Mind The Block: Your Weekly Dose of Web3 News and Insights
Mind The Block Headlines This Week
Table of Contents
- Crypto Market Cap Hits $1.69 Trillion
- Coinbase Expands EU Derivatives Reach
- BlackRock Anticipates SEC ETF Approval
- Finoa Secures $15M in Funding
- Redacted Integrates Chainlink CCIP
- ERC World’s NFT Marketplace Launch
- Solana Dips Below $100, Rebounds
- What is Magic Eden?
News
- Bitcoin (BTC) topped $47,000 for the first time since April 2022.
- NFT analytics platform Ninjalerts has inscribed a Super Nintendo Entertainment System emulator onto the Bitcoin network.
- Crypto market cap has reached a record $1.69 trillion, surpassing major economies like Spain and Australia.
- A total of 6,283.44 Ether worth $14M was burned from Ethereum transactions due to the Ethereum 2.0 upgrade.
- Polygon’s NFT ecosystem experienced a historic milestone, surpassing Ethereum in 24-hour NFT sales for the first time.
- Bitcoin ETF buzz has injected volatility, sending the price back to $45K as open interest mounts.
- Celsius is planning to unstake around $470 million worth of Ethereum tokens to raise funds for creditors.
- PancakeSwap has announced a significant token burn valued at approximately $25 million.
- TonUP has announced the launch of the TonTogether token (TOT) through an innovative Launchpool.
- Bit24.cash has reportedly exposed sensitive data belonging to 230,000 users.
- Ripple’s XRP Ledger network is experiencing a surge in activity, causing a distributed denial-of-service (DDOS) attack by Magnetic X.
- Digital Currency Group (DCG) has confirmed that it has settled $700 million of debt with Genesis.
- Binance has released its 14th Proof of Reserves, showing robust growth in user assets, particularly Bitcoin, Ethereum, and USDT.
- PayPal’s PYUSD stablecoin, which launched in August, is struggling to gain traction in the stablecoin sector.
Extras by Mind the Block
- Swiss Web3 consulting firm STORM Partners is set to launch Decentral House.
- Maincard.io, a Web3 sports fantasy manager, has entered the esports arena with big-name partnerships.
- Cardano continues to dominate development activity among other networks.
- Open Campus ID is a decentralized education platform launching in January 2024.
- HAQQ has partnered with decentralized home delivery service GoMeat to streamline the availability of halal meat in the US.
- CoinsPaid has suffered a second security breach in six months, resulting in a $7.5 million loss.
- The Loki Kit by Pivotal Pleb Tech has enabled crypto miners to run various configurations of Bitmain S19 ASIC miners on 120V power.
- BNB Chain Fusion aims to unify BEP-2 and BEP-20 by April 2024.
- Messari has named Larry Fink, Michael Sonnenshein, and Cathie Wood as key individuals to watch in the Bitcoin ETF space in 2024.
Major Companies Making Moves
- Coinbase plans to expand its derivatives offerings in the European Union by acquiring a Cyprus-based entity under the Markets.
- Binance has launched a presale for its Cloud Mining products, designed for Bitcoin BTC mining and GPU crypto mining.
- Japanese e-commerce platform Mercari plans to introduce Bitcoin payments for its flea market products by June 2024.
- Starknet’s community approved the Alpha version 13.0 update, allowing transactions with Starknet’s native token, STRK, and ether.
- X has reduced the price of gold checkmarks to $200 monthly amid a surge in crypto scams.
Government, SEC & Regulation
- EBA will investigate the interconnections between traditional banks and non-bank financial institutions like crypto platforms.
- BlackRock expects the SEC to approve its spot Bitcoin ETF application by Wednesday.
- Indian crypto companies are moving to Dubai to escape stringent tax regulations and uncertain legal frameworks.
- South Korea’s tax authority and five major cryptocurrency exchanges have formed a committee to prevent illegal foreign transactions.
- Nigeria’s Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has approved the cNGN stablecoin.
- Nebraska lawmakers have introduced a bill to aid Bitcoin mining in residential properties.
- Crypto exchanges Coinbase, OKX, Crypto.com, and Gemini are implementing financial knowledge assessments for UK users.
- The SEC asked a court to consider a recent judgment against Terraform Labs in its case against Binance.
- Honduras’ Próspera ZEDE has officially recognized Bitcoin as a unit of account for various financial transactions.
- Bitcoin ETFs, such as Valkyrie’s Bitcoin ETF, could be influenced by the US government’s agenda to ban crypto.
- The Bank of Spain has selected Cecabank, Abanca, and Adhara Blockchain for Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDC) testing.
- Upbit Singapore has been granted a Major Payment Institution (MPI) license by the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS).
- China’s Legal Daily has urged a crackdown on bribery using cryptocurrency and other electronic payment methods.
Raises & Major Investments rounds
- Blockchain industry leaders have raised $78 million to support pro-crypto politicians for the 2024 congressional elections.
- Finoa, a German crypto custodian and staking services provider, raised $15 million in a strategic funding round.
- Singapore-based CESS raised $8M in Series A funding, aiming to provide decentralized data services for Web3.
- InQubeta raised over $8 million through a presale of its native QUBE tokens.
- Solana-based DeFi firm Saros raised $3.75 million in a private funding round backed by major investors like Spartan and GBV.
- Umoja, founded by Robby Greenfield, has raised $2M to introduce DeFi’s first asset risk management primitive.
Trends & Narrative
- Redacted Cartel is integrating Chainlink’s Cross-Chain Interoperability Protocol (CCIP) to enhance cross-chain capabilities.
- COCA and Wirex have unveiled the world’s first Multi-Party Computation (MPC) wallet with a non-custodial debit card.
- Arllecta, a global startup, aims to launch the world’s first digital business sense-to-sense network based on economic principles.
- Ripple CTO David Schwartz has put an end to rumors that the company will buy back XRP tokens.
- Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino suggests that the crypto industry should focus on providing real-world use cases.
NFTs, Gaming, Metaverse
- ERC World is set to launch its NFT marketplace in early 2024, offering a competitive transaction fee of 1.33%.
- Samsung and Google are collaborating on a new mixed-reality headset designed to challenge Apple’s Vision Pro.
- MixMob, a Solana-powered gaming platform, has launched its first card strategy racing game, Racer 1, featuring race-to-earn mechanics.
- Ernest Cline and Dan Farah have co-founded Readyverse Studios to develop a metaverse for Ready Player One.
- Find Satoshi Lab’s Web3 social strategy game, Gas Hero has dominated NFT sales with a transaction volume of nearly $3.2 million.
- XPLA has partnered with Gall3ry, a social solution that promotes NFT holders to take responsibility for their social identifications.
- Wemade has added two new games to its top-tier Web3 games collection: NINJA SURVIVOR.io and Rebirth Heroes: RPG.
- Programmable NFTs, once considered monetized cryptocurrency projects, are now being accelerated by generative AI.
- Sky Mavis has launched the Mavis Store, an online shop for non-blockchain in-game items from the Ronin catalogue.
Onchain Data
- Solana (SOL) price fell below $100, validating the 0.382 Fib retracement support level at $86 and bouncing.
- Avalanche (AVAX) experienced a surge in Q4 2023 due to institutional inflow and adoption of tokenization.
- Bonk (BONK) has experienced a 68% drop from its recent peak, sparked interest as a potential dip buying opportunity.
- Shiba Inu price has fallen by 4.5%, dropping to $0.000009051 as the wider crypto market lost 1% in the past 24 hours.
- Celestia (TIA) price has increased significantly since the January 3 flash crash, reaching an all-time high of $16.88.
Educational Guides and Tips from Mind the Block
- Crypto index funds offer a convenient way to invest in the cryptocurrency market.
- Marpto is a new crypto-powered marketplace seeking to revolutionize e-commerce through global transactions using cryptocurrencies.
- What is Magic Eden? Everything You Need to Know About Solana’s Leading NFT Marketplace.
- Mainnet is the primary blockchain network where transactions occur, and native cryptocurrency is used.
- Account abstraction (ERC-4337) addresses challenges in crypto adoption.
- VeChain is a smart contract-compatible blockchain designed to improve supply chain transparency.
See you in the next edition of the Mind The Block.
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