The top daily news from the cryptocurrency and blockchain space:
- The Senate Banking Committee books hearing on Facebook’s Libra cryptocurrency.
- Bitcoin developers to get 50 bitcoin (BTC) in funding.
- 0.25% of Algorand’s ALGO tokens sell for $60 million.
At the time of writing, bitcoin (BTC) and ether (ETH) are trading at $9,294.1 (+1.5%) and $269.5 (+0.6%), respectively. As for the MVIS CryptoCompare Digital Assets 10 Index, it is currently tracking at 4,314.6 (-0.2%).
Senate Banking Committee Books Hearing on Facebook
The U.S. Senate Banking Committee announced it will hold a hearing on July 16 in order to question witnesses over Facebook’s new cryptocurrency and blockchain project, Libra. As of press time, it has not yet been publicly disclosed which individuals will testify before the Committee.
The hearing – entitled ‘Examining Facebook’s Proposed Digital Currency and Data Privacy Considerations’ – was scheduled just days after the social media giant officially revealed its plans regarding Libra and its new Calibra subsidiary.
Fund to Support Bitcoin Developers with 50 BTC
Primitive Ventures’ Dovey Wan has gathered 50 BTC – roughly $450,000 – on behalf of non-profit organization Hard Core Fund in an effort to sustainably fund Bitcoin developers.
When discussing why she decided to pursue the initiative, Wan told CoinDesk, “right now, you wouldn’t believe it, there are less than 10 full-time bitcoin developers… We want to fund full-time independent bitcoin developers.”
Established in 2018, the Hard Core Fund is managed by Pan Zhibiao, a former Bitmain employee. Wan – who serves as the executive director for the fund – is the only other team member listed on its website.
Huge shout-out to @bit_kevin, Patrick from Qtum, @bitfish1, WU Gang from Bitxin, and many more who are not on Twitter, blocked by GFW, but never doubt a sec that Bitcoin is the one truly global sound money
These Chinese Bitcoin warriors make https://t.co/9GeHBZTYDs possible
— Dovey Wan 🗝 🦖 (@DoveyWan) June 19, 2019
0.25% of Algorand’s ALGO Tokens Sell for $60 Million
Algorand – a scalable, secure and decentralized digital currency and transactions platform – closed its first Dutch auction with a clearing price of $2.40 per Algo (ALGO) token, the native token of the Algorand blockchain platform.
The auction was administered by the Algorand Foundation, which, in a blog post on Wednesday, said that it now stands as “the first organization to conduct a fully transparent global auction on its own blockchain.”
In total, a paltry 0.25 percent of ALGO’s total supply was sold to successful bidders for $60.4 million. Notably, the Algorand Foundation will – in exactly one year’s time – offer redemptions on tokens at 90 percent of the $2.40 clearing price.
The completion of the inaugural ALGO auction signalled the mainnet launch of the Algorand, also. It was first unveiled by MIT professor and Turing Award winner, Silvio Micali, in early 2017.
