Next weeks highlights
January 20
Trump’s inauguration will be held in Washington on January 20 local time ;
SEC Chairman Gary Gensler will leave his position on January 20 ;
The CFTC chairman will step down on January 20, Trump’s inauguration day ;
January 21
MicroStrategy shareholders will vote on plans to increase stock issuance on January 21 ;
South Korea’s FIU will review Upbit’s KYC violations on January 21 ;
January 22
January 23
ANIME is scheduled to launch on January 23 ;
January 24
January 25
The four Solana ETF applications will have their first SEC review deadline on January 25 next year ;
Others (specific time undetermined)
Jupiter: Airdrop claims will be available next week, and users must create a profile page first ;
From January 20 to January 26, more noteworthy events in the industry are previewed below.
January 20
Trumps inauguration will be held in Washington on January 20th local time
Odaily Planet Daily News: The 2025 U.S. Presidential Inauguration, the 60th U.S. Presidential Inauguration and the second inauguration of U.S. President-elect Donald Trump, will be held in Washington, D.C., the capital of the United States, on January 20, 2025 local time.
SEC Chairman Gary Gensler to step down on January 20
Odaily Planet Daily reported that SEC Chairman Gary Gensler will leave on January 20, 2025. (The Block)
CFTC Chairman to step down on January 20, Trumps inauguration day
Odaily Planet Daily News: CFTC Chairman Rostin Behnam will step down on January 20, the day of President-elect Donald Trumps inauguration. Behnam is concerned that the regulation of crypto assets, including Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies, is still insufficient. He said: In the US regulatory system, there is still a large part of the crypto asset field that is unregulated. Given that we have seen the adoption of some traditional financial institutions, retail and institutional investors have huge demand for these products, it is very important to fill this gap. The CFTC is still in a good position to become a spot regulator for crypto commodity assets. (ft)
SEC General Counsel Megan Barbero to Resign on Trumps Inauguration Day
Odaily Planet Daily reported that Megan Barbero, chief legal officer and general counsel of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), will leave next week, joining the wave of departures of senior officials of the agency who have been responsible for legal battles with the crypto industry in the past few years. Regarding Barberos departure, SEC Chairman Gary Gensler said in a statement: Her thoughtful advice and judgment are critical to the Commissions decision-making.
Barbero’s departure is scheduled for January 20, coinciding with the swearing-in of U.S. President-elect Donald Trump. Barbero was the agency’s chief legal officer, responsible for how the legal department handles disputes with crypto businesses in federal courts and advises on its enforcement stance. She has served as general counsel since February 2023. The SEC’s chief of enforcement, Gurbir Grewal, left in October, while accounting chief Paul Munter, who was responsible for the agency’s controversial crypto accounting policies, also announced this week that he was leaving. (CoinDesk)
Cross-chain protocol Orbiter Finance will hold TGE on January 20
According to official news, the cross-chain protocol Orbiter Finance will hold TGE on January 20, and the token will be OBT. Airdrop inquiries are now open, and claims will be open from 14:00 on January 20.
The details of user airdrop qualifications are as follows: the first snapshot of OPoints will be at 20:00 on January 16, 2025, and the second snapshot of NFT will be at 00:00 on January 20, 2025. To qualify as an airdrop recipient, users must have used the Orbiter protocol (cross-chain bridge/ecosystem) for at least 2 months since December 2021 and must have at least 40 OPoints. The OBT airdrop whitelist is also available to Discord Moderators, Ace NFT and Expert NFT holders, and users who receive rewards by participating in specific offline events held by Orbiter.
Odaily Planet Daily News: BitMEX co-founder and Maelstrom Chief Investment Officer Arthur Hayes said at the end of his latest article that the cryptocurrency market will experience a painful crash around Trumps inauguration on January 20, 2025 before entering the crash phase of the bull market. Maelstrom (Arthur Hayes fund) will reduce certain positions in advance and hopes to take them back at a lower price sometime in the first half of 2025.
Arthur Hayes added: If the market breaks out around January 20, we will admit that we were wrong and will lick our wounds and get back on board.
January 21
MicroStrategy shareholders to vote on plan to increase stock offering on January 21
Odaily Planet Daily News MicroStrategy shareholders meeting will vote on the plan to increase stock issuance on January 21, authorizing the number of Class A common shares to increase from 330 million to 10.3 billion shares, and increasing the number of statutory preferred shares from 5 million to 1 billion shares. Analysts expect the stock authorization plan to be approved, which will make MicroStrategys potential outstanding shares potentially exceed all companies except the top four members of the Nasdaq 100 Index (Nvidia, Apple, Alphabet and Amazon).
South Korea’s FIU will review Upbit’s KYC violations on January 21
Odaily Planet Daily News: The Financial Information Analysis Unit (FIU) of the Financial Services Commission of South Korea plans to hold a sanctions review committee against Upbit on January 21. This is due to the discovery of violations of customer identification (KYC) obligations during the on-site inspection of the registration renewal of virtual asset service providers (VASPs). The review results may involve the determination of the amount of penalties and fines for Upbit employees. It is understood that the FIU has been conducting on-site inspections of Upbit since the end of August, and in the process found at least 500,000 to 600,000 cases of suspected violations of KYC obligations. This includes cases where accounts are opened even when the name or registration number on the ID card verified by the customer is blurred and unrecognizable. However, it is not clear whether these cases actually constitute KYC violations. The extent of the fine is also expected to vary depending on Upbits interpretation. The key is the relationship between KYC violations and money laundering.
Industry insiders expect that after this sanction review, the registration renewal process for virtual asset service providers will be gradually advanced. Upbits registration renewal, which was originally scheduled to be completed in October last year, was delayed due to this incident and is still awaiting the results. (ET News)
Judge postpones CFTC vs. Gemini trial to January 21
Odaily Planet Daily News: New York Court Judge Alvin Hellerstein decided to postpone the trial of the civil case between the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) and Gemini Trust to January 21, 2024. The original trial date was January 13. The case stems from the CFTCs allegations against Gemini in 2022, accusing it of providing false or misleading statements to the CFTC when applying to offer Bitcoin futures contracts in 2017. The postponed trial date will coincide with the inauguration of the new president, which may affect the CFTCs position on Gemini and other crypto companies. The court stated that no further postponement will be approved unless there are special circumstances.
Sotheby’s is auctioning 8 NBA Top Shot NFTs, bidding ends on January 21
Odaily Planet Daily News: Sothebys is auctioning eight NBA Top Shot NFTs, each valued between $500 and $3,000, as part of its broader NBA memorabilia sale, a spokesperson said in a statement. The bidding deadline is January 21.
The sale includes digital collectibles from several well-known basketball players, including Jalen Wells, Barb Carrington, Pacom Dadit, and Keyshawn George. Each lot includes highlights from the respective players first NBA game.
January 22
Odaily Planet Daily News: The re-staking platform Swell announced that the Wavedrop 2 checker is now online, and users can now check the rewards they can receive in Wavedrop 2.
Swell also stated that claims are expected to open on January 22, and Wavedrop 1 claims will also be reopened on Swellchain at the same time, which has been suspended to facilitate migration from the mainnet.
Network 3 Token N3 will be available for spot trading on Bybit, Gate.io and BingX on January 22
Odaily Planet Daily reported that according to official news, the decentralized Edge AI infrastructure platform Network 3 will simultaneously launch spot trading of the token N3 on the three exchanges Bybit, Gate.io and BingX at 8:00 (UTC) on January 22, 2025.
Currently, Network 3 is carrying out a Pre-TGE airdrop event, which will give back 50 million tokens to the community. Users only need to log in to the official platform Network 3 official website and complete the designated tasks to get an airdrop quota worth 40,000 points for free. The points will be redeemable for N3 after TGE. In addition, the event also provides NFT acceleration cards to help users improve node mining efficiency.
Network 3 successfully completed a $5.5 million pre-seed seed round of financing on July 23, 2024. Investors include Borderless, E V3 Labs, IoTex, SNZ, Bing Ventures, Waterdrip Capital, Web3Port Foundation and other venture capital institutions.
January 23
Coinbase International will launch AIXBT, PNUT and VET perpetual contracts on January 23
Odaily Planet Daily reported that Coinbase International and Coinbase Advanced will launch AIXBT, PNUT and VET perpetual contracts. The AIXBT-PERP, PNUT-PERP and VET-PERP markets will open at or after 9:30 am UTC on January 23, 2025.
ANIME is scheduled to be launched on January 23
Odaily Planet Daily reported that according to official news, ANIME (Animecoin) announced that the token ANIME will be launched on January 23.
Ethos Network mainnet will be launched on Base on January 23
Odaily Planet Daily News: The mainnet of the on-chain reputation and credit project Ethos Network will be launched on Base at 2:00 on January 23. Officials said that the number of profiles on its test network has doubled in 7 days and has now increased to 118.
January 24
Kenya’s draft crypto legislation will be open for public comments until January 24
Odaily Planet Daily reported that Kenyan Finance Minister John Mbadi recently stated that the government is committed to establishing the necessary legal and regulatory framework for cryptocurrencies.
Kenya is drafting a new proposal titled “National Policy on Virtual Assets and Virtual Asset Service Providers.” The draft proposal outlines plans to create a “fair, competitive and stable market” for cryptocurrencies in Kenya while addressing risks such as money laundering, terrorist financing and consumer protection issues.
“The primary objective of this policy is to guide the development of a fair, competitive and stable market for Virtual Assets (VAs) and Virtual Asset Service Providers (VASPs) in Kenya,” the draft proposal reads.
The draft further proposes to “provide a comprehensive legal and regulatory framework to govern virtual asset activities and virtual asset service providers (VASPs)” and “develop standards and procedures for establishing and regulating virtual asset activities and VASPs.” The draft proposal will be subject to public feedback until January 24. If approved, Kenya will join countries such as South Africa and Nigeria that have already implemented cryptocurrency regulation.
Coinbase International: Plans to suspend FTM-PERP trading on January 24
Odaily Planet Daily News: Coinbase International Station posted on the X platform that Coinbase International Exchange and Coinbase Advanced will suspend FTM-PERP trading at around 10:30 am (UTC) on January 24, 2025. The final settlement price will be calculated based on the average index price 60 minutes before the suspension.
Odaily Planet Daily News: SoSoValue will launch its token next week and start the first season of airdrops. This season, 49 million SOSO tokens will be distributed to community members. This airdrop is divided into three parts:
1. Airdrop 4 million SOSO tokens through the Launchpool platform of cryptocurrency exchange Bybit;
2. Distribute 15 million tokens in the token generation event according to the PoW plan;
3. In the first quarter, 3,000 tokens are planned to be issued between January 25 and February 25 for PoS rewards.
Currently, SOSO has confirmed that it will be listed on Bybit Launchpool and will be open for trading on January 24. (TheBlock)
January 25
Four Solana ETF applications will have their first SEC review deadline on January 25 next year
Odaily Planet Daily reported that Bloomberg terminal data showed that the Solana ETF applications submitted by the four issuers VanEck, 21 Shares, Canary and Bitwise will usher in the first review deadline of the SEC on January 25, 2025.
The 19 b-4 applications of these four institutions were officially accepted by the SEC on November 21, 2024. According to the approval process, the SEC needs to make the first resolution within 45 days after acceptance, which may be approved, rejected or postponed.
In addition, Grayscales previous application for the Solana Trust Fund conversion ETF was submitted earlier, and its first review deadline was January 23, 2025.
Jupiter will host Catstanbul event in Istanbul from January 25
Odaily Planet Daily News Jupiter will hold the Catstanbul event in Istanbul from January 25 to 26, 2025.
January 26
BNB Chain: MVB Season 9 application deadline extended to January 26
Odaily Planet Daily News BNB Chain announced on the X platform that the application deadline for MVB Season 9 has been extended to January 26. Applicants have an additional 2 weeks to submit Web3 projects to obtain guidance, funding opportunities, and expansion tools.
Others (specific time undetermined)
Source: US SEC is ready to promote crypto policy reforms immediately after Trump takes office
Odaily Planet Daily reported that three people familiar with the matter said that senior Republican officials of the SEC are ready to start reforming the agencys cryptocurrency policy as early as next week after Trump takes office. Two of the people familiar with the matter said that the measures being considered by SEC Commissioners Hester Peirce and Mark Uyeda include launching relevant procedures and ultimately formulating guidance or rules to clarify under what circumstances the agency considers cryptocurrencies to be securities, and reviewing some cryptocurrency enforcement cases currently under trial in court. (Reuters)
Jupiter: Airdrop claims will be available next week, users need to create a profile homepage first
Odaily Planet Daily News: Jupiter officials said on X that airdrop applications will be open next week. Users need to create a personal profile homepage first. This homepage will later become the central hub for users to handle any Jupiter-related matters, from airdrop collection to future product releases and other community plans.
Jupiter added that more than 750,000 addresses were identified as bots/sybils. Given the large size of the airdrop (about 10 million addresses), some addresses may have been mislabeled. If you are one of them, you have 3 months to file an appeal.
