In our last best of the week segment of 2021, let's take a look back at the news stories from the worlds of forex, fintech and crypto this week.

NFTs Trading Volume in 2021 Jumps to $23 Billion

Demand for non-fungible tokens (NFT) has continued to rise in 2021 as the total trading volume for the year touched $23 billion. This is a significant jump from the previous year when a little less than $100 million worth of NFTs was traded.

The number of blockchain addresses engaging with NFTs on a daily basis went up from 5,000 at the beginning of this year to around 140,000 at the year-end.

Read more on the record NFT volumes here.

Consob Blocks 28 Financial Platforms Named in a Police Report

The Italian financial market supervisory, Commissione Nazionale per le Società e la Borsa (Consob), announced on Thursday the addition of another 28 names in its long list of blacklisted financial services platforms.

The latest intervention by the securities market regulator was the result of a report received from the country’s Finance Police. Both agencies have now agreed to collaborate against illegal investment platforms with the formation of a joint workforce.

The latest list includes the names of the financial platforms, mostly related to cryptocurrencies, that are offering services in the country illegally.

However, some of the names on the list are popular names in the industry.

Read more on the Consob blocking spree here.

Weekly Crypto Outflows Hit Record High

Weekly cryptocurrency outflows reached a record high of $142 million. Last week, digital asset investment products saw outflows for the first time in 17 weeks.

However, the latest outflows represent just 0.23% of the overall crypto assets under management (AUM). Bitcoin-related investment products witnessed outflows worth $89 million in the last week. Moreover, Ethereum-related outflows totaled $64 million.

Read more on the record weekly crypto outflows here.

eToro Expects to Close Q4 2021 with 33% Higher Commission Revenue

eToro, which is on its way to becoming a public company with an American SPAC merger, is expecting to close the fourth and final quarter of 2021 with total commissions between $285 million and $295 million.

These latest figures were reported on Thursday to the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) by eToro’s SPAC merger partner, FinTech Acquisition Corp. V (NASDAQ: FTCV).

The anticipated numbers are between 28 to 33 percent higher than the commissions generated by the social trading platform in the third quarter of the year and are even significantly stronger than the $164 million reported in the final quarter of 2020.

However, it is still lower than the revenue it generated in the first two quarters of the ongoing year.

Read more on the eToro Q4 expectations here.

CySEC Withdrew AFX Capital Markets’ License, Fines Directors

The Cyprus Securities and Exchange Commission (CySEC) announced on Thursday that it has withdrawn the Cyprus Investment Firm (CIF) license of troubled AFX Capital Markets Ltd, a decision that was taken by the board back in July.

An investigation of the regulator found multiple compliance violations, including some serious infringements of some provisions, by the former CIF. The decision to withdraw the license was taken as the company ‘no longer meets the conditions under which the authorization was granted’.

Additionally, the regulatory actions were extended to some key board members.

Is 2022 Going to Be the Year of Crypto Regulations?

Whilst small countries are slowly bringing crypto-friendly laws, regulators around the world are now taking more of an interest in crypto regulations than ever before.

In a Finance Magnates analysis with the aid of some expert insights, we delve deep into whether 2022 will be the year of crypto regulations.

Read more on the 2022 crypto regulations debate here.