The Block

Quick Take Republican presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy, who unveiled his own crypto plan in front of the Texas Blockchain Council last month, was asked on Wednesday about his thoughts on recent developments.

Quick Take Early-access launch follows last month’s nine-day “priority migration” period, where existing v0.1 stakers could transition their staked LINK and rewards to the new version. Eligible participants now have the opportunity to stake up to 15,000 LINK.

Bitcoin traded lower on Thursday as Wall Street showed caution ahead of Friday’s U.S. jobs report.

Quick Take Meanwhile Advisors has launched a bitcoin private credit fund. The fund seeks to raise $100 million and provide institutional investors access to bitcoin with an additional targeted 5% bitcoin-denominated yield.

Quick Take Terraform Labs co-founder Do Kwon will be extradited to the U.S. from Montenegro, according to The Wall Street Journal, which cited anonymous sources. Montenegro’s Justice Minister told people of his plans in private meetings, the paper said.

Quick Take The US Congress released a final National Defense Authorization Act on Wednesday night, which authorizes appropriations for defense-related activities. The package does not include any crypto or blockchain provisions, punting legislation to next year.

Quick Take Sotheby’s has begun its first-ever auction for Bitcoin Ordinals-based NFTs. The online auction features three items from the BitcoinShrooms collection — the first time the works have been made available to the public.

Quick Take Uphold is launching self-custody wallet Vault in beta which will initially support Ripple’s XRP token, with plans to expand to Bitcoin in the beginning of next year. If users lose their private keys, with Vault they “can initiate a key replacement that will enable them to recover access to their assets.”

Quick Take Miners prioritize revenue, making them unlikely to limit Bitcoin inscriptions like Ordinals, which could reduce their earnings, according to Bioniq CEO Bob Bodily. Even if limitations were imposed, alternative methods for data storage on Bitcoin would continue, Bodily said.

Quick Take Babylon has raised $18 million in a Series A round co-led by Polychain Capital and Hack VC. The bitcoin staking protocol is expected to launch “around the next Bitcoin halving.”