TL;DR: Welcome to In Case You Missed It (ICYMI), a daily crypto news update. Jack Dorsey wants to decentralize Twitter. BitMEX faces new $300 million lawsuit. Circle hit with more layoffs. Shopin CEO charged with running a fraudulent ICO. NY to change the listing procedure for tokens, and solarisBank debuts German custody solutions.



Jack Dorsey Talks Twitter Decentralization Plans

Twitter is funding a small independent team of up to five open source architects, engineers, and designers to develop an open and decentralized standard for social media. The goal is for Twitter to ultimately be a client of this standard. 🧵 — jack 🌍🌏🌎 (@jack) December 11, 2019

Jack Dorsey, CEO of Twitter, announced plans to transition to a more decentralized approach for the microblogging site. Dorsey is hiring a group of “open source architects, engineers, and designers” called BlueSky to build a protocol designed to make social media platforms decentralized using blockchain. However, Dorsey recognized it “will take many years to develop a sound, scalable, and usable decentralized standard for social media.”



BitMEX Facing New $300 Million Lawsuit

BitMEX, the cryptocurrency exchange helmed by Arthur Hayes, is facing a $300 million lawsuit from a supposed angel investor who was allegedly given false information. Frank Amato and RGB Coin Ltd. made allegations they were one of the first seed investors for the exchange, back in 2015, with an investment of $30K. This investment was to be reimbursed with equity valued at more than $50 million today. Amato is suing in California to get more than $50 million in equity and $250 million in compensation for damages.

Circle Hit With More Layoffs

Circle, the crypto exchange and payment processor, has been hit with more layoffs only one week after its co-CEO Sean Neville retired from his position. “As we continue to focus on advancing our stablecoin business strategy, we’ve streamlined some departments and eliminated about 10 roles,” a spokesperson declared. This is the second round of layoffs the exchange has faced this year, after laying off 30 employees in May due to regulatory uncertainty and market behavior, representing 10% of the workforce at that time.

Shopin Charged With Running a Fraudulent ICO

Shopin, a blockchain startup, and its founder Eran Eyal, have been charged with defrauding hundreds of investors by running a fraudulent ICO. Shopin gathered more than $40 million dollars from investors to build personalized, blockchain storing buyers’ profiles, but never delivered a working product. Also, the startup announced fake partnerships with well-known retailers to sway investors to put money behind the project. Eyal is also being accused of misappropriation of funds, using $500,000 to run a dating service.

NYDFS fo Change Procedures for Listing Tokens

The New York Department of Financial Services published a new guidance document regarding the adoption and listing of virtual currencies for licensed exchanges. The NYDFS is proposing to streamline the process of adding new tokens to exchanges, a process carried out today on a coin by coin basis. The first proposal would list all currencies accepted by the institution on a web page available to consult, and the other proposal is a revised framework for businesses to list new currencies depending on their use case.

solarisBank Launches Custody Solution in Germany

solarisBank, a bank involved with “blockchain bank” Bitwala, the first banking-related crypto offering in Germany, is launching a cryptocurrency asset custody solution that will be available for all of their partners. solarisBank Digital Assets includes a full cryptocurrency storage solution that will only need to be complemented by the UI’s of their partners. The custodial solution safeguards private keys on a distributed security cluster designed to keep assets safe.

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