Uniswap Trades Soar 🌊, Bitcoin Whale 🐳 $8M , Restaurant NFTs 🍽️
Daily Crypto, Blockchain & Web3 Update 2023-04-22
BUSINESS
Uniswap Trades Soar as Pepe Mania Grips Meme Coin Market (2 min read)
Transactions on the decentralized exchange have spiked by more than 66% from the previous all-time high, according to an Uniswap researcher.
This week’s reason for the buzz is mostly down to meme coins becoming popular again, largely Pepe (PEPE). It has surged by an insane amount, CoinGecko shows, helping some investors win big: one lucky buyer turned $250 into $1.02 million in just 4 days, a 407,900% increase.
Other meme coins also experienced a rise in value this week, when a lot of the market was in the red (although they’re mostly back down today).
Texas ‘Proof of Reserves’ Bill Passes House of Representatives (3 min read)
The Texas House passed a bill mandating crypto exchanges hold enough reserves to meet customer obligations.
The proposed bill would add a digital asset regulation chapter to the state's Finance Code to require exchanges to keep funds that allow all customers to completely withdraw their assets.
The bill will also ban digital asset service providers from mixing customer deposits with other accounts, including the provider's operating capital, proprietary accounts, digital assets, fiat currency, or any other non-customer funds.
SEC Warns Advisers to Apply 'Heightened Scrutiny' When Recommending Crypto Assets (3 min read)
The SEC released a bulletin suggesting finance professionals should fully comprehend the risks of investment products, such as crypto asset securities, before providing any related services or products.
The SEC said some products are complex and pose risks that can make it tough for firms and financial experts to fully understand their terms, features, and risks.
The agency argues that it may be difficult to establish a reasonable basis for retail investors to believe that these products are in their best interest.
Arthur Hayes: Market Makers Knew They’d Be Front-Run on FTX—It Was 'Common Knowledge' (3 min read)
BitMEX founder Arthur Hayes claims that "market makers did not want to trade on FTX," suggesting pro traders always knew the exchange was "a little bit shady."
FTX, whose valuation ballooned to $32 billion by early 2022, collapsed in November of the last year following a selloff of its FTT token and a liquidity crunch on the exchange that revealed the company did not hold one-to-one reserves of customer assets.
Crypto VC Funding Down 82% Compared to Last Year (3 min read)
The evaporating funding means "a lot of companies are doing their down rounds," said the founder of Delta Blockchain Fund.
A comparison between this and last year’s Q1 funding shows a drop from $9.1 billion during the first three months of 2022 to $1.7 billion in 2023, an 82% fall, according to a Crunchbase report.
Companies like Yuga Labs, ConsenSys, Polygon, FTX, and FTX US raised between $400 million to $450 million in 2022, driving high valuations.
TECHNOLOGY
NFT Twitter Is All Good Vibes Again, On Bluesky (4 min read)
Bluesky, a decentralized social media platform incubated by Twitter prior to Elon Musk's era, is gaining attention as a potential strong rival to its predecessor.
And now, as the beta gradually lets in more and more users, Bluesky is starting to attract prominent NFT creators, artists, builders, and collectors. Over the past few days, a number of notable NFT and Web3 projects have established Bluesky accounts, and their creators, along with other artists and personalities, have also expanded out from Twitter.
Solana Now Measures Network Carbon Emissions Data in Real Time (5 min read)
Solana is now measuring data pertaining to its carbon emissions in real time, the Solana Foundation announced today. It’s a claimed first-of-its-kind move for "a major smart contract blockchain network." Smart contracts hold the code that powers decentralized apps (dapps) and NFT projects.
Starting today, Solana will update a dashboard dedicated to tracking important environmental stats for the network. This includes monitoring energy usage, carbon footprint, network power intensity, and other related data on a regular basis. It pulls real-time data from software installed on Solana validator nodes, but the dashboard is only updated every two weeks.
COINS
Bitcoin Whale Moves Nearly $8M After 10 Years of Inactivity (2 min read)
Another sleeping Bitcoin whale just woke up.
According to Lookonchain, someone who had not used their cryptocurrency in ten years recently transferred 279 BTC, worth $7.8 million, to three new wallets.
The blockchain tracker said in a Friday tweet that the whale in question had originally received 1,128 BTC in the months of October 2012 and May 2013, when prices were about $12 and $195, respectively. In total, the whale holds $31.6 million in BTC.
He Started Resy: Now He Wants You to Take Restaurant NFTs Seriously (5 min read)
Blackbird, a restaurant loyalty platform using NFTs, has launched in New York, offering VIP treatment and rewards for diners. Founded by Resy co-founder Ben Leventhal, the platform started in two restaurants and aims to expand from there.
Blackbird allows diners to track visits and earn rewards, while restaurant owners collect data and crowdsource funds. Customers check in using NFC-enabled stickers and receive rewards, with their status saved on a digital "punch card" NFT.
The platform faces the challenge of maintaining exclusivity while extending special treatment to all users. Leventhal believes bespoke, organic loyalty programs are key to success.
The Crypto Research Toolbox (3 min read)
This thread shares a toolbox for spotting promising crypto projects before they take off.
Tools mentioned include DeepDAO for exploring DAO treasuries, Token Terminal for analyzing crypto asset data, Artemis for monitoring ecosystem activity, Token Unlocks for tracking token releases, Dune Analytics for dashboards, Kyber Network for trends, DeFi Llama for platform analysis, Bubblemaps for visualizing on-chain analytics, Arkham Intelligence for whale wallets, DeBank for top wallet ranking, Chain Broker for project insights, CryptoRank.io for active ICOs, Twitter lists, Nansen.ai for analytics, CryptoFeesInfo for fee rankings, and Blockpour for analytics features.
MARKETS
Bitcoin Drops to $28,000 as Macro Pressures Bite (2 min read)
Bitcoin's price continued its downturn for a third day, dropping below $28,000 briefly on the morning of April 21. The last trading price of Bitcoin, per CoinGecko data, was $28,070, down 2.7% over the last 24 hours.
Bitcoin’s decline dragged the rest of the market with it, with the total market capitalization of all cryptocurrencies slipping by 2.2% to $1.24 trillion during the same period. Ethereum lost 1.7% on a 24-hour scale to trade around $1,920, down 4.5% on the week.