HOUSING MARKET? The hotly anticipated seismic disruption of the multi-trillion dollar real estate market led by a high-profile joint venture between technology startup Fluidity and broker-dealer Propellr was quietly shelved in the summer. Both are now working on separate tokenized loan projects, saying that the tokenized market wasn’t ready for the real estate use case. Full story
HYPE RESPONSE: When President Xi Jinping praised blockchain technology as an opportunity that China should pounce on last month, it led to the return of speculative fever surrounding not just major cryptocurrencies, but also alleged crypto pump-and-dump schemes. That, in turn, has triggered another crackdown by local regulators, targeting exchanges, projects and media, as well as blockchain and crypto-themed events – dashing hopes for a crypto-friendly China. Full story
MONEYGRAM STAKE: Payments startup Ripple has completed the acquisition of its $50 million stake in remittance platform MoneyGram and now owns just under 10 percent of the firm’s outstanding common stock. According to a filing with the U.S. SEC, Ripple, in its final payment, bought $20 million of MoneyGram equity at a price of $4.10 per share, more than a dollar over the stock’s current price. Full story
MARCO POLO: Bank of New York Mellon has joined the Marco Polo trade finance consortium running on R3’s Corda, becoming the 28th bank to do so. “Our hope is that the business requirements of our clients will meet with what Marco Polo has to offer, and our intention is to move into live production A-S-A-P," said Joon Kim, global head of trade finance at BNY Mellon. Full story
MONERO DROP: A digital asset exchanges in Eastern Europe will delist the privacy-focused monero cryptocurrency to align with international anti-money-laundering standards. Estonia-based BitBay announced Monday that XMR will no longer be tradeable from Feb. 19, 2020 and that it will cease deposits as of this Friday. Full story
TALL TASK: Bitcoin has witnessed a bounce during Asian trading hours and may consolidate in the $7,500-$6,500 range. However, to avoid another price slide, the cryptocurrency needs to rise by more than $1,000 in the next three days to close the month on a positive footing, according to prominent analysts Willy Woo and Mike Novogratz. Full story
MARKET CHECK: CoinDesk's podcasts editor Adam B. Levine and senior markets reporter Brad Keoun discuss recent market activity in view of longer-term trends. Also on the docket is the recently announced second wave of allegations against Tether. Listen here
Realty check?