A choice of programming language is not the be-all and end-all of smart contract development. But it does influence the security, efficiency and accessibility of blockchain applications.



Each language comes with its own set of capabilities and limitations that can impact how contracts are executed, the potential for vulnerabilities, and the ease of finding and fixing errors. 



Algorand is becoming the first layer-1 blockchain to adopt Python as its canonical language, in what the Algorand Foundation Chief Technology Officer John Woods calls a “seismic change.”



"Python is a massive step forward on the roadmap towards removing all barriers to entry for developers," said Woods.



With over 10 million developers worldwide, it’s perhaps surprising that the language has been historically overlooked by smart contract platforms, given that the total pool of specialized smart contract developers remains relatively tiny.



Read more: Electric Capital finds veteran Web3 devs are on the rise



Mariano Dominguez, software developer at Vestige.fi, an Algorand-based DeFi dapp, told Blockworks there are a few reasons for this.



For one, “most chains that have a smart contract execution layer operate in a resource constraint scenario that isn't typical in modern development environments,” Dominguez said. “Because of this, it's oftentimes easier and cheaper to build a Domain Specific Language (so Solidity, PyTEAL/TEAL, or Move for example), than it is to integrate a "normal" language since you can exercise these limitations from the get go.”



TEAL was Algorand’s earlier smart contract language and PyTEAL was a mechanism to call TEAL instructions from a Python file.



The difference now, the Foundation told Blockworks, is that native Python is compiled to the bytecode of the Algorand Virtual Machine (AVM), making it compatible with Python-native tooling, including testing suites.



That sets it apart from both PyTEAL and languages like Vyper for the

Algorand courts Python devs in ‘seismic change’

Decentralized Physical Infrastructure (DePIN) project MapMetrics will leave the Solana ecosystem and migrate to peaq, a layer-1 solution designed specifically for DePIN and Machine real-world assets (RWAs).



MapMetrics is a drive-to-earn project that rewards users with tokens and NFTs for providing anonymous live traffic and map data. Similar to DePIN project Hivemapper, the team hopes to create a decentralized global map using Web3 technology. 



Read more: ‘Drive-to-earn’ app aims to bootstrap ‘dynamic maps’ with crypto rewards



Brent van der Heiden, co-founder at MapMetrics, told Blockworks that the decision was made as peaq offered a variety of modular DePin functionality.



“Peaq ID, a decentralized multi-chain machine identity, enables the network to prioritize real machines in times of high load,” Heiden said. “The Modular Functions, such as the DePIN data verification framework, will also help us further expand our DePIN's own features.”



Additionally, Heiden notes there are a handful of potential synergies in the wider peaq ecosystem, including with other DePINs and its enterprise partners, which may enable the team to secure new partnerships to build out demand for the project. 



“Peaq's community includes thousands of DePIN enthusiasts, which will help us grow, and the Machine Composability that comes with using the same identity standard across the ecosystem will help us tap into the pool of devices already on peaq,” Heiden said.



The transition process will be completed over multiple phases, beginning with smart contract deployments on peaq, followed by moving core business logic over to the layer-1. Afterwards, native token minting will also be available on peaq, and a bridging option will be available to existing holders. 



Despite MapMertic’s decision to leave the Solana ecosystem, the blockchain remains a popular home for many DePIN projects today. 



Read more: DePin projects have gained momentum on Solana

MapMetrics ditches Solana blockchain for peaq

Consensys, the company behind MetaMask, filed a lawsuit against the Securities and Exchange Commission in a Texas court on Thursday.



The complaint alleges regulatory overreach by the SEC.



“The US Securities and Exchange Commission seeks to regulate ETH as a security, even though ETH bears none of the attributes of a security — and even though the SEC has previously told the world that ETH is not a security, and not within the SEC’s statutory jurisdiction,” Consensys wrote in the filing. 



The SEC, under Chair Gary Gensler, is allegedly attempting to make a power grab, the company argued. 



“In August 2021, within months of becoming the SEC’s Chair, Gensler vowed to ‘take [the agency’s] authorities as far as they go’ in pursuit of crypto. Soon thereafter, the SEC doubled the size of its crypto enforcement unit and ramped up investigations of participants in the digital asset market,” Consensys said.



Read more: Ether is the Schrödinger’s cat of crypto



The SEC, Consensys continued, already declared that ETH was not a security in 2018. At the time, then-SEC employee William Hinman gave a speech that clarified ETH didn’t constitute a security under the regulator’s rules.



“Recognizing Ethereum’s lack of any centralized managing authority, the SEC’s director of corporation finance stated that ‘current offers and sales of Ether are not securities transactions,’” the suit said. 



“Hinman’s representations about ETH reflected the considered judgment of the SEC and its leadership,” the suit claimed.



The Texas suit also reveals that Consensys was served with a Wells Notice earlier this month, revealing that the agency could take potential action against the company at a later date.



“On April 10, 2024, the SEC staff sent Consensys a ‘Wells Notice’ stating its intent to imminently recommend that the Commission bring an enforcement action against Consensys for violating the federal securities laws

SEC seeks to regulate ETH as a security, Consensys alleges in lawsuit

Global payments company Stripe announced that it was going to start allowing crypto payments on Thursday at the company’s Global Internet Economy conference. 



Speaking at the final keynote, titled the Future of Payments, Stripe’s president John Collison,  said, “our history with crypto goes back a long time.” He cited the company’s now-defunct bitcoin support back in 2018 because it wasn’t being used. 



“We're excited to announce that we're bringing back crypto as a way to accept payments, but this time with a much better experience,” he announced.



Due to the fact that crypto has more use cases and, as Collison’s presentation said, “crypto’s back,” Stripe decided to bring back crypto payments. 



“Crypto is finding real utility,” Collison said. “With transaction speeds increasing and costs coming down, we’re seeing crypto finally making sense as a means of exchange.”



The feature, he added, will be available later this summer. 



The company hasn’t made any crypto-centric announcements since last year. 



Read more: Payment company Stripe enables crypto payouts in USDC



Collison told Axios last spring that the company saw potential in crypto, though it wasn’t going to switch its strategy to focus more on the space.



Collison said at the time that, despite the fact that some of their early crypto products faced a lack of demand, the company was still interested in the role crypto could play in the future.



Just last May, Stripe debuted a fiat-to-crypto onramp.



“The embeddable onramp is helpful for Web3 companies that want to fully customize the branding and customer experience, while the Stripe-hosted option provides an even easier way for users to get started,” the company said in a press release at the time.







Start your day with top crypto insights from David Canellis and Katherine Ross. Subscribe to the Empire newsletter.

Stripe to bring back crypto payments in the next few months

Cryptocurrencies and US equities slipped Thursday morning as economic data fueled concerns of stagflation. 



Gross domestic product (GDP), which broadly measures goods and services produced in the first quarter, increased at 1.6% year-over-year, missing analysts’ expectations of 2.4%, data from the Commerce Department showed. This latest reading is a sharp decline from the fourth quarter of 2023, which showed GDP increased 3.4%. 



Consumer spending also trended lower, increasing 2.5% between January and March, a decline from the 3.4% gain posted in the last quarter of 2023. 



Bitcoin (BTC) and ethereum (ETH) dipped on the report, losing as much as 2% each in the hour after the release. Stocks similarly declined, with the S&P 500 and Nasdaq Composite indexes trading 1.3% and 1.7% lower, respectively. 



“The GDP miss likely took investors off-guard — particularly with how solid some of this year’s economic reports have been and with strength in the labor market,” Bret Kenwell, US investment and options analyst at eToro, said. “It’s not necessarily a report to panic over, but it’s one to pay attention to.”



Traders are now looking ahead to Friday’s Personal Consumption Expenditure (PCE) index, which is the Federal Reserve’s preferred inflation gauge. Expectations are that the headline index will increase 0.3% month-over-month, the same change clocked in February. 



Read more: Former NY Fed compliance chief joins Binance US board



Year-over-year core PCE inflation is supposed to dip slightly from 2.8% to 2.6%. Another disappointing surprise, though, is not unlikely. The Cleveland Fed’s model is showing real-time inflation is closer to 3%. 



Central bankers are not looking terribly optimistic; they opted to increase their economic projections in March to put core PCE annual growth for 2024 at 2.6%, up from their previous prediction of 2.2%. 



“Even the Federal Reserve, yes, they of the ‘transitory’ camp, see no change in

Cryptocurrencies, equities slide on slowing economic growth 

A federally chartered bank is now offering settlement of US dollars and crypto assets for buy- and sell-side institutions. 



Crypto-focused Anchorage Digital unveiled its new settlement network, called Atlas, in a Thursday announcement. Atlas has already settled hundreds of millions of dollars in crypto since its “early access launch” earlier this year, the company said.



Atlas users can access counterparties that include clients of Anchorage Digital and its Singapore subsidiary. On-chain settlement ensures the assets are not commingled and don’t leave on-chain addresses until settlement occurs, according to the bank.



“Atlas participants are not reliant on settlement providers’ books,” a spokesperson told Blockworks. “Our regulatory status and security profile represent a major unlock for institutions, with Atlas advancing a new era for safe and secure settlement across the industry.” 



Initial users of the network include venture capital firm CoinFund and the clearinghouse affiliate of institution-focused crypto exchange EDX Markets, as well as crypto brokerage firm Nonco.



CoinFund President Chris Perkins said in a statement that the network mitigates counterparty risk while “cultivating deep, liquid and accessible markets.”



“Atlas offers the greatest level of security, paired with the best speed and efficiency,” EDX Clearing CEO Tony Acuña-Rohter added. “These features allow us to minimize delivery risk for time-sensitive transactions.” 



Anchorage Digital became a bank chartered by the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) in January 2021 — a distinction the company’s executives and users of the bank have highlighted in recent months.



Anchorage meets the Securities and Exchange Commission’s definition of a “qualified custodian,” CEO Nathan McCauley has said — a term included in the regulator’s February 2023 proposal that would “entrust safekeeping of client assets” to such entities.

Crypto-focused federal chartered bank intros settlement network

The Last Samourai



The government continues to wage a battle against crypto mixers.



The DOJ targeted Samourai Wallet’s co-founders for creating a so-called “haven” for criminals because of the privacy-focused nature of its product.



Users of Samourai Wallet could obscure bitcoin transactions, helping to hide the source of funds. 



The DOJ claimed that CEO Keonne Rodriguez and CTO William Lonergan Hill operated a crypto “mixing service” that executed over $2 billion in unlawful transactions while laundering around $100 million in “criminal proceeds.”



Some of those funds allegedly came from the Hydra Market and Silk Road.



The two execs could each face up to 25 years in prison after both were charged with one count of conspiracy to commit money laundering and one count of conspiracy to operate an unlicensed money transmitting business.



Read more: DOJ arrests founders of privacy-focused crypto wallet Samourai



If these allegations sound familiar to you, it’s because the charges are similar to those made against the co-founders of Ethereum crypto mixer Tornado Cash last year. 



The government conducted a lengthy probe of Tornado Cash before opting to target Roman Semenov and Roman Storm, though the two were also accused of sanctions violations — a charge notably missing from the Samourai case.



Some of the same law enforcement agencies played a role in arresting the co-founders, namely the criminal divisions of the IRS and the FBI. 



But the US wasn’t the only country to take action against both Hill and Rodriguez. Europol, the Icelandic police, and the judiciary police of Portugal took part.



Anyone who tries to visit the Samourai domain is now greeted with a seizure notice, decorated with the badges of the relevant law enforcement agencies. A creepy outline of a person adorns the background. 



In the indictment, the DOJ uses X screenshots in what they say is clearly Hill and Rodriguez operating “accounts that

Empire Newsletter: The war on crypto mixing has a new front

Blockchains as we know them have been around now for over 15 years.



Yet, the applications for interacting with them are still stubbornly hard for the average person to use, despite the many brilliant minds in the industry. This has been a problem for so long that the way we talk about it has become a cliché.



Product teams don’t make the time to think more about mainstream users.



They forget lean-startup principles and their prescribed conversations with actual customers.



They don’t invest the time to convey highly technical details in terms that the general, non-technical populace can understand.



They allow features possibly required for mass adoption — like multi-party computation (MPC) — to languish perennially over the horizon of their roadmaps.



They fail to deliver an end-to-end lifecycle experience that new users can complete in minutes, not hours or days.



These points are all true, but it’s easy to mistake effect for causality. One might hope that incentives would drive product teams to deliver a substantially better product for an emerging market of mainstream users (helping crypto truly “cross the chasm”). 



Instead, they’re driving teams to fight continually over market share among the earliest adopters — the so-called “degens,” who are willing to ape into any new protocol with the most minimum of minimal viable product.



What’s going on here? Why can’t we do better?



Across the retail market, it comes down to one simple fact: The “casino” side of crypto has become too big, trapping teams in short-term ways of thinking with customers who are happy to churn on a moment’s notice.



There’s this elephant in the room. Many of us joined the crypto industry (and specifically the Bitcoin ecosystem) to work on its long-term values and ideals. We were attracted by the society-preserving need for decentralized money and applications that could replace the persistent dominance of Web 2.0 and fiat. This is

Stop chasing degens

BlackRock’s spot bitcoin ETF had tallied net inflows on every trading day since launching on Jan. 11. That 71-day streak has ended, according to Farside Investors data. 



The iShares Bitcoin Trust (IBIT) saw zero net flows on Wednesday — shattering an unprecedented record for a newly launched ETF. 



While IBIT’s run was historic for a fund new to the market, according to Bloomberg Intelligence analyst Eric Balchunas, others had longer streaks after establishing themselves over months and years on the market.



IBIT extended its inflow streak to 71 days on Tuesday, marking the 10th-longest streak of all-time, Balchunas said in an X post. 




$IBIT inflow streak now 71 days which has it officially in the Top 10 all time after passing the ETF One Hit Wonder $JETS (remember JETSanity?). Also passed $BND and $VEA which are cash vacuum cleaners. Lot of mountain still left to climb tho. h/t @thetrinianalyst pic.twitter.com/NpZzgQe4v3— Eric Balchunas (@EricBalchunas) April 24, 2024




But data by London-based asset manager Farside Investors showed that net inflows into IBIT had ceased on Wednesday. 



Only the Fidelity Wise Origin Bitcoin Fund (FBTC) and the Ark 21Shares Bitcoin ETF (ARKB) saw slight inflows on the day, while the Grayscale Bitcoin Trust ETF (GBTC) tallied net outflows of $130 million.



The end of IBIT’s streak comes after two straight weeks of net outflows for the 11-fund segment. 



Read more: Bitcoin ETF snapshot: GBTC drives second straight week of outflows



Still, net inflows into the 11-fund category stand at $12.3 billion in their three-plus months of trading. IBIT alone has gathered about $15.5 billion in positive net flows to mostly offset GBTC’s nearly $17 billion of bleeding.The net money entering IBIT amounted to about 20% of BlackRock’s total ETF net inflows during the year’s first quarter.  



IBIT’s assets under management stood at roughly $17.6 billion, according to BlackRock’s website. That is second in the

BlackRock’s bitcoin ETF inflows halt after 71-day streak, data shows

No blockchain ecosystem is seemingly safe from speculative points farming, and the trend has now come to Bitcoin.



Less than a month ago, Merlin was an also-ran in terms of assets held in Bitcoin sidechains and layer-2s. But after seeing roughly 2,000% growth over the past 30 days, Merlin has over $1 billion in total value locked (TVL), making it far and away the largest Bitcoin sidechain, per DeFiLlama, and more than three times as large as the payments-focused Lightning Network. 



Merlin is now technically the ninth-most capitalized blockchain, with more TVL than established layer-1s like Avalanche and Polygon, DeFiLlama data suggests.



More than half of Merlin’s $1 billion is held in Solv Finance, a protocol that allows users to deposit wrapped bitcoin and receive “Solv Points” in return. Solv and Merlin are running a promotion encouraging users to farm for points and tokens.



In crypto, points refer to valueless participation tallies that often determine allocations in future token airdrops. Following a string of recent airdrops that netted converted points to large sums of tokens related to Solana and EigenLayer, so-called points farming may have found its outlet in the Bitcoin ecosystem.



Read more: DeFi ‘points’ farming has reshaped the crypto investment landscape



Merlin also airdropped its native MERL token to users last week. The token has slumped nearly 40% since being listed on CoinGecko.



Merlin positions itself as a Bitcoin layer-2 solution, integrating zero-knowledge proofs with Bitcoin's blockchain through Taproot. This integration allows the system to enhance transaction privacy and efficiency significantly.



However, unlike Ethereum zk rollups where proofs are verified on-chain, Merlin's proofs are verified off-chain by a decentralized network of oracle nodes before being batched and submitted to Bitcoin's blockchain through Taproot. This off-chain handling of data and proofs ensures scalability and security without

Points farming comes for Bitcoin as Merlin becomes 9th-largest chain

The Department of Justice announced that it was taking action against the founders and CEO of Samourai Wallet, alleging that it operated as a “cryptocurrency mixing service.”



Samourai’s CEO Keonne Rodriguez and CTO William Lonergan Hill were both arrested on Wednesday. 



The wallet startup, founded in 2015, had offered a series of privacy-enhancing features designed to obfuscate the source of funds — tools that prosecutors say enabled criminal activity. The DOJ alleges that Samourai Wallet executed over $2 billion in transactions unlawfully and “laundered over $100 million in criminal proceeds.”



Hill was arrested in Portugal, and US authorities are seeking an extradition. Rodriguez was arrested in the US and will face a judge either Wednesday or Thursday, the DOJ said. 



“In coordination with law enforcement authorities in Iceland, Samourai’s web servers and domain were seized,” the DOJ said. The domain now leads to a page that informs the visitor that it was seized as part of a seizure warrant. 



“Samourai unlawfully combined multiple unique features to execute anonymous financial transactions valued at over $2 billion for its customers.  While offering Samourai as a ‘privacy’ service, the defendants knew that it was a haven for criminals to engage in large-scale money laundering and sanctions evasion,” the DOJ alleged.



Hill and Rodriguez “intended” and knew that “a substantial portion of the funds that Samourai processed were criminal proceeds passed through Samourai for purposes of concealment,” the release continued. 



The official account on X, formerly Twitter, “encouraged” users to “launder proceeds” through the wallet, the DOJ claimed. 



The two were officially charged with one count of conspiracy to commit money laundering — which carries a max sentence of 20 years — and one count of conspiracy to operate an unlicensed money transmitting business — which carries a maximum sentence of five

DOJ arrests founders of privacy-focused crypto wallet Samourai

Decentralized Physical Infrastructure (DePIN) is utilizing blockchain technology to enable users to take ownership of their data.



Tokens incentivize users to provide services in the real world using physical infrastructure and systems. A popular example of a DePIN project today is Helium, a decentralized wireless network.



According to Scott Sigel, the chief operating officer of the Helium Foundation, anybody can buy a helium-compatible gateway — which is similar to a traditional WiFi hotspot in everyday homes — and install it around their properties or in commercial spaces.



Read more: Unlimited Helium Mobile cell plan goes nationwide for $20 a month



Once installed, these hotspots will enable community members to access wireless coverage in their neighborhoods or general vicinity. Those who provide the hotspot themselves will also be rewarded with tokens that they can cash out.



“The economics of building out an IoT network has been historically difficult, and a lot of centralized providers have gone bankrupt in the process,” Sigel said. 



Sigel explains that Helium started 10 years ago and quickly realized that it was extremely expensive, from a centralized point of view, to maintain the cost of real estate and install networks while building out its IoT network. 



“This is something that is the core to DePIN, which is how do you coordinate work in the physical world, and leverage a community to create physical infrastructure?” he said. 



In 2019, Helium launched its decentralized wireless network and quickly grew its coverage worldwide. According to the Helium Explorer, there are currently 392,090 hotspots around the world.



Read more: Helium hotspots go live in bid to turn Miami network profitable



Sigel notes that cellular users, regardless of which network they use, are at the mercy of large telecommunications companies who determine where coverage will be deployed. With Helium, individuals and small businesses have agency to