The Block

Quick Take Bitcoin is holding around the $44,000 mark, as the cryptocurrency market sees an influx of capital. BTC options open interest hit an all-time high, as derivatives traders bet on a bullish price move in 2024, data suggests.

Quick Take Dimon, who has not been shy in his dismay for crypto, said he would shut down crypto if he was the government. He made the comment when asked by Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass, about anti-money laundering concerns.

Quick Take Versatus Labs (formerly VRRB Labs) has raised $2.3 million in seed funding at a valuation of $50 million. The startup was previously building a Layer 1 network and now has pivoted to blockchain scaling.

Bitcoin’s rise above $44,000 caused about $100 million in short liquidations on centralized exchanges in the past 24 hours.Since the start of December, exchanges have recorded over $260 million in bitcoin short liquidations.

Quick Take Bitcoin developer and co-founder of the Ocean mining pool Luke Dashjr says inscriptions are exploiting a vulnerability in Bitcoin Core to spam the blockchain, having recently implemented a “fix” on the Bitcoin Knots implementation he maintains. Many community members disagreed, saying inscriptions wouldn’t stop amid an ongoing debate surrounding network congestion issues and differing perspectives on how Bitcoin should be used. Meanwhile, inscriptions also appear to be spreading to other chains,

Quick Take The Worldcoin Foundation, a non-profit steward of the Worldcoin project, laid out its thinking around decentralization and gave a first look at its grant program. The blog posts come just a few weeks after Sam Altman, who is also a co-creator of Worldcoin, was dramatically fired and then reinstated as CEO of OpenAI.

Quick Take The design used to create tokens on Bitcoin — in response to a lack of native token support — is now being used to create tokens on other blockchains that already offer native support for tokens. Here’s a look at the impact of this and why this is happening.

Quick Take The word “bitcoin” appeared in 1,074 regulatory filings submitted to the SEC in November, the highest amount ever.

Helium Mobile’s service combines the peer-to-peer Helium Network, an internet-of-things project that uses the Solana blockchain, and a nationwide 5G network.

Quick Take The SEC said it was extending its timeline for a decision on the proposed fund by 45 days to Jan. 25.