Real Vision Founder: Liquidity Operation Authority is Shifting from the Fed to the Treasury, Central Bank Independence Will Disappear

On March 17, CoinDesk reported that the UK High Court last week greenlit a trial for a theft case involving 2,323 bitcoins—currently worth roughly $172 million—testing how UK property law applies to digital assets. UK resident Ping Fai Yuen claims in court filings that his estranged wife, Fun Yung Li, secretly obtained the mnemonic seed phrase for his hardware wallet via home surveillance cameras in August 2023 and transferred the bitcoins without authorization. At the time of the theft, the coins were valued at ~$60 million; they’ve since surged to ~$172 million at current prices. The funds were held in a PIN-protected Trezor cold wallet, but anyone with the 24-word seed phrase can reconstruct the wallet and move the assets. The transferred bitcoins have gone through multiple transactions and are now dispersed across 71 non-exchange blockchain addresses, untouched since December 21, 2023. Yuen said he installed recording devices at home after his daughter warned him his wife was

On March 17th, Bitcoin broke above $75,000, per market data from HTX, posting a 3.12% gain over the past 24 hours.

March 17 — Silicon Valley industrial robotics firm RoboForce has closed a $52 million oversubscribed funding round, pushing its total capital raised to $67 million. The round was led by YZi Labs, with Yahoo co-founder and former CEO Jerry Yang joining as a new investor. Existing backers—including Nobel laureate in economics Myron Scholes, Qiming Venture Partners founding partner Gary Rieschel, and Carnegie Mellon University—also re-upped their participation. The new funds will accelerate development of the company’s next-generation robot base model, scale its general-purpose Physical AI robots, and boost manufacturing capabilities ahead of commercial deployment. Industry context: The industrial sector is grappling with a worsening labor shortage. Many labor-intensive, repetitive, and safety-risky jobs still rely on an increasingly scarce human workforce, leading to longer project cycles and elevated safety hazards. RoboForce’s solution targets these high-risk, mundane tasks

**March 17 — OpenSea CEO Devin Finzer shared an update on the SEA token project via a post today, revealing the OpenSea Foundation has delayed the first phase of the SEA rollout — originally scheduled for a March 30 event.** Finzer cited "challenging overall cryptocurrency market conditions" for the delay, emphasizing SEA will only be issued once. The team is prioritizing thorough preparation over sticking to the original timeline to meet community expectations, he added. Key details from the update: - No additional reward waves will be launched; the current round is the final one. - **Platform fee refunds**: Users who joined reward waves 3–6 are eligible for partial refunds of collected fees (tied to the initial Q1 launch promise). Opting for a refund will remove Treasures rewards earned during the corresponding period. If combined with Treasure Chest rewards, the refund effectively covers transaction fees for that period; specific steps will be announced later. - **Valid

On March 17, President Trump said the Federal Reserve should hold a special meeting to cut interest rates now.

On March 17, CBOE Global Markets filed a proposal to extend trading hours for EDGX, its stock and options exchange. The market operator said Monday it plans to allow trading of all listed NMS stocks on EDGX from 9 p.m. ET Sunday through 8 p.m. ET Friday, with a one-hour operational pause between 8 p.m. and 9 p.m. ET Monday through Thursday. CBOE noted demand for trading U.S. stocks outside traditional hours has grown in recent years. The firm already runs 24/7 trading via its proprietary index futures/options and global FX market operations. Oliver Sung, head of CBOE’s North American Equities Division, said the SEC filing is the latest step toward launching the extended trading in December. CBOE offers stock and derivatives trading platforms, including products tied to its flagship VIX volatility index—often called the market’s “fear index.” (Source: Golden Finance)