In a partnership with Coinbase, art marketplace Sotheby’s now accepts bitcoin and ethereum payments for art, beginning with Banksy’s Love is in the Air picture.
The picture will be auctioned on May 12 in their Contemporary Art Evening Auction, Coinbase announced Tuesday (May 4). The artist and the buyer can both choose whether to transact in crypto or fiat currency.
“Leveraging the trusted exchange Coinbase is a natural progression and is in line with our dedication to enhancing our client buying experience and developing new ways to expand our client base by meeting them where they are,” said Stefan Pepe, Sotheby’s Chief Technology Officer, in the press release.
In other news, even as Ripple faces a lawsuit from the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, the blockchain payments provider is padding its leadership with new hires, according to a press release published today (May 4).
Rosa “Rosie” Gumataotao Rios, former U.S. Treasurer, will join Ripple’s board of directors, and Kristina Campbell will become Ripple’s new chief financial officer (CFO).
“These two exceptional leaders join Ripple at a pivotal time for the company,” said Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse in the announcement. “Rosie’s experience in the public and private sectors provides an invaluable perspective to Ripple, especially during this time as the industry works to define crypto’s future.”
Plus, the first generations of many central bank digital currencies will lack some of the core aspects of cryptocurrencies, Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao told Bloomberg on Monday (May 3). Those aspects include their limited supply and the freedom of use and transactions, he said.
“Most central bank digital currencies are going to have a lot of control attached to them,” he said.
The difference in the two will allow them to coexist for “awhile,” Zhao said, “as long as people are willing to hold either or both.”
And a cryptocurrency scam might have stolen over $2 million from members of Reddit forum WallStreetBets, Bloomberg reported Tuesday (May 4).
An account on the forum called “Crypto Pumps” sold Reddit users on Telegram a digital coin called WSB Finance that had yet to be listed on crypto exchanges. After sending payments in the form of Binance Coin or Ether, users did not receive the new altcoin and were instead told the payments had failed and that they would have to re-send the payment or lose their investment.
The wallet connected to Crypto Pumps, whose Telegram account has since been deleted, moved 3,451 Binance coins — worth over $2.1 million — on Tuesday, Bloomberg reported, citing data from BscScan. Bloomberg did not report how many Ether coins were moved.
The recent surge in cryptocurrency interest has given scammers a new opportunity to draw in interested buyers. Bloomberg noted that altcoins are seeing 1,000 percent gains a day.
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