Justin Sun, the founder of blockchain operating system TRON (TRX), just finalized the acquisition of BitTorrent for $140 million, according to a report in The Next Web. The deal will effectively bring 100 million new users to TRON’s decentralized ecosystem. Speculation on such a deal first came up in May, when word surfaced that Sun was interested in buying the peer-to-peer (P2P) file-sharing platform and its architecture. Sun posted a public letter on Twitter about the deal, and the BitTorrent staff will join TRON’s new headquarters in San Francisco.
BitTorrent has claimed over the years that it is responsible for about one-third of all daily internet traffic. However, the report noted that, due to streaming services like Netflix and a decline in online piracy, the numbers have dropped precipitously.
In other news, bitcoin has broken the $8,000 barrier for the first time since May, the Financial Times reported. The price increase was linked to ties that are developing between traditional financial institutions (FIs) and cryptocurrencies, and because the market is beginning to take crypto-assets more seriously. Bitcoin previously peaked close to $20,000 in December. However, the price has since crashed and has not been above $10,000 since February.
Earlier in June, Mastercard won a patent that would allow it to develop a way to link fiat and cryptocurrency accounts.
In addition, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has delayed, until September, a decision on whether five bitcoin-related exchange rated funds (ETFs) can be approved, based on public documents reported by CoinDesk. According to the Federal Register, the SEC delayed the decision over whether to approve ETF proposals that Direxion Investments filed in January. One of the proposals will match bitcoin’s price, while the other four are based on price movements. The SEC has only received two comments on the proposed ETFs.
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