Web3 is Going Just Great

According to Binance, "As a result of corporate due diligence, as well as the latest news reports regarding mishandled customer funds and alleged US agency investigations, we have decided that we will not pursue the potential acquisition of FTX.com."

FTX is really up a creek. Reports suggest that the hole on their balance sheet is looking like $8 billion, a circumstance that is certainly not improving as FTT prices continue to plummet.

There is still no news about what will happen to Alameda, but the SBF-owned quant firm's website has ominously been taken offline.

Following the report, Binance CEO Changpeng "CZ" Zhao announced they would be liquidating their FTT holdings. CZ also took a shot at SBF's recent controversial policy recommendations, writing, "Liquidating our FTT is just post-exit risk management, learning from LUNA. We gave support before, but we won't pretend to make love after divorce. We are not against anyone. But we won't support people who lobby against other industry players behind their backs."

SBF first appeared conciliatory towards Binance, writing "I respect the hell out of what y'all have done to build the industry as we see it today, whether or not they reciprocate, and whether or not we use the same methods. Including CZ. Anyway -- as always -- it's time to build. Make love (and blockchain), not war." However, he later wrote that "A competitor is trying to go after us with false rumors" and urged that "FTX is fine. Assets are fine."

The government has filed a motion in the case against Ross Ulbricht, the founder and operator of the Silk Road who is serving life in prison, seeking to retain the seized Bitcoin. At the time of seizure in November 2021, the Bitcoin were notionally worth $3.36 billion. On the date the charges were announced, they would be notionally worth $1.06 billion.

Telegram later introduced some of the repossessed usernames for sale as pricey NFTs on their new "collectible usernames" market, dubbed Fragment. Although Durov had claimed that "70% of all Telegram usernames had been reserved in inactive channels by cybersquatters from Iran", and that the only usernames that were "withdrawn" had been out of use, users were given no warning or option to keep their names.

On October 27, Durov announced that "in a few days, we will also introduce the ability for users to sell their existing usernames on Fragment" — unwelcome news for those whose usernames were sold out from under them by Telegram.

Some of the usernames that have sold on the marketplace include brand names like Facebook (which sold for 60,000 TON, or ~$94,200), FIFA (sold for 600,000 TON, or ~$972,000), Amazon (sold for 262,500 TON, or ~$425,000), and Meta (sold for 404,000 TON, or ~$723,000). There is no indication the buyers are necessarily associated with the brands in question. Furthermore, the username marketplace is not available in the USA.

However, the Huobi crypto exchange has claimed that pNetwork's actions were not white hat, and that they profited $4.5 million from their actions. pNetwork rebutted that they had not made any money from the operation, and threatened to sue Huobi over the accusations.

Some traders who attempted to "buy the dip" and profit from the plunge in value of the GALA tokens were also upset with Huobi, when they found that the exchange had replaced their tokens with new, worthless $pGALA tokens.