Rappi is one of the most popular Latam delivery services. Rappi, which last year achieved a valuation exceeding $5 billion in its Series G financing round, announced that customers will be able to use cryptocurrency as a payment method. Customers can purchase Rappi credit directly through the app.

The Rappi credit can then be used for payment of delivery services through the app. The company was founded in Colombia and became the first unicorn in Colombia in 2018. It is now present in nearly all of Latam including Mexico, Costa Rica (Costa Rica), Colombia, Peru Ecuador, Chile, Argentina and Uruguay. Rappi stated that the new pilot project would only be available to Mexican users, and did not mention an expansion.

The inclusion of cryptocurrency addresses the rise in the digital world as well as the need for new ways for users of the app to interact. Sebastian Mejia (president of Rappi, ) spoke out about the importance of innovation for the company’s future.

Rappi’s pillar is innovation. We are interested in the crypto industry and believe the future lies in the interconnection of crypto and non-crypto companies. This will allow for simple user experiences without complexity.

Implementation and other Instances of Crypto Integration

Although the pilot project is still in its infancy, the company announced that they are working with local exchanges to integrate their services and make it easier to use the app to transfer cryptocurrencies. Rappi mentioned Bitso (an exchange with a presence here) as potential participants.

Rappi explained that the company is working on improving the security of transactions between exchanges and the app. Others in Latam are also looking to incorporate crypto into their business models. Nequi, a Colombian fintech platform, is preparing for a entry into the crypto sector.

Japan is going to tighten regulations regarding cryptocurrency exchanges amid concerns that Russia’s elites might use cryptocurrencies to bypass international sanctions. These platforms will have to verify that transactions recipients are not subject to financial sanctions.

According to Japan Today, the amendments to the country’s foreign exchange law and trade law will introduce this obligation. According to the publication, the revision will also prevent sanctioned entities and individuals from transferring crypto assets to third-party accounts.

Russia is now facing severe sanctions that limit its access to the global market for financial services and its gold and foreign currency reserves. According to reports, Russian officials are interested cryptocurrency and even willing to accept Bitcoin for energy exports. Moscow is showing increasing support for legalization of cryptocurrency, while experts and lawmakers are working on a comprehensive regulatory framework.

The Japanese government asked crypto trading platforms to improve monitoring and requested that they inform financial authorities about suspicious transactions. According to reports, the Financial Services Agency ( FSA) and Japan Virtual and Crypto Assets Exchange Association were searching for ways that Russian entities could avoid sanctions. They also ruled out blocking all Russian users.

Japanese law currently requires banks to verify that money transfer recipients aren’t subject to restrictions. However, cryptocurrency exchanges are not required to do this. Fumio Kishida, Japan’s Prime Minister, announced Monday that the government would prepare to introduce respective amendments during this session of parliament.

The crypto industry has had a variety of reactions to the conflict in Ukraine. While South Korean exchanges blocked Russians from accessing their platforms, major global platforms such as Binance and Kraken refused a request made by the Ukrainian government to unilaterally block all Russian accounts.

received a $150 million investment from Series B to Optimism. This solution allows you to transact on Ethereum at low fees. Paradigm and A16z co-led the round which saw the company reach a valuation in excess of $1.65 Billion. This is one of the most valuable L2 Ethereum expansion layers.

These scaling technologies are being considered by VCs as a key to the future success of Ethereum. Although Ethereum fees were relatively low in recent years, it was almost never this way during the bull market. L2 solutions emerged to alleviate users who don’t want to pay these exorbitant fees. Optimism, which is based on Optimistic rollsups, takes L1 (Layer 1) information and processes it in batches in the L2 to return the abbreviated data back to Ethereum.

According to company numbers, Optimism already saves its users $1 billion in gasoline fees and has more than $469 million in TVL (total worth locked) on its platform. This is the fourth-largest rollup per L2beat statistics.

Hiring and Advancements are two ways to expand your business.

Users were informed by Optimism via a blog posting about where the funds would go. To continue delivering features, the company plans to hire additional people to augment its large staff. Optimism currently has 18 job openings in a variety of departments. These include software development jobs and finance positions.

This latest round of funding follows the company’s Series B funding round. raised $25 million, which was also led A16z. The company praised Optimism and said that it adheres to Ethereum development paradigms. This results in a very simple transition for developers, wallets and users. There are no new programming languages or code changes required.

Sequoia Capital, an American venture capital firm, is launching a fund to invest in crypto assets. Sequoia claims that the liquid token fund will ‘complement’ its ongoing crypto investments in a blog. Sequoia also discussed previous partnerships with crypto movers, shakers and leaders like Sam Bankman-Fried, CEO of FTX, and Michael Shaulov (co-founder of Fireblocks).

Venture capital firm Sequoia also mentioned blockchains such as Solana and Ethereum. Sequoia said that investing in these technologies has been a rewarding experience and that she learned a lot along the way. “Today, we’re doing exactly that with a new sub fund of $500-600M focused primarily on digital assets and liquid tokens,” the blog post on Thursday noted. Sequoia Capital continued:

Sequoia Crypto Fund is an extension of our larger commitment to crypto. This fund aims to be more active in protocols and better support token-only project. We also want to learn from doing. We are committed to continuing our collaboration with the crypto community and providing support for open-source research.

Last year, venture capital that is geared towards blockchain protocols, crypto assets and up-and coming blockchain startups has grown exponentially. The total $621 million in venture capital investments in 2021 was a record. Venture capital funds, which were primarily focused upon crypto tokens or blockchain technology businesses, accounted for 5.28% of total VC investments in 2021 with $32.8 million.

Sequoia Crypto Fund will invest $500 million to $600 millions in ‘liquid tokens’ and digital assets. Sequoia however says that it plans to continue to partner with other crypto teams. Sequoia Capital India was the leader of the $450 million round in Polygon’s investment round. Sequoia is regarded as one of the top 20 venture investors in crypto and blockchain. The California-based company invests in Metastable and Polychain.

Tesla reported impairment losses of approximately $101 million last fiscal year due to value changes in its bitcoin holdings, according to a regulatory filing filed by the electric vehicle manufacturer on Monday.

The company shared its dealings and information with the most-traded cryptocurrency worldwide in a 10K annual financial performance report filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Tesla stated that in 2021, the company suffered impairment losses of approximately $101,000,000 due to changes in bitcoin’s carrying value and $128 million from certain bitcoin sales.

A company may take an impairment charge if it sees a decrease in the carrying price of a particular asset on its balance sheet.

Tesla claimed that $128 million in profits resulted from the sale of a portion its holdings in March 2021.

In January 2021, the company made a initial investment of $1.5 billion in digital assets. These holdings were worth approximately $500 million more at the end of 2021, Tesla claiming that the fair market value was $1.99billion.

Bitcoin’s value climbed by 60% to $46,000 last year.

According to Monday’s filing, “We believe in long-term potential digital assets both as investments and as liquid alternatives to cash,” according to Monday’s filing. Tesla stated last year that it had revised its investment policy in order to allow for more flexibility and maximize returns on cash that wasn’t required to maintain adequate operating.

Tesla accepted bitcoin for a time last year, but Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla, said that it stopped the practice in May due to environmental concerns “about the rapidly increasing use fossil fuels for bitcoin mining and transactions”. Later, he stated that Tesla would resume crypto payments once mining is more efficient.

Tesla isn’t the only company that has suffered a bitcoin-related impairment. MicroStrategy, a business enterprise software company, logged a $146.6million charge to cover its bitcoin holdings for quarter four of 2021.

Bitcoin’s 2022 price has fallen by 7%, and it traded at $43,000 Tuesday.