China Financial News

Bitcoin (BTC) starts a new week on a tentatively stronger footing as macro cues curiously stabilize.

BEIJING — As some parts of China reopen, others are imposing new Covid-related restrictions, reflecting the challenge government officials face in controlling the worst outbreak since early 2020.

In the years preceding its invasion of Ukraine, Russia set out to sanction-proof its economy by developing local substitutes for key foreign products, such as microprocessors. The only problem: Since it lacks advanced semiconductor fabrication capacity, production of these Russian-designed chips was outsourced, mainly to Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. After the invasion of Ukraine, Taiwan joined the U.S. in banning the export of sensitive technology to Russia. TSMC immediately promised to comply.

Progress has often been met with resistance, even when it comes to technology. The same can be said about blockchain and cryptos, with the SEC v. Ripple case a perfect illustration for some. The defendants in this lawsuit are among those who believe that the United States’ management of this asset class is pulling it back.

The Russian army said on Saturday that it fired hypersonic missiles in Ukraine, the first known use of the new weapon system in a combat environment.

Bitcoin (BTC) has been trapped in a symmetrical triangle for 56 days and the trend change could last until early May, according to price technicals.

BlackRock has put its overweight outlook on Chinese assets “under review”, with soaring Covid cases and mounting concerns about Beijing’s ties to Russia prompting the world's biggest asset manager to reconsider its view on the world's second largest economy.

A senior Russian parliamentarian has claimed that the Central Bank is working with the People’s Bank of China on workarounds that may help the countries bypass the SWIFT banking network – including domestic alternatives, blockchain solutions, and digital fiats.

Louis-Vincent Gave, co-founder of Gavekal Research, has been warning investors about a paradigm shift in the world order. Specifically, Gave says the assumptions underpinning financial assets need to be rethought due to a move toward a multipolar world and away from one dominated by the US and the dollar. His message seems especially germane now, given Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the West’s dramatic sanctions, and China’s attempts to support Russia without jeopardising its economic ties with the West.

If Sherlock Holmes ever decided to solve a mystery within the crypto community, his first one might be the curious case of PlanB and the $100k Christmas of 2021 that never came. Now, as the first quarter of 2022 slowly comes to a close, let’s check on the pseudonymous creator’s Bitcoin stock-to-flow model to see if it’s still kicking.

The world’s current monetary regime effectively ended with the freezing of Russian foreign reserves by Western governments on February 26. In the new era, central banks will no longer save reserves in Western fiat currencies -- instead, turning to gold and bitcoin (BTC) as their preferred reserve assets, according to former BitMEX CEO Arthur Hayes.

Get your daily, bite-sized digest of cryptoasset and blockchain-related news – investigating the stories flying under the radar of today’s crypto news.

Bitcoin briefly spiked above $41,000 for the first time in a week, bringing the cryptocurrency out of its recent narrow trading range, as risk assets rebounded worldwide. The largest digital asset by market value jumped as much as 5.7% to $41,691 before paring its gains in early New York trading. It is down about 12% this year. Other tokens such as Ether and Solana also got a lift. Stocks rose, with Chinese equities rallying on a pledge by Beijing for policies to boost financial markets. “Whenever we see stock market relief, crypto tends to do well, especially lately,” said Marcus Sotiriou, an analyst at London-based digital asset broker GlobalBlock. “At the end of the day, the key driving force behind prices is macro, so I expect a struggle for a sustainable uptick.”

In January 2022, the Central Bank of Russia (CBR) proposed a number of measures aimed at curtailing the country’s cryptocurrency market, which included a blanket ban on the use and mining of all cryptocurrencies. It pointed out risks posed by the volatile nature of cryptocurrencies to the financial stability of the country, the extensive use of crypto in illegal activity and the energy costs involved in crypto mining. However, the utility of blockchain technology didn’t escape the CBR. The following month, it announced that it had started the pilot stage of the digital ruble, its planned central bank digital currency (CBDC).

Disclaimer: The text below is a press release that was not written by Cryptonews.com. 

The director of the Science and Technology Supervision Bureau of China’s Securities Regulatory Commission Yao Qian has called for a special focus on Web3, deeming it to be the future of the internet.

Jake Chervinsky, head of policy at crypto advocacy group the Blockchain Association, said the United States should be careful to avoid a “totalitarian nightmare” in its potential launch of a central bank digital currency, or CBDC.

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BlackRock has put its overweight outlook on Chinese assets “under review”, with soaring Covid cases and mounting concerns about Beijing’s ties to Russia prompting the world's biggest asset manager to reconsider its view on the world's second largest economy.

Sanctions imposed on Russia as a result of its war in Ukraine could lead more countries to consider digital versions of their own currencies – known as central bank digital currencies (CBDCs) – as a counterweight to the dominant role of the US dollar, a former Bank of Japan (BOJ) executive has said.

Bitcoin (BTC) returned above $41,000 prior to the Wall Street open on March 16 as good news from Asia and Russia buoyed stocks.