January 9, 2023

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Barry Silbert’s Digital Currency Group (DCG) is being investigated by the U.S. Department of Justice’s (DOJ) Eastern District of New York and the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. The entities are examining financial transfers between DCG and its Genesis unit. The prosecutors with the DOJ's Eastern District of New York office have requested interviews and documents from DCG and Genesis, the report said, while the SEC appears to be in a similarly early stage of its own inquiry. The report, which cited people familiar with the matter, said that neither Genesis nor DCG, which is also the parent company to CoinDesk, have "been accused of wrongdoing."

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Solana (SOL) and cardano (ADA) outpaced the broader crypto market amid signs of recovery over the weekend. SOL and ADA were up over 15% on Monday morning, before seeing a slight price retreat as traders took profits. Solana was buoyed over the past week as some projects – most notably the Shiba Inu-themed Bonk (BONK) – saw massive hype and adoption within the ecosystem. On-chain data shows daily active users of Solana increased by over 40% in the past two weeks, from nearly 300,000 users in late December to over 525,000 wallets as of Monday.

Bankrupt crypto lender Voyager has defended its $1 billion plan to sell assets to Binance.US, calling criticisms “hypocrisy and chutzpah” based on unverified speculation, two legal filings posted late Sunday night show. The plan has been opposed by Alameda Research, the trading arm of bankrupt crypto exchange FTX, as well as the SEC, DOJ and numerous state-level regulators, with a hearing due to be held at a New York bankruptcy court on Tuesday.

Early Monday, the large order was partially filled for 40,000 contracts while 10,000 contracts were yet to be filled. (Deribit)

During the bull market of early 2021, hyper bullish bets on bitcoin and ether often crossed the tape on the leading crypto options exchange, Deribit. Two years later the opposite is happening, with market participants betting on an extended slide in ether.

Last week, a buy order for 50,000 contracts of ether's $400-strike price put option expiring in June appeared on Deribit's order book, raising alarm bells in the crypto community. At press time, ether was priced around $1,300, so the put buyer is expecting a 69% slide in less than six months. On Deribit, one ether options contract represents one ETH.

"On ether, the trade that made the most talk was the purchase of puts $400 on June 2023 made on-screen with a resting bid of 50k contracts," digital assets data provider Amberdata said in its weekly newsletter published Sunday.

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– Omkar Godbole