Daily Bullets 💊: FTX Stablecoin - Will SBF Take Over the World Next?
💊 Daily Bullets 💊 Thursday, October 27th
Bitcoin is still holding above $20k and ETH above $1500 however we’ve stalled for now. On the macro side, U.S. GDP growth in the third quarter was 2.6%, the highest since the Q4 of 2021, after two quarters of negative growth. This could indicate that the Fed will use this positive news that the economy is in good shape to not slow down future rate hikes. Another thing to pay attention to today is SBF hinting at a potential FTX stablecoin in the not-too-distant future depending on finding the right partners. This move would mirror Binance’s BUSD and highlights how much of powerhouse SBF and FTX are becoming. He’s been everywhere lately, bailing out rekt companies and making acquisitions. What else could we see from them next?
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⛓ Crypto News:
Meta’s Reality Labs business, the division in charge of producing metaverse-related technology, lost $3.7B during the third quarter. Follows losses of $2.9B and $2.8B in the first and second quarter
Credit reporting company Equifax, known for one of the largest data breaches in history, to partner with Oasis Labs to provide a privacy-focused KYC solution for Web3 companies
Core Scientific Inc., one of the world’s largest miners of Bitcoin, warned that it may run out of cash by the end of the year and could seek relief through bankruptcy protection
Blockchain market intelligence provider Glassnode acquired crypto tax and portfolio tracking platform Accointing.com
Blockchain technology firm ConsenSys will spend $2.4M annually to fund its newly launched MetaMask Grants DAO aimed at driving further development of the Web3 ecosystem
Crypto predictions site Polymarket predicts an overall 64% chance of Republicans winning both Senate and House and taking control of Congress
Google is launching a cloud-based node engine service for Ethereum developers and projects
Filecoin launched a new data delivery network called Saturn to help retrieve content for decentralized storage apps and make it cheaper to run Filecoin nodes and contribute storage to the network
Fantom has deployed an automated smart contract monitoring system called Watchdog, to strengthen the security of decentralized apps on its blockchain
Prometheum partners with Anchorage Digital on SEC-registered alternative trading system
Crypto investment platform Freeway said it will “take time” before the firm will resume partial or full trading, days after halting services. Token price had plummeted and project had removed the names and photos of employees from its website
Stone Ridge, a multi-billion-dollar asset manager, has launched a startup accelerator focused on the Bitcoin Lightning network
👨⚖️ Economic/Government/Regulatory:
63% of all transaction blocks on the Ethereum blockchain are compliant with OFAC sanctions
Hong Kong's government plans to allow retail investors to trade crypto on locally licensed exchanges as part of a wider effort to position the city as a center for virtual asset service providers
A European Union DLT pilot program will allow market participants to use stablecoins for trades and settlements before the legal framework for crypto is enforced in at least two years
Crowdfunding platform StartEngine is acquiring rival platform SeedInvest from Circle, pending approval from the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA)
Two million users in Nigeria and Kenya are set to be onboarded to a new cryptocurrency wallet called Mara, backed by Coinbase Ventures and Alameda Research
The National Bank of Kazakhstan has agreed to test Binance's blockchain network BNB Chain for potential integration into the country's central bank digital currency (CBDC)
💸 Exchange News:
FTX could launch its own stablecoin, CEO SBF said in an interview but would prefer launching a stablecoin via partnerships
Blockchain.com may raise money at a significant discount to previous valuation. Valued at $14B in a funding round earlier this year, but may only fetch $3B to $4B
Huobi Global to delist stablecoin HUSD and convert HUSD assets to USDT assets
Crypto exchange Blockchain.com introduced a Visa debit card available to U.S. residents with 1% cashback in crypto
Stocks and crypto investment platform eToro acquisition of Bullsheet, a portfolio management startup
Binance launches its Bahrain platform - binance.bh, a fully regulated platform by the Central Bank of Bahrain
Crypto trading firm PGI Global U.K. has been shut down after allegedly scamming would-be investors of around 612,425 pounds ($709,000) between July 2020 and February 2021
🏦 DeFi News:
Two Solana-based DeFi protocols, Tulip and UXD, have reopened after recovering tokens from Mango Markets following the $114M hack
Team Finance, a crypto token launchpad, suffered a $14.5M exploit in relation to a smart contract bug in its migration feature
Multi-chain crypto wallet UvToken hacked for 5,011 BNB tokens ($1.45M) and moved to Tornado Cash
🖼 NFT/Gaming/Metaverse News:
NFT marketplace X2Y2 blocked NFT aggregator Blur for violating their Terms (by applying for 10+ keys to access their API). X2Y2 replied that when a marketplace has its own aggregator it creates a conflict of interest
LooksRare becomes latest NFT marketplace to switch to optional royalties for NFT creators, however will allocate 0.5% of trading fees to creators
PlayBoy's "Rabbitars" NFT collection will be integrated into The Sandbox metaverse for its first anniversary
Microsoft is seeking to adapt part of its software service stack to the metaverse
Japanese media giant GREE to build Web3 games and run nodes on Avalanche
The Norwegian government is opening a metaverse tax office in Decentraland to educate a younger audience about taxes related to DeFi and NFTs
Multichain NFT marketplace myNFT will showcase its first-ever physical NFT vending machine at this year’s NFT.London event scheduled for Nov. 2–4
🎟 Upcoming Events:
Upcoming Event - ETHLisbon - Post Tornado Cash: Can Web3 Ever Be Truly Decentralized? by TRGC - Thu, October 27, 2022, 4:00 PM – 9:00 PM WEST
Breakpoint 2022 / Lisbon Blockchain Month - Side Events details and info
💰 Fundraises:
Hong Kong fintech startup Reap raised $40M for payments between Web3 projects and traditional businesses
Zoop, a digital celebrity collectibles trading platform, raised $15M in grants and investments, and will partner with cross-game avatar company Ready Player Me
The Decentralized Engineering Corporation (DEC), which developed ride-sharing app Teleport, raised $9M in seed funding to build a decentralized Uber and Lyft competitor on Solana
Fun, a blockchain software development company, raised $3.9M in a pre-seed round led by Tinder co-founder Justin Mateen’s Jam Fund
Notebook Labs, a new startup that aims to verify the identities of crypto users without compromising privacy, has raised $3.3M in a seed funding round led by Bain Capital
Martian, a crypto wallet for the recently launched Aptos blockchain, has closed a $3M pre-seed round led by Race Capital
Bitcoin derivatives exchange Kollider closed a $2.35M seed funding round led by Lemniscap, with participation from Castle Island Ventures, Polychain Capital, Alameda Ventures and others
👶 Early Stage Projects:
Hop’s first liquidity mining program is LIVE
The new Arbitrum Nova block explorer is now
Lido has conducted an initial pilot integration of Distributed Validator Technology (DVT) with SSV Network on the Goerli testnet
CoW Grants Program (CGP) is now live and accepting grant applications
Aries Markets mainnet is live - the first borrowing and lending protocol on Aptos
Introducing Harpie - the first crypto firewall - to end fear and theft on-chain
Introducing Hyperplonk: a super fast proof system specifically for zkEVMs
Introducing 0x Explorer - the most reliable and transparent tool to help developers and users verify transactions and analyze on-chain activity
The public version of on-chain Perpetuals (NEAR-First) is live on Spin
What’s your take on today’s news? Anything interesting that you have to say about these stories? Did we miss anything that should’ve been included?
📊 Data:
TL;DR: Smart money still isn’t buying, however their % holdings in stables has begun going down. We saw a local top on September 14th where smart money was 34.5% in stables and it’s currently dropped to 24% - indicates feeling more risk on. Today we’ve got light flows into WETH, COMP and Aave derivatives. Medium flows out of MATIC, Compound ETH, USDC and USDT (looks like Polygon Foundation dumped $28M they received yesterday). Light weekly inflow into stETH, Aave USDC and TUSD. Weekly outflows outweigh inflows and mainly from USDC, Compound ETH, WBTC and WETH. NFT volumes continue to stay low - CryptoPunks highest collection of the day with ~ 550 ETH
Nansen Smart Money Holdings Token Inflow and Outflows: Tracking what the whales are up to...
- Inflow (1D):
- Outflow (1D):
Weekly:
- Inflow (7D):
- Outflow (7D):
Nansen NFT Hot Contracts:
We saw a local top on September 14th where smart money was 34.5% in stables and it’s currently dropped to 24%
What is the Data telling you? See anything that sticks out to you?
🎓 Research/Reads:
Pantera - Blockchain's 2003 Moment - source
M6 Labs - zkLend - source
What role will Bitcoin play in the aftermath of a nuclear war? - source
Tornado Cash is no “golem.” It’s a tool for privacy and free speech - source
Decentralized Rollup Sequencing as a Service via Interchain Security - source
Metaverse Report #2: Demand for Metaverse Remains Amidst Crypto Turmoil - source
Burning MEV through block proposer auctions - source
Sway vs. Solidity Part 1: What’s The Difference? - source
Have you seen our institutional-quality research?
🌍 Crypto Twitterverse:
Did we miss anything or is there anything you want to discuss? We’d Love to hear your feedback and engage with the community! Feel free to leave a comment and let us know your thoughts on the Crypto market!
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