🥛 Why DeFi's in trouble...🧐

PLUS: Bitcoin hash rate just hit an ATH                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                 April 08, 2023 | [Read Online]( GM. This is Milk Road. We make you feel the way waking up on a Saturday morning without an alarm feels. Pure…bliss… Here's what we're serving up today: - The U.S. Treasury’s report on DeFi 🗒️ - The Digital Gold Rush ⛏️ - Visual of the day: Bitcoin’s hash rate/difficulty is up 📈 - DOGE disappears from Twitter 🍪 Prices as of 10 AM ET Today's edition is brought to you by [CoinTracker,]( the easiest software for filing your crypto taxes. THE U.S. TREASURY'S REPORT ON DEFI 🗒️ The U.S. government says there’s a new threat to national security… Decentralized Finance. That’s right, the U.S. Treasury just dropped a 42-page [report]( talking all about DeFi and the risks associated with it. Lucky for you, the Milk Man did all the reading so you wouldn’t have to. Here are the top things the U.S. Treasury said: - Criminals, ransomware attackers, scammers, etc. all use DeFi to launder stolen funds. *Cough N. Korea cough* - DeFi is used to launder money because it isn’t regulated. DeFi services don’t follow anti-money laundering (AML) or countering the financing of terrorism (CFT) laws. - The Treasury suggests the U.S. government should look at strengthening these regulations for DeFi services. AKA a new wave of DeFi regulation could be coming soon… So what? This is the first risk assessment ever done by the U.S. government on DeFi. And although there aren’t any new policies going into effect right now, it’s a warning that it could happen soon. Regulators have come after centralized exchanges, stablecoins, NFTs, staking services and now they have their eyes set on DeFi. The government hit crypto with a 4-punch combo and is winding up a haymaker next. We’ve seen what regulatory pressure does to DEXs before. ShapeShift (crypto exchange) added a KYC requirement in 2018 after getting hounded. It lost 95% of its users and has since transitioned back to a decentralized business structure. Here's how people on Twitter are reacting: [tw profile: willywonka.eth ⌐◨-◨ 🦊🚀🌈] willywonka.eth ⌐◨-◨ 🦊🚀🌈 @willyogo [tw] Replying to @willyogo 2/ The report fails to acknowledge the fact that DeFi interfaces are not intermediaries, do not handle user funds, and are in fact not subject to the Bank Secrecy Act. Apr 7, 2023 48 Likes 3 Retweets 3 Replies [tw profile: orlando.btc ⌐◨-◨] orlando.btc ⌐◨-◨ @Orlando_btc [tw] Replying to @Orlando_btc 21/ I read the Assessment as a major warning shot for crypto: The United States is going to be swinging. Remember, everything we've seen so far has mostly been enforcement against CeFi. I think this could be the moment where DeFi fundamentally changes. I hope I'm wrong. Apr 6, 2023 15 Likes 0 Retweets 2 Replies [tw profile: DivXMaN] DivXMaN @crypto_div [tw] This is why I've taken a backseat from DeFi and reduced my accumulation over the last few months. I see the value in certain projects but I see the risk to growth from terrible U.S. regulation and attacks. The Treasury see's it as a threat to the FEDs ability to print money and… twitter.com/i/web/status/1… Watcher.Guru @WatcherGuru JUST IN: 🇺🇸 US Treasury says decentralized #crypto markets threaten national security. Apr 6, 2023 43 Likes 3 Retweets 13 Replies Milk Road Take: Even though this is just a report, it’s still bad news. It’s the U.S. government's warning before it breaks through your front door. It’s the email before they send you the follow up “as per my last email." And although it's up for debate whether DeFi will need to follow these regulations (they don’t handle user funds and aren’t intermediaries so they aren’t subject to certain laws,) it will surely scare away any DeFi services from serving U.S. customers. The kicker in all of this? The government admitted that most money laundering happens using… *drumroll*... fiat currencies. AKA the money they made… [FILE YOUR CRYPTO TAXES WITH COINTRACKER]( It's no secret that everybody fears tax season. Tax-filing is stressful, confusing, and if you're in crypto, where do you even begin?! Back in 2017, crypto investors Jon and Chandan ran into the same problem. They needed a solution based on high-quality coverage and understanding of their transactions. After seeing similar needs across the crypto community, CoinTracker was born. CoinTracker was a quick success and has scaled to 1.7M users since. The reasons are simple: - It integrates with over 500 exchanges, wallets and blockchains to generate compliant tax reports in minutes - Supports advanced use cases such as staking, yield farming and liquidity mining - Automates gain and loss calculations and aggregates all data - Lets users effortlessly onboard their accountants, and in turn, allows accountants to seamlessly invite their clients. Don’t let tax season stress you out. [Sign up for CoinTracker today]( and use coupon MILK at checkout for 30% off your tax plan! GOLD-BACKED STABLECOIN MARKET CAP PASSES $1B ⛏️ Crypto has a new buzzword: tokenized real world assets (RWA.) They’re digital tokens that represent physical items like stocks, commodities, or real estate. Well, one type of RWA just hit a major milestone and passed a $1B market cap: gold-backed stablecoins. That’s enough to fill Scrooge McDuck’s swimming pool. [tw profile: 0x.Walker] 0x.Walker @0x_walker [tw] Comparing the Numbers: $1B in gold-backed stablecoins vs $13.36T in gold market cap. Still early days, but the potential is massive! Apr 7, 2023 2 Likes 0 Retweets 0 Replies How do gold-backed stablecoins work? Each token you buy is backed by an ounce of gold. The physical gold is stored in a vault for you and you’re issued a digital token on the blockchain. This gives token holders all the benefits that blockchain tech provides like transparency, decentralization, and increased security. So what? It’s estimated the RWA market could reach [$16T]( by 2030. And with all the recent U.S. regulations surrounding regular stablecoins, it might push people to look into other alternatives, like stablecoins backed by RWA. RWAs may be shaping up to be the Gold Rush of the 21st century. This time, no need to bring a shovel. VISUAL OF THE DAY: BITCOIN HASH RATE AT AN ATH 📈 Something has been climbing over the last few weeks, and it isn’t the Milk Man’s cookie intake. (summer bod coming soon) It’s… Bitcoin’s hash rate. It just hit a new all-time high (342.16 EH/s.) [tw profile: The Block Intern] The Block Intern @fintechintern [tw] Replying to @fintechintern 2/3 Bitcoin's hash rate is 'up only' 📈 #Bitcoin difficulty and hash rate mark all-time highs as miner revenue increases. Full story: theblock.co/post/225359/bi… cc: @XBT002 Apr 7, 2023 2 Likes 1 Retweets 1 Replies You see, Bitcoin miners all compete to solve complex, computational problems. In return, they get Bitcoin. Hash rate measures how much computational power is being used by Bitcoin miners. It’s a good way to measure the “health” of the mining ecosystem and how active it is. The higher the hash rate, the more mining activity. The lower the hash rate, the less mining activity. I’ll give you a quick analogy…. In 3rd grade, my teacher Ms. Johnson decided to host math challenges during recess. She’d put up some math problems, students would guess the answer, and the first few to guess correctly would win a prize. At first, Ms. Johnson was giving out Tootsie Rolls and Laffy Taffy (yuck). So there were very few students coming in to guess the answers to the problems (AKA a low hash rate.) But then Ms. Johnson started giving out pizza slices and Capri Suns as prizes. All of a sudden, every student turned into a mathematician and tried solving the problems. (AKA a high hash rate) So why is Bitcoin’s hash rate up? Bitcoin has been rallying this year (+69%) and it’s profitable to mine Bitcoin again. AKA there are better prizes now so more people are trying to solve the problems. Overall, this is a win-win for Bitcoin. High hash rates = more active miners = more security for the network. When there are more miners competing, it gets harder & costlier for an attacker to gain control of the network. MILK & COOKIES 🍪 [Days after the change, Twitter just removed “Doge” as their logo.]( The token declined 8% on the change and gave back all prior gains. [Thailand's opposition leader promised a $300 crypto airdrop per citizen if he’s elected Prime Minister in May.]( Going for the Andrew Yang approach. [Kyle Davies is now looking at a cloudkitchen to kick off his new restaurant venture.]( This is right after his OPNX exchange had a meh debut. [OpenEden, the first smart contract U.S. Treasury Bills tokenized vault, went live.]( Bringing risk-free rates to the blockchain. [Russia is the world’s second largest crypto miner.]( The spot was previously occupied by Kazakhstan. [Fidelity and Bank of America bought over $75M of Microstrategy stock in Q1.](Tell me you're into Bitcoin without telling me you're into Bitcoin. MILKY MEMES 🤣 That's a wrap for today. Meet us on Twitter to talk all about it. It’s kinda like a family BBQ but better - no screaming kids, awkward photos, or drunk uncles telling weird stories [(@MilkRoadDaily)]( Share Milk Road You currently have 0 referrals, only 1 away from receiving The Next 10x Opportunity in Crypto for 2023. [The Next 10x Opportunity in Crypto for 2023]( [Click to Share]( Or copy and paste this link to others: [ HIT THE INBOX OF 250K+ CRYPTO INVESTORS Advertise with the Milk Road to get your brand in front of the Who's Who of crypto. The Roadies are high-income crypto investors who are always looking for their next interesting product or tool. [Get in touch today](. What'd you think of today's edition? - [🥛🥛🥛🥛🥛 F**king great]( - [🥛🥛🥛 Meh, do better]( - [🥛 You didn't bring the heat]( ROADER REVIEW OF THE DAY VITALIK PIC OF THE DAY [tw profile: Milk Road] Milk Road @MilkRoadDaily [tw] GM, it's Saturday 😌 Apr 8, 2023 6 Likes 0 Retweets 3 Replies DISCLAIMER: None of this is financial advice. 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