Visa stablecoin plan, debt ceiling’s effect on Bitcoin price: Hodler’s Digest, April 23-29

Top Stories This Week

Circle launches cross-chain USDC transfer protocol

Circle launched a cross-chain protocol that enables USDC transfers between the Ethereum and Avalanche blockchains. The protocol works by burning the selected amount of native USDC on the source chain, and minting an equivalent amount of new USDC on the intended destination chain. The protocol essentially makes USDC transfers between the two networks faster and more user-friendly, as prior to its launch, people had to use third-party bridges or a Circle partner to facilitate transfers between the two networks. Additional support for Solana and other blockchains will be added later in 2023.

Stablecoin payments: Visa shares plans for ‘ambitious’ crypto product

Cuy Sheffield, the head of crypto at Visa, announced a new cryptocurrency-related project, on April 24, focused on stablecoin payments. Details are sparse at this stage; however, Sheffiled shared a job listing relating to the project, with the description noting that the “Visa Crypto Team is building the next generation of products to facilitate commerce in everyone’s digital and mobile lives.” The job listing is seeking candidates with a good understanding of layer-1 and layer-2 solutions, alongside experience with writing smart contracts using the programming language Solidity, among other things.

Kraken asks San Francisco court to intervene against IRS demands

Crypto exchange Kraken has fought back against the U.S. Internal Revenue Service (IRS) over what it feels is an “unjustified treasure hunt” for user’s trading info. According to court documents, the firm requested a federal court in San Francisco to intervene and ask the IRS to back off. The IRS issued a summons in February demanding additional information on Kraken users who traded $20,000 or more in any single year from 2016 to 2020. 

Meta disclosed in its Q1 earnings report that its metaverse unit, Reality Labs, posted a loss of around $4 billion during the quarter. In what has been a costly venture for the firm, the $4 billion loss adds to the $14 billion Reality Labs loss over the entirety of 2022. Still, Meta posted a profit totalling roughly $5.7 billion in Q1 overall, with the firm’s work on artificial intelligence somewhat curbing the losses. Mark Zuckerberg was also not phased by the loss from Reality Labs, as he reiterated that “we continue to expect Reality Labs operating losses to increase year-over-year in 2023” as the firm eyes growth in the long term.

Gary Gensler links crypto with cash in viral 2018 video — Crypto Twitter reacts

Viral clips of Securities and Exchange Commision chair Gary Gensler started circulating this week, showing him take a highly contradictory stance on crypto compared to what he holds now. As it stands, Gensler thinks almost every crypto asset apart from BTC is a security, and has pushed hard to regulate the crypto sector from that viewpoint. However, in a snippet from one of his “Blockchain and Money” lectures from 2018 — while he was working as a professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology — Gensler said, “Three quarters of the market is non-securities, it’s just a commodity, cash, crypto.” He even suggested Ether was not a security, despite repeatedly suggesting otherwise over the past couple years.

Winners and Losers

At the end of the week, Bitcoin (BTC) is at $29,275, Ether (ETH) at $1,900 and XRP at $0.47. The total market cap is at $1.2 trillion, according to CoinMarketCap.

Among the biggest 100 cryptocurrencies, the top three altcoin gainers of the week are Render Token (RNDR) at 40.91%, Cronos (CRO) at 13.47% and Injective (INJ) at 10.49%. 

The top three altcoin losers of the week are PancakeSwap (CAKE) at 19.13%, Zilliqa (ZIL) at 12.41% and Optimism (OP) at 11.26%.

For more info on crypto prices, make sure to read Cointelegraph’s market analysis.

Most Memorable Quotations

“It’s a critical moment here in the U.S. and, as I like to say, it’s really a moment for Congress to step up.”

Jeremy Allaire, CEO of Circle

“I think it’s probably not a coincidence that you’re seeing all these concerns about de-dollarization at the same time they’re cracking down on crypto.”

David Sacks, co-host of the All-In podcast

“[Blockchain] is about helping different groups of people come together to be able to trust each other more, to collaborate across larger…