DEVELOPING Latest updates on the major wildfires burning in Canada
The 2024 wildfire season has begun, and it's shaping up to follow last year's unprecedented destruction in kind, with thousands of square kilometres already consumed.
The cryptocurrency exchange Binance said it plans to buy its rival FTX Trading, in the latest example of how fortunes can change rapidly in the crypto world.
Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao said on Twitter Tuesday that his company had signed a letter of intent to buy FTX because the smaller exchange was experiencing a "significant liquidity crunch." The deal was pending due diligence, Zhao said on Twitter.
Samuel Bankman-Fried, founder and CEO of FTX, also took to Twitter to say the deal would protect the exchange's customers. It's a surprising turn of events after Bankman-Fried was hailed as somewhat of a saviour earlier this year when he helped shore up a number of cryptocurrency companies that ran into financial trouble.
FTX is the latest cryptocurrency company this year to come under financial pressure as crypto assets such as bitcoin and ethereum have collapsed in value. Failures include Celsius, a bank-like company that took in crypto deposits in exchange for yield, as well as an Asia-based hedge fund known as Three Arrows Capital.
Coindesk, which specializes in news about digital assets, reported last week that much of the balance sheet of Bankman-Fried's trading firm Alameda Research was tied up in FTX's own digital token called FTT. Binance rattled the market over the weekend when it said it planned to liquidate of its holdings in FTT on concerns that the company was illiquid.
On Tuesday morning, cryptocurrency investors said they were having trouble withdrawing money from FTX as well. The value of FTT plunged overnight only to stabilize after the deal was announced.
Other major cryptocurrencies were higher after the deal was announced as well, with Bitcoin rising 5 per cent.
The deal would make Binance, which is already the biggest cryptocurrency exchange by daily volume, an even more dominant player in the cryptocurrency industry. FTX was the third largest exchange as of this week.
Bankman-Fried, better known by his initials SBF, was hailed by the crypto industry earlier this year after pledging to buy certain crypto assets to bolster the balance sheets of other failing crypto companies. That included companies like Voyager Digital, which failed after owning a stake in the failed stable coin Terra.
Bankman-Fried also purchased a stake in the online trading platform Robinhood after that company's shares plunged as revenue dropped and it lost money.
Bankman-Fried said neither the U.S. operations of Binance or FTX are involved in the deal announced Tuesday.
The 2024 wildfire season has begun, and it's shaping up to follow last year's unprecedented destruction in kind, with thousands of square kilometres already consumed.
Veteran TSN broadcaster Darren 'Dutch' Dutchyshen, one of Canada’s best-known sports journalists, has died. He was 57. His family says 'he passed as he was surrounded by his closest loved ones.'
A ‘lifetime of abuse’ led Dallas Ly to snap and repeatedly stab his mother inside their Leslieville apartment in 2022 but he never intended to kill her, his defence lawyers argued during at his murder trial in Toronto on Thursday.
A burgeoning track star says his dream of going to the Olympics is being derailed by a deportation order after Immigration officials rejected his family’s claim for asylum
A Montreal father who kidnapped his daughter who has autism and lied to police when they asked where she was should serve three years in prison, a Crown prosecutor said.
Loblaw Cos. Ltd. said Thursday it's ready to sign on to the grocery code of conduct, paving the way for an agreement that's been years in the making.
A medical examiner says a Massachusetts teen who participated in a spicy tortilla chip challenge died from ingesting a substance 'with a high capsaicin concentration.'
To give Canadians a break on their summer road trips, Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre is calling on Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to suspend all gas and diesel taxes from Victoria Day to Labour Day.
Foreign Affairs Minister Mélanie Joly is imposing sanctions on Israelis she accuses of 'extremist settler violence' in the West Bank, three months after pledging to do so.
A Starbucks fan — whose name is Winter — is visiting Canada on a purposeful journey that began with a random idea at one of the coffee chain's stores in Texas.
Members of Piapot First Nation, students from the University of Winnipeg and various other professionals are learning new techniques that will hopefully be used for ground searches of potential unmarked grave sites in the future.
ALS patient Mathew Brown said he’s hopeful for future ALS patients after news this week of research at Western University of a potential cure for ALS.
When Adam Kirschner wrote 'Slap Shot,' he never imagined the song would be embraced by his favourite team.
A team is ready to help an entangled North Atlantic right whale in the Gulf of St. Lawrence.
A $200 reward is being offered by a North Vancouver family for the safe return of their beloved chicken, Snowflake.
Two daughters and a mother were reunited online 40 years later thanks to a DNA kit and a Zoom connection despite living on three separate continents and speaking different languages.
Mother's Day can be a difficult occasion for those who have lost or are estranged from their mom.
YES Theatre Young Company opened its acclaimed kids’ show, One Small Step, at Sudbury Theatre Centre on Saturday.