Kraken currently lives in all 30 European Economic Area (EEA) countries under the Crypto-Assets Regulation (MICA) licensed market. This is an important milestone that provides secure and compliant cryptography to millions of people in Europe.

Today, all EEA clients are directly serviced by Kraken’s MICA-regulated entities approved by the Central Bank of Ireland. This GoLive represents the full activation of MICA licenses, allowing services to be provided throughout the region under a single, unified regulatory framework.

MICA has implemented consistent standards throughout the EU for consumer protection, operational transparency and regulatory oversight. We provide Kraken clients with an additional assurance that the platform they trust operates in accordance with one of the world’s most robust cryptographic regulations.

This is what it means for Kraken clients across the EEA.

Regulatory Service Passport across all 30 EEA countries
Access to over 450 digital assetsthere is a continuous expansion
Fast and easy onboarding Local financial support
Facility-grade trading servicesIncludes OTC
EU-wide protection under MICA For greater transparency and security

This expansion is based on Kraken’s broader regulatory foundation in Europe. While MIFID licenses allow you to provide regulated derivatives to senior traders across the EU market, EMI licenses support FIAT-related services and payments across the region.

Together, these licenses allow Kraken to provide a fully regulated experience with consistency and confidence throughout the EU.

We are excited to serve European clients under MICA and continue to build the safest, innovative and reliable platform in the industry.

Trusted Editorial content, reviewed by leading industry experts and seasoned editors. Ad Disclosure

Jack Dorsey’s financial services company Block is set to let shops take bitcoin right at the cash register. It’s a new twist on how you pay, and it might change small businesses’ options.

Bitcoin Payments On Square Hardware

According to Block, starting in the second half of 2025, merchants using Square Point of Sale can accept bitcoin. The push rests on the Lightning Network, which handles payments in under a second and keeps fees low.

At Bitcoin 2025 in Las Vegas from May 27–29, shoppers can try it out at the BTC Inc. merchandise store.

A Two-Phase Rollout

Based on reports, the first phase rolls out later this year. Then, subject to approvals, every eligible seller could be live by 2026. That means millions of Square users may add bitcoin to their checkouts alongside credit cards and cash. It’s a big step for a tool many small shops already use.

Today: we’re accepting bitcoin payments at @TheBitcoinConf
Soon: you can accept bitcoin payments wherever you are

Details here: https://t.co/ko2S9hFpih pic.twitter.com/IYlYV6XM2S

— Square (@Square) May 27, 2025

From Conversions To Checkout

Block first let merchants convert part of their daily takings into bitcoin in 2024. Now they’ll take crypto up front. When a customer pays, Square’s app handles the exchange rate and confirmation. Stores see payouts faster. And customers who hold bitcoin get to use it without extra steps.

Filling Out A Bitcoin Toolbox

Block isn’t stopping at payments. Its Cash App has had bitcoin buy, sell, and send features for years. Then there’s Bitkey, launched in March 2024, a self-custody wallet without tricky seed phrases.

Soon it will add stronger privacy and smarter recovery tools, including ways to pass funds on to heirs. There’s also Proto mining gear and Spiral, which backs bitcoin projects. Together, they cover buying, storing, spending, and even building with bitcoin.

Image: iStock

Merchants will still face price swings if they choose to hold bitcoin. But automatic conversions remain an option. And for those who do hold, using the Lightning Network can cut costs versus 2%–3% credit-card fees.

Meanwhile, regulators will watch closely. Approvals may vary by region. But if all goes as planned, shoppers will see a new “bitcoin” button on Square screens in early 2026.

It’s early days, but this looks like a real test of bitcoin’s original peer-to-peer idea. Some will welcome lower fees and fast settlement. Others will wait and see if it sticks. Either way, small shops soon have a fresh way to get paid.

Featured image from Unsplash, chart from TradingView

Editorial Process for bitcoinist is centered on delivering thoroughly researched, accurate, and unbiased content. We uphold strict sourcing standards, and each page undergoes diligent review by our team of top technology experts and seasoned editors. This process ensures the integrity, relevance, and value of our content for our readers.

I saw a demo of Gemini Live’s multimodal video streaming and screen sharing support at Google I/O 2024, and admittedly, I was skeptical Project Astra would scale down to smartphones well. Fast-forward about a year later, and Project Astra is in the hands of millions of Google Pixel 9, Samsung Galaxy S25, and Gemini Advanced users. It’s ready, and it’s here — but is it actually useful?

The answer is that it absolutely can be, as long as its use cases are personal to you. For instance, Gemini Live’s multimodal features aren’t going to be a better alternative to Google Search or Circle to Search in most cases. However, in specific circumstances where it’s better to show than tell, Gemini Live’s camera support can come in handy.

After weeks of testing Gemini Live with video streaming, the feature has become an irreplaceable part of one of my non-tech hobbies: gardening. I’ve done it all my life, but after moving from the Garden State to the Arizona desert, I had to relearn everything — new growing seasons, care techniques, problems, and everything in between.

To my surprise, it wasn’t Google or Reddit that helped me navigate this climate most. It was Gemini Live.

Gemini can probably identify plants way better than you can

AI can be fun to play around with, but it’s only truly useful if you know when to use it. Specifically, Gemini Live’s camera features offer the most utility when you have something right in front of you that you’re not sure how to describe. Maybe it’s a piece of furniture in a coffee shop you don’t know the name of, or a monument with a faded plaque. In these situations, typing a written prompt into a chatbot or a search engine won’t do you any good.

That’s where you’d want to turn on your camera in Gemini Live. It’ll help out in many situations, including identifying plants. I picked up a few small potted plants from Ikea and turned to Gemini Live to figure out exactly what they were and how to care for them. Here’s how Gemini responded, based on pointing my camera at the plant:

While this is all happening off-device, Gemini returned the answer pretty fast. Sure enough, it looks like an aloe vera plant. After that, I took the AI assistant up on its offer to enlighten me on care options. Here’s what it said:

The responses were clear and concise, and they ended up saving me a ton of time researching care instructions for a plant I wasn’t even sure the name of a few minutes earlier.

It’ll come up with care options for your plants, too

If Gemini Live were only able to identify plants by looking at them, it would be cool, but it wouldn’t be groundbreaking. The killer feature here is the care instructions that Gemini can provide just by looking at a plant. To test this, I showed it a live camera feed of my basil plant and asked how I should take care of it, and Gemini replied with the following:

I then told Gemini I was planning to keep the basil out on my balcony, and it seemed to like the idea.

The cool thing about going “live” with Gemini is that you can easily provide context or follow-up questions in real time. For example, when the AI suggested I bring it inside when the temperature drops, I could let Gemini know that it won’t be an issue in my climate. It’s easy to get context-specific advice when using your camera with Gemini Live.

When issues arise, Gemini Live can diagnose them

By far, Gemini Live’s most useful capability is diagnosing problems you might run into with your plants. As I mentioned earlier, I’m new to growing plants in the desert, and it’s a learning curve. Since the sun is so intense and the temperature can exceed 120 degrees Fahrenheit, the climate is unforgiving. I was bound to run into issues, and Gemini Live helped me navigate them.

In one case, my hydroponic jalapeño and tomato plants were having a hard time. The jalapeño leaves were browning, and the tomatoes just weren’t turning red. It was Gemini that suggested my apartment’s temperature could be the problem, and sure enough, after turning up the heat for a few days, the tomatoes ripened. It also identified health problems with my plants, as explained in the reply below:

It’s important to remember that while you’re reading the transcript of my conversation with Gemini, this is all being spoken to me in real-time — the same way you’d have a conversation with another person.

I realized Gemini Live’s multimodal features were the real deal when it noticed that I was using an AeroGarden hydroponic system just from the information it could see via my camera feed. After picking up on that information, I received tailored care instructions as follows:

While I might usually dive into gardening books, research studies, or Reddit threads for hours to solve these types of problems, everything you see in this article happened within just a few minutes.

Often, plant growing problems can show the same symptoms, making them hard to diagnose, especially when you’re just getting started. Gemini was vital in helping me overcome them.

My plants are stronger than ever thanks to Gemini Live

If you’ve gotten this far and aren’t as excited by Gemini’s gardening prowess as I am, fear not. This is just one way Gemini Live can help you out in your daily life, and there are many more. I used Gemini to solve problems with my plants, but in the tech world, we simply call that troubleshooting.

You could follow the exact same steps for just about anything else you need to figure out. In Google’s first-ever demo of Project Astra at Google I/O 2024, it used the technology to troubleshoot a finicky record player. These are exactly the kinds of things AI can be great at — it is trained on material that includes user manuals, textbooks, and even online forums. You can tap into the online history of the internet without doing any of the work.

So, before you write off Gemini Live, give its new multimodal camera support a try. When you find your use case for it, it’ll become invaluable.