Top News in Asia from Tuesday to Today

China Leads the World in Google Searches for Facebook’s Libra. http://bit.ly/2JEWjO8

Japan’s government is leading a global push to set up an international network for cryptocurrency payments, similar to the SWIFT network used by banks, in an effort to fight money laundering. https://reut.rs/2GjlYtJ

U.S. Regulator Probing Crypto Exchange BitMEX Over Client Trades. https://bloom.bg/2xTHPmX

Libra’s Perceived Threat Towards the Chinese Renminbi. http://bit.ly/2Z0js30

Binance is starting to participate in staking, starting with Stellar, to airdrop 9 million Stellar, now offers staking rewards. http://bit.ly/2GhcjE2. Somewhat relatedly, checkout our recent piece on The Rising Trend of Exchanges Participating as EOS BPs

GCR Workshop takeaways with Awa Sun Yin, co-founder of Cryptium Labs on PoS variants and East and West developer community. Awa highlights the active projects in Asia and also how its increasingly difficult for projects as some jurisdiction will start comparing incoming protocols with existing popular ones 

Op-Ed: What to do when you are a crypto business in a prolonged market full of retail investors. http://bit.ly/2Z39pdu

Investments

Singapore-based market maker Altonomy Raises $7M in Funding Round Led by Polychain Capital. http://bit.ly/2YbcU4o

A startup founded by the Russian Waves platform team, Vostok, has been sold to one of the project’s earliest investors. http://bit.ly/2Gl2dSF

Venture funding in blockchain tumbled 60% this year– >Smart Money Said ‘Skip Bitcoin, Bet on Blockchain.’ Not Any More. https://bloom.bg/2YZe0gX

₿ Coins and Mining


Binance Jersey has started offering a British pound-backed Binance called GBP Stablecoin (BGBP). http://bit.ly/2JDxi65

Top-5 Crypto Tokens Pronounced ‘Dead’ — NEM and BCC Head the List http://bit.ly/2YclgIX

Circle CEO is joining Justin Sun’s meal with Warren Buffet. http://bit.ly/2xZz8Yc

Crypto wallet Renrenbit, that raised pre-sale LEO tokens will be one of the first to support storage & management of CKBytes,  the native token of the Nervos Network. http://bit.ly/2Z0x662

GCR interviews David Lee, Professor of Singapore University of Social Sciences On Libra. http://bit.ly/2xXFMyg

 Events coming up in Asia

GCR is providing complimentary tickets to Shanghai International Blockchain Week is set to be on 16th Sep. to Sep.18th. We have partnered up with the team to bring premium subscribers complimentary tickets to the conference, while supplies last. http://bit.ly/2NSdvEm

GCR is providing complimentary tickets are available to KryptoSeoul for BUIDL 2019 on July 22nd and 23rd, a technical and business forum held at Novotel Ambassador Gangnam. We have partnered up with the team to bring premium subscribers complimentary tickets to the conference, while supplies last.

  Exchange News

Binance Labs announced the third run of the Binance Labs Incubation Program.

Japan’s Exchange Bitpoint Hack Shows That Regulators’ Scrutiny Does Not Equal Safety: http://bit.ly/2GhYZzm

Exchange Huobi is upgrading its current HUSD solution, transitioning it from a stablecoin basket to a new, ERC-20, USD-pegged stablecoin, HUSD Token.https://prn.to/2GjbP0i

Bitpoint Reveals Amounts Stolen, Pledging to Reimburse Users in Crypto: http://bit.ly/2M47vWx

🧳 Business
 

Underground Bitcoin Business in China: $10k for Creating a Cryptocurrency and run a Ponzi scheme. http://bit.ly/2XTl9hi

Tencent Security report that they monitored a Virus-ransomware named Ryuk encrypts data on an infected device and demands a ransom in bitcoin. The ransom is generally very high (recent ransom reached 11 Bitcoins, worth about 750,000 yuan). http://bit.ly/2LTLfOW

U.K. Releases economic crime action plan, which details regulatory action on cryptocurrencies to prevent their use in criminal activities. http://bit.ly/2M0Edbh

Nearly 70% of polled companies by E&Y in Asia-Pacific don’t trust blockchain technology because they are still grappling to understand how reliable it is. Over two-thirds of enterprises also lack a solid understanding of blockchain tech and how to apply it.http://bit.ly/2SnfAqe

⚖ Regulations

The Hangzhou Internet Court pointed out that “virtual property” attribute of Bitcoin, recognized it as a virtual property with value. http://bit.ly/2xSMA0e

Taiwan is the new home for Hong Kongers seeking political safety. http://bit.ly/2y2hQK1

Municipal -Crypto is Spreading Around the World, in areas such as Berkeley, California, to Busan, Korea http://bit.ly/2Y5M5P9

Thailand economist: Libra is not just about Facebook, it is about the US’s continued domination of the world financial market. http://bit.ly/2XY2dxV

Thailand SEC says it’s stablecoin won’t be employed as a fundraising tool, instead of as an e-payment medium for clearing and settlement and not a fundraising tool. http://bit.ly/2Z99kEY