthetic asset protocolLinear Finance creates synthetic assets with the protocol design enabling unlimited liquidity. The network has been built on top of the Ethereum blockchain. As a consequence of activity surrounding the exploit, trading of LUSD over the course of the past 24 hours has proven to be out of the ordinary. At the time of writing volume over the past 24-hour period had increased by 8412%. The current market price of the stablecoin stands at $0.9874.Protocol and network hacks and exploits have been coming in thick and fast in recent days. Hong Kong crypto exchange CoinEx has been trying to recover from a $70 million hack on the platform over recent days. Meanwhile, Seychelles-headquartered peer-to-peer crypto platform Remitano suffered a $2.7 million hack late last week.On Wednesday, the project team behind DeFi protocol Balancer warned network users that the Balancer front-end user interface was under attack. The Ethereum-based DeFi network fell victim to another exploit last month, resulting in losses in the region of $900,000.In the dynamic crypto sector, unforeseen events like potential exploits can disrupt the market and sow uncertainty. The issue remains a major challenge both for centralized exchange platforms and DeFi protocols.