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UK-based loan provider lets investors tokenize their fund with Securitize partnership

The bridge financing fund becomes the first UK-based company to establish such partnership with a U.S. platform.

Whitehall Capital, a London-based loan provider, struck a deal with an American digital asset securities marketplace Securitize to enable its investors to hold their units as blockchain tokens.

According to an April 11 announcement, Whitehall investors will be able to use buy and sell units in the Whitehall fund via Securitize platform. After registering on Securitize, an investor will see their assets as a number of tokenized units, with the performance markers, investment reports and other valuable information included. They could also trade the units with other investors by posting a bid to buy or sell a certain quantity.

According to Anthony Bodenstein, managing partner at Whitehall Capital, the blockchain tokens, backed by loans that are secured by property assets, will deliver an 8-10% income annually:

“As there is currently no secondary market for investments in Whitehall Capital, we anticipate investors will quickly take to the benefits of working with this easy-to-use and interactive platform and holding units in this way.”

Securitize will be responsible for issuing tokenized shares, delivering them to shareholders and tracking transaction activity on the blockchain.

Related: Old but gold: Can digital assets become part of Americans’ retirement plans?

In September 2021, Securitize has already partnered with Arca Labs, the innovation arm of digital asset investment firm Arca, to provide a smart contract and issuance platform for the firm, starting with a tokenized fund named the “Arca U.S. Treasury Fund”. Arca Labs claimed it to be the first treasury fund registered under the Investment Company Act of 1940 to issue shares as digital assets via the blockchain.

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Museums in the metaverse: How Web3 technology can help historical sites

Historical-site metaverses may become a new business model for tourism, and they may rewrite history in the process.

Metaverse events at ancient and historical sites could soon shape up to be an alternate future for tourism.

Owners of physical castles and villas who have drafted up augmented reality blueprints of their properties think their ambitious plans to attract visitors in the metaverse will work, as virtual events can help them pay the hefty maintenance bills for their aging properties and also offer a chance to change historical narratives.

The metaverse tourism model was expedited by downturns in tourism brought about by COVID-19, but the industry may have already been heading that way. 

Currently, major metaverse platforms are clunky, difficult to use and waiting for more “real estate” development, but firms are concentrating on what could be. Brands seem to be entering the metaverse en masse just for PR bragging rights.

So, it seems the possibility of learning existing, new and revised histories through the metaverse is not so remote. 

Nonfungible castles, villas and chateaus

Michelle Choi, founder of 3.O Labs — a Web3 venture lab — turned to digital opportunities to finance the upkeep of physical paintings, such as selling nonfungible tokens, or NFTs, as fundraisers to preserve illiquid assets.

Choi was a product manager at Google when she noticed the downturn in museum tourism due to COVID-19, seeing it as an opportunity for future metaverses. She subsequently quit her job and started her own metaverse experiments.

She began by working with a team to launch Non-Fungible Castle, an NFT exhibition and auction at Lobkowicz Palace, a real-life castle in Prague, held in October 2021. The event saw NFTs displayed next to 500-year-old paintings and had the goal to “broaden accessibility to cultural heritage.”

The launch raised enough to cover the restoration of all urgent projects at the property. Motivated by this proof-of-concept, Choi and 3.O Labs are now busily curating metaverse tourism experiences globally.

With the broader mission of making Web3 accessible to all users, 3.O Labs is already incubating an array of Web3 projects ranging from NFTs to decentralized autonomous organizations, or DAOs. Within its metaverse vertical, the venture lab is already building a project in a castle in Germany, which will be followed by a villa in India and then possibly a museum in Ghana.

Lobkowicz Palace. Source: Prague Morning

 Choi told Cointelegraph about her long-term vision for metaverse travel:

“Travel will be augmented as a teaching tool. In the past, tourism meant visiting a place. Photos were 2D, but 3D travel then emerged with virtual headsets. 4D time experimentation is now possible. Now, we can mesh different time periods. There’s a teaching angle.”

This raises a series of questions regarding what new histories will be created in the metaverse.

Will history be rewritten in the metaverse?

For better or worse, tourism businesses, education platforms and museums could reimagine history in the metaverse.

Priyadarshini Raje Scindia’s family owns Jai Vilas Palace, a 200-year-old palace-turned-museum in Madhya Pradesh, India. She is planning an NFT collection produced by local artists to fund a metaverse experience. COVID-19 shut her museum for two years, allowing time for some needed — but expensive — restoration work. 

Scindia told Cointelegraph that NFTs should be embraced as art, as “Every generation has its art and the interpretation of it. This is a new medium and a new platform for hungry, emerging Indian artists.” She added that there “should be no barriers around art creation.”

Scindia is convinced that the metaverse is the future, as “A person usually visits a museum once,” but they can visit multiple times in the metaverse. She says that in India, especially, museums are not the first destination people think to go to for entertainment. Private museums in small towns can be taken for granted, especially when compared with shopping malls and cinemas. So, she is working with 3.O Labs to “create immersive experiences — for example, animations that allow you to put yourself in short history documentaries.” It’s about opening more doors for conversations and education.

Scindia also has a story to tell the world via the metaverse:

“I disagree with my family history. We have rooms of research documents in the palace. Now is the right time and the right platform to correct history.”

She told Cointelegraph that the historical narrative she would like to paint with her immersive experiences is “to tell the real story of my clan, the Maharatas. Retelling the story told by the British, which sounds like a Game of Thrones book — dark and barbaric. We fought for independence from all exterior forces, yet it was made out that we were fighting Indians in India. It is a historic fact that the Maharatas were the rulers of India, post the Mughals. And their narrative and value system are even more essential to study and understand today. I would like to use the platform to change the narrative through art, culture and history.”

“I disagree with the way Maratha history is portrayed. However, today there is a renewed interest, maybe because of the glamor of cinema, but there’s also a new world out there. People have a deep interest in history today and are rediscovering art and history. The metaverse may be the right platform to inform and educate people, to generate interest, so they may start their own journey of a deep dive into history, art and culture through this amazing world.” 
Jai Vilas Palace. Source: Mohitkjain123

DAOs for castles, villas and chateau restorations

Prince Heinrich Donatus of the Schaumburg-Lippe family owns Bueckeburg Castle, a castle in northern Germany, 45 minutes from Hannover. Schaumburg-Lippe was one of the 16 reigning families of the German Empire until 1918. Later, the British Army of the Rhine confiscated the castle to use as its headquarters from 1948 to 1953. It had previously been under American control following the end of World War II in 1945 until Germany’s occupation zones were established.

A bullet hole in the outhouse serves as a reminder of the castle’s recent history. Americans were the first to arrive at Bueckeburg during the war, and their tank shell that penetrated the dome is still viewable in the castle’s museum. The family exhibits the shell and has left the hole in the ceiling as a reminder of the war.

Donatus has the same idea as Scindia: a metaverse for historical preservation.

Bueckeberg Castle. Source: Trip Advisor

Donatus, who co-founded 3.O Labs with Choi, will soon operate an NFT exhibition and a DAO-focused hacker house at the castle. He told Cointelegraph that “The metaverse isn’t a virtual reality world. It is a new economy. For example, the incentivization to enter the metaverse could be to protect a castle.”

But why support noble families in 2022?

For illiquid assets like sprawling estates, the cost of maintenance can outweigh a family’s cash flow. The preservation of privately owned sites of historical significance is, therefore, a significant challenge for owners and a national or global public good. 

In 2001, Donatus’ grandfather sold a castle for 1 euro, and the new owner’s latest two attempts to sell the same castle for 1 euro failed to find a buyer. Donatus added:

“Foreigners who buy European castles give up after a year when they realize what is involved.”

“The Bueckeburg castle is not meant to be lived in anymore — it is primarily a cultural site,” Donatus said, “We have the sole responsibility to maintain this history working with limited resources, and suddenly resources can be vastly enhanced and crowd-sourced.”

“Virtual tours could be profitable, though metaverse ideas could take several years to pay back,” noted Choi. “But long term, there are no maintenance or air conditioning expenses for the metaverse.”

Donatus said he foresees a launching DAO treasury for renovations, akin to a “people’s UNESCO” — a reference to the United Nations agency tasked with protecting sites of cultural and historical significance.

DAOs are not constrained by borders, and this can create network effects for new models of tourism. “A sort of PleasrDAO for castles,” said Donatus. “They will include decentralized access/stewardship to castles, and castle hackathons — as castles are a cool place for meetups.”

Augmented 4D metaverse events 

Historical storytelling and experiences can also be augmented to create surreal and impossible scenarios.

“Under no circumstance do I want to experience things I can experience in the real world,” said Donatus. “The Metaverse can recreate and preserve the past.” He said one could create a “tennis match in a ballroom in the Palace of Versailles as a great tourist drawcard.”

Choi said, “In the metaverse, we can upload guns and recreate wars for historical teaching purposes.” Historical reenactments with reconstructed weapons happen all over the world, including in the United States, Germany, Russia, the United Kingdom and Italy, and there may be many future teachable moments in the metaverse.

If metaverses truly are the future, the planning for their rules and composition starts now. This is why, for example, a group of Indigenous Australians plan to set up an embassy in the metaverse. Mixing the ancient and the new is seemingly tenuous, but it all depends on how bullish one is about the significance of the cultural totems in the metaverses of the future.

As metaverses become new models for tourism, they may also rewrite history in the process.

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Crypto.com Launches US Exchange — Institutional Investors Granted Access First

Crypto.com Launches US Exchange — Institutional Investors Granted Access FirstThe digital currency exchange Crypto.com has revealed it’s launching a crypto trading platform in the United States to waitlisted users and then a progressive rollout will follow. Furthermore, the company says the trading platform’s VIP users will get access to “exclusive events, rewards, and cutting-edge market insights.” Crypto.com Launches US Exchange Platform — Waitlist Open […]

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Major crypto firms and groups form coalition aimed at promoting ‘market integrity’

“Harmonizing a broad global approach to digital assets and competition in the digital currency space race, can improve U.S. competitiveness, security and lower fundamental costs for basic financial access,” said Dante Disparte of Circle.

Several cryptocurrency exchanges and advocacy groups across different countries have banded together to form a coalition intended to fight market manipulation.

In a Monday announcement, market surveillance firm Solidus Labs and exchanges including Bitstamp, Coinbase, BitMEX, and CrossTower said they would be launching the Crypto Market Integrity Coalition, or CMIC, asking all other companies involved in the crypto space to follow their example. According to the CMIC, members must pledge to encourage “a fair digital asset marketplace to combat market abuse and manipulation and promote public and regulatory confidence” in crypto.

The group’s 17 founding members includes U.S.-based crypto advocacy group Chamber of Digital Commerce, United Kingdom-based self-regulatory trade association CryptoUK, and international think tank Global Digital Finance. In addition, crypto data provider CryptoCompare, Anchorage Digital, the first crypto firm to receive a charter from the national bank regulator in the United States, and Circle, the company behind the USDC stablecoin, have joined the coalition.

CMIC’s pledge includes a commitment to “maintain fair and orderly digital asset markets and prevent market abuse.” The group said it planned to eventually share its own research into crypto as well as establish a dialogue with regulators and consider a data-sharing and shared-surveillance framework.

“Harmonizing a broad global approach to digital assets and competition in the digital currency space race, can improve U.S. competitiveness, security and lower fundamental costs for basic financial access,” said Circle chief strategy officer and head of global policy Dante Disparte. “CMIC’s pledge brings leading industry participants together to advance market integrity standards.”

According to the CMIC website, the pledge asks that members agree to the following:

“Regardless of regulatory requirements, market activity should be reviewed and monitored on a reasonable ongoing basis for purposes of detecting and eliminating Market Manipulation and unfair market abuses. Clear instances of fraud and manipulation are illegal, and we will commit to preventing these activities to the best of our ability.”

Related: Binance denies allegations of market manipulation

Crypto firms and industry leaders have formed other groups aimed at addressing challenges in mainstream adoption and between regulators. In September 2020, Square — now Block — started a consortium aimed at pooling crypto- and blockchain-related patents to “defend against patent aggressors and trolls.” In February 2021, Chainlink, Aave, Messari and others launched the GoodFi alliance to focus on furthering education and research into decentralized finance.

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NYDIG partners with Houston Rockets basketball franchise, plans to pay team in BTC

The deal seems to be part of a larger move for Rockets owner Tilman Fertitta, who is also the chairman and CEO of a restaurant group that recently launched a Bitcoin rewards program.

The New York Digital Investment Group will be paying the National Basketball Association’s Houston Rockets franchise in Bitcoin as part of a partnership aimed at promoting crypto education and adoption.

In a Nov. 16 announcement, the Houston Rockets said the New York Digital Investment Group, or NYDIG, would become the team’s official Bitcoin (BTC) services partner and platform. As part of the partnership, NYDIG is planning to name some of the Rockets’ premium seating at the Toyota Center in Houston the ‘Bitcoin Suites.’

The deal with the NYDIG seems to be part of a larger strategy for Rockets owner Tilman Fertitta, who is also chairman and CEO of Landry’s Restaurant Group. Last week, the company announced it would be introducing a BTC rewards program for its restaurants and is already rolling out BTC payment options.

Through Landry’s and other ventures, Fertitta, worth an estimated $6.3 billion, also owns a few hotels and five casino resorts across the United States. There have been no reports of BTC or other cryptocurrencies being accepted at these venues at the time of publication. However, in June, Fertitta said his holding company planned to start validating blocks on the Akash Network.

Related: Dallas Mavericks fan wins $100K in Bitcoin at NBA shootout event

This year the crypto space has seen many major basketball franchises in the U.S. partner with companies dealing with digital assets and blockchain technology. In October, Voyager Digital inked a deal with the Dallas Mavericks in an aim to make crypto more accessible through fan engagement. Coinbase also recently signed a multiyear sponsorship contract with the NBA to be its exclusive crypto platform partner.

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Coinbase partners with esports gaming organization competing in League of Legends

“Crypto was new to me once, but once I started reading and watching, I realized that it wasn’t some passing fad — it’s here now, and will be in the future,” said Team Liquid owner and co-CEO Steve Arhancet.

Team Liquid, the esports and gaming organization operating across major titles including League of Legends and Fortnite, has inked a four-year agreement with Coinbase.

In a Nov. 10 announcement, Team Liquid said the partnership with the U.S.-based crypto exchange would be aimed at highlighting “the crossover between gaming and crypto-curious audiences” as well as creating new seemingly crypto-focused content. Coinbase will be enabling crypto payments for Team Liquid’s online marketplace, and both will be collaborating on technology aimed at encouraging fan engagement.

“Like a lot of our fans, crypto was new to me once, but once I started reading and watching, I realized that it wasn’t some passing fad — it’s here now, and will be in the future,” said Team Liquid owner and co-CEO Steve Arhancet. “Together with Coinbase, we hope we can demystify crypto for Team Liquid fans.”

Founded in 2000, Team Liquid reported it has more than 100 gamers competing in esports gaming titles including Fortnite, League of Legends, and Valorant. Coinbase will have its information appear on the organization’s jerseys, and may be assisting in the development of nonfungible tokens used across gaming platforms.

Related: 5 reasons why blockchain-based gaming economies are the future

There is already some competition between major crypto exchanges backing professional esports teams. In June, FTX announced it had signed a seven-year sponsorship deal with League Championship Series, or LCS, for League of Legends and other gaming competitions.

However, a previously signed deal between FTX and Team SoloMid in June had Riot Games — the developer behind League of Leagues — bar the team from appearing with the crypto exchange’s logo in competitions hosted by Riot. It is unclear if Coinbase intends to have its name appear on Team Liquid’s jerseys.

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OTOY’s Render Network plans to render the metaverse on Solana

Solana's programmable and secure underlying infrastructure is critical for scalable and shareable dynamic metaverse content, according to OTOY CEO Jules Urbach.

Jules Urbach, the CEO and founder of OTOY, wants to democratize content creation, specifically as it pertains to virtual assets. OTOY’s technology intends to fulfill the promise of an open cloud-based metaverse via the Render Network — the first decentralized GPU rendering network & 3D marketplace built on OTOY's OctaneRender NFT ecosystem.

While at the inaugural Solana Breakpoint conference in Lisbon, Portugal, Urbach announced Render Network’s integration with the Solana blockchain, as well as a partnership with NFT minting platform Metaplex.

Urbach noted that the project's recent move to Solana happened for a variety of reasons. He mentioned that Solana runs on high-performance code at a fast enough speed to handle scene graph changes on chain without sacrificing security. Such a programmable and secure underlying infrastructure is critical for scalable and shareable dynamic metaverse content, he said.

He also indicated that the Render Network aims to fund the development of an open source Rust GPU cross-compiler tool for the RNDR Software Development Kit, orSDK, that lets developers target both the Solana smart contracts VM and Render Network GPU nodes with identical code.

Urbach called Metaplex a huge opportunity to reimagine an NFT marketplace at scale, noting that storefront and smart contract code can be integrated into the art itself. Artists using the Render Network can benefit from custom 3D metaverse-like NFT storefronts coded inside the assets, and payment flows can ostensibly be handled regardless of the number of a given NFT’s rendering contributors.

Thanks to Metaplex, the Render Network will also equip AR creators with the flexibility to make live updates and to live stream renderings of NFTs on the cloud across all devices, including iPads and iPhones. Urbach said:

“To make mixed reality work, it’s more than just rendering. We need to be able to take all the data coming from an iPhone or an iPad and use that to blend and relight the scene.”

A number of Twitter users responded positively to the news. According to MediaFire.com Cofounder Tom Langridge, the keynote was “easily one of the most exciting presentations I've seen in the last decade.”

Another user called the Render Network the “the Uber for rendering” that “will power the Metaverse.”

The Render Network has already been used by many crypto artists such as Beeple. The work of both Marvel and DC Comic book artist Alex Ross and Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry is also currently being archived on the Render Network. These Metaverse archives will preserve their respective creations on the blockchain for future utilization.

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Bakkt shares skyrocket after partnering with Mastercard and Fiserv

Bakkt’s share price surged by 120% during Monday’s trading session on the heels of fresh partnerships with global payments firms.

The share price of the Intercontinental Exchange-backed crypto services company Bakkt ($BKKT) has surged as it unveiled two partnerships with major global payments firms.

On Monday 25 Oct., Mastercard announced it would be working with digital asset platform Bakkt to allow its customers based in the United States to buy, sell and hold digital assets through custodial wallets. On the same day, global payment provider Fiserv also announced a strategic collaboration with Bakkt to offer merchant-facing digital asset services.

The news drove a bullish day of trading for BKKT, with the stock rallying by more than 50% outside of regular trading hours from Friday Oct. 22’s closing price of $9.15, before surging a further 120% to close out Monday Oct. 25 at $30.60.

While Bakkt’s debut on the New York Stock Exchange saw its share price pull back by 6% to close out its first day of trading, BKKT has since rallied more than 236% from $9.09 to $30.60 over the past five days.

'BKKT/USD: TradingView'

Bakkt went public on Oct. 18 through a Special Purpose Acquisition Company deal that valued the company at $2.1 billion. Bakkt’s market capitalization currently sits at more than $4 billion.

Related: Mastercard plans to allow US partners to offer crypto loyalty rewards

In August 2018, Coinbase investor and New York Stock Exchange owner Intercontinental Exchange announced it would launch a digital asset platform dubbed Bakkt.

The following year, Bakkt launched its highly anticipated physically "deliverable" Bitcoin futures contracts for institutional investors.

After initially claiming to pioneer physically-delivered Bitcoin futures contracts, the firm received criticism over their cash settled product design. In response, Bakkt fully collateralized its daily futures contracts.

The firm launched a retail crypto asset payments app in April of this year, while its futures contracts posted record volume earlier this month.

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BlockFi partners with Neuberger Berman to launch crypto ETFs

"We are witnessing a significant shift in investor sentiment towards digital assets, and we believe that digital assets should be considered in modern portfolios," said Greg Collett, president of the joint venture.

Crypto lending firm BlockFi has formed a business with New York-based investment management company Neuberger Berman for the development and distribution of crypto products including exchange-traded funds.

In an Oct. 25 announcement, BlockFi said the joint venture, BlockFi | nb, expects to “launch crypto asset management products, including ETFs and other traditional structures,” giving investors exposure to crypto in their brokerage accounts. According to the two firms, the partnership will combine BlockFi’s retail and institutional crypto solutions with Neuberger Berman's suite of crypto strategies.

"We are witnessing a significant shift in investor sentiment towards digital assets, and we believe that digital assets should be considered in modern portfolios," said BlockFi | nb President Greg Collett.

The Securities and Exchange Commission has already approved shares of Bitcoin (BTC) futures-linked exchange-traded fund to be listed on U.S.-based exchanges. This month, ProShares became the first company to list its Bitcoin Strategy ETF for trading on the New York Stock Exchange, followed by Valkyrie’s Bitcoin Strategy ETF listing on the Nasdaq. Many expect VanEck's crypto ETF to be next.

Though the regulatory body has only approved crypto ETF applications with exposure linked to BTC futures, it still has BTC ETFs under consideration from Galaxy Digital and Invesco, WisdomTree, Global X, Ark Invest, Kryptoin, and others. BlockFi filed its own prospectus for a BTC Strategy ETF with the SEC on Oct. 8, with a decision expected before Dec. 7 should the regulator not extend or otherwise delay the deadline.

Related: $400B investment manager Neuberger Berman will allow crypto exposure through commodity-focused fund

BlockFi faced regulatory backlash from state officials regarding allegations the firm was not offering a security licensed at the state or federal level. In July, the New Jersey Bureau of Securities issued a cease and desist order preventing the firm from onboarding new interest account clients. Both the Alabama Securities Commission and the Texas State Securities Board subsequently made similar allegations. BlockFi claimed its Interest Account is not a security.

Analyst Issues Altcoin Warning, Says Black Swan Event Could Trigger ‘Very Last Shakeout’

$25B toy brand to launch L.O.L. Surprise NFT collectibles

Released in 2017, L.O.L. Surprise doll was MGA’s best-selling U.S. toy property for three consecutive years.

Consumer entertainment products giant MGA Entertainment is moving into the nonfungible token (NFT) industry by turning its best-selling toys into digital collectibles on blockchain.

The American toy giant is preparing to roll out an NFT functionality for its world-famous brand L.O.L. Surprise, allowing fans to mint NFTs, display their character collection, and buy, sell and trade digital collectibles online.

To enable the new feature, MGA has partnered with Ioconic, a London-based partnership business for brand owners, offering exposure to the NFT and digital asset industry. The startup will enable an online gaming hub for the L.O.L. Surprise trading card game, letting fans and collectors replicate physical purchases using QR codes.

Ioconic CEO Jamie Lewis told Cointelegraph that the startup has built “the entire L.O.L. Surprise digital ecosystem from scratch.”

“Every brand we work with receives a tailored digital asset strategy as no two brand requirements are the same. We have agreed on terms with a major protocol that will underpin the L.O.L. Surprise platform but will announce this once the site is launched in two weeks,” Lewis noted.

Founded in 1979, MGA Entertainment is one of the world’s private toy suppliers, famous for manufacturing the Bratz fashion doll and merchandise. Released in September 2017, MGA’s L.O.L. Surprise doll was the best-selling U.S. toy property for three consecutive years starting 2018, contributing to the overall toy sales in the United States, which amassed $25 billion in 2020 in retail sales.

Related: Tweet mocking how little value NFTs have... is turned into $5K NFT

Backed by initial investment from Hong Kong-based blockchain investment firm Kenetic, Ioconic was founded in early 2021. Kenetic managing partner Jehan Chu is one of Ioconic’s co-founders.

Ioconic has reached several licensing deals with entertainment giants such as Disneyland and Warner Bros. Entertainment. “We have worked with these brands in both previous environments focused on physical products and are now engaged with some of them focused on digital assets. As we are a relatively new company, we have not announced all of our partnerships yet,” Lewis added.

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