South Korea, Chainalysis Collaborate to Thwart North Korea’s Crypto Crimes

Midas Investments Founder Launches Locus FinanceIakov Levin, the founder of the recently failed Dubai-headquartered custodial crypto investment platform Midas Investments, has unveiled his latest project, Locus Finance, a DeFi platform.Photo by Shubham’s Web3 on UnsplashStarting overThat’s according to a recent report published by The Block. Locus Finance’s main focus lies in providing connectivity with high-yield tokenized vaults. In its initial stages, the company will introduce three yield-generating products, centered around Ethereum staking, DeFi expansion, and Arbitrum trading.Levin believes that investors are not interested in the intricacies of blockchains, protocols, or daily portfolio management. This is where vaults play a crucial role, catering to the retail yield market and generating profits for retail investors. In a statement Levin said:“Investors don’t want to worry about blockchains, protocols, transaction costs, and daily portfolio management. They need specific exposure in a set-and-forget style. Vaults represent a unique approach necessary for maturing the retail yield market, allowing for optimal wealth generation for retail investors.”With Locus Finance, Levin aims to learn from past experiences and provide a platform that meets the demands of retail investors seeking a more simplified and profitable DeFi experience. The company’s approach centers around yield generation and a seamless user experience, allowing users to focus on their investments without being bogged down by complex technicalities.Midas downfallMidas Investments, established in 2018, had seen significant success as a custodial crypto investment platform which offered yields on a range of digital assets. It managed assets worth over $250 million at its peak in 2021. However, the volatile market conditions in 2022 led to losses exceeding $50 million, forcing the company to close its doors in December 2022.The loss incurred accounted for 20% of the $250 million assets under management (AUM). The platform’s demise followed the collapse of prominent projects like Terra, FTX, and Celsius earlier in 2022. Those collapses prompted Midas Investments users to withdraw over 60% of their assets. That run on the platform rendered its fixed yield model unsustainable.Midas faced total liabilities of $115 million in Bitcoin, ETH, and stablecoins, with assets valued at $51.7 million. At the time of the platform’s collapse, Levin expressed his optimism about future plans. He disclosed plans to introduce an offering that would feature new investment strategies. Fast forward seven months and it appears that those plans have taken shape in the form of this newly-launched Locus Finance platform.However, Locus Finance’s success will be closely monitored in light of the challenges faced by its predecessor. A former Midas Investments customer took to Reddit three months ago to warn people to stay away from the new platform once launched.At that time, Midas Investments management had advised customers of its intention to start over via Lotus Finance. “Users lost tons of money and Midas got away with the bags. . . . I’d recommend staying as far away from them as possible,” the former customer warned.

The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) has unveiled a new initiative aimed at enhancing the nation’s financial infrastructure through the use of stablecoins and tokenized commercial bank money. Announced on Oct. 16, the project, known as BLOOM, short for Borderless, Liquid, Open, Online, Multi-currency, brings together 16 financial sector participants, including Anchorage Digital, Ant International, Circle, Coinbase, and DBS Bank. According to MAS, BLOOM is open to additional participants through a registration form available on its official website.Photo by Jason Leung on UnsplashBuilding on Project OrchidBLOOM operates under Project Orchid, a digital Singapore dollar initiative launched in 2021 to explore potential applications of central bank digital currency (CBDC) in strengthening Singapore’s financial ecosystem. Through BLOOM, it will examine use cases involving G10 and Asian currencies, covering both domestic and cross-border payments, as well as wholesale financial transactions. The project’s focus includes coordinating interoperability between different networks to enable the distribution and clearing of settlement assets. It will also explore automated compliance checks and study methods to make wholesale settlements more efficient and cost-effective. Artificial intelligence (AI) agents are expected to play a supporting role, executing transactions automatically within predefined limits and regulatory parameters. Expanding stablecoin usage in SingaporeThe MAS initiative comes shortly after the listing of XSGD, a Singapore dollar–backed stablecoin, on the U.S.-based crypto exchange Coinbase on Oct. 1. XSGD is issued by StraitsX, a digital payments provider, and is fully backed by reserve assets held with DBS Bank and Standard Chartered. Stablecoin payments have gained traction in Singapore’s retail sector as well. StraitsX recently began supporting settlements in USDT and USDC through OKX Pay. Consumers can use SGQR codes at participating GrabPay merchants to make everyday purchases, such as coffee, with transactions settled directly in Singapore dollars into merchant accounts. Rising local interest in digital assetsSingapore’s growing engagement with digital assets reflects a broader trend of public interest. A report from ApeX Protocol, cited by Cointelegraph, ranked Singapore as the world’s most “crypto-obsessed” nation, awarding it a composite score of 100. The ranking considered ownership rates, adoption growth, search activity, and ATM availability. The study found that 24.4% of Singapore’s population holds cryptocurrency, ahead of the United Arab Emirates (UAE), which scored 99.7 despite a 25.3% ownership rate. In a separate development, Channel News Asia reported that three Singaporeans have been implicated in a large-scale fraud scheme linked to Cambodia’s Prince Group. The U.S. Department of Justice recently confiscated 127,271 Bitcoin tied to the operation—the largest seizure in its history. Following the investigation, the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control imposed sanctions on the three individuals as well as 17 Singapore-registered entities. The sanctions block access to any property in their possession and prohibit U.S. persons from engaging in transactions with them, citing risks to U.S. national security and foreign policy interests. 

dYdX Foundation CEO Shares the Importance of Korean Developers of the Cosmos NetworkDecentralized crypto derivatives exchange dYdX is in the midst of a significant transition, as it prepares to move away from its current Ethereum-based layer-2 protocol to Cosmos, a decentralized network of independent blockchains. Meanwhile, senior members of the dYdX Foundation, a Swiss-based not-for-profit entity behind the derivatives exchange, paid a visit to South Korea on the occasion of Korea Blockchain Week: KBW2023, which is an annual event that spans from September 4 to 10 this year.Photo by Mariia Shalabaieva on UnsplashBusy Q4Regarding the upcoming v4 update on a Cosmos-based blockchain, Charles d’Haussy, the CEO of the dYdX Foundation, shared his thoughts in an interview with CoinNess. He expressed anticipation for a bustling fourth quarter this year but also acknowledged that the exact timeline remains uncertain, as it hinges on the voting processes, including one for bridging tokens to Cosmos, within the dYdX community.Utility token on v4As part of dYdX’s migration to Cosmos, its governance token will undergo a transformation into a utility token. The forthcoming dYdX v4 will be fully decentralized, with 100% of the fees collected from the exchange distributed to stakers and validators. Following the completion of this migration, the current dYdX protocol on Ethereum will eventually become deprecated.Exclusive focus on crypto derivativesIn a significant milestone, dYdX achieved over $1 trillion in total trading volume on its Layer 2 platform on July 14 of this year. d’Haussy expressed pride in this achievement and highlighted that dYdX’s competitive edge lies in its exclusive focus on crypto derivatives.DeFi mullet memeAlthough DeFi derivatives trading currently represents just 1% of the overall crypto derivatives volume, d’Haussy is optimistic about its future growth, predicting an acceleration. In a parallel to how traditional banks offer an array of products that originate from external entities such as brokerages and insurance companies, Charles d’Haussy envisions that centralized exchanges will provide a diverse range of offerings sourced from decentralized platforms. He expressed his strong belief in the idea encapsulated by the DeFi mullet meme, which features the phrase “Fintech In The Front, DeFi In The Back.”Top-tier Cosmos builders in KoreaWhen asked about his visit to Korea, d’Haussy emphasized the presence of top-tier Cosmos builders in the country. He underscored South Korea’s importance within the Cosmos ecosystem, highlighting that 10% of dYdX’s testnet participants are Korean companies.