The Block
Quick Take Polymarket CEO Shayne Coplan said the firm is “strictly non-partisan” and it never envisioned itself as a political platform. Instead, political bets could buoy Polymarket’s focus on market-based forecasting, he noted Friday in a post on X.
Tech giant Microsoft, with a market cap of over $3 trillion, is apparently considering investing in bitcoin, according to a Securities and Exchange Commission filing on Thursday.Analysts at BitMEX Research argued it’s “highly unlikely” that MicroStrategy will be forced to sell its bitcoin holdings due to its current debt structure, though “anything is possible.”Deribit CEO Luuk Strijers noted that bitcoin call options are double the number of put options set for the Nov. 8 expiry, signaling bullish sentime
Quick Take Reducing the need for every node to permanently store all history in addition to unneeded protocol features could mitigate Ethereum’s bloat, Buterin said. Titled “The Purge,” the possible roadmap is Buterin’s fifth installment in a series contemplating Ethereum’s future.
Quick Take The government-linked wallet has seemingly recovered 88% of the lost funds within a day of the security incident. The wallet linked to the U.S. government lost over $20 million worth of stablecoins and ETH on Oct. 24.
Quick Take Emory University reporting holding nearly 2.7 million shares of the Grayscale Bitcoin Mini Trust valued at around $15.1 million as of Sept. 30. The University also reported holding 4,312 shares in the crypto exchange Coinbase, with the dollar amount rising to $768,269.
Russia’s Foreign Ministry has demanded consular access to Telegram founder and CEO Pavel Durov following his arrest on Saturday in France, with Russian officials reacting angrily to news of the arrest, according to the Wall Street Journal.French authorities plan to address Durov’s address in a statement on Monday, according to NPR.
Quick Take This is an excerpt from the ninth edition of The Funding sent to our verified subscribers on August 24. The Funding is a fortnightly newsletter written by Yogita Khatri, The Block’s longest-serving editorial member. To subscribe to the free newsletter, click here.
Quick Take The X account for the TON blockchain has released a statement affirming support for Telegram founder and CEO Pavel Durov, who was arrested on Saturday in France and is expected to be indicted on a variety of charges related to the operations of the messaging platform. The price of Toncoin plummeted nearly 20% on Saturday before recovering slightly; the token is currently down 12% in the past twenty-four hours.
Quick Take Telegram’s founder and CEO Pavel Durov was arrested tonight at an airport in France while traveling with a woman and his bodyguard, according to the reputable French news site TF1. Investigators from France’s National Anti-Fraud Office have placed Durov in custody ahead of a possible indictment on Sunday for a wide range of alleged offenses, according to TF1, citing sources close to the case.
U.S.-based spot bitcoin ETFs logged $252 million worth of inflows on Friday, the highest single-day value in one month, continuing a seven-day streak of positive net inflows.Unsurprisingly, BlackRock’s IBIT gained the most, but only Grayscale’s GBTC saw negative net flows.Meanwhile, ether ETFs are on the opposite streak, logging seven days of net outflows.
