Worldcoin gets new signup every 9 secs in Argentina

This week, reports came out that Worldcoin witnessed a significant rise in its popularity and demand in Argentina. The identity project  confirmed on Thursday that it crossed a major milestone with its ID verification in the South American country.

The ambitious crypto project was launched by ChatGPT founder Sam Altman in July. It has caused a stir in Kenya, in the past one month which led to a crackdown of the project by the Kenyan authorities.

Further reading: Argentina joins the list of countries against Worldcoin

Here are major crypto stories from around the world this week

Another exec leaves Binance 

According to a Bloomberg report on Thursday, Binance has lost a fourth executive in less than two months. Leon Foong, Binance’s Head of Asia Pacific Market, reportedly resigned from the crypto exchange amid mounting legal and regulatory trouble for the company. 

Foong was responsible for Binance’s operations in the Asia Pacific region. He led the exchange’s expansion into key Asian markets including Thailand, Japan, and South Korea. The reason for his departure still remains unclear as it is yet to be publicly announced by the crypto exchange. 

Recall that in July, Binance’s Chief Strategy Officer Patrick Hillmann, Senior Vice President for Compliance Steven Christie, and General Counsel Han Ng left the exchange. 

SBF appeals jail decision 

According to a Reuters report on Monday, Sam Bankman-Fried’s lawyers have appealed a judge’s decision to send him to jail while he is waiting to start trial over several allegations tied to the collapse of FTX on October 3.

United States District Judge Lewis Kaplan, who will oversee the trial, had previously revoked the FTX founder’s bail saying that he tried to tamper with witnesses. SBF’s attorneys said they would appeal at the same hearing, and tried unsuccessfully to keep him out of jail until the appeal was heard.

The lawyers wrote: 

“It is unclear how a cooperating witness who has promised to testify against a defendant could be meaningfully threatened by nothing but their own statements being published by a reputable newspaper.”

Note that SBF is currently locked up at the Brooklyn Metropolitan Detention Center and is set to go on trial on allegations of wire fraud, commodities fraud, securities fraud, money laundering and related conspiracy charges.

Worldcoin frenzy in Argentina 

According to a blog post on Thursday, Human ID project Worldcoin signed up over 9,500 users in Argentina in a single day in August, setting a record for single-day sign-ups. Per the announcement, facilitators in Argentina reportedly onboarded participants at an average rate of less than nine seconds per person.

The Worldcoin facilitators are in 38 different locations and most locations are in the country’s capital city of Buenos Aires. The Thursday post claimed that despite the controversy surrounding the project, many Argentinians are signing up for World IDs. 

“There was a significant increase in demand for World ID verifications in countries around the world [after launch], this continued into August, which saw 9.5K Argentinians verify their World ID in a single day.”

Related post:

Kenya parliament forms 15-man committee to investigate Worldcoin

Also, the post stated that the surge in sign-ups caused the Worldcoin app to “temporarily become the number one app in Argentina on the App Store.” The Argentine government has however launched an investigation into Worldcoin’s privacy practices. 

Ronaldinho denies involvement in crypto scam

Retired football star Ronaldinho has denied his involvement in an alleged $61 million crypto pyramid scheme that bore his name, while testifying at a congressional hearing in Brazil on Thursday.

Ronaldinho appeared before a parliamentary committee inquiry where he refuted any role in the scheme called “18kRonaldinho” that promised 2% daily returns on crypto. Ronaldinho claimed he never partnered with the company, and it used his name and image without his authorisation.

In June, the inquiry was launched by Brazil’s lower house, the Chamber of Deputies to investigate crypto pyramid schemes that are being carried out in the country.