Japanese financial watchdog pushes new reserve rules for crypto exchanges 

Asian fund acquires majority stake in The BlockIn the wake of certain difficulties experienced following the FTX collapse, prominent crypto publication The Block has secured its future through a strategic sale to Singapore-based venture capital group Foresight Ventures.Taking to the X platform on Monday, The Block’s CEO Larry Cermak announced the acquisition, with Foresight Ventures taking a majority stake in the publication. The deal results in a valuation of the US media group at $70 million. Cermak stated:”This [transaction] gives The Block a fresh start ahead of the bull market and provides us with more capital to build out new exciting products and expand our footprint into Asia and the Middle East.”Cermak also thanked New York-based investment bank Moelis & Company for its help in running the process.Photo by Kelly Sikkema on UnsplashFTX controversyThe sale should allow the firm to move on from a difficult situation which saw it implicated in the activities of convicted fraudster and former FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried (SBF). The fallout from the collapse of the FTX exchange in November of last year included the revelation that The Block had relied on undisclosed loans from SBF to sustain its operations.Michael McCaffrey, the former CEO of The Block, resigned last December after it was disclosed that he had borrowed $43 million from SBF’s Alameda Research, a crypto trading company. This financial arrangement was allegedly aimed at supporting the media company and facilitating property acquisitions.Following the conviction of SBF on charges of fraud and money laundering in New York earlier this month, The Block faced challenges and turned its focus towards building a more robust institutional customer base. The media group has been actively engaged in compiling industry deals and offering subscription-based news services.McCaffrey had taken loans totaling $27 million to buy out shareholders and support the media group, with an additional $16 million used for property acquisition in the Bahamas. The financial arrangement with Alameda was undisclosed to the broader team at The Block, as revealed by Bobby Moran, the company’s chief revenue officer at the time.It’s still unclear if McCaffrey has repaid these loans to the FTX Debtor that is currently managing the FTX business. FTX filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in November 2022 and with that, it is in the process of being restructured.$56 million investmentAs part of the deal, Foresight Ventures will invest $56 million, securing an 80 percent stake in The Block, according to a source cited by the Financial Times (FT). The investment is a strategic move, especially considering the recent slowdown in venture capital investment in the crypto market.While investors injected approximately $30 billion into crypto projects in both 2021 and 2022, the figure plummeted to $7 billion by the end of September of this year, according to PitchBook.Foresight Ventures CEO Forest Bai confirmed to the FT that The Block will continue to operate as an independent business. Bai stated: “We think The Block is one of the crown assets in the crypto media space. Our view is that the media aspect will continue to drive education and adoption in the space.”

Phemex, a Singapore-headquartered crypto derivatives trading platform, has halted withdrawals following a multi-million dollar hack.Photo by GuerrillaBuzz on UnsplashHot wallet compromisedIn a message to platform users published to social media, the project stated: “To ensure security, withdrawals have been temporarily suspended while we conduct an emergency inspection and strengthen wallet services. We sincerely apologize for the inconvenience. Withdrawals will be restored soon.” In further commentary, the project apologized for the disruption, assuring service users that its mission remains to provide a trusted trading environment, while outlining that it is working on putting together a compensation plan. It added that “Our ongoing business operations are fine,” and that “trading services continue as usual.” The digital assets were removed from the platform over multiple blockchains including Polygon, Arbitrum, the Base network and BNB. Blockchain analytics firm Lookonchain itemized some of the assets that are believed to have been stolen. They include 3.48 million USDC stablecoin, 3.42 million USDT stablecoin, 841 ETH valued at $2.7 million, 110,701 LINK valued at $2.69 million, 142 billion PEPE tokens valued at $2.12 million, 1.19 million FET tokens valued at $1.45 million and 29,509 AVAX tokens valued at $1.04 million. Initial reports put the loss at $31 million. However, Web3 security firm Cyvers later claimed that $37  million covers the full extent of the loss. Following deeper analysis, it found that both Bitcoin and TRON blockchains had also been impacted, resulting in the overall loss being increased by a further $6 million. Cold wallet assets are safeThe company’s CEO Federico Variola, published a post on X advising service users that all of the assets held within the company’s cold wallets remain safe. He included a link to the Phemex proof of reserves, encouraging customers to check it. In a follow-up post, he wrote: “We are currently carefully testing our system to reprise withdrawals as soon as possible. Due to the sophistication of the threat actor we cannot rush this stage. The estimated timeline to reprise full operations is within 24h, thank you for your support.” The XNET Foundation, a non-profit entity that develops decentralized wireless networks, said that it is actively working with the Phemex team on the production of an exploit report following the incident. It added that “It has been confirmed that tokens sent to the exchange for a launchpad pool were compromised as part of this exploit.” Ongoing problemCrypto hacking remains a major concern within the digital assets sector. Blockchain security firm PackShield reported recently that $1.3 billion had been laundered from crypto hacks in 2024. That statistic demonstrates that the problem is worsening as it accounts for a $342 million or 280% increase when compared with 2023. In December a Chainalysis report found that 61% of the hacking losses suffered in 2024 implicated the involvement of North Korean hackers. It estimated crypto hacking losses of $2.2 billion for 2024, based on losses associated with 303 hacking incidents.

Cryptotax secures pre-series A funding from HashedCryptotax, a South Korean cryptocurrency tax and accounting platform run by accounting firm Xxsoft, has secured an investment from Asian blockchain investment firm Hashed during its pre-series A funding round. This comes just 16 months after the company secured seed funding.Photo by Markus Winkler on UnsplashEmpowering financial clarityCryptotax is a platform that offers comprehensive virtual asset tax accounting services that allow both individual and corporate clients to monitor their virtual assets, view receipts of their transactions and calculate and report their virtual asset tax records. To do so, it collects and analyzes transaction history and asset details from crypto exchange accounts and digital wallets that users can register on their Cryptotax accounts.Individual investors can also monitor their assets and view their net profits, as well as receive a preview of the amount of tax they would actually have to pay later on based on those profits.On the other hand, corporate clients that issue or own virtual assets can get access to special services through Cryptotax’s solution as a service (Saas) dubbed Cryptotax Enterprise. By using this service, businesses, investment management firms and virtual asset issuers can benefit from automated tax processing and directly receive accounting documents.Harnessing technological prowess“We have been working hard to prove our technological and competitive capabilities through the establishment of the Cryptotax platform,” said Yoon Dong-hwan, CEO of Xxsoft, reaffirming the company’s efforts to rapidly expand the comprehensive platform and establish collaborative relationships.