This Week on Crypto Twitter: More BlackRock Banter as Ripple and Crypto.com Grow Globally

From a market perspective, the biggest talking point in crypto this week is a carryover from last week: the decision of top investment firm BlackRock to apply to the US Securities and Exchange Commission for authorization of a Bitcoin spot ETF.

While the SEC has dismissed such proposals like flies for years, there is a sense that this one is different. It helps that BlackRock—the world’s largest asset manager with a whopping $9 trillion in assets under management—applied for 576 ETFs and was rejected just once.

That air of experience and confidence helped push the price of Bitcoin to a a year long this week.

Footage of BlackRock CEO Larry Fink has made the rounds, where he explains how big a PR boost his company’s Bitcoin pivot has been.

Business analyst and famous crypto fan Adam Cochran bought an unofficial BlackRock NFT to commemorate the occasion.

The BlackRock news may have caused crypto prices to improve this week, but as usual in the cryptoverse, there is also a new pile of skepticism. Earlier in the week, Cochran was seen giving his two cents on a proposal by Ethereum developers to raise the stake required to become a network validator from 32 ETH to 2,048.

Crypto sleuth ZachXBT on Monday shared some of the venomous harassment he faced from people trying to take advantage of him as supporters rallied to fund his legal defense.

Blockchain journalist Colin Wu tweeted about an interesting glitch that recently occurred on Binance.US. The former unshakable Binance is the nabbed of the SEC for securities violations, and cracks reflected its public image after the SEC leaked incriminating chat logs of company personnel discussing how they knew the exchange was violating securities laws.

Like fellow US company Coinbase, Ripple is on a global expansion drive right now—and it has everything to do with the SEC crackdown on domestic blockchain companies.

Bitcoiners took another high-profile convert in Washington on Thursday.

CNBC’s Mad Money Host Jim Cramer had a little rant that day. Cramer used to be all about crypto. but it seems to have cooled down a bit last summer.

Singapore-based exchange Crypto.com on Saturday announced that it has entered Europe.

Alex Gladstein, the Chief Strategy Officer of the Human Rights Foundation, shared a video that day from his organization warning the public about the implications of a centrally issued digital currency—something that could mean the total end of the financial freedom of the people who live. under authoritarian regimes.

Several major companies are dabbling in crypto right now, according to a collaborative report by Coinbase and The Block, tweeted by the latter’s editor Frank Chaparro on Sunday.

Finally, President Joe Biden had something to say about everyone’s favorite crypto-adjacent topic: