Daily Archives: 28. Dezember 2022

Bulletpoints:
• Kraken will shut its operation in Japan and deregister with the country’s Financial Services Agency on Jan. 31, 2023.
• Affected users should withdraw their funds before Jan.31, and deposits will be suspended by Jan. 9.
• Kraken pulled out of Japan in 2018 and re-entered the market in 2020, but is now laying off roughly 1000 people due to the challenging market conditions.

Kraken, a leading cryptocurrency exchange, recently announced that it will be shutting down its operations in Japan by the end of January 2023. The decision was made due to the challenging market conditions in Japan in combination with the weak crypto market. In order to prioritize its overall business, Kraken will be deregistering with the Financial Services Agency in Japan by January 31st, 2023.

Affected users are expected to withdraw their funds before January 31st, 2023, and deposits will be suspended by January 9th, 2023. Kraken has also removed withdrawal limits so users can transfer their funds to an external wallet or liquidate their portfolio to withdraw from a domestic bank. For those who have staked their digital assets on Kraken, the exchange has provided information about the unstaking process for staked Ethereum.

Kraken had previously pulled out of Japan in 2018, citing the rising cost of doing business in the country. However, the exchange re-entered the Japanese market in 2020. Unfortunately, due to the challenging market conditions and weak crypto market, Kraken has now announced that it will be laying off roughly 1000 people from its global workforce.

Kraken is committed to ensuring a smooth transition for its users and providing them with the best possible experience. The exchange is also working on providing more information and assistance to those affected by the closure. It is a difficult decision to make, but one that Kraken believes is necessary in order to ensure the future success and sustainability of their business.

• In 2022, Solana worked on improving security, mobile compatibility, and performance.
• In November 2021, the price of Solana (SOL) fell 55% due to the insolvency of the now defunct crypto exchange FTX.
• The total value locked (TVL) in Solana decentralized finance (DeFi) fell 63% in a week amid the FTX fiasco.

Solana, the blockchain protocol that focuses on scalability and performance, has had a tumultuous year of growth, change, and setbacks. In 2022, the protocol worked on improving security, mobile compatibility, and performance – all of which have been key to its success over the past year.

However, as of late November, Solana (SOL) has seen a significant price decline due to the insolvency of the now defunct crypto exchange FTX. As of press time, SOL was trading at $11.15, down 70% from its November peak of $37.73. Solana last traded at this level in February 2021. Furthermore, SOL price has fallen 94.21% over the past year and is down 95.71% from its all-time high in November 2021, according to CryptoSlate data.

The decline of Solana was further fuelled by speculations around Binance’s consideration of buying out FTX – leading some to fear that Binance would prioritize its own Binance Smart Chain and BNB (BNB) token over Solana. Sam Bankman-Fried (SBF), the disgraced former CEO of FTX, was an early backer of Solana. SBF-owned hedge-fund Alameda Research owned 53 million SOL tokens, as of late August, according to a Forbes report.

The decline of Solana was also reflected in the total value locked (TVL) in Solana decentralized finance (DeFi). On Nov. 14, Solana TVL stood at $330 million after losing nearly $500 million in a week, it has fallen further to $214.53 million as of press time, as per DefiLlama data.

In the new year, Solana is looking to address these challenges and is focusing on enabling concurrent block production. Concurrent block production on Solana is a feature that allows multiple validators to concurrently produce the same block. This will enable the network to scale significantly and provide a more efficient, secure, and reliable service. Additionally, Solana is also looking to improve its governance structure by introducing a new proof-of-stake (PoS) consensus algorithm.

The Solana team is also looking to expand its development team and attract more developers to the platform. This is being done through grants, partnerships, and other initiatives. By increasing the number of developers on the platform, Solana hopes to further improve its performance and security.

With its focus on scalability, security, and performance, Solana is looking to become a leader in the DeFi space. The protocol has the potential to become a major player in the blockchain and cryptocurrency industry, and it will be interesting to see how it fares in the coming months and years.