Business intelligence firm MicroStrategy has announced that it acquired an additional 5,445 Bitcoin for $147.3 million, at an average price of $27,053 per BTC. The move was first announced by MicroStrategy’s co-founder and executive chairman Michael Saylor.

Digital asset management firm Bitwise has filed an amendment to its spot Bitcoin exchange-traded fund (ETF) application, underlining arguments that it believes directly challenge the regulatory reasons cited for withholding the product from US investors.

According to Justin Sun, an advisor to HTX, the cryptocurrency trading platform was hacked and lost 5,000 ETH, worth $7.9 million, in the incident. In a post on social media, Sun clarified “HTX has fully covered the losses incurred from the attack.”

Top stories in the Crypto Roundup today:

• MicroStrategy Buys More Bitcoin, Now Holds Over 158,000 BTC
• Google Cloud Adds 11 New Blockchains to BigQuery
• Bitwise Pushes Back Against SEC’s Bitcoin ETF Denials
• Stablecoin Trading Volumes Surge in August, But Remains Subdued

MicroStrategy Buys More Bitcoin, Now Holds Over 158,000 BTC

Business intelligence firm MicroStrategy has announced that it acquired an additional 5,445 Bitcoin for $147.3 million, at an average price of $27,053 per BTC. The move was first announced by MicroStrategy’s co-founder and executive chairman Michael Saylor.

According to a Form 8-K filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, between Aug. 1 and Sept. 24, MicroStrategy and its affiliate entities made the acquisition. By September 24, MicroStrategy and its subsidiaries held around 158,245 BTC in its wallets.

The coins were acquired at an average price of around $29,582 per BTC including fees and expenses, according to the filing. MicroStrategy has now spent around $4.68 billion buying Bitcoin.

MicroStrategy notably bought 12,333 BTC for $347 million in June, at an average price of $29,668 per coin as it keeps on accumulating.

Bitwise Pushes Back Against SEC’s Bitcoin ETF Denials

Digital asset management firm Bitwise has filed an amendment to its spot Bitcoin exchange-traded fund (ETF) application, underlining arguments that it believes directly challenge the regulatory reasons cited for withholding the product from US investors.

At the heart of the firm's argument is the assertion that the CME Bitcoin futures market has an overarching influence on Bitcoin's spot pricing, potentially classifying it as a “regulated market of significant size,” for market surveillance purposes. Bitwise stands alongside nearly ten other firms, all aspiring to introduce a spot Bitcoin ETF within the US. The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has so far rejected every spot Bitcoin ETF application it received.

The regulator’s main argument is that the CME Bitcoin Futures market isn’t large or regulated enough to Bitcoin’s spot market to counteract potential manipulative actors within the exchange.

Bitwise, however, claims that the futures market is far more instrumental in determining Bitcoin's pricing than the SEC believes. A Bitwise study from 2021 found that between 52.97% and 68.03% of Bitcoin price discovery was attributable to CME futures.

Crypto Exchange HTX Hacked for Nearly $8 Million in ETH

According to Justin Sun, an advisor to HTX, the cryptocurrency trading platform was hacked and lost 5,000 ETH, worth $7.9 million, in the incident. In a post on social media, Sun clarified “HTX has fully covered the losses incurred from the attack.”

Sun detailed that the stolen Ether represents “a relatively small sum in comparison to the $3 billion worth of assets held by our users,” and said that the amount of stolen funds amounts to two weeks worth of revenue for HTX. He wrote that exchange took action to prevent further losses, and added:

"As a result, all funds are secure, and trading operations have continued as usual. We promptly addressed and resolved all issues, restoring the platform to its normal state without delay."

The exchange has offered to give the hacker a $400,000 bug bounty to return the stolen funds, with Sun adding that it would hire the hacker as a security white hat advisor if they took the deal.

HTX was hacked less than two weeks after the ten-year-old exchange rebranded from Huobi to it in a bid to help boost user adoption as it seeks more licenses in different jurisdictions.

Stablecoin Trading Volumes Surge in August, But Remains Subdued

In August there was a 10.9% surge in stablecoin trading volumes, reaching $462 billion. Despite the increase, centralized exchanges continue to see subdue trading activity, underscoring the impact of the stablecoin sector’s drawdown over the last 18 months.

As of September 18th, the trading volumes are pacing to mirror August's figures, with only $174 billion traded.

USDT trading volumes on centralized exchanges dropped by 5.8%, to $292 billion in August. USDT’s market share, in terms of trading volume, currently stands at 64.5%.

Dig deeper into the stablecoin sector through CCData’s latest Stablecoins & CBDCs report.

State of the Crypto by Top Tier Exchange Volume

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