Bitcoin (BTC) was trading up 3% on the day after a positive week for the cryptocurrency. BTC reached highs of $24,250 on Wednesday, its highest since mid-June. Ether (ETH) was up 9% on the day, extending this month's spectacular rally, with a 52% price gain just in July alone. On Thursday, Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin spoke about the network's upcoming Merge at the Ethereum Community Conference in Paris.He said that in terms of Ethereum’s overall network development, the protocol will be “55% complete once we finish the Merge.” Thus, there is much more work for developers ahead. (By the way, if you didn't catch my dispatch this week from the EthCC conference in Paris, that's here.) NEAR protocol was also trading in the green on Friday, up 11%. Uniwap's UNI was up 8%. In traditional markets, stocks were on track for their best week in a month. The yield on the 10-year U.S. Treasury note declined by seven basis points (0.07 percentage point) to 2.81%. The yield is down from nearly 3.5% little over a month ago, a trend that some economists suggest could be a signal that a recession is coming. Meanwhile, Three Arrows Capital (3AC) has finally broken its silence in an interview with Bloomberg. 3AC founders Su Zhu and Kyle Davies discuss how one of the most successful crypto funds went from being a prominent trading desk to owing creditors $2.8 billion. The duo described the collapse as "regrettable," but denied claims that they pulled money from the fund before its collapse, according to the report. CoinDesk's Nikhilesh De reported the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission and Department of Justice brought insider trading charges against three people Thursday, but assertions cryptocurrencies are securities may hold greater implications. It formally declared nine digital tokens as “securities“ in its ongoing practice of defining its crypto oversight through enforcement actions. And finally, Citigroup said in a report Wednesday: With numerous brokers and market makers making counterparty exposure disclosures, Celsius filing Chapter 11, and staked ether (stETH) returning towards parity, it is likely crypto contagion fears have peaked in the interim. (It's important to note: Just this week the Singapore-based cryptocurrency exchange Zipmex apparently became a fresh victim of the contagion, when it halted deposit withdrawals. Zipmex said Thursday in a Facebook post that it had was dealing with some $53 million of combined exposure to the Babel Finance and Celsius.) Staked ether’s discount to ether has narrowed, which suggests some liquidity stress may have passed, the report said. The “acute deleveraging phase” has now ended given many of the large brokers and market makers in the sector have disclosed their exposures, according to the bank. | 