Regulation is good for the crypto industry: Binance CEO

Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao joins ‘Squawk Box’ to discuss the crypto exchange’s growth and why regulation is critical for the industry. For access to live and exclusive video from CNBC subscribe to CNBC PRO: https://cnb.cx/2NGeIvi

Last week, the cryptocurrency market briefly surpassed $3 trillion as the top digital coins rallied.

Bitcoin and ether both hit all-time highs on Wednesday, but have since cooled off.

Now, on Monday afternoon, bitcoin is trading at around $64,143, according to Coin Metrics, and ether at around $4,611, as of 12:56 p.m. EST.

As President Joe Biden signs the $1.2 trillion bipartisan infrastructure bill into law — which includes tax reporting provisions that apply to cryptocurrency — here are six important things that happened this past week in the space.

1. Robinhood’s data breach involved about 7 million customers

Online brokerage Robinhood announced on Monday that a Nov. 3 data breach involved exposure of personal information for about 7 million customers, CNBC reported.

For 5 million of them, email address were accessed. Another 2 million had their full names revealed. For about 310 users, name, date of birth and ZIP code were exposed. About 10 customers had more extensive account details revealed.

Robinhood said it is alerting affected individuals, and noted that based on its investigation, no Social Security numbers, bank account or debit card numbers were exposed.

2. Ripple to launch crypto service for financial companies

On Tuesday, Ripple announced that it is set to launch a product called Liquidity Hub, which will allow financial services firms to offer their customers access to cryptocurrencies, CNBC reported.

The San Francisco-based fintech start-up will offer trading in cryptocurrencies such as bitcoin, Ethereum, litecoin, ethereum classic, bitcoin cash and XRP. The Liquidity Hub feature will launch in 2022.

Ripple is in a legal battle with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) over XRP, a cryptocurrency with which it is closely associated. The SEC is suing Ripple and its executives for allegedly raising funds through an unregistered securities offering. Ripple is fighting the suit.

3. Tim Cook says he owns cryptocurrency

Also on Tuesday, Tim Cook said he personally owns cryptocurrency.

After Cook was asked if he owns bitcoin or Ethereum, the Apple CEO replied, “I do.”

“I think it’s reasonable to own it as part of a diversified portfolio,” Cook told Andrew Ross Sorkin at The New York Times DealBook conference. “I’m not giving anyone investment advice by the way.”

Cook added that he had been interested in cryptocurrency “for a while,” but clarified that his views are personal and that Apple isn’t accepting cryptocurrency as payment or buying cryptocurrency itself.

4. Coinbase shares drop after third-quarter revenue miss

Coinbase missed analysts’ revenue estimates on Tuesday after reporting its third-quarter earnings. Following, the stock sank more than 13% in extended trading.

The cryptocurrency exchange also said its monthly transacting users fell to 7.4 million from 8.8 million in the second quarter. In addition, trading volume fell from $462 billion to $327 billion in the previous quarter.

5. A major upgrade to bitcoin activated

Taproot, a highly anticipated upgrade to bitcoin, went into effect on Sunday at block 709,632.

This is bitcoin’s first major upgrade since 2017, and it will impact the blockchain in a number of ways.

Taproot will introduce what’s called Schnorr signatures, which will help bitcoin transactions become more private, efficient and less expensive. Most importantly, the upgrade will better enable bitcoin to execute smart contracts on the blockchain.