The Crypto Roundup: 10 June 2024

Latest price and news from the crypto space

Latest price from our hand picked list of digital assets

A change to the cryptocurrency reporting rules included in the U.S. infrastructure bill was blocked in the Senate, leaving it with imposing broad third-party reporting requirements by poorly defining what a cryptoasset “broker” is.

AMC Entertainment Holdings, which runs the largest movie theatre chain in the United States, is set to start accepting bitcoin payments for tickets and concessions by the end of this year.

Stablecoin issuer Tether has published a transparency report detailing where its $62.8 billion in reserves are allocated as of June 30. The majority (85%) are held in the “Cash & Cash Equivalents & Other Short-Term Deposits & Commercial Paper” category.

Sponsored: Another exciting quarter has come and gone and despite the turmoil experienced in crypto markets after mid-May, the Invictus Capital suite of funds has continued to offer investors exceptional returns, with the Hyperion VC (IHF), Margin Lending (IML) and Crypto10 Hedged (C10) Funds all shooting the lights out.

Top stories in the Crypto Roundup today:

Change to Crypto Reporting Rules in Infrastructure Bill Blocked
AMC to Accept Bitcoin Payments by Year End
Tether Transparency Report Shows Treasury Exposure Increased
Analyzing Increased UST Burns
Sponsored: Invictus Capital Q2 2021 Investment Report

Change to Crypto Reporting Rules in Infrastructure Bill Blocked

The change came in an amendment designed to address concerns from the cryptocurrency industry that the bill would require miners, software developers, and other entities to report to the Internal Revenue Service data they do not have access to.

The amendment, which would exempt certain network operators from such reporting requirements, failed even after influential figures in the cryptocurrency space pushed for its approval, in a bid to narrow the definition. Senator Rob Portman has said there are other ways to clarify the bill’s language, including Senate floor speeches to show additional guidance from the Treasury Department and lawmakers’ intent.

Senator Cynthia Lummis said:

“All that means is we’re gonna have to fight this another day because it’s important that the Congress define these terms and create a level playing field. Going forward this fall we’re gonna have to be much more proactive about defining terms in this space so people can still innovate.”

The bill and the language defining a crypto broker within it are still far from becoming law, as the legislation has to be taken up by the House of Representatives, where it could still be changed.

AMC to Accept Bitcoin Payments by Year End

AMC Entertainment Holdings, which runs the largest movie theatre chain in the United States, is set to start accepting bitcoin payments for tickets and concessions by the end of this year.

The move was revealed by the company’s CEO Adam Aron in a Q2 earnings call. He said:

“We are also in the preliminary stage of now exploring how else AMC can participate in this new burgeoning cryptocurrency universe and we’re quite intrigued by potentially lucrative business opportunities for AMC if we intelligently pursue further serious involvement with cryptocurrency.”

Aron did not specify which technology AMC would use to accept BTC payments, but added it will also start accepting Apple Pay and Google Pay payments by the end of the year. The company operates 593 theatres in the U.S. and 335 in other locations throughout the world.

Tether Transparency Report Shows Treasury Exposure Increased

Stablecoin issuer Tether has published a transparency report detailing where its $62.8 billion in reserves are allocated as of June 30. The majority (85%)are held in the “Cash & Cash Equivalents & Other Short-Term Deposits & Commercial Paper” category.

Commercial paper and certificates of deposit account for 58% of this category, while treasury bills accounted for 29%. Cash and bank deposits 12%, while reverse repo notes account for 2%.

Tether’s allocation to treasury bills rose significantly from 3% of the cash & cash equivalents category in March to 29% of the category – which has since grown – in June. These T-bills are short-term government debt obligations with a maturity of one year or less.

The Stablecoin issuer has notably also given the ratings of its commercial paper and certificates of deposit holdings, with the majority having an A-1 rating, followed by A-2, A-3, A-1+, and others.

The majority of Tether’s commercial paper and certificates of deposit holdings had a maturity of 81 to 365 days, followed by 0-90 days and 91-180 days.

Analyzing Increased UST Burns with Flipside Crypto

As Twitter user shreyashpatodia points out, in order for UST to be able to maintain its peg, there must be a high volume of UST to LUNA swaps so that the peg remains tight at all times. Fortunately, as we can see in the graph below, that’s exactly what’s occurring.

There was a more than $35 million UST (shown by the spike in the green line) burned in late May, and again more recently. According to @shreyashpatodia, this is “extremely good for UST” as “the ability to keep its peg...depends completely on arbitrageurs stepping in and minting LUNA and UST.

Invictus Capital Q2 2021 Investment Report

Another exciting quarter has come and gone and despite the turmoil experienced in crypto markets after mid-May, the Invictus Capital suite of funds has continued to offer investors exceptional returns, with the Hyperion VC (IHF), Margin Lending (IML) and Crypto10 Hedged (C10) Funds all shooting the lights out.

AUM is still ticking up, with an average of $145 million under management over June. Hyperion has continued to astound, and we are incredibly proud of the performance of the underlying portfolio that now firmly places the fund within the top tiers of global venture capital fund performance.

The company's funds offered commendable performance in a quarter marked by heightened volatility and extreme fear in the Bitcoin and broader cryptoasset market. The simple average return across our suite of seven funds was 9.85% for the quarter, which is equivalent to an annualized return of 45.61%.

We invite you to read the full Q2 2021 investment report which includes comprehensive macroeconomic and crypto market analysis, fund-specific commentary and detailed company updates.

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