It's that time of the week when we take a look back at the stories that dominated the worlds of Forex , Fintech and Crypto in our best of the week segment.
Ripple-Backed Tranglo Receives New Approvals from MAS
Tranglo, a leading Asian cross-border payment firm backed by Ripple, announced this week that the company has received new approvals from the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) to provide account issuance, domestic money transfer and e-money issuance services.
In March 2021, Ripple, the San Francisco-based Blockchain company, acquired a 40% stake in Tranglo.
Read more on the Tranglo MAS approvals here.
XRP Crosses $40 Billion Market Cap after GME’s RippleNet Announcement
XRP, the world’s 6th largest cryptocurrency, saw immense retail demand on Wednesday after Global Money Express (GME Remittance) announced that the company has joined RippleNet, the global financial network of blockchain firm, Ripple.
XRP jumped above the market cap of $40 billion as the price of the cryptocurrency touched the high of $0.90 on 11 August.
The price of XRP increased by more than 25% over the last seven days. The cryptocurrency now accounts for nearly 2% of the total market cap of digital currencies. Since the start of 2021, XRP is up by approximately 300%.
Read more on the XRP surge here.
Exness UK Reports a Significant Revenue Jump in 2020
Exness UK, the UK arm of the financial services provider Exness, has released its financial results for the year ended 31 December 2020 today. The multi-asset broker saw a massive turnaround in 2020 as the company reported a significant increase in net assets, trading turnover and profit before tax.
According to the results, the company’s net assets reached $62,293,815 in the year ended 31 December 2020, compared to $4,622,116 in 2019. Exness UK’s profit before tax touched $1.29 million in 2020, compared to a loss of $1.07 million in 2019.
Exness UK posted trading turnover of $1,087,048 in 2020, compared to just $35,297 in 2019. The total income for 2020 also jumped substantially compared to the last year.
Read more on the Exness 2020 revenue jump here.
US Senator Shows Optimism Regarding New Cryptocurrency Bill
Cynthia Lummis, the US senator from Wyoming, highlighted some developments regarding the cryptocurrency bill in the US.
In a statement made this week, Lummis said that the Senators had some productive discussions on crypto amendments in the last few days.
“Right now, we need an agreement on allowing amendments, which is being held up because of conflict between senators over the 30-hour rule, which allows the Senate to consider/read/review a bill for up to 30 hours before voting on it,” she added.
Read more on what Lummis said regarding the cryptocurrency bill here.
Argo Blockchain’s Revenues Increase by 180% in H1 2021
Argo Blockchain, one of the leading cryptocurrency mining firms, this week released its financial results for the six months ended 30 June 2021. The company posted strong growth in revenues and pre-tax profit.
According to the results, the revenue of Argo Blockchain reached £31.1 million in H1 of 2021, which is 180% higher compared to the same period in 2020. The latest jump in revenues was mainly driven by an increase in production and a surge in the price of Bitcoin.
Argo also reported a pre-tax profit of £10.7 million for the first six months of 2021, compared to £0.5 million in H1 of 2020. Earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortization (EBITDA) jumped by 332% to £16 million in H1 of 2021.
During the latest announcement, Argo mentioned that the company mined a total of 883 BTC during the first half of 2021.
Read more on the Argo Blockchain results here.
Binance Terminates Services in Malaysia, South Korea
In a push to comply with local regulators, Binance is restricting its services in Malaysia and South Korea. The exchange is terminating almost all the local services in the two countries, it announced on Friday.
Both in Malaysia and South Korea, the cryptocurrency has stopped offering trading with local fiats and terminated taking deposits with Malaysian ringgit and the Korean won.
Read more on Binance's latest moves here.
XTX Markets Almost Doubles Its Revenue in 2020, Profit Gains
XTX Markets Limited, a London-based multi-asset markets maker, has reported a 92 percent jump in its revenue for the year 2020, ending on December 31, according to its latest Companies House filing.
In absolute terms, the FCA-regulated company generated £651.9 million in revenue last year, compared to the previous year’s £339.8 million.
Read more on the XTX Markets Revenues here.
XTB Gains Regulatory License in South Africa
Poland-based X-Trade Brokers, better known as XTB, have received a new operational license from the Financial Sector Conduct Authority (FSCA), the regulator of the South African financial markets.
As seen on the regulatory registry, the new license was awarded to XTB Africa (Pty) Ltd on August 10, 2021. The Polish broker formed the local South African entity in 2018.
Read more on the XTB South African License here.
UK Authorities Seize $9.5 Million Worth of Ethereum Found in USB Sticks
Greater Manchester Police’s Economic Crime Unit of the United Kingdom has conducted a seizing of around $22.25 million after intelligence inquiries found USB sticks with significant amounts of Ethereum (ETH). According to the announcement made by the officials, investigators found $9.5 million worth of ETH, detailing that $12.7 million was found afterwards, without specifying which kinds of cryptocurrency it was.
The operation was made in the context of a crackdown of a crypto-related scam that operated fake savings and trading service, whose victims were based in the UK, United States, Europe, China, Australia and Hong Kong, the police said. The fraudsters told victims that they were relying on Binance Smart Chain to handle all the transactions.
Read more on Ethereum UK seizure here.
