Good Morning, Bitcoin - Saturday, December 14th, 2024

GM. We have sold our first newsletter shoutout reward via Geyser, so this special weekend's edition of the GM report comes courtesy of SoundMoney=Prosperity4ALL, who has the following message to share.

"Pres. BIDEN: FREE ROSS <<<YESTERDAY>>>! No Bullshit Bitcoiners: keep up your GREAT work! It is one of my daily must-reads (even tho' i sometimes miss a day) THANKS!" - @SoundMoney=Prosperity4ALL

What's new

• Bitcoin ATM operator Byte Federal reports data breach affecting 58,000 users. The breach occurred on September 30 and was discovered by Byte Federal on November 18.

"Customer personal information that was subject to the attempt at unauthorized access includes name, birthdate, address, phone number, email address, government-issued ID, social security number, transaction activity, and photographs of users," said the company.

• Coinbase user gets 2 years in prison for filing false tax returns. Frank Richard Ahlgren III, a bitcoin investor since 2011 from Austin, Texas, has been sentenced to two years in prison for intentionally underreporting capital gains from the sale of $3.7 million worth of bitcoin.

"This case marks the first criminal tax evasion prosecution centered solely on cryptocurrency. As the prices for cryptocurrency are high, so is the temptation to not pay taxes on its sale. Avoid the temptation and avoid federal prison," said Acting Special Agent in Charge Lucy Tan of IRS-Criminal Investigation (IRS-CI)’s Houston Field Office.

• Chainalysis claims cryptocurrency funds Syrian rebels. The blockchain surveillance firm reported that Syria's Hayʼat Tahrir al-Sham used cryptocurrencies after overthrowing Assad on December 8th. It identified four donation addresses linked to campaigns and a sanctioned individual's address, but did not disclose transaction volumes, reports L0la L33tz for The Rage.
• The Kenya National Fire Brigades Association establishes Bitcoin reserve. Proof of Workforce, a U.S. nonprofit promoting Bitcoin adoption among unions and workers, facilitated a donation to strengthen Kenya’s firefighting services.

• Riot Platforms buys additional 5117 BTC. The company bought 5,117 bitcoin for $510 million, raising its total holdings to 16,728 BTC as of December 12.
• Bitcoin Strategic Reserve bill in Texas. The Texas House introduced a bill to create a strategic Bitcoin reserve. The proposed bill would enable the state to accept taxes, fees, and donations in bitcoin, which must be held for at least five years.
• Vancouver city to study Bitcoin integration. On December 11, Vancouver City Council approved a motion to study Bitcoin integration. Supported by Mayor Ken Sim, the initiative explores accepting bitcoin for taxes and services and possibly converting part of the city's reserves to bitcoin.
• Australia: AMP becomes the first national pension fund to invest in bitcoin. The institution allocated $27 million back in May, when it traded at ~$60,000 per coin. The sum represents 0.05% of its $57 billion in assets under management.
• Ukraine bill seeks to legalize bitcoin by early 2025. Ukraine is drafting a bill to regulate bitcoin by early 2025, involving a parliamentary group, the National Bank, and the IMF, according to Ukrainska Pravda.

"In consultations with European experts and the IMF, we are taking a very cautious approach to using cryptocurrencies for tax exemptions, as it could potentially facilitate tax evasion in traditional markets," Danylo Hetmantsev, head of the Ukrainian Parliament's Committee on Finance, Tax, and Customs Policy told The Block.

• BlackRock recommends 2% bitcoin allocation in 60/40 portfolios. The world’s largest asset manager recommends a 1–2% bitcoin allocation in multi-asset portfolios, according to a December 12 paper.
• PlebLab announces season 2 of Top Builder 2025. Top Builder is a 3-month global competition for teams to create impactful Bitcoin solutions with mentorship, collaboration, and innovation. Apply and start building here.

Use the tools

• Ashigaru v1.1.0 implements automatic updates of Tor onion services, removing all dependencies and reliance on DNS from the app, overhauls the Settings screen user interface, introduces new transaction alerts, and more.
• Zero fee playground by Super Testnet is a site for trying out zero fee Bitcoin transactions. Read more about it here.
• Fedi app v1.20.6 fixes a few bugs and makes it easier to press chat buttons and rename group chats.
• Blockstream Green Android v4.1.0 has been released.
• Lightstack by massmux implemented the ability to add multiple stacks to the same server by using automagic automation.
• Amboss launched Magma AI - the first machine learning-powered channel recommender. Learn more about it here.
• BraiinsOS Bitcoin Dashboard v24.12 for Mini Miners introduces new scenes such as Information Overload, BTC Graph, and Network, adds a pickaxe mining indicator, and provides chip efficiency and consumption data.
• Coracle v0.5.0, comes with reworked login and onboarding experience, performance improvements to feeds and relay-based feeds, undo option via delayed send, nostr-editor for smoother note/reply editing experience, and more.
• GDK v0.74.1 pre-release is now available.
• Nutstash v2.0.2 adds Cashu payment requests, improved wallet file export, mint and unit swaps, improved UX, and bug fixes.
• Tando.me is a new Kenya-based payments app that allows users to spend their sats with merchants who don’t accept bitcoin. Learn more about it here.

• SimpleX Chat v6.2.1 has been released with fixes and small improvements.
• GrapheneOS v2024121200 is the latest release of an open-source, privacy and security-focused mobile operating system based on the Android Open Source Project (AOSP).

Other stuff

• Bitcoin Optech #333 covers vulnerabilities in old LN implementations and Wasabi, discusses LN channel depletion, includes a poll on covenant proposals, describes two incentive-based pseudo-covenants, and summarizes the latest Bitcoin Core developer meeting.
• Financial Freedom Report #53 by The Human Rights foundation is available here.
• Stacker.news user nout wrote a tutorial for Nostr zaps using Coinos.io, Nostr Wallet Connect (NWC), and Amethyst.

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