Europe

ATHDAOx: Building the future of Web3 in physical-digital with DAOs

The DAO-centric event took place in Athens, Greece over two days and focused on everything from governance and legal issues to community building and security.

ATHDAOx, an event in the tradition of the Solana Hacker House, took place on Dec. 9 and 10 in Athens, Greece to discuss all things decentralized autonomous organization (DAO).

From governance and legalities to community building and security, the event brought together the local DAO-focused community in Greece and abroad.

Cointelegraph was on the ground for the event and spoke with one of the event’s founders, Dimitris — aka Takisoul — about his experience building a physical space to discuss digital communities.

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CZ must stay, Do Kwon to be extradited: Law Decoded

A Seattle district court ruled out CZ’s departure to the UAE, and the Montenegrin justice minister plans to grant the United States request for Do Kwon’s extradition.

Binance founder Changpeng “CZ” Zhao has been ordered to stay in the United States until his sentencing in February 2024, with a federal judge determining there’s too much of a flight risk if the former exchange CEO is allowed to return to the United Arab Emirates. Seattle district court Judge Richard Jones wrote in his order:

“The defendant has enormous wealth and property abroad, and no ties to the United States […] His family resides in the UAE and it appears that he has favored status in the UAE. Under these circumstances, the Court finds that the defendant has not established by clear and convincing evidence that he is not likely to flee if he returns to the UAE.”

Jones accepted Zhao’s guilty plea to one count of Bank Secrecy Act violations, which the Binance founder submitted over two weeks ago on Nov. 21 alongside a $4.3 billion settlement with U.S. agencies. Now, the ex-CEO of Binance faces up to 18 months in prison.

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French startup Mistral AI closes $415M funding round

The French artificial intelligence startup Mistral AI closed a funding round worth around $415 million as it strives to be the EU’s rival to OpenAI.

French artificial intelligence (AI) startup Mistral AI has announced it raised €385 million ($415 million) in its latest funding round to develop its technology and open-source software.

Andreessen Horowitz and the company’s initial backers, Lightspeed Ventures, led the round, which closed on Dec. 11. This follows a previous funding round in June where Mistral raised $113 million in seed funding. The company is currently valued at around $2 billion.

Mistral AI focuses on open-source technology for generative AI tools, chatbot development and customizable features. It aims to make its products available to the general public in early 2024.

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Blockchain is fueling this emerging tech hub in Portugal: Madeira Blockchain 2023

The Madeira Blockchain Conference 2023 showcased startups exploring blockchain solutions for real-world problems across different industries.

The Madeira archipelago in Portugal is witnessing the birth of a startup hub focused on emerging technologies, such as blockchain and artificial intelligence.

Rogerio Gouveia, finance secretary of Madeira’s regional government, says the technology sector represents approximately 30% of the island’s businesses – a considerable increase for a traditionally tourism-driven economy.

The local tech community is behind the Madeira Blockchain Conference, a two-day event to promote startup networking and discussions about how blockchain can be used to solve real-world problems.

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EU officials reach ‘historic’ AI regulation deal

The agreement mandates models like ChatGPT and general AI to follow transparency rules before market entry.

The European Parliament and Council negotiators reached a provisional agreement on the rules governing the use of artificial intelligence (AI) on Friday, Dec 8.

The agreement covers the governmental use of AI in biometric surveillance, how to regulate AI systems such as ChatGPT, and the transparency rules to follow before market entry. This covers technical documents, adherence to European Union copyright and sharing training content summaries. 

The EU wants to be the first supranational authority with laws on AI, specifying how it is to be used beneficially while protecting against risks. The deal was struck following a nearly 24-hour debate on Dec. 8 and 15 hours of negotiations after that.

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Robinhood launches crypto trading services in Europe

All eligible customers in the EU region can access Robinhood for crypto trading services, with over 25 cryptocurrencies available for trade.

Trading and brokerage firm Robinhood announced the launch of its crypto services for all eligible European Union customers on Dec. 7. The platform will allow traders to buy and sell over 25 cryptocurrencies.

Robinhood’s entry into the European crypto market comes just a week after the firm launched its stock trading application in the United Kingdom.

Cointelegraph contacted Oliver McIntosh, senior product communications manager at Robinhood, to understand the firm’s crypto focus and expansion plans in Europe. Mcintosh said that the EU is the right market to anchor our international expansion plans, and Robinhood “welcomes the approach that the EU has taken in creating the world’s first comprehensive regime for crypto assets via the Market in Crypto-Assets Regulation (MiCA).”

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France’s 3rd-largest bank, Société Générale, launches euro-pegged stablecoin

The euro-pegged stablecoin will be the first of its kind in the region and will be available to the bank’s customer base for trading use.

Société Générale, France’s third-largest bank, has debuted its native euro-pegged stablecoin, making it one of the first European banking giants to venture into the stablecoin market.

The EUR CoinVertible (EURCV) stablecoin will debut on the Luxembourg-based Bitstamp crypto exchange, the Financial Times reported. EURCV will be fully backed by the euro, allowing bank customers to participate in the digital asset market. The asset will be available to a broad customer base and can be used for trading.

Jean-Marc Stenger, the CEO of Société Générale Forge, stated that the new stablecoin highlights the bank’s role in the evolving crypto domain and stressed the necessity for a stablecoin denominated in euro.

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How generative AI allows one architect to reimagine ancient cities

Cointelegraph spoke with architect and designer Tina Marinaki about her work using generative AI and text-to-image prompts to reimagine the ancient Athenian cityscape.

The emergence of generative artificial intelligence (AI) has presented modern society with new means for understanding and visualizing the world.

Meta, the parent company of social media platforms Facebook and Instagram, recently introduced new AI video and image-generating tools for creators, while OpenAI updated the premium version of its popular AI model ChatGPT to include powerful text-to-image generating capabilities. 

As the pace of AI development continues to accelerate rapidly, many artists are faced with the challenge of embracing the new tools as a part of their workflow while still managing to keep their unique vision. 

One such artist is the New York-based Greek architect Tina Marinaki, who has incorporated AI tools into her creative work and, in the process, created an online community of nearly 20,000 users on Instagram through “Athens Surreal,” which follows her reimagination of the ancient Athenian cityscape.

Cointelegraph spoke with Marinaki about incorporating AI into her work and how she reenvisions her home city using emerging technology.

She explained that the concept of Athens Surreal stemmed from the desire to understand “the way the different AI tools work” while testing ideas for a “different, sometimes romantic, sometimes utopian, futuristic Athens.”

Technical difficulties 

According to Marinaki, one of the primary difficulties working with text-to-image AI systems is “translating” an image description to communicate a vision with the AI systems.

“Other challenges are found in algorithmic ethnicity, gender or other biases when algorithms are trained using biased data.”

For example, she reported that a greater number of men can appear in AI-generated images even when a user’s parameters have no mention of gender, and in some cases, AI can create “racist or stereotypical images.”

Despite its biases in text-to-image generation, these weaknesses can lead to strengths if trained correctly.

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Crypto payment firm Alchemy Pay adds SEPA deposits in Europe

Alchemy Pay has introduced new deposit options, including the euro Instant solution, SEPA Instant, and the U.K. fast money transfer option, Faster Payments.

Cryptocurrency payment platform Alchemy Pay is scaling its payment options by integrating new on-ramps — new ways to buy crypto — in Europe and the United Kingdom.

Alchemy Pay has introduced new deposit options, including the euro instant solution, Single Euro Payments Area (SEPA) Instant, and the U.K.

Announcing the news on Nov. 29, Alchemy Pay stated that the new payment options aim to simplify purchasing cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin (BTC), enabling transfers to be processed in “seconds to a few minutes.”

With SEPA Instant, European Alchemy Pay customers can buy up to 5,000 euros ($5,460) in cryptocurrency, while Faster Payments has a transfer limit of up to 5,000 British pounds ($6,320).

Europe’s SEPA Instant payments and Faster Payments in the U.K.

“This move further amplifies Alchemy Pay’s payment network throughout Europe, surpassing emerging markets and broadening its influence,” the announcement states.

Related: SoFi Technologies to cease crypto services by Dec. 19

According to the announcement, Alchemy Pay currently supports 300 fiat payment channels across 173 countries, mainly in Southeast Asia. The platform is actively expanding its payment service worldwide, adding new licenses in the United States recently, including the states of Iowa and Arkansas.

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What’s next for EU’s crypto industry as European Parliament passes MiCA?

What is the potential impact of MiCA on the EU crypto and blockchain market, and what other regulations can be expected for this rapidly evolving industry?

On April 20, the European Parliament voted to pass the Markets in Crypto-Assets (MiCA) regulation, the European Union’s main legislative proposal to oversee the crypto industry in its member countries. 

The MiCA regulation is a significant development for the crypto industry in the European Union. Prior to MiCA, crypto companies had to comply with 27 different regulatory frameworks across the EU member states, with Germany or France being costly and burdensome, for example.

Under MiCA, however, EU-wide regulations will apply, allowing companies to operate throughout the entire EU crypto market with a MiCA license granted in one country. This will increase the competitiveness of EU startups and may result in them gaining market share from unregulated competitors.

MiCA will increase the EU’s competitiveness

Moreover, MiCA could encourage more institutional adoption and activity in the EU crypto and blockchain market. Patrick Hansen, director of EU strategy and policy at stablecoin issuer Circle, told Cointelegraph that MiCA will enable European crypto firms to scale and grow faster, allowing licensed companies to offer their services throughout the world’s largest single market, with roughly 450 million people:

“The legal clarity will also foster innovation amongst financial institutions that have been previously hesitant to launch products and services due to regulatory uncertainty. Additionally, as MiCA is the first comprehensive regulatory framework for crypto assets from a major jurisdiction in the world, it is likely to attract considerable foreign capital and talent to the region.”

For Moritz Schildt, a board member of the Hanseatic Blockchain Institute and the German Blockchain Association, the biggest advantage of MiCA is that “it will come into force already this year,” giving the EU a chance to provide a unified regulatory framework for crypto assets and related providers.

Magazine: Here’s how Ethereum’s ZK-rollups can become interoperable

Creating a regulatory framework for a technology that sees new developments and outgrowths practically every month and evolves as dynamically as the tokenization of investment opportunities is “very challenging.”

“It should come as no surprise, therefore, that some regulations are not yet optimal and that questions about concrete applications remain unanswered,” Schildt said, adding that with MiCA, Europe has the opportunity to position itself “as a location for innovation and quality.”

Unregulated companies out of the EU crypto market

Peter Grosskopf, co-founder of decentralized finance (DeFi) project Unstoppable Finance, is also convinced that MiCA will benefit the EU crypto and blockchain market. First, companies from outside Europe will have to register with a company in the EU, so there is a “direct impact on job creation and tax payments.”

Second, many jurisdictions take an overly strict approach to regulating crypto. For example, “the U.S. does regulation by enforcement.” Compared with other regions, the EU will become “a safe space for the industry as a whole, and innovators from around the world will start to build their businesses here,” Grosskopf said.

Stefan Berger also noted that the United States is currently cracking down on the crypto sector. According to the German politician and European Union Parliament rapporteur for MiCA, the European crypto asset industry has regulatory clarity that the United States doesn’t, and it would be wise for U.S. lawmakers to take a cue from MiCA:

“For me, the biggest advantage is that we create trust, which is a crucial booster, especially for young technologies like blockchain. I expect regulation to become a global standard-setter over time. A global MiCA would be desirable at some point.”

NFT regulation unavoidable

Through MiCA, European policymakers are trying to create a reliable framework that builds trust through legal certainty. This includes a uniform classification of assets and the requirement for coin issuers to provide a white paper that discloses all relevant information about the coins, such as their energy consumption and environmental impact.

In addition, MiCA will ensure that every new token is reviewed for approval to check that the business model does not threaten the stability of the cryptocurrency, which creates more transparency for investors.

But the crypto and blockchain sector is constantly evolving. “Tokenization is not hype and will become an integral part of our lives and financial world,” said Berger. More and more business models are emerging based on nonfungible tokens (NFTs), for example, which have been largely exempt from MiCA. (The new regulation will only address crypto-asset service providers that offer services for NFTs).

But according to Berger, NFTs are next on the docket, with European lawmakers looking at what type of regulation would benefit the industry and consumers.

Schildt also expects further regulations on NFTs relatively soon. “We should reconsider the traditional classification of investment products.” According to the expert, in the future, investments “that were previously considered ‘art collections,’ we will also qualify as capital investments.”

DeFi is a hot topic in European policy making

Some aspects of MiCA have yet to be defined through upcoming technical standards and guidelines.

For example, what are the specific liquidity requirements for electronic money token reserves? EU regulators will develop these standards over the next 12 to 18 months, and “the practical success of MiCA will largely depend on this implementation work — also referred to as Level 2 legislation,” Circle’s Hansen said.

Hansen further noted that, beyond MiCA, EU institutions are finalizing a new Anti-Money Laundering (AML) rulebook that will be “critical for crypto firms.”

Another critical review is that of PSD2, the EU’s main payments directive, which will also significantly impact crypto firms.

And finally, in about 18 months, the European Commission will publish a detailed report on DeFi and may take further legislative steps to regulate the space. “Brussels prides itself on being a global regulatory leader, and MiCA is just the first of many steps to come,” said Hansen.

Unstoppable Finance’s Grosskopf also expects DeFi regulation to become a hot topic following the next round of elections in Europe, as MiCA will not apply to “crypto-asset services provided in a fully decentralised manner without any intermediary.”

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“I think it’s important to be proactive and start thinking about how to regulate DeFi as early as possible in order to influence the process,” he said, stating that the new AML regulation is currently under discussion and will most likely become a reality before MiCA.

Although it’s still unclear exactly how European lawmakers will regulate NFT and DeFi or whether there will be new requirements regarding smart contracts, the success of the first step toward regulation — MiCA — could provide a significant boost to both EU crypto businesses and the EU economy as a whole. However, whether this success is realized will depend on the practical implementation standards developed in the future.