Fortune’s The Ledger is morphing into the Fortune Crypto newsletter
Hi everyone, it’s been an exciting week. On Tuesday, we successfully launched Fortune Crypto, a new site dedicated to all things blockchain – including a ticker of top tokens. The site reflects how crypto has become an integral part of financial and business news and how Fortunethe first mainstream website to carry a crypto brand, is dedicated to producing quality journalism on the subject.
You can see for yourself by reading Leo Schwartz’s exposé on how Coinbase’s $1 billion “GiveCrypto” plans went wrong, or Taylor Locke’s account of what happened behind the scenes during Ethereum’s epic merger. Leo and Taylor, along with NFT and metaverse reporter Marco Quiroz-Gutierrez, are the core of a growing team that will cover the most important stories in a way that is accessible to crypto newbies and OGs alike.
Our coverage will include new crypto technologies such as bridges and Layer 2 solutions, but also the growing role of banks and other large “TradFi” companies as they build out their blockchain capabilities. It is my thesis that if the first era of crypto was rooted in Silicon Valley, the next will be heavily shaped by the financial industry. To help our readers understand this transition, New York-based deputy editor Justin Doom will write about top executives at top companies.
All this also means that the time has come to retire The Ledger, a pioneering brand in crypto media, but one that did not reflect the full ambitions of the new Fortune Crypto. These ambitions include high-quality events, an education module and, in time, Web3-native business initiatives such as NFTs and crypto-payments.
The newsletter is also undergoing significant changes. Starting Monday, Fortune Crypto will land in your inbox five days a week. We realize your time is valuable, so the daily version will be shorter, but still important reading.
Your feedback is important. Feel free to share your thoughts about what you read here. And of course we’re always on the lookout for scoops, gossip and insights about the industry. So get in touch with me and my colleagues via email or Twitter DM or safely via Signal.
Thanks for reading – Jeff.
Jeff John Roberts
[email protected]
@jeffjohnroberts
DECENTRALIZED NEWS
The Biden administration is citing the 1865 failure of a bank founded by former slaves to highlight how new financial innovations, including crypto, can pose a particular danger to black communities.
Coinbase created a team to speculate on crypto — a bank-style prop desk — but ultimately pulled the plug before the team could venture.
Jesse Powell, a crypto OG and outspoken libertarian, stepped down as CEO of the Kraken exchange after 11 years.
Coinbase became the first company to receive central bank permission to operate crypto services in the Netherlands.
As Sam Bankman-Fried’s fame grows, so does scrutiny of the connections—and possible conflicts of interest—that exist between his FTX exchange and sister company Alameda Research.
FOMO NO MO