🔌 Crypto Unplugged: ‘Twas a ‘Good News’ Week

Hola, 

We kickstarted this week on quite a positive note. BTC was seen flirting with $70, and for a split second, everyone thought we’d end up scripting a new ATH. Alas, the hype was short-lived. 

From a bird’s-eye view, the past few days have indeed been good, despite not crossing the line that we wanted to. So, imma jump right into it and try to help renew your optimism. 

It's raining money 

Starting with the good news: This week, we clocked in crypto’s largest acquisition deal. Stripe shelled out a freakin’ $1.1 billion to acquire stablecoin platform Bridge. Now, you may ask, why does this matter? 

Well, hear me out: Bridge’s customers include government agencies and top companies, including the US State Department, the US Treasury, SpaceX, and Coinbase. Rolling the ball a bit further, I’d like you to note that it has processed more than $5 billion in annualized payment volume. 

The numbers are number-ing, the dollars are dollar-ing, the deal is deal-ing. What more could one ask for?!

Pump.fun to launch its own token

Thousands of tokens are released on this Solana launchpad every single day. It has sort of become the go-to platform for launchers to experiment and test out stuff, making it the epicenter of on-chain activity on Solana. 

Now, this ‘next big thing since sliced bread’ is planning to launch its token. Early users are gonna be rewarded. Airdrops are gonna become great again. Even though there ain’t any official date yet to look forward to, CT is excited, I’m excited, and you should be too. 

Crypto spending IRL: Avalanche edition  

We all know that chain abstraction is the secret sauce to mass on-boarding. Several prominent players from our space have been working on this front. While some have related products in the making, others are tryna to integrate abstraction-related features into their existing suite. 

Now, if you remember,  ether.fi and MetaMask recently toyed with the idea of launching crypto spend cards powered by giants like Mastercard and Visa. Now, Avalanche is the latest one to hop onto the bandwagon. 

With the card, you can spend your on-chain assets like WAVAX, USDC, and sAVAX in literally any and every place where Visa is accepted. Once you sign up, you’ll get a new self-custody wallet and be bestowed with the same features that your brain cells are already wired to — spend alerts, freezing, PIN changing, etc.

Now, while launches like this are bullish af, there’s one hurdle that we still need to clear — the regulatory hurdle. Barring a couple of exceptions, governments all over the world continue to remain skeptical about crypto. Even though these stalwarts are launching enticing products, users only from selected countries get access right off the bat. The rest just bear the brunt of ineligibility.  

Things are ‘bout to get excitINK

Kraken, the sixth largest exchange in the world, is looking to launch its own blockchain network — Ink — by early 2025. The testnet is slated to go live later this year.

Like Base, Kraken has also tapped into the OP stack to help it build its new network. Even though other L2s like Arbitrum, Polygon, zkSync, and Starknet have their own stack versions to get launchers to pick their boat, OP seems to have cemented its position as the torch-bearer for new Ethereum-based L2 networks. 

Ink’s founder Andrew Koller feels that the chain could end up becoming home to RWAs and advanced lending apps. INKciting, excitINK, say what you may! 

Saylor to leave his BTC for…

If you’ve ever wondered what Saylor is going to do with his Bitcoin stash when he’s gone, then well, he might have an answer for you. He recently confessed,

“I’m a single guy, I have no children — when I’m gone, I’m gone. Just like Satoshi left a million Bitcoin to the universe… I’m leaving whatever I’ve got to the civilization”

Apart from this, he went on to mutter something that garnered controversy. The BTC bull said that holders should rely on “too big to fail” banks that are “engineered to be custodians of financial assets” for custody services.

Buterin, in turn, criticized his comments and labeled it “batshit insane.” 

Now, amid the backlash received, he has outrightly expressed his support for self-custody — just like a politician.

Sky rebranding bites back MakerDAO

Towards the end of August, Maker was rebranded to Sky to foster the “next evolution of DeFi.” Several other nomenclature-related tweaks were simultaneously made.

Community members, however, did not accept the rebrand with open arms. They expressed skepticism about the utility of the SKY token. The protocol’s founder Rune Christian recently underlined the strong community affinity towards the Maker brand, suggesting it could be brought back to the spotlight while maintaining separate roles for Maker and Sky.

Specifically, he has given the community 3 options. The team can:  

i) continue building with Sky as the core brand

ii) reintroduce Maker as the central identity in its OG form

iii) recenter Maker as the central brand with a refreshed brand identity

If the community chooses to go with another rebrand, the protocol will consider new changes in tokenomics.

A Community call will be held today [25 Oct] to discuss how to move forward. Parallelly, the governance poll has been slated for Nov. 4.  

Magic Eden’s Blockchain Buffet: Bera, Ape, and a Touch of Monad

Magic Eden recently added support for Berachain and ApeChain — its eighth and ninth chain respectively. The Solana-based NFT platform is also looking to integrate Monda once it goes live on testnet. 

Doing so will help it honor its goal of supporting 10 blockchain networks by the end of 2024. Planning, plotting, and execution all seem to be on point, slayyyyy!   

Regulatory shenanigans

Country-wise, we’ve had both positive and not-so-positive developments shape up this week. 

Vietnam officially released a National Blockchain Strategy to develop the underlying technology and establish relevant legal frameworks. Buenos Aires rolled out a blockchain-based digital identity for 3.6 million residents powered by zkSync Era, giving residents greater control over their personal data. Simultaneously, Japan's DPP leader Tamaki vowed to reduce crypto gains tax to 20% if elected. 

Few bitter updates too: Denmark’s tax authority has recommended “mark-to-market taxation” for crypto investors. Meanwhile, the Minneapolis Fed said that the government must either tax or ban Bitcoin to maintain deficits.

They all want a piece of our pie, can’t help.  

AI is here to stay… or not? 

We’ve come to the last section of the newsletter, and I haven’t uttered “AI” yet, yikes! Mindshare-wise, it continued to dominate even this week.

This memecoin rallied midweek when Truth Terminal mentioned “Russell” in its response to a post from Coinbase’s Armstrong. 

Who’s Russell? Armstrong’s dog is Russell. 

The casual conversation pushed the coin’s price to a high of $0.01 on Wednesday. Like any out-of-the-blue pump, even this couldn't stand the test of time. It’s trading at $0.00255 at the moment, with its market cap down to $2.55 million. 

And of course, if you still haven’t caught up on Grant’s chat with Andy, do yourself a favor and give this pod a listen.

While you do that, imma head out and touch some grass. I’ll see y’all again in two weeks. 

Until then,

Ciao!