amycastor

Podcast: ‘Target Letter, Tether’ (Amy Castor and David Gerard)

I did a podcast for “When the Music Stops” with f...

The DOJ’s criminal probe into Tether — What we know

Early this morning, 2021-07-26 19:26:15 +0000 UTC View Post

News: Regulators zero in on stablecoins, El Salvador’s colón-dollar, Tether printer remains paused

My Patreon account ...

Binance: Italy, Lithuania, Hong Kong, all issue warnings; Brazil director quits

Ever since Germany’s BaFin and the UK’s FCA issued warnings against Binance, the dominoes have cont...

Binance: Fiat off-ramps keep closing, reports of frozen funds, what happened to Catherine Coley?

Last thing I remember,
I was running for the door.
I had to find the passage back
T...

What’s backing Circle’s 25B USDC? We may never know

Jeremy Allaire is taking his Boston-based company Circle public via a SPAC. Circle is best known for it...

Reggie Fowler, man at the center of Tether’s missing funds, ready for trial

It looks like Reginald Fowler, the man tied to hundreds of millions of dollars of missing Tether and Bitfinex money, has ditched plans for renegotiating a plea deal. Instead, he is planning to head...

News: Tether printer on hold, China’s crypto crackdown, the world hates Binance, El Salvador’s Chivo wallet

In case you missed my tweet, I ended up sick at the end of June. I was chatting with a frie...

RSA Conference goes full blockchain, for a moment

RSA Conference, arg...

Binance: A crypto exchange running out of places to hide

Binance, the world’s largest dark crypto slush fund, is struggling to find corners of the world that will tolerate its lax anti-money laundering policies and flagrant disregard for securities law...

Michael Peterson, El Salvador, and Bitcoin Beach

On June 8, El Salvador passed a law to make bitcoin legal tender, alongside the dollar. Salvadorans were blindsided by the decision. Overnight, their president, Nayib Bukele, had turned into a bitc...

NFTs and money laundering, the perfect storm

In June, I wrote 2021-06-10 23:36:29 +0000 UTC View Post

Rehost: A day in the life of Stuart Hoegner, General Counsel for Tether

One of my favorite Tether skeptics, Trolly McTrollface, had to take down a parody post about Stuart Hoegner today.

Trolly received an email from his hosting service this morning warning him t...

News: Tether—now 3% backed, Binance under investigation, Bitfinex shareholder charged, fickle Elon Musk

I’ve been inconsistent with my newsletters lately because I’m struggling to write this dang NFT book. It is slow going, and I keep falling down these rabbit holes. I feel like if I don’t hurr...

Tether’s first breakdown of reserves consists of two silly pie charts

Tether, the world’s most popular stablecoin issuer, released a br...

News: Tether surpasses 50B, Coinbase lists USDT, reported $2B crypto scam in Turkey

Bitcoin is sitting at around $54,000, and Tether has hit a new milestone: 50 billion tethers in circulation, something it�...

Coinbase lists tether, the world’s dodgiest stablecoin

Coinbase, the largest crypto exchange in the U.S., just announced i...

News: Coinbase Q1 earnings, Signal integrates MobileCoin, GBTC premium in the toilet, Reggie Fowler’s new lawyer

Bitcoin rose above $60,000 again. It only took 6 billion tethers to make that happen since 2021-04-12 04:50:35 +0000 UTC View Post

Signal adopts MobileCoin, a crypto project linked to its own creator Moxie Marlinspike

Many technologists today were disappointed to learn that Signal, an encrypted messaging service, is adopting MobileCoin (MOB), a new cryptocurrency that went 2021-04-07 20:36:22 +0000 UTC View Post

News: I’m writing a book, people are minting NFTs for the lulz, Chuck Tingle calls NFTs a ‘scoundrel plot’

I’m working on a book on NFTs and how they became the tulip mania of crypto. As of now, the plan is to self-publish on Amazon, hopefully before the bubble explodes like 2021-03-30 02:24:45 +0000 UTC View Post

BitClout’s social media experiment is one bad idea on top of another

BitClout, a social-media-on-the-blockchain project, is selling a type of token (called “creator coins”) tied to influential Twitter accounts—without account holders’ permission.

And f...

News: Metakovan unmasks himself, FATF goes after DeFi and NFTs, Coinbase pays CFTC $6.5M over wash trades

I’ve been traveling the U.S., visiting friends on the East and West Coasts and in between, and this is my first newsletter in a few weeks.

This week has been a busy one, full of interviews ...

WTF is an NFT?

NFTs are all over the news lately.

Recently, I was having drinks with a friend, who knows zip about crypto, and out of the blue, she started asking me about “non-fungible tokens.”

T...

Metakovan, the mystery Beeple art buyer, and his NFT/DeFi scheme

Last week, a crypto whale going by the moniker “Metakovan” bought a Beeple artwork via Christie’s auction for $69 million—$60 million in ETH and $9 million in fees—outbidding a surprised ...

Another QuadrigaCX documentary in the works

Dear Patrons,

I just wanted to drop a note and thank you all for your kind support— and share some news.

2021-03-04 01:09:50 +0000 UTC View Post

NYAG to crypto companies: ‘Play by the rules or we will shut you down’

The New York attorney general issued a stern warning to crypto companies and crypto investors on Monday. Crypto firms doing business in the state must play by the rules or face consequences, she sa...

News: NY gives Tether the boot, Tether leaks, Coinbase financials, MoneyGram dumps Ripple

February is coming to an end. I’m waiting to get vaccinated, so I can travel without worry again. Maybe I’ll go to some crypto conferences later this year? I still have 2021-02-28 21:28:39 +0000 UTC View Post

NY AG/Tether, Bitfinex settlement reveals commingling of funds, years of shenanigans

I wrote a quick article this morning about the New...

Tether, Bitfinex to pay $18.5M to NYAG, cease trading in NY

Bitfinex and Tether have settled with the office of the New York attorney general in an investigation that began two years ago.

The sister companies will pay $18.5 million in penalties to the...

News: MicroStrategy needs more cowbell, Tether surpasses $34B, those laser eyes, Tether collapse doomsday scenario

I nearly ventured to Austin Wednesday, but my flight was canceled due to the storm, havoc, and general disaster in the area. I found another flight later in the day and was headed out the door, whe...