XRP

PwC Venezuela Twitter account hacked, attacker shills fake XRP giveaway

An attacker gained access to PwC Venezuela’s Twitter account and has been actively posting cryptocurrency phishing links for the last eight hours at the time of the writing.

The official Twitter account of Big Four accounting firm PwC Venezuela, was compromised and has been used by the hacker to share links to fraudulent Ripple (XRP) token giveaways.

An attacker gained access to PwC Venezuela’s Twitter account and has been actively posting cryptocurrency phishing links for the last eight hours at the time of the writing. Considering that all the tweets posted by the hacker remain active, it is evident that PwC officials have yet to realize the compromise.

Investors clicking on the links remain at risk of being defrauded by the hacker. If not mitigated promptly, the threat may be catastrophic, considering that PwC Veleneula’s Twitter currently boasts over 37,000 followers.

Cointelegraph has reached out to PwC Venezuela to inform them about the hack. PwC Venezuela has not yet responded to Cointelegraph’s request for comment.

Related: Elon Musk-crypto video played on S. Korean govt’s hacked YouTube channel

BlueBenx, a Brazilian crypto lending platform, recently blocked 22,000 users from withdrawing funds following an alleged hack that drained $32 million, or 160 million Brazilian real.

Regarding the hack, an unnamed investor told Portal do Bitcoin:

“I think there’s a high probability of it being a scam because this whole hacker attack story seems like a lot of bullshit, something they invented.”

The statement reflects a general lack of trust among investors in centralized crypto exchanges.

Ripple’s plan to tokenize Colombian land stalls amid new administration

A joint effort to permanently store and authenticate Colombian property titles on the XRP Ledger looks set to stall as the new government focuses on other priorities.

A partnership between the Colombian government and Ripple Labs to put land titles on the blockchain appears to have stalled following the project being “deprioritized” by the new administration.

The project was initially announced by the outgoing government’s Ministry of Information Technology and Communications just two weeks before the newly elected president Gustavo Petro was sworn into office.

According to an Aug. 30 report from Forbes, the interim director of the National Lands Agency Juan Manuel Noruega Martínez said the project is not part of the agency’s strategic priorities for 2022, stating: 

“This isn’t one of the projects defined in the PETI [Strategic Plan for Information Technologies]”

The shift comes as something of a surprise considering Colombia’s new president is thought to be friendly toward cryptocurrencies, and has previously tweeted his support for them.

The partnership, which included Colombia’s National Land Agency, Ripple, and software development firm Peersyst Technology aimed to tokenize real estate on the blockchain to improve property search processes, create transparent and cheaper property title management, and more efficient processing of financing and payments.

Within the peace agreement in 2016 that officially marked the end of the Colombian conflict was a directive to formalize the property titles for small and medium rural properties. According to a 2013 report, only one of every two small farmers has formal rights to their land.

This lack of formality deters farmers from investing in lands and prevents land from being used as collateral when seeking credit. A blockchain ledger for real estate aimed to solve this by providing landowners with security and an incentive to invest in their property.

Related: Real estate leads securitized blockchain assets in 2022 — Report

The registry was launched on Jul. 1 as tweeted by Peersyst Technology, after having been in development for a year.

On Jul. 30, Peersyst tweeted that the first deed had been added to the ledger, with the land certificate looking like any other except for the QR code incorporated into it verifying the certificate on the blockchain. The QR code can be used by anyone to find the property deed’s location on the XRP blockchain.

There have been no further updates relating to the joint project. Cointelegraph has contacted Ripple Labs seeking comment on any progress but has not heard an immediate response. 

Ripple’s plan to tokenize Colombian land stalls amid new administration

A joint effort to permanently store and authenticate Colombian property titles on the XRP Ledger looks set to stall as the new government focuses on other priorities.

A partnership between the Colombian government and Ripple Labs to put land titles on the blockchain appears to have stalled following the project being “deprioritized” by the new administration.

The project was initially announced by the outgoing government’s Ministry of Information Technology and Communications just two weeks before the newly elected president Gustavo Petro was sworn into office.

According to a Wednesday report from Forbes, the interim director of the National Lands Agency, Juan Manuel Noruega Martínez, said the project is not part of the agency’s strategic priorities for 2022, stating: 

“This isn’t one of the projects defined in the PETI [Strategic Plan for Information Technologies]”

The shift comes as something of a surprise, considering Colombia’s new president is thought to be friendly toward cryptocurrencies and has previously tweeted his support for them.

The partnership, which included Colombia’s National Land Agency, Ripple and software development firm Peersyst Technology, aimed to tokenize real estate on the blockchain to improve property search processes, create transparent and cheaper property title management and more efficient processing of financing and payments.

Within the peace agreement in 2016 that officially marked the end of the Colombian conflict was a directive to formalize the property titles for small and medium rural properties. According to a 2013 report, only one of every two small farmers has formal rights to their land.

This lack of formality deters farmers from investing in lands and prevents land from being used as collateral when seeking credit. A blockchain ledger for real estate aimed to solve this by providing landowners with security and an incentive to invest in their property.

Related: Real estate leads securitized blockchain assets in 2022 — Report

The registry was launched on July 1, as tweeted by Peersyst Technology, after having been in development for a year.

On July 30, Peersyst tweeted that the first deed had been added to the ledger, with the land certificate looking like any other except for the QR code incorporated into it verifying the certificate on the blockchain. The QR code can be used by anyone to find the property deed’s location on the XRP blockchain.

There have been no further updates relating to the joint project. Cointelegraph has contacted Ripple Labs seeking comment on any progress but has not heard an immediate response. 

Ripple CEO comments on Crypto Leaks, denies funding law firm to target others

Kyle Roche allegedly approached Ripple’s CEO to invest in a law firm that would target competitor firms with lawsuits like those Ripple was facing in the United States.

Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse took to Twitter to deny recent explosive claims made by Crypto Leaks, an online publication focusing on corruption and fraud-related news in the crypto ecosystem.

Crypto Leaks published a report on Friday containing a series of short videos from an unknown source. The report claimed that Ava Labs formed a secret pact with the law firm to use the American legal system “gangster style” to “attack and harm crypto organizations.”

The same report also alleged that Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse funded a law firm to target competitor firms. The report claimed Roche, who founded Roche Freedman, was working with Boies Schiller Flexner, a firm that was representing Ripple in its lawsuit against the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).

Roche allegedly approached Garlinghouse to invest in a law firm that would target competitor crypto firms with lawsuits quite similar to what Ripple was facing at the time. And Kyle claimed that Garlinhouse agreed to his proposal.

“For whatever reasons Brad Garlinghouse invested in Kyle Roche and supported him on his current path, it certainly didn’t save him from the SEC.”

ThRipple CEO took to Twitter to deny any such allegations and claimed that he has “never met or spoken to (much less invested in) Kyle Roche. “

Crypto Leaks’ recent slew of allegations against Ava Labs and Brad Garlinghouse created quite a buzz in the crypto industry as both the CEOs of the firm have denied any allegiance to Kyle Roche and his law firm.

Related: Ripple CTO lashes back at Vitalik Buterin for his dig at XRP

Ripple and the XRP community were quick to come to the defense of the company’s CEO, where one user pointed toward the flaw in the argument put forward by Crypto Leaks. The user wrote  the claims were based on Kyle’s comments, which were later presented as facts without proof.

While Garlinghouse denied investing in a law firm that targets competitors, Ripple’s co-founder and executive chairman Chris Larsen was infamously involved in the campaign to change the code of Bitcoin.

XRP price pumps and dumps amid mysterious $51M whale transfers — What’s next?

XRP risks declining further in the coming weeks despite its eye-grabbing intraday price moves.

XRP price saw a major spike on Aug. 26, hinting at a possible effect from some big traders.

Large XRP transfers, Ripple Swell Global event

Notably, XRP’s price jumped 6% to $0.37, a two-week high, during the early London hours. The token’s upside move occurred hours after its network processed three massive transfers worth $51 million involving crypto exchanges Bitso and FTX, as highlighted by Whale Alert.

XRP/USD hourly price chart. Source: TradingView

XRP’s gains also came as a part of a broader upside move that started on Aug. 25, a day after Ripple announced its flagship event, “Ripple Swell Global,” to be held in London in November 2022. The market has seen similar reactions to the Swell event in the past.

Bearish reversal setup in play

XRP’s intraday spike left behind a “Graveyard Doji,” a bearish reversal candlestick with open, close and low prices near each other with a long upper wick. This candlestick suggests that the price rally witnessed at the beginning of the session was overwhelmed by bears by the end of it.

XRP/USD four-hour price chart. Source: TradingView

XRP now trades nearly 4% below its intraday high, testing a support confluence. The confluence comprises the upper trendline of XRP’s previous “ascending triangle” (at $0.35) and the 50-4H exponential moving average (50-4H EMA; the red wave in the chart above) near $0.343.

From a technical perspective, a break below the support confluence risks re-triggering the ascending triangle setup, with its profit target at around $0.33. In other words, a 7% price decline by September when measured from Aug. 26’s price.

Related: Ripple CTO lashes back at Vitalik Buterin for his dig at XRP

Conversely, a rebound after testing the support confluence could have XRP eye a recovery rally toward the $0.36–$0.38 range (marked in red in the chart above). This area served as XRP’s consolidation range in recent months.

The views and opinions expressed here are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of Cointelegraph.com. Every investment and trading move involves risk, you should conduct your own research when making a decision.

Ripple CTO lashes back at Vitalik Buterin for his dig at XRP

David Schwartz compared crypto miners in the Ethereum and Bitcoin ecosystems to shareholders of eBay, which he believes makes BTC and ETH securities as well.

In a discussion that started around two Ontario crypto exchanges’ recent 30,000-Canadian-dollar limit on altcoins purchases — which excluded Ether (ETH), Litecoin (LTC) and Bitcoin Cash (BCH) — Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin took a dig at XRP, which Ripple chief technology officer David Schwartz didn’t take very kindly.

Buterin, in a response to a tweet, lauded the Ethereum community’s pushback against regulations that privilege ETH over other cryptocurrencies. David Hoffman, founder of decentralized media and education platform Bankless, responded to Buterin and said he wouldn’t have minded if they had restricted XRP.

Buterin joined in on the XRP bashing, claiming, “They already lost their right to protection when they tried to throw us under the bus as ‘China-controlled.’” The response from Buterin created a storm among XRP followers on Twitter, and the debate was later joined by Schwartz himself.

Buterin was referring to Ripple’s defense in its ongoing court battle with the United States Securities and Exchange Commission, in which it claimed XRP shouldn’t be deemed as security since Ether and Bitcoin (BTC) are similar in nature, and it even called the top two cryptocurrencies Chinese-controlled. Ripple is currently fighting a lawsuit from the SEC over the alleged unlicensed sale and issuance of XRP tokens.

Schwartz reiterated Ripple’s earlier claims that ETH and BTC are securities and compared miners in the ecosystem to shareholders of eBay. He said:

“I do think it’s perfectly fair to analogize miners in PoW systems to stockholders in companies. Just as eBay’s stockholders earn from the residual friction between buyers and sellers that eBay does not remove, so do miners in ETH and BTC.”

Schwartz concluded his tweet with a question to Buterin, asking him whether the government or the market should settle the security debate.

Ether’s potential status as a security has become a hot topic during the ongoing lawsuit proceedings, with Ripple claiming that the SEC has a clear bias against them and favors Ethereum. In an interview in 2021, Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse contended that the SEC helped ETH overtake XRP as the No. 2 cryptocurrency.

Related: Alchemy and Infura block access to Tornado Cash as Vitalik Buterin weighs in on debate

Whether cryptocurrencies are securities has been a longstanding debate due to a lack of regulatory guidelines. The majority of regulators around the globe consider Bitcoin an asset, while there is still an ongoing debate over the status of ETH due to its pre-mine and initial coin offering.

Three-quarters of institutions to use crypto in the three years: Ripple

Ripple’s new Value Report on enterprise crypto and blockchain highlights NFT, blockchain and CBDC utility in business settings.

A whopping 76% of surveyed financial institutions plan on using crypto within the next three years, according to the report. Ripple’s new report highlights trends in the adoption and utilization of emerging technologies like crypto and blockchain in enterprise and financial institutions. 

Both financial institutions and enterprises are understanding the benefits of internal crypto usage. The most common reason is that crypto gives more people access to more financial services, says 42% of financial institutions and 41% of enterprises.

According to the survey, portfolio management and payments come forward as the most valuable additions to the enterprise world. Portfolio management is detailed as hedging against inflation, hedging against other asset types and asset appreciation. Participants said data security and quality are two major benefits of blockchain and crypto usage for payments.

Related: A mandate for blockchain businesses is to rebuild global trust

Nonetheless, as this is an emerging technology, adoption is still an uphill battle for large institutions. According to the report, enterprises and financial institutions both find that a general lack of understanding is one of the biggest challenges. 

However, the report also stressed that the slow-moving process of regulations surrounding the industry stirs up hesitation from potential users. Regulations from countries across the globe have been in constant flux as officials rush to keep up with the fast-paced crypto scene.

Recently, regulators in the United States came under scrutiny from the U.S. Congress for their “non-judicial actions” against crypto companies. The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) is in the throes of implementing effective crypto regulations for one of the industry’s most active regions.

Related: Tech trade group calls for regulatory clarity, claiming crypto job losses threaten US interests

Despite setbacks in crypto-ed and murky regulations, the report still reveals the active interest of global institutions and central bank digital currencies (CBDCs). 34% of surveyed institutions say CBDCs will help with the “acceleration of digitization of finance” and give “greater access to credit for consumers and businesses.”

From a global perspective, the report analyzed regional nonfungible token (NFT) interest based on emotional vs. functional benefits. Respondents in the Asia-Pacific region were three times more likely to purchase an NFT for sentimental or emotional reasons compared to other reasons. Of the eight NFT genres listed, 55% said music-related NFTs are of the most interest. 

Sustainability was also assessed, as it remains a hot topic both in and outside of the industry. According to Ripple’s data, over 75% of surveyed consumers prefer to buy sustainable cryptocurrencies. More than 20% claim they would only purchase “sustainable” crypto. 

FOMO Pay taps Ripple’s liquidity solution for treasury management

Ripple has continued to see adoption for its remittance technology from private institutions despite the ongoing lawsuit in the United States.

Singapore-based institutional digital payment solution provider FOMO Pay has become the latest fintech firm to integrate Ripple’s liquidity solution called on-demand liquidity (ODL).

FOMO Pay would use the popular crypto enterprise technology to improve its cross-border treasury settlements. Earlier, the firm used the traditional payment system for cross-border settlement of euro and United States dollar trades, which took up to two days. However, with ODL integration, the firm aims to achieve an instant settlement with very low transaction costs.

Louis Liu, founder and CEO of FOMO Pay said:

“We are excited to partner with Ripple to leverage On-Demand Liquidity for treasury management, which allows us to achieve affordable and instant settlement in EUR and USD globally.”

Ripple’s ODL service has gained a lot of popularity in the private banking and payment sector. The enterprise solution uses Ripple (XRP) as a bridge between two currencies, eliminating pre-funding of destination accounts and reducing operational costs. The tech has proven a great success in Asia, where cross-border transactions are among the highest.

Ripple didn’t respond to requests for comments from Cointelegraph at the time of publishing.

Ripple aims to make headway in the treasury settlement market that sees over $3.5 billion in annual expenditure to manage liquidity crises. With ODL, liquidity is always available in the form of XRP.

Related: After 8 years dumping billions of XRP, Jed McCaleb’s stack runs out in weeks

Japan’s SBI Remi integrated the ODL solution to transfer money from Japan to the Philippines last year. Some other major firms that have integrated Ripple ODL services include Pyypl, Novatti, Tranglo, iRemit, FlashFX and Azimo.

Ripple’s payment technology has been key to its success despite the long-running lawsuit in the U.S over the unregistered sale of XRP. In the latest development of the case, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) attempted to block XRP holders from aiding in Ripple’s defense and prohibit attorney John E. Deaton from any further participation in proceedings.

The key executives of Ripple, including CEO Brad Garlighouse, have maintained that they are confident of a positive outcome of the lawsuit. However, the blockchain firm has seen a great demand and adoption for its crypto-based cross-border remittance and liquidity solution.