In possibly the latest crime involving cryptocurrency, U.S. regulators say that a Nevada company and two involved individuals allegedly defrauded more than $6 million from customers seeking to buy a virtual currency called My Big Coin, Reuters reported. The U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission filed the lawsuit in federal court against the company, its founder and an individual who allegedly had solicited customers for the company.
Should 50 Cent change his name to … 50 bitcoin? The rapper agreed to accept the cryptocurrency for a 2014 album – “Animal Ambition” – when one coin was only valued at a few hundred dollars, but he apparently never cashed in the 700 bitcoins from the sale. His bitcoin holdings are now worth more than $7.5 million, according to NPR. “Not Bad [sic] for a kid from South Side, I’m so proud of me,” 50 Cent wrote in an Instagram post.
In other bitcoin news, two former BlackRock bond specialists are among three founders of Prime Factor Capital, a London hedge fund that will trade cryptocurrencies, according to Bloomberg. The third member of the team was previously an energy trader at RWE AG. One of the founders from BlackRock, Adam Grimsley, said he was drawn to cryptocurrencies because of their lack of correlation with more traditional asset classes.
And news about the digital currency Stellar has been, well, stellar, CNBC reported. Stellar, which is known as XLM, jumped 20 percent Wednesday after Stripe said it may support cryptocurrency in the future. The news comes on the heels of an announcement from Stripe that it will no longer support bitcoin on its platform.
But bitcoin may find a positive reception over at Nasdaq Inc., which is still thinking about introducing its own bitcoin futures, Bloomberg reported. Adena Friedman, chief executive officer of New York-based Nasdaq, said the company is exploring how to create something that is differentiated from the bitcoin futures contracts that are already available. Cboe Global Markets Inc. and CME Group Inc. have already introduced their own bitcoin contracts.
Despite blockbuster returns, are some hedge funds thinking about taking a break from cryptocurrencies? That is becoming the case, according to The Wall Street Journal. “You need to sit down and put a towel on your head and have a think about things,” Lee Robinson, founder of Monaco-based hedge fund firm Altana Wealth, told the paper. Robinson said he became concerned when the time it took for cryptocurrencies to double began halving late last year.
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