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Welcome to The Protocol, CoinDesk's weekly wrap-up of the most important stories in cryptocurrency tech development. I'm Ben Schiller, CoinDesk’s Opinion and Features editor.In this issue:Sony’s blockchain faces memecoin controversyBubblemaps readies BMT and new intel deskBabylon enhances Bitcoin’s interoperabilityProsecutors seek 95k BTC Bitfinex returnThis article is featured in the latest issue of The Protocol, our weekly newsletter exploring the tech behind crypto, one block at a time. Sign up here to get it in your inbox every Wednesday. Also please check out our weekly The Protocol podcast.Network newsSONY EMBRACES BLOCKCHAIN, BATTLES MEMES: Sony, the 78-year-old Japanese electronics giant, is the latest legacy megacorp to explore blockchain technology. On Tuesday, the company announced that it is officially launching "Soneium," its general-purpose blockchain platform built on Optimism's...

XRP, the native token of the XRP Ledger network closely related to Ripple, surged to a six-year high on Wednesday as bitcoin (BTC) rallied to $100,000, with traders encouraged by this morning's highly-anticipated U.S. CPI inflation data report.The token briefly topped $3 during early U.S. trading session for the first time since early 2018 January, before slightly paring gains. Recently changing hands at $2.95, it was 11% over the past 24 hours, outperforming bitcoin's (BTC) 3.6% and the broad-market benchmark CoinDesk 20 Index's 6.7% advances during the same period.XRP has been among the best-performing tokens, with a 488% gain since Donald Trump's election victory. It has now become the largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization behind BTC and Ethereum's ether (ETH),...

With only a handful of days remaining until the second inauguration of U.S. President-elect Donald Trump, crypto policy groups are readying to kick things into higher gear.Blockchain associations from eight U.S. states announced on Tuesday the creation of the North American Blockchain Association (NABA), an organization aiming to provide cohesive crypto policy recommendations to the federal government.“A few years ago Arry Yu and I led an effort to provide more information and best practices sharing between state associations,” Lee Bratcher, president of the Texas Blockchain Council and a member of NABA’s board of directors, told CoinDesk. “NABA is the formalization of that process in which each state association is independent and retains agency but can act in concert with...

On Jan. 20, 2025, the United States will start a new chapter in more ways than one. While the nation will be focused on President Trump's inauguration as our 47th President, the U.S. financial sector will be celebrating the resignation of Joe Biden's Securities and Exchange Commission Chair, Gary Gensler.As a member of the House Financial Services Committee, I am well aware of Gensler's heavy-handed approach in stifling innovation and shackling the American economy's engine. His punitive stance was particularly damaging in the burgeoning field of cryptocurrency and blockchain technology.While touting his actions as measures to protect investors, Gensler leveraged contrived ambiguity to undermine the growth and technological advancements that make U.S. markets competitive and drive promising projects offshore, including...

Last June, a sailing buddy (and aerospace engineer) asked if I could check out a family friend’s “bitcoin.” He forwarded me an image of a plastic bitcoin wallet held with a private key partially obscured. The family friend had received the card as some sort of “gimmick at a conference” and tossed it in a drawer.This is one of those moments where I find imposter syndrome perched on my shoulder, nodding its head, lips pursed. Two years in the business preceded by another two monkeying around in my personal account didn’t give me nearly enough crypto cred to say, “Oh, yeah, wow. I remember these.” Fine, I’m a noob. I made a no-promises disclaimer and quickly changed the subject.Back home,...