After a disappointing run of dips in the weeks prior, light finally begins to shine at the end of the tunnel as bitcoin shifts tides to edge $40k.

Binance’s regulatory controversies dominated headlines last week, surprising users by pulling futures and derivatives offerings from the European market, delisting AUD, EUR, and GBP margin trading pairs and hinting at a CEO replacement.

Mid-week, we saw the price of bitcoin pull back and forth once again, responding dramatically to Amazon denying payment rumours.

Despite waves of regulatory attention, the week closed doors with a sliver of positive institutional crypto news with Germany permitting institutional funds to hold up to 20% in crypto, Goldman Sachs applying for a DeFi ETF, Mastercard working with startups to ease cryptocurrency use and Wells Fargo offering crypto exposure to wealthy clients.

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Top stories of the week

Germany to allow institutional funds to hold up to 20% in crypto

Germany plans to allow certain institutional funds to invest billions of dollars in crypto assets for the first time. A law taking effect today will let so-called Spezialfonds with fixed investment rules put as much as 20% of their holdings in Bitcoin and other crypto assets. The funds, which can only be accessed by institutional investors such as pension companies and insurers, currently manage about 1.8 trillion euros ($2.1 trillion). Read More

Goldman Sachs applies for DeFi ETF

Investment banking giant Goldman Sachs has filed an application with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) for an exchange-traded fund (ETF) that would offer exposure to public companies in decentralized finance and blockchain around the globe. Sparse on details, the filing noted that the fund would invest at least 80% of its assets into companies that advance blockchain technology and the digitisation of finance. Read More

Binance pulls futures and derivatives offerings from European market

Crypto exchange Binance has announced that it is winding down its futures and derivatives products offerings across the European region. The shutdown will kick off in Germany, Italy, and the Netherlands, with users in those countries now unable to open new futures or derivatives products accounts. Read more

In case you missed it...

⚡️Wells Fargo set to offer crypto exposure to wealthy clients.

⚡️PayPal CEO: smart contracts, DeFi apps part of company’s crypto plans.

⚡️Mexico detected 12 illegal local cryptocurrency exchanges.

⚡️Tesla reports record $1bn income for Q2 despite $23m impairment loss on BTC.

⚡️UBS mulls offering prime brokerage services for crypto ETPs to European hedge funds.

⚡️Ether trading volume beat Bitcoin’s in first half for the first time.

⚡️It’s official: Blockfolio has now rebranded to FTX.

⚡️US Senators look to raise extra $28bn via crypto tax.

⚡️Microstrategy pledges to buy more BTC despite holdings of $424.8m in Q2.

⚡️Ripple joins SBI remit to launch on-demand liquidity service in Japan.

⚡️Bitcoin rallies past $40k level to highest since mid-may.

From Copper

Copper.co brings staking support to the Oasis ROSE token

Last week we announced that the Copper Platform now provides staking services for the Oasis Protocol Foundation ROSE Token. Copper Platform users will be able to stake ROSE in different pools simultaneously and receive annualised staking rewards of up to 20%. Full details here.

Mid-year review: How are our crypto predictions for 2021 holding up?

At the end of 2020, we asked our CEO Dmitry Tokarev to make some crypto predictions on how he envisioned the industry to unfold in the year ahead. Now more than halfway into 2021, our mid-year review revisits his predictions on DeFi, Bitcoin, Ethereum, CBDCs, and M&A to see how they've fared so far. Read it here.