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Crypto investors see trouble ahead

Crypto asset prices sank again on Monday even as Binance, the industry’s biggest exchange, tried to restore investor trust by pushing for greater transparency across its exchange following the collapse of its rival, FTX, earlier this month. How bad could it get? Mark Mobius, a co-founder of Mobius Capital Partners, told Bloomberg this morning that his new price target for Bitcoin is $10,000, implying a further drop of nearly 40 percent.

Binance sought to calm investor nerves. This weekend, Changpeng Zhao, its founder, said that the exchange had enough Bitcoins on hand to meet customer redemptions, and that anyone could track its reserves on a new website. (It’s not yet clear whether Binance has enough Ether or other digital coins in its reserves to ease investor concerns.)

Since FTX imploded amid a flood of customer withdrawals earlier this month, C.Z., as Mr. Zhao is known, has argued that the industry has to embrace such a proof-of-reserves system. He has increased Binance’s potential commitment to an industry rescue fund to $2 billion; more than 150 companies have applied for the aid. Still, the price of the firm’s native digital token, Binance Coin, has fallen over 5 percent in the past 24 hours.

Elsewhere in crypto:

• The crypto lender Genesis Global Capital is one of several companies facing inquiries from state regulators in a sweeping review of industry practices. Genesis, which is part of the crypto conglomerate Digital Currency Group — which also owns the trade publication Coindesk and the investment firm Grayscale — has hired financial restructuring advisers.

• The Bahamian attorney general, Ryan Pinder, defended the country’s handling of its investigation into FTX, which has its headquarters in the island nation.

• The chief digital officer of Farmington State Bank, and its online lender Moonstone, Janvier Chalopin, said the small Washington state bank had no “transactional interactions” with FTX, which invested $11.5 million into Farmington earlier this year, or Deltec, the crypto-focused Bahamian bank, whose chairman Jean Chalopin is also the chair of Farmington’s holding company, as well as Janvier’s father.

• Several U.S. accounting firms said they are treating crypto clients as high risk, The Financial Times reports, subjecting those companies to more invasive and expensive audits.

You won’t believe this Yahoo ad deal

Yahoo on Monday announced one its first major moves since it went private last year: taking a 25 percent stake in Taboola, the company known for serving up attention-grabbing links (often derided as click bait) on websites, The Times reports. It’s deepening its push into digital advertising even as the industry is in a slump.

Yahoo and Taboola are making a 30-year bet on each other. You read that right: They have signed a three-decade partnership, in which Yahoo will give Taboola the exclusive license to sell its native ads across Yahoo’s sites, with the two sharing revenue from those sales. Yahoo advertisers will also be able to sell their ads on sites across Taboola’s network. They expect the partnership to yield at least $1 billion in annual revenue.

As part of the deal, Yahoo will become Taboola’s biggest shareholder and will get a seat on its board.