DIB 30 APR 2024

BTC Daily Intelligence Bulletin (DIB)
Block: 841,506
DTG/ICOD: 0800EST 30Apr24
Precedence: Routine (RR)
Controls: Public Release
QQQQ
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BLUF: China Using Water Cannons in S. China Sea / Attacker Uses Sword in London Streets / Russia Captures US M1 Tank / Protests Continue in US Colleges, Escalating / India Fingered in US Assasination Probe / Russia Looks to Ban all Bitcoin, Crypto / Samourai Founder Pleads Not Guilty, Posts Bail / Hong Kong BTC ETFs Fizzle on First Day / Large Coal Miner Now Mining Bitcoin

Market Data: Price: 1 BTC= $61,175, 26.48 oz Gold, .14 Median US House
24hr Hi: $64,703 / Lo: $61,042
Vol: $30B (Up 41%)
Mkt Cap: $1.2T (Down 2%)
HashRate: 547 EH/s
Avg Fee Rate: 34 sats/vBtye (Up 19%)
Nodes: 18,902

—Reports—
-International Events-
1. Chinese water cannon damages ship in new South China Sea flare-up, Philippines says: The Philippine Coast Guard said the incident occurred as one of its ships and a fisheries agency vessel carried out a “legitimate patrol” near Scarborough Shoal, a Chinese-controlled rocky outcrop 130 miles (200 kilometers) west of the main Philippine island of Luzon and inside Manila’s exclusive economic zone. (CNN)

2. Sword-wielding attacker goes on rampage on streets of London, at least 5 injured: A sword-wielding attacker left five people, including two police officers, hospitalized in east London on Tuesday morning after crashing his van into a house and stabbing people seemingly at random. Police responded to reports of a man crashing his vehicle into a house in Thurlow Gardens just before 7 a.m. and stabbing multiple people, including two police officers. A 36-year-old man was arrested at the scene and taken into custody, the Metropolitan Police said in a statement. (NYPost)

3. Russia ‘Seizes’ Abrams Tank For The Very 1st Time; To Display US MBT As War Trophy At Moscow Exhibition: The first US-supplied M1 Abrams tank was evacuated by troops from the Russian military unit “Center” at the frontlines of the Avdiivka sector of Donbas, Alexander Savchuk, the group’s head of the press center, told Russian state news agency RIA Novosti. (EurAsianTimes)

-US Events-
1. Pro-Palestinian protesters take over Columbia building, barricade doors: Dozens of protesters breached an administrative building at Columbia University early Tuesday morning, barricading entrances and flying a Palestinian flag out a window on the Ivy League campus in Manhattan. The occupation is a dramatic escalation of campus chaos sweeping the nation. The number of arrests in the pro-Palestinian protest movement is approaching 1,000, per AP. (Axios)

2. Reported Indian role in assassination plots a ‘serious matter’, White House says: The Washington Post reported that an officer in India’s intelligence service was directly involved in a foiled plan to assassinate a U.S. citizen who is one of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s most vocal critics in the United States. It said the officer was also involved in the separate shooting death of a Sikh activist last June in Canada. (Reuters)

2. Sanctuary City Chicago: Police Made More Than 1,000 Arrests of Venezuelan Migrants in 2024 So Far: Put another way, while newly arrived Venezuelan migrants make up just 1.5 percent of Chicago’s 2.6 million residents, they have accounted for 11.11 percent of all arrests in the first three months of 2024, when officers recorded the arrestees’ country of origin. (Breitbart)

-Regulatory and Legal-
1. Russia prepares for total crypto ban as geopolitical tensions rise: Russia will enforce a strict ban on the general circulation of crypto assets such as Bitcoin, allowing only digital financial assets issued within its jurisdiction. Anatoly Aksakov, Chairman of the State Duma Committee on the Financial Market, said “Digital financial assets issued in Russian jurisdiction, and digital rubles will be allowed. The need for a ban is due to the fact that today cryptocurrency – is a quasi-currency that replaces the ruble in the country. But only the Russian ruble fulfills the mission of the monetary unit, so this decision has been made.” The law has not been fully adopted yet. (CryptoBriefing)

2. Samourai Wallet co-founder pleads not guilty, released on $1M bond: In an April 29 appearance in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, Keonne Rodriguez pleaded not guilty to conspiracy to operate an unlicensed money-transmitting business and money laundering, and was released on bail. (CoinTelegraph)

-Institutional Concerns-
1. Hong Kong’s six spot bitcoin, ether ETFs see $11 million in volume on first trading day: ChinaAMC’s spot bitcoin ETF led in trading volume, logging HK$37.16 million on the day, and its assets under management reached $121.7 million. In comparison, when the 11 spot bitcoin ETFs began trading in the U.S. in January, their daily turnover reached about $4.6 billion on the first trading day. (TheBlock)

2. MicroStrategy Now Holds $13.6B Worth of Bitcoin, 1% of Total Circulating Supply: MicroStrategy (MSTR) raised over $1.5 billion in the first quarter and used the proceeds to acquire an additional 25,250 bitcoin (BTC) and now owns 214,400 BTC worth around $13.6 billion. MicroStrategy reported a first-quarter net operating loss of $53.1 million after taking a digital asset impairment charge of $191.6 million. At the earnings call yesterday, MSTR confirmed they are not using the new FASB fair-market accounting system yet. (CoinDesk)

-Central Bank Digital Currencies (CBDC)-
1. The ECB Warn That The IPhone Is “Incompatible With Digital Currency”: Apple’s proposed commitments to the European Commission would not give third parties full access to the secure element (SE) in the iPhone. Access to the SE is important in the central bank digital currency (CBDC) context because, as Mr. Cipollone sets out in his letter, access to the SE is vital for mobile device-based offline digital euro payments. (Forbes) (AC- In other words, if the EU can’t access all your phone data, you can’t use that phone with the new Euro CBDC)

-Economic Indicators-
NSTR

-Security Incidents and Concerns-
1. FCC slaps fines on wireless carriers for illegally selling location data: The largest US wireless carriers, AT&T, Sprint, T-Mobile, and Verizon, face nearly $200 million in fines from the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) for illegally selling real-time location information data, which often end going up to “bail-bond companies, bounty hunters, and other shady actors.” (CyberNews)

-Technology-
NSTR

-Bitcoin Community-
1. Coal Mining Giant Enters Bitcoin Mining Sector: NASDAQ-listed coal mining giant Alliance Resource Partners (ARLP) has announced its entry into the cryptocurrency market by investing $30 million in Bitcoin mining. This unexpected step was revealed during the company’s latest earnings call, highlighted by CFO Cary Marshall. (CoinTurk)

2. Bitcoin Testnet Mayhem: Developer Admits Generating Three Years’ Worth of Blocks in Just One Week: Several Bitcoin developers are upset with a Bitcoin enthusiast who admitted “griefing” one of Bitcoin’s testnets. Jameson Lopp, a cypherpunk and founder of digital asset self-custody solution Casa caused havoc when he produced three years’ worth of blocks in just one week. This excessive generation of blocks forced some developers to pause the applications they were testing. (CCN)

-Bitcoin Sentiment-
1. Fear(0)/Greed(100) Index: 67/100 (Even)

Analyst Comments (AC): NSTR

Follow us on NOSTR: @Bitcoin Veterans
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Analyst: BV2A
END REPORT
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*NSTR-Nothing Significant To Report