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Binance Coin Falls Below $210 As BNB Bridge Hacker’s Health Rate Sinks To 0.99

In a complex tangle of smart contracts, governance proposals, and fluctuating crypto prices, the financial health rate of the infamous Binance BNB Bridge exploiter address (0x48…9bec) has fallen below the critical value of 1, hovering at 0.99. This development is of particular interest, given that the address holds a significant collateral of 784,616.10 BNB and a debt position in the form of USDT and USDC totaling $124 million.

The plummeting health rate comes amidst the fall of Binance Coin (BNB) to $207.9, well below the pre-determined liquidation price of $210.80, leading to increased speculation about potential liquidation scenarios.

As per a tweet from blockchain security firm PeckShield: “The health rate of the BNB Bridge Exploiter on Venus is 0.99. BNB has dropped to $207.9. The Venus community has passed a governance proposal to whitelist liquidation of the BNB Bridge exploiter’s position before.”

Liquidation Contingency: The Binance Plan

He Yi, the co-founder of Binance, alleviated some concerns stating, “The BNB collateral of Venus is covered by Binance. When the price of BNB falls, Binance will liquidate it in time. These BNB will not affect the secondary market price, and Binance will be responsible for burning these additional BNB.”

Nevertheless, the crypto community and analysts alike are closely following the situation, speculating on whether Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao, commonly known as CZ, intends to execute the liquidation to remove the illegitimate BNB from the ecosystem.

Renowned analyst Skew remarked regarding the currently ongoing price movements: “”BNB Shorts going at it again + -24% APR (24hr). BNB Aggregate CVDs show takers are net sellers on the day so far. BNB Binance Spot: Quite a lot of spot bids below down to $200, so there will need to be a frenzy of spot selling in order to cause price dislocation or a crash. Large limit buyer has been trying to absorb the sell pressure.”

Crypto influencer MartyParty brought this hypothesis into the limelight, stating, “Is CZ trying to liquidate the Venus loan to burn the 900k illegal BNB? Based on the Venus protocol documentation, the loan would have to be liquidated to burn the illegal BNB. That is the only way to remove it from the ecosystem.”

This liquidity and governance issue comes after an “exploiter” illegally minted 2 million $BNB through a vulnerability in BNB Bridge, which has since been repaired. Of this illegally minted BNB, 900,000 BNB was used as collateral on Venus Protocol to obtain a loan exceeding $150 million in stablecoins, which was then dispersed across multiple blockchains.

On June 12, 2023, a potential liquidation was averted when Binance stepped in to add $30 million in USDT margin, bringing the liquidation price down to $212. Again on August 17, another liquidation was sidestepped, pulling the liquidation threshold down to $210.80 and consequently the health rate to 1.02.

In an earlier reaction to MartyParty’s query, CZ seemed unfazed: “Took me a while to understand (IF I even vaguely understand now). So, Marty is worried about a $30-120m worth re-buy of #BNB? Maybe he should check the last BNB burn? or the #SAFU insurance fund size?”

He also commented on the volatility of BNB, adding, “And where did the $212 magic number come from? #BNB price is determined by the market. A $30m re-buy is less than 4% of a single day’s volume.”

As of this writing, the market is still uncertain, waiting for further signals from CZ, who hasn’t commented on the latest developments. Meanwhile, Arkham Intelligence’s dashboard remains a focal point for real-time updates on the loan status and the health rate of the exploiter’s account. At press time, no liquidation took place yet.

Binance BNB Bridge Exploiter

At press time, the BNB price was at $210.5.

Binance BNB price

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Diamond In The Rough: Solo Bitcoin Miner Secures $160,000 Block Reward

On August 18, a solo miner managed to solve block 803,821, securing a remarkable 6.25 Bitcoin block reward valued at $160,000. This is a very rare event as lone miners have a lower chance of mining a block due to the increase in mining difficulty and this solo miner became the 277th solo miner in bitcoin’s history to achieve this. 

Solo Bitcoin Miner Makes History

The solo miner was able to pull off this remarkable achievement using the Solo CKpool mining service. The miner identified with the tag bc1q2za4ejga366sn288273pty8trasn5zs4y9hqg6 used an S17 Bitcoin Miner with a hash power of roughly 1 PetaHash which is way lesser than most BTC mining entities, as was speculated by Con Kolivas, the administrator of Solo CKpool.

Perhaps the most interesting thing about this development is that the miner achieved this remarkable reward when mining difficulty was almost at an all-time high of 52.39.

Normally, mining Bitcoin with just 1 PetaHash seems impossible compared to other BTC solo miners that were able to pull this off in the past who had hash rate capacity in exa-hashes.

It is almost impossible for a solo miner to solve an entire block on their own, due to the increased popularity of BTC mining and the persistent rise in the network hash rate and powerful mining equipment. 

BTC miners are required to input computational power to solve and add the next Bitcoin block to the network, which creates a valid block hash while using the computational power of multiple mining rigs.

However, since the miner was using the Solo CKpool, it allows miners with outdated or inefficient equipment to pool their mining power together, increasing their chances of solving a block, which is what happened here. In their case, this miner was able to retain 98% of the reward. 

Bitcoin price chart from Tradingiew.com

The miner now joins two other solo miners who have been able to achieve this impressive feat in March and June this year using a Solo CKpool and is the third time this is happening so far in 2023.

Rise In Hashrate Triggers Surge In Mining Difficulty

Over the last few months, the Bitcoin hashrate has been rising rapidly, eventually hitting an all-time high in July. In response to this, the mining difficulty surged quickly and touched its own ATH in the same month.

By July 8, the Bitcoin mining hashrate was at 538.05 EH/s and difficulty surged to 53.9112T a few days later on July 12. However, since then, it has tapered off with hashrate dropping 26% to 424.76 EH/s and difficulty dropping around 3% to 52.39T.

Bitcoin mining difficulty

Nevertheless, both the Bitcoin hashrate and difficulty are significantly higher compared to the start of 2023, which makes the solo miner’s achievement even more impressive. However, as hashrate and difficulty continue to rise, such occurrences are expected to be fewer as miners with large hashrates dominate the market.

In the end, the winner is the Bitcoin network which becomes stronger for it with the increased hashrate. It is also beneficial to BTC investors as a rise in hashrate suggests there is more interest in the digital asset and this can convert to higher prices for the cryptocurrency.

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XRP Whales Accumulate, Can Price Recover Now?

On-chain data shows the XRP whales have been sharply accumulating recently, something that can help the price recover.

XRP Whales Have Continued To Expand Their Holdings Recently

According to data from the on-chain analytics firm Santiment, the largest of the XRP investors have been buying in recent days. The relevant indicator here is the “Supply Distribution,” which tells us about the total amount of the asset that each holder group in the market is carrying in their combined wallets right now.

The addresses or investors are divided into these groups based on the total number of coins that they are currently holding. The 10-100 coins cohort, for instance, includes all holders who own at least 10 and at most 100 XRP.

In the context of the current discussion, two such groups are of interest: 10 million to 100 million coins and 100 million to 1 billion coins. The combined range of these groups has a lower bound of $5.22 million at the current exchange rate, while the upper bound converts to $522 million.

This means that the members of both these groups are the whale entities, with the latter cohort naturally carrying the largest of holders even among these humongous investors.

Now, here is a chart that shows the trend in the XRP Supply Distribution for both of these whale groups over the last few months:

XRP Whales

As displayed in the above graph, the XRP Supply Distribution for the smaller of the two cohorts (that is, the 10 million to 100 million coins group) has been rising for a while now. This means that these whales have only continued to buy more as the asset’s price has observed an extended drawdown.

This behavior hasn’t changed with the latest sharp plunge in the cryptocurrency, either, as the metric has now risen toward the 5.1 billion mark.

The largest of whales (100 million coins to 1 billion coins), on the other hand, started to actively dump their coins not too long after the coin hit its top in July. They continued their selling until the recent crash, but following it, they have changed their tune and have participated in some pretty significant accumulation.

This is naturally a positive sign for the cryptocurrency, as it means that these humongous whales believe that the current lows should prove to be a profitable buying point.

With this accumulation spree, this cohort as a whole now holds an 11 billion tokens stack. This means that these two whale cohorts combined now carry around 16.1 billion coins of the asset, worth around $8.4 billion.

It’s uncertain whether XRP would recover anytime soon, but the buying from the whales is at least a sign that these humongous entities would be supportive of such a move if it happens.

XRP Price

At the time of writing, XRP is trading around $0.52, down 17% in the last week.

XRP Price Chart

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How High Can Shiba Inu (SHIB) Rise When Shibarium Restarts?

Shibarium, the much-anticipated layer-2 network of Shiba Inu is back online but remains under the radar, confined to an extensive private test phase. Shytoshi Kusama, the project’s lead developer, unveiled this update on Saturday. In his remarks, Kusama assured the community that they have resolved all technical challenges previously encountered on this layer-2 platform.

Kusama mentioned, “Shibarium is currently live (but in private mode) producing blocks as normal.” He further emphasized the importance of ensuring optimal scaling and functionality before a public re-release, suggesting that the SHIB development team is prioritizing caution above all.

Notably, Shibarium’s initial launch wasn’t without its issues. Block production had come to a standstill on the network just last week. Shibariumscan, the network’s designated explorer, indicates that the most recent block on the Shibarium mainnet was produced on Thursday.

However, among the many challenges faced, the most significant was the unexpected trapping of 965 ETH, valued approximately at $1.7 million during that period. The predicament arose because of the massive, unexpected influx of traffic on the network immediately post-launch, with 1000 ETH tokens and 600,000 BONE tokens deposited within the first 15 minutes alone. This rush resulted in Shibarium recording over 160 million compute units in merely half an hour.

Kusama, providing a silver lining, stated that they’ve since amplified Shibarium’s scaling and capacity by a staggering 1,500%. With such promising advancements and the dedication shown by the team, many Shiba Inu enthusiasts are ardently waiting for Shibarium to open its gates to the public.

How High Can Shiba Inu Surge Post Shibarium Restart?

The ripples of the Shibarium launch and its subsequent hiccups are vividly evident in SHIB’s recent price dynamics. A euphoric surge was observed around August 12, where SHIB’s price ascended to a 4-month high at $0.00001134. However, post the Shibarium’s temporary freeze, SHIB’s value plummeted sharply. This decline was so drastic that SHIB’s price slid below the support levels of all major daily moving averages.

The meme coin’s recent trajectory saw it dwindling precariously close to the 78.6% Fibonacci retracement mark at $0.00000717 just last Thursday. However, SHIB price managed to claw its way back, finding support above the 61.8% Fibonacci retracement level pegged at $0.00000806. A brief bounce was witnessed, but resistance at the 50% Fibonacci retracement level and the 100-day EMA at $0.00000869 thwarted its progress, causing it to retrace its steps back towards the 61.8% level.

With the potential public restart of Shibarium on the horizon, there’s a beacon of hope for SHIB’s price. A successful relaunch might propel SHIB to soar by 37% and retouch its 4-month peak at $0.00001134. But this ascent won’t be without challenges.

The Shiba Inu price will need to navigate a maze of resistance, most notably the area between the 100-day EMA at $0.00000867 and the 50% Fibonacci retracement level at $0.00000869, the area between the 200-day EMA at $0.00000932 and the 38.2% Fibonacci retracement level at $0.00000931, and the 23.6% Fibonacci retracement level at $0.00001009.

Shiba Inu price SHIB

 

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XRP Price At A Crossroad: Will $0.5 Support Trigger A Correction Shift?

XRP, the cryptocurrency associated with Ripple, faced a tumultuous ride in recent weeks as its price witnessed a significant downturn. However, an interesting turn of events has unfolded as the coin found solace at a crucial support trendline coinciding with the psychological level of $0.5. 

This fortuitous alignment has offered XRP bulls a potential launching pad for a counteroffensive, raising questions about the possibility of a recovery.

The value of XRP soared after a groundbreaking legal verdict that classified the token as not being a security in the protracted legal feud involving Ripple and the US Securities and Exchange Commission. This decision initially propelled XRP to higher valuation grounds, signaling optimism among investors. 

However, the enthusiasm proved to be short-lived as the cryptocurrency faced a noticeable drainage of capital. As of the latest available data, XRP’s market capitalization stands at $28.26 billion, witnessing a decline of $14.63 billion since the post-SEC ruling peak of $42.89 billion on July 14.

Boosted By Legal Victory, Subdued By Capital Outflow

The decline in XRP’s market capitalization can be attributed to an amalgamation of influences. Notably, traders who benefited from the initial surge in prices opted to take profits, inducing a downward pressure on the coin’s value. 

The inherent volatility of the cryptocurrency market also played a role in amplifying these fluctuations. Additionally, lingering apprehensions surrounding the regulatory outlook of XRP’s long-term status added to the uncertainty, potentially dissuading potential buyers from committing to the coin.

XRP: Path To Recovery

As the market assesses the course ahead for XRP, technical analysis offers insights into potential inflection points. To dismantle the impact of the previous price breakdown, buyers are looking to breach the $0.5948 high achieved on August 17.

Such a breakthrough would disarm sellers and could provide the momentum needed to drive the price toward recovery. In this scenario, with the current price of XRP at $0.534, XRP’s journey could see a resurgence towards $0.667, followed by aspirational targets of $0.854 and $0.933.

XRP’s recent price trajectory has been marked by oscillating sentiments, ranging from elation due to a favorable legal outcome to a subsequent exodus of investment capital.

However, the cryptocurrency appears to have found a stabilizing foothold as it aligns with a crucial support trendline at the $0.5 psychological level. 

The market’s focus now shifts to the battle between buyers and sellers, as investors watch for a potential rebound from the recent dip. 

(This site’s content should not be construed as investment advice. Investing involves risk. When you invest, your capital is subject to risk).

Featured image from CryptoTicker