LensLinks: Issue 18

Today in LensLinks:

• Historically notable 40,000 word crypto article in Bloomberg

• E&Y move clients to Metaverse

• UK recognizes crypto as regulated financial instruments

• Bitcoin, Ether "Surge on Short Squeeze"

• Singapore to require tests for crypto investors?

• Is "Meta doomed"?

• Aptos "Underwhelms"

• And Much, Much, More...

Bloomberg Businessweek published a 40,000-word article on cryptocurrencies by the news organization's popular financial columnist Matt Levine, who – amid one of the worst downturns in the industry's 14-year history – offered praise of the good parts, critiques of the bad and dangled hope that this newfangled way of moving money and information around has staying power.

Levine is well-known as a chronicler of all things finance, which in recent years has meant a lot of writing about crypto. As a sign of just how importantly Bloomberg viewed the former investment banker and lawyer's piece, the news outlet made it the only article in this week's issue of the magazine, just the second time the 93-year-old publication has filled itself with a single story. (The previous one, in 2015, was about computer programming.)

The metaverse is clearly going corporate. Ernst & Young said it will provide EY wavespace experiences in the metaverse to help clients prepare for Web3 and the metaverse.

The House of Commons, the Parliament's lower house, met on Tuesday for a line-by-line reading of the proposed Financial Services and Markets Bill, which broadly covers the U.K.'s post-Brexit economic strategy. The lawmakers considered a list of proposed amendments to the bill, including one put forward by parliamentarian Andrew Griffith to include crypto assets in the scope of regulated financial services in the country.

Singapore may soon require retail investors to take a test and not use credit card payments and other forms of borrowing for trading cryptocurrencies, the central bank proposed on Wednesday in a series of stringent measures as the island nation looks to make citizens aware of the risks surrounding volatile assets.

The Monetary Authority of Singapore said in a set of consultation papers that it’s worried that many retail customers may “not have sufficient knowledge of the risks of trading” digital payment tokens, which may lead them “to take on higher risks than they would otherwise have been willing, or are able, to bear.”

Metaverse & Gaming - A Little More...

Blockchain, Tokens & Defi - A Little More...

Crypto Trading - A Little More...

The recent Ethereum ‘Merge’ upgrade to adopt the Proof of Stake (PoS) algorithm, which cut the need for mining and thus reduced the blockchain’s energy consumption by 99.9%, might attract even more institutional investors with environmental, social and governance (ESG) considerations.

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