DeFi project COVER staking protocol has recently been the victim of a suspected attack while artificially inflating the COVER token supply. The hackers have reported exploited the Cover protocol with millions of stolen cover tokens amounting to a massive $2 trillion.

Allegedly, the hackers infused an additional supply of over 40 quintillion Cover “coins”. This resulted in the COVER coin price crashing nearly 90%. On Monday, December 28, the COVER token price crashed all the way from $735 to $53, as per the data on CoinGecko.

The hacker – may be an individual or a small group – has taken responsibility for the attack. In a dramatic, the suspected attacker also returned the funds saying “Next time, take care of your own shit”.

Ethereum wallet explorer Nansen also presented some key details of the event. Soon after inflating the token supply in the initial exploit, the attacker liquidated nearly 12K COVER coins on decentralized exchange aggregator 1inch. In a message on the Discord Group, the Cover Protocol noted:

“The Blacksmith farming contract has been exploited to mint infinite $COVER tokens. We have restricted minting access to the farming contract in order to stop the attacker. If you are providing liquidity for $COVER token (uniswap or sushiswap) please remove it immediately.”

The Cover Protocol team said that the issue has only affected the token supply. However, the funds in the “claim/noclaim” pools are still safe.

Exploring a New Cover Protocol Token

Soon after the attack on Monday, Cover Protocol also announced that it is exploring a new Cover token after a snapshot of the LP token holders. In a message on its Twitter handle, the Cover Protocol team noted.

Hello everyone, we are exploring providing a NEW $COVER token through a snapshot before the minting exploit was abused. The 4350 ETH that has been returned by the attacker will also be handled through a snapshot to the LP token holders.We are still investigating. Do NOT buy COVER

— Cover Protocol (@CoverProtocol) December 28, 2020

Interestingly, soon after getting the alert message, all developers from Yearn Ecosystem came to support the Cover team. The team noted that they “are working with multiple teams and individuals within the Yearn Ecosystem. We will provide updates as they come. We can not thank everyone enough for their help in this unfortunate situation.”

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Bitcoin bullish run looks to have come to a halt amidst an altcoin rally which has seen relatively lower coins put up impressive performances in the past few weeks. Bitcoin dominance is gradually fading as many experts believe the biggest digital coin is backing down as some top altcoin are showing strong “moves” or signals. 

Bitcoin hit an all-time high over the weekend, the third time its price has done so in just over 2 months. The price of the biggest digital coin touched $28,400 on December 27, before a lightning drop took it to $27,000 just hours of that incredible feat. 

Bitcoin failed to hold onto the $27,000 mark as its price further dropped to $26,000 a day after and is now testing lower levels centered on $26,000 as immediate support. Reports from crypto exchanges revealed BTC/USD trading at lows of $25,830 during the early hours of December 29. 

While Bitcoin has seen red over a couple of days, some altcoins are putting up impressive numbers, giving off signals of a strong altcoin rally. Despite XRP’s current issues, the altcoin market is showing glimpses of its glory days as some digital coins are poised to see major gains over the next couple of weeks. Ethereum (ETH) is at the forefront of the rally, with its price climbing above $700 for the first time since May 2018. 

Polkadot (DOT) also saw daily gains of 22.5% wrapping up an impressive week with an almost 34% rise in its value. The coin is now the seventh-largest token by market cap. Kusama (KSM), a cousin of Polkadot, also saw its price gain 46% last week, pushing its price from $43.1 to $63. The digital token is currently trading at $56 but experts are adamant a breakout above $65 is possible as the token has rebounded off the 20-day exponential moving average ($50.90)

Speaking on the possibility of a long term altcoin rally, analyst Van de Poppe stated that altcoins are next in line to see greens. He added that the next “impulse wave” on Bitcoin next year should be able to take the market to $40,000 or $50,000, but until then, the possibility of a continuance altcoin rally is very much likely.

Although many factors could be in play with regards to the latest Bitcoin price dip, it’s recent fallout with Ripple’s XRP leads the way. Ripple was hit with a lawsuit from the United States Security and Exchange Commission (SEC) and subsequently suffered drops that left its price in a pit. XRP, the fourth-largest cryptocurrency by market cap, is now trading at $0.20 as news broke that Coinbase, a major US cryptocurrency exchange has decided to suspend its trading from next month.

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XRP investors have met with an unfortunate fate. It has been a rocky ride for XRP investors as the cryptocurrency has been heading south after the SEC lawsuit. From its monthly high of $0.66 on December 1st, XRP has reduced to only 1/3rd of the price. At press time, XRP is trading 20% trading at $0.22 with a market cap of $10.3 billion. The latest price crash comes amid crypto exchange Coinbase announcing its plan to suspend XRP trading starting January 19, 2020.

Coinbase Chief Legal Officer Paul Grewar writes that the latest suspension comes amid the SEC lawsuit against Ripple Labs. Also, in the official announcement, Grewar writes:

“We have made the decision to suspend the XRP trading pairs on our platform. Trading will move into limit only starting December 28, 2020 at 2:30 PM PST, and will be fully suspended on Tuesday, January 19, 2021, at 10 a.m. PST. The trading suspension will not affect customers’ access to XRP wallets which will remain available for deposit and withdraw functionality after the trading suspension. We will continue to support XRP on Coinbase Custody and Coinbase Wallet”.

Coinbase joins Bitstamp as one of the top crypto exchanges to suspend XRP trading in recent times. There have been several other exchanges that have announced XRP trading suspension in recent times. Following the Coinbase announcement today, another major crypto exchange Crypto.com also announced its decision to delist the crypto asset.

$XRP will be delisted from the https://t.co/vCNztABJoG App in the U.S. effective Jan 19th, 2021 at 10am UTC.

Details: https://t.co/aja3yrhxCe

— Crypto.com (@cryptocom) December 29, 2020

The Road to XRP Recovery Isn’t an Easy One with Measures by Coinbase and Others

It looks like XRP’s road to recovery ain’t going to be an easy one! Over the last few years, the SEC has conducted a crackdown on several such crypto projects. Speaking to CoinTelegraph, Bybit CEO Ben Zhou said:

“SEC and Ripple will have their day in court with due process of law, so we shall not prejudge the case in the court of public opinion. It is of course likely that the case will take up much of Ripple’s attention and resources. […] We hope a clear precedent and framework emerge from these proceedings.”

Furthermore, the SEC has accused Ripple of selling unregistered XRP securities under Section 5 of the Securities Act of 1993. Also, the case will proceed further in the New York Federal Court. Todd Crosland, CEO of cryptocurrency exchange CoinZoom said that the lawsuit will have a long-lasting impact on XRP price.

XRP which has already been a laggard performer over the last two years will continue trading at lower levels even further. While institutional players have been betting big on crypto, they will refrain from having any exposure to XRP.

“Lack of institutional support will hurt liquidity. Institutions will not bet against the SEC, and will be unloading their positions and will avoid taking new positions in XRP until the lawsuit is resolved,” said Crosland.

The only hope for XRP currently is the appointment of new crypto-friendly SEC chairman Elad Roisman. Soon after filing the lawsuit complaint, previous SEC chairman Jay Clayton submitted his resignation. However, we don’t expect things to improve anytime soon.

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