Here’s what happened in crypto today

Need to know what happened in crypto today? Here is the latest news on daily trends and events impacting Bitcoin price, blockchain, DeFi, NFTs, Web3 and crypto regulation.

Grammy Awards will consider music with artificial intelligence (AI) elements from now on. Meanwhile, in Asia, there’s hope that account abstraction or Ethereum “smart accounts” could onboard a billion users to Web3. Also, the race for a spot Bitcoin ETF is heating up in the United States. 

Nasdaq joins BlackRock and Fidelity in refiling spot Bitcoin ETF application

Nasdaq has refiled for a proposed rule change with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission that would pave the way for a spot Bitcoin ETF for the Valkyrie Bitcoin Fund. The July 3 filing includes information on a “surveillance-sharing agreement” with Coinbase, as well as details of a June 30 agreement with Coinbase that would give Nasdaq “supplemental access to data regarding spot Bitcoin trades.”

The move came mere days after asset manager BlackRock refiled its Bitcoin ETF application after the SEC reportedly said that recent ETF filings with Nasdaq and Cboe were “not sufficiently clear and comprehensive.”

The race to list a spot Bitcoin ETF is heating up in the United States, with at least eight issuers vying for approval as of July 5. Issuers expect to hear back from the SEC in August and September, with final approval deadlines slated between December 2023 and March 2024.

UPDATE: These are the current competitors in the #Bitcoin ETF race. There's still a lot of unknowns right now pic.twitter.com/XDexRHJFlN

— James Seyffart (@JSeyff) July 5, 2023

Music with AI-created elements eligible for Grammy Awards, CEO confirms

The CEO and president of the Recording Academy, Harvey Mason, clarified that AI-generated music will be eligible for the Grammy Awards in 2024. He said:

“AI, or music that contains AI-created elements is absolutely eligible for entry and for consideration for Grammy nomination. Period.”

However, the Academy would not give a Grammy or a nomination to the AI portion of the track, which includes AI voice model. “We don’t want to see technology replace human creativity. We want to make sure technology is enhancing, embellishing, or additive to human creativity,” he warned.

Account abstraction to lead Asia’s Web3 explosion: ConsenSys

One billion users from Asia could onboard to Web3 due to “smart accounts,” also known as account abstraction, Laura Shi, the director of strategic initiatives at ConsenSys told Cointelegraph.

Account abstraction — as proposed by Vitalik Buterin and other developers in September 2021 — offers more “bank-like” features than a regular crypto wallet which Shi claims would increase adoption in the Asia-Pacific region:

“The development of account abstraction will facilitate the onboarding of the billion-level users in APAC to Web3.”

Shi said the Ethereum and Web3 ecosystem had a strong expansion in Asia so far this year and many dApps are “improving UX for the Asian market, including introducing Asian language support.”

The primary drivers of the expansion are zero knowledge Ethereum Virtual Machine (zkEVM) rollups and the mass adoption of Optimistic rollups.

Adoption in Asia is also driven by social and Web3 gaming according to Shi, who pointed to South Korea and China as examples. She added both use cases will rely heavily on zkEVM roll ups and account abstraction development.

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