Bitcoin Daily: YouTube, Ripple Reach Settlement Over XRP Lawsuit; Bankrupt Crypto Investment Firm Had UK Fugitive Managing Capital

YouTube and Ripple have agreed “to work together” after Ripple sued the video company last April for allegedly failing to remove XRP scams from its platform, according to a tweet from Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse.

The scams impersonated Ripple representatives and offered XRP giveaways in fraudulent online contests.

According to several tweets from Garlinghouse, the two companies have settled the court case confidentially and have agreed to work together to combat such scams.

“Social platforms are starting to acknowledge their role in allowing crypto scams to persist and recognize the need to be part of the solution,” Garlinghouse tweeted.

“Platforms need to lead the charge or it’s still just whack-a-mole,” he added.

In other news, the U.S. Bankruptcy Court has found that crypto investment platform Cred fell into bankruptcy due to a “dereliction in corporate responsibility,” The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reported, citing a court report.

The platform hired James Alexander as chief capital officer without researching his past, which would have revealed that he was a fugitive from the U.K. who had been convicted on illegal money transfer charges, WSJ reported.

The platform also failed to perform due diligence on its investments, track customer funds or keep reliable records, according to WSJ.

Cred blamed Alexander for a “significant” amount of its financial troubles and accused him of taking at least 225 bitcoin — worth $12 million — from the company, WSJ reported.

“The company employed highly competent security, finance, product, engineering and operations professionals, and it is highly unfortunate that a professional fraudster was able to evade the company’s background check and other security protocols,” Cred Co-Founder and former CEO Daniel Schatt told WSJ in an email.

Alexander’s lawyer declined WSJ’s request for comment, but last month held that he had done nothing wrong, WSJ reported.

Cred’s bankruptcy filing is pending approval, at which time a liquidation trust would be set up. Unsecured creditors may be able to recover about 30 cents for every dollar they are owed, WSJ reported.

Meanwhile, financial services firm Techemynt has launched $NZDs, the first stablecoin backed one-to-one by the New Zealand dollar, according to a press release.

The minimum amount of $NZDs customers can buy is 100,000 New Zealand dollars, which they can purchase directly from Techemynt, the release stated. They can also buy them on secondary exchanges, such as Dassetx.com. Techemynt plans to expand the Ethereum-based stablecoin to other exchanges in the future.

“As a blockchain-based stablecoin, $NZDs combines the stability and value of the New Zealand dollar with the intrinsic utility of cryptocurrency to allow arbitrage, remittance and digital payments,” the release stated.

The stablecoin helps bring the New Zealand dollar further into the global digital asset economy, according to the release.

Lastly, the supply of bitcoin ATMs worldwide has increased by 57.5 percent since the start of 2021, Cointelegraph reported, citing data from Coin ATM Radar. According to the data, an average of 34.6 new machines are installed every day.

There are currently 16,835 machines around the world, 81 percent of which — 13,699 ATMs — are installed in the U.S., a 177 percent increase year over year, according to the report. A total of 77.6 percent of the ATMs only offer bitcoin purchases, whereas consumers can buy and sell coins at the other 22.4 percent.