Fazzaco Weekly Digest: July Spot Trading Volume of Top 10 Crypto Exchanges; FTX Founder SBF Sent to Jail; Cboe's Executive Moves

Last week, Fazzaco compiled July transaction data for the top 10 crypto exchanges, observing that the spot trading volume of most cryptocurrency exchanges such as Binance, Coinbase, and OKX have generally declined, but Huobi and Upbit have achieved contrarian growth.

The crypto industry has been "buzzing" over the past week. Sam Bankman-Fried, the founder of FTX, has finally been busted after more than half a year of battle with the courts. Binance shut down its crypto payments infrastructure, Binance Connect, citing it as the result of its "periodical review".

Furthermore, the Singaporean police last week arrested 10 foreign nationals suspected of money laundering and seized assets worth about S$1 billion ($735 million) including cryptocurrencies.

Apart from crypto industry, executive changes in the Cboe derivatives market has also attracted great attention from the industry.

It is also worth noting that Fazzaco has analyzed the evolving trends and dynamics within the retail FX market during June 2023 based on the recent monthly report published by the CFTC.

Here are the related details, as well as some of the most read forex, crypto, and fintech news pieces and articles from Fazzaco over the past week.

1. Top 10 Crypto Exchanges See July Spot Trading Volume Decline, But Not Huobi and Upbit​

Fazzaco summarized the spot trading volume data of the top 10 cryptocurrency exchanges for one month since July 2023. The data shows that the spot trading volume uptrend that appeared in the crypto circle in June only lasted for one month and then went down again. However, since July, the decline of the top 10 cryptocurrency exchanges has not been large on average, and Huobi and Upbit have achieved contrarian growth.

Overall, as the cryptocurrency trading volume declined generally in July, BTC's annualized volatility dropped to the lowest point of this quarter. The slowdown in trading volume in July mainly came from the second half of the month.

2. Listen to the Article: FTX's Ex-Boss SBF Back in Headlines! How Did He Get His Bail Axed?

Sam Bankman-Fried (SBF) is heading to jail. Yes, you heard that right, the notorious crypto con artist of last year, SBF, is finally getting busted, even after he forked out a staggering bail of $250 million, he still landed behind bars.

(Fazzaco has been tracking and reporting on this event since FTX ran into a liquidity crisis last November, and launched a special feature FTX Collapse: Shock and Aftermath)

3. Binance Shuts Down Its Crypto On-Ramp and Payment Infrastructure, Binance Connect​

Binance Connect, the regulated buy-and-sell crypto arm of the Binance exchange, has shut down, as reported.

The same day, BNB Chain-based decentralized exchange Biswap tweeted that Binance "has made a difficult decision to disable @Binance_Connect on 15 August due to its provider closing the supporting card payments service."

4. Cboe Global Markets Names Mandy Xu as Head of Derivatives Market Intelligence

Cboe Global Markets, the world's leading derivatives and securities exchange network, announced the appointment of Mandy Xu as its Vice President and Head of Derivatives Market Intelligence.

In her new role, Xu will be responsible for producing high-level insights and analysis on derivatives market themes and flows, with a focus on furthering client education about Cboe's markets and its leading suite of derivatives products.

5. Singapore Busts $735M Alleged Money Laundering Case Involving Crypto​

Singaporean police Tuesday arrested 10 foreign nationals on suspicion of money laundering and seized assets worth about S$1 billion ($735 million) including cryptocurrencies, the police said.

In a statement on Wednesday, the police said it had arrested 10 people, most of whom possessed Chinese passports, for their suspected involvement in offenses of forgery, money laundering and resistance to lawful apprehension.

6. Advanced Markets and Takeprofit Tech Team up to Improve Liquidity Offering​

Advanced Markets Group, a renowned institutional liquidity and prime-of-prime brokerage organization, announced a partnership with Takeprofit Tech, a leading provider of financial technology solutions.

The collaboration aims to improve liquidity access for retail FX brokers and fund managers globally by harnessing the advanced capabilities of Takeprofit Liquidity Hub – an order management system for liquidity aggregation, regulation of streams and risk management – in combination with Advanced Markets' liquidity solution, Liquidity Pool.

7. CFTC-Registered Brokerages Experienced a 3.16% Decline in FX Funds in June 2023​

According to the recently published monthly report by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), retail FX deposits experienced a decline of 3.16 percent in June 2023 compared to the previous month. This decrease reflects the evolving trends and dynamics within the retail FX market during that period.

The report encompasses data from registered Retail Foreign Exchange Dealers (RFEDs) and broker-dealers that hold retail Forex obligations in the United States, such as Gain Capital Group LLC, IG US LLC, Interactive Brokers LLC, OANDA Corporation, CHARLES SCHWAB Futures & Forex LLC, and Trading.com Markets.